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Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-07-06 10:51:44 -04:00

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LegalText 17 U.S.C. § 202 Ownership of copyright as distinct from ownership of material object us united_states_code code_section 17 COPYRIGHTS 2 COPYRIGHT OWNERSHIP AND TRANSFER 202 17 U.S.C. § 202 current 119-100 2026-06-26 official https://uscode.house.gov/download/releasepoints/us/pl/119/100/xml_usc17@119-100.zip /us/usc/t17/s202 data/legal/raw/us/code/title-17/usc17.xml 13bf998c99d628023f52ffd8427bf3254b4d9fccddb98c630310ce7957f29f2c 53c244d73050c7c92329dce6d1ccd78b9e2fece359d919b044b600b95258446c 1aaeba045e4b97a78796721329a7759a22257418600f8ea99fc453a06494d4af 2026-07-04 official
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17 U.S.C. § 202 - Ownership of copyright as distinct from ownership of material object

Text

Ownership of a copyright, or of any of the exclusive rights under a copyright, is distinct from ownership of any material object in which the work is embodied. Transfer of ownership of any material object, including the copy or phonorecord in which the work is first fixed, does not of itself convey any rights in the copyrighted work embodied in the object; nor, in the absence of an agreement, does transfer of ownership of a copyright or of any exclusive rights under a copyright convey property rights in any material object.

(Pub. L. 94553, title I, § 101, Oct. 19, 1976, 90 Stat. 2568.)

Notes

Historical and Revision Notes

house report no. 941476The principle restated in section 202 is a fundamental and important one: that copyright ownership and ownership of a material object in which the copyrighted work is embodied are entirely separate things. Thus, transfer of a material object does not of itself carry any rights under the copyright, and this includes transfer of the copy or phonorecord—the original manuscript, the photographic negative, the unique painting or statue, the master tape recording, etc.—in which the work was first fixed. Conversely, transfer of a copyright does not necessarily require the conveyance of any material object. As a result of the interaction of this section and the provisions of section 204(a) and 301, the bill would change a common law doctrine exemplified by the decision in Pushman v. New York Graphic Society, Inc., 287 N.Y. 302, 39 N.E.2d 249 (1942). Under that doctrine, authors or artists are generally presumed to transfer common law literary property rights when they sell their manuscript or work of art, unless those rights are specifically reserved. This presumption would be reversed under the bill, since a specific written conveyance of rights would be required in order for a sale of any material object to carry with it a transfer of copyright.