I'm fed up with copyright law!

[McatholicN]

Is it a sin to use any idea, even small, without somehow citing it? From my understanding, breaking any civil law is a sin; is this correct? I like to write and create and often I look things up to learn about things I don’t know and to use ideas. When I ask people about this they normally say something along the lines of “Well, technically, it’s illegal, but no one cares about it.”. But if it really is a sin, then wouldn’t God care even about the smallest, most technical transgression of civil law?

For some examples:

• If I look up some fact about linguistics online and use it in a conlang (invented language), do I have to somehow cite this every time I show my conlang to someone and such?
• If I find the population and GDP of Australia from a book, and use this for a private project, and do not cite it somehow (or even use it at all!) am I committing a sin?

Sorry if those weren’t the greatest examples. Thank you for any help!

 

[Barbkw]

In our day and age, it’s best if you footnote material and give readers the website or book so they can look up the material themselves.

Give credit where credit is due. In most cases, once the idea is cited you don’t have to continue reciting the same idea.

Can you imagine what a pain footnoting was prior to computers?

 

[LeafByNiggle]

Is it a sin to use any idea, even small, without somehow citing it? From my understanding, breaking any civil law is a sin; is this correct? I like to write and create and often I look things up to learn about things I don’t know and to use ideas. When I ask people about this they normally say something along the lines of “Well, technically, it’s illegal, but no one cares about it.”. But if it really is a sin, then wouldn’t God care even about the smallest, most technical transgression of civil law?

For some examples:

• If I look up some fact about linguistics online and use it in a conlang (invented language), do I have to somehow cite this every time I show my conlang to someone and such?
• If I find the population and GDP of Australia from a book, and use this for a private project, and do not cite it somehow (or even use it at all!) am I committing a sin?

Sorry if those weren’t the greatest examples. Thank you for any help!

What you have described does not sound like any violation of copyright law. Knowledge is just knowledge. It is not covered by copyright. That was tested in the courts when the main telephone directory company tried to sue a competing phone book company who just copied the information from the first company’s book to make theirs. The courts held that there was no creativity in the presentation of a the list of phone numbers, and so copyright did not apply. The lawsuit was dismissed.

So don’ worry, it is not illegal to use published information, unless you copy the exact presentation of it too. And even then, it depends. But citing your sources is a good idea anyway because it gives you more credibility.

 

[chevalier]

Is it a sin to use any idea, even small, without somehow citing it? From my understanding, breaking any civil law is a sin; is this correct? I like to write and create and often I look things up to learn about things I don’t know and to use ideas. When I ask people about this they normally say something along the lines of “Well, technically, it’s illegal, but no one cares about it.”. But if it really is a sin, then wouldn’t God care even about the smallest, most technical transgression of civil law?

I don’t think God would care about technical transgressions of civil law. This is not to say obeying even the letter of the law when possible isn’t important but I somehow don’t believe God would want us to be scrupulous about a piece of legislative half-product that leads to absurdity when it’s read literally.

For some examples:

• If I look up some fact about linguistics online and use it in a conlang (invented language), do I have to somehow cite this every time I show my conlang to someone and such?
• If I find the population and GDP of Australia from a book, and use this for a private project, and do not cite it somehow (or even use it at all!) am I committing a sin?

Sorry if those weren’t the greatest examples. Thank you for any help!

Neither of the examples strikes me as needing a citation for copyright reasons. One certainly cannot copyright the GDP of Australia, you cite that book to show where you get your information from (i.e. that you’re credible and don’t pull data out of thin air) or to explain why you have this figure and not the other.

Same way, you don’t cite your dictionary when you write in a foreign language and you don’t cite the author of a novel from which you learnt a new expression. You cite people when you draw on their own creative ideas, not when you just happen to learn something from them.

 

[edwest2]

I like to write and create things. Robots are in general use. If you create another robot you’re not stealing anything. I can design a super-tank that resembles a modern tank. I think it would be appropriate when inventing languages to cite your inspiration. However, even invented languages need something that allows the reader to connect with it.

Copyright means the right to copy. I can design my own airplane on paper, I just don’t have the right to copy someone else’s design and call it my own. I can design a spaceship but if it looks just like a spaceship from Star Wars then there could be problems.

