Source: http://ivanhoffman.com/fillingout.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 00:45:21+00:00

Document:
Think filling out a copyright application is a “slam dunk?” Maybe not. And guessing wrong could cost you your rights of registration (read “Do I Need To Register My Copyrights?” ) and many tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees and related costs.
A recent case highlights the issues. In Dr. Seuss Enterprises, L.P. vs. Comicmix, LLC, et. al., the trial court in the United States District Court for the Southern District of California was faced with an issue that frankly comes up more often than not as it deals with a somewhat confusing section of the various copyright forms. And the key question in this case was whether or not the copyright applications for “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!” (“Go!”) and “The Sneetches and Other Stories” (“Sneetches”) were based on inaccurate information and if so, whether the Register of Copyrights should refuse registration.
the inaccuracy of the information, if known, would have caused the Register of Copyrights to refuse registration.
Another short work written by Dr. Seuss is “The economic situation clarified: A prognostic re-evaluation” (hereinafter, “Economic Situation”), first published in the June 15, 1975 issue of The New York Times Magazine. The New York Times obtained a copyright for the collective work as the owner, (ECF No. 57-10), and obtained a renewal registration in the collective work in 2003. “Economic Situation” is a short work printed on a background image. The image, with changes, appears in Go! (See MTN 12, 14 (artwork compared).) When Dr. Seuss applied to the Copyright Office to register the copyright in Go!, he did not reference “Economic Situation” in the application.
So the issue presented was whether, when Dr. Seuss and Dr. Seuss Enterprises, LP (“Seuss”) filled out the copyright applications for these works, the failure to note that the claims were based on previously published works rendered the copyright applications defective warranting refusal of the registrations.
The legal position of Seuss was that there was no inaccuracy in either application because (i) the material from the prior works comprised an insignificant portion of the books that were the subject of the applications; (ii) that it was not required to disclose re-use of these prior works because they were authored by the same party applying for the copyrights; and (iii) that the defendants did not prejudicially rely on the said omissions and those omissions were not part of any effort to fraudulently conceal the facts about the prior works.
Dr. Seuss left this line blank.
Copyright in each separate contribution to a collective work is distinct from copyright in the collective work as a whole, and vests initially in the author of the contribution.
The Court went on to discuss one of the key issues: whether an applicant has to disclose a prior work that the work being applied for is based upon IF that prior work was authored by the applicant.
The law is somewhat divided as to whether the author is required to disclose prior works on a copyright application even if those prior works were created by the author himself. Under 17 U.S.C. § 409(9), "[t]he application for copyright registration . . . shall include . . . in the case of a compilation or derivative work, an identification of any preexisting work or works that it is based on or incorporates, and a brief, general statement of the additional material covered by the copyright claim being registered." Some courts have held disclosure is not required if the prior work was created by the same author. The court in Frank Betz Associates, Inc. v. J.O. Clark Construction, LLC, No. 3:08-cv-159, 2010 WL 2253541, at *11 (M.D. Tenn. May 30, 2010), held "[t]he issue raised by § 409(9) is whether and to what extent the derivative design incorporates elements designed by someone else." Where the evidence indicates that plaintiff created derivative designs based on its own original designs, "the concerns that § 409(9) raises are not implicated." Id. Similarly, the court in Robert L. Stark Enterprises, Inc. v. Neptune Design Group, LLC, No. 1:16 CV 264, 2017 WL 1345195, at *9 (N.D. Ohio Apr. 12, 2017), stated "[t]o the extent defendant owns a valid copyright in [the prior] plans, the Court finds that on the facts of this case, the failure to disclose the plans as pre-existing material when registering later works, standing alone, would not invalidate the subsequent registration." The court reasoned, "[a]s the copyright would have simply incorporated plans created by defendant, its failure to identify those plans as pre-existing materials does not implicate Section 409(9) of the Copyright Act." Id.; see also Dorchen/Martin Assocs., Inc. v. Brook of Cheboygan, Inc., No. 11-10561, 2012 WL 4867608, at *6 (E.D. Mich. Oct. 15, 2012) (finding that the plaintiff was the author of the prior plan, which was used to create the new plan, and "[t]o deny Plaintiff protection for that plan, simply because it failed to identify an earlier version it created and incorporated, would contravene the purpose of rule 409(9)").
The purpose of disclosure on Space 6 is twofold: to permit the Copyright Office to determine whether the new material is sufficient to support the derivative registration, and to place on the public record a clean separation of the original, preexisting work from the derivative work so that copyright in the original work is not impermissibly extended through successive registrations for undisclosed variations.
Id. Further, the current edition of the Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices states "[t]he U.S. Copyright Office has a longstanding practice of precluding previously published material from a claim in a collective work or derivative work, even if the author of the collective work or derivative work is the author of the previously published material and owns all of the rights in that material." U.S. Copyright Office, Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices, § 1008.2 (3d ed. 2017) (hereinafter "Compendium").
The Court agrees with the latter determinations. The purpose of the statute requiring disclosure is better served when disclosure is made whether the previously published material was copyrighted and/or written by the author or by a third party. It is immaterial whether Dr. Seuss or another party owned the copyrights for the Redbook stories and "Economic Situation."
But the Court found that the prior work as to “Sneetches” did not form a “substantial” part of the work being registered and thus the application in this regard was not inaccurate.
As to “Go!” the Court found there were several issues.
However, keep in mind, that the rules may have changed now.
General Instructions: Complete space 6 if this work is a “changed version,” “compilation,” or “derivative work” and if it incorporates one or more earlier works that have already been published or registered for copyright or that have fallen into the public domain. A “compilation” is defined as “a work formed by the collection and assembling of preexisting materials or of data that are selected, coordinated, or arranged in such a way that the resulting work as a whole constitutes an original work of authorship.” A “derivative work” is “a work based on one or more preexisting works.” Examples of derivative works include translations, fictionalizations, abridgments, condensations, or “any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted.” Derivative works also include works “consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, or other modifications” if these changes, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship.
Note that the language about “substantial” is not part of these applications. The Dr. Seuss case was decided based on the law at the time of the filings. The situation may be different now.
Same Version: If this version is substantially the same as the work covered by a previous registration, a second registration is not generally possible unless: (1) the work has been registered in unpublished form and a second registration is now being sought to cover this first published edition; or (2) someone other than the author is identified as copyright claimant in the earlier registration, and the author is now seeking registration in his or her own name. If either of these two exceptions applies, check the appropriate box and give the earlier registration number and date. Otherwise, do not submit Form TX. Instead, write the Copyright Office for information about supplementary registration or recordation of transfers of copyright ownership.
Previous Registration Number and Date: If more than one previous registration has been made for the work, give the number and date of the latest registration.
So as you can see, there is a relationship between the information required under Space 5 and Space 6.
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