AEC = Architecture, Engineering, Construction
AIA = American Institute of Architects
Architectural services are...well services, not products. It's not as if there is a copyright on a phone conversation or a drive to the project site, and it is not as if those things are incorporated into any artifact, e.g. a sketch for a new shed.Assigning copyright in the US AEC industry carries additional complexity since architects and many of their consultants are licensed professionals and therefore are professionally liable for their designs. Part of the responsibility that comes with licensure is maintaining professional control of the design. By assigning copyright the architect and their consultants might maintain liability for its execution in contexts of which they are unaware, e.g. where soil conditions or sesmic loads differ from those on the site for which the building was designed. Legally architects cannot reassign their professional responsibility...that's what makes it professional. An analogy in software might be Software as Service in particular and licensing in general. The Software industry already has retention of copyright as the common mode of agreement. Going further, full assignment of copyright to the client just turns the problem around. If I assign the copyright to the design to a client, I need to obtain a license back in order to use similar parts and pieces in other projects, e.g. a detail for a door jamb or the profile and reinforcing of a footing or more directly the "drawings" that show them. Likewise a software engineer needs to be able to reuse foreach foo in bar without consulting a lawyer. While there are exceptions, it's simply easier to negotiate a useful set of licenses without transfer of copyright than to include that in the negotiation. Functionally, if the client can do anything with the work except reassign copyright the vast majority of cases are well served. The price of full assignment? The question correlates to a Kremlin on May Day with Brezhnev in the reviewing stand parade of red flags. Screening clients is critical. |