This article is written by SURAJ KUMAR SHAW,UNIVERSITY NAME: PRESIDENCY UNIVERSITY (BANGALORE)
ABSTRACT
The word Plagiarism is taken from the word Plagiarius, a Steal. One of the major problems with copyright law is plagiarism, which is the act of stealing from or copying from the original authentic source. The idea-expression dichotomy that exists makes it a problem. Therefore, if someone is accused of plagiarism, it is his burden to show that, related to possible similarity of ideas, he has utilised a different expression in his entire body of work. However, doing so would actually reduce an intellectual property’s inherent value. The real author thus loses a great deal in terms of money as well as the intellectual merit associated with his work. The degree of authenticity that the actual author is putting in must also be considered. Therefore, it becomes necessary to determine the actual “mens rea” and “actus reus”[1] involved before charging the individual accused of plagiarism with a criminal. It is also important to look for substantial copying. The research paper will focus on and explain every aspect of plagiarism such as the conditions under which it would really be considered copyright an infringement. The paper will also attempt to elucidate the precautions that have been implemented to avert these kinds of incidents.
INTRODUCTION
The Latin term for looting is where the word “plagiarism” originates. In fact, the idea that kidnap the words of others, as a child is kidnapped from a parent is appropriate to explain the way in which plagiarism is defined. The concept that words could be kidnapped or misappropriated by someone with legal accusation was generally accepted in eighteenth- century England. The Statute of Anne of 1709, that became the basis for this acceptance, was also introduced into the legal systems of other former British colonies, such Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, India, New Zealand, and the United States.[2] The birth of the idea that could “own” words and exercise ownership or authorial rights over their creation was unleashed in various copyright laws around the world.
Today’s courts investigate plagiarism cases because it is closely related to copyright legal rights. The act of stealing and presenting the ideas or words of another as one’s own, using another’s original work without giving due credit, or representing as new and original something that was actually obtained from another source are all examples of plagiarism. Thus, plagiarism appears to involve two, or maybe three, basic “elements” in the language of the criminal law: two actus reus elements and possible a mens rea element. The actus reus elements are copying a work which is an act and failing to attribute such work to its author (an omission) where one has a duty to do so. . The element of mens rea is less clear.
STATEMENT OF PROBLEMS
Under this research paper the problem which going to be discussed is related to plagiarism and copyright infringement
Plagiarism refers to the passing off someone else’s work or ideas as one’s own, whereas copyright infringement refers to the use of copyright-protected material without the permission of the copyright holder. Both plagiarism and copyright infringement involve using someone else’s work without permission.
While using someone else’s work without their consent is prohibited, plagiarism and copyright infringement are two very different types of theft. The fact that copyright infringement is prohibited distinguishes it significantly from plagiarism.. The article provides examples of both types of unethical use of content and discusses additional differences between the two.
OBJECTIVE OF STATEMENT
The objective of the study is,
- Explain the relationship between copyright infringement and plagiarism.
- The aim of this paper is to examine to achieve explained and resources related to copyright & plagiarism issues.
HYPOTHESES
While both plagiarism and copyright infringement can be characterized as the improper use of someone else’s work, they are distinctly different improper uses of someone else’s work. The biggest difference is that copyright infringement is illegal, while plagiarism is not.
RESEARCH QUESTION
- What is copyright infringement and plagiarism?
- How To Avoid Committing Plagiarism or Copyright Infringement ?
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
The research method used for the study is Doctrinal method of research . It starts by adopting a proposition as a focal point or beginning point. The law is then located in statutes, judicial rulings, and discussions in commentaries, books, journals, and debates. reads them thoroughly, examines them, makes his observations, and writes them down. It may provide a set of formulations or highlight the purpose behind the proposition and suggest what it should be based on the examination of the same.
SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS
The study limits it’s boundary around only the Intellectual property rights. The study would not extend beyond the plagiarism and copyright infringement. Under the limit it would also slightly touches the concept of copyright protects and plagiarism.
PLAGIARISM
Everyone is known that stealing anyone’s material or materials is crime but plagiarism, which involves taking someone’s ideas, quotations, illustrations, or words, is not crime but rather ethical. Plagiarism can occur in a variety of forms and situations. It usually happens when a person uses someone else’s work and claims it as his own, along with that he doesn’t even give any credits to the deserving person.
Plagiarism generally occurs in academic circles, both electronically and physically. when a student submits an article that is entirely plagiarised from another person’s work without any references or footnotes. Plagiarism can also occur in cases of unpublished works, such as lecture notes or other notes created by other students, but only if they are used without giving the author proper credit.[3]
- Submission of someone else’s work or ideas as one’s own.
- Failing to add citations which should contain true or accurate information.
- If you’re adding quotations then it should be within quotation marks and you should provide the citations in order to give credits to the original author.
