Federal Register, Volume 77 Issue 60 (Wednesday, March 28, 2012)

[Federal Register Volume 77, Number 60 (Wednesday, March 28, 2012)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 18742-18748]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2012-7428]

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

37 CFR Parts 201 and 203

[Docket No. 2012-1]

AGENCY: Copyright Office, Library of Congress.

ACTION: Notice of proposed rulemaking.

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SUMMARY: The Copyright Office is proposing the adoption of new fees for
the registration of claims, recordation of documents, special services,
Licensing Division services, and processing of FOIA requests. The
proposed fees would recover a significant part of the costs to the
Office for services that benefit both copyright owners and the public,
and provide full cost recovery for many services which benefit only or
primarily the user of that service. As part of the fee setting process,
the Office is providing an opportunity to the public to comment on the
proposed changes before submitting the fee schedule to Congress for
review.

DATES: Comments must be received in the Office of the General Counsel
of the Copyright Office no later than May 14, 2012.

ADDRESSES: The Copyright Office strongly prefers that comments be
submitted electronically. A comment page containing a comment form is
posted on the Copyright Office Web site at http://www.copyright.gov/docs/newfees/comments/. The Web site interface requires submitters to
complete a form specifying name and organization, as applicable, and to
upload comments as an attachment via a browse button. To meet
accessibility standards, all comments must be uploaded in a single file
not to exceed six megabytes (MB) in one of the following formats: The
Adobe Portable Document File (PDF) format that contains searchable,
accessible text (not an image); Microsoft Word; WordPerfect; Rich Text
Format (RTF); or ASCII text file format (not a scanned document). The
form and face of the comments must include both the name of the
submitter and the organization. All comments will be posted publicly on
the Copyright Office Web site exactly as they are received, along with
names and organizations. If electronic submission of comments is not
feasible, please contact the Copyright Office at (202) 707-8380 for
special instructions.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Megan Rivet, Budget Analyst, or Tanya
Sandros, Deputy General Counsel, at (202) 707-8380.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The Copyright Act (the ``Copyright Act'' or
``Act'') provides that the Register of Copyrights may, by regulation,
adjust fees for certain, enumerated services based upon a study of
costs incurred by the Copyright Office. The study must consider the
timing of any adjustment as well as the authority to use such fees
consistent with the budget. The Register's proposed changes are subject
to review by Congress. However, the Register may implement the changes
at the end of 120 days after submitting them to Congress in conjunction
with an economic analysis unless, within that 120 day period, Congress
enacts a law stating in substance that Congress does not approve the
schedule. The Act further authorizes the Register to establish fees for
services that are not enumerated in the statute, including, for
example, the cost of preparing copies of Copyright Office records,
based on the cost of providing the service. The Register is not
required to submit these additional fees to Congress. See 17 U.S.C.
708(a)-(b).
Congress amended the Copyright Act in 1997 to allow the Register to
set fees for Copyright Office services. Since this time, the Office has
undertaken a fee study approximately every three years; the last one
was undertaken in 2008 and implemented in 2009. See 74 FR 32805 (July
9, 2009). A new fee study was initiated on October 1, 2011 at the

[[Page 18743]]

