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Copyright Office Releases Online Registration of Claims

Beginning July 1, 2008, the Copyright Office is offering online registration of claims to copyright. Online registration through the electronic Copyright Office (eCO) is the preferred way to register basic claims for literary works; visual arts works; performing arts works, including motion pictures; sound recordings; and single serials. Advantages of online filing include a lower filing fee; the fastest processing time; online status tracking of your claim; secure payment by credit or debit card, electronic check, or Copyright Office deposit account; and the ability to upload certain categories of deposits directly into eCO as electronic files. To register your claim electronically, go to the Copyright Office website at www.copyright.gov and click on the eCO logo.

How Copyright Is Holding Back The Creative Class

While not enough people recognize it, the real purpose of copyright law is to provide an incentive for the creation of more content. The government felt that there was a market failure, where not enough "content" would be produced without a limited monopoly, and thus, copyright was born. However, that happened back in the day when creating content wasn't easy. You pretty much had to go through a professional process. These days, thanks to new technologies, creating content is exceptionally easy -- and thus, a big part of the very basis for copyright no longer makes sense. We're drowning in content -- and it's not because of the "incentive" of copyright. There are plenty of incentives for creating content these days and very few have anything to do with copyright.

Don't Blame One Wal-Mart Employee For Dumb Copyright Comments

A bunch of folks have submitted this BoingBoing story about a Wal-Mart employee making some dumb (and incorrect) comments concerning copyright to a guy who was trying to scan some century-old photos of his family. Wal-Mart and some other convenience stores have had policies in place for years that they won't reprint or scan images that might still be under copyright. Yes, it's a silly policy, but the convenience stores feel they need to do this to avoid ridiculous lawsuits from copyright holders, which we all know are far too common these days. The problem here is copyright law, not necessarily the Wal-Mart policy, no matter how ridiculous the end results are. In fact, Wal-Mart has supported important changes to copyright law, such as an orphan works bill, that would enable it to avoid such liabilities.

EU Again Thinks About Extending Copyright, Despite Earlier Rejection

Copyright was never designed to be a welfare system -- yet increasingly we're hearing from people who seem to think it is one. A couple years ago, the UK commissioned a detailed report on the question of copyright extension, known as the Gowers Report -- which clearly recommended against extending copyright on performance rights. In fact, Gowers later admitted that all the evidence suggested that copyright length should be shortened, rather than lengthened. And, for at least a little while, the government agreed.

Should Organizations Get To Ignore Copyright For The Sake Of Preservation?

Copyright was clearly designed for a different age: when not everyone was a "publisher." And while we've spent years pointing out many of the different problems that has caused, here's another one: how is a library or some other institution charged with "archiving" written works for posterity supposed to deal with copyright laws that can often make such archival activities against the law? Well, the Library of Congress and a bunch of other organizations have a suggestion: let them all ignore copyright law for the sake of archiving. Basically, the report recommends that certain organizations be designated as "preservation institutions," which are then more or less allowed to ignore copyright law and copy-at-will for the sake of preservation. Of course, this is clearly going to lead to many questions, including just who would get designated

Patry Copyright Blog Closed

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "William Patry, noted copyright expert and Google's top copyright lawyer, has decided to close his personal blog. (For no reason that he has explained, the archives are gone too.) Ordinarily, that wouldn't be very newsworthy, but that little blog has made a lot of news, outing the ACTA treaty and discussing lots of other important pending legislation. Mr. Patry gives two reasons for the closure: his personal views were being attributed to Google, and the current trends in copyright law are too depressing. Though I am not the only one to have done so, as someone who has contributed to that misunderstanding by listing his credentials without a disclaimer, I would like to publicly apologize to him. Unfortunately, there's nothing I can do to reverse the depressing trends in copyright law that I'm n

O'Reilly On How Copyright Got To Its Current State

Schneed Tweedly writes "William Patry is one of the leading scholars in the world on copyright law. For a long time he maintained a blog, "Patry on Copyright," that discussed new cases as they came out. A few days ago, though, he shut down his blog because 'the Current State of Copyright Law is too depressing.' O'Reilly has a long post up on their news site discussing Patry's retirement from blogging and giving a history of copyright that explains how we got where we are."

