Source: https://proceedings.nyumootcourt.org/2018/12/reconceptualizing-the-registration-approach-in-anticipation-of-the-supreme-courts-decision-in-fourth-estate/
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 03:46:01+00:00

Document:
Should the Copy­right Office be able to vet copy­right appli­ca­tions before any action for copy­right infringe­ment is insti­tut­ed? This term, in the upcom­ing case Fourth Estate, the Supreme Court will con­sid­er whether “reg­is­tra­tion” with­in the mean­ing of the Unit­ed States Copy­right Act mere­ly mean that the com­po­nents of the appli­ca­tion need to be sub­mit­ted to the Copy­right Office (the “appli­ca­tion” approach) or that the Copy­right Office has affir­ma­tive­ly approved or refused the appli­ca­tion (the “reg­is­tra­tion” approach). In this Con­tri­bu­tion, Jonathan Wieder (’19) dis­cuss­es the tex­tu­al and leg­isla­tive ori­gins and con­se­quences of each approach and the dif­fer­ing cir­cuit inter­pre­ta­tions that led to the grant of cer­tio­rari in Fourth Estate. Ulti­mate­ly, this Con­tri­bu­tion argues that the reg­is­tra­tion approach bet­ter effec­tu­ates con­gres­sion­al pol­i­cy of vest­ing the Copy­right Office with dis­cre­tion over copy­righta­bil­i­ty and bal­anc­ing pro­tec­tions for all par­ties to a copy­right dis­pute.
The Supreme Court in June 2018 grant­ed cer­tio­rari to decide the long­stand­ing debate about a copy­right owner’s oblig­a­tions pri­or to fil­ing an action for copy­right infringe­ment.2 Under Sec­tion 411(a) of the Unit­ed States Copy­right Act, “[n]o civ­il action for infringe­ment of the copy­right in any Unit­ed States work shall be insti­tut­ed until pre-reg­is­tra­tion or reg­is­tra­tion of the copy­right claim has been made in accor­dance with this title.”3 The cir­cuits have split in defin­ing “reg­is­tra­tion” with­in the mean­ing of the statute. At stake in that def­i­n­i­tion is the abil­i­ty of the Copy­right Office to vet copy­right appli­ca­tions in advance of cost­ly lit­i­ga­tion.
This Con­tri­bu­tion will argue that the courts have it back­wards. Though the statute is far more ambigu­ous than has been dis­cussed by the courts to date, the reg­is­tra­tion approach bet­ter effec­tu­ates con­gres­sion­al pol­i­cy of vest­ing the Copy­right Office with dis­cre­tion over copy­righta­bil­i­ty and bal­anc­ing pro­tec­tions for all par­ties to a copy­right dis­pute.
Those oth­er pro­vi­sions lend strong sup­port for the appli­ca­tion approach. First, sec­tion 408(a) of the statute pro­vides that “[t]he own­er of the copy­right … may obtain reg­is­tra­tion by deliv­er­ing to the Copy­right Office a deposit as spec­i­fied by this sec­tion, togeth­er with an appli­ca­tion and fee … Such reg­is­tra­tion is not a con­di­tion of copy­right pro­tec­tion.”11 The lan­guage of “such reg­is­tra­tion” sug­gests that reg­is­tra­tion is defined by the three items pre­vi­ous­ly listed—an appli­ca­tion, deposit, and fee. Sec­ond, sec­tion 411© pro­vides that where the first fix­a­tion of a copy­right is simul­ta­ne­ous with the first trans­mis­sion, the copy­right own­er can sue as long as they pro­vide notice to the Copy­right Office and “make reg­is­tra­tion for the work with­in three months after its first trans­mis­sion.”12 Reg­is­ter­ing with­in three months is gen­er­al­ly impos­si­ble under the reg­is­tra­tion approach since the Copy­right Office takes eight to ten months to make their deci­sion.13 The copy­right own­er would there­fore be forced to employ “Spe­cial Han­dling,” which involves pay­ing an increased fee in exchange for an expe­dit­ed