Artists Against Orphan Works Bill

Oslo, Norway

2009-10-22T06:35:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Authors Groups Meet in Oslo

10.22.09

OSLO NORWAY Over 60 authors organizations met here this week to discuss strategies for defending authors' rights in the digitized world. Their call to action is reminiscent of the grassroots coalition that came together in the US last year to oppose the Orphan Works bill. In addition to concerns over anti-copyright legislation, authors around the world, including visual artists, face threats from piracy, unauthorized usage, all-rights contracts and, in the US, the loss and/or dissipation of their reprographic royalties.

The Oslo meeting was held concurrent with the anniversary of the founding of the International Federation of Reproduction Rights Organizations (IFRRO). IFRRO was born in Oslo 25 years ago. In the last quarter century, it has grown to 190 members and associate members, of which the Illustrators' Partnership is one.

IFRRO was founded by a small group of visionaries who believed that there was a need for an international organization of Reprographic Rights Organizations (RROs). RROs are collecting societies that monitor and clear rights to authors' creations in collective works such as books, magazines, etc. They grant rights, as mandated by authors, collect fees and return royalties to illustrators, artists, writers and others.

Collecting societies are a new concept to most American illustrators. They exist in countries around the world, but currently, there are none for illustrators in the US. Two years ago, the Illustrators' Partnership brought together 12 prominent visual arts organizations. These groups have incorporated as the American Society of Illustrators Partnership (ASIP).

ASIP, which has been chartered as a collecting society, hopes to begin the long-overdue process of bringing accountability to illustrators' reprographic rights. The 12 founding groups of ASIP also formed the nucleus of the 85 organizations that opposed the Orphan Works bill. In future reports, we'll tell you more about what illustrators can do individually to help us build this formal coalition into a functioning society.

Another Anniversary: The 1999 Santa Fe Conference
The meeting of authors this week in Oslo recalls another anniversary closer to home: the first Illustrators Conference, which opened 10 years ago this week in Santa Fe.

The Santa Fe Conference was a grassroots event founded by 8 artists and reps who believed that illustrators should not accept a slow evolution toward the dissolution of their rights. The conference led to the creation of the Illustrators' Partnership - founded by 3 of the same artists- to act on the initiatives first raised at that pioneering event.

So now, as authors worldwide issue a call for cooperative action, we're pleased to note that the spirit of Santa Fe, invoked by illustrators a decade ago, is still alive and well in the US. It's the spirit that guided artists in Washington last year and with luck, it may yet swell and aid in the preservation of copyright law, which is the legal means by which the distinctive expressions of individuals are themselves preserved.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

______________________________________________________________

For news and information, and an archive of these messages:
Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 85 organizations opposed the last Orphan Works bills, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message and wish to subscribe to the IPA mailing alerts, click on the link below, "Join Our Mailing List" and follow the simple directions on the webpage.
Please post or forward this message to any interested party.

Compelling Argument

2009-10-02T21:14:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works and the Google Book Settlement / Part III

10.2.09

Compelling Arguments

On September 10, 2009, Marybeth Peters, Register of the US Copyright Office, testified before Congress in opposition to the Google Book Search Settlement. Her arguments on behalf of creators rights are compelling and we support them. However, we note with some irony that they are nearly identical to the arguments we made in opposing the Orphan Works bill last year. We don't know what conclusions to draw from this fact, but we think it's fair to draw attention to it.

We've picked several examples below and matched them with quotes from our own writings and testimony. In every case, the emphasis is ours.

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "The [Google] settlement is not merely a compromise of existing claims, or an agreement to compensate past copying and snippet display. Rather, it could affect the exclusive rights of millions of copyright owners, in the United States and abroad, with respect to their abilities to control new products and new markets, for years and years to come."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: The bill's sponsors say it's merely a small adjustment to copyright law. In fact...its provisions have been drafted so broadly it will orphan the work of working artists. Its consequences will be far reaching, long lasting, perhaps irreversible and will strike at the heart of art itself."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "[The Book Rights Registry] is likely to have the unfortunate effect of creating a false database of orphan works, because in practice any work that is not claimed will be deemed an orphan."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "As clients come to rely on these [visual arts] registries as one-stop shopping centers for rights clearance, any works not found in the registries could be infringed as orphans."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "Compulsory licenses... are scrutinized very strictly because by their nature they impinge upon the exclusive rights of copyright holders...By its nature, a compulsory license 'is a limited exception to the copyright holder's exclusive right . . . As such, it must be construed narrowly.'"

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "[The Orphan Works bill] radically abridges the fundamental principal of exclusive rights granted to creators under the copyright law, and creates a sweeping compulsory license permitting large scale unauthorized use of not only older works, the provenance of which may be difficult to determine, but also of the valuable contemporary works that are the economic life blood of those in our profession."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "Compulsory licenses are generally adopted by Congress only reluctantly, in the face of a marketplace failure."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "The Copyright Office only received about 215 relevant letters to their Orphan Works Study. From this they deduced a claim of widespread market failure in commercial markets..." " But the Copyright Office studied the specific subject of orphaned work. They did not inquire about the workings of commercial markets and there is no evidence in their report that business clients are unable to find the living authors they wish to work with. No evidence whatsoever."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "In summary, the out-of-print default rules would allow Google to operate under reverse principles of copyright law..."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "[The Orphan Works bill] creates the public's right to use private property as a default position, available to anyone whenever the property owner fails to make himself sufficiently available." "[I]ts logic reverses copyright law."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "In essence, the proposed settlement would give Google a license to infringe first and ask questions later..."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "Since orphan works transactions would occur only after infringement, the rights holder would have no leverage to bargain for more than the infringer is willing or able to pay."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "[C]opyright law has always left it to the copyright owner to determine whether and how an out-of-print work should be exploited."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "Under copyright law, no author can be compelled to publish his or her work. So by what right of eminent domain can Congress give strangers the right to publish our work without our knowledge, consent or payment?"

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "The broad scope of the out-of-print provisions and the large class of copyright owners they would affect will dramatically impinge on the exclusive rights of authors, publishers, their heirs and successors."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "The fundamental problem with the Orphan Works Act is that it's been drafted so broadly its use cannot be confined to real orphaned work situations." "To redefine an orphaned work as "a work by an unlocatable author" is to radically re-define the ownership of private property...Since everybody can be hard for somebody to find, this voids a rights holder's exclusive right to his or her own property."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "Some foreign governments have raised questions about the compatibility of the proposed settlement with Article 5 of the Berne convention, which requires that copyright be made available to foreign authors on a no less favorable basis than to domestic authors, and that the "enjoyment and exercise of these rights shall not be subject to any formality."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "[P]utting pressure on creators to subsidize the creation of privately-owned registries violates the intent of international copyright law, specifically Article 5(2) of the Berne Convention: "The enjoyment and the exercise of these rights shall not be subject to any formality."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "The ability of copyright owners and technology companies to share advertising revenue and other potential income streams is a worthy and symbiotic business goal that makes a lot of sense when the terms are mutually determined. And the increased abilities of libraries to offer on-line access to books and other copyrighted works is a development that is both necessary and possible in the digital age. However, none of these possibilities should require Google to have immediate, unfettered, and risk-free access to the copyrighted works of other people. They are not a reason to throw out fundamental copyright principles; they are a pretext to do so."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "The internet has created a culture of appropriation; and immediate global access to artistic works has facilitated piracy, unintentional infringement and plagiary. But instant and unrestricted access to work should not be construed as a necessity just because technology has made it a possibility. That an artist's work now can be instantly transmitted around the world without the artist's permission or control does not justify a user's 'right' to take the work."

* * * * *

Marybeth Peters on the Google Book Settlement: "[T]he settlement would inappropriately interfere with the on-going efforts of Congress to enact orphan works legislation in a manner that takes into account the concerns of all stakeholders as well as the United States' international obligations."

IPA on the Orphan Works Bill: "This bill has been drafted behind closed doors, without a needs-assessment study, an economic impact analysis, or an evaluation of how the public would be affected by this transfer of private property from individuals to giant commercial databases...For artists, the most troubling part has been our near-total exclusion from the legislative process."

"On July 11th [2008], on behalf of all those who oppose this bill, [we] submitted Amendments to the Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet and Intellectual Property. Those Amendments would make this bill a true orphan works bill. The Amendments have never been considered...This is no way to re-write U.S. copyright law."

Q.E.D.

The Register's full testimony from September 10, 2009 can be found here.
Our comments have been excerpted from various articles posted in 2008 on the IPA Orphan Works blog.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

______________________________________________________________

For news and information, and an archive of these messages:
Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog

Over 85 organizations opposed the last Orphan Works bills, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message and wish to subscribe to the IPA mailing alerts, click on the link below, "Join Our Mailing List" and follow the simple directions on the webpage.
Please post or forward this message to any interested party.

