Intellectual Property and the Circus: Can You Copyright Your Choreography?

Sun, 06 Oct 2019 17:19:30 GMT

Do You have an Intellectual Property Right in Relation to your Act?

As an aerialist, I’ve heard the term “Intellectual Property” being thrown around a lot. But do you really have an intellectual property right in relation to your act? How do you protect yourself from someone replicating choreography that you’ve spent weeks, months, or years perfecting, and claiming it as their own?

The short answer is YES, you can copyright choreography, but only under very specific

conditions…

What is Intellectual Property?

Intellectual property is a broad term covering patents, trademarks, trade secrets, and copyrights. What we’re concerned about is copyright protection. According to the US Copyright Office, copyright “is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States to the authors of ‘original works of authorship,’ including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other

intellectual works.”

What does it cover?

As it relates to performance art, Section 106 of the 1976 Copyright Act gives the

copyright owner the exclusive right to, and to authorize others to “To perform the work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audiovisual works.”

So we know that the Copyright Act anticipated choreographic works as an “original work of authorship,” but we still have to define a choreographic work. To further confuse the matter, explanatory material provided by the US Copyright Office refers specifically to dance choreography and “other forms of movement” which we will just have to assume includes choreography in the air as well as on the ground.

The Copyright Office considers the following factors when determining whether a work is “choreography”:

1. The presence of rhythmic movements from a dancer’s body in a defined space;

2. Compositional arrangement into a coherent, integrated whole;

3. Musical or textual accompaniment;

4. Dramatic content such as a story or theme.

5. Whether the work is designed to be performed by skilled individuals for an audience. Additionally, works MUST be independently created and contain a sufficient amount of creativity.

It’s clear from these considerations that the Copyright Office will not consider a simple sequence of moves to be copyrightable choreography, but the act as a whole. Your work should tell a story, be set to music, and all come together into an integrated whole. And that means that, in order to violate your copyright, someone has to replicate your entire act, not just a sequence of movements.

How do I protect myself from theft?

Now that we know what Intellectual Property is and what qualifies for copyright

protection, we need to figure out how to protect ourselves from theft by registering the copyright.

Step One: Transfer Your Choreo to a Tangible Medium

Under U.S. copyright law, copyright protection exists as soon as an original work of authorship has been created in fixed form. If you’re like most aerialists, you’re probably recording it anyway. Be sure to back up your videos and record the entire act.

Step Two: Register with the U.S. Copyright Office

There’s a small fee associated with registering your copyright, but it puts everyone on notice that they cannot sell or claim your act as their own. You can even do it online!

Step Three: Add the Copyright Notice to Published Versions of Your Act

If you’re uploading the video online or sending it out as a demo, be sure to include a copyright notice containing your name and year copyrighted. This will prevent infringement.

Welcome

Mon, 26 Aug 2019 20:36:40 GMT

Welcome Fellow Aerialists

Welcome fellow aerialists, interested aerialists, and anyone who's found themselves here after a few hours of aimlessly perusing the worldwide web. My name is Cyara and I'm an aerial performer based out of Columbus, Ohio and specialize in aerial hoop/lyra. I created this website because, well, my dad offered to do it for free (thanks pops!) and because I want to share my love of aerial arts with all of you marvelous people!

I hope that this will become a community where circus artists can share their interests and experience, offer guidance, and help others to grow and reach their potential. Share the wealth ya'll!

I will be periodically sharing my journey on here as I progress, as well as some tips and tricks that I've picked up along the way. Just a disclaimer, there are many people out there with WAY MORE expertise than I have, so I recommend that you do what's best for you and is most comfortable for your own body. You know your body better than I do, and really, better than anyone.

Thanks for visiting, feel free to stick around!

cyaerial

Intellectual Property and the Circus: Can You Copyright Your Choreography?

Do You have an Intellectual Property Right in Relation to your Act?

Welcome

Welcome Fellow Aerialists