July 17, 2008
American Library Association Unveils Slide Rule for Copyright Advice
For those who doubt the complexity of U.S. copyright law take a look at this online slide-rule from the American Library Association’s Office for Information Technology Policy. It’s designed to help librarians and others figure out if a creative work is copyright protected. The exceptions to the law, and the exceptions to the exceptions, are reminiscent of the nerve-wracking U.S. tax code.
For example, say you have a book that was created before 1979 and published before January 1, 2003. Is permission needed to reuse the book? According to the slide-rule, maybe. Generally speaking, the book is copyright protected through 2047. Then again, the protection could last longer.—Andrea L. Foster
Posted on Thursday July 17, 2008 | Permalink |Comments
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ALA copyright slide rule
— Sonja Nielsen Jul 17, 04:39 PM #
This is why Creative Commons is so important. http://creativecommons.org
— Cable Green Jul 17, 05:20 PM #
The ALA Washington Office web page at http://www.ala.org/ala/washoff/woissues/copyrightb/copyright.cfm has a lot of useful information about copyright.
— Philip J Tramdack Jul 18, 07:25 AM #
I have spent some time researching Creative Commons and fail to find any advantage it might provide. It only seems to infringe upon the copyrights I own.
— Jeff Jul 18, 10:04 AM #
Jeff, you may not see any advantage to adopting a Creative Commons license, but the existence of an option to give away some of your rights does not “infringe” (i.e., violate) those rights.
— Amanda French Jul 18, 10:59 AM #
Jeff, What exactly do you own? On what basis do you think you own it? Copyright does not confer ownership, only a time period during which the public has limited access after which the public reclaims full rights in the interest of the public good, although now, thanks to Disney ,that’s a long, long time.
— David Jul 18, 03:30 PM #