Reverse in Copyright Laws

2009-09-29T22:37:00.000-07:00

ROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works and the Google Book Settlement / Part II

9.29.09

A Reversal of Copyright Law

Last Friday we summarized the basic details of the Google Book Search Settlement. Like the visual arts "databases" we opposed last year, this agreement would allow both Google and a yet-to-be-created Book Rights Registry to commercially profit from an author's work whenever they say they can't locate the author.

Both schemes would force authors to opt out of commercial operations that infringe their work - or to "protect" their work by opting-in to privately owned databases run by infringers. This Hobson's Choice for authors reverses the principle of copyright law.

The by-product of the Google settlement (again like the Orphan Works bill) would be to establish public access to private property as the default position in copyright law. In other words, it presumes:

a.) that the public is entitled to use your work as a primary right,
b.) that it's your legal obligation to make your work available, and
c.) that if you fail to do so, you forfeit your exclusive right to control access to your work.

If you're an author and you wish to keep the book you write from becoming a potential orphan, you'd therefore have to register it with the Book Rights Registry run by the parties that settled with Google (and who will receive an award of $30 million for cutting themselves in).

Advocates of the deal try to justify it by saying it will make more books available to more people than at any other time in history - a claim that's no doubt true - but therefore they say, as Andrew Albanese writes in Publishers Weekly, "the massive public good of the deal far outweigh[s] the individual greivances [sic] of rightsholders."

Yet it's in this very argument that the danger lies.

Once the Copy Left has established a legal precedent that the property rights of authors can be subordinated to the assertion of public interest, they can build on that principle to enact further statute and case laws to benefit commercial interests. To do this, they'll have to chip away further at the inherent property rights of individuals.

Orphan Works: "Half a Loaf"
An example of the agenda that underlies both the Google book search settlement and the Orphan Works bill came in May, 2008, at a time when the Orphan Works bill looked to be a shoo-in by early summer. Anticipating a quick mopping up operation, the bill's advocates were high-fiving one another. But as James V. DeLong of the Convergence Law Institute reminded them, there was still much work ahead.

Calling the Orphan Works bill just "half a loaf," he hinted at what it would take to permit commercial interests to take the whole loaf:

"These possibly-orphan, sort-of-orphan, and gray literature works simply cannot be made available if the digitizers are required to make one-by-one judgments and seek permission before copying. If they are to be retrieved in useful form, then sooner or later Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and some others must be permitted to digitize on a massive scale."

Of course he acknowledged that the new reverse copyright law should not deprive intellectual property owners of their "legitimate rights." But he reaffirmed the Copy Left's fundamental premise that intellectual property owners should not be entitled to legitimate rights except in situations where they've registered their works:

"At some point, some kind of grand grandfathering proceeding will probably be required, a window in which holders of existing rights must reaffirm them or lose them." (Italics added)

Again, this is the same premise we see at work in the Google book settlement. As Lynn Chu, a principal at Writers Representatives LLC, wrote in the Wall Street Journal, March 28, 2009:

"Under the settlement, every rights-owner in America is supposed to hand over all their private contract data, on every edition of every work they ever wrote -- and every excerpt permission ever granted to others -- at the peril of losing the money Google will be making on their backs. This is a massive burden on everyone in the book industry, making us all, in effect, Google's data-entry slaves. Indeed, in most cases such information about every permission ever granted is unlocatable. It opens a Pandora's box of disputes and mistaken claims about who actually owns what." (Italics added)

This is identical to our warning last year about the Orphan Works bill:

"[The Orphan Works bill] would force artists either to entrust their entire life's work to privately owned commercial databases or see it exposed to widespread infringement. It would let giant image banks access our commercial inventory and metadata - and enter our commercial markets as clearinghouses to compete with us for our own clients. I can think of no other field where small business owners can be pressured to supply potential competitors with their content, business data and client contact information." - Brad Holland, Small Business Administration Roundtable, August 8, 2008

The War on Authors
Both the Google Book settlement and the Orphan Works bill have their intellectual rationale in the war on authors that began decades ago in the obscure theories of Postmodern literary critics. Their fundamental premise is that all creativity is communal and that authors are only the agents through which the community creates. This has led a handful of activist legal scholars to demand changes in the law requiring artists, writers and others to affirm and reaffirm the rights to use their own work by, in effect, licensing it from the public "commons."

This argument, Marxist in its origins, has found its unlikely champion in those large commercial Internet interests that hope to build Information Age empires supplying businesses and the public with creative "content." By defining millions of works as orphans on the premise that some might be, both the Google Book settlement and the Orphan Works bill would allow these opportunists to profit by harvesting the work of others, providing their databases with content they could never afford to create themselves nor license from authors.

Next: Orphan Works and the Google Book Settlement /Part III: Compelling Arguments
The Register of the US Copyright Office has condemned the Google settlement in terms nearly identical to our condemnation last year of the Orphan Works bill. In Part III, we'll examine those similarities to see the patterns that are emerging from this insidious effort to change copyright law.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

______________________________________________________________

For news and information, and an archive of these messages:
Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog

Over 85 organizations opposed the last Orphan Works bills, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message and wish to subscribe to the IPA mailing alerts, click on the link below, "Join Our Mailing List" and follow the simple directions on the webpage.
Please post or forward this message to any interested party.

Google Settlement

2009-09-24T23:27:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works and the Google Book Settlement / Part I

9.25.09

We've been asked for news about the Orphan Works bill. Last June Intellectual Property Watch warned that it would be back during the summer. And on June 11th, Senator Orrin Hatch confirmed his intent to reintroduce the bill. We immediately put out a notice to artists. But summer's over and we've had no further news. So far, so good.

Of course Congress has had other priorities: the ongoing financial mess, the health care debate and - on the copyright front - the Google book search controversy. For those who haven't followed the news about this Google assault on copyright, we'll try to summarize it.

The World's Largest Library (Or is it Bookstore?)
In 2004, Google announced its intent to digitize all of the world's 80-100 million books - and to make most of them commercially available as orphaned works. The plan has been controversial since its inception.

Google began with the cooperation of several major libraries. The libraries gave Google access to their holdings. The problem is that libraries are libraries; they don't own the copyrights to the books they hold. In short, they gave Google the rights to other people's work. So far, Google has scanned over 10 million books.

In 2004, the Authors Guild and Association of American Publishers sued Google for copyright infringement. Last October the parties settled. The resulting agreement is 141 pages long, with 15 appendices of 179 pages. The implications for copyright holders are not clear, but what the litigants would get is breathtaking. As Lynn Chu, a principal at Writers Representatives LLC, wrote in the Wall Street Journal, March 28, 2009:

"[I]f approved by the federal court, [it would] permit Google to post out-of-print books for reading, sales, institutional licensing, ad sales, and other publishing exploitations, by Google, online. The settlement gives the class-action attorneys $30 million; a new, quasi-judicial bureaucracy called the Book Rights Registry $35 million...and $45 million for owners infringed up to now -- about $60 a title." http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123819841868261921.html

Google would keep just over a third of the profits generated by selling these books online. The rest would go to the Book Rights Registry run by publishers' and authors' representatives. In other words, 63% would go to the parties that sued Google. In theory, the Registry would attempt to locate the authors of orphaned works and pay them royalties. But as Ms. Chu points out, the parties that sued Google - and would therefore benefit from Google's infringement - have themselves traded away other people's rights in the bargain:

"No one elected these 'class representatives' to represent America's tens of thousands of authors and publishers to convey their digital rights to Google. Nor are the interests of this so-called class identical."

The US Department of Justice apparently agrees. Last Friday, it filed an objection to the settlement and advised the court to reject the settlement as written. On page 9 of their brief, the DOJ attorneys write:

"The structure of the Proposed Settlement itself, therefore, pits the interests of one part of the class (known rightsholders) against the interests of another part of the class (orphan works rightsholders). Google's commercial use of orphan works will generate revenues, which will be deposited with the Registry. Any unclaimed revenues, however, will inure to the benefit of the Registry and its registered rightsholders. Thus, the Registry and its registered rightsholders will benefit at the expense of every rightsholder who fails to come forward to claim profits from Google's commercial use of his or her work...

"The greater the economic exploitation of the works of unknown rightsholders by Google and the Registry, the stronger the incentive for known rightsholders to retain the unclaimed revenues for themselves." [Emphasis added]

The Department of Justice also warns that the settlement fails to comply with copyright, antitrust laws and the rules of class action litigation. http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2009/September/09-opa-1001.html

The US federal court was scheduled to hold a fairness hearing October 7. But over 400 objections from around the world have been filed by rightsholders, competitors to Google and (in addition to the US government) the governments of France and Germany. Yesterday we received news that the fairness hearing has been delayed.

