Law Commons^™

Derivative Works And Making Sense Of The Maxim That 'Others Are Free To Copy The Original. They Are Not Free To Copy The Copy.', David E. Shipley

Scholarly Works

This is a paper about some of the most entertaining and challenging cases in America’s copyright law jurisprudence concerning derivative works as copyrightable subject matter, and the closely related right to prepare derivative works. The cases are entertaining because they involve very familiar works of authorship, and they are challenging because the rulings are often difficult to reconcile due to the fact that the courts are grappling with copyright’s elusive originality standard as applied to derivative works as well the copyright owner’s right to prepare derivative works. Instead of attempting to say something ‘original’ about originality, my goal for this …