I am not a lawyer. There is a concept of "derivative work" and copyright protection extends to derivative work. A translation[1], for example, is a derivative w

I am not a lawyer. There is a concept of "derivative work" and copyright protection extends to derivative work. A translation[1], for example, is a derivative work regardless of being complete. So subtitles fall under the same copyright as the original work and distributing subtitles without the copyright holder permission is an infringement of his copyright[2]. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derived_work#Definition http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derived_work#Definition [2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fansub#Legal_and_ethical_issues http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fansub#Legal_and_ethical_issues