Question on public domain-and why it is

Copyright applies to words in a certain sequence. Some ideas might be protected under the law, but this is not copyright--and no one author came up with the current state of these myths.

It depends - some author might have first came up with the "vampire can't go out into the sun" thing, but that was almost certainly way back when, well before current copyright applies, so you're free to use such a character.

But a sparkly vampire, now that might be a different matter...

Ideas cannot be protected by copyright. Only specific expression of those ideas can be. Now, you may also be getting copyright confused with trademark, which is a totally different animal existing under different, separate statutes. And even if a work has lapsed into public domain, you can't ethically quote from it without attribution. Else, you commit the ethical sin of plagiarism.

caw

MoonStone said:

I wasn't sure where to put this question. I apologize if it is the wrong place. I am curious how copyright works for myths like werewolves and vampires ..are they in public domain? If an author started the detail that vampires can't go out into the sun, or werewolves transform at the full moon, or mermaids attract sailors by singing, etc- are authors allowed to copy that? I know they do...just..I don't understand fully how it works and why it is free to use.

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Hi . . . you can't copyright an idea -- only the tangible (in writing, on audio tape, computer file, etc) expression of an idea.

See www.copyright.gov and look for the FAQs and "Copyright Basics" for starters.

You can write about vampires and werewolves until the cows (werecows?) come home. But do it in your own words, with your own plot lines. (Exception: you can, as have many other writers, borrow characters and plot ideas freely from such public-domain sources as the Bible, Shakespeare's plays, classic mythology, and so on.)

--Ken

I think you start to get into trouble, when you specifically steal characters and key elements of another author's universe.

For instance, I can't write about Luke Skywalker getting transporting to the DC Universe and getting into a fight with Superman. Not without the written permission of the entities who 'invented' said characters and universes.

but now i'm starting to derail this thread so i'll just stop here

Mel...

MoonStone said:

I know they do...just..I don't understand fully how it works and why it is free to use.

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I recommend reading Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig. It explains everything you need to know about copyright. The question shouldn't be why its free to use, but to ask why certain things aren't.

As described in the book, the point of initially introducing copyright was because "society" thought that it would encourage writers to write more and quality would increase... which most people thought would be for the benefit of everyone. It is a trade-off between limiting our freedoms and getting more good stuff to consume.

That's still the official motivation for keeping copyrights in place, and if you think of it that way, the copyright laws we have will make sense, regardless if you agree with them or not. At it's core copyrights is simply this trade-off. It's got nothing to do with natural rights of the creators or anything like it.

Ideas, like Veinglory pointed out, spread virally in cultures and copyrighting them has got liberal democracy/free speech legal conflicts. That's a can of worms we don't want to open.

benbradley said:

It depends - some author might have first came up with the "vampire can't go out into the sun" thing, but that was almost certainly way back when, well before current copyright applies, so you're free to use such a character.

But a sparkly vampire, now that might be a different matter...

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Oh, I would never personally use sparkly vampires, although I am planning to start a vampire novel as soon as I finish my incomplete ones. That is stupid in my opinion, and many people agree with me.