Bean v. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Co.

585 F. App'x 322

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: October 17, 2014
• Docket: 13-16977
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

MEMORANDUM **

Tom Bean appeals from the dismissal of his copyright infringement action against Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. The district court held that Bean had not met 17 U.S.C. § 411(a)’s pre-suit copyright registration requirement because his photographs were improperly registered under 17 U.S.C. § 409. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291, Cosmetic Ideas, Inc. v. IAC/Interactivecorp, 606 F.3d 612, 614 (9th Cir.2010), and we VACATE the dismissal order and REMAND for further proceedings.

We recently held in a similar case, Alaska, Stock, LLC v. Houghton Mifflin Harc-ourt Publishing Company, that the registration of a compilation of photographs also registers the individual photographs within the compilation where, as here, the registrant follows Copyright Office practice and does not include the title and author of each individual photograph on the registration application. 747 F.3d 673, 685 (9th Cir.2014). Consistent with our Alaska Stock opinion’s express disagreement with the district court’s decision in this case, id. at 684 n. 50, we hold that the district court erred in dismissing Bean’s action under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) on the ground that his photographs were not individually registered.

VACATED and REMANDED.

Costs awarded to Appellant.

** This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.