EDUCAUSE | Copyright

RIAA, MPAA resume lobbying push to expand copyright law

ckeller — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 11:51:57 -0500

The Recording Industry Association of America and the Motion Picture Association of America are lobbying for a pair of bills that enjoy bipartisan support. Both are designed to give the federal government more power to police copyright violations, and both are likely to run into opposition from political foes of the RIAA and MPAA.

OCLC's Copyright Evidence Registry makes its debut

ckeller — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 10:36:13 -0500

The Copyright Evidence Registry [OCLC] was recently launched. The effort promises a big step forward for those struggling to come up with ways to identify works for whom owners cannot be identified or located -- orphan works. The effort also enables those with information about the owner of a work to contribute that as well.

Web 2.0 and the perilous seas of content access

catherine — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 06:58:31 -0500

This post is not about "naming and shaming" innovative web content providers, who are making great strides in bringing interesting multimedia content to end-users.

It's just a small story to remind us that web 2.0 is not always as "accessible" as we think. For educators, perhaps it's a yet another reason to prefer open content. And it reminds us that commercial constraints and IP issues continue to prevent the web from being as "global" a resource as the educational community would like.

This is how I received the error message: browsing Jason Kottke's popular website kottke.org (now described as "a weblog about the liberal arts 2.0") , I noticed that, in a post about the film Koyaanisqatsi, Jason had linked to the popular video site hulu.com. But I couldn't actually see the video content - all I got was the above message.

Typing the hulu.com URL into my browser address field and hitting 'enter' brings up the following:

"Hulu is committed to making its content available worldwide. To do so, we must work through a number of legal and business issues, including obtaining international streaming rights. Know that we are working to make this happen and will continue to do so. Given the international background of the Hulu team, we have both a professional and personal interest in bringing Hulu to a global audience."

"We have both a professional and personal interest" -- I'm sure they do. Good luck to hulu.com.

In the meantime, I'll continue to recommend VideoLectures, Easy YouTube, and TeacherTube. For video search, beyond the Googleplex, BlinkX continues to expand its functionality and now offers an education content search option. Yovisto (formerly known as OSOTIS) continues to expand, and has an English-language-only video search option.

Secrecy claims on copyright treaty

ckeller — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 12:13:46 -0500

The Bush administration's plans for a copyright treaty, dubbed "Hollywood's Christmas list" by privacy advocates, may be disrupted as protests over "secret negotiations" emerge in participating nations, including Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

Copyright protection and the new stakeholders in online distance education: The Play’s the Thing

ckeller — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 14:33:46 -0500

This paper analyses the university as an Internet intermediary in the current climate of online distance education, classifies the stakeholders associated with the university in Web course management, and explores the need for an “Instructional Design Copyright Law”. The situation is likened to a theatrical production, with front-of-house preparations, backstage operations, and tragic characters.

Copyright Renewal, Copyright Restoration, and the Difficulty of Determining Copyright Status

ckeller — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 15:46:21 -0500

It has long been assumed that most of the works published from 1923 to 1964 in the US are currently in the public domain. Both non-profit and commercial digital libraries have dreamed of making this material available. Most programs have recognized as well that the restoration of US copyright in foreign works in 1996 has made it impossible for them to offer to the public the full text of most foreign works. What has been overlooked up to now is the difficulty that copyright restoration has created for anyone trying to determine if a work published in the United States is still protected by copyright. This paper discusses the impact that copyright restoration of foreign works has had on US copyright status investigations, and offers some new steps that users must follow in order to investigate the copyright status in the US of any work. It argues that copyright restoration has made it almost impossible to determine with certainty whether a book published in the United States after 1922 and before 1964 is in the public domain. Digital libraries that wish to offer books from this period do so at some risk.

ASPP's Best Practices for Locating Copyright Owners Of Photographic and Visual Art

ckeller — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 09:57:34 -0500

The American Society of Picture Professionals (ASPP) recommendations to tracking down copyright ownership for works primarily of US authors.

