copywrong

English

Etymology

Blend of copyright +‎ wrong·

Noun

copywrong (countable and uncountable, plural copywrongs)

1. (nonce word) The unethical use of, or disregard for, copyright law.
   • 1847, Freeman Hunt, Hunt's merchants' magazine, page 539:

     We do it with less compunctious visitings of conscience, on the score of copyright or copywrong, as we are informed by the New York bookseller, that the demand, since we commenced the publication of our extracts, has been greater than the supply...

   • 1998 March 23, Network World, volume 15, number 12:

     But immediately we run headlong into the issue of copywrong. For instance, take a sample of some artist and mix it with other samples and sounds to create a new work and you will get a composition that will attract entertainment lawyers like a garbage bin gathers flies.

   • 2005, Gerard M Stegmaier, The Digital Millennium Copyright Act: 2005 supplement:

     For me personally, the copyrights and "copywrongs," as I have called them, simply boil down to either one or two things, and that is it's either an act of distribution or it is an act of consumption.

See also

• copyleft