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.

I beg Ms. Friedman's pardon. There are several cases so holding, but they are distinguishable. See, e.g., Woods v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 920 F.Supp. 62, 64 (S.D.N.Y.1996), in which the court held that copyright registration for a collective work satisfies the registration requirements of Sec. 411(a) for an infringement action based on constituent parts, but only where the owner of the copyright for the collective work also owns the copyright in the constituent parts. In the case Ms. Urquiaga mentioned, the owners of the copyright in the collective work and the copyright in the individual contribution were NOT the same; so the holdings do not conflict.

Tyler T. Ochoa
Associate Professor
Whittier Law School
<tochoa[_at_]law.whittier.edu> Received on Tue Apr 25 2000 - 18:56:30 GMT