The claim that's being allowed to proceed is under 17 USC 1202, which is about stripping metadata like the title and author. Not exactly "core copyright violation". Am I missing something?
You don't have to pre-register copyright in any Berne Convention countries. Your copyright exists from the moment you create something.
AFAIK in the USA, registered copyright is necessary if you want to bring a lawsuit and get more than statutory damages, which are capped low enough that corporations do pre-register work.
Not the case in all Berne countries; you don't need this in the UK for example, but then the payouts are typically a lot lower in the UK. Statutory copyright payouts in the USA can be enough to make a difference to an individual author/artist.
As I understand it, OpenAI could still be on the hook for up to $150K per article if it can be demonstrated it is wilful copyright violation. It's hard to see how they can argue with a straight face that it is accidental. But then OpenAI is, like several other tech unicorns, a bad faith manufacturing device.
You seem to know more about this than me. I have a family member who "invented" some electronics things. He hasn't done anything with the inventions (I'm pretty sure they're quackery).
But to ensure his patent, he mailed himself a sealed copy of the plans. He claims the postage date stamp will hold up in court if he ever needs it.
Is that a thing? Or is it just more tinfoil business? It's hard to tell with him.
It won't hold up in court, and given that the post-office will mail/deliver unsealed letters (which may then be sealed after the fact), will be viewed rather dimly.
Mailing yourself using registered mail is a very old tactic to establish a date for your documents using an official government entity, so this can be meaningful in court. However this may not provide the protection he needs. Copyright law differs from patent law and he should seek legal advice
Honestly I don't know whether that actually is a meaningful thing to do anymore; it may be with patents.
It certainly used to be a legal device people used.
Essentially it is low-budget notarisation. If your family member believes they have something which is timely and valuable, it might be better to seek out proper legal notarisation, though -- you'd consult a Notary Public:
The USmoved to first to file years ago. Whoever files first gets it, except if he publishes it publicly there is a 1-year inventor's grace period (it would not apply to a self mail or private mail to other people).
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