A "copyright" springs into existence at the moment of creation, i.e.,
when the author embodies a sufficiently creative idea into a tangible
medium. So I would venture that yes, there exists a "copyright" in
the postcards because at some point someone embodied a sufficiently
creative idea into a tangible medium by reproducing certain
photographs onto a postcard. Presumably the copyrights in the
photographs are owned by Curt Teich as the person who took the
photographs; a separate and distinct copyright may be owned by the
person who embodied the photos onto the postcards if not Curt Teich.
The better questions to ask, then are, "who owns the copyright
currently and is that copyright enforceable?" These are complex
questions. Strategies for determining who owns a copyright are
presented in a Copyright Office Circular located at
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ22.pdf. Determining whether a
copyright is enforceable is even more involved, and depends on whether
the copyright has expired and the work has entered the public domain.
For general information on that topic, please see
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ15a.pdf. |
