Copyright
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50 free Copyright trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Copyright touches almost everything people read, watch, hear and post, yet most of us only notice it after a video is taken down or an old character suddenly appears in a strange new film. The rules are full of surprises, from works that anyone may copy freely to courtroom fights that changed how pop songs are written. This quiz covers the ground a curious person would want: what the law protects and what it leaves free, how fair use and the public domain work, the difference between copyright and other kinds of intellectual property, the rules creators meet on YouTube, and the authors, musicians and film-makers whose disputes made headlines. It suits students, teachers, creators and anyone who enjoys a good legal oddity. Every question comes with a short explanation, so you will leave knowing why the answer is right, not only which option to pick.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Whose 1963 speech at the Lincoln Memorial is protected by copyright, as a 1999 lawsuit against CBS confirmed?
Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. spoke to a vast radio and television audience, which raised doubts over whether the words had passed into the public domain. The courts sided with his estate.
Q 02Photos of which Paris landmark are free to publish by day, though its operator claims copyright over the night lights?
Eiffel Tower
The Eiffel Tower itself has been in the public domain since 1993, 70 years after Gustave Eiffel's death. A French court ruled in 1990 that a light display on it was an original creation in its own right.
Q 03Which animal pressed the shutter for the 2011 selfies that led US officials to say only humans can hold copyright?
A monkey
A monkey, a crested macaque in Indonesia, took the pictures with photographer David Slater's camera. An animal rights group sued on its behalf, calling it Naruto, and the case was dismissed.
Q 04Which song did Warner Chappell collect licensing fees on until a US court threw out its copyright claim in 2015?
Happy Birthday to You
Happy Birthday to You is traced to a greeting tune two Kentucky sisters published for kindergarten classes in 1893. Warner Chappell agreed to pay back $14 million in fees.
Q 05Which 1928 Mickey Mouse cartoon entered the US public domain in 2024?
Steamboat Willie
Steamboat Willie had been due to lapse in 2003 before a 1998 law added 20 more years. Two earlier silent Mickey films had failed to find a distributor, so this counts as his official debut.
Q 06Which storybook bear entered the US public domain in 2022 and promptly became the killer in a low-budget horror film?
Winnie-the-Pooh
Winnie-the-Pooh became fair game once A. A. Milne's 1926 book lost its protection. The slasher Blood and Honey, made on a shoestring, took $7.7 million worldwide.
Q 07British law lets Great Ormond Street Hospital collect payments forever from stagings of which children's story?
Peter Pan
Peter Pan was a gift: J. M. Barrie handed the rights to the London children's hospital in 1929 and asked that the sums never be revealed. A 1988 Act made the payments permanent.
Q 08A court ordered every copy of the 1922 film Nosferatu destroyed after the widow of which novel's author sued?
Dracula
Dracula had been filmed without permission, with the count renamed Orlok. Bram Stoker's widow Florence won, yet several prints survived, which is why the film can be watched now.
Q 09George Harrison was found to have subconsciously copied the Chiffons' He's So Fine in which chart-topping solo single?
My Sweet Lord
My Sweet Lord, the first number one by an ex-Beatle, was ruled an infringement although the judge accepted the copying was unintentional. Harrison then wrote the upbeat This Song about the case.
Q 10Which 1946 film became a Christmas television staple after a 1974 clerical error let its US copyright lapse?
It's a Wonderful Life
It's a Wonderful Life was then shown again and again each December, which is how it became a classic. In 1993 its owner reclaimed control through the short story it was based on.
Q 11Which file-sharing service, launched in 1999 by Shawn Fanning, shut down after Metallica and the record labels sued?
Napster
Napster took its name from Fanning's school nickname and let millions swap songs directly between their computers. An injunction closed the whole network in July 2001.
Q 12Vanilla Ice settled out of court after Ice Ice Baby borrowed the bassline of which earlier rock hit?
Under Pressure
Under Pressure earned Bowie and every member of Queen a songwriting credit on the rap hit. Vanilla Ice had claimed that one added note made his bassline different, which he later called a joke.
Q 13Which kind of legal protection, separate from copyright, covers a brand name such as Pepsi or a company's logo?
A trademark
Q 21Which English novelist spent his 1842 American tour complaining that US publishers printed his books without paying?
Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens got 25 American writers, led by Washington Irving, to sign a petition to Congress. The press called him mercenary, and the US gave foreign authors no protection until 1891.
Q 22The heirs of sculptor Edvard Eriksen sued a newspaper over a cartoon of which famous statue, losing in 2023?
