Law and Ethics in Masscommunication Practise in Nigeria
COPYRIGHT
Laws and regulations govern every profession whether they are formally enacted as laws or accepted as conventions, thus journalism is no exception, there are many minefields through which a media professional must walk, in the course of his work, and unless he equips himself with a minesweeper to detect the dangerous explosives buried in the ground tto ambush him, he is liable to sustain serious injuries.
The laws governing journalism, have been designed to prevent invasion of individual's privacy, protect individual's reputation against malicious statements and publication, and also safeguard the property rights of individuals by preventing literary theft. Others are to prevent the media professional from inciting the people against the person of the president or governor or the state in general. Similarly, there is a law that prevents disclosure of classified matters, official information, prohibited and defense establishment or spying and breach of official trust by public officers under the official secret acts.
Copyright is the right which the law gives an author or other originator of an intellectual production whereby he is invested with the sole and exclusive privilege of reproducing and selling copies of his work.
In other words, copyright in a work is the exclusive right of the owner or author to control his original work, the copyright law vest the ownership of a publication in an individual or an organization from copying such a publication word-for-word without the permission of the owner.
' It also extends to the control of the reproduction, broadcasting, publication, adaptation, communication, public performance, or any translation of the work' (Daramola, 1999: 143).
Copyright covers the making of any cinematograph film or a record in respect of the work, distribution to the public for commercial purposes, copies of the work by way of rental, lease, hire, loan or similar arrangement, broadcasting or communicating the adaptation of
Laws and regulations govern every profession whether they are formally enacted as laws or accepted as conventions, thus journalism is no exception, there are many minefields through which a media professional must walk, in the course of his work, and unless he equips himself with a minesweeper to detect the dangerous explosives buried in the ground tto ambush him, he is liable to sustain serious injuries.
The laws governing journalism, have been designed to prevent invasion of individual's privacy, protect individual's reputation against malicious statements and publication, and also safeguard the property rights of individuals by preventing literary theft. Others are to prevent the media professional from inciting the people against the person of the president or governor or the state in general. Similarly, there is a law that prevents disclosure of classified matters, official information, prohibited and defense establishment or spying and breach of official trust by public officers under the official secret acts.
Copyright is the right which the law gives an author or other originator of an intellectual production whereby he is invested with the sole and exclusive privilege of reproducing and selling copies of his work.
In other words, copyright in a work is the exclusive right of the owner or author to control his original work, the copyright law vest the ownership of a publication in an individual or an organization from copying such a publication word-for-word without the permission of the owner.
' It also extends to the control of the reproduction, broadcasting, publication, adaptation, communication, public performance, or any translation of the work' (Daramola, 1999: 143).
Copyright covers the making of any cinematograph film or a record in respect of the work, distribution to the public for commercial purposes, copies of the work by way of rental, lease, hire, loan or similar arrangement, broadcasting or communicating the adaptation of