- Modifying and restating a sentence without giving due credit.
Plagiarism is frequent in academic settings, and many students engage in it without realizing it. However, plagiarism has major repercussions and penalties, which, depending on the circumstances, can vary from a grade reduction to expulsion from the institution. However, if the original author is given due credit with citations, plagiarism can be prevented.
Copyright infringement
The creators of the exclusive right to duplicate their work those who are referred to as the creator or original author of an article of authorship are given copyright protection. In order to obtain copyright protection, the work needs to be original and fixed in a tangible medium. Some examples of original works that need copyright protection are computer software, music, literary work, photographs, novels, online content, etc. Usually, the owners obtain copyright protection to enjoy the exclusive rights and to gain profits from it. However, it’s their choice if they want to grant permission to someone else to use or reproduce their work through compulsory licensing agreements or else they can sell the work.[4]
Copyright infringement may arise by violating the law on intellectual property. To be more precise, using a work that has been granted copyright without the creator’s or author’s permission is known as copyright infringement. There is a copyright law violation here.For instance, in India, obtaining copyright without the owner’s consent, who is authorized to reproduce the work, is considered infringement according to Section 51 of the Copyright Act, 1957.[5]
Copyright infringement vs Plagiarism
Is it the right idea to use or duplicate someone else’s creative work without his or her consent? It is not the best practise in terms of ethics and the law. The pirating question undergoes long and thoughtful debates. however to understand how to act in a given situation, it is important to comprehend the basic difference between the notions of plagiarism and copyright infringement. These distinct concepts can occur simultaneously, as well as you can plagiarize without violating copyright or vice versa. To begin with, one can infringe the license of a copyright holder for work presented in any format, not just fixed in writing. As described in “Step-by-step introduction to the copyright registration“, copyright grants legal protection and exclusive rights to:
- Reproduce and duplicate created work.
- Distribute and display it in public.
- Perform the creative output publicly.
- Develop derivative works.
Copyright infringement is the act of violating these rights or using the work without the creator’s consent. Federal law governs penalties, as does state law in certain situations.
How can it be avoided? In actuality, there are numerous ways to use copyright-protected content without breaking the law that are legal. First and foremost, you can obtain the author’s consent.
Furthermore, you can use copyrighted content for certain purposes without obtaining the author’s consent thanks to legal exceptions like fair use. Simply follow the rules if there are license requirements for the creation you want to adopt.
Plagiarism and copyright infringement occur when someone tries to write a book using exactly the words of another author and then tries to publish the book under that author’s name without that author’s consent. The attempt to publish the book without the original author’s consent and pass it off as his own could harm the original author’s reputation in the market place.
Copyright infringement and plagiarism are related and can harm your IP strategy, but there is significant difference between them that lies at their core and in its official outcome. Let’s study a few examples.
Using a passage from a 1912 work without giving credit to the original author or source is plagiarism. Nevertheless, this is not a copyright infringement because the work is no longer protected by a copyright and is now in the public domain. It will be neither copyright infringement nor plagiarism if you include several quotes from an article into your research report, identifying third-party material and using quotation marks, because short quotes in research fall within the scope of Fair Use.
- Plagiarism takes place when a person uses others’ creative output without proper citing and references, issues this work as the one created by himself. Copyright infringement is the unapproved use of intellectual property covered by copyright.
- Even if the copyright owner is not the original author, copyright infringement can only be related to them. Plagiarism is also blatantly against the creator’s rights, regardless of who is actually entitled to the legal rights.
- There are numerous tools that allow detecting plagiarism, whereas copyright infringement can be based on the indirect evidence only. This will have legal repercussions, and the plagiarist will be subject to sanctions relevant to their organisation.
- Copyright infringement is a crime when plagiarism is not covered by legal regulations and is a subject to person’s morals and ethics or organization norms.
- The creative output must be guarded by the copyright to establish the matching infringement claim, whereas plagiarism can happen to any, not necessarily copyrighted work.
- To avoid the copyright infringement you should get an response from the copyright keeper, and if you aim to avoid plagiarism, use suitable formatting styles and credit the original source in your work.
How To Avoid Committing Plagiarism or Copyright Infringement[6]
You may avoid being accused of plagiarism or copyright infringement by taking certain safety measures.
- First of all, you have to know what copyrights protect and that it applies to anything owned by a person, whether an idea, painting, literary work, article, and so on.
- Do not claim ownership of someone else’s work by using it! Never utilize something that isn’t legally yours. Additionally, because copyrights apply to everything you see internet, not everything you see is legal for use.
- case, you want to use an image, then it is optional that you contact the original owner or seek websites that allow you to buy images.
- Also, in order to avoid plagiarism, you must provide due credit to the source you use. Learn how to properly cite sources, and ensure that your article contains a list of all the sources you used.