EDUCAUSE Now - Show #5 - P2P Update & Data-Rich Blogging

gbayne — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 13:13:19 -0500

EDUCAUSE Now is a monthly podcast, focusing on the intelligent use of information technology in higher education. Each episode features a variety of stories, interviews, and views that relate to IT in higher education. Let us know what you would like to hear at podcast@educause.edu.

Subscribe to EDUCAUSE NOW RSS feed

This episode of EDUCAUSE Now features:

P2P Update: New Business Models, Old Ways of Thinking
(01:22–10:52)
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is a nonprofit organization that fights for your rights in the digital realm. We interview EFF's staff attorney, Corynne McSherry, to hear the latest updates in the file-sharing debate and learn some new ways of thinking about the issue.
A Commentary from EDUCAUSE President Diana Oblinger
(10:52–14:16)
Diana contemplates what we mean by “communication” in a tech-savvy world.
Data-Rich Student Blogging: Reflection and Ownership in Learning
(14:53–21:43)
Biology professor Stephen Gallik noticed that more of his students’ time in the lab was spent on clerical tasks and record keeping than on reflection and learning. He collaborated with instructional technologists Jim Groom and Andrew Rush to design a flash application that saves time and publishes full lab results to a student’s own blog. A screencast demonstration of this application is also available.

Music for EDUCAUSE Now:

"Groove IT" by Denis Kitchen
“Electric Guitar 005” by Plastic Soul Band
“Rebirth” by Steven Host
"Butterfly Disease" by Undadogg
"Sunsand" by Sebastian6

5 Things You Should Read about Copyright and Sharing Instructional Materials

ckeller — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 11:01:17 -0500

This ACRL publication serves to instruct and educate readers about topics relevant to library instruction, which are either timely or underdiscussed. The publication's emphasis is on current information packaged in a recognizable, consistent, readable way. It is intended to be a user-friendly entry into reading and keeping up with library instruction research and practice.

Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Online Video

ckeller — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 10:36:42 -0500

This document is a code of best practices that helps creators, online providers, copyright holders, and others interested in the making of online video interpret the copyright doctrine of fair use. Fair use is the right to use copyrighted material without permission or payment under some circumstances.

In Lawsuit, University Asserts That Downloading Copyrighted Texts Is Fair Use

ckeller — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 12:05:17 -0500

"In a closely watched copyright-infringement lawsuit, Georgia State University fired back this week at its accusers, three academic publishers that say the institution invites students to illegally download and print readings from thousands of works. The university asserts that its online distribution of course material is permitted under copyright law's fair-use exemption. "

Open Doors and Open Minds: What Faculty Authors Can Do to Ensure Open Access to Their Work Through Their Institution

ckeller — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 16:29:28 -0500

Recently, on February 12, 2008, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) at Harvard University took a landmark step. The faculty voted to adopt a policy requiring that faculty authors send an electronic copy of their scholarly articles to the university’s digital repository and that faculty authors automatically grant copyright permission to the university to archive and to distribute these articles unless a faculty member has waived the policy for a particular article. Essentially, the faculty voted to make open access to the results of their published journal articles the default policy for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences of Harvard University.

Inspired by the example set by the Harvard faculty, this White Paper is addressed to the faculty and administrators of academic institutions who support equitable access to scholarly research and knowledge, and who believe that the institution can play an important role as steward of the scholarly literature produced by its faculty. This paper discusses both the motivation and the process for establishing a binding institutional policy that automatically grants a copyright license from each faculty member to permit deposit of his or her peer-reviewed scholarly articles in institutional repositories, from which the works become available for others to read and cite.

Collaborative Social Networking: Copyright Nightmare, Dream, or Reality?

drupal — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 10:04:16 -0500

The collaborative nature of sharing media in social networks can present varied and challenging copyright issues. The knowledgeable application of copyright laws, policies, and practices are keys in determining if the use of your creative works by others and vice versa will be a nightmare, dream, or reality.

Section 108 Copyright Study Group's Report Recently Released

agould — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 14:19:22 -0500

The Section 108 Copyright Study Group (www.section108.gov), which was assembled to study and look for potential changes to copyright law, released its report on March 31. Established under the watch of the Library of Congress, this group of independent experts was charged with finding areas in copyright law that might need changes in order to better balance the positions of rights holders and "cultural memory organizations such as libraries and archives in the digital world."

The group has worked on this issue for nearly three years. Among their recommendations, they conclude:

Museums should be included for Section 108 eligibility, since they perform many of the same functions as libraries and archives.
A new exception should be added to Section 108 to permit certain qualified libraries and archives to make preservation copies of at-risk published works prior to damage or loss.
Libraries and archives should be permitted to make a limited number of copies to create and maintain a single replacement or preservation copy. This would allow libraries to more securely preserve digital materials.

For more information, please see their full report at:http://www.section108.gov/docs/Sec108StudyGroupReport.pdf.

Winning Hearts and Minds in War on Plagiarism

ckeller — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 10:34:22 -0500

To many writing instructors, going nuclear (expulsion threats) or high tech (detection software) have failed to stop cheating. So they aim for small victories, through new approaches to teaching about academic integrity.

Don't Download This Panel

drupal — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 12:00:14 -0500

The attention of—and on—higher education has been focused on defensive measures to curb illegal file sharing. But this is occurring in the context of a much larger national debate about the appropriate role of copyright and intellectual property in cyberspace. Simultaneously, myriad new business models and delivery options for online digital entertainment are being tested. Ê What are institutions of higher education doing to curb illegal file sharing? What are the issues in the larger copyright debate? And what is the vision of the entertainment industry for offering digital entertainment online? A panel of distinguished experts in the field will discuss these and other pertinent issues in the peer-to-peer file sharing debate.

Full Report of the Section 108 Study Group

ckeller — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 13:19:08 -0500

The Section 108 Study Group is a select committee of copyright experts charged with updating for the digital world the Copyright Act's balance between the rights of creators and copyright owners and the needs of libraries and archives. The Study Group was convened as an independent group by the National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation program of the Library of Congress and by the U.S. Copyright Office. The recommendations, conclusions, and other outcomes of the Study Group's Report are its own and do not reflect the opinions of the Library of Congress or the U.S. Copyright Office.

EDUCAUSE Live! Podcast: Update on Key U.S. Copyright Developments

gbayne — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 17:57:02 -0500

In this EDUCAUSE Live! podcast, join host, Steve Worona, for the topic "Update on Key U.S. Copyright Developments". Steve's guest is James G. Neal, Vice President for Information Services and University Librarian at Columbia University .

Copyright continues to be a core interest of the higher education and academic library communities. This briefing focuses on eight critical legislative and legal arenas where the United States will be working on copyright: orphan works, digital fair use, broadcast flag, Section 1201 anti-circumvention rulemaking, electronic reserves, peer-to-peer file sharing, open access to government-funded research, and the report of the Section 108 Study Group on exceptions and limitations for libraries and archives. The work of the study group is highlighted, including its primary findings and recommendations. In addition, two important recent studies are described and their importance for libraries are cited. The advocacy and educational roles and responsibilities of librarians on copyright also is outlined.

Copyright in OpenCourseWare

drupal — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 10:14:59 -0500

When MIT OpenCourseWare began, intellectual property was expected to be one of its biggest challenges. Here we will share our experiences in developing systems and strategies that have changed dealing with third-party content in an open publication from a major concern to a routine part of our publication process.

Get Me Out of the Middle!

elilly — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 14:29:13 -0600

"File sharing serves as a tuning fork for an entirely new orchestra of digital communication, interaction, and social expectation. We in higher education must provide a clear, calm, ringing voice in defining
the terms of the new world when we believe our goals and values are important not only to us but to society."

