Collectibles and Auction Checklist: Title and Provenance, Authentication and Grading Terms, Reproduction and Image Rights, Consignment and Platform Terms, and Counterfeit Response

By Casey Scott McKay · 2026-03-02

This checklist audits a collectibles or auction position from any side of the trade. It begins with title rather than authenticity, because a thief passes no title and the market habitually directs its diligence at the wrong question. It then covers what a collector actually owns, the reproduction position in listing and catalogue imagery, and grading terms that are disclaimed opinions sold as guarantees. Further phases address the licensing stack underneath cards and memorabilia, consignment and auction warranties, publicity rights determined by domicile, and custom or altered items. The final phases match claims to the counterfeit taxonomy, route platform complaints correctly, and protect the intellectual property a professional seller owns. Gate items mark where work should stop until a question is answered.

IP and Technology > Copyright | Checklist | Published 2 March 2026 - Updated 26 May 2026 | Casey Scott McKay - marksy.us

Summary. This checklist audits a collectibles or auction position from any side of the trade, beginning with title rather than authenticity because a thief passes no title and the market directs its diligence at the wrong question. It covers what a collector actually owns, the reproduction position in listing and catalogue imagery, grading terms that are disclaimed opinions, the licensing stack underneath cards and memorabilia, consignment warranties, publicity rights by domicile, custom and altered items, the counterfeit taxonomy and matching claims, platform routing, and the intellectual property a professional seller owns. Gate items mark where work should stop.

Keywords: collectibles checklist · title diligence · stolen property registries · ownership of copies · listing image fair use · grading terms · holder protection · population reports · licensing stack · consignment warranties · publicity rights domicile · custom items · platform routing · dealer assets · inventory and valuation

How to use this checklist

| Phase | What it produces | Who runs it | Gate | |---|---|---|---| | 1. Title | A recorded diligence file | Counsel | Registries searched and logged | | 2. Ownership | A written statement of what was bought | Counsel | Client told before any image question | | 3. Imagery | A documented fair use position | Counsel and operations | Not extended to derivatives | | 4. Grading | Terms read as disclaimers | Counsel | Buyer told it is an opinion | | 5. Licensing stack | Every layer identified | Counsel | Mapped before anything new is made | | 6. Consignment | Warranties allocated honestly | Counsel | Image licence read | | 7. Publicity | A domicile answer per subject | Counsel | Answered before production | | 8. Custom items | An honest risk assessment | Counsel | Production stopped on notice | | 9. Counterfeits | Claims matched to categories | Counsel | Fraud not pleaded as infringement | | 10. Own assets | Registrations and an inventory | Counsel and the business | Photography registered |

The matter. A specialist dealer with a twenty-year business, an online storefront, a print catalogue, a growing custom-item side line, an unregistered brand, a price database on a shared drive, and a letter from a property owner's licensing department that complains about two different things at once.

Phase 1. Check title before authenticity

[ ] Accept the rule. A thief passes no title, however innocent the buyer, however long ago, and however many intermediate sales occurred.
- Why. This is the rule participants most often assume has a good-faith exception, and the market spends its diligence effort on whether an object is genuine rather than on whether the seller can convey it.
[ ] Ask for the chain and expect it to be incomplete, since the question is not whether the chain is complete but whether the gaps are explicable.
[ ] Date the gaps, since a gap in a period and region associated with known losses is a different proposition from one in an ordinary collection in the 1990s.
[ ] Search the stolen property registries and record the search with its date and parameters, since the record is what evidences good faith.
[ ] Check the category-specific databases that specialists know and generalists do not.
[ ] Ask the consignor direct questions in writing: how the object was acquired, from whom, when, and what documentation exists. The answers are the warranty's factual basis.
[ ] Check restitution and repatriation exposure for archaeological material, ethnographic objects, and items removed during conflict.
[ ] Check the export position at the same time, since an object may be lawfully owned and unlawfully removable.
[ ] Note that limitation periods start differently by jurisdiction — from the theft, from demand and refusal, or from discovery — so an object stolen decades ago may still be recoverable.
[ ] Explain the limits of warranties and insurance, since a consignor's title warranty is worth the consignor's solvency and policies rarely respond to a title failure.
[ ] [Gate] No high-value acquisition completes without a recorded title diligence file.