PLAGIARISM BUT NO COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT:
COPYING PUBLIC DOMAIN WORKS
Imagine that someone has copied both the ideas and exact expression of another author’s work. For example, they might have copied another person’s poem and they are trying to pass it off as their own work, whether to their friends and family, to their teacher or classmates, or to the wider world. This is plagiarism. But is it also copyright infringement?
Whether or not the original work is still protected by copyright is one of the many variables that will determine whether or not the poem violates copyright. Recall that the poem’s original author, Julian Grenfell and John McCrea, were among the many poets who perished in the First World War (1888–1915).
Wilfrid Owen (1893–1918) or John Wilkes (1872–1918). Their artistic creations are now in the public domain and are not protected by copyright. As a result, copyright permits anyone to reproduce these poems without obtaining permission. Just fight the impulse to claim credit for creating any of these or other works in the public domain. Anyone wants to avoid being accused of plagiarism at all costs.![7]
Laws related to plagiarism and copyright infringement in India
- There aren’t any direct provisions or statutes regarding plagiarism in India, but Section 57 of the Copyright Act, 1957[8]provides the original authors rights to claim authorship of their work.
- Section 57 also includes the term “special rights” which is for the original authors. Here, the special rights is considered the moral rights and says no to the act of plagiarism.
- Section 63 of the Indian copyright act, 1957 recognizes copyright infringement as an act of crime and provides punishment for copyright infringement and violation of Section 57. In addition to a fine, the penalty will involve incarceration for a maximum of three years.
- The Indian Copyright Act’s Section 51 defines what constitutes copyright infringement.
CASE LAW
- Baigent v. Random House [2007] EWCA Civ 247[9]
The claimants were the authors of a book published in 1982, The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail. They suspected that Dan Brown had infringed their copyright by incorporating a substantial part of their work within six chapters of The Da Vinci Code, Brown’s blockbuster thriller first published in 2003.
Mr Brown’s publisher disagreed. If Mr Brown copied anything, they argued, he simply copied information, facts and ideas from The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, somewhat than the way in which the authors had expressed their ideas. The case was settled in favour of Mr Brown. In the Court of Appeal, Lord Justice Mummery commented that the material alleged to have been copied from the claimants’ book was simply an collection of historical fact and information, events, incidents, theories and arguments: this was raw research material and nothing more. The claimants were not entitled to rely on copyright law to ‘monopolise historical research or knowledge and
prevent the legitimate use of historical and biographical material’. No copyright infringement had occurred. The case was extensively covered in the media as a plagiarism case following the Court of Appeal’s final ruling. But is it really about plagiarism? Or was it simply a case about copyright infringement? Or is it about both plagiarism and copyright infringement? Is it okay to copy information, facts and ideas from someone else’s work?
v R.G Anand vs M/S. Delux Films & Ors on 18 August, 1978[10]
In R G Anand case, the court observed that where the idea is developed into a different way and presence of dissimilarities can negate an allegation of infringement, there can be both qualitative and quantitative test for finding the substantiality though the literal number of words copied might not be the determining factor for copyright infringement. If the ‘heart of the book’ is taken by way of copying that would amount to substantial taking. In this case, the apex court referred many foreign judgments to distinguish between fair dealing and infringement.
Conclusion
As we discovered, there are a lot of distinctions between the ideas of plagiarism and copyright infringement despite their apparent similarities. There is an increase in copyright infringement cases because most people find it difficult to distinguish between the two and have certain misconceptions about them. Though plagiarism and copyright infringement often go beyond, it’s important to remember that the two are not same and can never be actually same. Plagiarism is an moral construct and copyright infringement is a legal one. Most important point to remember is while copyright infringement has one victim, the copyright, plagiarism has two sets of victims, the copyright and the people who were uninformed about the origin of the work.
[1] https://www.notguiltyadams.com/faqs/what-is-actus-reus-and-mens-rea-
[2] Stuart P. Greene, Plagiarism, Norms and the Limits of Theft Law: Some observations on the use of criminal sanctions in enforcing intellectual property rights, Page 1, Hastings Law Journal, November,
[3] https://legamart.com/articles/plagiarism-vs-copyright-infringement/
[4] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/copyright-infringement.asp
[5] https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1038145/
[6] https://library.alliant.edu/screens/plagiarism.pdf
[7] https://www.quora.com/Can-you-plagiarize-something-in-the-public-domain
[8] https://www.lawyerservices.in/Copyright-Act-1957-SECTION-57-Authors-specialrights
[9] https://www.5rb.com/case/baigent-and-leigh-v-the-random-house-group-ltd-ca/
[10] RG Anand v Delux Films and Others, 1978 AIR 1613.
