Notice of copyright: Visually perceptible copies
United States Code
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How this statute sits in the citation network, derived from CiteLaw's graph of published opinions.
★Landmark AuthorityTop 1% most-cited · cited by 186 decisions
186
Citing decisions
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Courts citing
Citations by decade
2
57
40
38
24
25
1970s1980s1990s2000s2010s2020s
Courts citing this statute
Most recently cited by10
- 2026Nordstrom Consulting, Inc.; Steven Nordstrom v. Innova Systems, Inc.; Cheryl Nordstrom, individually N.D. Ill.
- 2026Equine Legal Solutions, Pc v. Fireline Farms, Inc. 9th Cir.
- 2025TSDC, LLC v. Pearson N.D. Ohio
- 2025James Fortune v. Glam House Group, Inc. C.D. Cal.
- 2024Hartman v. Meta Platforms, Inc. S.D. Ill.
- 2024Shen Engineers v. Brighton D. Utah
- 2024Sadowski v. Downing and Downing, Inc. N.D. Ohio
- 2023PalatiumCare Inc v. Notify LLC E.D. Wis.
- 2022Energy Intelligence Group, Inc. v. Constellation Energy Generation, LLC. N.D. Ill.
- 2022Cadles of West Virginia, LLC v. Alvarez S.D. Cal.
Counts reflect decisions in the CiteLaw corpus and may lag very recent opinions.
Text
Whenever a work protected under this title is published in the United States or elsewhere by authority of the copyright owner, a notice of copyright as provided by this section may be placed on publicly distributed copies from which the work can be visually perceived, either directly or with the aid of a machine or device. the symbol © (the letter C in a circle), or the word “Copyright”, or the abbreviation “Copr.”; and the year of first publication of the work; in the case of compilations, or derivative works incorporating previously published material, the year date of first publication of the compilation or derivative work is sufficient. The year date may be omitted where a pictorial, graphic, or sculptural work, with accompanying text matter, if any, is reproduced in or on greeting cards, postcards, stationery, jewelry, dolls, toys, or any useful articles; and the name of the owner of copyright in the work, or an abbreviation by which the name can be recognized, or a generally known alternative designation of the owner. The notice shall be affixed to the copies in such manner and location as to give reasonable notice of the claim of copyright. The Register of Copyrights shall prescribe by regulation, as examples, specific methods of affixation and positions of the notice on various types of works that will satisfy this requirement, but these specifications shall not be considered exhaustive. If a notice of copyright in the form and position specified by this section appears on the published copy or copies to which a defendant in a copyright infringement suit had access, then no weight shall be given to such a defendant’s interposition of a defense based on innocent infringement in mitigation of actual or statutory damages, except as provided in the last sentence of section 504(c)(2). If a notice appears on the copies, it shall consist of the following three elements: (Source: (Pub. L. 94–553, title I, § 101, Oct. 19, 1976, 90 Stat. 2576; Pub. L. 100–568, § 7(a), Oct. 31, 1988, 102 Stat. 2857.))