Copyright Laws and Submitting Multiple Versions of the Same Work

504.3 Multiple Versions of the Same Work:

A registration only covers the specific version of the work that is submitted for registration. The U.S. Copyright Office does not offer so-called “blanket registrations” that cover prior versions or derivative versions of the same work. For example, a registration for a published website covers the text, photographs, or other copyrightable content that appeared on that website on the date(s) claimed in the application and specified in the deposit copy(ies), but it does not cover any future version of that website. Similarly, a registration for version 1.30 of a computer program does not cover version 1.20 or any previously published or previously registered content that appears in the later version of that program.

512. Multiple Versions of the Same Work:

The Copyright Act states that “a work is ‘created’ when it is fixed in a copy or phonorecord for the first time.” 17 U.S.C. § 101 (definition of “created”). The statute states that “where a work is prepared over a period of time, the portion of [the work] that has been fixed at any particular time constitutes the work as of that time.” Id. It also states that “where the work has been prepared in different versions, each version constitutes a separate work.” Id.
The copyright law protects each version of a work from the moment it is fixed in a copy or phonorecord, provided that the author contributed a sufficient amount of original expression to that version.

Source: Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices, Third Edition. U.S. Copyright Office, August 19, 2014.

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