deci­sion.14 That fee might be rea­son­able for the few copy­right­ed works aris­ing under sec­tion 411©, but the time-peri­od of three months is note­wor­thy because it par­al­lels the time peri­od dis­cussed in sec­tion 408(f) in regards to pre­reg­is­tered works.15 More­over, the statute in sec­tion 408(f) spec­i­fies that the three-month peri­od relates to the “con­se­quences of an untime­ly appli­ca­tion” for reg­is­tra­tion.16 Since the three month lim­i­ta­tion in sec­tion 408(f) relates to the appli­ca­tion, it is rea­son­able to sug­gest that the same three-month lim­i­ta­tion in sec­tion 411© also relates to the appli­ca­tion, rather than oblique­ly demand­ing that the copy­right own­er use Spe­cial Han­dling.17 More­over, the par­al­lel between the lan­guage of “makes reg­is­tra­tion” in sec­tion 411© and “reg­is­tra­tion has been made” in the oper­a­tive pro­vi­sion of sec­tion 411(a) opens the pos­si­bil­i­ty that reg­is­tra­tion in the con­text of sec­tion 411(a) also refers to the appli­ca­tion.
Read­ing the statute as a whole, there is ample sup­port for the appli­ca­tion approach.18 Con­verse­ly, while the strength of the tex­tu­al read­ing in sup­port of the appli­ca­tion approach has been under­stat­ed, the pol­i­cy argu­ments mar­shalled by its sup­port­ers have been vast­ly over­stat­ed.
Nor, under the reg­is­tra­tion approach, is the statute indif­fer­ent to pro­tect­ing mer­i­to­ri­ous plain­tiffs. Con­trary to what var­i­ous courts have opined, in the vast major­i­ty of cas­es, no claims or sig­nif­i­cant mon­e­tary dam­ages will be lost by requir­ing the Copy­right Office to take affir­ma­tive action on a reg­is­tra­tion before the own­er can file an infringe­ment law­suit. To hold oth­er­wise effec­tive­ly ignores pro­tec­tions from the statute itself, from oth­er reg­u­la­tions of the Copy­right Office, and from back­ground prin­ci­ples of com­mon law.
The copy­right statute itself con­tains spe­cif­ic carve-outs to ame­lio­rate par­tic­u­lar injuries that might result from delay. For instance, sec­tion 408(f) allows for pre-reg­is­tra­tion of par­tic­u­lar claims where delay in obtain­ing reg­is­tra­tion is most like­ly to cause irrepara­ble harm, pro­vid­ed that the own­er lat­er seeks actu­al copy­right reg­is­tra­tion.28 The excep­tion, as ever, proves the rule. Con­gress leg­is­lat­ed devi­a­tions from the nor­mal reg­is­tra­tion process only in spe­cif­ic instances where there is a his­to­ry of infringe­ment for that class of works, sug­gest­ing that Con­gress coun­te­nanced the delay in oth­er instances. Fur­ther­more, sec­tion 410(d) back­dates the cer­tifi­cate of reg­is­tra­tion which defines the time peri­od in which a copy­right own­er can seek statu­to­ry dam­ages to the time at which the appli­ca­tion of copy­right was deliv­ered to the Copy­right Office.29 In addi­tion to these statu­to­ry pro­tec­tions, the Copy­right Office also offers Spe­cial Han­dling, a form of expe­dit­ed review.30 For eight hun­dred dol­lars, the Copy­right Office can issue a cer­tifi­cate of reg­is­tra­tion with­in a mat­ter of days.31 Final­ly, the three-year statute of lim­i­ta­tions is entire­ly suf­fi­cient because the over­whelm­ing major­i­ty of courts only start tolling the statute of lim­i­ta­tions from the day on which infringe­ment is first dis­cov­ered or with due dili­gence should have been dis­cov­ered, and that peri­od starts anew for every suc­ces­sive infring­ing act.32 There­fore, time should not pre­vent a suf­fi­cient­ly moti­vat­ed copy­right own­er from being able to pro­tect his or her copy­right.