Phase 2. State what the collector actually owns

[ ] The object, not the rights. 17 U.S.C. § 202 provides that transfer of ownership of a material object does not of itself convey any rights in the copyrighted work embodied in it.
[ ] A resale right. 17 U.S.C. § 109 permits the owner of a lawfully made copy to sell or dispose of it and to display it to viewers present where it is located.
[ ] No reproduction right at all, since photographing the object for a listing, catalogue, post, or print is reproduction under 17 U.S.C. § 106.
[ ] Marks that may be resold and not reproduced, since reselling a genuine article bearing marks is permitted and producing new material bearing them is not.
[ ] Publicity rights belonging to depicted people, engaging on commercial use.
[ ] Objects with no protectable expression at all — a ball, a jersey, a piece of set dressing — whose value is entirely provenance, which makes the documentation the asset.
[ ] Put it in writing to the client early, since every later conversation about images, merchandise, and custom production depends on it.
[ ] [Gate] No advice on imagery or products is given before the ownership position is stated.

Phase 3. Build the imagery position

[ ] Identify what the photograph reproduces. A photograph of a trading card reproduces the artwork on the card; a photograph of a jersey reproduces a logo; a photograph of a poster reproduces the poster.
[ ] Run the four factors honestly under 17 U.S.C. § 107, and treat Andy Warhol Foundation v. Goldsmith as having narrowed the first factor to a comparison of purposes rather than an inquiry into aesthetic difference.
[ ] Note the strength of the resale listing case: the purpose is to identify a specific object for sale rather than to supply the work's expressive content, the amount is what identification requires, and the market for the underlying work is not substituted.
[ ] Note that a photograph shot to show condition is naturally documentary — the flaws, the corners, the stains, the repairs — which is exactly the framing the first factor now rewards.
[ ] Stop at the listing. A wallpaper, a print, a T-shirt, or a "greatest cards of the decade" poster built from the same photographs is a different use with a different answer.
[ ] Watch the catalogue, since an auction catalogue that is also a collectible has an ambiguity in its purpose that a listing does not.
[ ] Check whether the photograph is itself protectable, since a straight-on record shot taken to show condition has thin protection at best under Feist Publications v. Rural Telephone Service, which is an argument that cuts both ways for a dealer whose images are being scraped.
[ ] Register the photography catalogue anyway, in periodic batches, because statutory damages and fees under 17 U.S.C. § 412 require timely registration and thin protection is still protection against literal copying.
[ ] Give operations a one-page rule rather than a doctrinal memorandum, since the people making the decisions are photographing forty objects a day.
[ ] [Gate] The fair use position is not extended to derivative products without separate analysis.

Phase 4. Read grading and authentication terms as what they are

[ ] Treat the grade as an opinion, since every major service says so in its terms and the market treats the number as a fact.
[ ] Read the guarantee, which typically promises to buy back or compensate on a wrong opinion up to a stated value and is a contractual undertaking, not a warranty of authenticity.
[ ] Check who can enforce it, since the person who suffers is usually a later purchaser with no contract and the guarantee may or may not run with the object.
[ ] Check the cap and the survival period, and check whether the limitation is enforceable where the customer is.
[ ] Check the consistency of characterisation across terms, marketing, certificate, and staff statements, since a business that disclaims in its terms and advertises certainty has undermined its own defence.
[ ] Note that the holder is protectable subject matter: its shape is a design patent candidate under 35 U.S.C. § 171, its appearance is trade dress, the label bears marks, and the security features are the practical enforcement tool.
[ ] Record the holder with Customs, since a counterfeit holder is a counterfeit product and the recordation is how it is stopped at the border.
[ ] Treat the population report as data, not property, since a compilation of facts is unprotectable to the extent of the facts under Feist and the protection comes from access controls, terms of use, and 18 U.S.C. § 1839 trade secret analysis.
[ ] Publish the regrading and crossover position, since a service whose terms are silent about resubmission will find that its own guarantee is being arbitraged.
[ ] Assume the opinion file will be produced, since a wrong grade becomes evidence and the record behind it is the defence.
[ ] [Gate] No buyer is told a grade means the object is genuine.

