08 Brandir Intern., Inc. v. Cascade Pac. Lumber

08 BRANDIR INTERN., INC. v. CASCADE PAC.
LUMBER AUTHOR: Adre

[834 F.2d 1142 (2d Cir. 1987)] NOTES: case filed in United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit. Brandir
TOPIC: WHEN DOES COPYRIGHT VEST? Sec. 172 and 172.2 IPC, Rule 7, International, Inc. sold a wire sculpture as a bicycle rack that by was deemed not
Sec. 2-4, Copyright Safeguards to be copyrightable because it was an industrial design not subject to copyright
PONENTE: OAKES, Circuit Judge. protection.
Ganito ata yung itsura (wala sa appendix ng case kahit sabi nandun haha)
CASE LAW/ DOCTRINE: “Copyright ultimately should depend on the extent to which the work reflects artistic expression not restricted by functional
considerations. If design elements reflect a merger of aesthetic and functional considerations, the artistic aspects of a work cannot be said to be conceptually
separable from the utilitarian elements. The final form of the bicycle rack sold by Brandir (Plaintiff) is basically a product of industrial design. Form and function are
inextricably intertwined in the rack, its ultimate design being as much the result of utilitarian pressures as aesthetic choices. The original aesthetic elements have
clearly been adapted to accommodate and further a utilitarian purpose.”
Emergency Facts:
A wire sculpture was created by the owner Lavine, Brandir International, Inc. (Brandir) created the Ribbon Rack, a bike rack consisting of looped, bent tubing.
Brandir made minor adjustments to the original sculpture for functional purposes, such as widening the upper loops so that bikes could park below as well as above
the loops. The U.S. Copyright Office denied Brandir a copyright for the Ribbon Rack. Cascade Pacific Lumber Co. (defendant) sold a similar bike rack. Brandir
brought suit for copyright infringement. The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York granted Cascade summary judgment. Brandir
appealed.
FACTS:
 Brandir contends (and its owner Lavine) that the original design of the Ribbon Rack stemmed from wire sculptures that Levine had created, each formed from
one continuous undulating piece of work.
 He created these sculptures and displayed it in his home as a means of personal expression but was never sold or displayed elsewhere.
 He also created a wire sculpture in the shape of a bicycle he did not give any thought to the utilitarian application of any of his sculptures until he accidentally
juxtaposed the bicycle sculpture with one of the self-standing wire sculpture
 November 1978: Levine seriously began pursuing the utilitarian application of his sculptures, when a friend, G. Duff Bailey, a bicycle buff and author of
numerous articles about urban cycling, was at Levine's home and informed him that the sculptures would make excellent bicycle racks, permitting bicycles to be
parked under the overloops as well as on top of the underloops.
 After, he met with several others completing the designs for the RIBBON Rack by the use of a vacuum cleaner hose, and submitting his drawings to a fabricator
complete with dimensions. The Brandir RIBBON Rack began being nationally advertised and promoted for sale in September 1979.
 November 1982 Levine discovered that another company, Cascade Pacific Lumber Co., was selling a similar product
 Beginning in December 1982, a copyright notice was placed on all RIBBON Racks before shipment and on December 10, 1982, five copyright applications for
registration were submitted to the Copyright Office.
 Copyright Office: refused registration by letter, stating that the RIBBON Rack did not contain any element that was "capable of independent existence as a
copyrightable pictorial, graphic or sculptural work apart from the shape of the useful article."
 Appeal to Copyright Office: denied. Letter stated: "nothing more than a familiar public domain symbol." Appealed again.
 After the denial of the second appeal of the examiner's decision, Brandir sent letters to customers enclosing copyright notices to be placed on racks sold prior to
December 1982. (its sales were about $1.367 M and even won awards and even featured in a magazine.)
 Cascade Pacific Lumber Co began copying the bike racks. Brandir sued for copyright infringement.
 Cascade argued that Brandir could not copyright the bike racks because they weren't works of art, they were utilitarian, and utilitarian items (aka useful articles)
are not copyrightable.
 The Trial Court found for Cascade. Brandir appealed.
 The Appellate Court affirmed.
 The Appellate Court looked to 17 U.S.C. §101 and found that works with utilitarian features are only copyrightable to the extent that the design features "can be
