Powerpoint templates Usage rights

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Guest

Is it permissible to use an uploaded Powerpoint template, graphics, color
scheme etc as the basis for a commercial venture template.

What rights does the, in this case, 3rd party supplier of the template have,
or have they surrenderred those by uploading it to office online?
 
I can't find any information on the office online website about this.

Common sense and law would say:
The original creator has copyright in the presentation template. There's no
way round this unless they give that copyright to someone else completely.
Someone must own the copyright, it can't be 'disowned'. It exists the moment
a creative work is created. If they gave it to anyone in uploading to MS that
would be MS, although I suspect they retain copyright and have just
implicitly given you (and others) a non-exclusive right to use the template
under a (free) licence. This also implies you have a right to create
derivitave works from this (ie presentations based on the template since that
is the sole purpose of a template) although it is not so clear if this is
only for your own use or for commercial purposes.
If I use them to make presentations to use in my business, this seems
implicitly OK.
If I use them to make presentations which I sell as part of my product, eg I
print out the slides of a training course as part of a handout form that
course, that woudl seem OK too.
But selling the template itself or a derived version of it? At what point
does it become different frmo the original? Changing the font size of the
titles?

Legally you might be able to do this but beware:
1) morally this is bad form. Someone gave this out of their generosity to
the community. Ripping this off discourages such altruism
2) I could produce the same (or very similar) template as you and sell it
myself (and have just as much right to do so as you do), undercut you or even
give it away. Don't base your business on this as your competitors (or
customers) have almost no barrier to entry and you will not make money
3) The original author has a right under the Berne convention to be
identified as the author of the work and possibly it's derivatives. Even
though they are allowing you to use their work, they are not necessarily
saying you can do so without attributing the orignal to them.

Why not approach the author and ask for their permission?
 
Hi

Thanks, I am not planning to set up a business selling templates, just a
consulting business with some nice corporate imaging.

I did manage to find that in fact you are not allowed to upload copyright
works to the website, presumably even if they are yours, so I read that as an
implicit surrendering of all rights. I would guess that this is deliberate
since as we all agree there's not much point posting templates the the
website and then being angry when people use them!

Plus, most of them would only be used in a commercial context to begin with

cheers for your thoughts
 
Dazza

Why not ask permission from whoever authored the templates.

Or create your own templates.

Either way you would not get yourself into any trouble.

cheers
TAJ Simmons
microsoft powerpoint mvp

awesome - powerpoint backgrounds,
http://www.awesomebackgrounds.com
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