Opus37 copyright policy

It is important to Opus37 that your copyright ownership is respected by everyone in the Opus37 community. In case it can be demonstrated that copyright has been infringed, we will remove the sheet music in question. If necessary, we will cooperate in any judicial action taken against individuals who have published unlawful material on our website. Wilful copyright infringement is a crime punishable by fine or imprisonment.

When we are notified that a file published on Opus37 infringes on someone else's copyright, we will immediately remove the file in question. Persisting to upload unlawful content will result in a permanent ban of the account and IP address concerned, in accordance with our policy on habitual offenders.

Some important facts on copyright infringement:

  • You can be sued for copyright infringement, even after suspension of your account.
  • The size of the copied document is irrelevant, as is the amount that has been copied: even copying a very small part of sheet music can make you liable for copyright infringement.
  • A copyright notice (©) is generally not required to ensure copyright protection.
  • Distributing content protected by copyright without permission of the copyright owner is considered an infringement of copyright, even when the sheet music has been made available free of charge.
  • No exception is made for the unauthorized copying and distributing of content for 'personal use'. Even when you share sheet musict with a limited group or family or friends, you can still be held liable for copyright infringement.
  • No exception is made for the unauthorized copying and distributing of content protected by copyright for educational or non-commercial use.
  • In this case you can be held liable for copyright infringement, even if you add a reference to the owner or author of the copyright-protected content/material.
  • When you use your own creativity and create a new document which contains copyright-protected material, you can still be held liable for copyright infringement
  • Even when there is sheet music in Opus37 comparable to yours, you can be held liable for copyright infringement.
  • Sheet music that have been published on Opus37 with a Creative Commons license can be copied, distributed and reused under certain circumstances. See Wikipedia for more information on the Creative Commons license.

We hope you enjoy using Opus37

The Opus37 Team.