Notice2026-05886
Alternative Fee Structures for Registration
Primary source
Metadata and text below are from the Federal Register, a public-domain U.S. government work. Always verify the official published version before relying on it for any legal matter.
Published
March 26, 2026
Issuing agencies
Library of CongressCopyright Office, Library of Congress
Abstract
The U.S. Copyright Office is initiating this inquiry to collect information regarding alternative fee structures that could be adopted once its updated electronic registration system is fully operational. The information will be used to study the feasibility of alternative fee structures, their impact on participation in the registration system, and the potential economic effects. This inquiry is separate from the Office's pending rulemaking proceeding instituted on March 20, 2026 to update fees within the current fee structure.
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 91 Issue 58 (Thursday, March 26, 2026)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 91, Number 58 (Thursday, March 26, 2026)]
[Notices]
[Pages 14724-14729]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2026-05886]
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
Copyright Office
[Docket No. 2026-3]
Alternative Fee Structures for Registration
AGENCY: U.S. Copyright Office, Library of Congress.
ACTION: Notice of inquiry.
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SUMMARY: The U.S. Copyright Office is initiating this inquiry to
collect information regarding alternative fee structures that could be
adopted once its updated electronic registration system is fully
operational. The information will be used to study the feasibility of
alternative fee structures, their impact on participation in the
registration system, and the potential economic effects. This inquiry
is separate from the Office's pending rulemaking proceeding instituted
on March 20, 2026 to update fees within the current fee structure.
DATES: Written comments must be received no later than 11:59 p.m.
Eastern Time on June 24, 2026.
ADDRESSES:
Submission of written comments: For reasons of governmental
efficiency, the Copyright Office is using the <a href="http://regulations.gov">regulations.gov</a> system
for the submission and posting of public comments in this proceeding.
All comments are therefore to be submitted electronically through
<a href="http://regulations.gov">regulations.gov</a>. Specific instructions for submitting comments are
available on the Office's website at <a href="https://www.copyright.gov/policy/altfeestudy">https://www.copyright.gov/policy/altfeestudy</a>. If electronic comment submission is not feasible due to
lack of access to a computer or the internet, please contact the Office
using the contact information below for special instructions.
Submission of business confidential information: Any submissions
containing business confidential information must be marked
``confidential treatment requested'' and submitted through
<a href="http://regulations.gov">regulations.gov</a>. Submitters should provide an index listing the
document(s) or information they would like the Office to withhold. The
index should identify the confidential document(s) by document
number(s) and document title(s) and should identify the confidential
information by description(s) and relevant page number(s) and/or
section number(s) within a document. Submitters should provide a
statement explaining their grounds for requesting nondisclosure of the
information to the public as well. The Office also requests that
submitters of business confidential information include a non-
confidential version (either redacted or summarized) that will be
posted on <a href="http://regulations.gov">regulations.gov</a> and available for public viewing. In the
event that the submitter cannot provide a non-confidential version of
their submission, the Office requests that the submitter post a notice
on the docket stating that they have provided us with business
confidential information. Should a submitter fail either to docket a
non-confidential version of their submission or to post a notice that
they have provided business confidential information, the Office will
note the receipt of the submission on the docket with the submitter's
organization or name (to the degree permitted by law) and the date of
submission.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Rhea Efthimiadis, Assistant to the
General Counsel, by email at <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#c4a9a1a2b084a7abb4bdb6ada3acb0eaa3abb2"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="82efe7e4f6c2e1edf2fbf0ebe5eaf6ace5edf4">[email protected]</span></a> or telephone at 202-
707-8350.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The Copyright Office is in the midst of a
comprehensive project to update its technological infrastructure. This
project, the Enterprise Copyright System (``ECS''), is expanding access
to the Office's services in furtherance of its strategic objective of
``Copyright for All.'' \1\ A major component of ECS is a new
registration system (``ECS Registration''), which will make the
statutory benefits of registering works of authorship more accessible.
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\1\ See U.S. Copyright Office, Strategic Plan 2022-2026
Fostering Creativity and Enriching Culture 4 (2022) (``Strategic
Plan 2022''), <a href="https://www.copyright.gov/reports/strategic-plan/USCO-strategic2022-2026.pdf">https://www.copyright.gov/reports/strategic-plan/USCO-strategic2022-2026.pdf</a>.
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Currently, most copyright owners use the Standard Application,
which allows registration of a single work for a set fee. The Office
has also introduced an increasing number of group registration options
that allow multiple works to be registered with one application and one
filing fee, effectively reducing the per-work fee for certain types of
works.\2\ While many copyright owners have taken advantage of these
options, some have also urged the adoption of alternative fee
structures to further minimize or eliminate perceived barriers to
registration.
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\2\ See, e.g., Group Registration of a Two-Dimensional Artwork,
90 FR 59383, 59387 (Dec. 19, 2025) (noting that group registration
of 2D artwork will ``effectively reduce[ ] the per-work cost of
registration by half''); see also 37 CFR 202.3(b)(5), 202.4(c)-(k),
(m), (o) (group registration options for unpublished works, news
websites, newspapers, newsletters and serials, unpublished and
published photographs, contributions to periodicals, secure test
items, works on an album of music, short online literary works, and
database updates).
