Do copyright’s ever-evolving laws seem a little blurry? You’re not alone, but you need to figure it out to avoid tarnishing your brand’s reputation.
Cision’s new white paper, “The Professional Communicator’s Guide to Copyright Compliance & Fair Use,” provides an overview of how copyright laws affect PR professionals, what you can do to follow them and how doing so will protect your content and reputation in the long run.
Adhere to the following three of the many best practices from the free white paper to ensure your brand is safe:
Want to discover more copyright compliance best practices? Read the new white paper today!
1. Stay informed on copyright laws
Copyright laws protect works such as books, blog posts, videos, podcasts, artwork and more. When you create a piece of content, others can talk about and reference it, but they cannot copy or redistribute it – that is, not without proper attribution.
Congress has changed copyright laws in the past, and will continue to make updates in the future. Pay attention to new rulings, and make sure your team is informed, too. Consider holding regular trainings or offering resources to familiarize your employees with the laws they need to follow and abide by to keep your brand compliant.
2. Monitor people who publish your content
In today’s content-saturated world, sharing and copying is as easy as the click of a button. But that also means it’s easy for thieves to steal your content and pass it off as their own.
Keep an eye on where and how people share your content. Start with a simple Google search to see where your content pops up. Social listening software can help by providing alerts when others share your published content.
3. Attribute credit where it’s due
It isn’t just your own content that you need to worry about. Whenever you share or retweet someone else’s content, you need to ask yourself, ‘am I attributing this correctly?’ Put yourself in the author’s shoes and think about how you’d want someone to use your content. If you’re unsure, contact the author and ask for permission.
To find out what the rules are for sharing content, think about these three factors: the source of information, the copyright protections currently in place and how the content will be reused. Each situation will be different, but by understanding the factors involved, you can determine whether or not your use of the content is legal.
Images: Horia Varlan, Sam Howzit, Daniel Lobo (Creative Commons)