Brian
MCTC Sound Arts
Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 of the United States Constitution empowers Congress:
“To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."
Must be in a tangible form
Must be original on some level
Must be substantial enough to be 'a work'
No registration or notice is required (but there are good reasons to do them)
Copyright applies to "The Work", not just one particular form of it.
An idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, mere listing of ingredients or contents, or discovery
...But certain expressions of those things can be copyrightable
Titles, names, short phrases, and slogans; familiar symbols or designs; mere variations of typographic ornamentation, lettering, or coloring (but may be eligible for trademark protection)
Things in the public domain: Ideas, words, phrases, facts, government works, expired copyrighted works
1. You come up with a chord progression, write it down, and add a copyright symbol at the bottom. Is this eligible for copyright protection? Why/why not?
2. If I teach this class as a completely verbal presentation is it eligible for copyright protection? Why/why not?
1. You come up with a chord progression, write it down, and add a copyright symbol at the bottom. Is this eligible for copyright protection? Why/why not?
2. I teach this class as a completely verbal presentation. Is this eligible for copyright protection? Why/why not?
3. You play a killer bass trombone solo in your ska band at the Medina Ballroom. The lead sheet for the song calls for the solo, but it is intended to be improvised over the written chord changes and so isn't written note-for-note. The bandleader, who wrote the song, is the singer but this song was an instrumental, so she didn't perform in it. An archival recording was made from the sound board. Who owns the copyright on the bass trombone solo?
(accounting system, music/sound theory book)
Selden's wife sued Baker for selling the instructions to the system, and for damages for those who bought Baker's book to use the system. In other words, for selling Selden's idea for an accounting system.
(phone book, chord progression, music anthology)
Rural sued Feist for infringement on their copyrighted phone book.
Investment in a work (effort, money, etc.) does not entitle copyright protection.
The primary objective of copyright is not to reward the labor of authors, but '[t]o promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts.'...It is the means by which copyright advances the progress of science and art.
–Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Feist Publications vs. Rural Telephone Service, 499 U.S. 340, 349 (1991)
By Brian