Re: copyright for fonts?

On Thu, 30 Sep 1999, Ralph Clifford <rclifford[_at_]snesl.edu> wrote:
>
> According to the legislative history, no. "The Committee does
> not regard the design of typeface, as thus defined, to be copyrightable
> 'pictorial, graphic, or sculptural work' within the meaning of [the
> copyright act] ..." H. Rep. No. 94-1476 at 55. The Committee seemed
> to think that typefaces were industrial designs which were excluded from
> copyright protection as useful articles.

Of course, the context of this remark is the House Committee's opinion about the 1909 Copyright Act, not of its own legislation.

Both the House and Senate Committee's reports make clear that the 1976 Act simply incorporated the 1909 Act's requirements for copyright subject matter unchanged:

     The phrase "original works of authorship," which is purposely 
     left undefined, is intended to incorporate without change the 
     standard of originality established by the courts under the 
     present copyright statute [i.e., the 1909 Copyright Act].  This
     standard does not include requirements of novelty, ingenuity, 
     or esthetic merit, and there is no intention to enlarge the 
     standard of copyright protection to require them. 

H. Rep. No. 94-1476 at 51; S. Rep. 94-473 at 50 (identical text in both reports). So the House comment, when read in conjunction with the above, makes it clear that it's talking about the the 60th Congress' legislation enacted 68 years earlier, not its own.

Only the House Committee added the view construing the 1909 Act with regard to typeface. Given that it's not an interpretation of its own enactment, and represents only the House Committee's views even on that, it's not as authoritative a comment as it would at first appear to be.

-- 
Terry Carroll         |
Santa Clara, CA       |            
carroll[_at_]tjc.com       |
Modell delendus est   |