identified separately from, and are capable of existing independently of, the utilitarian aspects of the article." This separablity can be either physical or
conceptual.
ISSUE(S): WON the RIBBON Rack is copyrightable?
HELD: No. It is not copyrightable. It seems clear that the form of the rack is influenced in significant measure by utilitarian concerns and thus any
aesthetic elements cannot be said to be conceptually separable from the utilitarian element.
RATIO:
Court interpreted §101 to mean that, "if design elements reflect a merger of aesthetic and functional considerations, the artist aspects of a work cannot be said to
be conceptually separable from the utilitarian elements. Conversely, where design elements can be identified as reflecting the designer's artistic judgment exercised
independently of functional influences, conceptual separability exists."
 Basically, the courts must look at the features of a work and decide if the creator chose those features for design reasons or aesthetic reasons.
The Court looked at the features of the bike rack and found that the form of the bike rack was significantly influenced by utilitarian concerns and not aesthetic
concerns. Therefore there was no conceptual separability.
They applied the Denicola test. To state the Denicola test in the language of conceptual separability, if design elements reflect a merger of aesthetic and functional
considerations, the artistic aspects of a work cannot be said to be conceptually separable from the utilitarian elements. Conversely, where design elements can be
identified as reflecting the designer’s artistic judgment exercised independently of functional influences, conceptual separability exists.
Had Brandir merely adopted one of the existing sculptures as a bicycle rack, neither the application to a utilitarian end nor commercialization of that use would have
caused the object to forfeit its copyrighted status. Comparison of the RIBBON Rack with the earlier sculptures, however, reveals that while the rack may have been
derived in part from one of[sic ]more ‘‘works of art,’’ it is in its final form essentially a product of industrial design.
In creating the RIBBON Rack, the designer has clearly adapted the original aesthetic elements to accommodate and further a utilitarian purpose. These altered
design features of the RIBBON Rack, including the space saving, open design achieved by widening the upper loops to permit parking under as well as over the
rack’s curves, the straightened vertical elements that allow in-and above-ground installation of the rack, the ability to fit all types of bicycles and mopeds, and the
heavy-gauged tubular construction of rustproof galvanized steel are all features that combine to make for a safe, secure, and maintenance-free system of parking
bicycles and mopeds.
While the RIBBON Rack may be worthy of admiration for its aesthetic qualities alone, it remains nonetheless the product of industrial design. Form and function are
inextricably intertwined in the rack, its ultimate design being as much the result of utilitarian pressures as aesthetic choices. Indeed, the visually pleasing
proportions and symmetricality of the rack represent design changes made in response to functional concerns. Judging from the awards the rack has received, it
would seem in fact that Brandir has achieved with the RIBBON Rack the highest goal of modern industrial design, that is, the harmonious fusion of function and
aesthetics. Thus there remains no artistic element of the RIBBON Rack that can be identified as separate and "capable of existing independently, of, the utilitarian
aspects of the article."
Concurrence. (Winter, J.) The relevant question should be whether the design of a useful article, however intertwined with the article’s utilitarian aspects, causes
an ordinary reasonable observer to perceive an aesthetic concept not related to the article’s use. The answer to this question is clear in this case since any
reasonable observer would easily see the bicycle rack as an ornamental sculpture. The Copyright Act expressly states that the legal test is how the final article is
perceived, not how it was developed at various stages along the way.
Discussion. The majority in this case adopted a test suggested by Professor Denicola in his article “Applied Art and Industrial Design,” 67 Min. L. Rev. 707
(1983). The Winter dissent suggested applying a different test and another dissent suggested using a temporal displacement test. In general, if a work is a useful
article, the artistic elements have to be separate in order for the work to be copyrightable.

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