Logically, copyright does not only address the author. Several parties have an interest in a created work:
- The author creates the work and possibly also wants to be paid for their work;
- Agents who are known as mediators of copyrighted work help authors to make their work available to the public (e.g. publishing houses). As mediators usually require authors to assign rights to them, they are also owners of rights;
- Users of a work (or users) wish to ‘consume’ the work, i.e. either just enjoy the work, which is termed perception of a work (e.g. listen to, look at, read), or use the work in some other form (e.g. reproduce, distribute).