Page:The copyright act, 1911, annotated.djvu/67

 ' • Valuable considera- tion."

��Rights. 55

The valuable consideration need not be in monoy. §5(1). Where the proprietors of a school procured certain photo- graphers to take photographs of the premises on the terms that they would only pay for such copies, if any, as they might afterwards approve of and select, it was held that the copyright in the photographs vested in them under the Fine Arts Copyright Act, 1862. The photographers, it was held, were employed for valuable consideration to take the photographs on behalf of the proprietors of the school. The valuable consideration consisted in the grant- ing to them of liberty to come upon the premises, and the consequent chance of selling copies {zj.

It will be observed that copyright passes immediately Actual pay- the work is executed in pursuance of the commission, and m^nt not a consequently payment of the artist, in the case of a money precedent, consideration, is not a condition precedent to the vest- ing of the copyright in the employer:

The proviso only operates to vest the copyright in the " Agreement absence of any agreement to the contrary. It will be contrary" observed that such agreement need not be in writing, or even expressed in words. If the proper inference of fact from all the circumstances of the employment is that the mutual intention of the parties was that the copyright should remain with the author, it ought to be so held. The proviso merely raises a presumption in favour of the view that the copyright passes to the employer, but that presumption may be rebutted by any evidence of an agree- ment to the contrary.

Proviso (b) applies to all classes of work. The con- Works exe- dition precedent to the passing of the copyright there- (^^^^^ '^y under is the relationship of nraster and servant, or master under con- and apprentice. A contract of service imports the right tract of of control and supervision by the master over the servant service. during the execution of the work. Where such control and supei'vision exists, the work is done under a contract of service, notwithstanding that it is paid by results, that is to say, that the work is piece-work. Reporters, leader writers, editors and others on the permanent staff of a newspaper do their work under a contract of service. So, as a rule, do canvassers and other persons employed to do such work as the compiling of directories, year books, and the like.

(z) Stncl-cnianu v. Patnii. [1906] 1 Ch. 774.

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