"copyright" = "right to copy".
- - - A legal protection in place in most countries designed to protect the creators of literary, artistic and other work from theft, ie, people using their work without paying them.
- - - The word, "copyright", usually refers to unlimited rights, as in, "In the USA, the copyright to a photograph is automatically granted to the original photographer unless other arrangements were made. A copyright does not have to be registered with the government to be valid and in effect."
"license"
- - - Usually refers to carefully specified, limited rights to the use of a literary, artistic or other work. As in, "I purchased a license from Deposit Photos to use this image for a 2 month run of web advertisements for my little home business. The price was astonishingly low."
HTH,
Tom