Update on Key U.S. Copyright Developments

ckeller — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 11:40:56 -0600

Copyright continues to be a core interest of the higher education and academic library communities. This briefing will focus on eight critical legislative and legal arenas where the United States will be working on copyright: orphan works, digital fair use, broadcast flag, Section 1201 anti-circumvention rulemaking, electronic reserves, peer-to-peer file sharing, open access to government-funded research, and the report of the Section 108 Study Group on exceptions and limitations for libraries and archives. The work of the study group will be highlighted, including its primary findings and recommendations. In addition, two important recent studies will be described and their importance for libraries will be cited. The advocacy and educational roles and responsibilities of librarians on copyright also will be outlined.

Open Access in 2007

elilly — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 12:50:38 -0600

Peter Suber shares his annual review of the open access movement. The article highlights 15 categories of open access activity in 2007.

Copyright Fair Use and the Economy

ckeller — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 09:11:26 -0600

The copyright legislative process in Washington traditionally focuses on increasing the protection provided to copyrights, based on the assumption that this will strengthen the economy. Recent research, however, indicates that exceptions to copyright protection also promote innovation and are a major catalyst of U.S. economic growth. Specific exceptions to copyright protection under U.S. and international law, generally classified under the broad heading of fair use, are vital to many industries and stimulate growth across the economy. In fact, business enterprises that benefit from fair use generate substantial revenue, employ millions of workers, and, in 2006, represented one-sixth of total U.S. gross domestic product. This economic research suggests that future copyright legislation needs to account for these important limitations if the policy-making process is to stimulate growth.

Tune In Jan. 23 for a Free Web Seminar on Evaluating the RIAA’s Legal Threats to Online Activity

pkurkowski — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 17:11:33 -0600

The recording industry’s complaints against alleged music downloaders are just the tip of the iceberg in legal threats against online activity. In the five years of the Chilling Effects Clearinghouse, we have seen thousands of legal threats, with claims including trademark infringement, defamation, and copyright infringement. This seminar will discuss some of the range of complaints, both unwarranted and justified, and describe ChillingEffects.org’s resources for those trying to evaluate legal threats. In some cases, the web’s sunlight can help to melt meritless threats.

In this free January 23 EDUCAUSE LIVE! seminar, Legal Threats, Chilling Effects, and Warming the Air, presenter Wendy Seltzer, Fellow, Berkman Center for Internet & Society, and Visiting Professor, Northeastern University School of Law, will discuss these threats and how to evaluate them.

Those unable to attend may wish to visit the archives after the event or browse related EDUCAUSE resources on Copyright Infringement, P2P or File Sharing, Piracy, and Patents.

Recut, Reframe, Recycle: Quoting Copyrighted Material in User-Generated Video

ckeller — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 14:14:28 -0600

As online video burgeons, so do questions about what kinds of uses of copyrighted works are legal online. Inevitably, those questions will be settled at least as much by practice and private negotiation as by legal action. Recent discussions of filtering and monitoring practices for platform providers show the importance of identifying lawful uses, while meeting industry concern to limit unauthorized use of copyrighted material. This study showcases user practices in use of copyrighted works within their own online videos at the dawn of this process. It identifies nine common kinds of re-appropriation practices, including satire and parody, criticism, and video diaries. It shows that a substantial amount of user-generated video uses copyrighted material in ways that are eligible for fair use consideration, although no coordinated work has yet been done to understand such practices through the fair use lens.
Thus, a significant set of creative practices is potentially both legal and at risk of curtailment by currently discussed ways to control online piracy and theft of copyrighted works.

