Gorsuch, J., concurring
… , scholarship, or research.” §107 (emphasis added). Once more, the statute indicates that a court must examine the purpose of the particular use under challenge, not the artistic purpose underlying a work. And once more, the statute tasks courts with asking whether the challenged use serves a different purpose (as, say, a “criticism” of or “comment” on the original) or whether it seeks to serve the same purpose (as a substitute for the original).
Second, the copyright statute expressly protects a copyright holder’s exclusive right to create “derivative works” that “transfor[m]” or “adap[t]” his original work. §§101, 106(2). So saying that a later user of a copyrighted work “transformed” its message and endowed it with a “new aesthetic” cannot automatically mean he has made fair use of it. Contra, post, at 1–2, 22–23, 34–36 (Kagan, J., dissenting). To hold otherwise would risk making a nonsense of the statutory scheme—suggesting that transformative uses of originals belong to the copyright holder (under §106) but that others may simultaneously claim those transformative uses for themselves (under §107). We aren’t normally in the business of putting a statute “at war with itself” in this way. United States v. American Tobacco Co., 221 U. S. 106, 180 (1911).
Finally, the fourth fair-use factor requires courts to assess “the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.” §107(4). This Court has described the fourth factor as the “most important” one. Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enterprises, 471 U. S. 539, 566 (1985). This Court has said, too, that no factor may “be treated in isolation, one from another.” Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., 510 U. S. 569, 578 (1994). Nor does anything in the fourth factor call on courts to speculate about artistic ambitions or aesthetics. Instead, it requires courts to ask whether consumers treat a challenged use “as a market replacement” for a copyrighted work or a market complement that does not impair demand for the original.