Phase 5. Map the licensing stack

[ ] Identify the underlying property owner — the league, the studio, the estate, the publisher — whose characters, logos, and marks appear on the object.
[ ] Identify the manufacturer or publisher whose rights in the card design, packaging, and set numbering are separate.
[ ] Identify the photographer or artist whose image appears, whose licence may have been limited to a print run.
[ ] Identify the depicted individual whose publicity rights are separate from all of the above.
[ ] Identify the grading service whose holder, label, and marks sit on top of the object.
[ ] Ask which layer permits what, since a licence to print a card does not permit a poster, and a licence for a set does not cover a reissue.
[ ] Get the licence text rather than a summary, since the field-of-use limits are where the answer lives and the summary never contains them.
[ ] Check territorial scope, since a licence limited to one market does not travel with the internet listing.
[ ] Check the term and whether sell-off rights exist, since inventory outlives licences.
[ ] [Gate] The stack is mapped before anything new is manufactured.

Phase 6. Allocate consignment and auction risk honestly

[ ] Take an express title warranty from the consignor with an indemnity, and understand its practical value.
[ ] Take a warranty of authenticity to the extent the consignor can give one, and record what the consignor actually knows.
[ ] Set the authenticity guarantee period the house gives the buyer and state exactly what triggers it.
[ ] State who bears the cost of authentication and reauthentication, since disputes about the invoice are common.
[ ] Take a licence to photograph and publish, since a consignment agreement silent on imagery leaves the house's catalogue exposed.
[ ] State what happens to the images after the sale, since archive and price-database use continues indefinitely.
[ ] Address withdrawal, since an object withdrawn after cataloguing has already generated photography and marketing costs.
[ ] Address post-sale claims and the route by which a buyer's claim reaches the consignor.
[ ] Address the estate scenario in which the consignor's knowledge is second-hand because the collector has died.
[ ] [Gate] No consignment proceeds without an image licence and a stated warranty allocation.

Phase 7. Answer the publicity question by domicile

[ ] Identify the depicted person and their domicile at death, since that determines whether a post-mortem right exists at all.
[ ] Check whether the right is descendible in that state, and for how long.
[ ] Check whether the state requires registration of a post-mortem claim.
[ ] Distinguish resale from production, since selling a genuine signed item is different from manufacturing new merchandise bearing a likeness.
[ ] Watch the boundary between reporting and merchandising, since a magazine cover is not a poster.
[ ] Note that the analysis changes entirely for living subjects, where consent is available and should be obtained.
[ ] Note that a signature is both an autograph and, sometimes, a registered mark, so a facsimile signature on new merchandise is a trademark question as well.
[ ] [Gate] Publicity is answered before any custom production using a likeness.

Phase 8. Assess custom, altered, and upcycled items

[ ] Classify the item. A repainted figure, a card in a custom frame, a jersey remade into a bag, a piece of a stadium seat mounted on a plaque, and a hand-finished sneaker are different problems.
[ ] Ask whether anything new was manufactured, since 17 U.S.C. § 109 protects disposition of a lawfully made copy and not the making of a new one.
[ ] Ask whether the original object survives inside the new one, since the answer bears on whether the transaction is a resale at all.
[ ] Ask whether marks appear on the new item in a way that suggests the owner authorised or sponsored it, which is the trademark question under 15 U.S.C. § 1125.
[ ] Assess whether alteration is material, since a genuine article materially altered without consent is treated as not genuine for infringement purposes.
[ ] Look at the disclaimer honestly, since a small note on a listing rarely dispels confusion created by the product itself.
[ ] Look at the volume, since a one-off differs from a production line in practice even where the doctrine is the same.
[ ] Advise the client that the practice is common and often unlawful, and that the letter, when it comes, will be about this and not about the listing photographs.
[ ] [Gate] Production of custom items bearing third-party marks stops on notice pending analysis.