direction of the newly appointed Register of Copyrights. The study was
identified in the Register's public report, ``Priorities and Special
Projects for the United States Copyright Office'' as a key project for
fiscal year 2012. See http://www.copyright.gov/docs/priorities.pdf. In
executing the study, the Office is acutely aware of its fiscal
responsibilities as an agency of the federal government, including the
responsibility to set sound monetary policies and develop a budget
derived primarily from fees for services. However, the Office is also
deeply cognizant of its responsibility to authors and other copyright
owners, and to users of copyrighted works, to price services in a
manner that encourages participation in the Nation's registration and
recordation systems and ensures a robust database of copyright
information for purposes of commerce and the public good. Indeed, the
Copyright Act requires that fees ``shall be fair and equitable and give
due consideration to the objectives of the copyright system.'' 17
U.S.C. 708(b)(4).
The Register may not adjust fees more than that necessary to cover
the reasonable costs incurred by the Copyright Office for its services
plus a reasonable inflation adjustment to account for any estimated
increase in costs. In fact, the Office's fees have not historically
recovered full costs for all services. When fees were adjusted in 2009,
the Office was recovering approximately 61.4% of its costs for
services. In fiscal year 2011, fee receipts covered only 59.5% of the
Office's costs, a recovery rate that is insufficient by any standard.
In the study at hand, the Office has calculated its true costs
using a traditional methodology. The cost study uses an activity based
costing methodology to calculate full costs of each Copyright Office
service. The study includes a review of both direct and indirect costs
associated with fee services in fiscal 2011. Most copyright activities
are labor intensive and staff costs are tracked for each of the various
fee services. The study requires directly assigning non-personnel costs
that are associated with just one fee service. Once direct costs were
applied, administrative and indirect costs related to fee services were
allocated proportionately. The Office also considered statutory fee
setting requirements, economic factors, and the objectives of the
copyright system in arriving at the proposed fees.
The Office also sought comments from the public in a Notice of
Inquiry published on January 24, 2012 on two specific issues: (1)
Whether special consideration should be provided to individual author-
claimants registering a single work, and (2) the identification of any
special services and corresponding fees the Office should expand,
improve or add to its offerings at this time, including, for example,
additional expedited services and fee options. 77 FR 3506 (January 24,
2012). The proposed fee schedule published today reflects the public's
comments on these issues.
The Office also acknowledges that commenters offered many
additional interesting proposals that we appreciate but will not
address today in the context of this fee study. Many of these proposals
are not ready for action because the Office is considering them in the
context of other major projects that are technical or legal in nature.
Such proposals include, for example, the question of whether
photographers may pay a flat fee for registration of photographs in the
context of a business to business submission model; the question of
whether copyright registration certificates and/or recorded documents
can be made available online for free; and the question of whether the
Office should accept deposits of works in electronic formats that may
be insufficient for the Library's ``best edition'' requirement. The
Office greatly appreciates these issues and suggestions and it will
continue to consider them outside of this fee study.
The purpose of this Notice of Proposed Rulemaking is to offer the
public an opportunity to comment on the Register's proposed fee
adjustments, all of which would be implemented early in fiscal year
2013.

I. Registration, Recordation, and Related Service Fees

1. Basic registration. The Office will soon eliminate Form CO and
will offer two options for filing basic registrations beginning this
summer: online filings and the traditional paper application. See 76 FR
60774 (September 30, 2011). The Office receives approximately 87% of
new copyright claims electronically through its online filing system.
Such filings are far less costly to process. Nevertheless, the Office
understands that some claimants have good reasons for preferring paper
forms, despite the higher cost to the claimant, and the Office will
continue to offer this option. However, the Office will continue to
charge a higher fee for filing a claim using a paper application to
encourage the use of the online filing option. Online filing is the
option that is most efficient to the Office as well as the claimant. On
average, a claimant who files an application online will receive a
registration (or a denial of a registration) within 3 months, while a
claimant filing with paper forms will wait about 10 months.
The Office is also proposing to offer a reduced fee to a single
author who is also the claimant for the online filing of a claim in a
single work that is not a work made for hire, for the policy reasons
discussed below and after considering the comments received from the
public in response to the January 24, 2012 Notice of Inquiry. The
Copyright Office is committed to maintaining an affordable copyright
registration system. No author or copyright owner should be deterred
from registering a copyright because the cost of registration is too
high, and the Office is mindful that there is not endless elasticity in
pricing; pricing is a factor in whether one chooses to register. Many
of the works that come from independent creators are critical to the
Nation's economy and the Library of Congress' mint record and
collection of American creativity. The copyright law itself is designed
to promote and protect authorship and this includes facilitating
registration for the establishment of a public record of copyright
claims and to enable the copyright owner to seek all the remedies
available in the Copyright Act. Similarly, users of copyrighted works
rely on the Copyright Office registration records to identify copyright
owners when they require licenses. If individual authors do not
register and are therefore not part of the public database, they more
than any other group of copyright owners may be difficult to find.
Commenters to the Notice of Inquiry support a separate and lower
fee for single authors. They note, as did the Office, that such
applications are easier to process; that registration provides
important remedies for the author; and that registration benefits the
public by creating a more robust public record.
The Office therefore sees a clear benefit to offering a lower fee
to these claimants as an incentive to register their works. The details
for filing such a claim will be fully set forth in a separate notice of
proposed rulemaking later this year.
In setting the fees for basic registration, the Office closely
examined its costs and recent success in recovering them. In fiscal
year 2011, the Office recovered only 64% of its cost to process an
online claim and only 58% of its cost to process paper applications. In
light of these figures, the Office proposes increasing fees for both
options for filing claims in order to recover a larger percentage of
the Office's cost, but at levels that will still