The Google settlement has also been condemned by Marybeth Peters, Register of the US Copyright Office. Testifying before the House Judiciary Committee last Wednesday, Ms. Peters stated that it would allow Google to "operate under reverse principles of copyright law," adding "it could affect the exclusive rights of millions of copyright owners, in the United States and abroad, with respect to their abilities to control new products and new markets, for years and years to come." http://www.copyright.gov/docs/regstat091009.html

We haven't had much to say about this agreement because, with the notable exception of childrens' book illustrations (which for purposes of the settlement are considered part of the text) the agreement doesn't include visual art. Yet like the Orphan Works bill itself, the Google Book Settlement would be a radical change to copyright law.

Tomorrow we'll examine some of the ways in which this settlement parallels the Orphan Works bill.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

______________________________________________________________

For news and information, and an archive of these messages:
Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 85 organizations opposed the last Orphan Works bills, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message and wish to subscribe to the IPA mailing alerts, click on the link below, "Join Our Mailing List" and follow the simple directions on the webpage.
Please post or forward this message to any interested party.

Starting again!!!

2009-06-23T08:26:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works: Back Again

6.17.09

In Orphan Works Land, no news has been good news, but that's about to change:

http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2009/06/11/copyright-holders-acknowledge-losing-battle-for-public-consciousness-at-world-copyright-summit/

US Copyright Register Marybeth Peters told Intellectual Property Watch that orphan works legislation is expected to be introduced within the next 10 days. It is her understanding there may still be some issues in the House version to be resolved, and there are some stakeholders - such as illustrators and other artists - "who are probably going to lobby pretty hard against it."

Peters said this issue is important to her, and the fact it came so close to passing last year is almost bittersweet. "What I hope it isn't ... is it's one magic moment you get" to finally get it passed, then it doesn't happen, she said.

We don't mean to disparage the Register's comments. She's had a long and distinguished career at the Copyright Office. But her statement deserves a reality check. Illustrators are not opposed to an orphan works bill. We're opposed to this bill.

We're opposed because its scope far exceeds the needs of responsible orphan works legislation.

Moreover, illustrators and artists are not the only stakeholders who oppose it. At last count, more than 83 creators organizations are on record against it, representing artists, photographers, writers, songwriters, musicians and countless small businesses.

Last year, we proposed amendments to the Orphan Works Act that would have made it a true orphan works bill. The amendments were drafted by the attorney who was chief legal counsel to the House Judiciary Committee in drafting the 1976 Copyright Act. The amendments were co-sponsored by the Artists Rights Society and the Advertising Photographers of America. They can be found here: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/2008/07/hr-5889-amendments.html

On July 11, 2008, we submitted those amendments to both the House and Senate Judiciary Committees. In our preamble we wrote this:

As rights holders, we can summarize our hopes for the Orphan Works Act simply: to see that it becomes a true orphan works bill, with no unnecessary spillover effect to damage the everyday commercial activities of working artists. We'd be happy to work with Congress to accomplish this. No legislation regarding the use of private property should be considered without the active participation of those whose property is at stake.

Last year more than 180,000 letters were sent to lawmakers from our Capwiz site. These letters did not come from obstructionists. They came from citizens whose property is at stake. They may lack the resources of big Internet companies and the access of high powered lobbyists, but last year they spoke. They asked only one thing: that Congress respect their personal property rights and amend this bill to make it nothing more than what its sponsors say they want it to be - a bill that would affect only true orphaned work.

We urge this Congress to listen.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

______________________________________________________________

For news and information, and an archive of these messages:
Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 83 organizations opposed the last Orphan Works bills, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message and wish to subscribe to the IPA mailing alerts, click on the link below, "Join Our Mailing List" and follow the simple directions on the webpage.
Please post or forward this message to any interested party.

Google attack!

2009-04-09T10:42:00.000-07:00

The Google attack!

Hold!

2009-01-29T00:13:00.001-08:00

It seems that Obama has frozen all legislation that was going through congress in the Bush administration, so for the time being there is no activity on this matter. Will keep you informed.

Lame duck countdown!

2008-12-02T22:10:00.000-08:00

Orphan Works: A Lame Duck Countdown:
Part II. The Legislative Blueprint

12.02.08

The "legislative blueprint" for the Orphan Works Act was not drafted by the Copyright Office after their year-long Orphan Works study, but before it, by law students at the Glushko-Samuelson Intellectual Property Law Clinic.

Their Copyright Clearance Initiative (CCI) is the document that first proposed the "limitation on remedies" that would radically change international copyright law. From page 5 of the CCI proposal:

"Under no circumstances will Sec. 504(c) statutory damages, attorney's fees, damages based on the user's profits or injunctive relief relating to the challenged use be available against a qualified user." http://copyright.gov/orphan/comments/OW0595-Glushko-Samuelson.pdf

This is the premise the Copyright Office adopted with only slight modifications: where the law students had proposed capping infringement fees at $100, the Copyright Office proposals changed that to an ambiguous "reasonable fee."

And how did the student authors describe their study of the orphan works issue?

"On April 11, 2003, the Clinic held a symposium with scholars, academics and other interested parties to discuss this issue. Since then, the work of CCI has focused its efforts on devising the blueprint for a legislative solution to the 'orphan works' problem...and has been in close contact with various non-profit organizations, intellectual practitioners and academics..."

A footnote names the eight "clinic students" who contributed to the "legislative solution." And among the "interested parties," the authors cite Public Knowledge, a group now actively promoting the Orphan works bill. Copyright holders were apparently not considered interested parties, as none are listed among those invited to participate.

The Clinic authors submitted their blueprint to the Copyright Office March 24, 2005. They cited no effort to survey the potential impact of their legislative solution on commercial markets - nor did the Copyright Office three years later, when they adopted the "limitation on remedies" and proposed it to Congress in their 2006 Report on Orphan Works.

The Director of the Glushko-Samuelson Law Clinic is a long-standing critic of existing copyright protections.

In 1994, legal scholar Peter Jaszi wrote that in the new "information environment" created by the internet, authors, artists and others "may not need the long, intense protection afforded by conventional copyright -- no matter how much they would like to have it."

Copyright, he wrote, is rooted in outdated concepts of "possessive individualism." The "romantic myth of authorship," he argued, is a vestige of the 18th and 19th centuries "in which entrepreneurial publishers...[and] entrepreneurial writers...played out their shared conviction that the "individual [is] essentially the proprietor of his own person or capacities -- and thus of whatever can be made of them."

Professor Jaszi has criticized the US for joining the international Berne Copyright Convention, calling it "an international agreement grounded in thoroughly Romantic assumptions about creativity." And he noted with disapproval:

"The first Act of this preeminent 'authors' rights' treaty in 1886 represented the culmination of a process which got underway in the mid-nineteenth-century with Victor Hugo's vigorous campaign for the rights of European writers and artists. Other famous 'authors' rallied to the cause: Gerhard Joseph suggests that the manic energy with which Charles Dickens championed international copyright stemmed from the novelist's private insecurities about his own 'originality.'"*

Note the scare quotes around "authors rights" and "originality." The Professor appears to subscribe to the postmodern cliché that all art is a form of collage and that authorship and originality are merely covers for one writers "vigor" or another's "manic energy" and "insecurities."

Maybe so, but a working author might guess that Dickens and Hugo were merely protecting their copyrights because that's how they made a living.

Citing the authority of postmodern critics, Professor Jaszi laments that their "critique of authorship" "has gone unheard by intellectual property lawyers."

"However enthusiastically legal scholars may have thrown themselves into 'deconstructing' other bodies of legal doctrine, copyright has remained untouched by the implications of the Derridean proposition that the inherent instability of meaning derives not from authorial subjectivity but from intertextuality. Above all, the questions posed by Michel Foucault in 'What Is an Author?' about the causes and consequences of the persistent, overdetermined power of the author construct -- with their immediate significance for law -- have gone largely unattended by theorists of copyright law, to say nothing of practitioners or, most critically, judges and legislators." -Page 12 The Construction of Authorship*

Or to put it in plain English: why hasn't Congress harkened to some collectivist literary critics and written their debatable theories into US copyright law?

With the Orphan Works bill, maybe they will.

Yet if this were one's goal - to impose a collectivist agenda on US copyright law, wouldn't forthrightness be the better policy? Shouldn't you say "we want to change the laws governing a citizen's ownership of his or her intellectual property" - then present the case frankly and debate it publicly and transparently?

Wouldn't that serve the public interest better than concealing the agenda behind a claim that you're only amending the law to "find homes for the poor orphan works" or making the world safe for folks to duplicate pictures of grandma?

Tomorrow: How many letters did it take to trigger the Orphan Works Bill? Would you believe 215?