Fair Use in the U.S. Economy

ckeller — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 11:29:32 -0600

While policymakers pay much attention to copyrights, exceptions to copyright protection also promote innovation and are a major catalyst of U.S. economic growth. Specific exceptions to copyright protection under U.S. and international law, generally classified under the broad heading of Fair Use, are vital to any industries and stimulate growth across the economy. Companies benefiting from fair use generate substantial revenue, employ millions of workers, and, in 2006,represented one-sixth of total U.S. GDP.

Under guidelines published by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), economic activity associated with copyrights has been studied extensively. To date, however, the economic contribution of industries dependent on fair use has not been quantified. Thus, a primary objective of this study is to fill the gap and provide an initial assessment of the economic contribution generated by companies benefiting from fair use. Fair use is an important restriction to the rights conferred on original works by the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976: "The fair use of a copyrighted work ... is not an infringement of copyright." The fair use doctrine, and other limitations and exceptions, have grown in importance with the rise of the digital economy, as fair use permits a range of activities that are critical to many high technology businesses and are an important foundation of the Internet economy.

The beneficiaries of fair use encompass a broad range of companies, particularly those whose business activities involve the Internet, as well as consumers. The ubiquity of the Internet means that its benefits are widespread as well.

Educational Fair Use Today

ckeller — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 11:10:56 -0600

Three recent appellate decisions concerning fair use should give educators and librarians greater confidence and guidance for asserting this important privilege. In all three decisions, the courts permitted extensive copying and display in the commercial context because the uses involved repurposing and recontextualization. The reasoning of these opinions could have far-reaching implications in the educational environment.

What Can You Do? The Rest of the Copyright Story

drupal — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 13:39:00 -0600

The ARL's Know Your Copy Rights is a multifaceted campus copyright education initiative that accentuates the positive and emphasizes what you can do with copyrighted materials. This effort offers resources, including a unique brochure, specifically created for all campus constituencies with the assistance of nationally recognized copyright educators.

Image Collection Guidelines

ckeller — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 11:50:48 -0600

These are guidelines in the acquisition and use of images in non-profit educational visual resources collections, written by the Visual Resources Association.

Ending the Intellectual Property Frenzy

ckeller — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 10:05:03 -0600

New president of Rochester Institute of Technology proposes alternate way for academe to support business and the economy — and it involves admitting that your institution won’t have a big windfall.

Developing a Campus Copyright Education Program

drupal — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 15:16:29 -0600

Brigham Young University's Copyright Licensing Office is dedicated to promoting copyright education, securing permissions, and increasing legal compliance. This session will cover several tools developed to accomplish these goals, including a university copyright policy, an online tutorial, a resource manual for faculty, a helpful Web site, and databases to process permissions requests.

The Cost of Copyright Confusion for Media Literacy

ckeller — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 13:44:34 -0600

The fundamental goals of media literacy education -- to cultivate critical thinking about media and its role in culture and society and to strengthen creative communication skills -- are compromised by unnecessary copyright restrictions and lack of understanding about copyright law, as interviews with dozens of teachers and makers of media literacy curriculum materials showed.
In K-12, higher education, and after-school programs and workshops, teachers face conflicting information about their rights, and their students' rights, to quote copyrighted material. They also confront complex, restrictive copyright policies in their own institutions. As a result, teachers use less effective teaching techniques, teach and transmit erroneous copyright information, fail to share innovative instructional approaches, and do not take advantage of new digital platforms.
This is not only unfortunate but unnecessary, since copyright law permits a wide range of uses of copyrighted material without permission or payment. Educational exemptions sit within a far broader landscape of fair use. However, educators today have no shared understanding of what constitutes acceptable fair use practices.
Media literacy educators can address this problem with the same techniques they use in their work: increasing shared knowledge. Like other creative communities, such as documentary filmmakers, media literacy educators from K-12 to university level can articulate their own shared understandings of appropriate fair use in a code of practice. This code can educate not only themselves and their colleagues, but their students and administrators. Finally, their code can guide and instruct other educators, in formal and informal settings, who use copyrighted material in their teaching for a wide range of educational purposes and goals.