[[Page 18744]]

encourage copyright owners to register their works. As mentioned above,
elasticity is an important consideration in setting fees. Copyright
registration is a voluntary system, not required by law, and pricing
that is unaffordable or which exceeds the reasonable expectation of a
copyright owner will discourage or prevent participation in the
system--to the public's detriment.
At this time, the Office proposes raising the fee for an online
claim from $35 to $65 and the fee for filing a claim using a paper
application from $65 to $100, but adopting a new fee of $45 for single
authors filing an online claim for a single work that is not a work
made for hire. As specified in the chart at the end of this document,
the Office is also proposing to raise the registration fees for group
registrations, mask works, and vessel hulls based upon the principles
discussed above in order to recover a greater percentage of the basic
costs for processing these claims.
2. Renewals. The Office is proposing a reduction in the fee for
filing a renewal claim from $115 to $100. Renewal registration was
required in the 28th year for works published or registered prior to
1978. The law no longer requires registration for the renewal term to
vest. Renewal registration primarily serves those parties who need a
certificate of registration for various commercial purposes. The cost
study reveals that the actual cost of processing these claims is quite
high. To set a fee to recover full cost would be prohibitive and negate
the goals of the Office in encouraging registration of these older
claims, many of which may still be commercially viable, and
incorporating these claims into the public record. Similarly, the
Office is proposing to reduce the fee for filing a Renewal Addendum,
the necessary filing for renewal when basic registration for the work
was not made during the original term, from $220 to $100 to avoid
deterring these registrations.
3. Recordation. As outlined in the Register's Priorities and
Special Projects document, the Office will reengineer the business
processes for its recordation services, which allow copyright owners
and other people to publicly record in the Copyright Office certain
documents related to copyright interests, including, for example,
assignments, licenses, mortgages and wills. There are some legal
benefits to recording these documents but it is not required by law.
The Office has begun discussions with stakeholders on topics including
searchability and the feasibility of connecting to privately held
records and databases, among others, and a plan will be finalized in
the next 18 months. However, as of this writing, the Office is
accepting paper submissions and, through a limited pilot, filings
submitted on flashsticks. In either case, the basic cost of accepting,
reviewing, indexing and recording a document, especially documents that
are hundreds of pages long and have multiple titles, has not been
recovered in recent years. For this reason, the Office is proposing an
increase in the basic recordation fee from $105 to $120 and a slight
increase in the fee for processing documents with multiple titles from
$30 to $35 to approach full cost recovery.
4. Other related services. Other services including, for example, a
receipt for a deposit under section 407 of the Act and certification of
Copyright Office records, primarily benefit only the user of that
service. In these instances, no overriding principles of public policy
dictate the recovery of less than the direct cost of providing the
service. This approach is supported by the Office of Management and
Budget's guidance to Federal agencies on approaches to establishing
fees for services, which states: ``It is the objective of the United
States government to * * * promote efficient allocation of the Nation's
resources by establishing charges for special benefits provided to the
recipient that are at least as great as costs to the Government of
providing the special benefits.'' See OMB Circular No. A-25 Revised at
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/circulars_a025. The Office is therefore
proposing to increase its fees for optional services and for services
that are for personal or commercial purposes to recover fully its
direct costs in most instances. One major exception is the fee for
reference search reports, for which the Office proposes to increase
fees but to recover only partial costs.
Historically, the fees for a reference search report have recovered
only a small portion of the costs of the service. The Office concludes
that it cannot set a fee at full cost recovery as a practical matter
because the cost would be too high and it would be far out of the range
of fees charged by private-sector providers of this service. A very
high fee would prejudice requestors who, for legal reasons, need their
searches prepared and certified by the Copyright Office. Therefore, the
Office has adjusted its fees for reference search reports upward to
recover more but not all of its direct costs for the service. The
proposed fee is a $400 minimum with an additional fee of $200 for every
hour after the first two hours.