The Little Mermaid
The Little Mermaid stays protected until 2030, seventy years after Eriksen's death. Two lower courts had sided with the heirs before Denmark's Supreme Court ruled the cartoon a lawful parody.
Q 23Led Zeppelin won a 2020 US appeal over claims that the opening of which song was lifted from Spirit's Taurus?
A trademark can be renewed indefinitely for as long as the mark is in use, while copyright runs out. Even a shape can qualify: the contoured Coca-Cola bottle is registered as one.
Q 14What is the term for passing off someone else's writing as your own, which can be wrong even where no copyright applies?
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is about credit, not permission: copying a long-dead author without acknowledgement breaks no law but is cheating all the same. Infringement means using protected work without consent.
Q 15Which founding US document lets Congress grant authors exclusive rights to their writings, but only for limited times?
The US Constitution
The US Constitution ties the power to a purpose: promoting the progress of science and useful arts. James Madison was among the delegates who proposed it, and the same clause covers inventors.
Q 16Which company's Betamax recorder was cleared by the US Supreme Court in 1984, making home taping of TV shows fair use?
Sony
Sony won by a single vote, 5–4, after Universal and Disney had objected to the machines. Recording a programme to watch later, known as time-shifting, was held not to infringe.
Q 17A 2015 jury found that the Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams hit Blurred Lines copied a 1977 song by which soul singer?
Marvin Gaye
Marvin Gaye's family argued the hit copied the feel and sound of Got to Give It Up, which Thicke had called one of his favourite songs. Gaye was given a posthumous songwriting credit.
Q 18Which bestselling thriller survived a 2006 lawsuit by two authors who said it stole their Holy Grail theory?
The Da Vinci Code
The Da Vinci Code was safe, the judge held, because a novelist is free to use ideas that others have presented as historical research. The claimants had written The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail.
Q 19Which accordion-playing comedy act asks artists' permission before spoofing their hits, though parody can be fair use?
Weird Al Yankovic
Weird Al Yankovic asks as a courtesy, and most stars agree: Kurt Cobain reportedly took a Nirvana spoof as a sign the band had made it. Lady Gaga approved hers after her manager had refused.
Q 20Which American novelist urged Congress in 1906 to extend copyright so that it would take care of an author's children?
Mark Twain
Mark Twain backed a term of the author's life plus 50 years and said the grandchildren could take care of themselves. He had earlier put his own rights in his wife's name to keep them from creditors.
Stairway to Heaven
Stairway to Heaven opens with acoustic arpeggios that resemble the 1968 instrumental. Spirit's guitarist, who wrote it, never sued; a trust filed the claim in 2014, years after his death.
Q 24Which part of a novel gets no protection under US copyright law, which is why different books can share one?
Its title
Its title is left free for anyone, along with names, slogans, short phrases and band names. A recipe's bare list of ingredients gets no protection either.
Q 25At what moment does an original sketch first gain copyright protection under United States law?
When it is drawn
When it is drawn, a picture is protected at once, because the law asks only that a work be fixed in a tangible form. Registration is optional, though it is needed before bringing a lawsuit.
Q 26How many copyright strikes within 90 days lead YouTube to terminate a channel and remove all of its videos?
Three
Three strikes close the channel, wipe its videos and bar the owner from opening another. Each strike expires after 90 days, so a careful creator's count can fall back to zero.
Q 27Which automated YouTube system checks every upload against a database of fingerprints supplied by copyright owners?
Content ID
Content ID lets the owner decide what happens to a match: block the video, track its viewing figures, or run adverts on it and keep the proceeds.
Q 28Which 1998 US law created the notice-and-takedown process websites use to remove uploads that infringe copyright?
DMCA
The DMCA, signed by Bill Clinton, spares a site from liability for what its users post so long as it acts promptly on complaints. That bargain is called a safe harbor.
Q 29Which nonprofit, founded in 2001, offers free licences that let creators share work on conditions such as giving credit?
Creative Commons
Creative Commons licences cover the text of the world's biggest online encyclopaedia, which anyone may reuse with credit. Law professor Lawrence Lessig co-founded the group to counter what he called a permission culture.
Q 30What term describes licences such as the GNU GPL, which let anyone adapt software if the result stays equally free?
Copyleft
Copyleft turns the usual rights notice on its head, and its symbol is a backwards C in a circle. Richard Stallman, who wrote the GPL, took the word from a letter he received in the mid-1980s.