Clarification

[ellenmillion]

Dude. You can sue for actual damages and losses if you have not registered your copyright. You cannot sue for punitive (statutory) damages unless you have registered said copyright.

I saw that Neil Gaiman had blogged that you couldn't sue if you didn't register a copyright. I would've emailed him a little note of clarification, since that seems the thing to do. But I wasn't able to find a contact form easily, and I'm far too full of delicious dinner to look for it hard, which is why I'm posting this in my own journal instead. Call me lazy.

I am putting together a comprehensive article on the topic (in particular the CMA and the OWA that have been a hot conversation lately) for the May issue of EMG-Zine, and if anyone felt like I was being condescending or snotty, I apologize. I know it's been a touchy subject, and everything is frighteningly possible. I'm glad it came up, because I've learned a ton on the subject.

I agreed to work all day tomorrow, somehow. I've had four days off, I'm not sure I remember how to go to work again.

Comments

[uminomamori.livejournal.com]

Huh... I've always been under the impression one cannot sue at all as the gov site states "Before an infringement suit may be filed in court, registration is necessary for works of U.S. origin." So how you sue someone without filing it in court I do not know.

And I want all the people who think it's not important to go away. I'm glad people have been made aware of the subject.

[jasminetoad.livejournal.com]

Speaking from personal experience, you can definitely sue without a registered copyright. I try to always register mine, especially on licensed stuff, but I paint so darned much I had a couple slip by. Lo and behold, that was one I had to file a lawsuit over. My lawyer told me basically the same thing Ellen said above. I was able to recoup losses/payments (basically what would have been royalties if they'd actually licensed the image from me) without a registered copyright.

However, under my lawyer's advice - I did file a copyright immediately before we sent the original Cease & Desist. That way we were able to say that the copyright registration was "pending". Since it usually takes them about 10 months to get the paperwork back anyways, a lot of my recent stuff was genuinely "pending" as well.

[uminomamori.livejournal.com]

That's good to know. You paint so much stuff I don't know how you'd keep up.

[rhiamon.livejournal.com]

I'm remiss in filing copyrights, and part of it is because of the costs of registering things individually. I understand you can register in collections, but does that give the individual artworks the same protections as if they'd been registered separately, or are they only protected as part of the collection (for example, if someone nicked the artwork I'd have a hard time prosecuting for punitive, but if they nicked the whole collection I could nail 'em)? I've always been confused by that!

[ellenmillion.livejournal.com]

Registering a collection protects each individual piece in it.

[rhiamon.livejournal.com]

That's good to know - that way I could do a yearly collection and it wouldn't hurt the bank account too much!

[metasilk.livejournal.com]

Great idea for EMG zine! Thank you!

[rhiamon.livejournal.com]

There's a link somewhere on the site for 'Ask Neil' - I've found it once or twice. :D

I'm glad you're working up an article for it - that will be most appreciated, no doubt!

There's some bru-ha-ha brewing now over 'The Harry Potter Lexicon' site being published in book form (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7346093.stm). JK's adamantly against it as it infringes on her copyright, while the site's creator and the book publisher claim it will give authors (and if you extend the thought out to all creative works - artists) too much control over their work. Uh, yeah...it's OUR work, we should have a say in how and by whom it is used. It should be interesting to see how this trial comes out.