Prof to speak on dangers of new copyright act - On Tuesday, July 15, Laura Murray will give a talk entitled C-61: The Lowdown. Dr. Murray, coauthor of Canadian Copyright: A Citizen's Guide and proprietor of www.faircopyright.ca, will explain the... F

On Tuesday, July 15, Laura Murray will give a talk entitled C-61: The Lowdown. Dr. Murray, coauthor of Canadian Copyright: A Citizen's Guide and proprietor of www.faircopyright.ca, will explain the dangers to educational, activist, and artistic practice posed by Bill C-61, the new Copyright Act just introduced. The talk will take place at the Ban Righ Centre, 32 Bader Ln., at noon.

Copyright Office May Have Just Added New Royalties For Webcasts

Well, this is just downright disturbing. Jon Healy has a quick summary of a totally unexpected and unnecessary proposed rulemaking from the Copyright Office that could add additional royalties that webcasters would need to pay (on top of the already onerous webcasting rates). Basically, the Copyright Office had been asked to decide on a totally different question concerning royalties back in 2000. That issue isn't even in question any more, as the two sides had already worked out their differences, and the Copyright Office didn't do much to give an official answer on that question anyway.

Nigeria's Metro Digital copyright dispute headed for court

In the wake of copyright infringement claims and subsequent raids by government operatives on Metro Digital, the company has denied all piracy charges and is bringing several lawsuits against the Nigerian Copyright Commission, the country's chief enforcer of copyright laws.

Nigeria's Metro Digital Copyright Dispute Headed for Court

In the wake of copyright infringement claims and subsequent raids by government operatives on Metro Digital, the company has denied all piracy charges and is bringing several lawsuits against the Nigerian Copyright Commission, the country's chief enforcer of copyright laws.

When Suing For Copyright Infringement On A $500 License, Don't Ask For $766 Million

Eric Goldman has a short blurb describing the outcome in a copyright lawsuit where a title company apparently infringed on the copyright of another company by reusing its web-based "rate calculator" on its own site without a license. Where the case got bizarre was that the copyright holder tried to claim that the title company now owed it every single cent it made, which amounted to $766 million in revenue -- even though (1) a license for the calculator would run $500 for the year and (2) it's difficult to see how all of the company's revenue could have been because of that single rate calculator. Luckily, the judge practically laughed them out of court, calling the request "preposterous." Instead, the court awarded a mere $1,500, or the equivalent of a three year license.

UK Looks To Increase Penalties For Commercial Online Copyright Infringement 10X

When the "Gowers Report" on copyright first came out in the UK, we pointed out that it had a lot of bad ideas included. The one good point was that copyright length shouldn't be extended any more. So, now that the UK is planning to ignore that one good suggestion, it's moving forward with plans to implement the bad suggestions in the report -- such as increasing the fines for online copyright infringement by 10x. To be fair, this is focused just on "commercial-scale" copying where someone is profiting from the infringement. But, given how the recording industry works, how long until they look for ways to expand that definition or increase the fines for "personal copying" to keep them "more aligned" with the fines for commercial copying?

NBC, Fox File Copyright Infringement Lawsuit Against Video-Sharing Services Redlasso

July 24, 2008 (FinancialWire) General Electric Co. s (NYSE: GE) NBC Universal and Fox News Channel, a division of News Corp. (NYSE: NWS-A) has sued video-sharing service Redlasso for copyright infringement and has accused the website of showing programs like "The Tonight Show" and "The Fox Report with Shepard Smith" without permission. Online video viewing and sharing has boomed across the Web, and broadcasters have sought to avoid the music industry's troubles by closely protecting their content online and previously, Viacom Inc. (NYSE: VIA-B) filed a $1 billion copyright infringement against Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) and its video-share site, YouTube. The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Manhattan, comes two months after the television networks complained to the closely held website that it violated copyright laws by running unauthor

