What is Copyright?
The Copyright Act 1964, Cap 81, Laws of Uganda, defines copyright to mean, "copyright under this Act". "Copyright is the exclusive right of printing or otherwise multiplying copies of interalia a published work; the right of preventing others from doing so.

The infringement of this right is called piracy": Osborn's Concise Law Dictionary, 6th Edition, by Sweet & Maxwell,1981. Copyright gives the owner of copyright power to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies, to distribute copies of the work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease or lending; to broadcast or perform the whole or a substantial part of the copyrighted work in public in the case of audio-visual works in it's original form or in any form recognisably derived from the original.

Section 1 of the Act states that the following acts found in the First Schedule to the Act shall be eligible for copyright.

Literary Works
Under Section 15 of the Act, literary work means work irrespective of the literary quality in any of the following or works similar thereto;
novels, stories and poetical works; plays, stage directions, film scenarios and broadcasting scripts; textbooks, treatises, histories, biographies, essays and articles; encyclopaedias, dictionaries, directories and anthologies; letters, reports and memoranda; and Lectures, addresses and summons.

Musical Work
S.15 interprets this to include any musical work, irrespective of musical quality, and words composed for musical accompaniment.
Artistic Works

Means, under S.15, irrespective of artistic quality, any of the following or work similar thereto.

paintings, drawings, etchings, lithographs, woodcuts, engravings and prints; photographs not comprised in a cinematography film, maps, plans and diagrams; works of sculpture; works of architecture in the form of buildings or models; and works of artistic craftsmanship.

Cinematography films
This is interpreted under Section 15 to include the material first embodying the recording of a sequence of visual images capable by use of that material;

of being shown as a moving picture; or of being recorded on other material by the use of which it can be shown, and material first embodying the recording of a sound track associated with the film.

Gramophone Records
Under S.15, it means the material first embodying the recording of a
sequence of pounds capable, by the use of that material of being automatically reproduced aurally but does not include a sound track associated with a cinematography film.

Broadcasts
Under S.15 includes a sound or television broadcast of any material not broadcast by the use, whether direct or indirect, of  broadcast.
a gramophone record, copies of which have been issued to the public; or a cinematography film, copies of which have been issued or exhibited to the public and a broadcast by diffusion over wires.

The Act goes on to state that for Literary, Musical or artistic works to be eligible for copyright; -

Sufficient efforts should have been expended on giving the work an original character;

The work should have been written down, recorded or otherwise reduced in to material form.

An artistic work shall not be eligible if at the time when the work is made it is intended by the author to be used or multiplied by any industrial process.

Further, a work will not be eligible for copyright simply by virtue of the fact that the making of the work or the doing of any act in relation to the work was involved in an infringement of copyright in some other work.

Nature of copyright
Copyright, confers an exclusive right subject to the provisions of the Act to do or authorise the doing in Uganda or any other country of any of the following acts in respect of the whole or a substantial part of the work either in its original form as in any form recognisably derived from the original. In the case of a literary, musical or artistic work.

the distribution or copies of the work;
the public performance for payment; and
the broadcasting of the work.

in the case of a cinematography film

the distribution of copies of  the film;
the public exhibition for payment; and
the broadcasting of the film.

in the case of a gramophone record

it shall be the exclusive right to control the distribution in Uganda and in any other country.

In the case of broadcasts

the distribution of copies.
the public communication of them; and
the re-broadcasting of the work.

However, a copyright in a television broadcast shall not include the right to control the distribution on re-broadcasting of still photographs taken from the broadcast if done by way of fair dealing for purposes of criticism or review or the reporting of current events.

The Right and Ownership of Copyright
The Act states that a copyright shall be conferred on every work eligible for copyright for which the author, or in the case of joint authorship, any of the authors at the time of the work: -

is a citizen of or is domiciled as resident in Uganda or any of the countries specified in the second schedule of the Act.
Do the laws of Uganda or any such country incorporate a body corporate.

A copyright so conferred shall vest initially in the author.