If you can identify and locate an author, you have a clear starting point. A simple Internet search can provide direct contact information or connections through a university or other employer.
Benefits of Contacting Authors
Contacting the author puts you in direct touch with the source of the work, providing an opportunity to ask questions, get insights, and gain information about the work. Additionally, authors may be less likely than publishers to charge fees for the use of their material.
Drawbacks of Contacting Authors
The author of the material has transferred the copyright to a publisher or another party and may not even know that he or she no longer holds the copyright. Therefore, the most important source for the information you need may be the publication agreement.
Be proactive and ask the author about the terms of any contracts, especially publication contracts, related to the work.
If the author has died, the copyright does not end upon death. You may have to find and contact the author’s heirs to determine who inherited the author’s copyrights.
Based on and used under a Creative Commons BY license from the Copyright Advisory Office of Columbia University, Kenneth D. Crews, director.
The first source for identifying the copyright owner is the copyright notice on the work, which often looks like this: Copyright © 2010, XYZ Corporation.
Another important source is the registration of the claim of copyright with the United States Copyright Office. However, this method will not cover all works or all transfers of copyright because authors do not have to register their works in order to qualify for copyright protection. For information about searching registration records, see:
http://www.copyright.gov/records/.
Searching copyright registrations and renewals can be crucial for identifying likely owners and for determining whether a work is still protected or is in the public domain. "How to Investigate the Copyright Status of a Work" provides a detailed examination of the process for searching the current status of a work.
A simple search on the Internet for titles, authors’ names, publishers, excerpts of text, or lyrics can also produce useful information about the work. Many organizations can help identify the owner of a copyright and can also contact the copyright owner or grant permission on behalf of the owner.
Because the law does not require a copyright notice or registration, and because the original owner may have transferred the copyright, sometimes none of the above methods will take you to the current copyright owner. In that event, you may simply need to contact any person associated with the work, such as the author, publisher, or benefactor, and ask about the copyright status and ownership of the work.
Based on and used under a Creative Commons BY license from the Copyright Advisory Office of Columbia University, Kenneth D. Crews, director.
A published work will often include the publisher’s contact information. Determining whether the publisher holds the copyright usually depends on the terms of the contract with the author, so be sure to ask the publisher if it in fact holds the copyright.
Benefits of Contacting Publishers
Publishers often have contact information and well-established systems for granting copyright permissions. Search the publisher’s website for a reprint or permissions office (e.g., the New York Times and Dow Jones Reprints).
Many publishers routinely take a transfer of the copyright from authors, and you can sometimes find the standard publication agreement on the publisher’s website. If the publisher is one that routinely takes the copyright, then permission from the publisher will probably be most reliable.
Drawbacks of Contacting Publishers
Publishers may limit the permission to only specific uses of the material, such as a narrow project or a limited time. They are also more likely than authors to charge a fee for your use.
Based on and used under a Creative Commons BY license from the Copyright Advisory Office of Columbia University, Kenneth D. Crews, director.