Calling all Michigan librarians! ALA’s Copyright Advisory Network (CAN) is a free service for librarians who want to learn about copyright or get help with their copyright questions. Please post your copyright questions on the CAN website! To post a copyright question: 1. Register at: http://www.librarycopyright.net/wordpress/punbb/register.php 2. Log in. 3. Click on “Copyright Questions” and …Read more »

Check out the Unshelved archives for Unshelved comic strips for May 28 – June 2.  In only six strips, Bill Barnes and Gene Ambaum have succinctly encapsulated intellectual property infringement issues for public libraries.  As usual, pretty funny stuff that hits the nail on the head!

Stanford’s Copyright Renewal Database is now searchable online at: http://collections.stanford.edu/copyrightrenewals/bin/search/simple The database covers the copyright renewal records received by the US Copyright Office between 1950 and 1993 for books published in the US between 1923 and 1963. Note that the database includes ONLY US Class A (book) renewals. The welcome page notes: “The period from …Read more »

There is a great blog post on Creating Passionate Users titled “Face-to-face trumps Twitter, Blogs, Podcasts, Videos.” Kathy Sierra asks – why are we still going to conferences when we now have social networking technology to allow us to meet online? She writes, “The point is, face-to-face still matters. And in fact all our globally-connecting-social-networking …Read more »

ARL has published a new brochure, Know Your Copy Rights: What You Can Do, aimed at faculty and teaching assistants. The brochure is available for download in PDF or for purchase in print copies. A one-page chart, “What you can do,” is also available to download or purchase in print. The web site lists several …Read more »

Electronic Information For Libraries, eIFL-IP Advocacy for Access to Information, has released a new Handbook on Copyright and Related Issues for Libraries on their web site in html and downloadable PDF. The Handbook is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 license. Sponsored by UNESCO, the handbook is a practical guide to topical legal questions …Read more »

Lawrence Lessig’s presentation of his orphan works proposal is now available on his blog.  Libraries are particularly interested in what Congress will enact regarding “orphan works” (copyright-protected materials whose copyright owners cannot be located) for library digitization projects. Lessig’s proposal covers only published works, not unpublished works.  Because many digitization projects include unpublished, unique materials …Read more »

Copyright law professor, Lawrence Lessig, is posting a series of presentations on his blog over the next couple weeks.  The presentations will outline arguments for five Internet-related proposals that he believes Congress should enact this year: Orphan Works, Remix Culture, Network Neutrality, Spam, and Harmful to Minors Material.  The first presentation will be posted later …Read more »