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  • 1.  Dual gift of copyright

    Posted 2 days ago

    Our college archives has held, on long term loan, a large number of photo negatives and prints from a deceased alum who was a prominent photographer. His two sons now wish to transfer full ownership of these items to the college, along with the copyrights. The items are being appraised and a Deed of Gift is being drafted that will itemize each piece. Two questions have arisen through this process:

    1) The sons wish to split the donation of items: do we need to split the inventory and draft two separate Deeds of Gift? Or is it acceptable to have one Deed of Gift which states some sort of division of the donation?

    2) While conversations about the transfer of copyright have only been in the early stages, I want to get ahead of things now and find out what, if anything, should be recorded in relation to this? I would think the gift-in-kind of items covers everything we'd need to record since a copyright doesn't necessarily hold a value, but just want to be sure I'm prepared.



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    Gabrielle Read-Hess
    Coe College
    greadhess@coe.edu
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  • 2.  RE: Dual gift of copyright

    Posted 2 days ago
    If the sons want to split the donation equally between them (each getting a tax deduction), a single deed signed by both, detailing how the assets are divided (by describing who is giving what), is sufficient. However, I believe they would then need two appraisals - one for each collection that each son is donating. The last thing you want is a single lump-sum appraisal where you have to determine the value to assign to each son.

    Regarding what to count for the copyright, CASE guidelines recommend $0.00. The copyright itself has no cash value (even if it comes with an appraisal), just like IP and patents. CASE advises recording donations of this kind with a nominal value, such as a dollar, as a placeholder. You can later adjust that amount based on the actual cash received.

    John

    John H. Taylor, Principal
    John H. Taylor Consulting, LLC
    2604 Sevier Street
    Durham, NC     27705

    919.816.5903 (cell/text)

    Serving the Advancement Community Since 1987