Caught in a Copyright Timebomb: “Friday the 13th: The Game”
By: Ian Lipka
On May 26th, 2017, Friday the 13th: The Game released on both PC and console platforms. Players young and old ventured into the hazy horror that was Camp Crystal Lake, the infamous fictional summer camp from the 1980 film Friday the 13th. Brandishing the horrific terror of Jason Voorhees, players hunted one another through cabins and trees in thrilling fashion. But to the dismay of many avid partakers, the game would not receive any content updates after September of 2018. That same month, a federal district court would declare that Victor Miller, the screenplay writer of the original film, had accumulated a termination of rights claim as the original author of the work under the Copyright Act of 1976.[1] The court ruled that Victor Miller was not a “work for hire” when he wrote the screenplay for Friday the 13th and therefore was permitted to terminate his delegation of copyrights under 17 U.S.C. § 203.[2]