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Does Lanham Act §43(a) compel original authorship credit to be given when a work that has passed into the public domain is substantially copied, repackaged and sold by another as a new product? – Dastar Corp. v. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp., 539 U.S. ____ (2003)

In 1995 Dastar produced a set of video tapes titled World War II Campaigns in Europe by copying virtually all of the footage from a prior television series titled Crusade in Europe which had been produced by Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation (Fox). The original Crusade in Europe television series was based on a book by Dwight D. Eisenhower. The copyright in the book had been renewed in 1975, but the copyright in the original television series had not been renewed, which left the original television series in the public domain as of 1977. Dastar released its video set as its own product using its own title and without giving any credit to Fox. Fox claimed that Dastar was improperly passing off Fox's work as its own in violation of §43(a) of the Lanham Act. The Supreme Court disagreed and held that Dastar was the "origin" of its video set within the meaning of §43(a) of the Lanham Act. Even though virtually all of the video footage was copied from a public domain source, there were at least minor modifications, and Dastar actually manufactured the video sets. The Court considered the video sets to be the "goods" and Dastar to be the "origin" of those goods within the meaning of §43(a) of the Lanham Act.

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