France Passes New Laws on the "Digital Exploitation of 20th Century Unavailable Books"

The Global Legal Monitor from the Library of Congress provides a summary of the recently passed legislation but writer/tweeter @BlankTextField (based in France) says the article include a few inaccuracies.
From the Global Legal Monitor

This Law adds a new chapter to the French Intellectual Property Code, comprising articles L.134-1 to L.134-9. Article L. 134-1 provides that an unavailable book is “a book published in France before January 1, 2001, which is commercially unavailable and is not currently published in paper or digital format.” (Id.) The Law creates a public database specifically dedicated to unavailable books, accessible at no charge, which will list these titles. The Bibliothèque Nationale de France (French National Library) will oversee the implementation and updates of the database. Any individual will be able to request that the National Library register an unavailable book in the database (art. L.134-2).
After a book has been registered in the database for six months without any opposition, a collective management society approved by the Ministry of Culture will be authorized to grant a publisher a non-exclusive license for digital exploitation of the book for a period of five years, which will be renewable (art. L.134-3). The publisher will have to accept the license within two months of notification of its having been granted (art. L.134-5).

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This afternoon @BlankTextField tweeted about the inaccuracies he found in the LOC summary.
Here are Direct Links to the those tweets.
Tweet 1 ||| 2 ||| 3 ||| 4 ||| 5 ||| 6
If you read French or feel comfortable using mechanical translation (be careful), here’s some coverage of the legislation @BlankTextField shared with us from the French press/blogosphere.

•  Petit guide de survie juridique à l’usage des auteurs d’oeuvres indisponibles (via S.I. Lex; Feb. 29, 2012 )

• Numérisation des oeuvres indisponibles : auteurs spoliés, droit bafoué… (via Actualitte.com; Feb. 23, 2012)

• Exclusif : L’accord-cadre sur la numérisation des oeuvres indisponibles . (via Actualitte.com; Feb. 23, 2012)

• Oeuvres indisponibles : les auteurs contre une numérisation abusive (via Actualitte.com; Feb. 20, 2012)

• Numérisation des oeuvres indisponibles : une loi monstrueuse (via Actualitte.com; Feb. 12, 2012)

• Numérisation : la grande manoeuvre des indisporphelines (via S.I. Lex; Nov. 11, 2011)

Filed under: Funding, Journal Articles, Libraries, Management and Leadership, National Libraries, Publishing