Editing Author (section)

==Legal significance of authorship==
Holding the title of "author" over any "literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, [or] certain other intellectual works" gives rights to this person, the owner of the copyright, especially the exclusive right to engage in or authorize any production or distribution of their work.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" /> Any person or entity wishing to use intellectual property held under copyright must receive permission from the copyright holder to use this work, and often will be asked to pay for the use of copyrighted material.<ref name=":1" />

The copyrights on intellectual work expire after a certain time. It enters the [[public domain]], where it can be used without limit.<ref name=":1" /> Copyright laws in many jurisdictions – mostly following the lead of the United States, in which the entertainment and publishing industries have very strong [[lobbying]] power – have been amended repeatedly since their inception, to extend the length of this fixed period where the work is exclusively controlled by the copyright holder. Technically, someone owns their work from the time it's created. A notable aspect of authorship emerges with copyright in that, in many jurisdictions, it can be passed down to another, upon one's death. The person who inherits the copyright is not the author, but has access to the same legal benefits.

Intellectual property laws are complex. Works of fiction involve [[trademark law]], [[likeness rights]], [[fair use]] rights held by the public (including the right to [[parody]] or [[satirize]]), and many other interacting complications.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2013-03-29 |title=Overview of Intellectual Property Laws |url=https://fairuse.stanford.edu/overview/introduction/intellectual-property-laws/ |access-date=2022-12-28 |website=Stanford Copyright and Fair Use Center |language=en-US}}</ref>

Authors may portion out the different rights that they hold to different parties at different times, and for different purposes or uses, such as the right to adapt a plot into a film, television series, or video game. If another party chooses to adapt the work, they may have to alter plot elements or character names in order to avoid infringing previous adaptations. An author may also not have rights when working under contract that they would otherwise have, such as when creating a [[work for hire]] (e.g., hired to write a city tour guide by a municipal government that totally owns the copyright to the finished work), or when writing material using intellectual property owned by others (such as when writing a novel or screenplay that is a new installment in an already established media franchise).

In the United States, the [[Copyright Clause]] of the [[Constitution of the United States]] ([[Article One of the United States Constitution#Section 8: Powers of Congress|Article I, Section 8, Clause 8]]) provides the Congress with the power of "securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries".<ref name=crs>{{cite book |title=U.S. Constitution Annotated |publisher=Congressional Research Service |url=https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/article-1/section-8/clause-8/copyrights-and-patents |access-date=17 September 2021 |chapter=COPYRIGHTS AND PATENTS}}</ref> The language regarding authors was derived from proposals by [[Charles Pinckney (governor)|Charles Pinckney]], "to secure to authors exclusive rights for a limited time", and by [[James Madison]], "to secure to literary authors their copyrights for a limited time", or, in the alternative, "to encourage, by proper premiums & Provisions, the advancement of useful knowledge and discoveries".<ref name="William F. Patry 1994">William F. Patry, ''Copyright Law and Practice'' (1994).</ref> Both proposals were referred to the [[Committee of Detail]], which reported back a proposal containing the final language, which was incorporated into the Constitution by unanimous agreement of the convention.<ref name="William F. Patry 1994"/>