Gone With The Wind paper 5 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Gone With The Wind paper 5 - Essay Example Thus, copyright law though protects originality and creativity of the authors, gives room for rewrites by providing exemptions under which they are not entitled to infringement.However, this has also created a room for copyright conflicts and other related issues. Numerous copyright issues have dominated the debate scene prompting the question as to what should be considered fair use and what should not. One notable copyright battle was between Gone With The Wind (GWTW) and The Wind DoneGone (TWDG). In this case, the author, Randall rewrote the GWTW by retelling the story through a slave’s perspective. This encompasses writing back to society and power, which has a rich contribution to the society. Nevertheless, the conflict here was whether TWDG violated copyright laws by copying GWTW. Through evaluation of free speech, fair use, parody and satire, it is clear that TWDG did not cause infringement of copyright laws. The infringement law allows rewrites based satire and parody. As a result, there was no infringement in the case of GWTW and TWDG since the rewrite was based on satire. Nevertheless, when solving the conflict, other concepts such as free speech and its application also came up. Thus, it is essential to understand how fair use, parody and satire, and free speech apply in rewrite cases. ... This marked the beginning of a long-term battle on TWDG’s infringement of copyright laws with regard to the rewrite of GWTW. Nevertheless, what arose from this case is that fair use sets the legal framework that accommodates both commercial and creative decisions. In analyzing a literary work or any other thing for fair use, there are four factors that play a key role in the determination of fair use. According to Netanel in Making Sense of Fair Use, these are provisions of Section 107 of the United States Copyright Act (Making Sense of fair Use 715). The first factor deals with character and purpose of the uses, for example, it considers whether the use is for nonprofit educational or for commercial nature purposes. The second factor provides for the nature of the work copyrighted. The third factor looks at the work copyrighted as a whole and determines the substantiality and amount of the portion used with respect to the entire work. Finally, the fourth factor provided for b y the US Copyright Act under Section 107 looks at the impact of the rewrite on the potential market, and how the copyrighted work is valued. Beebe notes that the four factors are a test that must be applied in every case to determine fair use, and there is no bright line rule that can determine the issue of fair use (558). The major goal of fair use is to provide a flexible approach of determining and making a decision as to whether fair use applies in a particular case. The major concern is whether the use of the original work that is copyright protected is fair or not. In addition, the fair use doctrine does not base its arguments on equity, but is rather a creature of the common law courts. Furthermore, in the application of fair use, the secondary user’s motives are generally