https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/Originally Posted by Alan Klein
https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/
No wonder people don't bother registering them.
Flickr Home Page: https://www.flickr.com/photos/alanklein2000/albums
the 20 year bench warrant is renewable alan.
most of these cases come from amateurs trying to do business and later get burned. why?... no contract! as a professional, you make a detailed contract , using a lawyer drafted document, with your clients that spells out usage and other terms which in essence is as good as a copyrite or registration in court. thats how business runs!
as for thieft, well there is the registration but if the thief altered it such that it becomes his original work... that complicates matters and is tough to prove its your work... even if you did register and officially copyrited it.
the best advance, post low res pix that are too small to use for anything. people that try to impress everyone with their full blown perfect master pieces online will suffer sooner or later to the right click of a mouse. also be careful with where you post your master pieces because every host site has terms that may give them the right to own or use it... again, thats contractual since you agreed by using the site. if you dont like the terms... then dont post it!
here's the form
https://fill.io/US-Copyright-Office-Form-VA
it takes about 5 minutes to fill out ( if that )
it's kind of a no brainer.
excellent post and advice!
Last edited by jnantz; 16-Apr-2023 at 08:19.
Copyright / infringement claims in the US are handled by the Federal courts. Registration of copyright with the LOC copyright office is requirement to pursue litigation in Federal court. The filing fee alone for federal court is $600 - never mind the associated expenses like discovery etc, that price litigation out of reach for many claims under $10K.
The small claims court referred to in the original post is the Copyright Claims Board, established in 2020 by the CASE act to handle infringement cases without lawyers and the financial cost associated with a Federal court trial. The judgments are capped (IIRC it is $30K) and there is no requirement for the work to be registered, however the judgements are capped at a lower level for unregister work. The CCB is not your local small claims court - there is still no recourse for copyright in small claims court. The CCB works more like an arbitration panel, since it started hearing cases in 2021 the initial evaluation has been pretty good, it seem to be able to fill that gap allowing recourse for those that don't have a large monetary claim.
You are correct that many infringement disputes are actually poor/nonexistant contracts - even for professionals, however the rest of your advice is off the mark. Advertising campaigns have moved from print to online - a small jpg is all that is needed for a multimillion dollar worldwide ad campaign so keeping your work small does nothing to prevent this. The technology that allows for easy click and save also now includes the ability to track your own work everywhere online and deal with infringers as you see fit. The major social media platforms do not claim ownership of your work, or copyright, just the ability to distribute on their platform.
Does it have to be renewed befoe the twenty years lapses?
Flickr Home Page: https://www.flickr.com/photos/alanklein2000/albums
In a small claims case, with no expensive lawyers involved, I'd think merely walking in there with a 4X5 or 8X10 film original and portable light box, or perhaps even an original slide, would constitute firm evidence against digital piracy, or any other lossy version. But if garden variety digital capture was involved to begin with, perhaps another story, and a tangled ball of yarn legally at this point. And if the culprit happens to be a well-financed corporation, they can simply starve you to death by court delay tactics, just like they do all the time with patent infringements. You never really own a law, but for all practical purposes, have to be able to afford to rent it. It costs.
Many years ago my business partner and I lodged copyright and trademark infringment claims against a guy who pirated our product and product advertising illustrations. Just bringing "the original" did not cut it because so did they. We had to prove "first to commerce" for the trademark infringement and basically the same, "first produced" for the copyright infringement. Neither our trademark or copyright was registered. It would have been so much easier if they had been registered. The independent timestamping provided by magazine advertisement was the proof that led to our prevailing.
"walking in there with a 4X5 or 8X10 film original and portable light box, or perhaps even an original slide, would constitute firm evidence against digital piracy, or any other lossy version."
cant beat a negative as proof of ownership!
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