Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/11pdf/10-545.pdf
Page Number: 13.0

Cite as:  565 U. S. ____ (2012) 

9 

Opinion of the Court 

had  no  right  to  exclusivity  in  the  United  States  for  any
of  three  reasons:  lack  of  copyright  relations  between  the 
country  of  origin  and  the  United  States  at  the  time  of
publication;  lack  of  subject-matter  protection  for  sound 
recordings  fixed  before  1972;  and  failure  to  comply  with 
U. S. statutory formalities (e.g., failure to provide notice of
copyright  status,  or  to  register  and  renew  a  copyright).
See §104A(h)(6)(B)–(C).11 

Works that have fallen into the public domain after the 

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is,  or  after  such  date  of  enactment  becomes,  a  nation  adhering  to 
the  Berne  Convention.”    §104A(h)(3).    As  noted  above,  see  supra, 
at  3,  164  countries  adhere  to  the  Berne  Convention.    World  Intellec-
tual  Property  Organization,  Contracting  Parties:  Berne  Convention, 
www.wipo.int/treaties  (as  visited  Jan.  13,  2012,  and  in  Clerk  of  Court’s 
case file). 

11 From  the  first  Copyright  Act  until  late  in  the  20th  century,  Con-
gress  conditioned  copyright  protection  on  compliance  with  certain 
statutory formalities.  The most notable required an author to register
her  work,  renew  that  registration,  and  affix  to  published  copies  notice
of copyrighted status.  The formalities drew criticism as a trap for the 
unwary.  See, e.g., 2 Nimmer §7.01[A], p. 7–8; Doyle, Cary, McCannon, 
&  Ringer,  Notice  of  Copyright,  Study  No.  7,  p.  46  (1957),  reprinted  in
1 Studies on Copyright 229, 272 (1963). 

In  1976,  Congress  eliminated  the  registration  renewal  requirement 
for future works.  Copyright Act of 1976, §302, 408, 90 Stat. 2572, 2580.
In  1988,  it  repealed  the  mandatory  notice  prerequisite.    BCIA  §7,  102 
Stat. 2857.  And in 1992, Congress made renewal automatic for works
still  in  their  first  term  of  protection.    Copyright  Amendments  Act  of 
1992,  106  Stat.  264–266.    The  Copyright  Act  retains,  however,  incen-
tives for authors to register their works and provide notice of the works’
copyrighted status.  See, e.g., 17 U. S. C. §405(b) (precluding actual and
statutory  damages  against  “innocent  infringers”  of  a  work  that  lacked 
notice  of  copyrighted  status);  §411(a)  (requiring  registration  of  U. S. 
“work[s],” but not foreign works, before an owner may sue for infringe-
ment).  The revisions successively made accord with Berne Convention 
Article  5(2),  which  proscribes  application  of  copyright  formalities  to
foreign  authors.    Berne,  however,  affords  domestic  authors  no  escape
from  domestic  formalities.    See  Art.  5(3)  (protection  within  country  of
origin is a matter of domestic law).