*Quotes from the Introduction to The Construction of Authorship: Textual Appropriation in Law and Literature by Martha Woodmansee, Peter Jaszi, Editors, Duke University Press, 1994
http://books.google.com/books?id=dpRKltgJYYwC

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership
______________________________________________________________

Over 80 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses
Please post or forward this message to any interested party.

Lame duck!

2008-12-02T22:08:00.000-08:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works: Lame Duck Countdown

12.01.08

Part I. Little Known Facts

Congress will reconvene for a lame duck session next week. That means Orphan Works backers may try again to pass their bill by suspending the rules. We believe this bill is too controversial to be passed by backroom dealing. It would let commercial interests harvest and monetize the personal property of ordinary citizens without their knowledge.

The bill can be improved, and we've offered amendments that would improve it. But there's not enough time to improve it during a lame duck session. The bill should be held over until the next session of Congress, when those whose livelihood it will threaten can have the opportunity to present their case.

Over the next few days, we'll highlight some little known facts about the way this bill has been conceived, drafted and promoted. We believe these facts raise serious questions about the legislative process that has brought this legislation to the brink of passage:

1. The "legislative blueprint" for the Orphan Works bill was not the result of the Copyright Office's year-long Orphan Works Study. It was drafted before the study began, by law students who made no apparent effort to survey its potential impact on commercial markets.

2. The blueprint was drafted under the guidance of a legal scholar who opposes current copyright protections. He has written that authors in the internet age "may not need the long, intense protection afforded by conventional copyright -- no matter how much they would like to have it."

3. The Copyright Office received barely 200 relevant letters to their Orphan Works Study. Although they testified to Congress that the number was "over 850," they failed to acknowledge that more than 600 letters had to be dismissed as irrelevant or too vague to determine their relevance to orphaned work.

4. In their Orphan Works Report, the Copyright Office failed to acknowledge a unified statement submitted by 42 national and international visual arts organizations. This statement called for the maintenance of existing copyright protections and warned that a bill drafted too broadly would spread uncertainty in commercial markets.

5. The Copyright Office studied the specific subject of orphaned work, yet concluded they had discovered a widespread "market failure" in commercial markets. But since they didn't study commercial markets, there's no evidence for this conclusion in their report.

6. The principal author of the Orphan Works Report has acknowledged that their true goal was to "pressure" working authors into relying on registries to protect their work. He said this was necessary because artists and photographers have "failed to collectivize."

7. The first commercial Orphan Works domain name was registered by an anonymous party more than two years before the Copyright Office announced their Study. Did this anonymous party have a crystal ball? How did he know the Copyright Office would ever study orphan works? How did he know they'd open the door to commercial usage? And why did he register anonymously?

8. Two of the key players in the legislative process have already left government service and gone to work for companies that stand to profit from passage of the bill. On the other hand, one of the parties who testified in favor of the bill has already gone to the Copyright Office. She's now in charge of orphan works.

We think these and other little known facts give lawmakers sufficient reason not to pass this bill without a thorough vetting.

Tomorrow: The Legislative Blueprint: How a copyright critic and his students tackled the "orphan works issue."

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership
______________________________________________________________

Over 80 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses
Please post or forward this message to any interested party.

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-11-22T22:51:00.000-08:00

Orphan Works Update: House Recesses Until December

11.20.08

The lame duck session that started yesterday recessed abruptly this morning. Lawmakers plan to reconvene December 8th, subject to the Chair's discretion. We don't know how long they'll be in session when they return and economic developments could bring them back sooner.

We'll keep our eyes peeled, our ears open and update you when we learn more. In the meantime, have a great Thanksgiving, rest up and get ready for another bumpy ride. Thanks to all of you for your dedication and perseverance.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership
______________________________________________________________

Over 80 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators.

U.S. Creators and the image-making public can email Congress through the Capwiz site: http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/home/ 2 minutes is all it takes to tell the U.S. Congress to uphold copyright protection for the world's artists.

INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS please fax these 4 U.S. State Agencies and appeal to your home representatives for intervention. http://www.illustratorspartnership.org/01_topics/article.php?searchterm=00267

CALL CONGRESS: 1-800-828-0498. Tell the U.S. Capitol Switchboard Operator "I would like to leave a message for Congressperson _______ that I oppose the Orphan Works Act." The switchboard operator will patch you through to the lawmaker's office and often take a message which also gets passed on to the lawmaker. Once you're put through tell your Representative the message again.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

Please post or forward this message to any interested party.
STOP THE U.S. ORPHAN WORKS ACT NOW.

Just in!!

2008-11-22T22:49:00.000-08:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works Update: Congress has reconvened today.

11.19.08

They're scheduled to be in session until Friday, although that could change. And although sponsors of the Orphan Works bill say publicly that it won't come up, sources have told us they'll try to use the lame duck session to pass it by means of another back room deal.

Currently the situation in Washington is fluid, but if deals are being made, they'll be made before the bill is placed on the Suspensions calendar. Then they'll try to pass it immediately. How we respond will depend on developments. But while we keep watch, consider this news from the National Journal, Nov. 12, 2008:

Conyers To Abolish IP Subcommittee On Judiciary Panel
by Andrew Noyes

"House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers will abolish the Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet, and Intellectual Property in the new Congress and instead keep intellectual property issues at the full committee level, a Judiciary aide told CongressDaily today."

This is the subcommittee that spawned the Orphan Works Act and placed it on the "Rocket Docket." Yet remember last spring, when those lobbying for this bill warned us that unless we accepted it - no matter how bad it was - that the next chairman of the Subcommittee would be a copyright foe and would pass a worse one? Well, now the Subcommittee itself won't exist. So much for urging artists to bet against themselves!

This bill is very controversial. It would strip ordinary citizens of their intellectual property rights without due process. This is no way to pass legislation that would radically change US property laws. The bill can be fixed, but there is no time to fix it in a lame duck session. Stay tuned.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership
______________________________________________________________

Over 80 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators.

U.S. Creators and the image-making public can email Congress through the Capwiz site: http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/home/ 2 minutes is all it takes to tell the U.S. Congress to uphold copyright protection for the world's artists.

INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS please fax these 4 U.S. State Agencies and appeal to your home representatives for intervention. http://www.illustratorspartnership.org/01_topics/article.php?searchterm=00267

CALL CONGRESS: 1-800-828-0498. Tell the U.S. Capitol Switchboard Operator "I would like to leave a message for Congressperson __________ that I oppose the Orphan Works Act." The switchboard operator will patch you through to the lawmaker's office and often take a message which also gets passed on to the lawmaker. Once you're put through tell your Representative the message again.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

Please post or forward this message to any interested party.
STOP THE U.S. ORPHAN WORKS ACT NOW.

Just in!!

2008-10-07T22:14:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works: The Big Internet Factor

10.7.08

On October 2, several professional organizations sent a letter to every member of Congress, calling attention to the role of big internet companies in orphan works legislation. Here's an excerpt:

"We believe these bills mask an effort by Big Internet companies to profit by undermining existing global intellectual property rights protections...

"The lobbying efforts to promote this legislation pit small entrepreneurs and artists of all kinds against some of the largest and most well-financed Internet powerhouses in America...

"We find it deeply disturbing that the U.S. Copyright Office has so clearly and unambiguously advocated legislation that will privilege large commercial interests such as Google at the expense of creators and the countless small businesses that serve, and are dependent on the creative community.

"We find this even more troubling in light of Google's substantial contribution to the Library of Congress at a time when the Copyright Office was preparing its Orphan Works recommendations -- and at a time when Google had acknowledged to the SEC that its financial well-being is dependent on a business model that has already engendered multiple lawsuits for copyright infringement totaling billions of dollars.

"Google and other large database, advertising and search engine companies clearly have a major financial stake in the weakening of copyright law through new legislation. The Orphan Works Acts, if enacted in either of its current forms, would solve the problem that has vexed so many start-up internet companies: how to make money by giving away free content. By opening the door to potentially billions of "permitted" infringements of protected copyrights, this legislation would allow Big Internet to create an entirely new business model, by licensing content they don't have to pay for - through the digitizing, archiving and monetizing of the intellectual property of ordinary citizens."

To read the full letter go to: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/2008/10/orphan-works-big-internet-factor.html

The letter is signed by representatives of:

The Illustrators' Partnership of America
The Advertising Photographers of America
The Artists Foundation
The National Writers Union
pro-imaging.org
The Association of American Editorial Cartoonists
The National Cartoonists Society
______________________________________________________________

Over 79 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators.

U.S. Creators and the image-making public can email Congress through the Capwiz site: http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/home/ 2 minutes is all it takes to tell the U.S. Congress to uphold copyright protection for the world's artists.

INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS please fax these 4 U.S. State Agencies and appeal to your home representatives for intervention. http://www.illustratorspartnership.org/01_topics/article.php?searchterm=00267

CALL CONGRESS: 1-800-828-0498. Tell the U.S. Capitol Switchboard Operator "I would like to leave a message for Congressperson __________ that I oppose the Orphan Works Act." The switchboard operator will patch you through to the lawmaker's office and often take a message which also gets passed on to the lawmaker. Once you're put through tell your Representative the message again.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

Please post or forward this message to any interested party.
STOP THE U.S. ORPHAN WORKS ACT NOW.

Just in!!

2008-10-02T21:59:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

THE HOUSE ORPHAN WORKS BILL (H.R. 5889)
IS MOVING IN THE HOUSE NOW

10.2.08

Phone, fax, email these Congressman immediately

DELAHUNT Phone (202) 225 3111 Fax (202) 225-5658
Phone: (617) 770-3700 Fax: (617) 770-2984

CONYERS Phone: (202) 225-5126 Fax: (202) 225-0072
Phone: (313) 961-5670 Fax: (313) 226-2085

NADLER Phone: (202) 225-5635 Fax: (202) 225-6923
Phone: (212) 367-7350 Fax: (212) 367-7356

BERMAN Phone: (202) 225-4695 Fax: (202) 225-3196
Phone: (818) 994-7200 Fax: (818) 994-1050

EXPRESS YOUR OUTRAGE AT THE WAY THIS IS BEING DONE

We've been getting assurances all day that the bill was "dead for this year."

TELL THEM NOT TO PASS THIS ANTI-COPYRIGHT LAW

* UNDER COVER OF NIGHT
* UNDER COVER OF ECONOMIC CRISIS
* UNDER COVER OF ANOTHER TELEVISED DEBATE

TELL THEM THIS IS AN OUTRAGEOUS WAY TO RE-WRITE THE COPYRIGHT LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

Please post or forward this message immediately to any interested party.
_______________________________________________________________

For news and information:
Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 75 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

U.S. Creators and the image-making public can email Congress through the Capwiz site: http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/home/ 2 minutes is all it takes to tell the U.S. Congress to uphold copyright protection for the world's artists.

INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS please fax these 4 U.S. State Agencies and appeal to your home representatives for intervention. http://www.illustratorspartnership.org/01_topics/article.php?searchterm=00267

CALL CONGRESS: 1-800-828-0498. Tell the U.S. Capitol Switchboard Operator "I would like to leave a message for Congressperson __________ that I oppose the Orphan Works Act." The switchboard operator will patch you through to the lawmaker's office and often take a message which also gets passed on to the lawmaker. Once you're put through tell your Representative the message again.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area.

STOP THE U.S. ORPHAN WORKS ACT NOW.

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-10-02T03:04:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works: Not Dead Till It's Dead

10.1.08

Wired Magazine has posted an article: "'Orphan Works' Copyright Law Dies Quiet Death" http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/09/orphan-works-co.html
Well, we can hope. But we're dealing with a.) a fluid situation in Washington; and b.) special interests determined to pass this bill. So our assessment:

It's not dead till it's dead.

According to our DC sources, the most efficient way for Congress to pass this bill now would be for the House to scrap their own version and adopt the Senate's. There are procedural ways they can do this. Some say they will; some say they won't. It's enough to know they can.

There are special interest groups promoting the House bill now: big stock houses, for example, like Getty and Corbis, and groups working with them. They want an infringer-friendly "dark archive," a privately-owned "entity" sanctioned by the Copyright Office where infringers would file a notice of intent to infringe a work.

Since artists would not have access to this dark archive, the "sanctioned entity" would be of no use to us until our work has been infringed and we've filed a case in federal court. And then it would mostly serve the interests of infringers - letting them prove in court they had done the minimal necessary paperwork before they infringed.

The important thing to remember about the House bill is that there is no protection for artists in it. It would simply give more middlemen a chance to profit from this gutting of copyright law.

We know it's hard to ask Congress to focus on copyright law with a financial crisis looming. But we didn't pick this fight and it's our rights at stake if we don't.

There is no national emergency for orphan works that requires Congress to pass this bill - which was drafted in secret - in the dark of night.

Please contact your House Representative today. Tell them not to pass the House bill. Tell them not to adopt the Senate's.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

TAKE ACTION: EMAIL CONGRESS NOW
http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/issues/alert/?alertid=11980321

Please post or forward this message immediately to any interested party.
_______________________________________________________________

For news and information:
Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 75 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

U.S. Creators and the image-making public can email Congress through the Capwiz site: http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/home/ 2 minutes is all it takes to tell the U.S. Congress to uphold copyright protection for the world's artists.

INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS please fax these 4 U.S. State Agencies and appeal to your home representatives for intervention. http://www.illustratorspartnership.org/01_topics/article.php?searchterm=00267

CALL CONGRESS: 1-800-828-0498. Tell the U.S. Capitol Switchboard Operator "I would like to leave a message for Congressperson __________ that I oppose the Orphan Works Act." The switchboard operator will patch you through to the lawmaker's office and often take a message which also gets passed on to the lawmaker. Once you're put through tell your Representative the message again.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area.

STOP THE U.S. ORPHAN WORKS ACT NOW.

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-09-30T22:00:00.000-07:00

Orphan Works: Connect the Dots

9.30.08

1. Web firms quietly win copyright victory in Congress

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) Sept 29 -- As the media turned its attention last weekend to battles on Capitol Hill over the fate of the proposed Wall Street bailout bill, Internet companies including Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp. quietly walked away with a legislative victory that could facilitate their use of copyrighted material.

The Senate on Friday passed the Orphan Works Act of 2008, legislation that weakens copyright protection for works whose owners cannot be located. The legislation has now been referred to the House Judiciary Committee.

The legislation requires only that a company make a "reasonably diligent" search to locate a copyright owner before using their work in media including the Internet, and limits compensation required for the use of an infringed work.

-By John Letzing, MarketWatch Sept. 29, 2008
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/web-firms-quietly-win-copyright/story.aspx?guid={E21206C0-98F5-459B-9506-8133CBD82859}&dist=hpts

2. Google Acknowledges Copyright Infringement Claims Could Harm Business

ILLUSTRATORS PARTNERSHIP Sept 30 -- In March 2007, Google filed a mandatory 10-Q Filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In it, they acknowledged: "copyright claims filed against us [by copyright owners] alleging that features of certain of our products and services, including Google Web Search, Google News, Google Video, Google Image Search, Google Book Search and YouTube, infringe their rights."

Google admitted that "[a]dverse results in these lawsuits may include awards of substantial monetary damages, costly royalty or licensing agreements or orders preventing us from offering certain functionalities, and may also result in a change in our business practices, which could result in a loss of revenue for us or otherwise harm our business." (Italics added.)

--Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, Illustrators Partnership
http://investor.google.com/documents/20070331_10-Q.html

3. Google Sees Value in Orphan Works

ILLUSTRATORS PARTNERSHIP March 8, 2006 -- At the Copyright Office's Orphan Works Roundtables, July 26-27, 2005, Alexander MacGilivray of Google stated:

"The thing that I would encourage the Copyright Office to consider is not just the very, very small scale -the one user who wants to make use of the [orphan] work - but also the very, very large scale - and talking in the millions of works. - page 21

"Google strongly believes that these orphan works are both worthwhile, useful, and extremely valuable." - page 119

"We expect that our use of these orphan works will likely be in the 1 million works range..." (Italics added.) - page 166

"[W]e know that many of them [orphan works] will be in the public domain, that most of their authors won't care. But there are a few [authors] that really will care and they will come forward [to claim authorship] and it will be extremely inefficient for us." (Italics added.) -page 166
(Page numbers are from Copyright Office transcripts.)

Orphan Works Roundtables were held by the US Copyright Office July 26-7, 2005 in Washington DC
http://www.copyright.gov/orphan/transcript/0726LOC.PDF

4. Google Donates $3 Million to U.S. Library of Congress

Australian IT Nov 23, 2005 -- The U.S. Library of Congress is kicking off a campaign to work with other nation's libraries to build a World Digital Library, starting with a $US3 million donation from Google.

-Eric Auchard in San Francisco | November 23, 2005
http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,17339145%5E15409%5E%5Enbv%5E15306-15322,00.html

TAKE ACTION: EMAIL CONGRESS NOW
http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/issues/alert/?alertid=11980321

Please post or forward this message immediately to any interested party.
_______________________________________________________________

For news and information:
Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 75 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

U.S. Creators and the image-making public can email Congress through the Capwiz site: http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/home/ 2 minutes is all it takes to tell the U.S. Congress to uphold copyright protection for the world's artists.

INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS please fax these 4 U.S. State Agencies and appeal to your home representatives for intervention. http://www.illustratorspartnership.org/01_topics/article.php?searchterm=00267

CALL CONGRESS: 1-800-828-0498. Tell the U.S. Capitol Switchboard Operator "I would like to leave a message for Congressperson __________ that I oppose the Orphan Works Act." The switchboard operator will patch you through to the lawmaker's office and often take a message which also gets passed on to the lawmaker. Once you're put through tell your Representative the message again.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area.

STOP THE ORPHAN WORKS ACT NOW.

Just in!

2008-09-29T01:09:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works: Legislation by Misdirection

9.29.08

The architects of the Orphan Works Act have already placed testaments to the bill on their websites:

Senator Leahy: http://leahy.senate.gov/issues/OrphanWorks.html
Senator Hatch: http://tinyurl.com/3jsq5o

They say this "landmark intellectual property bill" will "unlock proverbial attics of copyrighted works" whose owners can't be found. Is that really what all the fuss has been about?

No. If that were the case, the problems could be solved with a modest expansion of Fair Use. It's not proverbial closets we fear seeing unlocked. It's our commercial inventories, which would be exposed to potential infringement.

And while one Senator pointedly writes that the bill "does not dramatically restructure copyright law" (emphasis added), he's right: it doesn't "restructure" it. It merely redefines an orphaned work so broadly that it would let users infringe millions of works as orphans on the premise that some might be.

And why, if the bill is only meant to benefit libraries and museums, have the doors been opened wide for commercial usage?

A Fundamental Change to Copyright Law

For us, the saddest of these postings is on the Copyright Office website itself. http://www.copyright.gov/orphan/ There, Marybeth Peters, the Register of Copyrights explains that this bill is necessary because the U.S., in trying to harmonize our law with international agreements, has created too many orphans.

But that's not the sad part. There are orphans. She's entitled to her belief. And as Register of Copyrights, she's entitled to lobby for a change in the law. But what's sad is that the Register, who we've respected for years as an advocate for creators rights, has chosen to justify this legislative scheme by mischaracterizing the honest objections that creators have raised in good faith, again and again.

Here's how she summarizes the objections of the hundreds of thousands of artists, writers, photographers and musicians who oppose this bill:

"Some critics [she writes] believe that the legislation is unfair because it will deprive copyright owners of injunctive relief, statutory damages, and actual damages. I do not agree."

Well, those are all real issues, but they've never been our focus. We've made our case clearly, simply and often.

Our objection goes to the heart of the matter. Here it is, as one of us expressed it in his opening statement at the Small Business Administration Roundtable, August 8:

"The bill's sponsors say it's merely a small adjustment to copyright law. In fact, its logic
reverses copyright law. It presumes that the public is entitled to use your work as a primary right and that it's your obligation to make your work available. If this bill passes, in theUnited States, copyright will no longer be the exclusive right of the copyright holder."
- From "Orphan Works: A Hobson's Choice for Artists," by Brad Holland August 8 2008

And in case the point needed elaboration:

"This exclusive right matters to artists for three reasons:
· Creative control: No one can change your work without your permission;
· Ownership: No one can use your work without your permission;
· Value: In the marketplace, your ability to sell exclusive rights to a client triples the value
of your work.
- http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/2008/08/orphan-works-hobsons-choice-for-artists.html

The Orphan Works Act passed by the Senate Friday explicitly voids that exclusive right as expressed in Article 9 of the Berne Copyright Convention:

(1) Authors of literary and artistic works protected by this Convention shall have the exclusive right of authorizing the reproduction of these works, in any manner or form.

(2) It shall be a matter for legislation in the countries of the Union to permit the reproduction of such works in certain special cases, provided that such reproduction does not conflict with a normal exploitation of the work and does not unreasonably prejudice the legitimate interests of the author.

(3) Any sound or visual recording shall be considered as a reproduction for the purposes of this Convention.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/treaties/berne/9.html

There can be no responsible argument that the Orphan Works Act is consistent with Article 9 of Berne. None.

Simple reason: the Orphan Works Act does not limit exemptions to an author's exclusive right to "certain special cases." Case closed.

There are many other reasons to object to this terrible bill: it violates the entirety of Article 9. But we only need to make this single point to show that it's a radically new copyright law.

Hiding the Rabbit

The key to the Congressional magic act has been to hide an anti-copyright rabbit in an Orphan Works hat while misdirecting attention to a tedious debate about "reasonably diligent searches," injunctive relief and statutory damages.

Meanwhile the secret of the trick has been simple: redefine an orphaned work as "a work by an unlocatable author."

This new definition would permit any person to infringe any work by any artist at any time for any reason - no matter how commercial - so long as the infringer found the author sufficiently hard to find.

Since everybody can be hard for somebody to find, this voids a rights holder's exclusive right to his own property. It defines the public's right to use private property as a default position, available to anyone whenever the property owner fails to make himself sufficiently available.

This is a new definition of copyright law.

The headline on the Copyright Office website should read:

In the United States, Copyright Will No Longer Be the Exclusive Right of the Copyright Holder.

This headline would at least have the virtue of candor.

On March 13, the Register of Copyrights testified before the House IP Subcommittee. On page 1 of her testimony she said:

"Every country has orphan works and I believe that, sooner or later, every country will be motivated to consider a solution. The solution proposed by the Copyright Office is a workable one and will be of interest to other countries."
http://www.copyright.gov/docs/regstat031308.html

You can bet it will be of interest to other countries, because the copyrights of other countries can now be orphans in the U.S. too. The Copyright Office and the Senate have thrown down a gauntlet to the world.

Write your congressional representatives today and tell them not to follow.

-Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

TAKE ACTION: EMAIL CONGRESS NOW
Tell the House Judiciary Committee not to adopt the Senate version.

We've supplied a special letter for this purpose:
http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/issues/alert/?alertid=11980321

Please post or forward this message immediately to any interested party.
_______________________________________________________________

For ongoing developments, go to the Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works Blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 70 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

The Capwiz site is open to professional creators and any member of the image-making public. International artists will find a special link, with a sample letter and instructions as to whom to write.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area.

Please post or forward this email to any interested party.

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-09-28T21:59:00.001-07:00

Orphan Works: The Devil's Own Day
Never Too Busy to Pass Special
Interest Legislation 9.28.08
As lawmakers struggled Friday to clean up the mess on Wall Street, sponsors of the Orphan Works Act passed more special interest legislation. Their bill would force copyright holders to subsidize giant copyright databases run by giant internet firms.

Like the companies now needing billion dollar bailouts, these copyright registries - which would theoretically contain the entire copyright wealth of the US - would presumably be "too big to fail." Yet it's our wealth, not theirs, the scheme would risk.

Small business owners didn't ask for this legislation. We don't want it and we don't need it. Our opposition numbers have been growing daily. So Friday, the bill's sponsors reached for the hotline.

What is Hotlining?

Critics of hotlining say "that lawmakers are essentially signing off on legislation neither they nor their staff have ever read."

"In order for a bill to be hotlined, the Senate Majority Leader and Minority Leader must agree to pass it by unanimous consent, without a roll-call vote. The two leaders then inform Members of this agreement using special hotlines installed in each office and give Members a specified amount of time to object - in some cases as little as 15 minutes. If no objection is registered, the bill is passed."
- Roll Call, Sept 17, 2007

In other words, a Senate bill can pass by "unanimous consent" even if some Senators don't know about it.

The Devil's Own Day

Senators Leahy and Hatch hotlined the Orphan Works Act twice last summer. Each time came at the end of a day, at the end of a week, near the end of a legislative session. Each time lawmakers were distracted by other issues and other plans. Each time artists rallied quickly and each time a Senator put a hold on the bill.

Friday the Senators found a new opportunity.

With lawmakers struggling to package a 700 billion dollar bailout to avert a worldwide economic meltdown, with the rest of the country focused on Presidential debates, with Washington in chaos and Congressional phone lines jammed, they hotlined an amended bill. On short notice, even the legislative aides we could reach by phone said they didn't have time to read it. And so, while we were rushing to get out a second email blast to artists, the bill passed by "unanimous consent" - in other words, by default.

What better way to pass a bill that was drafted in secret than to pass it while nobody's looking?

Since Friday, artists have been conducting bitter post mortems on their blogs. That's understandable, but it's not time yet.

"When Sherman arrived at Grant's headquarters later that evening, he found the general - broken sword and all - chewing on a soggy cigar in the rain, which had begun soaking the battlefield.

'Well, Grant,' Sherman said to his friend, 'we've had the devil's own day, haven't we?'

'Yes,' replied Grant, 'lick 'em tomorrow, though.'"

The Senate passed their bill Friday, but the House hasn't. There's still time to write, phone and fax your congressional representatives. Tell them not to let the House Judiciary Committee fold their bill and adopt the Senate's.

Tell Congress to protect the private property of small businesses. Lick 'em tomorrow.

- Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership
Quote from "The Devil's Own Day," by Christopher Allen, January 2000 America's Civil War Magazine

TAKE ACTION: EMAIL CONGRESS TONIGHT
Tell the House Judiciary Committee not to adopt the Senate version.

We've supplied a special letter for this purpose: http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/issues/alert/?alertid=11980321

Please post or forward this message immediately to any interested party.

Responce!

2008-09-27T00:09:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works Opposition: Plan B

SEPT 27 Yesterday, in a cynical move, the sponsors of the Senate Orphan Works Act passed their controversial bill by a controversial practice known as hotlining.

With lawmakers scrambling to raise 700 billion dollars to bail out businesses that are "too big to fail," the Senate passed a bill that would force small copyright holders to subsidize big internet interests such as Google, which has already said it plans to use millions of the images this bill will orphan.

With the meltdown on Wall Street, this is no time for Congress to concentrate our nation's copyright wealth in the hands of a few privately owned corporate databases. The contents of these databases would be more valuable than secure banking information. Yet this bill would compel creators to risk their own intellectual property to supply content to these corporate business models. That means it would be our assets at risk in the event of their failure or mismanagement.

As David Rhodes, President of the School of Visual Arts has said, the Orphan Works bill would socialize the expense of copyright protection while privatizing the profit of creative endeavors. Copyright owners neither want nor need this legislation. It will do great harm to small businesses. We already have a banking crisis. Congress should not lay the groundwork for a copyright crisis.

--Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Illustrators' Partnership

NOW FOR PLAN B

We MUST try to stop the House Judiciary Committee from folding their bill (HR5889) and adopting the Senate version.

PLEASE EMAIL CONGRESS TODAY.
If you've done it before, do it again!

It takes only a minute to use our new special letter.
Click on the link below, enter your zip code, and take the next steps.
Thanks to all of you who heeded the call to action yesterday.

http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/issues/alert/?alertid=11980321

_______________________________________________________________

For ongoing developments, go to the Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 70 organizations oppose this bill, representing over half a million creators. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

The Capwiz site is open to professional creators and any member of the image-making public. International artists will find a special link, with a sample letter and instructions as to whom to write.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area.

Please post or forward this email to any interested party.

The Senate has just passed their version of the Orphan Works Bill!

2008-09-26T22:29:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works: Risking Our Nation's Copyright Wealth

The Senate has just passed their version of the Orphan Works Bill

Now we must try to stop the House Judiciary Committee from folding their bill and adopting the Senate version.

We've supplied a special letter for this purpose.

PLEASE EMAIL CONGRESS TONIGHT.

USE THIS LINK
http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/issues/alert/?alertid=11980321

-Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership
__________________________________________________

For ongoing developments, go to the Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Over 70 organizations are united in opposing this bill in its current form. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

The Capwiz site is open to professional creators and any member of the image-making public. Sample letters have been provided. International artists will find a special link, with a sample letter and instructions as to whom to write.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area.

Please post or forward this message in its entirety to any interested party.

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-09-26T22:28:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

ORPHAN WORKS BILL HOTLINED
Again.

THIS MEANS IT COULD PASS THE SENATE THIS AFTERNOON
PLEASE CALL YOUR SENATORS IMMEDIATELY

ASK THEM TO VOTE NO ON THIS BILL:
S2913 THE SHAWN BENTLEY ORPHAN WORKS ACT OF 2008

ASK THEM TO PUT A "HOLD" ON THE BILL:
TELL THEM YOU OPPOSE THIS CONTROVERSIAL BILL
ASK THEM NOT TO PASS IT WITHOUT A FULL AND OPEN HEARING
WARN THEM THAT IT WILL DO GREAT HARM TO SMALL BUSINESSES

To find your Senators' phone numbers go to the Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works site:

http://illustratorspartnership.capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/dbq/officials/

At the top of the home page, click on "Elected Officials"
You'll find a US map:
Click on your state,
Then "Senators,"
Then click on each Senator's name,
Then click "Contact."
This will give you their phone and fax numbers.

Please phone and fax them both immediately.

-Brad Holland and Cynthia Turner, for the Board of the Illustrators' Partnership

__________________________________________________

Over 70 organizations are united in opposing this bill in its current form. Illustrators, photographers, fine artists, songwriters, musicians, and countless licensing firms all believe this bill will harm their small businesses.

The Capwiz site is open to professional creators and any member of the image-making public. Sample letters have been provided. International artists will find a special link, with a sample letter and instructions as to whom to write.

If you received our mail as a forwarded message, and wish to be added to our mailing list, email us at: illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com Place "Add Name" in the subject line, and provide your name and the email address you want used in the message area.

Please post or forward this message in its entirety to any interested party.

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-09-15T22:46:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

Orphan Works: Responses to the House Judiciary Committee

If you've written Congress about the Orphan Works bill, you may have received a reply based on talking points supplied by the House Judiciary Committee. Recently, a Congressman asked us to respond to them in detail. On September 1, we did. We've posted our replies on our blog:
http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

The Committee's statements are taken verbatim from their talking points. Our responses have been filed with the Small Business Administration for distribution to members of Congress. Artists are free to use any of our responses in their own letters to lawmakers.

Some excerpts:

[T]his bill re-defines an "orphaned work" as any work by any author that any potential user ever finds hard to find. Sooner or later, that could be every work by every author. This bill will define millions of works as orphans on the premise that some may be.
Why must an owner be "easily found" by parties other than those the owner chooses to do business with? Is there a national emergency in visual images that requires legislation to regulate this sector of the free market?
There's no need for government intervention here. We're professionals. We're alive, working and managing our copyrights. We can be found. Our clients find us all the time. But that doesn't mean that anyone, anywhere can find us. And frankly, why should it? Basing a law on this questionable premise is not solving an orphaned work problem. It's legalizing the taking of private property.
The argument that artists can always resolve orphan works disputes in court is a measure of the bill's most serious defect: Any law that drives business decisions into the courts is bad for business and bad for the courts.
We believe our work benefits the public by being published through the channels where we wish to publish it. The current copyright law works by giving us the incentive to keep doing this.
Authors' rights are exclusive. Public interest cannot compel creators to publish their work. So by what right of eminent domain can government give members of the public the right to publish their work for them?

- Brad Holland, for the Illustrators' Partnership

For ongoing developments, go to the Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Take Action: Don't Let Congress Orphan Our Work
E-mail your Senators and Representatives with one click. Go to:
http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/home/

This Capwiz site is open to professional creators and any member of the image-making public.
Sample letters have been provided. International artists will find a special link, with a sample letter and instructions as to whom to write.

Two minutes is all it takes to write Congress and defend full copyright protection for creators.

This email may be posted or forwarded in its entirety to any interested party.

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-09-10T21:25:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

With Congress back in session this week, Orphan Works rumors are back too.
According to some sources, deals have been made to pass the bills quickly.
According to others, the bills have stalled for this session.
Here's what we know, independent of conflicting sources:

SEPT 6 OpenCongress Lists "8 Controversial Bills That Congress Still May Pass"
In Congress Gossip, by Donny Shaw, the article notes that the Orphan Works Bills "have been called out by concerned citizens... but are in a good position to quickly become law" in the next several weeks. The author quotes artist Brad Holland and attorney Larry Lessig in opposition to the legislation, and ends with this quote from "an anonymous OpenCongress user":

"Isn't it funny how music is getting huge, sledgehammer like protection in HR 4279 and visual art is getting devalued and made worthless by this bill, HR 5889? Music must just be soo much more valuable. It's all about the corporate interests. Artists need to band together for our own protection and fight this dangerous bill. I'm an art student, and while I will never stop making art I'm worried I'll be unable to make a living at it. It's never been easy to be an artist without this kind of stuff coming along and making it impossible for us."

Read the full article here: http://www.opencongress.org/articles/view/636-8-Controversial-Bills-That-Congress-Still-May-Pass

SEPT 10 Authors Groups Submit Opposition Papers to Small Business Administration
The Illustrators' Partnership, Artists Rights Society and Advertising Photographers of America have submitted over 60 papers and articles to the Office of Advocacy of the US Small Business Administration. These written statements were filed on behalf of attorneys, illustrators, designers, fine artists, photographers, songwriters, musicians, writers, members of the art licensing community and other small business owners. All are opposed to the bill.

These papers are the written statements submitted in conjunction with the Orphan Works Roundtable, conducted by the SBA August 8, 2008 at the Salmagundi Club in New York City. The package will be distributed to lawmakers in both houses of Congress.

The webcast of the SBA Roundtable is available here: http://videos.cmitnyc.com/asip.html

A PDF of the collected papers will be available soon from the Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

AUGUST 30 Copyright Expert Releases Analysis of Orphan Works Bills
Leading copyright expert Jane C. Ginsburg of the Columbia Law School has published a major Orphan Works piece, the first of a two part article:
Recent Developments in US Copyright Law: Part I - "Orphan" Works.

