[Federal Register Volume 82, Number 88 (Tuesday, May 9, 2017)]
[Notices]
[Pages 21551-21553]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2017-09317]


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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

U.S. Copyright Office

[Docket No. 2017-5]


Pilot Program for Bulk Submission of Claims to Copyright

AGENCY: U.S. Copyright Office, Library of Congress.

ACTION: Public notice.

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SUMMARY: The U.S. Copyright Office is announcing a pilot program that 
will allow for the bulk submission of claims to copyright in certain 
limited types of literary works. Specifically, at this time, the pilot 
program is limited to claims to single literary works that have a 
single author, where all content that appears in the work was created 
and is owned solely by that single author. Applicants that participate 
in the pilot will be required to provide author, title, and

[[Page 21552]]

other pertinent information for each work they submit. And they will be 
required to upload a copy of each work and pay the appropriate filing 
fee. But they will be able to bypass the Office's online interface and 
transmit their claims directly into the electronic registration system, 
instead of filing them on an individual basis. To participate in the 
pilot, applicants would have to comply with certain technical 
requirements, which are discussed below. The Office is offering this 
pilot as part of its continuing effort to increase the efficiency of 
the registration system for both applicants and the Office alike.

ADDRESSES: Entities interested in participating in the pilot program 
should contact the Copyright Office by submitting their contact 
information, as well as a description of the type of works sought to be 
registered and anticipated volume, in the form located at https://www.copyright.gov/rulemaking/bulk-submission. The Copyright Office will 
contact interested parties after receiving this information.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Sarang V. Damle, General Counsel and 
Associate Register of Copyrights, by email at [email protected] or by 
telephone at 202-707-8350, or Robert J. Kasunic, Associate Register and 
Director of Registration Policy and Practice by telephone at 202-707-
8040.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: In 2013, the U.S. Copyright Office began to 
identify and evaluate potential improvements and technical enhancements 
to the information technology platforms that support its electronic 
registration system. As part of this effort, the Office sought public 
comment on how stakeholders use the Office's online system, known as 
``eCO,'' and whether the system meets or fails to meet user 
expectations. The Office also sought input on the types of online 
services that stakeholders would like to see in the future. See 78 FR 
17722 (Mar. 22, 2013).
    The Office received input from various stakeholders, including 
copyright owners, users of copyright records, technical experts, public 
interest organizations, professional associations, and small 
businesses. One recommendation that the Office frequently heard was the 
need for bulk data transfer between interested parties and the Office. 
Stakeholders predicted that ``system-to-system'' or ``business-to-
business'' transfers would allow applicants to submit large quantities 
of electronic material and associated application data to the Office. 
They encouraged the Office to take an active role in facilitating this 
type of data exchange by adopting standards-based protocols, such as 
ebMS, SOAP, and AS4. 78 FR at 17722, 17723.
    In February 2015, the Chief Information Officer for the Copyright 
Office issued a report that offered several recommendations for 
creating a better user interface and a better public record. See U.S. 
Copyright Office, Office of the Chief Information Officer, Report and 
Recommendations of the Technical Upgrades Special Project Team (Feb. 
2015), available at http://copyright.gov/docs/technical_upgrades/usco-technicalupgrades.pdf (hereinafter ``Technical Upgrades Report''). With 
respect to the electronic registration system, the report recommended 
that the Office establish a short-term pilot, using the Office's 
existing registration system, allowing for the bulk submission of 
copyright claims from select parties, while maintaining the long-term 
goal of eventually allowing ``open and easy bulk submission'' from any 
interested party in a future registration system. Id. at 10, 72. The 
report predicted that bulk submission would reduce the amount of manual 
labor involved in submitting claims, and improve the quality of the 
data that the Office receives. The report encouraged the Office to 
initiate a pilot ``sooner rather than later,'' but acknowledged that 
``such a critical initiative should not be undertaken without proper 
planning.'' Id. at 69-70.
    The pilot program described in this Notice of Inquiry represents a 
first step in implementing this recommendation. It also represents a 
step towards the Office's ultimate goal of developing ``a robust and 
flexible technology enterprise that is dedicated to the current and 
future needs of a modern copyright agency.'' U.S. Copyright Office, 
Strategic Plan 2016-2020: Positioning the United States Copyright 
Office for the Future, at 35 (Dec. 1, 2015), available at http://www.copyright.gov/reports/strategic-plan/sp-2016-2020.html.
    This pilot program will be very limited in scope. It will be 
available only for claims to single literary works that have a single 
author, where all content that appears in the work was created and is 
owned solely by that single author.

