In Bryant v. Media Right Productions, Inc., --- F.3d ---, 2010 WL 1659113 (2d Cir. April 27, 2010), the Second Circuit considered the question of how many statutory damages awards may be granted for an infringement of an album comprised of ten songs.
The court made clear that if the copyright owner published a work as a "compilation" - or album, only one award would be available under 17 USC 504(c).
If a defendant took ten songs from ten different albums and published them as one compilation, ten awards would be available because the copyright owner had not published the works as a compilation.
The decision was written by Judge Kimba Wood sitting by designation. It relied on plain language and legislative history arguments regarding Congress's limitation on the number of awards of statutory damages in enacting the Copyright Act.
Bryant explicitly rejected the "independent economic value" test adopted by the 9th, 11th and DC Circuits in determining whether copyrighted works within a compilation could support additional awards of statutory damages. The other Circuits have not explicitly dealt with the question of songs and albums but television shows (9th and 11th) and individual poses of Mickey Mouse (D.C. Cir.).
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