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Over the past few years, the Office has acknowledged these
proposals and expressed the intent to consider them once the necessary
technological capabilities are in place.\3\ At this stage in the
development of ECS Registration, the Office seeks to evaluate the
feasibility of adopting any of the proposed fee mechanisms. This
entails an analysis of their potential economic impact on the revenue
that the Office receives from registration fees and the costs of
administering the registration system. As we have affirmed in the
context of the pending fee study,\4\ our goal is to enhance access to
the copyright registration system, growing a robust record of copyright
ownership. To that end, this notice of inquiry solicits information
about copyright owners' current registration practices and how
alternative fee structures might affect those practices. The Office
will use the information provided to study the potential economic
impact of alternative fee structures, which in turn will inform plans
for further development of ECS Registration and funding strategies to
be considered in future fee studies.
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\3\ See Group Registration of Photographs, 83 FR 2542, 2545
(Jan. 18, 2018) (explaining that in response to proposals for ``a
tiered filing fee'' or ``a sliding-scale subscription model'' that
``the current registration system is not capable of supporting
th[ese] type[s] of [ ] fee structure[s]'').
\4\ See Copyright Office Fees, 91 FR 13529, 13532 (Mar. 20,
2026).
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I. Background
A. The Office's Fee-Setting Authority
The Copyright Act requires the Office to collect fees to cover the
costs of certain services, including registration of copyright claims.
The Register may ``adjust fees'' by regulation ``to not more than that
necessary to cover the
[[Page 14725]]
reasonable costs incurred by the Copyright Office for [its] services.''
\5\ The process for modifying fees entails studying the costs that the
Office incurs in providing services and submitting a proposed fee
schedule, along with an economic analysis, to Congress.\6\ As part of
this process, the Office recently published a notice of proposed
rulemaking seeking public comment on proposed adjustments to its fee
schedule for certain fee-based services.\7\
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\5\ 17 U.S.C. 708(b)(2).
\6\ Id. at 708(b)(5).
\7\ 91 FR 13529.
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Section 708 of the Act requires that registration fees ``be fair
and equitable and give due consideration to the objectives of the
copyright system.'' \8\ One such objective is to ``encourage the
production of original literary, artistic, and musical expression for
the good of the public.'' \9\ The Office also seeks to encourage the
public's use of our services. One way that the Office promotes these
objectives is by charging higher fees for some services--albeit less
than the actual costs incurred--in order to offer lower fees for other
services to promote participation in the copyright system.\10\ While
the Register has broad discretion to set fees,\11\ she cannot waive
them except in limited circumstances.\12\
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\8\ 17 U.S.C. 708(b)(4).
\9\ Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc., 510 U.S. 517, 524 (1994); see also
Strategic Plan 2022 at 4 (``The Office's core services of
registration, recordation, and statutory licensing play an important
role in expanding culture and knowledge, supporting the ability to
protect and exploit creative works while facilitating their
dissemination through licensing and other lawful uses, here and
abroad.'').
\10\ See H.R. Rep. No. 105-25, at 8 (1997).
\11\ See Public Law 105-80, 111 Stat. 1529, 1532 (1997); H.R.
Rep. No. 105-25, at 16.
\12\ See 17 U.S.C. 708(c) (permitting fee waiver for federal
agencies and employees ``in occasional or isolated cases involving
relatively small amounts''); id. at 708(e) (establishing fee waiver
mechanism for winners of high school art competition sponsored by
the Congressional Institute).
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In sum, the Act requires that any proposed fee changes balance
reasonable cost recovery against the effect on the use of the
registration system. Economic analysis is therefore critical in setting
fee schedules, including any potential changes to accommodate
alternative fee structures.
B. Past Consideration of Alternative Fee Structures
While the Office has not previously conducted a comprehensive
analysis of alternative fee structures, we have received comments on
such structures in prior proceedings. In 2018, the Office published a
notice of inquiry seeking input on registration topics, including
whether we should implement a ``dynamic pricing model'' or offer a
subscription service.\13\ In response, some commenters suggested that
the Office consider an annual subscription option for high-volume
creators to register works in bulk.\14\ Some supported tiered
registration fee structures based on the number of works.\15\ Another
proposal was to introduce tiered registration fees that would
distinguish between individual authors, small businesses, and large
corporate rightsholders.\16\ Commenters repeated these proposals in
2022 in comments for the Office's deferred examination study,\17\ in
which we considered the potential effect of a deferred examination
option that would permit partial registration applications at a
significantly discounted fee.\18\
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\13\ See Registration Modernization, 83 FR 52336, 52339 (Oct.
17, 2018).
\14\ Coalition of Visual Artists, Comments Submitted in Response
to U.S. Copyright Office's Oct. 17, 2018, Registration Modernization
Notice of Inquiry (``2018 Registration Modernization NOI'') at 23
(Jan. 15, 2019); ImageRights 2018 Registration Modernization NOI
Comments at 4 (Jan. 15, 2019); Shaftel & Schmelzer 2018 Registration
Modernization NOI Comments at 8-9 (Jan. 11, 2019).
