I’ve been recently reading about copyright law as applicable to libraries and archives. My interest in this was partially sparked by a recent patron request for original drafts of materials that may or may not have been published prior to 1923 (still researching on that point). Under the 1976 US Copyright Act,the “fair use”doctrine (section 107) and the exemption for libraries &archives (section 108),and assuming that we won’t turn up another copy of these materials (so far a safe bet),I feel fairly confident in making a copy of the materials for this visiting scholar. A glance at this copyright chart from Peter Hirtle at Cornell’s Copyright Information Center was useful in determining whether this document potentially stands in the public domain or not,and how long it might be until that day arrives (check it out!)–really quite useful.
This is a fairly cut-and-dry instance,but my recent poking around has uncovered some other potential “land mines”that should be addressed within our collections. Some of the resources that I’ve found to be useful:
The Law of Libraries and Archives by Bryan M. Carson
The Stanford Law School Fair Use Project
Mary Minow’s LibraryLaw blog
While I was perusing the last of those,I saw a post of interest–titled “Free the Founding Fathers,”it discusses NARA’s report to Congress on planning for digital access to the papers of John Adams,Benjamin Franklin,Alexander Hamilton,James Madison,Thomas Jefferson,and George Washington. The NARA report can be found on the NHPRC website (pdf here),and I encourage you to read Peter Hirtle’s take on the situation at the LibraryLaw blog here.
Other tangents of interest:the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CETA)/“Mickey Mouse”Protection Act,Eldred v. Ashcroft,Public Domain Enhancement Act(PDEA),Warner Bros. Entertainment and J.K.Rowling vs. RDR Books
A Fair(y) Use Tale:A short film by Eric Faden discusses copyright using clips from the work of a company who has lobbied hard for extended copyright terms.
well done,dude