Ownership of Footage

[Paul Tauger]

Originally Posted by Peter Wiley

I googled "Oregon work for hire" and "Oregon copyright law" and could find no reference to Rob's idea that Oregon is a "work for hire state."

I too would be suprised if state law superceeded federal law in this case so I went to http://www.leg.state.or.us/ors/ and searched for "work for hire" and this phrase apparently does not appear in Oregon statue. I searched the statues for "copyright" and the only reference I could find were in the generic disclaimers about copyright of the texts of the statutes.

I'm not sure how I missed this thread the first time around.

Federal copyright law preempts state copyright law (to the extent that any exists). The presumption is that, absent a written agreement to the contrary, copyright in protectable expression created as a work-for-hire by a contractor belongs to the contractor. Similarly, absent a written agreement to the contrary, copyright in protectable expression created by an employee belongs to the employer.

Oregon state law cannot vary this.