Are you obeying the "legal deposit" laws?

[efindel]

The big question would be -- are there any penalties for failing to deposit copies with the Library of Congress? If there are none, then there's no actual reason to do so. So I'm off to explore with Google and see if I can find anything about that...

By the way, pet peeve: it's copyright, not copywrite, and therefore this is no such word as "copywritten". The past tense is "copyrighted".

[ApK]

Originally Posted by efindel

The big question would be -- are there any penalties for failing to deposit copies with the Library of Congress? If there are none, then there's no actual reason to do so. So I'm off to explore with Google and see if I can find anything about that...

By the way, pet peeve: it's copyright, not copywrite, and therefore this is no such word as "copywritten". The past tense is "copyrighted".

From http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap4.html#407:

(d) At any time after publication of a work as provided by subsection(a), the Register of Copyrights may make written demand for the required deposit on any of the persons obligated to make the deposit under subsection (a). Unless deposit is made within three months after the demand is received, the person or persons on whom the demand was made are liable —

(1) to a fine of not more than $250 for each work; and

(2) to pay into a specially designated fund in the Library of Congress the total retail price of the copies or phonorecords demanded, or, if no retail price has been fixed, the reasonable cost to the Library of Congress of acquiring them; and

(3) to pay a fine of $2,500, in addition to any fine or liability imposed under clauses (1) and (2), if such person willfully or repeatedly fails or refuses to comply with such a demand.

As for "copywritten," isn't that what an ad man will have done after he has written copy? As is "Our best copy writer has copywritten for many successful ad campaigns...."

[efindel]

Well, that didn't take long. The Library of Congress, if a work has not been deposited, can contact the publisher and request their two copies. If the two copies are not delivered to them within three months of the request, the publisher can be fined $250. An additional $2500 can be fined if the violation is found to be willful or flagrant.

( information from http://www.eshieldkret.com/copyright/deposit.shtml )

Everything I can find, though, says that the mandatory deposit requirment does not affect copyright.

Since the deposit requirement is for the "best edition", the only way that I can think of that someone could get caught out by this would be if the "best edition" was made in such a way that it wouldn't be possible to recreate it and deliver it in three months, and you didn't keep two copies of that "best edition" that you could send in if needed.

Thus, for those publishing ebooks, even if the law were to be changed to require ebooks to be deposited, there's no problem, as long as you keep a copy so you can provide when/if asked.

Of course, you can also request "Special Relief". In the case where you can't provide the "best edition" any more, that would probably be what you'd need to do. If you couldn't provide any version any more (e.g., the ebook was no longer being offered anywhere and you'd deleted your own copies of it, so you'd have to literally rewrite it in order to provide a copy), I'd imagine the "Special Relief" would have to be requested as well.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by efindel

Well, that didn't take long. The Library of Congress, if a work has not been deposited, can contact the publisher and request their two copies. If the two copies are not delivered to them within three months of the request, the publisher can be fined $250. An additional $2500 can be fined if the violation is found to be willful or flagrant.

( information from http://www.eshieldkret.com/copyright/deposit.shtml )

Yep. No penalties unless they demand copies & you don't provide them within a few months.

Since the deposit requirement is for the "best edition", the only way that I can think of that someone could get caught out by this would be if the "best edition" was made in such a way that it wouldn't be possible to recreate it and deliver it in three months,

There's an exemption for copies that are too expensive or otherwise troublesome to deliver. (If you make twenty copies of a solid-gold sculpture with ruby accents, you don't have to give one of them to the library of congress.) Also, less than five copies are exempt--so unique works of art like portraits don't have to be turned in.

The rule isn't intended to be onerous; it's to keep a usable archive of creative works. The problem is that when the rule was written, only a fairly small fraction of copyrightable works were "published," and most of those were registered. Now, every corner café publishes its menus as trifold pamphlets and hands them out to customers. The law, as written, makes no sense anymore.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

Now, every corner café publishes its menus as trifold pamphlets and hands them out to customers. The law, as written, makes no sense anymore.

I have noticed that many menus have copyright notices on them. Seriously, if they think they need to protect the copyright on their menus, then I guess the law makes sense. Perhaps the alternative, if a cafe realizes there is no great IP inherent in "California burger.....$6.95" and the doodle of their logo (which should be a trademark if it's special) then they should just put "No rights reserved" or something instead of a copyright notice, and not claim any protection. Then there would be no need for them to deposit.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by ApK

I have noticed that many menus have copyright notices on them. Seriously, if they think they need to protect the copyright on their menus, then I guess the law makes sense.

They don't want a competitor to open across the street and use their menu layout & descriptions. However, I don't see the value in the Library of Congress having copies of all those menus. OTOH, the Historical Menus Project is a crowdsourced OCR project, and it is interesting to see what prices for cheap-vs-expensive dinners used to be.

Perhaps the alternative, if a cafe realizes there is no great IP inherent in "California burger.....$6.95" and the doodle of their logo (which should be a trademark if it's special) then they should just put "No rights reserved" or something instead of a copyright notice, and not claim any protection. Then there would be no need for them to deposit.

There's no IP in lists of foods & prices. Those aren't copyrightable. However, the layout, font choices, and descriptions, if any, are covered by copyright. And I suspect that any restaurant or cafe that knew the requirement existed, would be happy to pay a dollar for an oversized envelope & a couple of stamps to send 2 copies of their menu to the Library of Congress. I'm just not sure what the LoC would *do* if they started actually getting two copies of every flyer, menu, info-pamphlet, and advertising brochure published in the US.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

I'm just not sure what the LoC would *do* if they started actually getting two copies of every flyer, menu, info-pamphlet, and advertising brochure published in the US.

They'd throw them away, presumably. They do say that they don't keep every item they're sent (unlike the British Library, who do keep everything).