Social media posts ownership: US Copyright Office
<p>The US Copyright Office recently introduced in August 2020 the option of copyrighting &quot;short online literary works such as blog entries, social media posts, and short online articles&quot; <a href="https://www.copyright.gov/grtx/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.copyright.gov/grtx/</a></p>
<p>Suppose that there are two parties A and B where each party separately owns a website that publishes blog posts and news stories. Suppose that A first publishes a story but does not copyright the story with US Copyright Office. Then B plagiarizes the story but actually registers a copyright with the Copyright Office. Then legally speaking, who actually owns the original post? Does B hold legal ownership even though it is plagiarized?</p>

<p>In the US, copyright is granted automatically when content is created, so party A owns the copyright to the work. Party B has filed a fraudulent copyright registration, attempting to claim ownership of a work they did not create and do not own. This does not give them ownership rights to the work. Party A may need to go to court to prove their ownership of the work and have the copyright office issue a cancellation of copyright registration, since party B should not be the registered copyright holder of the work. In theory, one cannot register a copyright they do not own in the first place, and B's fraudulent registration does not somehow grant them legal rights to the original work. Of course, this will be a matter for the courts to decide.</p>

copyright intellectual-property