registration under the Rule of Doubt. In the case of an online application, this statement should be provided in the Note to Copyright Office field. In the case of a paper application, this statement should be provided in a cover letter. If the object code contains a copyright notice for the program, the applicant should submit the portion of the code where the notice appears. The notice should be underlined or highlighted, and the content of that notice should be decoded and presented in words and numbers that are comprehensible to the Registration Program.
If the applicant submits object code instead of source code, the Registration Program will examine the application to determine whether the formal and legal requirements for registration have been satisfied. However, the Registration Program will not make any determination concerning the existence of copyrightable authorship in the object code, even if the applicant submits other deposit material that clearly contains copyrightable authorship, such as screen displays or a user manual. Instead, the Registration Program will accept the applicant's assertion that the object code represents an original work of authorship and will register the claim in the work under the Rule of Doubt. This limitation will be reflected on the certificate of registration and in the online public record with an annotation, such as: "Regarding deposit: registration made under rule of doubt." See 37 C.F.R. § 202.20(c)(2)(vii)(B).
The annotation indicates that the program has been registered without any examination for copyrightable authorship, and therefore, without a prima facie presumption of validity. If there is a legal dispute involving the program, the courts can evaluate the copyrightability of the object code.
See generally Registration of Claims to Copyright Deposit Requirements for Computer Programs Containing Trade Secrets and for Computer Screen Displays, 54 Fed. Reg. 13,173, 13,173, 13,175 (Mar. 31, 1989); Registration of Claims to Copyright; Deposit Requirements for Computer Programs Containing Trade Secrets, 51 Fed. Reg. 34,667, 34,668 (Sept. 30, 1986); Notice of Inquiry Deposit of Computer Programs and Other Works Containing Trade Secrets, 48 Fed. Reg. 22,951, 22,952 (May 23, 1983).
1509.1(C)(7) Computer Screen Displays
As a general rule, a computer program and the screen displays generated by that program are considered the same work, because in most cases the screen displays are created by the program code. If the copyright in the program and the screen displays are owned by the same claimant, the program and any related screen displays may be registered with the same application. See Chapter 700, Section 721.10.
When an applicant expressly asserts a claim in a computer program, the registration covers the copyrightable expression in the program code and any copyrightable screen displays that may be generated by that code, even if the applicant does not submit a copy of the screen displays with the application. By contrast, if an applicant only asserts a claim in screen displays the registration does not cover the computer program unless the applicant submits appropriate identifying material for that program. See Registration Decision; Registration and Deposit of Computer Screen Displays, 53 Fed. Reg. 21,817, 21,819-20 (June 10, 1988).
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