\15\ See Coalition of Visual Artists 2018 Registration
Modernization NOI Comments at 23 (Jan. 15, 2019) (proposing
``[t]iered pricing [that] could be set at different levels (e.g. 1-
50. 51-500, 501-1,000, 1,000+, etc.)'' as ``lower fees for creators
registering fewer works would help many creators keep their
registration cost-per-work more reasonable and encourage more
registrations''); see also Coalition of Visual Artists, Comments
Submitted in Response to U.S. Copyright Office's Dec. 1, 2016, Group
Registration of Photographs Notice of Proposed Rulemaking at 59
(Jan. 30, 2017) (``The Copyright Office could create tiered
registration fees for specific quantities of images included in a
group registration.'').
\16\ See Shaftel & Schmelzer 2018 Registration Modernization NOI
Comments at 9-12 (Jan. 11, 2019). The Office previously studied
price differentiation between single authors and larger copyright
owners, and implemented a registration option that offered lowered
fees for an individual author-claimant registering a single work.
See Single Application Option, 78 FR 38843 (June 28, 2013); U.S.
Copyright Office, Proposed Schedule and Analysis of Copyright Fees
to Go into Effect on or About April 1, 2014 1, 7-8 (Nov. 14, 2013);
U.S. Copyright Office, Analysis and Proposed Fee Schedule to Go into
Effect July 1, 1999 iv (Feb. 1, 1999). Because few copyright owners
have used this option, the Office is proposing to eliminate it as
part of the proposed fee schedule. See 91 FR 13529, 13533-34.
\17\ Three comments expressed support for subscription pricing.
See Coalition of Visual Artists, Comments in Response to U.S.
Copyright Office's Dec. 10, 2021, Deferred Registration Examination
Study Notice of Inquiry (``Deferred Registration Examination NOI'')
Comments at 21-22 (Jan 24, 2022); Shaftel & Schmelzer Deferred
Registration Examination NOI Comments at 21-22 (Jan. 22, 2022);
Copyright Alliance Deferred Registration Examination NOI Comments at
3, 5-6, 32 (Jan. 24, 2022). Five comments supported tiered pricing
that differentiates between individuals, small businesses, and large
corporations. See Copyright Alliance Deferred Registration
Examination NOI Comments at 3, 31; Shaftel & Schmelzer Deferred
Registration Examination NOI Comments at 22-25; AIPLA Deferred
Registration Examination NOI Comments at 6 (Jan. 24, 2022); Assoc.
of Med. Illustrators Deferred Registration Examination NOI Comments
at 6, 8 (Jan. 24, 2022); Coalition of Visual Artists Deferred
Registration Examination NOI Comments at 20.
\18\ See U.S. Copyright Office, Deferred Registration
Examination Study 10, 18-21 (Aug. 1, 2022) (``Deferred Registration
Examination Study''), <a href="https://www.copyright.gov/policy/deferred-examination/Letter-on-Deferred-Registration-Examination-2022.08.01.pdf">https://www.copyright.gov/policy/deferred-examination/Letter-on-Deferred-Registration-Examination-2022.08.01.pdf</a>.
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The Office previously expressed the intent to study these proposals
further.\19\ In order to do so, additional information is essential to
perform the necessary economic analysis for sound, data-driven policy
decisions.\20\ This inquiry therefore seeks empirical evidence about
how different fee structures would influence applicants' registration
practices and affect the Office's costs. Because any new fee structure
would be implemented in ECS Registration once it is in production, we
are initiating this process now to plan for development of whatever
additional system functionality may be required.
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\19\ See 91 FR 13529, 13535; Group Registration of Two-
Dimensional Artwork, 89 FR 11789, 11791 (Feb. 15, 2024); Deferred
Registration Examination Study at 22-23; Registration Modernization,
85 FR 12704, 12706 (Mar. 3, 2020); Proposed Schedule and Analysis of
Copyright Fees to Go into Effect in Spring 2020 34 (Oct. 16, 2019)
(stating that the Office will ``examine alternative vehicles for
variable fee setting, including through further solicitations for
public comment'').
\20\ 17 U.S.C. 708(b)(5) (requiring the Register to submit an
``economic analysis'' of proposed fee adjustments to Congress prior
to implementation).
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II. Alternative Fee Structures
As the Office explores alternative fee structures, our statutory
lodestars are that fees be ``fair and equitable'' and ``give due
consideration to the objectives of the copyright system.'' \21\
Economic analysis of these fee structures requires consideration of how
they would impact Office operations, and how they would affect
applicants' registration decisions. In addition, because fees do not
cover the full cost of the Office's services, any net increase in
filing volume would likely entail increasing fees, additional
congressional appropriations, or both, to sustain Office
operations.\22\ With these considerations in mind, this notice broadly
outlines four types of alternative fee structures that have been
proposed, along with some of the potential benefits and risks of each.
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\21\ Id. at 708(b)(4).
\22\ See 91 FR 13529, 13532; Copyright Office Fees, 85 FR 9374,
9378-79 (Feb. 19, 2020).
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A. Fees Differentiated by Type of Work
The vast majority of applicants submit their claims using the
Standard Application. The Office currently charges a uniform fee of $65
for processing these claims, regardless of
[[Page 14726]]
the type of work involved.\23\ The resources required to examine each
application, however, vary substantially across work types. For
example, processing an application to register a motion picture on
average costs $83, whereas processing an application to register a
literary work on average costs $147.\24\ As a result, some applicants
end up paying fees that are disproportionate to the costs borne by the
Office. This misalignment effectively creates subsidies and can, over
time, distort applicant behavior.\25\
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\23\ 37 CFR 201.3(c)(1)(i)(B).