II. Service Fees

The Copyright Office provides a number of services not enumerated
in the Copyright Act and, as stated above, the Register has statutory
authority to establish fees for such services. These include fees for
expedited service (``special handling''), secure test processing,
requests to reconsider rejections of claims, and fees for reproducing
Copyright Office records, among others. The proposed fees reflect the
costs of providing these services, Office-wide cost recovery, and
policy considerations. Many cost adjustments reflect inflationary
increases for the service. In other cases, the fees have not been
adjusted, e.g., basic photocopying costs; or costs have decreased and
the fees have been lowered, e.g., copying to CDs or DVDs. While this
notice will not discuss proposed adjustments to fees that are set to
recover costs or account for inflation, the Office believes further
clarification is useful to understand the change in the fee schedule
for the following services:
1. Expedited handling. The Office offers expedited services for
processing claims; recording documents; searching, retrieving and
copying Copyright Office records; and certifying registrations and
other documents in an advanced timeframe. The proposed fees for these
services will increase slightly to capture increased costs due to
inflation. These fees continue to reflect the cost of the service, plus
a premium payment that reflects the value of the expedited service to
the customer and the disruption to the Office's regular statutory
services.
In reviewing the fees for expedited services, the Office considered
comments it received in response to the January 24, 2012 Notice of
Inquiry as to whether the Office should offer additional services for
expedited handling of claims that do not fit into the current
categories for ``Special Handling.'' Historically Special Handling has
been limited to cases where a compelling need for the service exists
due to pending or prospective litigation, customs matters, or contracts
or publishing deadlines that necessitate the expedited issuance of a
certificate of registration. One suggestion was to drop the
``compelling need'' requirement for special handling and to offer a
tiered fee schedule for special handling based on the turnaround time
for processing the claim. The Office believes the concept of expedited
services warrants further analysis and it will publish a separate
public notice to address the issues fully. A decision on this issue,
however, will not affect the fee for the service in the

[[Page 18745]]

near future. The Office also considered the suggestion to adopt a
tiered system for handling expedited claims, an option it will continue
to consider but will not implement at this point in time, in part due
to limited resources.
2. Secure test processing. The Office offers a special service for
inspecting deposits of secure tests. The Office provides a private
review of the full deposit of a secure test and compares it with the
accompanying identifying material that does not disclose secret
materials. The review process may include one or more staff depending
on the number of claims being processed at any one time. For this
reason, the proposed fee for this labor intensive service reflects an
upward adjustment based on the processing cost to the Office and the
number of staff doing the review; as such, the Office proposes a $250
fee per staff member per hour.
3. Requests for reconsideration of rejections of claims. A claimant
whose work is rejected for registration may request reconsideration of
its claim through a two-tiered administrative process. A staff attorney
in the Registration Program who is not involved in the initial review
of the claim handles the first request for reconsideration. If the work
is not registered at this stage, the claimant may make a second request
for reconsideration. Second requests are considered by the Review Board
consisting of the Register of Copyrights, the General Counsel, and the
Associate Register for the Registration Program or their qualified
delegates. The fees for the first and second reconsideration of a
single claim are not scheduled for change, in part because the Office
recognizes that an increase in fees may prohibit a claimant from
pursuing subsequent review. However, the Office is eliminating its
practice of allowing the joinder of multiple related claims into a
single request for reconsideration because there is no reduced cost in
processing such claims, each of which must be analyzed separately.
Instead, the fee for a request for reconsideration will cover only the
works in a single original claim for registration.

