Royal Canadian Mint Claims Copyright On One Cent Piece, Threatens Indie Musician Over Album Art
from the penny-for-your-thoughts dept
Recently, we learned that Canadian musician Dave Gunning ran into some copyright troubles regarding his latest album, No More Pennies. No, he did not use music or lyrics from any other artist without permission. What he did was something far worse, at least in the eyes of one organization. What he had the audacity to do was include images of the soon-to-be-retired Canadian penny.
“We have helped this guy out by giving him a break,” Alex Reeves, communications manager for the Royal Canadian Mint, said Tuesday.Dave, however, saw things a bit differently.
“Now that we have explained the rules and the policy, it’s very clear what the implications are for using the penny’s image. And we’re certainly being consistent in the applications of our policy for any for-profit use,” he said.
“It is pennies to them but is pretty substantial for me,” said Gunning, who won two East Coast Music Awards in 2011, adding “we really had no idea” the ode to the penny was going to land him in hot water.I had to scratch my head for a bit on this little dispute. Here in the US, works of the government are automatically in the public domain and can be freely used by the public. In regards to currency, while it is illegal to create counterfeit currency, it is legal to duplicate the images of currency as long as it is clearly a fake. Things are not quite so clear cut in Canada.
For the Canadian government, works it produces are covered by a Crown Copyright in which the government retains some control over the use. However, even this explanation might not be quite so cut and dry. As Canadian lawyer Howard Knopf explains:
To be clear, the album cover shown above does not infringe any so-called intellectual property rights of the mint because:Knopf points out that the Mint has even attempted similar actions before, when the city of Toronto created an ad campaign which featured an image of the penny. Just as it was then, it is now: the penny, if it was ever covered by copyright, has long since entered the public domain. This is because Crown Copyright only lasts 50 years. This fact, and plenty of negative publicity, lead the Mint to drop its action against Toronto.Someone over at the Mint should learn some basic facts about intellectual property law, This kind of thing makes people lose respect for IP law and for the credibility of government institutions. There’s nothing funny about that.
- If there ever was copyright in the Canadian penny, which is doubtful, it has long since expired and the above album cover would not be infringing copyright in any event
- The above album cover does not "use" or "adopt" the Canadian penny in any technical sense covered by the Trade-marks Act.
Now, we learn that the Mint has turned tail and dropped its action against Dave too:
The mint did not only waive the fee for Mr. Gunning, but said it would also review its intellectual property policy to ensure that it’s fair.Perhaps this change of heart came about because those running the legal offices of the Mint were reminded that they don't have a solid claim on the copyright of the penny. Even if they did, as Knopf clearly pointed out, Dave's use of the penny in his album work is transformative and as such covered by fair dealing. Either way, Dave is happy to have this saga ended.
“We recognize our policy as it is today may not consider the individual needs and circumstances of those who request the use of our images,” spokeswoman Christine Aquino said from Ottawa.
“We’re allowing [Gunning] to do this and we truly wish him well in his career.”
“Everything’s gonna taste better now. I’m gonna sleep better,” laughed Mr. Gunning, who said he was overwhelmed by the attention his story had generated across Canada and the United States.All of this raises the question of why a government has any claim of copyright on its currency to begin with. In reality, to claim such a copyright makes no sense. If the concern is that people would attempt to print their own currency, that is what counterfeit laws are for. Otherwise, it seems to be an unneeded burden on the freedom of Canadians.
“This all started very simply from the fact that I’ve got a wife and three kids and just want to be able to make a living, and felt that I had to stand up for that.”
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Filed Under: artwork, canada, crown copyright, dave gunning, musician, pennies
Companies: royal canadian mint
Reader Comments
The First Word
“It should review its IP policy to ensure that it's legally valid before threatening people.
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I'm allowing Mr. Gunning to do it to, and my permission has as much significance as the Crown's.
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That's ridiculous. They are arrested just for copyright infringement, obviously. I mean, the damage payments are so insane that they would be stupid not to try to make a mint out of the whole situation.
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YEEEEAAAHHHHH!!!
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GoC Idiots
Totally embarrassing to be a Canadian with this news.
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Re: GoC Idiots
Patent Trolls, Copyright Trolls, The Cartels all use this as a viable business model. They simply point out how much it will cost to prove them wrong, and that exceeds the resources of nearly every single one of their targets. They victim "settles" and the Troll feels more secure in their shakedown as they turn their ever hungry eye to the next big prize.
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Re: GoC Idiots
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Scratching my head, too
What happened with Dave gunning had to be coming from some ignorant dickwad. All through my lifetime, I've seen thousands of usages of our money's images, none resulting in any such idiocy as this.
Even if there were some active copyright to worry about, I can't see how it could be applied to the mere image of the currency, which would have to be considered a public symbol.
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Re: Scratching my head, too
The money is designed by the Treasury, not the Federal Reserve.
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The US should do this as well
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It should review its IP policy to ensure that it's legally valid before threatening people.
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Frankly I can't figure out at all how things went so far as to make such idiocy even possible?
What next ?
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Exactly, like a bunch of spoiled rotten Jr. High level brats.
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he should have paid them
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is the picture shown in this article the cover art for the CD in question ? ? ?
'cause if *that* is what they are bitching about, i simply don't get it...
assuming it is the offending cover, i can't tell if those coins are amerikan, canuckistan, or martian, from that shot...
dog damn, *some* otherwise useless bureaucrats must have a LOT of time on their hands...
world gone crazy...
art guerrilla
aka ann archy
eof
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They just don't get it. They see it as a way of protecting Canadians, only "approved agencies" present the info, so we can "trust it".
A lot of statistics and information is like this, making it very hard to collect and present information about my own damned country. If, for example I want to list the GDP from each year over the last hundred years and compare it to which party was in power to get a sense of who is better for the economy, I can't find it anywhere. If I want to do the same for The States, after 5 minutes on Google, I have everything I need.
How is this helping Canadians?
The public paid for it, the public should own it.
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Currency SHOULD be protected by Copyright
That would greatly help fight counterfitting.
Just think about it for a second.
Copyright Infringement is an offense punished far more harshly than murder, violent assault, robbery, burglary, etc.
Using Copyright against counterfitters would be like using Tax Evasion code against Capone.
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Please fire them
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Since the mint uses a different cast/mould/stamp for coins approximately every other decade, wouldn't the copyright be applicable to that version? Like the 1920–1941 penny is different in metal composition and design than the 1982–1996 penny which is also different than the 2000–current penny. So wouldn't the 2000 penny design be covered until 2050?
Same thing happens with the bills, they change the artwork and security features every decade or so, like our new polymer bills.
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