\24\ See Federal Research Division, U.S. Copyright Office FY2024
Fee Study: Cost Assessment Report 19-20 (2025) (``FRD 2025 USCO Cost
Report'') (Table 4), <a href="https://www.copyright.gov/rulemaking/feestudy2026/Cost%20Assessment%20Report.pdf">https://www.copyright.gov/rulemaking/feestudy2026/Cost%20Assessment%20Report.pdf</a>. For more information
about the Office's costs for providing services, see generally
Copyright Office Fees, 91 FR 13529, 13533-40.
\25\ See Yongmin Chen & Marius Schwartz, Differential Pricing
When Costs Differ: A Welfare Analysis, 46 RAND J. Econ. 442, 443
(2015) (explaining that uniform pricing across services with
different marginal costs misallocates output by encouraging
excessive consumption of subsidized services and insufficient
consumption of higher-cost services). See also Gerald R. Faulhaber,
Cross-Subsidization: Pricing in Public Enterprises, 65 Am. Econ.
Rev. 966 (1975) (discussing how cross subsidies can arise from the
structure of costs and pricing); Dennis W. Carlton & Jeffrey M.
Perloff, Modern Industrial Organization 712 (4th ed. 2015)
(discussing cross-subsidization arising from differentiated prices).
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One possibility to address the differences in cost recovery would
be to charge different fees for different types of works, based on the
resources required to process claims. Under a differentiated fee model,
applicants would pay fees more closely tied to the actual cost of
examining their claims. This fee structure would reduce the existing
cross-subsidies from applicants who submit inexpensive-to-process works
to those submitting works that require the Office to expend more
resources.\26\
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\26\ When fees reflect true resource demands, users are more
likely to make more efficient decisions about the costs and benefits
of consuming the service, and the Office will be better able to
allocate its limited examination resources in a way that more
closely matches stakeholder value. See Chen & Schwartz, supra note
25, at 443 (``Differential pricing obviously has the potential to
increase total welfare when marginal costs differ: uniform pricing
will misallocate output, so a small output reallocation to the low-
cost market will raise total welfare.''). See also Faulhaber, supra
note 25 (discussing how cross subsidies can arise from the structure
of costs and pricing). See also Carlton & Perloff, supra note 25, at
712 (discussing cross-subsidization arising from differentiated
prices).
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Because the Office already organizes examination operations into
divisions corresponding to the major categories of works, and currently
differentiates application forms and deposit requirements along similar
lines, a differentiated fee system could align with the existing
institutional structure.\27\ Still, some outlays would be necessary to
update electronic systems, public guidance, and intake procedures.
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\27\ Currently, the Office of Registration Policy & Practice is
organized into three different divisions--Literary, Performing Arts,
and Visual Arts--that examine applications for different types of
works. See 37 CFR 203.3(e).
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There are also circumstances where differential pricing based on
the type of work could be inefficient and counterproductive. Because
the Office's administrative classifications do not have legal
significance,\28\ if fees differ across categories, applicants may
intentionally or inadvertently misclassify works, thereby triggering
examiner review, correspondence, and supplemental fee collection,
resulting in a later effective date of registration based on when the
correct fee is received. Further, misclassification increases
processing time, imposes administrative costs, and may degrade the
quality of the public record.
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\28\ See 17 U.S.C. 408(c)(1).
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B. Differential Fees for Individuals and Organizations
A second approach to fee differentiation would be to vary fees
depending on whether the author, claimant, and/or applicant is an
individual or an organization.\29\ This structure is what is known to
economists as third-degree price discrimination, in which a seller
charges different prices to distinct groups that exhibit different
levels of price sensitivity.\30\ It does not necessarily cost the
Office more to process a registration application from an organization
than it does to process an application from an individual, so charging
organizations more than individuals would make the fees paid by
organizations disproportionately high relative to the costs they impose
on the Office, and fees paid by individuals disproportionately low.\31\
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\29\ See U.S. Copyright Office, Compendium of U.S. Copyright
Office Practices secs. 402, 404, 613.1 (3d ed. 2021).
\30\ Price sensitivity refers to how consumer demand for a good
or service is affected by price changes. Higher price sensitivity
means that a consumer is more likely to forgo a good or service if
the price increases or purchase more if the price decreases. In
contrast, price insensitivity exists where demand remains the same
regardless of any change in price. See Hal R. Varian, Intermediate
Microeconomics: A Modern Approach ch. 24 (4th ed. 1992) (defining
third-degree price discrimination as the practice of charging
different prices to distinct consumer groups with different demand
elasticities).
\31\ In some circumstances, the Office already effectively
subsidizes applications from certain types of authors. For example,
the fees for group registration of photographs are set low because
many applicants are individuals and/or small businesses. See 91 FR
13529, 13534. These lower fees are partly subsidized by charging
higher fees to register works in certain categories of services
where the applicants or requesters are more likely to be corporate
entities, including databases and news website updates, vessel
hulls, special handling, and litigation statements. See id. at
13534-35.
