Can You Protect a Dance Move With a Copyright Law

Complex choreography is a creative act and can be registered for copyright protection as long as it meets the other requirements, such as being fixed in some form of media by being recorded. 17 USC § 102(a)(4). However, individual dance moves or poses generally cannot by protected by copyright. This issue recently gained some attention […]

March 8, 2019

A Brief History of the Public Domain in the USA

Recently, there have been a number of court cases where the plaintiff sought to narrow or restrict the public domain. In one of the most direct attacks, CBS sued a YouTube user who posted certain episodes of the Andy Griffith show which were individually in the public domain by claiming that these episodes were derivative […]

July 10, 2018

Websites with User Generated Content Must Now Re-register Under the DMCA

By Timothy Wiseman  The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is an important law for providers of online services or any website which allows users to upload or post content. The DMCA, whose relevant part is now codified at 17 U.S.C. 512, provides safe harbors from copyright infringement for online service providers for user posted content. Generally, […]

February 6, 2017