The Brief Writer

The United States Copyright Office has announced that it has an 8-month backlog for processing paper registrations.  The office attributes the backlog to the transition from paper to electronic applications.   In its announcement, the office states:

Regardless of when you receive your certificate, the effective date of registration of a work is still the day all the required elements in acceptable form are received by the Copyright Office.

All creative works are protected by copyright automatically, but registration provides additional remedies in the case of infringement.

Don Buchwald, Ashley Dupre's court-appointed criminal lawyer, emailed a press release to reporters stating, in part:

While the circumstances surrounding Governor Spitzer's resignation are newsworthy, some publications, in violation of journalistic norms, have used the occasion of Governor Spitzer's political misfortunes as an excuse to exploit Ms. Dupre's persona for commercial purposes by, among other things, displaying a montage of suggestive photographs of Ms. Dupre that has nothing to do with the Spitzer story. Ms. Dupre has not consented to the use of her photos in this manner, and it appears that certain of those photos were obtained in violation of Ms. Dupre's privacy rights and federal copyright law. It has also come to our attention that Ms. Dupre's picture and persona have been used on commercial websites without her permission.

The unauthorized usages of Ms. Dupre's pictures, voice, name, and likeness in this manner may well constitute violations of federal copyright laws, § 43(a) of the Lanham Act, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the New York Civil Rights Law § 51 and other federal and state statutes concerning privacy rights. In view of what happened, we feel constrained to put the media on notice that as counsel for Ms. Dupre we will take all steps that we deem necesssary or appropriate to protect Ms. Dupre from any unwarranted exploitation of her name, picture, voice, or likeness for purposes of profit.

It is not clear from the press release just who took the photographs, but unless "Kristen" took them herself or got an assignment from the photographer, she doesn't own the copyright and would not have standing to prosecute a copyright claim. And while the lawyer cites "commercial websites" as having published the photographs, it is appearsthat the websites would have a strong fair use defense.