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Two conditions for this sort of pricing structure to be effective
are: (1) a substantial difference in demand elasticity between groups,
and (2) an ability to efficiently distinguish between the groups.\32\
With respect to the first condition, it is plausible that individuals
and organizations exhibit markedly different demand elasticities for
registration services.\33\ As for the second condition, from an
administrative perspective, distinguishing between individuals and
organizations may be relatively straightforward, since applicants are
asked to indicate whether each author and claimant is an individual or
organization.\34\ However, introducing differential fees would create
incentives for organizations to misclassify themselves as individuals,
which could result in additional costs to process applications with
these errors.\35\ Ultimately, if these two economic conditions are met,
this type of fee differentiation could make registration more
affordable for individuals, and, in theory, increase the overall number
of applications.
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\32\ See Carlton & Perloff, supra note 25, at ch. 9 (explaining
that third-degree price discrimination requires identifiable
consumer groups with different demand elasticities and that firms
must be able to separate those groups at low cost for price
discrimination to be effective).
\33\ When one group is much more responsive to price than
another, there may be efficiency and revenue advantages to charging
the more elastic group a lower fee and the less elastic group a
higher one. See Michael A. Crew & Paul R. Kleindorfer, The Economics
of Public Utility Regulation ch. 6 (MIT Press 1986) (discussing
Ramsey pricing and explaining that efficiency and revenue objectives
are advanced when prices deviate from marginal cost inversely to
demand elasticity, with lower prices charged to more elastic
customer groups and higher prices to less elastic groups).
\34\ See generally U.S. Copyright Office, Copyright Registration
Toolkit (Jan. 2026), <a href="https://www.copyright.gov/intellectual-property-toolkits/copyright-registration-toolkit.pdf">https://www.copyright.gov/intellectual-property-toolkits/copyright-registration-toolkit.pdf</a>; Standard
Application Registration Tutorial, U.S. Copyright Office, <a href="https://copyright.gov/eco/standard.mp4">https://copyright.gov/eco/standard.mp4</a>. The Office intends to continue the
practice of asking applicants to specify whether authors and
claimants are individuals or organizations in ECS Registration.
\35\ Preventing misclassification may require the Office to
adopt verification measures, causing additional costs. See Jean-
Jacques Laffont & Jean Tirole, A Theory of Incentives in Procurement
and Regulation chs. 1-2 (MIT Press 1993) (explaining that when
regulated parties have incentives to misrepresent their type,
differentiated pricing or regulatory schemes require verification
and enforcement mechanisms whose administrative and informational
costs can offset or exceed the efficiency gains from
differentiation).
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[[Page 14727]]
C. Reduced Fees for Small Entities
Another approach could be for the Office to offer lower or
discounted fees for smaller entities--small businesses and non-profit
organizations that fall below a certain employee headcount or revenue
level. This approach would provide benefits similar to our cost-
effective group registration options, which we implemented to make
registration more accessible to individual creators and small
businesses.\36\
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\36\ See 91 FR 13529, 13534; 90 FR 59383, 59387 (Dec. 19, 2025)
(noting that the Office tailored the proposed group registration
option ``to address the challenges facing individual artists and
small businesses in registering two-dimensional artwork one work at
a time, in light of concerns that these claimants often lack the
time and resources required to register works individually'').
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The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (``USPTO''), following
congressional legislation, has offered small entity fee discounts for
patent applicants for several years. Under the America Invents Act, the
USPTO is statutorily required to discount various patent application
fees for small and micro entities, by 60 to 80 percent,
respectively.\37\ To deter misuse of these options, the USPTO requires
that small and micro-entity patent applicants certify that they meet
income and filing-history thresholds; and civil penalties, and, in some
cases, criminal liability, are available to deter
misrepresentations.\38\
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\37\ See Unleashing American Innovators Act of 2022, Public Law
117-328, sec. 107, 136 Stat. 4459, 5521-22 (2022).
\38\ See id.; Leahy-Smith America Invents Act, Public Law 112-
29, sec. 10(b), 125 Stat. 284 (2011), amended by the SUCCESS Act,
Public Law 115-273, 132 Stat. 4158 (2018); 37 CFR 1.27, 1.29. A
``small entity'' is defined as a person, small business concern
(i.e., 500 or fewer employees), or nonprofit organization (e.g.,
university, 501(c)(3) organization, state nonprofit scientific and
educational organizations, foreign nonprofit that, if located in the
U.S., would qualify as a nonprofit under federal or state law). 37
CFR 1.27(a); 13 CFR 121.802. A ``micro entity'' is an application
that qualifies as a ``small entity'' under USPTO rules, has not been
named as an inventor on more than four previously filed patent
applications, did not earn more than three times the median
household income and did not convey an interest to an entity that
exceeded the triple median gross income limit. 35 U.S.C. 123.
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Discounting copyright registration fees for smaller entities would
operate on similar economic logic as differentiating between
individuals and organizations. The presumption is that smaller entities
have less ability to pay fees and higher price sensitivity than larger
organizations, making them more responsive to fee changes. Differential
pricing could therefore improve access to registration for smaller
enterprises while shifting a larger share of cost recovery onto larger,
less price-sensitive entities.\39\
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\39\ See Carlton & Perloff, supra note 25, at ch. 9 (explaining
that under third-degree price discrimination, charging lower prices
to more price-elastic groups and higher prices to less price-elastic
groups can expand participation by the elastic group while allowing
greater cost recovery from the inelastic group).