When It’s OK to Copy

ckeller — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 09:37:31 -0600

"There are few circumstances in which it’s legal to copy a DVD and screen it in its entirety to an audience without paying royalties. One of them is in the classroom."

The Society for Cinema and Media Studies’ Statement of Best Practices for Fair Use in Teaching for Film and Media Educators

ckeller — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 09:34:24 -0600

The Society for Cinema and Media Studies ("SCMS") has created this Statement of Best Practices
for its membership to clarify some of the issues concerning the permissible use of media for teaching.

JSTOR Amicus Brief

ckeller — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 12:41:46 -0600

EDUCAUSE joined a broad coalition in filing an amicus, or friend of the court, brief on behalf of the National Geographic Society which seeks permission to reproduce a print collective work in electronic format. At issue is ensuring the availability, preservation and dissemination of prior research which is essential for scholarly advancement. Oral arguments are expected to take place in the Eleventh Circuit Court during the week of February 25th, 2008, with a decision rendered at some point thereafter.

Students for Free Culture

ckeller — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 10:29:58 -0500

FreeCulture.org is an international chapter-based student organization that promotes the public interest in intellectual property and information & communications technology policy.

Sharing Visual Arts Images for Educational Use: Finding a New Angle of Repose

ckeller — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 12:04:20 -0500

Educational institutions should be actively rethinking how they are accessing and using copyrighted visual arts images, and they should be exploring an approach that seeks to address copyright owners’ interests, as well as users’ needs, in an environment that encourages increased, shared access to these images for teaching and study.

Righting the Copyright Balance

ckeller — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 17:20:25 -0500

Can the music go on by offering fans better ways to get music, while guaranteeing payment for its creators? Where have copyright law and its enforcers gone wrong, and what can students, music fans, and co-creators do to put the law back on track?

Protecting the University from Copyright Bullies

ckeller — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 16:56:47 -0500

How can the university foster intellectual exploration and creativity, protect students' privacy, and educate responsible citizens of the networked world? Is it possible to support balanced copyright law and enforcement, without responding to every entertainment company's demands for internet filtering and "pre-litigation notices"?

Faculty Attitudes and Behaviors Regarding Scholarly Communication:Survey Findings from the University of California

ckeller — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 16:37:08 -0500

This paper reports the results of over 1,100 responses to a late 2006 survey of UC faculty attitudes and behavior with regard to several key issues in scholarly publishing and scholarly communication. The report is timed to inform Universitywide discussions - many of them prompted by a series of faculty white papers - about strategic responses to challenges and opportunities in the evolution of scholarly publishing and communication. The survey also provides important insight into how the University's eScholarship publishing services (including those offered in partnership with the UC Press) can meet faculty needs.

Annual Copyright License—A New Tool for Permissions

ckeller — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:33:37 -0500

Colleges and universities routinely struggle to address their copyright licensing needs campus-wide. How do faculty, library, bookstore staff, and others on campus effectively assess and secure the rights to copy material for coursepacks, classroom handouts, reserves, course Web pages, e-mail, and more? Are instructors getting permission to post published content on course management systems and electronic reserves when fair use may not apply?

To address these challenges, CCC recently unveiled the Annual Copyright License for Academic Institutions, a comprehensive campus-wide license that permits campus faculty, staff, and researchers to use and share copyrighted text-based content online and in print. In this presentation, we will learn how staff members at Middlebury College, the license's charter client, helped CCC shape this new licensing service and how they're using it to address their copyright needs. This session will also include a brief overview of the license itself.

