Ten New Issues in Copyright Law

Computer Programs

Computer programs are protectable under copyright law and can be registered with the Copyright Office as literary works, regardless of their medium. Thus object code, source code, disks, and CD-ROMs can all be protected. Because of the ease of registration and modest filing fees, numerous authors have registered their computer programs with the Copyright Office. Only one registration per work is required, and computer screen displays and accompanying instruction manuals are considered part of the computer program so that only one registration need be sought for the work.

As discussed in Chapter 10, because a computer program can include trade secrets, the Copyright Office allows the copyright ...

Get Protecting Your Company's Intellectual Property: A Practical Guide to Trademarks, Copyrights, Patents & Trade Secrets now with the O’Reilly learning platform.

O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.