Works Eligible for Bulk Submission

    Applicants can register most types of works through the eCO 
system.\1\ But they must file their claims through the Office's Web 
site, and each claim must be submitted on an individual basis. Many 
stakeholders complain that this system is cumbersome and difficult to 
use. Technical Upgrades Report at 18; 78 FR at 17723.
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    \1\ As the Office noted in a recent rulemaking, applicants 
currently must file a paper application to seek a supplementary 
registration, a renewal registration, or a basic registration for a 
mask work, a vessel design, a foreign work restored to copyright 
protection under the Uruguay Round Agreements Act, and certain types 
of databases. See 81 FR 86656, 86657-58 (Dec. 1, 2016).
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    Applicants that have been accepted into the pilot program will be 
able to bypass the Office's Web site and the eCO interface. Instead, 
they will transmit their claims directly into the electronic 
registration system through a separate portal. And they will be able to 
submit multiple batches of claims, instead of filing them one by one.
    The pilot is intended for applicants that routinely submit large 
numbers of claims, either on their own behalf or on behalf of other 
parties. As with any other claim, applicants will be required to 
provide the information called for in the application, including the 
author, title, and other pertinent details about each work. But they 
will be able to send this information in a single transmission instead 
of preparing separate submissions for each work. Applicants will be 
required to pay the appropriate filing fee for each claim, but they 
will be able to pay these fees with a single deduction from their 
deposit account instead of making separate payments. Finally, 
applicants will be required to upload a complete electronic copy of 
each work. But they will be able to bundle these copies together and 
send them in a single package, instead of uploading each copy 
individually. Once these materials have been received, the electronic 
registration system will match each electronic copy with the 
corresponding application information for that work.
    To be clear, the Office is not creating a new group registration 
option. The pilot is simply intended to facilitate the submission of 
large numbers of individual claims that would otherwise be submitted 
one by one. When the Office receives a bulk submission it will examine 
each work on an individual basis to determine if it meets the 
eligibility requirements established for the pilot, and if the other 
formal and legal requirements have been met. If so, the Office will 
issue a separate certificate of registration for each work.
    As noted above, applicants may be eligible for the bulk submission 
option only if their claims satisfy certain requirements. Specifically, 
each claim must be limited to one literary work. Each work must be 
created by one

[[Page 21553]]

individual, all the content that appears in the work must be created by 
that individual, and that individual must be the sole owner of all 
rights in the work. In this respect, the pilot program will mirror the 
eligibility requirements that apply when a literary work is submitted 
with the Single Application. Likewise, the filing fee for claims 
submitted through the pilot will match the fee that currently applies 
to the Single Application, namely $35 for each work. The deposit for 
each work must be uploaded as one PDF file.
    If the Office determines that a particular work does not satisfy 
these eligibility requirements, it will refuse to register the claim. 
In particular, works made for hire will not be eligible for the pilot. 
A work created by two or more individuals will not be eligible. A work 
will not be eligible if the deposit contains material created by two or 
more authors (even if the applicant only intends to register material 
created by one of those individuals). For the same reason, a derivative 
work will not be eligible if it is based on a preexisting work by a 
different author. A work created by one individual will not be eligible 
if the author transferred his or her rights to another party or if the 
work is co-owned by two or more parties. Claims involving collective 
works, an unpublished collection, a unit or publication, a Web site, a 
database, or other multiple works also will not be eligible for the 
pilot.
    The Office is limiting the pilot to literary works at this time, 
because they account for the largest number of claims submitted through 
the eCO system in any given year. For example, in Fiscal Year 2016, the 
Office received more than 180,000 literary claims, which represent 
roughly 36% of the electronic claims submitted during that period. At 
the same time, the Office must balance the administrative burden that 
bulk submission may impose on the Office. The Office decided to limit 
the pilot to works that satisfy the eligibility requirements for the 
Single Application in part because these claims tend to be less complex 
than claims involving multiple works, multiple authors, and/or multiple 
owners. If the pilot is successful, the Office may consider expanding 
this option to include other types of works.

