does translation relieve copyright???

I am in process to write an article on this interesting Argentina religious thing (long explanation omitted), and there's a lot of good chunks on certain Spanish-language websites, where I would just like to take whole paragraphs/prayers/rituals outright ( cause they are interesting) and incorporate them into my article. Now I assume everything on someone else's website is copyright to them. But if I take it and translate it myself, word for word, but in a way that it's obviously my own work and not from a translation program (fluently but idiosyncratically) - Then I don't have to worry about their copyright or permission, correct? Because the non-generic translation makes a new work? Please advise, thank you, on what the tinwiki rule on this is.

reply to post by nine-eyed-eel

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I don't know th tinkwi law or whatever you refer to, but if you recieved an idea or learned it from somewhere then use it as you're work as if you came up with idea, you are a phony,and thief.

If you expand the idea to another level you can claim it!

reply to post by azblack

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No, I'd give them a footnote, I wouldn't say I wrote these prayers, but I don't want to ask them for permission or paraphrase if I could avoid it.

Copyright extends to the information content as well as the language/wording.

If you are translating something from another website, you are not the author. You are the translator. The information being presented is not your own, regardless of how much time you spend on your translation. Rewording another person's research and presenting it as your own is plagiarism - which will get you booted from any reputable university, for a start.

I do a fair bit of translation work as a sideline, and the most recognition that tends to be acceptable is a "translated by: " footnote to the text - but that usually only gets included on very large pieces intended for print media.

actually you can write it that you're the author as long as you provide the source for the original article. You're the author of the article in this language but you still translated the original. It's not illegal if you provide the link for original source of the article. All the major news agencies doing it all the time

[edit on 21-6-2008 by baburak]

How long are these prayers and so on ? If they are not big and you translate them into English it may be ok. Make sure you also add in where you got them from, and dont do alot of them. Ill check them out later if its too much i may have to delete that bit.

Fox

Let us take the IChing as an historical example.
You give credit.
You put in a nice introduction.
You accept responsibility for any errors and politely apologize for them in advance.
You get someone famous to write an original forward for you.
You add your research and interpretation, perhaps historical variations of the text.
You publish.


If it is historical and is or was commonly known somewhere, and others have used it, you have as much right to do so.
It is not a product of the other historians creative juices.
Unless of course they make up their sources, in which case you have been duped, and they should be punished.

If it were a novel or other book, and you simply lifted it that would be bad, and potentially litigious.
However once you have the millions in hand you can hire the lawyers to negotiate the settlement as you work on the next book deal.




[edit on 21-6-2008 by Cyberbian]

Sorry, baburak, you're wrong.

What news agencies do - translate segments of other published work - is covered under international agreement as Fair Use.

Translating a large piece of work without permission and publishing it (here or elsewhere) is an outright copyright violation. Claiming it as your own work carries it further into the realm of outright theft. If it were my work being copied, I would certainly have my lawyers contacting the site owners.

As the servers are based in the USA, here is the relevant copyright law:



"Derivative Works" is clearly defined (sec. 101) as including translations.

Claiming authorship of the work is a copyright violation by merit of translation is a copyright violation.

Why not just mail the owner of the sites and ask their permission to translate the stuff?

I didn't say that he would claim that it's his own work ..... i said as long as he provides the source of the original article it's ok

I'd say that you'd be covered with Fair Use. Just remember to make sure that the original writers are credited.