Hope this helps,

Ed

 

[St_Francis]

If you quote directly, then of course your must attribute the quote. If you temporarily forget when the American Revolution ended and look it up, that’s probably knowledge general enough that you don’t need to attribute it.

If you are writing casually, then you don’t need to footnote as much. Like here, people will ask where you got the info if they want to find out.

Giving credit where credit is due is important, but copyright violations are more a matter of taking credit for yoirself of someone’s original work.

 

[broconsul]

Copyright and plagiarism are different things. It seems like you have them confused.

Copyright is very complicated, but I can’t think of a situation that would open you up to liability over something like a citation.

Copyright is not about giving credit where credit is due. It’s about the author or owner of a work having control over how it is reproduced. For example, YouTube users will often upload an infringing video and put in the description, “I DO NOT OWN THE RIGHTS TO THIS VIDEO.” Duh. Of course you don’t. But you also aren’t obeying the law by disclaiming your upload like that.

I could make copies of the DVDs I own and sell them on the street, but it would make no difference whether I put a notice on them saying, “Copyright belongs to MGM, not to broconsul,” I’d still get hit with a lawsuit.

And as someone else wrote about above, facts are not subject to copyright. If you are using facts for a hobby of yours, you don’t need to cite your source. Research papers for school are a different matter.

 

[1ke]

• If I look up some fact about linguistics online and use it in a conlang (invented language), do I have to somehow cite this every time I show my conlang to someone and such?
• If I find the population and GDP of Australia from a book, and use this for a private project, and do not cite it somehow (or even use it at all!) am I committing a sin?

Facts are not copyrightable.

You might want to cite your GDP and Population source for other reason, but it is not necessary for copyright purposes.

I think you’re just confused about copyright, and possibly scrupulous on top of that.

 

[McatholicN]

Maybe plagiarism would’ve been a better word. In what way would I have to cite every inspiration and fact I have gotten?

 

[broconsul]

Maybe plagiarism would’ve been a better word. In what way would I have to cite every inspiration and fact I have gotten?

You don’t. Just be honest and do as your well formed conscience instructs you to.

 

[jschutzm]

When I ask people about this they normally say something along the lines of “Well, technically, it’s illegal, but no one cares about it.”. But if it really is a sin, then wouldn’t God care even about the smallest, most technical transgression of civil law?

Yes, transgression of laws are sins.

However…

A) Note everyone is aware of the laws, therefore, if they didn’t know about it, then God doesn’t hold them accountable. The Court system may…but God does not. Ignorance is bliss to a certain extent. The next time we confess our sins to God, these minor infractions which we may not even be aware of, are forgiven.

B) This is why we should seek God’s forgiveness frequently, so we can confess and be absolved of these infractions and mistakes in judgement that we make. Catholics call these sins “venial” and so long as they were not intentional and done with malice or criminaly, then we can simply ask God for general forgiveness and be absolved.

However, in case of “B” - venial sins harm our relationship with God in that it can harden our heart and make it easier for us to justify and do more sin. Little sins make it easier to do more sinning and do bigger sins. Again, this is why we need to be humble and seek forgiveness as often as we can. To combat our own tendency to let little mistakes lead to bigger ones.

For some examples:

• If I look up some fact about linguistics online and use it in a conlang (invented language), do I have to somehow cite this every time I show my conlang to someone and such?
• If I find the population and GDP of Australia from a book, and use this for a private project, and do not cite it somehow (or even use it at all!) am I committing a sin?

Sorry if those weren’t the greatest examples. Thank you for any help!

I’d say this as a general rule of thumb to go by…

If you recall the information on your own, then no need to cite it. If you can’t recall the information and have to look it up - cite the source.

If you remember the information on your own, but wish to look it up to verify that you aren’t mis-quoting or have messed up the figures, - then you don’t need to cite your source, because it was still your own knowledge, you just verified.

If you quote something EXACTLY which is not public record or common knowledge - CITE your source.

If you want to show that this not your own opinion, but from an authority - like civil law, then cite your source.

For instance… I know that there are roughly 1.1 billion Catholics in the world (roughly). I know this… so I don’t have to cite a source. However, it is probably a good idea to cite my source, because how does anyone else reading that know that it is true and I’m not mistaken? So I’m not plagarizing, but I may still want to link to where I got that information from.

Get it?