Register of Copyrights and Director of the U.S. Copyright Office Karyn Temple worked her way up the corporate ladder with hard work and dedication.

Karyn Temple is no stranger to hard work and believes the more you know the better can be. That’s one thing she’s steadily trying to do at the copyright office: inform. She understands that copyrighting can be confusing and people shouldn’t walk away confused. Therefore, she’s helping build a bridge between the office and the public.

Read more about Temple in Episode 19 of People You Should Know.

“So I do feel like Detroit had a huge impact on me as the woman I am today.” Karyn Temple

1.  Since 2011 you’ve worked your way up the Copyright Office ladder. You started as Senior Counsel for Policy and International Affairs. As of March 27, 2019, your title is Register of Copyrights and Director of the U.S. Copyright Office. First, congratulations! Second, what duties does this new position entail?

First of all –thank you for the congratulations! It’s a really exciting time for copyright and the Copyright Office! When I first started as senior counsel I worked in the department of the Copyright Office called the Office of Policy and International Affairs. That office had about 7 to 9 attorneys that worked on international issues related to copyright such as treaties, trade negotiations, and domestic legislation related to copyright. Then I subsequently became the associate register of copyrights where I headed that department, but now I am head of the entire office. So I don’t just work on policy and international affairs, I manage the entire 400-person U.S. Copyright Office. I handle both policy and international affairs, which is what I did before, but also the registration program, all office operations. So it’s just basically managing the whole U.S. Copyright Office.

It’s a small office in a sense that we only have 400 people, but we do really provide an out-sized contribution to the United States in terms of supporting the millions of people involved in the copyright community out there. We manage over $1 billion in statutory licenses in the Copyright Office as well as register more than a half a million copyrighted works each year. So, we’re a small office but we definitely feel like we have a significant contribution to the U.S. culture and economic well-being.

2. What are the different types of items someone can register with the Copyright Office and why is it important for people to protect their products and intellectual property?

Basically almost anything that a person expresses creatively, they can seek to register, whether it’s a photograph that they take; poem or books that they write; artwork that they paint or draw; computer software code that they turn into a software program. Copyright covers the expression of an individual’s creativity and so long as it’s fixed in a permanent medium and has that creative spark to show that it is a creative work, the Copyright Office can register it. Everyone in the world essentially is a creator and copyright owner because everyone takes pictures and writes things to one another and so everyone has the opportunity to apply to register their works with the Copyright Office.

I would say it’s important for people to register their works especially those who want to be able to make a business of copyright. Songwriters who want to be able to be full-time songwriters, artists who want to be full-time painters need to ensure that they are getting paid for their work and people are not taking their works unlawfully. So it’s important for them to register with us so that they can get into court if somebody steals their work. It’s also important for them to register with us if they want to get a certain type of damages called statutory damages. Everyone who creates a work automatically has copyright protection. But, there are certain benefits that arise from coming to the U.S. Copyright Office to register their work.

3.  What are the most common types of copyright infringement cases you see and how can people avoid it?

The U.S. Copyright Office is not an enforcement agency. So we don’t, ourselves, engage or participate in copyright infringement cases. In terms of the federal government, that would be the Department of Justice, but certainly we’re aware of copyright infringement cases as we consider policy and legislative changes to the copyright law.

4.  Can you please explain the process of having something such as a book or song, for example, registered? Also, how long is something protected by copyright?

The latter question is the most complicated because it all depends on when the work was created because there are different standards for that. The general answer is that if you’re an individual, it will be protected for your life plus 70 years. So the life of the author plus 70 years for an individual. It’s separate for a corporate entity and also separate if you created the work a long time ago.

In terms of the process to register, it does change a little bit depending on what the work is. So what I would encourage people to do is to go on our website. We have a lot of materials that explain how to register their works with us. Some of the materials are separated by type of work; so if you want to register a book versus a song. We have something called the Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices, which goes into detail on each type of work and how to register. If you want file electronically you can go online and you can fill out the paperwork online, submit the copy of the work so that we’re able to review it and send us the actual fee. That’s essentially what you have to do across the board, but the different types of work might have some differences or nuances in terms of exact requirements.

To be clear, that’s only required to get a registration certificate from our Office. A work is protected by copyright law as soon as it is actually created. So in order to have copyright protection you don’t have to register with us. It is voluntary, but there are benefits to registration. We encourage registration for everyone, but they don’t have to.