Tune In October 2 for a Free Web Seminar on the Annual Copyright License, a New Tool for Copyrights on Campus

cluckett — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 11:54:56 -0500

To address these challenges, Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) recently unveiled the Annual Copyright License for Academic Institutions, a comprehensive campus-wide license that permits campus faculty, staff, and researchers to use and share copyrighted text-based content online and in print. In this free October 2 EDUCAUSE Live! Web seminar, Annual Copyright License—A New Tool for Permissions, Tim Bowen, Product Manager for academic licensing at CCC, and Jeff Rehbach, LIS Policy Advisor at Middlebury College, will discuss how staff members at Middlebury College, the license's charter client, helped CCC shape this new licensing service and how they're using it to address their copyright needs. This session will also include a brief overview of the license itself.

Those unable to attend may wish to visit the archives after the event or browse related EDUCAUSE resources on Licensing and Licensing Policies.

NACUA Fall 2007 Workshop: Law and Electrons -- Computers, Copyright, Telecommunications, Privacy, and Security on Campus

vvogel — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 11:37:34 -0500

Designed for college and university attorneys and administrators with responsibility for information technology, the NACUA Fall Workshop 2007 covers legal issues that arise at the intersection of computers and internet with legal obligations relating to privacy, security, and intellectual property. The program begins with a session covering recent developments in digital copyright and trademark law, and includes separate tracks on copyright and intellectual property issues as well as contracting and information technology law. Please join your colleagues November 7-9, 2007, in Washington, DC, for this opportunity for professional education, networking, and discussion.

This workshop is presented by NACUA in cooperation with EDUCAUSE.

The Purpose of Copyright

ckeller — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 10:55:37 -0500

"Copyright permeates our lives and yet, despite its impact on our lives, relatively few people, including lawyers, have sufficient knowledge or understanding of what copyright is. And far too many people, including lawyers, have major misconceptions concerning copyright. These misconceptions are causing a dangerous shift in copyright protection, a shift that threatens the advancement of knowledge and learning in this country."

Researcher: Optimal copyright term is 14 years

ckeller — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 14:49:19 -0500

A Cambridge University PhD candidate recently suggested,using economics formulas, that copyright should last no longer than 14 years.

Naughty Bit

ckeller — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 12:12:19 -0500

"DRM technology represents an attempt to treat bits like atoms. "Watermarks" allow two otherwise identical collections of bits to be viewed as different objects. Biometric-based encryption can restrict access to only the current "holder" of the bits. Elaborate check-in/check-out schemes constrain a particular set of bits to "exist" in only one place at a time. Rather than rethinking their approach to copyright and developing new business models appropriate to the digital world, proponents of DRM technology are devoting their ingenuity and energy to trying to make bits behave like atoms in order to preserve the old ways. "

Webcasting Royalties: Where Do We Go from Here?

drupal — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 11:53:39 -0500

June 5: Free Web Seminar on the Future of Webcasting in Light of New Royalty Rates

cluckett — Tue, 29 May 2007 16:31:46 -0500

The Copyright Royalty Board of the Library of Congress has recently issued a determination setting royalty rates for the performance of sound recordings via Webcasting. The rates have increased substantially, causing many Webcasters to worry about their future.

In this free June 5 EDUCAUSE Live! Web seminar, Webcasting Royalties: Where Do We Go from Here?, Matthew J. Astle, an attorney for Wiley Rein LLP, will address the history of the proceeding, review the key terms of the decision, and discuss options available to Webcasters to help them navigate an uncertain future. Those unable to attend may wish to visit the archives after the event.

This EDUCAUSE Live! Web seminar is cosponsored by The Association for Communications Technology Professionals in Higher Education (ACUTA).

A Professor Pokes Fun at Copyright

drupal — Tue, 22 May 2007 16:17:39 -0500

A Bucknell University professor, Eric Faden, created a 10 minute film "A Fair(y) Use Tale" that uses Disney movie clips to explain current copyright law.

Backers of Stronger Copyright Laws Form Lobby Group

drupal — Mon, 21 May 2007 16:53:36 -0500

"Some of the staunchest advocates for stricter copyright laws have formed a new alliance designed to pressure Congress into preserving stronger intellectual property rights."