Discussion:
What is the name of your state?What is the name of your state? Texas
I was inspired to make a sound recording for someone that is publishing a story. They have the rights to the story. I recorded the story with songs intermitten; and songs at the end. There was no agreement as to copyrights on the CD that will be inserted into the storybook.
I would like to maintain copyright of the story and songs on the CD sound recording to use for other markets, as they are publishing it for a limited market. I offered to give the CD for their use in the book, and to keep the copyright on the music for my own use. Here is what they want to do: copyright the story (agreed). I copyright the songs (agreed). They put their company copyright on the whole CD (?), and maintain the rights to production of the CD. This was not a "works for hire". There is no contract involved. What are the legalities to this? How do I proceed? I would like to maintain a good relationship on my end and wish to do the right thing.
Thank you kindly,
Shanti
Answer:
What is the name of your state?What is the name of your state? Texas
I was inspired to make a sound recording for someone that is publishing a story. They have the rights to the story. I recorded the story with songs intermitten; and songs at the end. There was no agreement as to copyrights on the CD that will be inserted into the storybook.
I would like to maintain copyright of the story and songs on the CD sound recording to use for other markets, as they are publishing it for a limited market. I offered to give the CD for their use in the book, and to keep the copyright on the music for my own use. Here is what they want to do: copyright the story (agreed). I copyright the songs (agreed). They put their company copyright on the whole CD (?), and maintain the rights to production of the CD. This was not a "works for hire". There is no contract involved. What are the legalities to this? How do I proceed? I would like to maintain a good relationship on my end and wish to do the right thing.
Thank you kindly,
Shanti Although it may not be a "work for hire," this may qualify as a "collective work," which would also result in someone else owning the copyright to the entire CD as a whole. If you have no written agreements, if you want to maintain a good relationship, you'll need to sit down with everyone and discuss what each of you want to do, and try and come to some agreement. As soon as you bring the law and lawyers into this, the "good relationship" will probably be less good...
Answer:
Thank you Divgradcurl.
I've enjoyed reading your posts. (I am also a Bay Area native .
Could you kindly tell me how this would look on the credits as a "collective work"? Do I put my company name and their company name as copyright, i.e.,
copyright 2005, Jane Doe and Shiva Kumar or: copyright 2005, Jane Doe;
copyright 2005, Shiva Kumar?
What about copyrighting each separate - story and songs, and putting: produced for (said company)?
Thank you again for your answers.
Sincerely yours,
Shanti
Answer:
Thank you Divgradcurl.
I've enjoyed reading your posts. (I am also a Bay Area native .
Could you kindly tell me how this would look on the credits as a "collective work"? Do I put my company name and their company name as copyright, i.e.,
copyright 2005, Jane Doe and Shiva Kumar or: copyright 2005, Jane Doe;
copyright 2005, Shiva Kumar?
What about copyrighting each separate - story and songs, and putting: produced for (said company)?
Thank you again for your answers.
Sincerely yours,
Shanti If it's a collective work, then only the owner of the copyright to the work as a whole would have their name listed as the copyright owner.
However, this is all really irrelevant, as a copyright notice isn't even required, nor does it confer any status on anyone. In other words, it doesn't really matter HOW you put the notice, since the notice is irrelevant anyway. Copyrights these days are automatic, no notice required. However, as I noted above, you need to sit down and talk with your collaborator and figure out who is going to have the rights to what, and you will likely want to memoralize any agreements in writing (a contract), and then register the copyrights with the copyright office accordingly.
Regardless of who owns what copyright, the copyright owner can always give a license to the other party, and that license could be as broad or as narrow as you can agree to. You could hold the copyrights to the songs, and maintain the right to use them in other situations, and grant her a license to do whatever she wants with her CD, that's fine. Figure out what you each want to get out of this, and then figure out the copyright ownership and license issues as needed. Then get it all in writing. That's the best way to handle this amicably.
Answer:
Thank you kindly for your advice. This clears things up greatly for me.
Sincerely yours,
Shanti