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Because the Office does not collect data on entity size, it cannot
confirm these presumed differences in demand elasticity. Moreover, the
findings in one recent empirical study cast doubt on whether discounted
fees for smaller entities meaningfully increase patent filings.\40\ If
similar dynamics apply to copyright registration, fee discounts for
smaller entities could reduce Office revenue without meaningfully
increasing registration activity.
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\40\ Ga[eacute]tan de Rassenfosse & Adam B. Jaffe, The Effect of
Application Fees on Entry into Patenting (Nat'l Bureau of Econ.
Rsch., Working Paper No. 33492, 2025), <a href="https://www.nber.org/papers/w33492">https://www.nber.org/papers/w33492</a> (finding that the USPTO's fee reductions for small and micro
entities had no measurable effect on small-entity patenting
activity).
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But distinctions between the copyright and patent systems may lead
to a different outcome if the Office were to discount fees for small
entities. Most fundamentally, an application is necessary to secure
patent rights; no protection exists until the patent is granted by the
USPTO.\41\ In contrast, copyright subsists automatically upon fixation
of a work of authorship.\42\ Although copyright owners have meaningful
incentives to register,\43\ they need not do so to enjoy legal rights.
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\41\ See 35 U.S.C. 100-105, 111, 131, 151, 154 (specifying that
a patent, and the exclusive rights that it provides, can only be
``obtain[ed]'' by submitting an application that complies with the
relevant statutory and regulatory provisions to the USPTO, which
examines and issues the patent).
\42\ See 17 U.S.C. 408(a) (``[R]egistration is not a condition
of copyright protection.'').
\43\ These incentives include that a registration determination
by the Office is a precondition to instituting litigation in federal
court and for seeking statutory damages and fees for infringement.
See id. at 411(a); Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corp. v. <a href="http://Wall-Street.com">Wall-Street.com</a>, LLC, 586 U.S. 296, 309 (2019).
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A related distinction is the cost of services: copyright
registration fees are considerably lower than patent filing and
maintenance fees.\44\ Further, filing fees often represent a relatively
small share of total costs in developing and securing a patent for an
invention, including the cost of paying an attorney to prosecute the
patent, such that the amount of fees may not be a significant factor
influencing smaller entities' application decisions.\45\ This may be a
more significant factor for small entities that rely on copyright
protection, like a freelance photographer's limited liability
company.\46\ Moreover, copyright owners are often individuals who are
not engaged in business activity, who may register simply to make a
record of their claims and protect against infringement without
intending to commercialize their works.
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\44\ Compare 37 CFR 201.3 (copyright fee schedule, including a
fee of $65 for a Standard Application filed online), with id. at
1.16-1.21 (patent fee schedule, including a basic application filing
fee of $350, search fee of $770, and examination fee of $880).
Unlike fees for copyright registration that are paid only when the
application is filed, patent owners must also periodically pay fees
after a patent is granted to maintain protection for the entire
term. See id. at 1.20(e)-(g) (fees for maintaining a patent due at
3.5 years ($2150), 7.5 years ($4040), and 11.5 years ($8280)).
\45\ Based on a survey of intellectual property firms and
individual practitioners about professional service fees charged in
FY2024, the AIPLA reported median fees of $8,000 for preparing a
patent application of ``minimal complexity'' and median fees of up
to $12,000 for a ``relatively complex'' application. See AIPLA,
Report of the Economic Survey 22-25 (2025). In addition to the costs
of preparing a patent application, inventors may incur costs for
related professional services such as to amend or argue the patent
application, appeal a denial, conduct a novelty search, provide a
validity opinion, and issue an approved patent. See id.
\46\ Even where an author engages a third-party service to
assist with a copyright registration, however, those fees, including
the fee charged by the Office, generally amount to less than $1000.
See id. at 31 (reporting median professional fees of $525 to prepare
and file an application for copyright registration). This cost,
while not insignificant to an individual or small business, is
relatively modest compared to the legal fees and costs of retaining
an attorney to prosecute a patent, which on average start at $8000
and can far exceed that. See id. at 22-25.
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In addition to potentially affecting application volume, offering
discounts for smaller entities may require the Office to incur
additional operating costs. Like the proposal to differentiate fees
based on the type of work, a system that conditions eligibility for
lower fees based on income, size, or filing history could invite
strategic behavior, entailing greater burdens in identifying and
correcting miscategorized applications. Nevertheless, if reduced fees
for small entities leads to increased use of the copyright registration
system, that may justify some additional administrative costs.
D. Subscription Pricing
Subscription pricing is a model in which users pay a fixed periodic
fee--usually monthly or annually--in exchange for access to a service
during that period.\47\ Instead of charging users each time they apply
to register a work, the Office could charge a fixed subscription fee
that entitles them to file up to a certain number of applications
within a prescribed period (subject to any volume constraints imposed
by the
[[Page 14728]]
system). While adopting any of the proposed alternative fee structures
would require modifications to the application fee calculator in ECS
Registration, because the Office does not currently offer subscription
pricing for any of its services, doing so would require more
substantial development work.\48\
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\47\ Liran Einav et al., Selling Subscriptions, 115 a.m. Econ.