Phase 9. Match the claim to the counterfeit category

[ ] Reproduction sold as original. The claim is copyright reproduction under 17 U.S.C. § 106, trademark counterfeiting under 15 U.S.C. § 1114, and fraud, with counterfeit remedies under 15 U.S.C. § 1117 including treble damages and the statutory election.
[ ] Genuine item altered to appear better. A trimmed card, a restored comic sold as unrestored, a pressed page: the wrong is fraud and, if a certification or holder is involved, a trademark claim against the certifier's mark.
[ ] Counterfeit holder or label. This is trademark counterfeiting against the grading service and the strongest, cleanest claim in the category.
[ ] Forged signature. The wrong is fraud, and a trademark claim exists where the signature is registered.
[ ] Fabricated provenance. The wrong is fraud, and the evidence is documentary.
[ ] Unauthorised reproduction sold as a reproduction. This is straightforward copyright infringement with no fraud component, and is the easiest to prove and the least commercially damaging.
[ ] Do not plead them interchangeably, since the elements, the remedies, and the evidence differ, and a fraud dressed as infringement fails on damages.
[ ] Preserve the physical evidence and the chain of custody, since the object is the exhibit.
[ ] Consider seizure and border measures where a manufacturing operation is identified.
[ ] [Gate] The category is identified before the claim is drafted.

Phase 10. Route platform complaints correctly

[ ] Send copyright notices under 17 U.S.C. § 512 with all the statutory elements, and note that the safe harbour conditions are cumulative.
[ ] Send trademark and counterfeit complaints outside the safe harbour, on the platform's own programme terms, since 17 U.S.C. § 512 does not cover trademark at all.
[ ] Frame contributory claims on knowledge and control, per Inwood Laboratories v. Ives Laboratories.
[ ] Recognise that most complaints are misdescription, which is neither copyright nor trademark but a consumer and contract matter for the platform's own dispute process.
[ ] Push for seller verification, since the leverage is identity rather than listing removal.
[ ] Track repeat sellers across accounts, since the pattern is what makes a knowledge argument.
[ ] Advise a platform that authentication is a representation, and that the terms of the programme should state what it covers, what it does not, and what the remedy is.
[ ] [Gate] No counterfeit complaint is filed as a copyright notice.

Phase 11. Protect what the seller owns

[ ] Register the name, since a twenty-year unregistered dealer name is a common law right that stops at its trading area and does not travel with an online storefront.
[ ] Register the photography in periodic batches, since it is the most-copied asset and registration is the gate to statutory damages under 17 U.S.C. § 412.
[ ] Treat the price database as a trade secret under 18 U.S.C. § 1839, with access controls, employee terms, and a written statement of what it contains.
[ ] Fix the shared drive, since a database everyone can read is not the subject of reasonable measures.
[ ] Take assignments from photographers and cataloguers, since a contractor owns their work absent a signed agreement under 17 U.S.C. § 201.
[ ] Check the platform terms for the licence granted in uploaded images, and price the consequence.
[ ] Treat the customer list as a trade secret and confirm it has been handled as one.
[ ] Value the archive, since decades of catalogues and condition reports are provenance evidence for objects the business no longer owns.
[ ] Plan succession, since the expertise is personal, the archive is institutional, and the two are usually confused.
[ ] [Gate] The business does not describe itself as protected until the registrations exist.

