Artists can register their work on the TEIA DAO's copyright contract and declare their intentions on what owners of their work can or cannot do - effectively turning NFTs into a portable license that can be used for their own purposes - display, reproduce, broadcast, adapt. Going a few steps further than the typical “All Rights Reserved” and Creative Commons licensing, this registration process lets artists set each term themselves, clause by clause, rather than choosing from a fixed menu of licenses.
reading the registry…
Registrations are made on TEIA's own copyright tool and read here straight from the contract. Register your work on TEIA ↗
What this page is. teia.cafe displays entries recorded on the copyright registry contract operated by the TEIA DAO LLC on the Tezos blockchain. teia.cafe does not operate that contract, does not create, verify, moderate or countersign entries, and is not a party to any licence recorded in it. Entries are reproduced as their registrants wrote them.
Identity is asserted by key control, not verified. A registration binds a statement of terms to a Tezos wallet address. Neither the contract nor teia.cafe verifies the legal identity of the person or entity controlling that address, nor that they hold the rights they purport to license. Every registration proceeds on the assumption that the party controlling a wallet's private key is the party bound by, and entitled to the benefit of, the terms recorded against it. That assumption can fail: keys may be shared, delegated, lost, stolen or transferred, and an address may be operated by someone other than its apparent owner. Anyone relying on a registration should satisfy themselves independently as to who they are dealing with.
Existing law and prior agreements take precedence. A registration does not displace anything that already binds the registrant. Statute, mandatory rules and moral rights in the applicable jurisdiction; prior or subsequent written agreements; employment, commission and work-for-hire arrangements; publishing, label, distribution or collecting-society obligations; and the terms of any platform on which a work is minted or sold all take precedence over a registration to the extent of any conflict. Where a registrant lacks the capacity or authority to grant the terms recorded, those terms are ineffective whatever the chain says.
What a registration is for. Its purpose is evidentiary: to document a clear statement of intent, attributable to a wallet address, fixed at a known moment and publicly readable from then on. It is not an adjudicated licence, a warranty of title or authorship, a transfer of copyright, or a substitute for a signed agreement where one is required, and it does not enforce itself. Whether a given registration is legally effective, and against whom, is a question for the applicable law and for counsel.
No advice, no warranty. Nothing on this page is legal advice, and reading it creates no professional relationship. Entries are shown as read from the chain through third-party indexers and may be incomplete, out of date, superseded by a later entry, or simply wrong. To the fullest extent permitted by law, teia.cafe gives no warranty as to the accuracy, validity or enforceability of any registration and accepts no liability for reliance placed on one. On-chain records are public and permanent: do not register anything you are not content to publish irrevocably.
Take advice before you rely on this. Where something turns on the terms of a registration - money, a licence you intend to grant or accept, an infringement you intend to pursue - consult a qualified lawyer in the relevant jurisdiction first.
In short.TEIA's registration system is the peer-to-peer version of copyright licensing. There is no central authority adjudicating these terms, and no automatic remedy behind them: disputes and resolutions happen case by case, person to person, between the parties themselves. The blockchain's role is largely documentary - a dated, tamper-evident record of what was declared and by which wallet, of the kind courts commonly accept as electronic evidence, subject to the rules of the forum hearing it. That is a genuinely useful thing to have and it is not the same as a judgment. If you are unsure where you stand, consult a lawyer.