III. Licensing Fees

The Licensing Division of the Copyright Office is responsible for
administering various aspects of the statutory licenses set forth in
sections 111-122 of the Copyright Act, including the processing of the
statements of account filed along with royalties for use of the cable
and satellite statutory licenses in accordance with sections 111 and
119, respectively. The Licensing Division also receives quarterly
statements of account and royalties from companies that import and
distribute or manufacture and distribute digital audio recording
devices and media pursuant to Chapter 10 of the Act. In addition, this
division accepts for recordation certain contracts and licensing
agreements, notices of intent to use the statutory licenses in sections
112 and 114, and notices of intent to use musical works pursuant to the
section 115 compulsory license, and it provides search and copying
services to the public. Proposed fees are based either on a separate
cost study related to the budget and expenditures of the Licensing
Division or, in the case where the Licensing Division offers services
that parallel other services in the Copyright Office, fees are based on
the cost study covering the Copyright Office services. Fees which are
being established for the first time are more fully explained below:
1. Filing fee for Cable and Satellite Statements of Account. In
2010, Congress enacted the Satellite Television Extension and Localism
Act (``STELA'') which, for the first time, granted authority to the
Office to set fees for filing cable and satellite statements of
account. Prior to 2010, the cost of processing the statements was
covered completely by the royalty fees collected under the statutory
licenses for the benefit of the copyright owners. STELA allows the
Office to apportion the cost of processing the statements of account
equally between the copyright owners and the statutory licensees.
According to section 708(a), fees ``shall be reasonable and may not
exceed one-half of the cost necessary to cover reasonable expenses
incurred by the Copyright Office for the collection and administration
of the statements of account and any royalty fees deposited with such
statements.''
In conducting its cost study, the Office took into account the
reengineering efforts of the Licensing Division (the purpose of which
is to develop an online filing system) and the equities associated with
apportioning costs fairly among the licensees. Consequently, the Office
is proposing a three-tiered fee schedule that corresponds to the filing
of the different types of cable statements of account. The fee for
licensees who file a SA1 form and currently pay only $52 each
accounting period is set at $15, the low end of the scale; whereas the
fee for cable systems filing the SA2 form is set slightly higher at $20
because of the review of the basic calculation of the royalty fee for
this group. Licensees who file the more complicated cable statements of
account, the SA3 form, necessarily are expected to pay a
correspondingly higher fee because of the time associated with
reviewing the information on the forms, especially the classification
of community groups and television stations. Thus, the proposed fee for
filing the SA3 form is set at $500. Overall, these fees represent
approximately one-half the cost on average of processing the current
filings. The Office also recognizes that the proposed fees account for
certain reengineering costs that may decline over time. Consequently,
the Office anticipates initiating another targeted cost study after it
has gained experience with the new electronic filing system.
The new fee schedule also includes a $75 filing fee for a satellite
statement of account. In this case, there is a single statement of
account applicable to all satellite carriers and a single fee for
filing that statement. The filing fee of $75 is set at this level
because the forms require some examination beyond that afforded to the
SA1 and SA2 forms filed by cable operators, but they do not require the
particularized examination that is afforded to the complex Form SA3
cable statement of account. As with the filing fees for the cable
statements of account, the filing fee for the satellite statement of
account represents no more than half the cost of processing this form.
2. Fee for filing Notices of Intention to Make and Distribute
Phonorecords electronically. The Office accepts Notices of Intention to
Obtain a Compulsory License for use of the statutory license to make
and distribute phonorecords when the notice cannot be served on the
copyright owner or when the Copyright Office records do not include the
name and address of the copyright owner. Historically, this statutory
license was used to obtain the rights to use a particular musical work
to make a cover record, and the Office received very few such notices.
The advent of the digital age, however, changed the law and how
businesses utilize the section 115 license. Today, the license is
viewed as an acceptable way to license the reproduction and electronic
distribution of the musical work embedded in a digital phonorecord.
Consequently, the use of the license has expanded exponentially and the
Office has responded by investing in the development of an online
filing system. The Office is optimistic that the first iteration of the
online filing system will be operational at the time the proposed fees
become final. In anticipation of that day, the Office has undertaken a
cost study to determine a basic filing fee and the costs for additional
titles for an

[[Page 18746]]

electronic notice which, based on recent experience and the comments to
the Office's earlier Notice of Inquiry regarding additional services
and fees, can include tens of thousands of titles. Based on this cost
study, the Office is proposing to set the fee at $75 for each Notice
with a single title. Notices with additional titles will incur an
additional $20 fee per ten titles for a paper submission and an
additional $10 fee per hundred titles for an online submission (which
works out to $0.10 per additional title). In light of the low proposed
fee for additional titles for filing a Notice online, the Office does
not see a need to consider a cap on the total fees for any one Notice
filed in this manner as suggested in a comment to the Office's January
24, 2012 Notice of Inquiry. As with the filing fees for the cable and
satellite statements of account, the Office will reevaluate the fees
for electronic filings in the future after gaining experience with the
systems and the related costs.

