The 9th Circuit has ruled in a fabric-design case that copyright requirements for a single unpublished collection of works are satisfied when it is assembled in an orderly form with a single title, and the claimant is the sole author of the individual works.

United Fabrics International sued Macy's Inc. in the Central District of California, claiming Macy's infringed its copyright on fabric designs.  The court said United’s copyright registration for its collection of designs was invalid due to United’s failure to publish them concurrently, a requirement for a published single-work copyright that comprises a collection of works.

But the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said that while a necessary element of a published-collection copyright is that the collection is sold, distributed or offered for sale concurrently, there is no such requirement for an unpublished collection.

The panel agreed with a 5th Circuit ruling that a copyright claimant's registration of a single unpublished collection of songs satisfied the unpublished single-work requirements, because it was assembled in an orderly form with a single title identifying the collection as a whole.   

In addition, the claimant in the 5th Circuit case was the sole author and copyright claimant of the individual songs.   

Because United's collection met the criteria set forth in the Copyright Act, the 9th Circuit concluded that United registered a valid copyright in an unpublished collection of works.

United Fabrics Int’l v. C&J Wear Inc., No. 09-56499 (9th Cir. Jan. 26, 2011) 

(Reporting by Ronald Owens, Principal Attorney Editor, San Francisco.)