The inventory as four documents

[ ] The title file. Chain, gaps, registry searches with dates, consignor answers, and export position, per object above a value threshold.
[ ] The rights file. Who owns the underlying work, who owns the photograph, whose likeness appears, what the grading service asserts, and what any licence permits.
[ ] The condition and grading file. Grades, submission history, regrades, the terms in force at the time, and the guarantee position.
[ ] The commercial file. Acquisition cost, consignment terms, warranties given and received, insurance, and the images used.
[ ] Keep them per object, not per transaction, since objects outlive transactions and the next sale asks the same questions.
[ ] [Gate] A collection is not insured, sold, or bequeathed on a spreadsheet of prices alone.

The letter that complains about two things at once

A licensing department's letter in this market almost always bundles two grievances, and treating them as one is the most common tactical error.

[ ] Separate the listing imagery complaint from the custom production complaint, since they have different answers and bundling them concedes the good one to save the bad one.
[ ] Answer the imagery complaint on the merits, since a resale listing photograph of a genuine object in the seller's possession, shot to show condition, is the strongest fair use position in the category and is supported by 17 U.S.C. § 109 as the reason the sale itself is lawful.
[ ] Do not answer the custom production complaint the same way, since new manufacture bearing third-party marks is not resale, is not exhausted, and is not saved by a documentary purpose.
[ ] Concede the weak point early and in writing, since a client who stops the practice on notice and says so has removed wilfulness from the case and preserved the credibility needed to defend the strong point.
[ ] Ask what the sender actually wants, since the objective is often a licence rather than a cessation and the letter is an opening position in a commercial negotiation.
[ ] Price the licence against the margin, since a custom side line that cannot bear a royalty was never a business.
[ ] Check the sender's rights, since licensing departments send letters about properties they do not own and about uses their own licences do not reach.
[ ] Diary the response, since silence invites escalation and a prompt, narrow, factual reply is the cheapest defence available.

Where positions in this market usually fail

[ ] Diligence aimed at the wrong question. Hours spent on authenticity and none on title, which is the risk that voids the transaction entirely.
[ ] The certificate treated as a warranty. A disclaimed opinion sold, resold, and relied on as a guarantee of genuineness.
[ ] The fair use position stretched. A sound listing-photograph analysis extended to posters, prints, and calendars, which are different uses.
[ ] The licensing stack collapsed into one layer. A licence from the property owner treated as consent from the photographer, the manufacturer, and the depicted person.
[ ] The consignment agreement silent on images. A house that photographs, catalogues, archives, and publishes without a licence to do any of it.
[ ] Publicity answered by the wrong state. The law of the seller's state applied instead of the law of the subject's domicile at death.
[ ] Custom production treated as resale. The most common commercial practice in the market and the one with the weakest legal foundation.
[ ] Counterfeit complaints filed as copyright notices. A routing error that produces a rejection and a delay rather than a removal.
[ ] The seller's own assets unprotected. An unregistered name, unregistered photography, and a trade secret on an open drive.
[ ] No inventory. A collection recorded as a list of prices, which is neither an insurance schedule nor an estate document nor a diligence file.

A worked sequence

[ ] Object arrives. Consignor questioned in writing; chain recorded; registries searched; searches logged with date and parameters.
[ ] Title cleared or escalated. A gap in a period of known losses is escalated rather than absorbed.
[ ] Ownership stated to the client. Object yes; copyright no; resale yes; reproduction no; publicity someone else's.
[ ] Photography taken to show condition, filed with the object record, and added to the next registration batch.
[ ] Grading position checked. Terms read; guarantee scope and cap noted; buyer told it is an opinion.
[ ] Stack mapped before any catalogue essay, poster, or merchandising idea proceeds.
[ ] Consignment signed with title warranty, indemnity, authenticity allocation, image licence, and archive rights.
[ ] Publicity checked by subject domicile if a likeness will appear on anything new.
[ ] Listing published on a platform whose terms have been read for the image licence they take.
[ ] Complaint received and routed by category rather than by convenience.
[ ] File closed into the four-document inventory, per object, for the next owner.

