What is a Sublicense?

Sublicense means: A license giving rights of production or marketing of products or services to a person or company that is not the primary holder of such rights.

Perpetual means: Lasting forever; never-ending.

As a creative person, you can find many websites that offer help in the form of submissions for prizes, awards, publications, etc.  Sometimes companies claim a perpetual sublicense of an artists’ works.  Here’s an example:

This information was found in small print, two page clicks away from the submission page.

There’s one grey area of helping an artist with marketing and media.  If a company is concerned about protecting an artist’ works, this is simply done by adding copyright information, not by insisting on a perpetual, royalty free, non-exclusive, sublicense right.

What does Royalty Free mean?  It refers to the legal permission to use copyrighted material or intellectual property without the obligation to pay royalties for each use.

The stipulation above means that the company has the right to the works submitted forever and can sell the works without paying royalties to the artist.

It’s not an honest company and it’s actually against Human Rights:

Article 27 — Right To Participate in and Enjoy the Culture of One’s Community

(1) Everyone has the right to freely participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.

(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.

Study the website before submitting!