Category: Intellectual Property

Podcast – Formalities in U.S. Copyright with Steven Tepp

In this post, I wrote about some of the difficulties that U.S. formalities present to many independent creators, difficulties highlighted in the case Unicolors v. H&M. I cited a paper written by Steven Tepp for the Professional Photographers of America (PPA) and mentioned that I would follow up with a podcast to delve a little deeper into the subject of formalities–those pesky, administrative details that sometimes confound independent authors trying to protect their works under copyright.

Steven Tepp is the president and founder of the IP consulting firm Sentinel Worldwide. In his career, he has  served as Chief Intellectual Property Counsel for the Global Intellectual Property Center (GIPC) of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and as senior counsel for Policy and International Affairs at the U.S. Copyright Office.  See Steven’s website here.

Episode Contents

  • 46:06 – Steven Tepp’s background
  • 01:42 – What are  formalities in U.S. copyright?
  • 06:06 – The relationship between formalities and the Library of Congress.
  • 08:05 – Consolidation of deposit copies at the Library of Congress.
  • 11:15 – U.S. partial breaks with formalities.
  • 19:28 – A copyright notice is not required, but…
  • 21:25 – The basics of complying with existing formalities.
  • 33:58 – AWF v. Goldsmith and registration of an unpublished work.
  • 37:22 – Unicolors v. H&M and mixing published and unpublished works.
  • 40:41 – The meaning of “published” as a question of law.
  • 45:45 – The difficulty of “publication” after preemption of common law copyright.
  • 50:29 – The well-intended doctrine of “limited publication.”
  • 53:46 – Unicolors’s challenge as a result of the “limited publication” doctrine.
  • 57:34 – One solution to the “publication” problem.
  • 01:06:00 – Formalities and the small-claim provision created by the CASE Act.

Podcast – IP & Social Justice with Professor Lateef Mtima

In this episode, I talk with Professor Mtima about how and why he and his colleagues approach IP from a social justice perspective.  “Lateef Mtima is a Professor of Law at the Howard University School of Law. After graduating with honors from Amherst College, Professor Mtima received his J.D. degree from Harvard Law School, where he was the co-founder and later editor-in-chief of the Harvard BlackLetter Journal.” Visit Professor Mtima’s website.

Show Contents

  • 1:07 – Defining social justice in an IP context.
  • 7:54 – Distinguishing between social justice and predatory practice
  • 11:45 – How the conversation about race factors into the IPSJ discussion.
  • 18:17 – The “Blurred Lines” case.
  • 24:30 –  Was copyright a highly democratic statement at U.S. founding?
  • 30:56 – But patent was  a different story.
  • 34:05 – Cotton gin and further patent discussion.
  • 36:46 – How can IPSJ be made accessible to laymen?
  • 43:30 – Anti IP and the corporatist message.
  • 47:49 – On trademarking offensive terms.
  • 58:35 – Are contemporary politics, policy, caselaw moving toward IPSJ?
  • 01:04:58 – Anti IP and progressive views.
  • 01:10:28 – Idea/Expression dichotomy discussion.

Podcast: Photography, Art & Copyright with Eric O’Connell

In this episode, I talk to art and commercial photographer Eric O’Connell, who is also an associate professor of practice at Northern Arizona University. We talk about his work, about photography in general, his students, and of course copyright. O’Connell’s photo recently won Off the Clock 2021 Best in Show from American Photographic Artists (APA). Read interview here.

Visit Eric O’Connell’s website.

Leaning by chance that there were more than a few East Germans who had avidly adopted the American cowboy aesthetic, O’Connell began working in 2002 on a series of photographs and a short documentary film.

East German Cowboys series ©Eric O’Connell.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, O’Connell lived with his parents and did a series of photographs with them, including this one below, which won Off the Clock 2021 Best in Show from American Photographic Artists (APA) in June of 2021.

Pandemic series. ©Eric O’Connell

Contents

  • 2:06 – How do you describe or think about your work?
  • 4:37 – Visual anthropology
  • 6:25 – German Cowboys Series
  • 8:50 – Native Americans & Heavy Metal series
  • 12:28 – Reactions to the German Cowboys
  • 16:44 – Pandemic (parents) series
  • 25:12 – How has commercial work changed?
  • 30:06 – Conversations with students about rights to their work.
  • 32:46 – Richard Prince Instagram Show
  • 34:59 – What is a derivative work of a photograph?
  • 38:07 – How much do you follow rights issues?
  • 41:25 – Lars was right.
  • 42:53 – Do your students intent to become professionals?
  • 45:49 – The work that goes into photographs
  • 53:02 – Authorship in photography

Lens photo by Bushko