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Copyrights, Intellectual Properties

Copyrights and Intellectual Property are well known in the context of written or multi-media content. Software is a special case already, but within the last decades most judicial systems around the world caught up with the special problems related to software. Now, a speech corpus is another thing and can be treated neither like traditional written content nor like software. Usually the first thing to do is to declare your Copyrights clearly in the documentation of the speech corpus (documentation). For instance:
©Copyright 2002, 2003 by Bavarian Archive for Speech Signals, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Germany, D-80538 München, Geschwister-Scholl-Platz 1
In addition to the ©symbol you should use the word `Copyright' or the phrase ``This corpus is the intellectual property of...''. Be sure to use the official (legal) name of your institution. For instance in the above example the ``Bavarian Archive...'' is not an official name; therefore we added the official name of the university where the BAS is located. If you share the copyrights (see below) then you should list all partners after the copyright. If you add or extend to your speech corpus later, add a new year to the copyright line.

To declare a copyright is one thing and anybody can do it. Another thing is to protect it against abuse. Consult your legal advisor about that.


next up previous contents
Next: Speaker and Producer Up: Legal Aspects, Contracts Previous: Legal Aspects, Contracts   Contents
BITS Projekt-Account 2004-06-01