Professor Ginsburg's scholarly paper raises several critical questions about the current legislation. Among various points, she notes that certain provisions appear to violate Article 10.1 of the Berne Convention, which prohibits prejudicial exceptions to an author's exclusive right of copyright. She states that the preclusion of injunctive relief with respect to derivative works would appear to force authors to tolerate "even derivative uses they find offensive or that distort their works," and she adds that this "has economic consequences as well," depriving the author of the right "to grant exclusive derivative work rights to a third party. The bill thus potentially devalues the derivative work right."

"The US proposals," she writes, "may run afoul of EU restrictions" for various reasons, and adds: "[t]here may also be Berne- compatibility problems regarding the inclusion of non-divulged [unpublished] works in the proposed orphan works regime...[T]he bills should exclude "orphan works" which have never been disclosed to the public, and whose authors are still living."

"The 'progress of knowledge' to which US copyright aspires," she writes, "is achieved not only by putting works into circulation, but also by fostering conditions conducive to creativity."

The full paper can be accessed here: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1263361

SEPT 6 French Magazine Telerama Sounds Orphan Works Warning
Main basse sur les images "orphelines" by Olivier Pascal-Moussellard. In this article, initiated by artist Etienne Delessert, the popular French magazine notes that 60 organizations oppose the controversial US bill and warns that it threatens to harm international artists as well "if they don't wake up." In opposition to the bill, it quotes Brad Holland and Dr. Ted Feder, President of the Artists Rights Society, which represents the estates of Matisse, Picasso, Chagall and tens of thousands of others. It also quotes Stefan Biberfeld, legal director of Corbis Europe, noting that stock agencies such as Getty and Corbis will benefit from passage of the legislation because it will allow them to market orphaned work without fear of being "intimidated" by copyright owners. The article is in French.

"LE FIL ARTS ET SCÈNES- Menace sur les droits d'auteur : une loi américaine veut rendre libre l'usage des photos, tableaux ou dessins dont on ne connaît pas l'auteur. A qui profite-t-elle ?"

"Simple question de bon sens, disent les uns. Hold-up légal, rétorquent les autres. Légal, car perpétré par les députés et sénateurs américains, téléguidés en coulisse par les géants d'Internet. L'objet du casse ? Les droits d'auteur des peintres, dessinateurs et photographes américains, mais peut-être aussi ceux de leurs collègues étrangers s'ils ne se réveillent pas."

TRANSLATION: "Threat to artists' copyrights: A U.S. law would free up the exploitation of photos, paintings, and illustrations whose creators cannot be located. Who profits?

Some maintain that "It's a simple question of common sense". Others retort that "It's legal highway robbery." Legal, because the law is being perpetrated by U.S. Congressmen and Senators remotely controlled by internet giants operating behind the scenes. The target of this break-in: the copyrights of American painters, photographers and illustrators, but perhaps also of their foreign colleagues if they don't wake up in time."

Read the full article: http://www.telerama.fr/scenes/main-basse-sur-les-images-orphelines,33013.php

For ongoing developments, go to the Illustrators' Partnership Orphan Works blog: http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/

Take Action: Don't Let Congress Orphan Our Work
E-mail your Senators and Representatives with one click. Go to:
http://capwiz.com/illustratorspartnership/home/

This Capwiz site is open to professional creators and any member of the image-making public.
Sample letters have been provided. International artists will find a special link, with a sample letter and instructions as to whom to write. Two minutes is all it takes to write Congress and defend full copyright protection for creators.

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-08-14T23:12:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

The webcast of the Orphan Works Roundtable is now available here:

http://videos.cmitnyc.com/asip.html

"A Seminal Event"
"Unprecedented"
"The most effective advocacy in opposition to these bills I have seen."
"The Gathering of the Tribes"

These are some of the comments we've received from last Friday's Roundtable on Orphan Works, conducted by the Small Business Administration. Artists, photographers, songwriters, musicians, writers and spokesmen for collateral businesses all made this the best attended Roundtable the SBA has conducted.

As one member of the audience said, perhaps the only good thing about the Orphan Works bill is that it's brought so many creative communities together. The full house is the best measure of the concern creators have about this effort to undermine copyright law.

Here are some of the key points to emerge from the discussion:
The high cost of digitizing and registering work with commercial databases will make compliance impossible for most artists.
This will cause billions of unregistered works to fall into the public domain.
To make money, commercial databases will have to promote and facilitate infringement.
Infringer-friendly databases will compete with artists for clients.

As one panelist summed up: this bill "will socialize costs and privatize profits."

If you missed this important industry event, please watch it now at your convenience.

Please forward this message and link to every copyright holder you know.

You may review the agenda, the panelists and their biographies on the Illustrators' Partnership blog:
http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/2008/08/80808-sba-hearing-on-orphan-works.html

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-08-04T22:41:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

A Reminder: You are invited to attend
THE ORPHAN WORKS ROUNDTABLE
CONDUCTED BY THE SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

How Will the Orphan Works Bill Economically Impact Small Entities?
This Friday, August 8, 2008
10:00 a.m. - 12:00 noon
Salmagundi Club
47 Fifth Avenue (between 11th & 12th Streets)
New York, NY 10003
212-255-7740
http://www.salmagundi.org
Free Admission

If you live in the New York area, please attend this critical event in person. Congress established the SBA's Office of Advocacy to represent the views of people like us before Federal agencies and Congress. One of their goals is to ensure that our voices aren't lost within the lawmaking process. Your presence at this grassroots event will do much to see that our voices get heard.

Until now, Orphan Works legislation has been driven by anti-copyright forces and special interest groups. Their talking points have defined the issue. That's why, if you've written lawmakers, you may have received those talking points as a response.

We need to get our own views before lawmakers. We've had to go to Washington to make the case for artists. Now Washington is coming to us. We thank the SBA for agreeing to conduct this unprecedented field hearing and we thank the Salmagundi Club for offering us their space.

Don't miss this opportunity to show that our industry is united in opposing the Orphan Works bill.
This bill would radically change copyright law.
The change would create an entirely new business model for the licensing of copyrighted work.
That business model would favor large corporate image banks at the expense of individual creators.
This would harm artists, photographers, songwriters, musicians, writers.
It would harm the small businesses that serve and are dependent on the creative community.
This is a side of the story Congressmen haven't heard so far. We need to make it part of an open, public debate.

The Roundtable will be chaired by Tom Sullivan, Director of the Office of Advocacy of the Small Business Administration. Eighteen distinguished panelists, all from the creative community, will represent the copyright interests of grassroots artists.

This event will be webcast.
PLEASE RSVP to illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com and include the names of those attending.

You may review the agenda, the panelists and their biographies on the IPA blog:
http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/2008/08/80808-sba-hearing-on-orphan-works.html

Just in from Illustrators Partnership

2008-08-01T22:23:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ILLUSTRATORS' PARTNERSHIP

You are cordially invited to attend
THE ORPHAN WORKS ROUNDTABLE AND WEBCAST
CONDUCTED BY THE SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

How Will the Orphan Works Bill Economically Impact Small Entities?
Friday, August 8, 2008
10:00 a.m. - 12:00 noon
Salmagundi Club
47 Fifth Avenue (between 11th & 12th Streets)
New York, NY 10003
212-255-7740
http://www.salmagundi.org
Free Admission

Please attend this important industry event. Let government officials hear directly from those of us who will be harmed if this bill passes.

Until now, the Orphan Works bill has been driven by anti-copyright forces and special interest groups. This will be our first opportunity to be heard in a government sponsored forum devoted to the business interests of copyright holders. The Roundtable will be chaired by Tom Sullivan, Director of the Office of Advocacy of the Small Business Administration (SBA). It will give artists from the Northeast the chance to explain the impact of Orphan Works legislation on our careers and the art we create.
Will the cost of compliance create an unreasonable burden on artists, writers and musicians?
Will the failure to register work lead to the loss of copyrights?
Why should artists be forced to supply their business data to commercial databases?
Will the bill create a new business model favoring large corporations at the expense of individual artists?
Will this change the nature of competition for all of us?
Eighteen distinguished panelists, all from the creative community, will represent the copyright interests of illustrators, photographers, fine artists, art licensors, writers, musicians, and the collateral businesses that serve and are dependent on creators.

Congress established the Office of Advocacy under Pub. L. 94-305 to represent the views of small entities before Federal agencies and Congress. Advocacy is an independent office within the Small Business Administration.

This event will be webcast.
PLEASE RSVP to illustratorspartnership@cnymail.com and include the names of those attending.

You may review the agenda, the panelists and their biographies on the IPA blog:
http://ipaorphanworks.blogspot.com/2008/08/80808-sba-hearing-on-orphan-works.html