Expansion of U.S. copyright law

The Copyright Act of 1909 ^[1] was a landmark statute in United States statutory copyright law. The Act was superseded by the Copyright Act of 1976, but it remains effective for copyrighted works created before the 1976 Act went into effect in 1978. It allowed for works to be copyrighted for a period of 28 years from the date of publication, renewable once for a second 28-year term. Like the Copyright Act of 1790 before it, the copyrighted work could be extended for a second term of equal value.

Under the 1909 Act, federal statutory copyright protection attached to original works only when those works were 1) published and 2) had a notice of copyright affixed. Thus, state copyright law governed protection for unpublished works, but published works, whether containing a notice of copyright or not, were governed exclusively by federal law. If no notice of copyright was affixed to a work and the work was "published" in a legal sense, the 1909 Act provided no copyright protection and the work became part of the public domain. The 1976 Act changed this result, providing that copyright protection attaches to works that are original and fixed in a tangible medium of expression, regardless of publication or affixation of notice.

It also created (Section 1(e))^[2] the first compulsory mechanical license to allow anyone to make a mechanical reproduction (known today as a phonorecord) of a musical composition without the consent of the copyright owner provided that the person adhered to the provisions of the license. (Congress intended it to govern piano rolls.) In later practice, compulsory license made it possible to record and distribute a cover version of a hit song – once a recording had been released, and the copyright owner was served with a notice of intention to use – that directly competed with the original.

[edit] Case law

• White-Smith Music Publishing Company v. Apollo Company: 1908 Supreme Court decision on sheet music superseded by the act
• F. W. Woolworth Co. v. Contemporary Arts, Inc.: 1952 Supreme Court decision on the latitutde provided to judges under the act.

[edit] References

1. ^ [1] aka 'Public Law 60-349 (March 4, 1909) • 35 Stat. 1075
2. ^ copyright.gov

[edit] External links

• Works related to Copyright Act of 1909 at Wikisource
• Full text of the Copyright Act of 1909, as amended.
• 1909 Act as originally passed and each revision.

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