Rule of Doubt

In certain circumstances, the U.S. Copyright Office may register a claim under the Rule of Doubt if the registration specialist is unable to examine the deposit copy(ies) to determine if the work contains copyrightable authorship. In exceptional cases, the Office may apply the Rule of Doubt if it has not taken a position on a legal issue that is directly relevant to whether the work constitutes copyrightable subject matter or whether the other legal and formal requirements of the statute have been met. The Office will not register a claim under the Rule of Doubt simply because there is some uncertainty as to how a particular issue may be decided by a particular court

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *