COPYRIGHT PROTECTION IN NIGERIA (I)
RECENT POST
December 11, 2023
November 5, 2020
November 5, 2020
REGISTER A TRADEMARK
ADDRESS
33 Cavendish Square London W1G 0PW
BOOK AN APPOINTMENT
Please contact us by phone or via the online form to set an appointment. thank you!
Copyright protection is afforded to certain “works” under S.1. of the Copyright Act, Nigeria.
The term “work” includes literary, musical and artistic works, cinematograph films, sound recordings and broadcasts.
Only if a “work” falls into the following categories will it attract copyright protection in Nigeria.
Literary Work:
i. Novels, stories and poetical works;
ii. Plays, stage directions, film scenarios and broadcasting scripts;
iii. Choreographic works;
iv. Computer programmes;
v. Text-books, treatises, histories, biographies, essays and articles;
vi. Encyclopaedias, dictionaries, directories and anthologies;
vii. Letters, reports and memoranda;
viii. Lectures, addresses and sermons;
ix. Law reports, excluding decisions of courts; and
x. Written tables or compilation.
Musical Work:
Means any musical work, irrespective of musical quality, and includes works composed for musical accompaniment.
Artistic Work:
i. Paintings, drawings, etchings, lithographs, woodcuts, engraving and prints;
ii. Maps, plans and diagrams;
iii. Works of sculpture;
iv. Photographs not compromised in a cinematograph films;
v. Works of architecture in the form of buildings, models; and
vi. Works of artistic craftsmanship, pictorial woven tissues and articles of applied handicraft and industrial art.
Sound Recording:
Defined as the first fixation of a sequence of sound capable of being perceived aurally and of being reproduced but does not include a soundtrack associated with a cinematograph film
Broadcast:
Defined as sound or television broadcast by wireless telegraphy or wire of both by satellite or cable programmes and includes re-broadcast.
Even if a work falls into the above mentioned categories it will only be afforded copyright protection unless there is sufficient effort has been expended on making the work and the work must be fixed in a definite medium from which it can be perceived, reproduced or otherwise communicated. In other words the work must be both original and in a fixed form to obtain copyright protection.
Duration:
Other than photographs, Copyright in Literary, Musical and Artistic works lasts for seventy years after the years in which the author dies or in the case of a corporate body, seventy years after the end of the year in which the work was first published.
For Cinematographic films, Sound recordings and photographs, copyright lasts for fifty years after the recording was first made and fifty years after the photograph was taken. Finally, for Broadcast works, copyright lasts for fifty years after the end of the year in which the broadcast first takes places.
Next time we will look at who can claim copyright in Nigeria and how Copyright is administered in Nigeria.
RECENT POST
December 11, 2023
November 5, 2020
November 5, 2020
REGISTER A TRADEMARK
ADDRESS
33 Cavendish Square London W1G 0PW
BOOK AN APPOINTMENT
Please contact us by phone or via the online form to set an appointment. thank you!