Rev. 1650, 1650-51 (2025) (``A growing number of retail products are
now sold as subscriptions, which are typically billed on a monthly
basis and automatically renewed unless a consumer actively
cancels.'').
\48\ See 89 FR 11789, 11797 (explaining that the Office ``will
not be able to offer alternate fee structures for high volume
creators,'' including subscription pricing, ``until after the ECS
system is fully operational''); 83 FR 2542, 2545 (explaining that
currently the Office does not have the ability to charge a flat fee
that would allow applicants to submit a set number of applications
or register a set number of works over a given time period).
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A subscription model is common in certain commercial markets where
the cost of providing one additional unit of the service is close to
zero, for example, markets for software, digital media, or cloud
services.\49\ In economics terms, subscription pricing converts what
would otherwise be a per-use transaction into a flat-rate system in
which the marginal price of the next use is effectively zero. Such a
model is economically efficient under a specific set of conditions,
including high fixed costs, high switching costs, low marginal costs,
and a high variance of usage intensity across subscribers. If all these
economic conditions are met, subscription pricing could benefit
applicants and the Office, and ultimately the public, by reducing
transaction costs, taking advantage of economies of scale, and
smoothing revenue. Otherwise subscription pricing becomes inefficient
and potentially costly.
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\49\ Einav et al., supra note 47, at 1650-52 (explaining that
subscription pricing is most attractive in markets with low marginal
costs and where consumer behavior--such as inattention or switching
costs--supports flat-rate pricing, and that absent these conditions
firms must rely on substantially higher fixed fees or experience
reduced revenue, making the subscription model inefficient or
unsustainable).
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Such inefficiencies would be particularly acute for a public-sector
agency like the Office. The marginal cost of examining a registration
application is not close to zero; rather, the per-unit cost of
examining standard applications ranges from $83.46 to $194.46.\50\ The
Office does not experience economies of scale in the examination
process--each claim requires examiner review, including time-consuming
correspondence in some cases, as well as system resources. Neither
would subscription pricing meaningfully reduce transaction costs.
Applicants would still need to submit individual deposit copies and
complete all required information for each registration application,
which constitute most of the transaction costs for the user. The only
obvious reduction would come from avoiding repeated payment entry--a
benefit already achieved through deposit accounts in the current
registration system.\51\
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\50\ See FRD 2025 USCO Cost Report at 32.
\51\ See 37 CFR 201.6(b). In the future, some of applicants'
other transaction costs may be reduced if they submit claims, upload
deposits, and pay subscription fees through an application
programming interface (``API'')--an option that the Office is
planning to develop in ECS Registration.
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Further, a subscription system may introduce inequity among
claimants by severing the link between usage and cost, encouraging
high-volume applicants, including large organizations and third-party
registration services, to file even more frequently while paying far
less per claim. Meanwhile, low-volume users, including individual
creators and small entities, would pay relatively more per claim. This
would constitute a cross-subsidy from small or infrequent users to
large or high-volume users.
Finally, allowing applicants to file additional claims for no
additional fee might lead to speculative, low-quality, or borderline
claims, which would strain examination resources. An influx of low-
quality claims could overwhelm Office capacity, lengthen processing
times, and degrade the quality of the public record. To mitigate such
harms, the subscription fee would likely need to be set high and the
number of applications would need to be limited.\52\ While subscription
pricing might be feasible under those conditions--where the fee is
sufficiently high and volume is appropriately limited--they may
eliminate the utility of a subscription for the applicants who would be
inclined to use it.
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\52\ See Crew & Kleindorfer, supra note 33, at ch. 7 (explaining
that when services are priced at zero or near-zero marginal cost,
excessive or low-value usage can strain system capacity and degrade
service quality, requiring either higher fixed charges or quantity
restrictions to preserve cost recovery and system performance).
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III. Subjects of Inquiry
This notice builds on previous public comments proposing various
alternative registration fee structures by providing an opportunity to
expand on those proposals and explain in greater detail how they could
be structured and implemented. We also seek to elicit information--in
particular, quantitative data about stakeholder registration practices
and price sensitivity--that can be used for a robust economic
analysis.\53\ The resulting analysis will be a predicate for developing
the functionality that would be needed for any alternative fee
structures in ECS Registration.
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\53\ In order to be considered, data must meet professional
standards of quality and transparency, and submitters should include
a statement detailing what the data is and how it was collected. For
guidelines, see for example, Office of Mgmt. & Budget, Guidelines
for Ensuring and Maximizing the Quality, Objectivity, Utility, and
Integrity of Information Disseminated by Federal Agencies, 67 FR
8452, 8452-55 (Feb. 22, 2002) (establishing government-wide
standards for data quality, including requirements that information
used in agency analysis be accurate, reliable, unbiased, transparent
as to sources and methods, and suitable for its intended analytical
use, particularly where data are used to support economic and policy
decisions).
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Accordingly, the Office is requesting public comment on the
subjects of inquiry below. A party choosing to respond to this notice
of inquiry need not address every subject, but we request that
responding parties clearly identify and separately address each subject
for which a response is submitted. The Office also requests that
commenters explain their interest in the topic and, with respect to
each answer, the basis for their knowledge.