Notes on running the phases in a real business

Phase 1 is the one clients resist. Title diligence produces no saleable output, delays a transaction, and occasionally kills one. It is also the only phase that addresses a risk capable of unwinding the deal entirely years later, against a buyer who did nothing wrong. The practical compromise is a value threshold: full diligence above it, consignor questionnaire and registry search below it, and no exceptions for objects that arrive with an appealing story. Stories are the most common feature of objects with title problems.

Phase 2 is the one clients misremember. A collector told once that buying the object does not buy the copyright will, six months later, ask whether the licensing programme should be run in-house. Put the position in writing, keep it short, and re-send it whenever a new use is proposed. The written statement also protects the adviser, because the question always returns in the form of a decision that has already been made.

Phase 3 is the one that gets stretched. The listing photograph analysis is strong; the calendar, the poster, the coffee-table book, and the merchandise line are not the same use. Give operations a rule that draws the line at the sale of the depicted object, and require a separate review for anything else. A rule with a bright line survives contact with a marketing department; a rule that requires the marketing department to run four factors does not.

Phase 4 is the one the market has agreed to misunderstand. Every participant knows the grade is an opinion. Every participant prices it as a fact. The adviser's job is not to correct the market but to ensure the client knows which side of the gap they are standing on, and to ensure that a client operating a grading business has not said one thing in its terms and another in its advertising.

Phase 5 is the one that takes the longest. Getting actual licence text rather than a summary is slow, and the field-of-use limits that matter are never in the summary. Start it early, and treat a client who cannot produce the licence as a client who does not have the rights.

Phases 6 and 7 are the ones that are cheapest to fix in advance. An image licence in a consignment agreement costs a sentence. A publicity check costs an hour. Both are expensive to fix afterwards, and neither is ever the reason a deal fails.

Phases 8 through 10 are the ones that arrive by letter. They are reactive by nature, and the quality of the response depends entirely on whether Phases 1 through 7 were done. A client who can produce a title file, an ownership statement, a licence map, and a signed consignment agreement is in a different negotiating position from one who can produce a spreadsheet of prices.

Phase 11 is the one that is always deferred. It generates no revenue and prevents no immediate loss, which is why a twenty-year business commonly has an unregistered name, unregistered photography, a trade secret on an open drive, and no assignment from the photographer. It is also the phase that determines what the business is worth when it is sold or inherited.

Category-specific notes

[ ] Trading cards. The densest licensing stack in the market: league, players' association, photographer, manufacturer, and grader all have positions in a single object. Trimming and pressing are the characteristic alterations; counterfeit holders are the characteristic counterfeit; population reports are the characteristic data asset. Custom "slabs" and reprint sets are the characteristic infringement.
[ ] Comics. Restoration disclosure is the central authenticity issue and is a fraud question rather than an infringement one. Cover art is separately owned and separately licensed. The publisher's licensing department is active and writes about reproduction of covers on merchandise.
[ ] Sports memorabilia. Game-used claims are provenance claims and turn on documentation, not on the object. Signatures raise both authentication and trademark questions. Team marks appear on almost everything, which makes custom production the recurring problem.
[ ] Coins and bullion. Grading is long-established, holders are heavily counterfeited, and the underlying object generally carries no copyright at all. Statutory restrictions on reproducing currency imagery are a separate regime and catch marketing material.
[ ] Stamps. Expertisation certificates function like grading opinions, with the same disclaimer structure. Postal administrations assert rights in designs more often than collectors expect.
[ ] Vintage toys and figures. Packaging is often the valuable element and is separately protected as artwork and trade dress. Repainting and customisation is a large cottage industry with a weak legal foundation. Reproduction packaging is sold both honestly and dishonestly.
[ ] Vinyl and physical media. Cover art, liner notes, and the recording are separate rights. Bootlegs raise a distinct set of claims. Listing photographs of covers are the ordinary Phase 3 question.
[ ] Fashion and sneakers. Custom finishing is the characteristic practice, marks are the characteristic complaint, and material alteration is the characteristic argument. Resale platforms with authentication programmes have taken on representations the earlier generation of platforms avoided.
[ ] Autographs. The forgery rate is high, third-party authentication is dominant, and the opinion is disclaimed. A registered signature mark converts some forgeries into trademark matters.
[ ] Digital collectibles. The rights conveyed are whatever the terms say, which in the first generation was usually very little. The lesson generalises: any certificate, registry, or authentication scheme is a private promise on terms its author wrote, and it is worth what the author's continued operation is worth.

