What Can Be Copyrighted? - Copyright protection is available for "original works of authorship" that have been "fixed in a tangible medium of expression." From this general statement, some basic requirements have been distilled which all material must meet in order to receive protection under the copyright laws:

1. Originality - There must be some element of originality, even if only to a minimal degree. It must possess some minimal degree of creativity and have a distinguishable variation which is not merely trivial. However, the copyright laws do not impose a real standard and the originality requirement is a minimal one. Likewise, the copyright laws do not require any type of judgment as to what is creative as long as some minimal creativity is present.

2. Authorship - Generally, a work must be the creative act, however minimal, of a human being. Works that are created by a machine are not copyrightable unless they are generate by the machine as a result of human input. Works that are randomly generate by a machine are not copyrightable. It may seem obvious, but items that are the products of plants or created by animals are not protected by copyright laws.

3. Classes of Copyrightable works include:

• Literary works
• Musical works
• Dramatic works
• Pantomimes and choreography
• Pictorial, graphics and sculptural works
• Motion pictures and audiovisual works
• Sound recordings
• Compilations
• Collective works
• Derivative works
• Supplementary works

  4. Things That Are Specified As Not Being Copyrightable include:

• Ideas
• Processes
• Procedures
• Systems
• Methods of operation
• Concepts
• Titles
• Principles of discovery
• Slogans and mottos
• Ordinary phrases
• Factual information
• Computations
• Useful items such as furniture, parts, etc.
• Most blank forms
• Type styles
• Ingredient listings
• Works created by the US government
• Trivial changes to public domain works
• Book designs
• Illegal or obscene work