To the extent that, despite these safe­guards, cer­tain reme­dies are for­feit­ed, this rep­re­sents Con­gress’ intent to encour­age prompt reg­is­tra­tion. As the Ninth Cir­cuit not­ed in Cos­met­ic Ideas, Inc. v. IAC/InteractiveCorp, Con­gress sought to cre­ate “incen­tives” to reg­is­ter in the hopes of cre­at­ing a robust nation­al reg­is­ter.33 The appli­ca­tion approach does not incen­tivize reg­is­tra­tion. Rather, copy­right own­ers are unlike­ly to reg­is­ter until the moment that they want to sue for copy­right infringe­ment. The “robust nation­al reg­is­ter” would be reduced to those works for which a copy­right own­er has an infringe­ment claim. In con­trast, because of the acknowl­edged delay in receiv­ing a prop­er copy­right reg­is­tra­tion, the reg­is­tra­tion approach “incen­tivizes” copy­right own­ers to apply for reg­is­tra­tion prompt­ly in case some­one tries to infringe on their copy­right in the near or dis­tant future.
The appli­ca­tion approach is there­fore need­less­ly per­turbed by the con­se­quences for a plain­tiff in a prospec­tive copy­right action. But this analy­sis also focus­es too nar­row­ly on the plain­tiff in a copy­right infringe­ment suit. The appli­ca­tion approach might incen­tivize strike-suits by enabling a plain­tiff to begin expen­sive and lengthy lit­i­ga­tion before the Copy­right Office has an oppor­tu­ni­ty to ful­fill its prop­er role. Indeed, the Copy­right Office’s deter­mi­na­tion on reg­is­tra­tion offers valu­able input to a lit­i­gant as to whether to set­tle or con­tin­ue the case in court, and the inter­ven­tion of the Copy­right Office can save an inno­cent defen­dant con­sid­er­able expense if that inter­ven­tion dis­suades a plain­tiff from bring­ing suit alto­geth­er. The reg­is­tra­tion approach bal­ances pro­tec­tions for a plain­tiff with pro­tec­tions for the defen­dant in such an action.
Under the reg­is­tra­tion approach, reg­is­tra­tion is far from a need­less for­mal­i­ty. It is a del­i­cate bal­anc­ing of the inter­ests of a plain­tiff and defen­dant in a prospec­tive copy­right infringe­ment action. This explains why the reg­is­tra­tion require­ment has sur­vived mul­ti­ple amend­ments to the statute, even as Con­gress removed oth­er “for­mal­i­ties” like the notice require­ment to com­ply with the Berne Con­ven­tion.34 Con­gress’ deci­sion to main­tain the reg­is­tra­tion require­ment should be viewed as delib­er­ate.35 In con­trast, the appli­ca­tion approach makes reg­is­tra­tion a need­less for­mal­i­ty by reduc­ing the require­ment to the mere fil­ing of an appli­ca­tion.
The Supreme Court will soon hear argu­ments in Fourth Estate. To pre­vail in favor of the reg­is­tra­tion approach, an argu­ment ignor­ing the strong tex­tu­al sup­port for the appli­ca­tion approach would be unwise. Instead, advo­cates of the reg­is­tra­tion approach should recon­cep­tu­al­ize reg­is­tra­tion as a vet­ting func­tion which achieves the prop­er bal­ance between pro­tec­tions for plain­tiffs and pro­tec­tions for defen­dants in a copy­right suit.
1. Jonathan Wieder is a 3L at New York Uni­ver­si­ty School of Law. This piece is a com­men­tary on the 2018 Prob­lem at the BMI Moot Court Com­pe­ti­tion held at Car­do­zo Law School in New York City. This issue in the prob­lem dealt with whether a UPS Notice of Receipt of a Copy­right Appli­ca­tion, along with a deposit and prop­er fee was suf­fi­cient under the “reg­is­tra­tion” require­ment of 17 U.S.C. § 411(a) (2008). I am indebt­ed to Pro­fes­sor Sprig­man of NYU School of Law who, dur­ing a cri­tique of a prac­tice moot, sug­gest­ed the ini­tial con­cept for this arti­cle.
