bizarre question

[kaigou]

but if anyone knows the answer, it'd be one of you. I'm sure of it.

There was a recent ruling in the US, I thought, as regards translations -- that the translator owns copyright. Is this true, and wouldn't that mean that if your translation is stolen and posted without your permission, you have essentially a kind of copyright holder's right to have it removed?

Just wondering how far that ruling (if I'm remembering it right) would carry.

Comments

[kaigou]

Yep, recent -- well, maybe the past six months or so? All I can recall was something about Brazilian (either a translation out of, or into, I think), and the translator was paid like a ridiculously low amount. Then the publication went into overload reprints, and the translator argued that since he held the copyright, the publishing company was stiffing him. Part of the issue, I think, had to do with what's work-for-hire and whether translations can be work-for-hire, but I'm not positive about that, only that the eventual end was that the translator did hold copyright, and had to be reimbursed like anyone else with copyright. (And I could be totally off-base, but I think it revolved around a bestseller translation, like LotR or Harry Potter.) But if you happen to come across anything, that'd be awesome. My google fu is totally falling down on the job.

[maire]

Whether a translation counts as work for hire really depends on the contract between the translator and the hirer at the time.

(The licences that the original author signed have nothing to do with the translation's ownership, although if the translator doesn't have the right to publish a translation, then they can't do anything with their work.)

[aldanise]

I am pointlessly procrastinating months later, but I think this is what you're looking for. The recent decision wasn't about translators' rights, per se, but about the legality of putting things in the public domain back under copyright.