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46
THE LAW OF MOTION PICTURES
tion and production of literary works are contracts for personal services.60 The creation of a literary work resembles that of a patentable invention;61 and since the co-owners of the copyright as of the patent are tenants in common, there is no partnership in the work, nor is there a joint venture.62
Of course, that relation may be modified by special contract,63 but any such contract would have to create
60 Mallory v. Mackay (1899), 92 Fed. (C. C. A.) 749; Blakely v. Sousa (1900), 197 Pa. St. 305; 47 Atl. 286. See also Section 14.
61 Henry v. Dick (1911), 224 U. S. at page 45; 32 Sup. Ct. 364; Scribner v. Strauss (1904), 130 Fed. (C. C.) 389.
62 De Wilt v. Elmira Nobles Co. (1876), 5 Hun, 459; aff’d 66 N. Y. 459. “These parties are not partners in the ownership of this patent. Beyond doubt they are tenants in common each owning the undivided half.”
Pitts v. Hall (1854), 3 Blatch. 201. “In the case of joint patentees, where no agreement of partnership exists, the relation of co-partners certainly does not result from their connection as joint patentees; and when one joint owner of a patent transfers his undivided interest to a stranger, the assignee does not become
the partner of his co-proprietor. In both cases the parties interested in the patent are simply joint owners or tenants in common of the rights and property secured by the patent.”
Robinson on Patents, Section 795.
“And it may be established as an accepted doctrine that whatever may be their relation to the monopoly such joint owners are not co-partners nor collective owners of the invention. . . .” And we find this rule enunciated in Lindley on Partnership (6th Ed.) at p. 36:
“Mutual rights of co-owners of a copyright have not been much discussed; but it has been decided that a license to represent a dramatic entertainment granted by one only of several co-owners of the copyright in it does not bind the other.”
63 Pitts v. Hall (1854), 3 Blatch.