A copyright is the right of an author to prevent others from copying his creative work. Copyright protects the form in which a creative idea is expressed. The owner of copyright has the exclusive right to do and to authorize others to do each of the following: reproduce the work by any means, including paper copies, electronic copies, or otherwise; prepare derivative works based on the original creative work (for instance, electronic or physical modification of a copy of the work, etc.); control distribution of copies of the work to the public by any means, including sale, lease or rental. You can readily understand, with this background, that copyrights on the works displayed on this site are very valuable business assets of the artists. All works displayed on this site are with the permission of the artists.

WHAT DOES THAT MEAN TO ME?

You cannot download, forward, save, retrieve, store or do anything else with the artwork displayed on this site, except look at it.

NOTICE OF COPYRIGHT

So that you can't claim you didn't know, the all material on this site is protected by United States and international copyright laws. The use of a copyright notice is not required for works first published on and after March 1, 1989. All rights are reserved by the artists/copyright owners.

WHAT IS THE PENALTY FOR COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT?

The owner of a registered copyright can enforce his rights by bringing a civil lawsuit in Federal District Court. In addition, the Federal government itself can act. Criminal actions can be brought by the U.S. Attorney; and Customs and Postal officials may seize and impound infringing articles that are being imported. Recovery of attorneys' fees is possible if the suit is successful. The penalties for infringement can be substantial. In civil actions brought by the copyright owner, the court may order forfeiture and/or destruction not only of all infringing articles, but also of any implements used to manufacture the infringing articles. The court may even order seizure and impoundment of such articles prior to trial, and in some cases, without prior notice to the alleged infringer. In addition to obtaining an order stopping the infringement and ordering destruction of infringing articles, the court can order payment of any provable damages, including lost profits. The copyright owner can elect to receive "statutory damages". The minimum amount of statutory damages that can be awarded for copyright infringement is $500; and the maximum is $20,000. If the infringement was willful, the potential statutory damage award is increased to $100,000 for each act of infringement. In addition, attorneys' fees may be awarded. In addition to civil penalties, copyright infringers can be prosecuted under the federal criminal laws. All willful copyright infringement is a criminal offense. The lowest penalty is conviction of a federal misdemeanor, with a prison sentence of up to one year and a fine of up to $5000.

More serious penalties are levied against infringers who make multiple copies of a work, or who copy expensive works. It is a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000 to willfully infringe copyrights of others by making, during a 180-day period, ten or more copies of a work which have a cumulative value of $2500 or more. Second and subsequent offenses carry a prison term of up to ten years in addition to the fine. Companies which willfully infringe can be assessed up to $500,000 in fines.