This important email is a request from you and your faculty
patrons for examples of harm caused by the Sonny Bono [Copyright]
Term Extension Act. You may have seen this or other versions of
this
request recently: please excuse any duplication.
VRA has agreed to sign onto the CAA (College Art Association)
amicus brief.
I have volunteered to gather your examples and send them to
Jeffrey Cunard, CAA's
legal counsel. There are other venues for submitting examples, as you
will see described in the meail below.
Maryly Snow
ARLIS/NA
VRA Intellectual Property Rights Committee
[log in to unmask]
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Friends:
The US Supreme Court has agreed to hear Eldred vs. Ashcroft, a
case which
challenges the constitutionality of the Sonny Bono Term Extension Act
(CTEA). Many scholarly societies, library, and museum
organizations are
requesting information from researchers, teachers, libraries, and
archivists about their experiences with the Copyright Extension
Act. The
College Art Association and the Association of Research Libraries
are each
preparing an Amicus Brief against the CETA. Other scholarly societies,
including the American Historical Association, will either sign
on with
one of these amicus briefs or file their own.
Below is a note from the ARL explaining its position and requesting
information about individual experiences under the CETA. The ARL
asks that
you write directly to them if you have had experiences with the CETA.
Sincerely,
Mark
Mark Kornbluh
Executive Director, H-Net: Humanities and Social Sciences OnLine
---------- Forwarded message ----------
>March 7, 2002
>
>TO: Directors of ARL Libraries
>FROM: Prue Adler
>RE: Update on Copyright Term Extension
>
>Summary:
>
>Much to the surprise of many legal scholars, on February 19,
2002, the
>Supreme Court agreed to hear Eldred v. Ashcroft, a case which challenges
>the constitutionality of the Sonny Bono Term Extension Act
(CTEA). In
>1998, Congress through the CTEA, extended the copyright term of
>protection an additional twenty years from the life of the
author plus
>50 to life plus 70. For works for hire, the new term is 95
years. The
>CTEA has resulted in a significant decline in works entering the public
>domain--resources critically important to the research and education
>enterprise. Indeed, an editorial in the Washington Post notes, "the
>resulting terms are far too long to cordon off works that should long
>since have entered the public domain, to mingle with, be
reshaped by and
>enrich the general culture."
><http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A38827-2002Mar4.html>
>
>We need your assistance in identifying examples of problems that you
>face with the extension of copyright term and with the delay of
>information resources moving into the public domain.
>
>Background of Case:
>
>Lawrence Lessig, Professor of Law, Stanford University Law
School, has
>been at the forefront of the CTEA challenge and has written extensively
>about copyright issues. In February 2001, a federal appeals
court found
>that retroactive term extensions by Congress were permissible
under the
>Copyright Clause and rejected the argument that CTEA is
>unconstitutional. The Court found that Congress' grant of an additional
>twenty years was constitutional as it was "limited." The Constitution
>empowers Congress to grant copyright protection for "limited
times" as a
>means of "promoting" the arts and sciences. In Eldred, Lessig
and others
>argue that Congress violated this clause by "creating in
practice an
>unlimited term" for copyrights.
>
>Libraries/Archivists/DFC's Amicus Brief:
>
>ARL, along with the American Library Association, the American
>Association of Law Libraries, the Digital Future Coalition, the Medical
>Library Association, and the Society of American Archivists
filed an
>amici curiae brief on December 13, 2001, requesting that the Supreme
>Court take the case. Our brief was written by students at the
>Glushko-Samuelson Intellectual Property Law Clinic, Washington College
>of Law, under the guidance of Professors Peter Jaszi and Ann Shalleck.
>The brief is available at
><http://www.arl.org/info/frn/copy/ashcroft.html>. Additional information
>concerning term extension is available at
><http://www.arl.org/info/frn/copy/extension.html>. A number of other
>organizations also filed briefs requesting that the Court accept the
>case.
>
>Now that the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case, members
of the
>Shared Legal Capability (ARL, AALL, ALA, MLA, and SLA) will be
filing an
>amicus brief. Its purpose will be to explain the impact of the
>twenty-year extension on the public domain and the deleterious
impact on
>access to information that supports scholarship and teaching. We will
>again be joined by the Society of American Archivists. Other
>associations, organizations, and institutions have expressed an interest
>in joining the brief. In addition, there will be a number of other
>briefs filed that challenge the CTEA from different perspectives.
>Technically, the briefs must be filed by April 5, 2002, but a 45-day
>extension has been requested; the new filing date would be May
20. Oral
>arguments before the Supreme Court will occur in the fall of 2002.
>
>Next Steps for ARL:
>
>To strengthen our amicus brief, it is very important to include examples
>of the following:
>
>1) titles or list of works that your library or a member of the faculty
>had hoped to use (e.g., digitization projects or materials for a course)
>that would have fallen into the public domain but are now
covered by the
>additional extension
>
>2) difficulties you may have encountered in obtaining
permissions for
>older works and /or for those that are now covered by the 20-year
>extension; this could include difficulties in tracking owners/ownership
>information of older materials, expensive fees, and the like.
>
>Since we dont know if the extension will be granted, we will
need these
>examples as soon as possible. The end of March would be the most
>helpful. I will be back in touch if we hear that the extension
has been
>granted. Please send these either to me <[log in to unmask]> or to Amy
>Masciola <[log in to unmask]>. Please let me know if there is additional
>information that I can provide.
>
>Thank you very much for your assistance. This is a very important
>endeavor for our community.
>
>PSA 3/07/02
>
>
>--
>Judith Matz
>Communications Officer
>Association of Research Libraries
>21 Dupont Circle, NW #800
>Washington, DC 20036-1118
>Phone 202-296-2296
>Fax 202-872-0884
>[log in to unmask]
>www.arl.org
-----end of forwarded message-----
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