A. Alternative Fee Structure Details
1. Please describe, in detail, mechanisms for how the Office could
implement the four proposed alternative fee structures and explain how
they would support the objectives of promoting equity among authors of
different work types, sustaining Office operations, and encouraging
registration to create a reliable public record of copyright ownership.
In doing so, consider the following:
(a) Where an alternative fee structure would be limited to certain
types of claims or applicants, how should those categories be defined
and why? Describe any proposed fee tiers based on the type of claim or
applicant, including how fees should be set for each tier relative to
other tiers, and explain why these tiers would be consistent with the
statutory requirement that fees charged by the Office be ``fair and
equitable.''
(b) If the Office were to charge different fees for individuals and
for organizations, should the fee be based on the person who created
the work (the author), the person who owns the copyright in the work
(the claimant), and/or the person who is submitting the claim (the
applicant)?
(i) Should fees vary depending on whether the work was created by
an individual author (i.e., not a work made for hire) or corporate
authors (i.e., works made for hire)?
(ii) Should fees vary depending on whether the copyright in the
work is owned by an individual claimant or a corporate claimant (which
may have
[[Page 14729]]
obtained the copyright from an individual author)?
(iii) Should fees vary depending on whether the claim is being
submitted by an individual (e.g., an individual author/claimant
submitting the claim on their own behalf) or a corporate entity (e.g.,
a person submitting a claim on behalf of their corporate employer, a
person who works for a law firm, or a person who works for a copyright
registration service)?
(c) If the Office were to discount fees for smaller entities, how
should entity size be determined--based on annual revenue, employee
headcount, non-profit status, and/or another metric?
(d) Under a subscription model, what would be reasonable limits on
the number of works that an applicant could register and/or the number
of applications they could file within a particular time period? Should
there be different limits for different work types and, if so, how
should the Office set these limits? How should fees be set given that
the Office incurs similar costs when examining each individual work?
(e) What should be the consequence(s) for applicant filing errors
(e.g., misclassifying a work, misrepresenting the applicant as an
individual or small entity)? In order to help recoup costs and deter
this behavior, should the Office refuse registration and require the
applicant to refile with a later effective date, charge additional
administrative processing fees (in addition to the fee difference), or
some other option?
(f) Please identify any current legal or regulatory constraints on
adopting alternative fee structures and explain what changes to
statutory or regulatory language would remove these impediments.
2. Other than the four alternative fee structures identified in
this notice, are there any others that the Office should consider
(e.g., tiered fees based on the number of works being registered)? If
so, please describe them in detail while considering the above
questions.
B. Business and Registration Practices
3. Please describe your or your organization's current practices
with respect to registration, providing information about filing volume
and costs incurred (e.g., application fees, personnel costs, third-
party service and legal fees) for different types of works where
available. In addition, please specify whether you are an individual or
organization; and if an organization, please provide the entity's
approximate staff headcount and annual revenue.
4. Please describe the extent to which any alternative fee
structure, if implemented by the Office, is likely to affect your
practices with respect to registration, including any quantitative
projections about the effect on filing volume and registration-related
expenses.
5. Are you aware of any potential applicants that are not fully
participating in the current registration system and would be
incentivized to register works if the Office implemented one or more
alternative fee structures? If so, describe the potential applicant(s),
identify the fee structure(s), and explain the projected change(s) in
registration activity, providing quantitative data where available.
6. Would implementing any of the alternative fee structures deter
any potential applicants from seeking registration or otherwise lead
them to modify their registration practices? If so, describe the
potential applicant(s), identify the fee structure(s), and explain the
projected change(s) in registration activity, providing quantitative
data and analysis where available.
C. Processing Costs and Feasibility
7. The Office has traditionally recovered approximately 50 to 60%
of our costs through fees; and the remainder is provided through
appropriations from Congress. If alternative fee structures were to
increase costs for providing registration services--for example, by
increasing registration volume and requiring more examiners--how should
the Office recover these additional costs? If the Office were to
increase fees to make up for any budgetary shortfall, please identify
which service fees should be increased and explain why those increases
would be ``fair and equitable.''
8. The adoption of any alternative fee structure is subject to
technical feasibility within ECS Registration, currently in
development, and would require developing additional system
capabilities. To assess usage and costs before expanding access to more
applicants, should the Office adopt any alternative fee structures on a
limited or temporary basis? Should these fee structures be limited to
certain types of works or applications? Please identify any appropriate
limitations and explain why certain applications should be given higher
priority.
9. Are there other process changes that could be implemented
through development of ECS Registration--i.e., in-process technological
upgrades to make application processing easier for internal and
external users--that would incentivize registration and improve cost
recovery? Would the Office's planned development of API functionality,
once implemented, diminish the need for any of the proposed alternative
fee structures?
10. The Office periodically evaluates, including in our fee
studies, how often various registration options are used by applicants
and the costs associated with providing each of them. If we were to
adopt any alternative fee structures, would that obviate the need for
any existing application options, such as current group registration
applications? Conversely, would more or expanded group registration
options obviate the need for any of the alternative fee structures?
Should the Office ``sunset'' or discontinue any group registration
options or alternative fee structures if they are infrequently used or
duplicative of other options?
Dated: March 24, 2026.
Emily L. Chapuis,
General Counsel and Associate Register of Copyrights.
[FR Doc. 2026-05886 Filed 3-25-26; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 1410-30-P
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