IV. FOIA Fees

The Copyright Office last adjusted its fees for services associated
with the Freedom of Information Act in 1999. See 64 FR 29518 (June 1,
1999). Fees are set in accordance with the guidelines established by
the Office of Management and Budget in accordance with the OMB Uniform
Freedom of Information Act Fee Schedule and Guidelines. 52 FR 10,012
(March 27, 1987). Currently, the Office has an hourly search fee of $65
for entities other than educational institutions, non-commercial
scientific institutions, and representatives of the news media which
mirrored the fee for searching Copyright Office records in 1999 when
the fee was revised. Today's proposed increase in the FOIA fee schedule
brings this and other FOIA fees up to date.
The OMB guidelines allow agencies to recoup the full allowable
direct costs they incur and provide that separate rates may be
established for searching the records and reviewing responsive records
to determine, e.g., the applicability of an exemption. In both cases,
where a single class of reviewers is typically involved in providing
the service, agencies may establish a reasonable agency-wide average
fee. Accordingly, the Office proposes adoption of a two-tiered fee
structure for searches to reflect the direct costs of the service
depending upon the level of the personnel conducting the search. The
proposed fee for a search based on a FOIA request is set at $15 for the
first half hour and $7.50 for each additional 15 minutes if conducted
by administrative staff, and $35 for the first half hour and $17.50 for
each additional 15 minutes if conducted by professional staff.
Similarly, the Office is proposing to adopt new fees for reviewing the
documents at the same rates as those proposed for a FOIA search.
However, the fees for reviewing the documents will be based on 15
minute units and without a minimum fee. In addition, the Office is
proposing to remove the separate fee for a copy of a certificate of
copyright registration and the separate fee for certification services,
currently listed in Sec. Sec. 203.6(b)(1) and (4), respectively. The
OMB guidelines state that such services are not covered by FOIA or its
fee structure and that an agency should recover the full costs of such
services. Therefore, the Office proposes that the FOIA fees for these
services should be the same as the Copyright Office fees for these same
services listed in the proposed schedule.

V. Schedule of Proposed Fees

The chart below sets forth the current and proposed fees for
services related to Registration, Recordation; Special Services; the
Licensing Division; and FOIA requests.

Schedule of Proposed Fees
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Current fee Proposed new fee
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registration, Recordation and Related Services
------------------------------------------------------------------------
(1) Registration of a basic claim in
an original work of authorship:
Single author, same claimant, $35 $45
one work, not a work made for
hire, filed electronically.....
All other claims filed 35 65
electronically.................
Forms PA, SR, TX, VA, SE (paper 65 100
filing)........................
(2) Registration of a claim in a 65 100
group of contributions to
periodicals (Form GR/CP), published
photographs, or database updates
(paper filing).....................
(3) Registration of a renewal claim
(Form RE):
(i) Claim without Addendum...... 115 100
(ii) Addendum (in addition to 220 100
the fee for the Claim).........
(4) Registration of a claim in a 25 35
group of serials (Form SE/Group)
[per issue, minimum 2 issues]......
(5) Registration of a claim in a 80 150
group of daily newspapers or
qualified newsletters (Form G/DN)..
(6) Registration of a claim in a 65 100
restored copyright (Form GATT).....
(7) Preregistration of certain 115 140
unpublished works..................
(8) Registration of a correction or 100 130
amplification to a claim (Form CA).
(9) Registration of a claim in a 105 120
mask work (Form MW)................
(10) Registration of a claim in a 220 400
vessel hull (Form D/VH)............
(11) Providing an additional 35 40
certificate of registration........
(12) Certification of other 165 200
Copyright Office records (per hour)
(13) Search report prepared from 330 400
official records (for up to 2
hours).............................
(i) Additional hours of 165 200
searching (per hour)...........
(ii) Estimate of search fee..... 115 200
(14) Retrieval of in-process or
completed Copyright Office records
or other Copyright Office
materials:
(i) Retrieval of paper records 165 200
(per hour, 1 hour minimum).....
(ii) Retrieval of digital 165 200
records (per hour, \1/2\ hour
minimum/quarter hour
increments)....................
(15) Recordation of document, 105 120
including a Notice of Intention to
Enforce (NIE) (single title).......
Additional titles (per group of 30 35
1 to 10 titles)................
(16) Recordation of an Interim 105 105
Designation of Agent to Receive
Notification of Claimed
Infringement under Sec. 512(c)(2)
(OSP)..............................
Additional names (per group of 1 30 35
to 10 titles)..................
(17) Issuance of a receipt for a 30 30
Sec. 407 deposit.................
------------------------------------------------------------------------

[[Page 18747]]

