Released today by the The Orphan Works and Mass Digitization Symposium: Obstacles and Opportunities begins tomorrow at Claremont Hotel, Berkeley CA. Here’s the agenda.
White Paper #3 was released today by the Berkeley Digital Library Copyright Project.
Title
Orphan Works: Causes of the Problem
Berkeley Digital Library Copyright Project White Paper No. 3
Author
David Robert Hansen
University of California, Berkeley – School of Law
Abstract
The orphan works problem can be traced in part to several recent changes in the way copyright law grants rights to owners and in the way that users consume copyrighted works. Broadly defined as the situation where the owner of a copyrighted work cannot be located by someone who wishes to make use of the work in a manner that requires authorization, the problem of orphan works may have existed in theory since the first copyright laws came into effect. But in recent years, at least four developments have exacerbated the problem: (1) the elimination of copyright formalities, (2) the progressive extension of copyright terms, (3) technological advances that allow authors to create and preserve more copyrightable works, and (4) technological changes in the way users access and consume copyrighted works, especially in the shift from print to digital. This paper seeks to familiarize the reader with these developments and the ways that they have brought the orphan works issue to the forefront.
See Also: “Orphan Works: Mapping the Possible Solution Spaces”
Paper No. 2
See Also: “Orphan Works: Definitional Issues”
Paper No. 1
[…] The symposium took place in Berkeley, CA and was sponsored by the UC Berkeley Center for Law and Technology (BCLT). Links to three white papers that were released by BCLT prior to the event are linked here. ” […]