5.  Let’s say I write a book and sell it to about 40 people, and a few years later my book has been made into a movie. I didn’t register my work with the Copyright Office. What are the chances that I would be able to prove that it’s my work and get compensated?

That is where certain benefits do arise from you registering your work. If you have paperwork that shows that you’re able to prove over time when you created the work and that no one else created the work, then in court, hopefully, you’ll be able to prove your case. But, if you register with us and identify the work, identify yourself as author of the work, and submit the work with us, then basically everything that you’ve stated in the registration certificate the court will take as true unless the defendant comes back and proves otherwise. So it does give you the benefit that you’ve already proven that you own the work, you’ve at least met your burden of proving you own the work, and that it is in fact your work by registering with us.

6.  How do copyright laws work when it comes to people sharing pictures or memes on social media without permission and it becomes viral? Have copyright laws caught up with social media? If so, how?

That’s a great question. I think one of the things that the law does struggle with is trying to address the digital age and the internet and the way that things change so rapidly on the internet. It’s hard for the law to keep up because by time you get a law passed there’ll be some new technology. So that is something that I think Congress has constantly analyzed regarding ‘how do we make sure the laws are caught up to date to address all these new things?’ We do tell people that sharing something online is no different than if you would’ve distributed it to your friends and family physically. So you have to have permission to distribute something online in the same way that you would have to permission to copy and send physically a picture. Generally, if there are pictures then you should seek permission from the owner of that picture to distribute it online just as if you would’ve sought permission from the owner if you had gotten that physical copy. There are provisions that allow you to distribute works without permission in certain instances. For example, fair use is an important part of the copyright law, it’s an exception in the copyright law that allows you to share things without permission if certain criteria are met, but you have to do an analysis to see if fair use applies in each case.

7.  Speaking of social media, how has the Copyright Office kept up with the digital age and making things readily available online to keep the public informed about the ever-changing copyright laws?

In the last 5 years for the first time, for example, we put our office practices online so people could search our Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices online when they had a question about registration or about copyright laws. So a lot of our materials we’ve been putting online to help inform people. We’ve also been trying to expand our social media presence. We have a YouTube channel in which we post videos; again we’re trying to educate the public about various aspects of copyright law. We have a Twitter account where we send out tweets about various changes to the copyright law. So anytime the law changes we do try to provide information to the public on how the law changes and how it will impact them. Certainly we work with Congress a lot to make sure that the copyright laws are updated as well. Finally, we’re trying to update our registration system to make it easier for people to register online with us. So that’s something we’re going to be doing for the next few years, to really modernize our system so that people can use their mobile phone or some other device easily to register with us.

8.  The Copyright Office is currently making changes to the music licensing system to address the digital age. What does this mean for people in the music industry going forward?

We don’t ourselves make changes to the laws, this is something that comes from Congress. But, Congress did just enact the Music Modernization Act late last year, which is probably the most significant update to the copyright law in the last 20 years. The act changed how songs are licensed. Part of that new bill does require us to provide outreach and education to songwriters about how that change in the law has affected them and to notify them of the new processes that are out there. So our website has been constantly updated. We have a music modernization page with FAQs about this new law and how it impacts the music community. The purpose of the new law is to make things more efficient and easier for people to license songs and for songwriters to get paid for the use of their songs on internet platforms. So hopefully that’ll be a very positive step forward to address the digital age for both music platforms as well as the songwriters themselves.

9.  What’s the difference between trademarks, copyrights, and patents?

Here at the Copyright Office we just deal with copyrights. So that’s your creative expression. We don’t handle patents or trademarks. That’s separately handled by the U.S. PTO, the Patent and Trademark Office. Trademarks identify the source of goods or services, so the requirements to have a trademark are very different than the requirements for a copyright. Patents cover inventions. For the most part they’re very three separate things and the standards to get a patent versus a copyright versus a trademark are very different.

10.  You graduated from one of Detroit’s extremely popular preparatory schools Cass Technical High School, and you received a B.A. in English from the University of Michigan. How did Detroit’s culture and the city’s surroundings influence you to become the woman that you are today?

I came to Detroit when I was 13. I like to say since I did spend my entire high school time in Detroit and just moved down the street to Ann Arbor for undergrad that my most formative years were spent in Detroit. So I do feel like Detroit had a huge impact on me as the woman I am today. It really did help to inspire my love and appreciation for art and culture.