2. Fourth Estate Pub. Ben. Corp. v. Wall-Street.com, LLC, 138 S. Ct. 2707 (2018).
3. 17 U.S.C. § 411(a) (2008).
4. La Resolana Archi­tects v. Clay Real­tors Angel Fire, 416 F.3d 1195, 1197 (10th Cir. 2005) (abro­gat­ed on oth­er grounds by Reed Else­vi­er v. Much­nick, 559 U.S. 154 (2010)); Fourth Estate Pub. Ben. Corp. v. Wall-Street.com, LLC, 856 F.3d 1338, 1341 (11th Cir. 2017).
5. Cos­met­ic Ideas, Inc. v. IAC/InteractiveCorp, 606 F.3d 612, 619, (9th Cir. 2010).
6. The Sev­enth and Fifth Cir­cuits are also often cit­ed as fol­low­ing the “appli­ca­tion approach,” but they have not con­sis­tent­ly done so. Com­pare Gaiman v. McFar­lane, 360 F.3d 644, 654 (7th Cir. 2004) (adopt­ing reg­is­tra­tion approach), with Panoram­ic Stock Images, Ltd. v. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 963 F. Supp. 2d 842, 849 (N.D. Ill. 2013) (adopt­ing the appli­ca­tion approach in the absence of con­trol­ling author­i­ty in the Sev­enth Cir­cuit); 1–6 Associate’s Guide to the Prac­tice of Copy­right Law § 6.18 (col­lect­ing cas­es and not­ing that although the Fifth Cir­cuit con­tin­ues to be cit­ed as fol­low­ing the appli­ca­tion approach, recent deci­sions have adopt­ed the reg­is­tra­tion approach).
8. Fourth Estate, 856 F.3d at 1341.
9. 17 U.S.C. § 410.
10. Fourth Estate, 856 F.3d at 1341–42; In La Resolana, 416 F.3d 1195 (10th Cir. 2005), sim­i­lar argu­ments were made for why sec­tion 411(a) also can­not be read to sup­port the appli­ca­tion approach. Specif­i­cal­ly, the court not­ed the abil­i­ty of a copy­right own­er that is refused reg­is­tra­tion to begin a copy­right infringe­ment action despite the refusal so long as they pro­vide notice to the Copy­right Office. That notice require­ment may be prac­ti­cal­ly mean­ing­less if the copy­right own­er was able to start the action months before the refusal is made. How­ev­er, that the copy­right own­er could start an action ear­li­er does not mean that he or she will do so, so the notice pro­vi­sion would still be impor­tant in cer­tain sit­u­a­tions.
11. 17 U.S.C. § 408(a).
12. 17 U.S.C. § 411©.
13. See Fre­quent­ly Asked Ques­tions About Copy­right, Copyright.Gov, https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/index.html.
14. U.S. Copy­right Office, Spe­cial Han­dling (Cir­cu­lar 10), at 2 (Sept. 2017).
17. Peti­tion­er and Respon­dent sparred over this read­ing of sec­tion 411© in their briefs in sup­port of, and oppo­si­tion to, writ of cer­tio­rari in Fourth Estate. Com­pare Fourth Estate Pub­lic Ben­e­fit Corp. v. Wall-Street.com, LLC, 2017 WL 4641783 (U.S.), with Fourth Estate Pub­lic Ben­e­fit Corp. v. Wall-Street.com, LLC, 2017 WL 5989992 (U.S.). But nei­ther not­ed the sim­i­lar­i­ty of the three-month time frame to sec­tion 408(f).
