OpenAd.net is an online platform for the buying and selling of advertising, marketing and design ideas (creative material). OpenAd.net acquires and manages material contributed by creatives (sellers, authors) and offers them for sale (licensing) to Members (buyers).
OpenAd.net transfers copyright, including all material rights in an idea, from the author of an idea to the buyer. The precondition for the submission of any idea to OpenAd.net is that all intellectual property issues must be settled prior to submission. Authors must have full copyright ownership of all elements within any idea submitted to OpenAd.net.
Note
When a buyer licenses an idea from OpenAd.net, they are licensing only the concept – that is, the author's presentation and combination of the elements of the idea – rather than the elements themselves. Those elements (photography, music, illustrations, layout, etc) must be licensed separately by the buyer and are not covered by the licence fee paid by the buyer to the author.
Here are two examples to illustrate this:
1. An author uses a photograph from the Corbis photostock library (which they are entitled to do free of charge under OpenAd.net's agreement with Corbis) as part of a print ad idea, and a buyer decides to license and produce that idea. The buyer must purchase that photograph from Corbis before any further production using that photograph can take place.
2. An author owns the copyright to a piece of music used in a radio ad idea (i.e. he composed it himself, or purchased it) that is licensed by a buyer. The licence fee paid by the buyer does not include any further licence fee for that piece of music; this must be negotiated separately. As buyers and creatives are aware, music copyright is a particularly complex area of law. No music that is not fully owned by an author may form part of any idea submitted to OpenAd.net. Authors may, of course, suggest a piece of music to accompany their idea, but they may not upload the music itself. If the buyer decides to follow the author's suggestion, they will have to license the music in question separately.
Authors can submit creative material to OpenAd.net after signing two copies of the Assignment and returning them to the London address of OpenAd UK Ltd. When an author signs the Assignment, he is indicating that he accepts the terms of the Author Agreement, wherein all rights in creative material are assigned to OpenAd.net for 18 months. The Assignment is a constituent part of the Author Agreement and its signing is only valid if the author has indicated that he accepts the terms of the Author Agreement. The Assignment has no validity on its own.
It is OpenAd.net's firm aim to make the system as safe and transparent as possible for both buyers and sellers.
