Property, intangible

a blog about ownership of intellectual property rights and its licensing


notice

  • Notifying Co-Authors About a Lawsuit

    The Copyright Act of 1976 made a fundamental change to copyright law by making copyright divisible. Authors can give someone else exclusive rights in a portion of their copyright, for example the exclusive right of first publication, retaining no right of first publication for themselves. The drafters of the Copyright Act also contemplated that this… Continue reading

  • Copyright Notice and Ownership

    Eminent scholar Jessica Litman has published What Notice Did, 96 B.U.L. Rev. 717 (2016), an interesting article on how copyright notice has shaped copyright ownership jurisprudence. Most interesting to me was the “head’s I win, tails you lose” nature of notice. Since 1870 an assignment had to be in writing, but publishers would name themselves… Continue reading

  • Yankees Sued Over Ownership of Logo

    There’s an interesting, albeit quixotic, complaint against the Yankees over the ownership of its “top hat” logo: Plaintiff Tanit Buday claims that her uncle, Kenneth Timur, designed the logo for the Yankees in 1936 but was not compensated for the design.  In 1947 he modified the logo design in preparation for the 50-year anniversary of… Continue reading

  • Steamboat Willie as Public Domain

    The LA Times recently ran a story about whether some early “Steamboat Willie” cartoons are still protected by copyright. It’s not new news; in 2003, inspired by an internet article, Douglas Hedenkamp wrote a law review article on the subject and concluded they are not. But an entertaining article for both the gist of the… Continue reading