18. Even if this read­ing results in some incon­sis­ten­cy in the def­i­n­i­tion of reg­is­tra­tion, “the pre­sump­tion [of con­sis­tent use] is not rigid and read­i­ly yields when­ev­er there is such vari­a­tion in the con­nec­tion in which the words are used as rea­son­ably to war­rant the con­clu­sion that they were employed in dif­fer­ent parts of the act with dif­fer­ent intent.” Gen. Dynam­ics Land Sys. v. Cline, 540 U.S. 581, 595 (2004).
19. See gen­er­al­ly The Berne Con­ven­tion: Its His­to­ry And Its Key Role In The Future, 3 J.L. & Tech. 1, 2 (1988).
20. See, e.g., Cos­met­ic Ideas, 606 F.3d at 620 (cit­ing 2 Nim­mer on Copy­right §7.16(B)(3)(b)(ii)(2013)).
21. La Resolana, 416 F.3d at 1204; Ryan v. Carl Corp., No. C 97–3873 FMS, 1998 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 9012, at *8 (N.D. Cal. June 15, 1998).
22. Ross v. Blake, 136 S. Ct. 1850, 1855 (2016).
23. See for exam­ple the ongo­ing saga of Ora­cle against Google about copy­right­ing an API com­put­er code. E.g., Ora­cle Am., Inc. v. Google, Inc.,750 F.3d 1339 (Fed. Cir. 2014).
24. John Muller & Co. v. N.Y. Arrows Soc­cer Team, Inc., 802 F.2d 989, 990 (8th Cir. 1986).
25. Report of the Reg­is­ter of Copy­rights on the Gen­er­al Revi­sions of the U.S. Copy­right Law, 87th Cong., 1st Sess. 75 (1861).
26. Id. (quot­ing H.R. Rep. No. 609, 100th Cong., 2d Sess. 41–42 (1988)).
27. See, e.g., Patrick Collins, Inc. v. Doe, 843 F. Supp. 2d 565, 568 (E.D. Pa. 2011) (declin­ing to sub­poe­na twen­ty-six ISP­sun­til plain­tiff could at least pro­vide proof that the Copy­right Office would end up reg­is­ter­ing the copy­right).
28. 7 U.S.C. § 408(f)(2)-(3).
29. The inclu­sion of this back­dat­ing pro­vi­sion is also cit­ed as a tex­tu­al sup­port for the appli­ca­tion approach because sub­mit­ting the appli­ca­tion is the crit­i­cal step in “reg­is­tra­tion.” How­ev­er, that sup­port should not be over­stat­ed because the appli­ca­tion time peri­od is not over­ly-deter­mi­na­tive of the copy­right owner’s rights. The copy­right own­er can still seek actu­al dam­ages even before the effec­tive date of copy­right. Gerig v. Krause Pub­ls., Inc., 58 F Supp 2d 1261 (D. Kan. 1999).
30. U.S. Copy­right Office, Spe­cial Han­dling (Cir­cu­lar 10), at 2 (Sept. 2017).
31. See U.S. Copy­right Office, Spe­cial Han­dling (Cir­cu­lar 10), at 2 (Sept. 2017), https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ10.pdf.
32. Patrel­la v. Gold­wyn-May­er, Inc., 134 S. Ct. 1962, 1969 n.4 (2014).
33. 606 F.3d at 620 (quot­ing H.R. Rep. No. 94–1476, at 158 (1976)).
34. La Resolana, 416 F.3d at 1205-06.
35. Id. at 1206. Any dis­cus­sion of the impor­tance of reg­is­tra­tion, how­ev­er, must con­tend with the fact that Con­gress excused for­eign copy­rights from this require­ment. This may have been a nec­es­sary sac­ri­fice in order to become a mem­ber of the Berne Con­ven­tion, but need not sug­gest that Con­gress want­ed to shrink the reg­is­tra­tion require­ment any more than absolute­ly nec­es­sary.

References: v. 
 § 411
 v. 
 § 411
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 § 6
 § 410
 § 408
 § 411
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 §7
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 § 408
 v. 
 v.