Re: And now for something completely different:

From: Frederick E Emrich <emrich[_at_]U.Arizona.EDU>
Date: Wed, 18 Jun 1997 12:24:22 -0700 (MST)

On Tue, 17 Jun 1997, Terry Carroll <carroll[_at_]tjc.com> wrote:
>
> On Mon, 16 Jun 1997, Amalyah Keshet <akeshet[_at_]netvision.net.il> wrote:
> >
> > But if the *original* work of art (the unique, physical original, a
> > painting for example) is thrown away/destroyed, is copyright abandoned?
> > If the artist himself does the throwing out or destroying, could this
> > not be construed as evidence of intent to abandon copyright?
> > (Theoretical scenario: an artist destroys his original painting, but
> > continues to license use of copies of it, as copyright holder. That, I
> > assume, would be evidence of lack of intent to abandon copyright.)
>
> There have been cases that say that a copyright owner's deliberate
> destruction of the only known copy of a work may be evidence of the
> copyright owner's intent to abandon the copyright. One case I recall on
> this point involved a news station that routinely destroyed its tapes of
> old broadcasts, and who nonetheless sued a "clipping service" for copying
> off-air broadcasts and then sold the copies. (In fact, if I recall
> correctly, the plaintiff obtained the copy for the Copyright Office
> deposit by ordering a copy from the defendant.)
>
> I agree with the court of appeals in that case that such destruction may
> be considered as evidence of an intent to abandon the copyright. However,
> I would want to see significantly more evidence before I would conclude
> that there was such an intent. If an artist destroys the only known copy
> (e.g., the original) of a work, for example, I rather doubt that that
> indicates his intent to abandon the copyright and thereby dedicate the
> work to the public domain. Instead, I think it's far more likely that the
> artist was intending to prevent further reproduction and distribution of
> the work. This is quite the opposite of abandoning the copyright, and
> exactly the sort of thing that copyright is intended to allow.

But isn't the idea behind copyright to encourage the dissemination of information by allowing the producer an exclusive right to make money on that idea, rather than to give the "owner" of the work the opportunity to deny any possibility of such dissemination? Destruction of the only known copy of a work would seem to fly in the face of copyright's underlying principle. Copyright is not intended to allow a creator the right to destroy his work, but to give the creator a financial incentive to create and share that work.

--Rick Emrich

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Rick Emrich
emrich[_at_]U.Arizona.EDU Received on Wed Jun 18 1997 - 19:27:05 GMT