When dealing with copyrights, there are several important questions to ask. Primarily, it is important to understand what exactly a copyright is, what the owner of a copyright is entitles to and how the copyright affects the public's use of that material. A copyright is a protection of expressed work that has been established in a tangible format, regardless of whether it is published. It grants the exclusive rights to work by the original author and is governed by the Copyright Act of 1976. This copyright entitles the original author of a work to reproduce their work, allow others to use their work, creative derivative pieces of their work, and perform or display their work to the public. These works are protected for the life of the original author plus 70 years, so long as the work was created on or after January 1, 1978. For those that wish to use copyrighted material, permission must be granted by the original author and all instructions pertaining to that use must be adhered to, otherwise it may constitute a copyright violation. Fair use exceptions allow the pubic to use copyright material without permission.