Participation in the Pilot Program

    This Notice provides a general overview of how the pilot program is 
expected to work. Participants will be allowed to join the pilot only 
if they cooperate with and obtain approval from the Office's technology 
staff during each phase. The Office may also limit the total number of 
participants based on its available resources and the volume of claims 
that each party plans to submit.
    Briefly stated, the Office will create a separate portal into the 
eCO system for each participant. In addition, the Office will provide 
participants with an XML (extensive markup language) schema that 
identifies the type of data that must be included in each submission. 
The schema will call for a unique tracking number that will be assigned 
to each claim. It will contain a field for the deposit account that 
will be used to pay the filing fee for each claim. And it will contain 
data fields that match the corresponding fields in the Single 
Application for literary works. These fields include the type of work; 
title of work; completion date; publication status; name of author, 
claimant, and correspondent; and the name of the person who certified 
the application.\2\
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    \2\ The schema also will include optional fields for limiting 
the claim, providing rights and permissions information, and 
requesting special handling.
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    Each participant will develop its own internal systems for 
collecting this data. In addition, each participant will create a 
secure gateway--in close consultation with the Office's technology 
staff--that will be used to transmit this data to the Office. 
Participants will be required to conduct extensive testing to confirm 
that their gateway is compatible with the eCO system before they will 
be allowed to use the bulk submission option.
    Once it has been tested and approved, the gateway will be attached 
to the portal and will interact directly with the eCO system. Briefly 
stated, participants will transmit streams of data through the gateway 
in an XML format using the HTTPS secure transport protocol. 
Participants will use the HTTP ``POST'' method to submit an electronic 
copy of each work in a PDF format. The Office does not plan to limit 
the number of claims that may be included within each submission, but 
each batch must include a header that identifies the total number of 
claims contained therein.
    Once the XML stream and the electronic copies have been sent 
through the gateway, the participant will receive an email notification 
acknowledging the receipt of the transmission. Before the transmission 
is entered into the eCO system, the Office will scan it for potential 
security issues, such as the presence of malicious code. Next, the 
transmission will be scanned to determine if (i) there is a sufficient 
amount of money in the participant's deposit account to cover the 
filing fees, (ii) a copy of each work has been submitted, and (iii) the 
electronic copies can be linked to the corresponding data file for each 
work. If not, the system will reject the entire batch and send an email 
notification to the participant. Finally, the system will scan each 
transmission to determine if any information appears to be missing from 
the claims, such as the author or title of a particular work. If so, 
the system will send an email notification to the participant regarding 
that claim. In such cases, the participant will need to correct the 
issue and resubmit the claim in another bulk submission.\3\
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    \3\ Alternatively, the participant could file a separate 
application for that claim by submitting an application deposit and 
filing fee through the Office's Web site.
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    If the transmission is accepted, the XML streams will auto-populate 
the corresponding fields within the electronic registration system. The 
tracking number for each work will be used to connect the electronic 
copies with the corresponding data file for that work. The eCO system 
will assign a service request number to each claim, and eventually they 
will be distributed to an examiner--just like any other claim that is 
submitted through the Office's Web site. If the claims are approved, 
the Office will send a certificate of registration to the person named 
in the correspondent field.
    Parties that are interested in participating in this pilot program 
should contact the Copyright Office using the contact information in 
the ADDRESSES section above.

    Dated: May 3, 2017.
Sarang V. Damle,
General Counsel and Associate Register of Copyrights.
[FR Doc. 2017-09317 Filed 5-8-17; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 1410-30-P