Lambton College is guided by the Canadian Copyright Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-42). All staff, students and faculty at Lambton College are expected to adhere to the rules and regulations according to the act in its entirety. Additionally, Lambton College policies 4000-6-7 Copyright and 4000-6-6 Fair Dealing also inform staff, students and faculty of the expectations while working and learning at Lambton College.
This material has been adapted for Lambton College using information from Copyright at Centennial licensed under a CC-BY-NC license: Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial License.
Copyright is a legal concept that automatically protects a person's economic and moral rights to any literary, dramatic, musical, or artistic works they create. Only copyright holders can reproduce, distribute, and share these works with others, or permit others to do so. Copyright protection applies whether a copyright statement appears on the material or not.
In other words, copyright is the right to copy.
If the work is created in the course of employment, the employer holds the copyright, unless there is a written agreement to the contrary. However, students retain copyright to their course work.
Copyright protection has a legally defined time period that varies depending on the type of work and who created it. In Canada, that protection extends to life-plus-70 years. When protection ends on a work, it then belongs in the public domain and may be used without permission or the payment of royalties.
Please note that when it comes to the public domain, it’s the copy-in-hand that counts. For example, the character of Anne of Green Gables, created by L.M. Montgomery is a public domain figure, however, new creators have taken the character of Anne and made it into something of their own (for example, a tv show based on the novels). So, while the original Anne created by L.M.M. is public domain, there are several new copyrighted versions of Anne that are protected by copyright law.
This decision tree will help you determine whether you can use a copyright protected work for your intended purpose. You may need to use it in conjunction with other information available on and linked from this website.
General Inquires: copyright@lambotoncollege.ca