[Ecommerce] US Copyright Office: Fixing one orphan work problem and creating a new one?

[Manon Ress]

http://offzroad.blogspot.com/

Matt Skelton (US Copyright Office) at a conference in DC on Friday
describing the process for their work on orphan works that resulted
in a "Report on Orphan works" with recommended staturory languages
(see http://www.copyright.gov/orphan/):

"There was a request by Hatch and Leahy last year... and then more
support from Congress. Then, in January, a notice of inquiry and
public comments and then reply comments. 720 initial comments and 140
reply comments. And then we had several roundtables in Washington
DC... and in California with 43 participants. ... in Berkeley 21
participants. And then we had informal meetings...about 17 meetings
with 24 organization. And now the January report"

Everyone is pretty happy the Copyright office is trying to solve the
orphan works problem (you know how frustrating it is when you want to
get permission to use a work but you cannot find the owner...who
might be dead or just not responsive). Almost everyone, some trade
associations, like media photographers, do not think it is in the
interest of their members who'd rather not compete with "whatever" is
available on the internet (sometimes even for free!).

But it looks as if the Copyright Office is quite satisfied about
their proposed solution and recommendations: orphan works problem is
real, it is elusive to quantify and describe, some situations may be
adressed by existing law but many are not...so, new legislation is
necessary (specific language is in the report). To summarize, they
recommend a reasonnable treshold requirements for diligent search
(before use) and limitation of remedies if the user can prove he
conducted a reasonnable search.

One can only wish that 1 ) they would follow the same process of
various public consultations regarding their work on creating new
rights for webcasters (see WIPO proposed treaty that would include
webcasting) and that 2) they address (before it's too late?)...the
orphan works problems that will certainly come up with creating a new
layer of rights on the internet. It would not make sense to fix the
orphan (copyright) work problem while creating a new orphan (webcast)
work problem at the same time. Unless some people are just enjoying
the process?

************************************************
Manon Anne Ress
manon.ress@cptech.org,
www.cptech.org

Consumer Project on Technology
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