The three words we dread to see on products when we hike to the grocery store to stock up on our favorites, are the words “New and Improved!” (Always with one or two exclamation points). Uh oh. That doesn’t start with a T, but it still spells trouble here in River City. Usually, it’s a […]
Posts Tagged copyright registration
KodakOne and the Zombie Myth
Jan 15
In our numerous copyright lectures, we always discuss copyright myths and “mythconceptions”. There is one myth, that like Dracula, refuses to die. Like a zombie myth, continually rising from the dead. It’s known as “The Poor Man’s Copyright”. That’s where instead of filing your copyright at the Copyright Office in accordance with Federal Law, you […]
Working Blue
Jun 19
One of the things that make this copyright blog of ours unique is that we pull stuff from our actual experiences. They are not assumptions, not impossible scenarios or “what ifs”, but rather experiences and events from the field, from real life. Most of the time the names and the exact facts are changed to protect […]
We are “blue in the face” in large measure because we keep cajoling, pleading, begging and even yelling (we are both New Yorkers ya’ know) that everyone ought register their copyrights with the US Copyright Office all of the time, always, no exceptions. As with all rules, along comes the apparent real life exception to our rule. It […]
We have written about Andrew Paul Leonard’s 1.6 million dollar jury award for actual damages arising out the infringement of his images by a company known as Stemtech. See our prior article here. Mr. Leonard is a client of Ed’s but this case was handled by counsel in Delaware. The Third Circuit Court of Appeals just […]
That Ole Dog Still Hunts
Aug 9
Among all of the other benefits of registering your copyright, one of the practical reasons is that registration brings with it the legal presumption that you are the creator. The burden is thus placed on an infinger to disprove the validity of your registration. Typically this is very, very difficult. In other words, “very not easy”. […]
There is a famous quote attributed to Mark Twain, who in turn erroneously attributed it himself to Benjamin Disraeli, which has been used by many, and is absolutely one of our favorites. It goes: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” This will be a blog article on statistics. Some in […]
Just a heads up, various copyright registration filing fees are going up today, May 1st. The one that will affect most photographers is the standard filing fee for collections of unpublished work, which is rising from $35 to $55. If you have one photo, by one photographer, then it stays at $35, but if you […]
Again, we find answering a question in comments is worthy of a blog post. We get asked the question many time, why register before an infringement, when one can still register after an infringement? If you register upon shooting/creation as unpublished or within the 3 month grace period for published work, and you work is […]
The 96 Percent Solution
Apr 23
We had great turnouts for our three classes at Photoshop World in Orlando last week. The word is finally out that it is critical that professionals, amateurs and those who fall some where in between must register their work. Of the many people who attended our lectures and were obviously motivated to learn more about […]
