Copyright is a major issue here in DeviantArt, probably one of the hot topics you can't miss every single day. art thefts happen, and it's better if we protect ourselves ahead, and get the last laugh.

first, lets define Copyright.

What is Copyright?
The legal right granted to an author, composer, playwright, publisher, or distributor to exclusive publication, production, sale, or distribution of a literary, musical, dramatic, or artistic work. [link]

Are There Many kinds of Copyrights?

Creative Commons
Creative Commons licenses are several copyright licenses released on December 16, 2002 by Creative Commons, a U.S. non-profit corporation founded in 2001.

Many of the licenses, notably all the original licenses, grant certain "baseline rights", such as the right to distribute the copyrighted work without changes, at no charge. Some of the newer licenses do not grant these rights.

Creative Commons licenses are currently available in 43 different jurisdictions worldwide, with more than nineteen others under development. Licenses for jurisdictions outside of the United States are under the purview of Creative Commons International. [link]

Original Licenses
The original set of licenses all grant the "baseline rights". The details of each of these licenses depends on the version, and comprises a selection of four conditions:
Attribution

* Attribution (by): Licensees may copy, distribute, display and perform the work and make derivative works based on it only if they give the author or licensor the credits in the manner specified by these.

Non-commercial

* Noncommercial or NonCommercial (nc): Licensees may copy, distribute, display, and perform the work and make derivative works based on it only for noncommercial purposes.

Non-derivative

* No Derivative Works or NoDerivs (nd): Licensees may copy, distribute, display and perform only verbatim copies of the work, not derivative works based on it.

Share-alike

* ShareAlike (sa): Licensees may distribute derivative works only under a license identical to the license that governs the original work. [link]

Combinations
Combinations

Mixing and matching these conditions produces sixteen possible combinations, of which eleven are valid Creative Commons licenses and five are not. Of the five invalid combinations, four include both the "nd" and "sa" clauses, which are mutually exclusive; and one includes none of the clauses. Of the eleven valid licenses the five that lack the "by" clause have been phased out, because 98% of licensors requested Attribution. But they do remain available for reference on the website. This leaves six regularly used licenses:

1. Attribution alone (by)
2. Attribution + Noncommercial (by-nc)
3. Attribution + NoDerivs (by-nd)
4. Attribution + ShareAlike (by-sa)
5. Attribution + Noncommercial + NoDerivs (by-nc-nd)
6. Attribution + Noncommercial + ShareAlike (by-nc-sa) [link]

What Are the Works Protected?
Work licensed under a Creative Commons License is protected by copyright applicable law. This allows Creative Commons licenses to be applied to all work protected by copyright law, including: books, plays, movies, music, articles, photographs, blogs, websites.

However, the license may not modify the rights allowed by fair use or fair dealing or exert restrictions which violate copyright exceptions. Furthermore, Creative Commons Licenses are non-exclusive non-revocable. Any work or copies of the work obtained under a Creative Commons license may continue to be used under that license.

In the case of works protected by multiple Creative Common Licenses, the user may choose either. [link]

Other Licenses
A number of additional licenses have been introduced, which are more specialized:

* Sampling licenses, with two options:
o Sampling Plus: parts of the work can be copied and modified for any purpose other than advertising, and the entire work can be copied for noncommercial purposes
o Noncommercial Sampling Plus: the whole work or parts of the work can be copied and modified for noncommercial purposes

Besides licenses, Creative Commons also offers an easy way to release material into the public domain through the Public Domain Dedication, as well as Founder's Copyright, through which the work is released into the public domain after 14 or 28 years.

A recent project was announced called CC0, a legal tool for waiving as many rights as legally possible, worldwide. CC0 improves and extends the current CC public domain dedication, by adding a waiver statement and attempting an universal rather than the current dedication's U.S.-centric approach.

Legal and technical work on the CC0 waiver was completed on 1 December. Launch is pending. [link]

Retired License
Due to either disuse or criticism, a number of previously offered Creative Commons licenses have since been retired, and are no longer recommended for new works. The retired licenses include all licenses lacking the Attribution element other than the Public Domain Dedication, as well as two licenses not allowing non-commercial copying:

* Sampling: parts of the work can be used for any purpose other than advertising, but the whole work cannot be copied or modified
* DevNations: a Developing Nations license, which only applies to countries deemed by the World Bank as a "non-high-income economy". Full copyright restrictions apply to people in other countries. [link]

_{i'll make a different article to elaborate on the above different licenses :aWW:}

PROTECT YOUR WORKS.
here are someways to make artthefts out there look at your work, and NOT decide to steal it.

1. PUT YOUR LOGO, NAME, WATERMARK ON THE IMAGE.
not too big, bot too small, but clear enough to be noticed. oh don't worry, it won't look you image hideaous.
if you're tired of doin it manually, becuase you only thought of adding it now, here's a software that would add watermarks to your images by batch - [link] , or design you own logo through this - [link] if you think photshop is to fancy to do the job

2. UPLOAD OUT IN A FREE COPYRIGHTING SITE.
i personally use myfreecopyrights.com
now, MyFreeCopyright.com captures your original creation's fingerprint, stores the fingerprint in a database and sends a copy of the fingerprint to you in an email. The email contains the verified date; the fingerprint verifies the digital creation, and your email address verifies it belongs to you.
all you have to do is create an account, upload your art/creations, fill up the description and wala, you have proof that it REALLY is yours. [link]

3. INDICATE IN YOUR COMMENT BOX/ANYWHERE ELSE THAT YOU ARE COPYRIGHTED.
constant reminder is nagging and therefore scareful to art thieves out there.

i usually put this phrase in my artist comment box -
IMPORTANT! © COPYRIGHT SHRYNE SIGLOS
The work contained in my gallery is copyrighted©2007-2009 Shryne Siglos. All rights reserved.My work may not be reproduced, copied, edited, published, transmitted or uploaded in any way without my written permission. My work does not belong to the public domain. If you doubt this, feel free to email me: shrynesiglos@rocketmail.com

please do feel free to do the same

now, i hope i everyone gets the last evil laugh!
if i think of more ways, i'll post them up!

xoxo,
shryne