UK IP Office seeks harsher copyright infringement penalties

In late 2006, the UK government received an evaluation of the country's legal landscape, as it pertained to copyright and intellectual property. That analysis, termed the Gower Report, after the head of the committee that produced it, included specific recommendations for modernizing the nation's copyright laws and their enforcement. Now, the UK Intellectual Property Office is soliciting public comment on changes that will implement one of the recommendations of the report, which suggested rationalizing the recommended sentences for those convicted of copyright infringement.

WIPO and SERCI Examine Economic Aspects of Copyright

A meeting jointly organized by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and the Society for Economic Research on Copyright Issues (SERCI) in Geneva on 10 and 11 July, 2008 examined the economic importance of copyright and underlined the need for further research on the role of copyright in the creative industries.

WIPO and SERCI Examine Economic Aspects of Copyright

GENEVA - A meeting jointly organized by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and the Society for Economic Research on Copyright Issues (SERCI) in Geneva July 10 -11, 2008 examined the economic importance of copyright and underlined the need for further research on the role of copyright in the creative industries, a press release by WIPO stated.

Pending Federal Law Threatens All Copyright Owners Says The Hodgson Law Group

Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Congressman Howard Berman (D-CA) have introduced two similar bills in the House and Senate that threaten to dismantle 100 years of copyright protection, rights guaranteed to authors the U.S. Constitution. The Shawn Bentley Orphan Works Act of 2008 (S. 2913) and the Orphan Works Act of 2008 (H.R. 5889) allows anyone to use a copyrighted work without first obtaining permission. The user can later claim as a defense to copyright infringement that a diligent search was conducted, but the owner could not be found. As presently drafted, the infringer is virtually insulated from liability absent court proceedings says the Hodgson Law Group. The copyright owner can learn what, if any, diligent search was actually performed to locate the owner only through discovery in costly federal court litigation.

U.S. Copyright Office Offers Beta Online Registration on Copyright Claims

Online registration through the electronic Copyright Office (eCO) is a way to register basic claims for literary works; visual arts works; performing arts works, including motion pictures; sound recordings; and single serials.

EU Plans To Extend Copyright; Turns Copyright System Into Welfare For Musicians

Just as we feared, the EU has now approved copyright extension of performance royalties from 50 years to 95 years. This is basically an approval to steal from the public. The public made a deal with musicians 50 years ago: give us music, and we'll give you performance royalties for 50 years. The musicians accepted that, and it was a worthwhile deal for them. Yet, now, the government has decided to change the deal, remove that content from the public domain and give it to the musicians for another 45 years. This is, simply, bad policy. It encourages the exact wrong behavior: telling people that the public will pay them for work they did many many years ago over and over again. This doesn't encourage musicians to continue working and it doesn't encourage them to be fiscally responsible and save for retirement or anything.

Research and Markets: Examine the Paradoxical Nature of Copyright as Tensions Exist Between Copyright Law &

DUBLIN, Ireland, BUSINESS WIRE -- Research and Markets (http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/ee9b51/copyrights_parado) has announced the addition of the "Copyright's Paradox" report to their offering.

Internal Market and Services: Intellectual Property: Commission adopts forward-looking package

The European Commission today adopted two initiatives in the area of copyright. First, the Commission proposes to align the copyright term for performers with that applicable to authors, in this way bridging the income gap that performers face toward the end of their lives. Secondly, the Commission proposes to fully harmonise the copyright term that applies to co-written musical compositions. In parallel, the Commission also adopted a Green Paper on Copyright in the Knowledge Economy. The consultation document focuses on topics that appear relevant for the development of a modern economy, driven by the rapid dissemination of knowledge and information. Both of these initiatives comprise a unique mix of social, economic and cultural measures aimed at maintaining Europe as a prime location for cultural creators in the entertainment and know

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