Proposed Copyright Rule Would Ease Registration for News Publishers, Magnani Says

Tom Magnani, head of the firm’s Technology Transactions practice and co-chair of the Technology, Media, & Telecommunications industry group, was featured in the Bloomberg Law article, “Copyright Rule Would Ease News Registration as AI Fight Looms.” The article examines the U.S. Copyright Office’s recent proposal to create a new group registration option for frequently updated news websites. The proposed rulemaking would ease copyright registration for online news publishers, who are currently required to submit a separate application, deposit, and filing fee for each website update they want to register for copyright.

Magnani told Bloomberg Law that allowing website publishers — particularly those who belong to websites that update constantly — to submit a month’s worth of updates together is significant from a cost perspective because under the current system, the only option is to file an application for a day's worth of updates and “once a day is still one filing fee per day,” whereas under the proposed plan the publishers would pay one fee for a whole month's worth of updates. He added that the proposed changes would allow publishers to register more content in one application using representative examples, which means they would not have to be as selective about what specific works they register.

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