The estate handover

[ ] Start from the object list, not the price list, since a valuation spreadsheet is not an inventory and the executor needs to know what each object is, where it came from, and what may lawfully be done with it.
[ ] Identify the objects whose value is provenance rather than form, since those are the ones whose documentation must travel with them or the value evaporates.
[ ] Locate the archive, since decades of catalogues, condition reports, and correspondence are the provenance evidence for objects sold long ago and are frequently discarded during a clearance.
[ ] Distinguish personal expertise from institutional assets, since a dealer's judgment is not transferable and the archive, the database, the name, and the photography are.
[ ] Confirm the trade secret position survives the transition, since a price database that becomes generally accessible during an estate administration has stopped being a secret.
[ ] Check the publicity position of the deceased if the business used their name, since a personal-name mark and a post-mortem right can both be in play.
[ ] Record which objects carry outstanding warranties, since an authenticity guarantee given by the deceased may still be open against the estate.
[ ] Record which objects are on consignment and not owned, since these are the ones most often sold in error during a clearance.
[ ] [Gate] No collection is distributed before the archive has been located and preserved.

[ ] Warn the beneficiaries about forced-sale timing, since a collection liquidated to meet a tax deadline realises materially less than one sold over two seasons, and the difference is usually larger than the tax.
[ ] Confirm the insurance schedule matches the inventory, since collections grow faster than schedules and the gap is discovered at the worst moment.
[ ] Decide what happens to the name, since a dealer name with goodwill is either sold with the business, retired, or licensed, and doing none of those quietly abandons it.

[ ] Ask whether any object was promised to anyone in conversation, since collectors make oral gifts constantly and the resulting disputes are bitter, expensive, and unprovable in either direction.

Key Authorities at a Glance

| Authority | Where it bites in this checklist | |---|---| | 17 U.S.C. § 202 | Phase 2 — the object is not the rights | | 17 U.S.C. § 109 | Phases 2, 8 — resale and display; not manufacture | | 17 U.S.C. § 106 | Phases 2, 3, 9 — reproduction is the exclusive right in play | | 17 U.S.C. § 107 | Phase 3 — the listing photograph analysis | | Warhol v. Goldsmith | Phase 3 — purpose comparison, not aesthetic difference | | Feist v. Rural Telephone | Phases 3, 4 — thin protection in record shots and fact compilations | | 17 U.S.C. § 412 | Phases 3, 11 — timely registration and statutory damages | | 17 U.S.C. § 201 | Phase 11 — contractor photography ownership | | 35 U.S.C. § 171 | Phase 4 — the holder as a design patent candidate | | 15 U.S.C. § 1114 | Phase 9 — counterfeit holders and labels | | 15 U.S.C. § 1117 | Phase 9 — counterfeit remedies and the statutory election | | 15 U.S.C. § 1125 | Phase 8 — custom items and sponsorship confusion | | Inwood v. Ives | Phase 10 — contributory liability on knowledge and control | | 17 U.S.C. § 512 | Phase 10 — copyright notices only | | 18 U.S.C. § 1839 | Phases 4, 11 — population data and price databases | | 15 U.S.C. § 1116 | Phase 9 — seizure in counterfeiting cases | | 15 U.S.C. § 1052 | Phase 11 — registrability of a dealer name | | 17 U.S.C. § 411 | Phases 3, 11 — registration before suit | | FRCP 26 | Phase 4 — the opinion file in discovery | | 16 CFR 260 | Phase 4 — substantiation principles applied to authenticity claims |

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