Page 346 - Law and the Media

The Law in the United States of America
21.3 Copyright

21.3.1 General principles

Copyright protection in the United States is governed by federal law under the Copyright Act
1976 as amended. The Copyright Act 1976 protects works created after 1 January 1978.

Copyright protects original works of authorship that are expressed in a ‘tangible’ form, in
other words written down or recorded. For copyright to exist in a work, it will usually fall
within one of the following categories:

Literary, musical and dramatic works
Pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works
Motion pictures and other audiovisual works
Sound recordings.
The categories are not exhaustive. Like the law of copyright in the United Kingdom, the
categories can be considered broadly. For example, computer programs can be registered as
‘literary works’. Compilations and derivative works can also be copyrighted.

Copyright does not protect ideas, news, information, names, works that have not been
expressed in a ‘tangible form’ (such as improvisation or performances that have not been
written down or recorded) or ‘common property’ such as calendars and height and weight
charts.

Like the position under the law of the United Kingdom, joint authors of a work will be co-
owners of the copyright in the work unless there is an agreement to the contrary.

Freelancers retain some copyright in their work. In the case of New York Times Co Inc v
Tasini (2001) the Supreme Court held that articles written for the New York Times by
freelancers could not be licensed by the newspaper for inclusion in electronic databases
because in the absence of an express transfer of copyright the newspaper acquired copyright
in the articles only for the purpose of ‘reproducing and distributing the contribution as part
of that particular collective work, any revision of that collective work and any later collective
work in the same series’ (Section 201(c) of the Copyright Act 1976). The court held that
inclusion of freelance articles in electronic databases was a separate work and not a
‘reproduction, distribution, revision or the same series’.

21.3.2 Publication
Protection under the Copyright Act 1976 is available to both published and unpublished
works. Under the previous legislation, publication and notice of copyright was necessary in
order to obtain federal copyright protection. Publication remains relevant for works
published after 1 January 1978 because all works published in the United States must be
deposited with the Library of Congress in Washington.
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