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Introduction
As you write blog posts, you may find that you want to include images you find online. Or maybe you found a great piece of writing—a recipe, a story, or a review—that you want to highlight on your own blog. It's important to know that almost all of the content you find on the Web belongs to someone. Just because you can take images, text, and more from other sites doesn't mean it's right to do so—ethically or legally.
In this lesson, you'll learn about the copyright protections that apply to work posted online. You'll learn about the rules that determine which images and text you can use, and how you can use them. You'll also learn how to protect the content you create.
The laws discussed in this lesson are United States laws. No lawyer was involved in preparing this lesson. We are not legal experts, and this lesson should not be taken as legal advice.
Understanding copyright
Copyright is the legal concept that works—art, writing, images, music, and more—belong to the people who create them. According to copyright law, any original content you create and record in a lasting form is your own intellectual property. This means other people can't legally copy your work and pretend it's their own. They can't make money from the things you create either.
To use, copy, or change a copyrighted work, you need permission from the person who holds the copyright. This permission is called a license. Even though everyone has the right to require that others respect their copyright and ask permission to use their work, some people and organizations choose to license their content more freely. They do this by giving their work a Creative Commons license or by placing their work in the Public Domain.