Special Services
------------------------------------------------------------------------
(1) Service charge for deposit 165 250
account overdraft..................
(2) Service charge for dishonored 85 100
deposit account replenishment check
(3) Service charge for an 25 30
uncollectible or non-negotiable
payment............................
(4) Requests for Reconsideration of
Refusals to Register Claims:
(i) First Request (per claim)... 250 250
(ii) Second Request (per claim). 500 500
(5) Secure test processing charge 165 250
(per staff member per hour)........
(6) Copying of Copyright Office ................ variable
records by staff:..................
Photocopy (b&w, 8\1/2\ x 11) 0.50 0.50
(per page, minimum: $12).......
Photocopy (b&w, 11 x 17) (per 1 1
page, minimum: $12)............
Photocopy (color, 8\1/2\ x 11) 2 2
(per page, minimum: $12).......
Photocopy (color, 11 x 17) (per 4 4
page, minimum: $12)............
Audiocassette (first 30 minutes) 75 75
Additional 15 minute increments. 20 20
Videocassette (first 30 minutes) 75 75
Additional 15 minute increments. 20 20
CD or DVD....................... 100 30
Flash Drive..................... N/A 30
Other formats not available in variable at cost
the Copyright Office, dependent
upon availability of equipment
and media, at cost from
provider.......................
(7) Special handling fee for a claim 760 800
For multiple claims with one 50 50
deposit where special handling
is requested only for a single
claim, handling fee in addition
to the basic registration fee
for each claim using the same
deposit........................
(8) Special handling fee for 480 550
recordation of a document..........
(9) Handling fee of extra deposit 45 50
copy for certification.............
(10) Full-term retention of a 470 540
published deposit..................
(11) Expedited search report (for up 890 1,000
to 2 hours)........................
Additional hours of searching 445 500
(per hour).....................
(12) Expedited retrieval, 265 305
certification and copying services
(surcharge, per hour)..............
(13) Notice to Libraries and 50 50
Archives...........................
Each additional title........... 20 20
(14) Service charge for Federal 40 45
Express mailing....................
(15) Service charge for delivery of 1 1
documents via facsimile (per page,
7 page maximum)....................
------------------------------------------------------------------------
FOIA Fees
------------------------------------------------------------------------
(1) Search of Copyright Office
records:
(i) Search prepared by \1\ 65 7.50
administrative staff (per 15
min., \1/2\\ hour min.)........
(ii) Search prepared by \1\ 65 17.50
professional staff (per 15 min,
\1/2\ hour min.)...............
(2) Review of documents:
(i) Performed by administrative N/A 7.50
staff (per 15 min.)............
(ii) Performed by professional N/A 17.50
staff (15 min.)................
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Licensing Division Services
------------------------------------------------------------------------
(1) Processing of a statement of
account based on secondary
transmissions of primary
transmissions pursuant to Sec.
111:
(i) Form SA1.................... N/A 15
(ii) Form SA2................... N/A 20
(iii) Form SA3.................. N/A 500
(2) Processing of a statement of N/A 75
account based on secondary
transmissions of primary
transmissions pursuant to Sec.
119 or Sec. 122:.................
(3) Statement of Account Amendment 100 150
(Cable Television Systems and
Satellite Carriers, 17 U.S.C. Sec.
111, Sec. 119, and Sec. 122;
Digital Audio Recording Devices or
Media, 17 U.S.C. Sec. 1003)......
(4) Filing fee for recordation of a 140 140
licensing agreement (17 U.S.C. Sec.
118).............................
(5) Recordation of a Notice of 60 75
Intention to Make and Distribute
Phonorecords with a single title
(17 U.S.C. Sec. 115).............
(i) Additional titles (per group 20 20
of 1 to 10 titles), paper
filing.........................
(ii) Additional titles (per N/A 10
group of 1 to 100 titles),
online filing..................
(6) Recordation of Certain Contracts 50 50
by Cable TV Systems Located Outside
the 48 Contiguous States...........
(7) Section 112/114, Notice of 25 40
Digital Transmission of Sound
Recording..........................
Amended Notice of Digital 25 40
Transmission of Sound Recording
(8) Photocopy of Licensing record by 0.50 0.50
staff (b&w) (per page) [minimum:
$12]...............................
(9) Search report prepared from 165 200
Licensing records (per hour).......
(10) Certification of search report 165 200
(per hour).........................
------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Current fees are based on an hourly rate.

[[Page 18748]]

VI. Technical Amendments

The Office will adopt technical amendments as needed to conform
existing regulations to the changes proposed in this notice.

VII. Request for Comments

The Copyright Office is publishing the proposed new fee schedule to
provide the public with an opportunity to comment. The Office
anticipates implementation of the new fees with the beginning of the
new fiscal year, October 1, 2012.

Dated: March 21, 2012.
Maria A. Pallante,
Register of Copyrights.
[FR Doc. 2012-7428 Filed 3-27-12; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE P