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

[Federal Register Volume 77, Number 60 (Wednesday, March 28, 2012)]
[Rules and Regulations]
[Pages 18705-18707]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2012-7429]

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

37 CFR Parts 201 and 202

[Docket No. 2011-8]

Discontinuance of Form CO in Registration Practices

AGENCY: Copyright Office, Library of Congress.

ACTION: Final rule.

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SUMMARY: The United States Copyright Office is amending its regulations
in order to discontinue use of the Form CO application as an option for
applying for copyright registration, and in order to remove references
to CON 1 and CON 2 continuation sheets. The removal of Form CO leaves
applicants a choice of filing an application for registration
electronically or by using the appropriate printed application form
relating to the subject matter of the application. The amendment also
removes the references to CON 1 and CON 2 continuation sheets, which
were never developed or made available to the public; the regulations
instead now refer only to the continuation sheets currently available
for applicants filing paper applications and makes other housekeeping
amendments relating to applications for copyright registration.

DATES: Effective Date: July 1, 2012.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Tanya Sandros, Deputy General Counsel,
Copyright Office, GC/I&R, P.O. Box 70400, Washington, DC 20024.
Telephone: (202) 707-8380. Telefax: (202) 707-8366. All prior Federal
Register notices and comments in this docket are available at http://www.copyright.gov/docs/formco/.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Background

In 2007, the Copyright Office began an extensive business process
reengineering initiative that had an impact on a variety of
registration-related activities. See 72 FR 36883 (July 6, 2007). As
part of this initiative, the Office promulgated interim regulations
regarding how the public submits and the Office processes copyright
applications. In these interim regulations, the Office announced four
ways to file an application for registration. At the time, the Office
used the term ``Form CO'' generically in its regulations to cover all
four approaches to registration. With the implementation of the new
electronic registration practices, however, Form CO was used to
describe a specific form that is filled out on a computer and that uses
barcodes to capture the information entered by the person filling out
the form. After completing the form, the applicant prints it out and
submits the paper form to the Copyright Office. This newer incarnation
of Form CO, first made available in 2008, was intended to simplify the
application process and replace the traditional paper Forms TX, VA, PA,
SR, and SE. See 72 FR at 36885; 37 CFR 202.3(b)(2)(ii). However,
following the implementation of reengineering, it eventually became
clear (for reasons discussed below) that Form CO did not live up to its
expectations because many users of the form made entries on the form
that were not captured in the barcodes and therefore were not carried
over into the Office's registration records and because of problems
with printing the forms.
The regulations promulgated in 2007 also referred to two additional
continuation sheets, CON 1 and CON 2, which the Office intended to be
used in connection with Form CO and which would have allowed applicants
to provide additional information that would not fit within the
barcodes to be generated by Form CO. See 72 FR at 36886. However, the
Office never developed these new continuation sheets and continued to
accept the traditional Form CON for the provision of additional
information. See http://www.copyright.gov/forms/formcon.pdf.
On September 30, 2011, the Copyright Office published a notice of
proposed rulemaking and request for comments in regard to Form CO, CON
1, and CON 2. 76 FR 60774. The Office proposed eliminating Form CO as
an application option and removing references to CON 1 and CON 2. Form
CO, the Office pointed out, is not widely used, but it does present a
disproportionate number of problems for the Office. As is explained in
greater detail in the notice of proposed rulemaking, when applicants
find they need to amend information on Form CO after preparing and
printing the form but before submitting it, they frequently make
changes by writing directly on the form rather than redoing or revising
the form correctly online. As a result, additional time and resources
are required for the Office to manually input the amended information
into the system, or it may be missed in the ingestion process
altogether. Either way, the added time required to detect and correct
these problems defeats all the efficiencies promised by this
technology.
Nor is human error the only concern. The notice of proposed
rulemaking also noted that the use of barcodes presents other unique
problems associated with

[[Page 18706]]

the technology. Barcodes can be compromised and fail to function
properly, e.g., due to distortion in the printing of the application,
or due to tears in the portion of the page on which the barcode
appears. In such cases the information on a Form CO application must be
manually entered into the online registration system.
In addition to proposing the elimination of Form CO, the Office
proposed amending its regulations to remove references to continuation
sheets for use with Form CO--CON 1 and CON 2--because the Copyright
Office never created these specialized forms.

Comments

The Office received two comments in response to its notice of
proposed rulemaking one in support of the proposal to eliminate Form CO
and the other in support of maintaining it Author Services, Inc.
writing in support of the Office's proposal to eliminate Form CO,
stated that its use is ``likely to cause errors and lengthen the
examination process.'' Attorney Joshua Kaufman, on the other hand,
opposed elimination of Form CO. He argued that the electronic filing
system is ``clunky, cumbersome and takes a great deal of time,'' and
stated that the system does not provide a copy of the application
suitable for the applicant's file and for subsequent review. The
alternative to electronic filing--using forms specific to various types
of works--was also insufficient, maintained Mr. Kaufman, because these
forms take over a year to process and are more expensive than
electronic registration.

Discussion

Form CO represents a very small percentage of applications received
by the Office--approximately two percent of applications submitted
since January 2011 have been submitted on Form CO. Eliminating Form CO
will simplify the registration process for the Copyright Office and
leave applicants with two options to register their works. They may
submit applications for registration electronically or they may use the
paper forms (Forms TX, PA, VA, SR, and SE., or the Short Forms TX, PA,
VA or SE if appropriate). Applications submitted electronically are
less expensive and this option allows for a quicker turnaround time.
Currently, these applications are processed on average in three months.
The Office has also reduced the time it takes to process a paper
application, completing the process on average in 10 months. However,
the key benefit gained in eliminating Form CO is the savings in
resources which the Office now spends on reviewing each Form CO to
ensure the accuracy of the Form CO information embedded in the barcode.
While Mr. Kaufman's lone voice in favor of maintaining Form CO does
not provide a strong reason for the Office to continue to offer this
option for registration, he does raise three issues that the Office,
for the sake of clarity, wishes to address. First, the Office is aware
that improvements are needed to make the online registration system
more user-friendly and less time-consuming and, for that reason, the
Office is committed to making it as easy and efficient as possible. To
that end, the Register has made the evaluation of technical upgrades to
the current electronic deposit system a major priority over the next 18
months, a process that includes significant involvement from remitters
and technical experts. See Priorities and Special Projects of the
United States Copyright Office (http://www.copyright.gov/docs/priorities.pdf) at 13. Also, contrary to Mr. Kaufman's assertion, a
reviewable copy of an electronic application is available to applicants
after successful fee payment. Using the ``My Applications'' link, an
applicant can view and print a copy of the certificate preview
displaying all the information entered by the applicant under the
corresponding headings. Finally, regarding the use of paper forms
instead of electronic registration, the Office notes that while paper
registration is more expensive and does take longer, the processing
time for these applications has been steadily declining. As noted
above, the current average processing time for a paper application is
10 months, not a year or longer.
For the reasons set forth above and because there is little support
for maintaining Form CO, the Office has concluded that the use of Form
CO should be discontinued. In addition, because the Office is
discontinuing Form CO and never created the CON 1 and CON 2 forms that
were to be used with Form CO, the Office is amending its regulations to
remove references to the CON 1 and CON 2 forms. Note, however, that
those applicants using paper applications may continue to use existing
Form CON. See http://www.copyright.gov/forms/formcon.pdf. As a related
point of clarity, the Office is also amending Sec. 202.3(b)(10)(iv)(D)
and (v) of the regulations, relating to group registration of published
photographs, to clarify that the references therein to ``special
continuation sheet'' are references to Form DR/PPh/CON.

Effective Date

Beginning July 1, 2012, the Copyright Office will no longer accept
Form CO applications for registration. Upon receipt of a Form CO on or
after July 1, 2012, the Office will notify the remitter that it has
received an incomplete submission for registration and that the
remitter may complete the submission by providing a completed ``Form
TX''; ``Form PA''; ``Form VA''; ``Form SR''; ``Form SE.,'' or the short
form versions of Forms TX, PA, VA or SE as appropriate, along with any
applicable short fee. The effective date of registration for the claim
will be the date the Office receives a complete submission, including
an acceptable form, the appropriate fee and the deposit. Should the
remitter fail to provide the correct form and additional fee within 30
days, the Office will close the claim and retain the initial fee to
cover the administrative costs of processing the incomplete submission.

Housekeeping Amendments

The Office also takes this opportunity to make three additional
amendments to its regulations. First, the Office is amending Sec.
201.3(c) to clarify that the $35 fee for an electronic filing listed in
item 2 applies only to the electronic submission of applications for
group registration of photographs and for registration of automated
databases that predominantly consist of photographs and updates to
these databases. See 76 FR 4072 (January 24, 2011) and 76 FR 5106
(January 28, 2011). While the Office had anticipated providing an
online option for group registration of contributions to periodicals,
this option still requires further testing and evaluation and is not
currently offered.
Second, the Office is amending Sec. 202.2(b)(1) which incorrectly
identifies the appropriate copyright notice on a sound recording as a
``(copyright).'' The technical amendment corrects this error and
identifies the correct notice for a sound recording as a ``[ballot].''
Finally, the Office is amending Sec. 202.3(b)(2)(ii) to include
specific references to the short forms of several standard applications
for registration and to indicate the circumstances under which these
forms are used today. The conditions for use of the short forms are
explained in the instructions accompanying Short Form PA, Short Form
TX, Short Form VA, and Short Form SE. Thus, the proposed amendment
merely clarifies the longstanding practice of the Office to accept
short form applications, provided that the claim meets the conditions
outlined in the instructions to the forms.

[[Page 18707]]

List of Subjects

37 CFR Part 201

37 CFR Part 202

Final Regulations

In consideration of the foregoing, the Copyright Office amends
parts 201 and 202 of 37 CFR, as follows:

PART 201--GENERAL PROVISIONS

0
1. The authority citation for part 201 continues to read as follows:

Authority: 17 U.S.C. 702.

