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Scenes From The Copyright Office, Brian L. Frye
Scenes From The Copyright Office, Brian L. Frye
Law Faculty Scholarly Articles
This essay uses a series of vignettes drawn from Billy Joel’s career to describe his encounters with copyright law. It begins by examining the ownership of the copyright in Joel’s songs. It continues by considering the authorship of Joel’s songs, and it concludes by evaluating certain infringement actions filed against Joel. This Essay observes that Joel’s encounters with copyright law were confusing and frustrating, but also quite typical. The banality of his experiences captures the uncertainty and incoherence of copyright doctrine.
If It’S Broke, Fix It: Fixing Fixation, Megan M. Carpenter
If It’S Broke, Fix It: Fixing Fixation, Megan M. Carpenter
Law Faculty Scholarship
The fixation requirement, once an intended instrument for added flexibility in copyrightability, has become an unworkable standard under modern copyright law. The last twenty-five years have witnessed a dramatic expansion in creative media. Developments in both digital media and contemporary art have challenged what it means to be fixed, and cases dealing with these works reveal how inapposite current interpretations of fixation are for these forms of expression. Yet, getting fixation “right” is important, for it is often the juridical threshold over which idea becomes expression. Thus, we must enable fixation to help define the parameters of creative expression while …