19.
Infringement of the Work.
Publisher agrees to use reasonable commercial efforts at its sole expense to enforce the copyright in the Work against online piracy, including, for instance, by using a service to locate infringing copies on the internet and to send takedown notices under Section 512 of the Copyright Act. Author will use reasonable efforts to notify Publisher if Author finds and identifies infringing copies on the internet. If the copyright of the Work is infringed in any manner, Publisher shall consult with Author about proceeding with legal action; and if the parties agree to proceed, the expenses and recoveries, if any, shall be shared equally. If the parties agree not to proceed jointly, then either party shall have the right to prosecute such action individually, and such party shall bear the expenses thereof, and any recoveries shall belong to such party. Each party will notify the other of any infringements coming to its attention.
Due to the overwhelming growth of internet piracy in the last few years, the Authors Guild believes that publishers should exercise vigilance to identify and purge pirate copies. Many publishers have contracts with services that scan the internet for pirate copies and send automatic takedown notices. Because publishers' facility for enforcing copyright depends on their financial resources, Section 19 of the Model Contract proposes a modest but effective baseline process for targeting piracy.
This clause further provides that if the author and publisher jointly bring an infringement action, the money recovered (after repayment of expenses) will be divided equally between them.