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Terms & Conditions
THE COLUMBUSITE, LLC
A note about our legal structure, and how we build our team.
Thank you for your interest in The Columbusite. It is our privilege and honor to provide a comprehensive resource for arts and culture in The Chattahoochee Valley. At any given time you will find our extended team to be comprised of writers, artists, photographers, interns, and creative entrepreneurs. Every individual who works for us highly values the impact the arts have in our community. We hire contributors and independent contractors on a regular basis to assist us in the production of our content. It is our ever-evolving team of people who make The Columbusite operate at full force, 365 days a year, for our audience.
The truth about Intellectual Property. (It is, in fact, property.)
Due to the highly visual nature of our content and the close relationships we work to build and maintain through supporting artists and creative entrepreneurs, we take copyright and intellectual property rights very seriously. Many often consider these areas of legal protection "invisible" and therefore inconsequential. Nothing could be further from the truth.
In short, the fine print matters. For it is there, and often only there, that an artist's work is protected by the law. By honoring and upholding the laws developed to protect creative individuals, we each do our part to ensure the artists we support receive credit and compensation for their work at all times. We take it as our highest responsibility to protect and honor the rights of creative individuals - both those on our team and those whose work we share with our audience.
When you read The Columbusite, you do so with the guarantee that the artists and content you are reading are shared in an ethical and legal method. We put protecting the rights of the artists whose work we share above any other task we have. If you find an image or source we have not listed appropriately, please contact us and we will rectify the situation immediately.
The Columbusite takes legal matters of intellectual property to heart, and we ask the same of our audience. If you see something you'd like to share, please do so! Just ask permission first, and credit the source when sharing. Failure to do so will result in written contact from our team requesting appropriate measures taken. Failure to comply to this request will result in legal action.
Unsure how to do your part to protect the work of others? It's simple, really.
When in doubt, ask for permission before you share.
Giving credit to an object or idea's creator is not optional.
Thank you for joining us in our effort to educate and equip our community to honor and ethically support the work of local artists. Again, please reach out if you have a question about this matter or any content on our website. Need to reach someone on our team? Check our staff page for direct links, or simply contact us here and we'll happily connect you!
Carrie Beth Wallace
Founder, Editor - in - Chief
Additional Resources
Is the idea of intellectual property new to you?
Here's a brief explanation and list of additional resources for your convenience.
Below is a fantastic explanation from our favorite resource on the topic of intellectual property for creatives, Business and Legal Forms for Photographers by Tad Crawford, copublished with the American Society of Media Photographers. While written specifically for photographers, intellectual property applies to all creative endeavors as illustrated in this superb definition from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) :
"(IP) refers to creations of the mind, such as inventions;
literary and artistic works; designs;
and symbols, names and images used in commerce."
From Business and Legal Forms for Photographers
Crawford, Tad. © 2015
Excerpt from p. 137
(Find the book here)
"Certain projects require obtaining permission from the owners of copyrighted materials such as illustrations, photographs, paintings, articles, or books. The individual ignores obtaining such permissions at great peril. Not only is it unethical to use someone else's work without permission, it can also lead to liability for copyright infringement and breach of contract.
Of course, some copyrighted works have entered the public domain, which means that they can be freely copied by anyone. For works published on or before December 31, 1977, the maximum term of copyright protection was 95 years. However, copyrights have expired for all United States works registered or published prior to 1923. Copyrights obtained from 1923- 1963 have a 95 year term if these copyrights were renewed, while copyrights from 1964-1977 benefit from automatic renewal and definitely have a 95 year term. Authors should also keep in mind that foreign countries may confer different terms of copyright protection.
For works published on or after January 1, 1978, the term of protection is usually the life of the creator plus 70 years, so these works would only be in public domain if copy right notice had been omitted or improper... The absence of copyright notice on works published between January 1, 1978 and February 28, 1989 (when the United States joined the Berne Copyright Union) does not necessarily mean the work entered public domain. On or after March 1, 1989, copyright notice is no longer required to preserve copyright protection, although such notice does confer some benefits under the copyright law. A basic rule would be to obtain permission for any work published on or after January 1, 1978, unless certain the work is in the public domain."
Are you an artist?
World Intellectual Property Organization
Art Law Journal from Artpreneur Article: What does intellectual property protect?
From Stanford University: Overview of Intellectual Property Laws
Last updated, June 2023.