Sec. 201.3 [Amended]

0
2. Amend Sec. 201.3(c) as follows:
0
a. By removing the line beginning ``Form-D barcode application properly
completed online) * * *'' and the phrase ``; and Form CO without
barcodes or incomplete information, or information added after printing
(paper filing)'' from item (1) of the fee chart titled ``Registration,
Recordation and Related Services.''
0
b. By adding ``of automated databases that predominantly consist of
photographs and updates thereto or group registration of published
photographs'' after ``electronic filing'' in item (2) of the fee chart
titled ``Registration, Recordation and Related Services.''

PART 202--PREREGISTRATION AND REGISTRATION OF CLAIMS TO COPYRIGHT

0
3. The authority citation for part 202 reads as follows:

Authority: 17 U.S.C. 409 and 702.

Sec. 202.2 [Amended]

0
4. Amend Sec. 202.2(b)(1) by removing ``(copyright)'' after ``in the
case of a sound recording, the symbol'' and adding ``[ballot]'' in its
place.

0
5. Amend Sec. 202.3 by:
0
a. Revising paragraphs (b)(2) and (b)(3).
0
b. In paragraphs (b)(10)(iv)(D) and (b)(10)(v) by adding ``(Form GR/
PPh/CON)'' after the phrase ``special continuation sheet'' wherever it
appears.
0
c. In paragraph (c)(2) introductory text by removing ``, electronically
or in printed form, on the appropriate form prescribed by the Register
of Copyrights under'' and by adding ``by using one of the methods set
forth in'' in its place.
0
d. By resdesignating footnotes 3 through 6 as footnotes 2 through 5.

Sec. 202.3 Registration of copyright.

* * * * *
(b) * * *
(2) Submission of application for registration. For purposes of
registration, an applicant may submit an application for registration
of individual works and certain groups of works electronically through
the Copyright Office's Web site, or by using the printed forms
prescribed by the Register of Copyrights.
(i) An applicant may submit an application electronically through
the Copyright Office Web site [www.copyright.gov]. An online submission
requires a payment of the application fee through an electronic fund
transfer, credit or debit card, or through a Copyright Office deposit
account. Deposit materials in support of the online application may be
submitted electronically in a digital format along with the application
and payment, or deposit materials in physically tangible formats may be
separately mailed to the Copyright Office, using a mailing label
generated during the online registration process, or
(ii) (A) Alternatively, an applicant may submit an application on
one of the printed forms prescribed by the Register of Copyrights. Each
printed form corresponds to a class set forth in paragraph (b)(1) of
this section and is so designated (``Form TX''; ``Short Form TX'',
``Form PA''; ``Short Form PA'', ``Form VA''; ``Short Form VA'', ``Form
SR''; ``Form SE''; ``Short Form SE'', and ``Form SE/Group'').
(B) Short form applications may only be used if certain conditions
are met. Short Form TX, Short Form PA, and Short Form VA may be used
only to register a single work in a case when a living author who is
the only author of his or her work is the sole owner of the copyright
in the work, the work is not a compilation or derivative work
containing a substantial amount of previously published or registered
material, and the work is not a work made for hire. Short Form SE may
be used only if the claim is in a collective work, the work is
essentially an all-new collective work or issue, the author is a
citizen or domiciliary of the United States, the work is a work for
hire, the author(s) and claimant(s) are the same person(s) or
organization(s), and the work was first published in the United States.
(C) Printed form applications should be submitted in the class most
appropriate to the nature of the authorship in which copyright is
claimed. In the case of contributions to collective works, applications
should be submitted in the class representing the copyrightable
authorship in the contribution. In the case of derivative works,
applications should be submitted in the class most appropriately
representing the copyrightable authorship involved in recasting,
transforming, adapting, or otherwise modifying the preexisting work. In
cases where a work contains elements of authorship in which copyright
is claimed which fall into two or more classes, the application should
be submitted in the class most appropriate to the type of authorship
that predominates in the work as a whole. However, in any case where
registration is sought for a work consisting of or including a sound
recording in which copyright is claimed, the application shall be
submitted on Form SR.
(D) Copies of the printed forms are available on the Copyright
Office's Web site [www.copyright.gov] and upon request to the Copyright
Public Information Office, Library of Congress. Printed form
applications may be completed and submitted by completing a printed
version or using a PDF version of the applicable Copyright Office
application form and mailing it together with the other required
elements, i.e., physically tangible deposit copies and/or materials,
and the required filing fee, all elements being placed in the same
package and sent by mail or hand-delivered to the Copyright Office.
(3) Continuation sheets. A continuation sheet (Form CON) is
appropriate only in the case when a printed form application is used
and where additional space is needed by the applicant to provide all
relevant information concerning a claim to copyright. An application
may include more than one continuation sheet, subject to the
limitations in paragraph (b)(10)(v) of this section.
* * * * *

Dated: March 12, 2012.
Maria A. Pallante,
Register of Copyrights.
Dated: March 19, 2012.
James H. Billington,
The Librarian of Congress.
[FR Doc. 2012-7429 Filed 3-27-12; 8:45 am]
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