17 U.S.C. § 409

Application for copyright registration

Read at: OLRCuscode.house.gov CornellLII GovInfogovinfo.gov JustiaTitle 17 CasesGoogle Scholar

The application for copyright registration shall be made on a form prescribed by the Register of Copyrights and shall include—(1) the name and address of the copyright claimant;(2) in the case of a work other than an anonymous or pseudonymous work, the name and nationality or domicile of the author or authors, and, if one or more of the authors is dead, the dates of their deaths;(3) if the work is anonymous or pseudonymous, the nationality or domicile of the author or authors;(4) in the case of a work made for hire, a statement to this effect;(5) if the copyright claimant is not the author, a brief statement of how the claimant obtained ownership of the copyright;(6) the title of the work, together with any previous or alternative titles under which the work can be identified;(7) the year in which creation of the work was completed;(8) if the work has been published, the date and nation of its first publication;(9) 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; and(10) any other information regarded by the Register of Copyrights as bearing upon the preparation or identification of the work or the existence, ownership, or duration of the copyright.If an application is submitted for the renewed and extended term provided for in section 304(a)(3)(A) and an original term registration has not been made, the Register may request information with respect to the existence, ownership, or duration of the copyright for the original term.(Pub. L. 94–553, title I, § 101, Oct. 19, 1976, 90 Stat. 2582; Pub. L. 102–307, title I, § 102(b)(1), June 26, 1992, 106 Stat. 266; Pub. L. 111–295, § 4(b)(2), Dec. 9, 2010, 124 Stat. 3180.)Historical and Revision Noteshouse report no. 94–1476

The various clauses of section 409, which specify the information to be included in an application for copyright registration, are intended to give the Register of Copyrights authority to elicit all of the information needed to examine the application and to make a meaningful record of registration. The list of enumerated items was not exhaustive; under the last clause of the section the application may also include “any other information regarded by the Register of Copyrights as bearing upon the preparation or identification of the work or the existence, ownership, or duration of the copyright.”

Among the enumerated items there are several that are not now included in the Copyright Office’s application forms, but will become significant under the life-plus-50 term and other provisions of the bill. Clause (5), reflecting the increased importance of the interrelationship between registration of copyright claims and recordation of transfers of ownership, requires a statement of how a claimant who is not the author acquired ownership of the copyright. Clause (9) requires that, “in the case of a compilation or derivative work” the application include “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.” It is intended that, under this requirement, the application covering a collection such as a song-book or hymnal would clearly reveal any works in the collection that are in the public domain, and the copyright status of all other previously-published compositions. This information will be readily available in the Copyright Office.

The catch-all clause at the end of the section will enable the Register to obtain more specialized information, such as that bearing on whether the work contains material that is a “work of the United States Government.” In the case of works subject to the manufacturing requirement, the application must also include information about the manufacture of the copies.

Editorial NotesAmendments

2010—Par. (9) to (11). Pub. L. 111–295 inserted “and” after semicolon at end of par. (9), redesignated par. (11) as (10), and struck out former par. (10) which read as follows: “in the case of a published work containing material of which copies are required by section 601 to be manufactured in the United States, the names of the persons or organizations who performed the processes specified by subsection (c) of section 601 with respect to that material, and the places where those processes were performed; and”.

1992—Pub. L. 102–307 inserted at end “If an application is submitted for the renewed and extended term provided for in section 304(a)(3)(A) and an original term registration has not been made, the Register may request information with respect to the existence, ownership, or duration of the copyright for the original term.”

Statutory Notes and Related SubsidiariesEffective Date of 1992 Amendment

Amendment by Pub. L. 102–307 effective June 26, 1992, but applicable only to copyrights secured between January 1, 1964, and December 31, 1977, and not affecting court proceedings pending on June 26, 1992, with copyrights secured before January 1, 1964, governed by section 304(a) of this title as in effect on the day before June 26, 1992, except each reference to forty-seven years in such provisions deemed to be 67 years, see section 102(g) of Pub. L. 102–307, as amended, set out as a note under section 101 of this title.

Notes of Decisions

Cited in 60 cases (9 in the last 5 years), 1982–2025 · leading case: Sohm v. Scholastic Inc., 959 F.3d 39 (2d Cir. 2020).

Sort: Relevance Newest Treatment

Sohm v. Scholastic Inc., 959 F.3d 39 (2d Cir. 2020). · cites it 3× “2014); (3) the Copyright Act limits damages to the three years prior to when a copyright infringement action is filed; and (4) the registration of a compilation of photographs under 17 U.S.C. § 409 by an applicant who holds the rights to the component works is valid and…”

Alaska Stock, LLC v. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publ'g Co., 747 F.3d 673 (9th Cir. 2014). · cites it 6× “The defendants in that case made the same argument Houghton Mifflin makes here, namely, that the “failure to identify names of creators and titles of individual works as required by 17 U.S.C. § 409 (2) and (6) limits the registration^] to the Database itself and therefore that…”

Metro. Reg'l Info. Sys., Inc. v. Am. Home Realty Network, Inc., 722 F.3d 591 (4th Cir. 2013). · cites it 3× “We turn now to the first question presented: whether MRIS has failed to register its interest in the individual photographs with the Copyright Office prior to filing suit for copyright infringement as required by the Copyright Act. If AHRN is correct, and the registrations…”

Data Gen. Corp. v. Grumman Sys. Support Corp., 36 F.3d 1147 (1st Cir. 1994). · cites it 2× “See 17 U.S.C. § 409 (1988 & Supp. IV 1992) (requiring application to include, inter alia, title of work, dates of completion and publication, along with “any other information .”

Unicolors, Inc. v. Urban Outfitters, Inc., 853 F.3d 980 (9th Cir. 2017). “” 17 U.S.C. § 409 (9). The current application form 5 for visual arts registrants addresses Section 409(9) requirement via “Space 6.”

Muench Photography, Inc. v. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publ'g Co., 712 F. Supp. 2d 84 (S.D.N.Y. 2010). · cites it 4× “” 17 U.S.C. § 409 (2). When, as here, the work at issue is a compilation, the copyright “extends only to the material contributed by the author of such work ____” 17 U.”

Est. of Hevia v. Portrio Corp., 602 F.3d 34 (1st Cir. 2010). “See 17 U.S.C. § 409 . In their application, they claimed that the Hevia Plans were created by RHA in 2001, as an original work.”

Oravec v. Sunny Isles Luxury Ventures, L.C., 527 F.3d 1218 (11th Cir. 2008). “See 17 U.S.C. § 409 (9) (providing that 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”).”

Metro. Reg'l Info. Sys., Inc. v. Am. Home Realty Network, Inc., 888 F. Supp. 2d 691 (D. Maryland 2012). · cites it 2× “17 U.S.C. § 409 . Defendants argue that MRIS’s failure to provide the names of the authors and the titles of all underlying works in its database registrations limits the registrations and scope of copyright protection to the MRIS Database as a whole, but does not cover the…”

Energy Intelligence Grp, Inc. v. Kayne Ande, 948 F.3d 261 (5th Cir. 2020). “The trial court did not clearly err in finding that Oil Daily is not a compilation KA makes a cursory argument on appeal that EIG’s copyright registrations were inaccurate because EIG “concealed the fact that its works were compilations” subject to the registration requirements…”

Kaseberg v. Conaco, LLC, 360 F. Supp. 3d 1026 (S.D. Cal. 2018). · cites it 5× “" 17 U.S.C. § 409 (10). Correspondence with the Register seeking reconsideration of a refusal of registration would appear to fit within the plain language of this definition.”

Cable News Network, Inc. v. Video Monitoring Servs. of Am., Inc., 940 F.2d 1471 (11th Cir. 1991). · cites it 3× “” See Appendix B; 17 U.S.C. § 409 . Hence, all prerecorded segments and commercials, many of which are either in the public domain or are the copyrighted work of others, would have to be disclosed.”

Show all 60 citing cases →

Annotations are extracted automatically from the opinions in the Syfert caselaw corpus and ranked by authority, recency, and treatment. Dots show Syfertize treatment of the citing case itself.