Occasionally, you will see “legalese” boilerplate that includes a statement that the contract, or a clause of the contract, applies “in perpetuity throughout the universe”, or “throughout the universe, in perpetuity”, or something substantially similiar. Does this have a specific legal meaning that goes beyond “always and everywhere”, or “with no exceptions”, or simply not qualifying the original statement with a limiting clause like “in New York up till 2050.”? Is there any legal theory that would say that a contract that is signed that is not specifically stated to be valid “in perpetuity throughout the universe” is void on the Moon, or in deep space?
Defendant’s attorney: “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I leave you with this. Regardless of whether or not you feel the defendant signed a contract for consideration in which he promised to refrain from whirlygigging, and then whirlygigged, remember that the contract stated that the defendant stated that the defendant ‘did hereby promise to refrain from whirlygigging’ period, and did NOT state that the promise applied in perpetuity throughout the universe. Since the witnesses to the alleged post-contractual whirlygigging all testified that said whirlygigging occured in Jovian orbit, you should find for the defendant since the aforementioned contract was void beyond Earth’s atmosphere since it did not state that it was valid throughout the universe.”
“You represent and warrant that all materials included in your submission shall be owned by you or lawfully licensed to you for the purposes intended under this agreement and that no claim shall be made against IMTF relating to same by any person or entity now and in perpetuity throughout the Universe.”
I chuckled when I saw that phrase in a contract I recently received. I, too, wondered if it meant extra-terrestrial abodes.
I suppose one could claim, for example, that a satellite in earth orbit is not really within any one country and therefore not subject to the laws of those countries. Beaming data (say, copyrighted material) to that satellite could remove it from earthly bounds, legally speaking. Probably not a very defensible position, but the “throughout the universe” clause immediately nullifies it.
I don’t think there’s any special legal meaning other than being a very clear way to specify that there are no limits. In the world of intellectual property, geographical and time limitations are a big deal - just look at the regions built into DVD technology, or the fact that iTunes has a different selection of songs for each country.
As for other planets… it’s not impossible that it will be relevant in the near future. The founder of SpaceX (a for-profit company even) thinks he’ll make it to Mars in the 2020’s. Now, I think he’s full of it regarding 2020. but I think we’ll get there eventually. Disney is still fighting to protect IP that’s 80 years old (Mickey Mouse). With that time frame in mind, it’s certainly plausible that today’s contracts need to consider interplanetary licensing.
Some think it’s just a lazy way to write a contract without having to explicitly list all the possibilities. Others think it’s a prudent way to cover all future possibilities - Mars rights or whatever.
I have to wonder if it has any legal validity. Does any legal body on Earth have jurisdiction over any extra-solar entities? As far as I know, the lizard people of Rigel VII have never signed the Berne Convention. So why should they be bound by our copyright law?
But you’ll still be sued in the jurisdiction where you accepted the contract. So if the guys on Rigel VII are re-broadcasting copyrighted games of the NFL, they’ll still be sued in the good old United States.
But Rigellian law clearly states that all copyrights end at a distance of one light-year from their point of broadcast. Any transmissions received past that point are legally considered a natural resource that may be copied and resold by anyone. So the NFL surrendered its copyright by broadcasting its transmissions over a medium that sent its signals past that range. If they had wanted to retain their copyright they should have broadcast using short-range transmissions like any Rigellian copyright holder would. This was all clearly established by the Glorgg Accord.