Re: comment on copyright case?

On 04/24/2000, Jessica R. Friedman <jrfriedman[_at_]earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> On Mon, 24 Apr 2000, Laurie Urquiaga <urquiagal[_at_]lawgate.byu.edu> wrote:
> >
> > I haven't seen any commentary about this case:
> >
> > > Publisher's Copyright of Magazine Issue Won't Protect Individual Authors
> > >
> > > Copyright registration of an entire issue of a magazine does not
> > > extend protection to the individual articles within the magazine,
> > > a federal court in New York ruled. The U.S. District Court for
> > > the Southern District of New York found that an author's failure
> > > to obtain copyright registration of her columns left her without
> > > a remedy for "abject and reprehensible" copying by another
> > > publisher. (IP Law Weekly -- For complete story, see
> > > http://www.lawnewsnetwork.com/stories/A21143-2000Apr13.html)
> >
> > Although I'm just a lowly 1L, it seems to me that the summary judgment
> > order was wrong in this case. Failure to register copyright prohibits
> > statutory damages, but isn't the copyright owner still entitled to
> > actual and consequential damages? What's the point of the 1976 change
> > removing the need to register if registration is still required for
> > protection?
>
> I think it's also in conflict with at least one prior ruling that the
> copyright in an issue of a periodical protects an individual article.
> Of course, I can't recall the name of the case or even the court in
> which the decision came down, but it was a couple of years ago at least.

Ms. Friedman may be thinking about copyright notice rather than registration. Sec. 404(a) provides that "a single notice applicable to the collective work as a whole is sufficient [notice] ... with respect to the separate contributions it contains ... regardless of the ownership of the copyright in the contributions and whether or not they have been previously published." There is no comparable provision regarding registration, however.

Tyler T. Ochoa
Associate Professor
Whittier Law School
<tochoa[_at_]law.whittier.edu> Received on Tue Apr 25 2000 - 18:16:29 GMT