Vietnam: What is author and co-author? What is included in copyright?

Vietnam: What is author and co-author? What is included in copyright? (Internet image)

Regarding this issue, LawNet would like to answer as follows:

1. What is author, co-author?

According to Clause 4, Article 1 of the Law on Intellectual Property Amended in 2022 (adding Article 12a to the Law on Intellectual Property 2005), authors and co-authors are prescribed as follows:

- The author is the person that directly creates the work. In case two or more persons collaborate to create a combined and complete work, they are co-authors.

- The person who provides support, opinions or documents for another person to create a work is not an author or co-author.

- The moral rights and economic rights to a work with co-author must be exercised with the consent of the co-author, unless the work has a separate part which is detachable for independent use without prejudice to the parts of the work of the co-author or otherwise prescribed by law.

2. What is included in copyright?

Article 18 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005 stipulates that copyright shall comprise moral rights and economic rights.

- Moral rights of authors include :

- The right to name their works.

Authors are entitled to transfer the right to name their works to other organizations and individuals as prescribed in Clause 1 Article 20 of Law on Intellectual Property 2005;

- The right to have their real names or pseudonyms attached to their works; the right to have their real names or pseudonyms announced when their works are published or used;

- The right to publish or permit other persons to publish their works;

- The right to protect the integrity of their works; and to forbid other persons to modify, edit or distort their works in whatever form, causing harm to the honor and reputation of the author.

(Based on Article 19 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005)

- Economic rights of authors include:

+ The right to create derivative works;

++ The right to publicly perform their works, whether directly or via audio and video recordings or any technological devices, at a location that is publicly accessible but the public cannot select the time and part of the works.

++ The right to directly or indirectly reproduce the entire or part of the work using any means or form, except for the cases specified in Point a Clause 3 of Article 20 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005;

++ The right to distribute, import for public distribution by sale, or transfer of other rights to ownership of the original or copies of their works in tangible forms, except for the cases specified in Point b Clause 3 of Article 20 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005;

++ The right to broadcast, communicate to the public their works by wireless or wired devices, electronic information networks or other technical means, including the provision of their works to the public in a manner that it can be accessed by the public at their time and location of choice;

++ The right to lease the original or copies of cinematographic works and computer programs, unless these computer programs are not the main subject matter of the lease.

+ The rights specified in Clause 1 of Article 20 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005 shall be exclusively exercised by the author or copyright owner, or by another organization or individual under authorization of the author or copyright owner.

When any organization or individual exercises one, several or all of the rights stipulated in Clause 1 of this Article and Clause 3 Article 19 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005, such organization or individual must ask for permission from the copyright owner, pay royalties and other material benefits to the copyright owner, except in the cases specified in Clause 3 of this Article, Articles 25, 25a, 26, 32 and 33 of Article 20 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005.

In case a derivative work is created in a manner that affect the moral rights specified in Clause 4 Article 19 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005, the author's written consent must be obtained.

+ The copyright owner does not have the right to prohibit other organizations and individuals from:

+ Reproducing the work only for exercising other rights prescribed by this Law; temporarily reproducing the work following a technological process during the operation of the devices in order to transmit within a network between third parties via intermediates, or legally using the work without independent economic purposes and the copy is automatically deleted and cannot be recovered;

+ Subsequent distribution, import for distribution of the original or copy of a work the distribution of which has been carried out or permitted by its copyright owner.

(Based on Article 20 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005)

3. Subject matter of copyright in Vietnam

According to Clause 1, Article 3 of the Law on Intellectual Property 2005, the subject matter of copyright shall comprise literary, artistic and scientific works; the subject matter of copyright related rights shall comprise performances, audio and visual fixation, broadcasts and satellite signals carrying coded programmes.deo recordings, broadcasts, encrypted program-carrying satellite signals.

Nhu Mai

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