"Copyright Compliance and Infringement in ResearchGate Full-Text Journal Articles"

Hamid R. Jamali has self-archived "Copyright Compliance and Infringement in ResearchGate Full-Text Journal Articles."

Here's an excerpt:

This study aims to investigate the extent to which ResearchGate members as authors of journal articles comply with publishers' copyright policies when they self-archive full-text of their articles on ResearchGate. . . . The key finding was that 201 (51.3%) out of 392 non-OA articles infringed the copyright and were non-compliant with publishers' policy. While 88.3% of journals allowed some form of self-archiving (SHERPA/RoMEO green, blue or yellow journals), the majority of non-compliant cases (97.5%) occurred when authors self-archived publishers' PDF files (final published version).

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"’Notice-and-Stay-Down’ Is Really ‘Filter-Everything’"

Elliot Harmon has published "'Notice-and-Stay-Down' Is Really 'Filter-Everything'" in Deeplinks.

Here's an excerpt:

There's a debate happening right now over copyright bots, programs that social media websites use to scan users’ uploads for potential copyright infringement. A few powerful lobbyists want copyright law to require platforms that host third-party content to employ copyright bots, and require them to be stricter about what they take down. Big content companies call this nebulous proposal "notice-and-stay-down," but it would really keep all users down, not just alleged infringers. In the process, it could give major content platforms like YouTube and Facebook an unfair advantage over competitors and startups (as if they needed any more advantages). "Notice-and-stay-down" is really "filter-everything."

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"Copyright: The Immoveable Barrier That Open Access Advocates Underestimated"

Richard Poynder has published "Copyright: The Immoveable Barrier That Open Access Advocates Underestimated."

Here's an excerpt:

In calling for research papers to be made freely available open access advocates promised that doing so would lead to a simpler, less costly, more democratic, and more effective scholarly communication system. To achieve their objectives they proposed two different ways of providing open access: green OA (self-archiving) and gold OA (open access publishing). However, while the OA movement has succeeded in persuading research institutions and funders of the merits of open access, it has failed to win the hearts and minds of most researchers. More importantly, it is not achieving its objectives. There are various reasons for this, but above all it is because OA advocates underestimated the extent to which copyright would subvert their cause.

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EFF Submits Amicus Brief in Cambridge Press v. Georgia State University E-Reserves Copyright Case

The EFF has submitted an Amicus Brief in the Cambridge Press v. Georgia State University case.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

On behalf of three national library associations, EFF today urged a federal appeals court for the second time to protect librarians' and students' rights to make fair use of excerpts from academic books and research.

Nearly a decade ago, three of the largest academic publishers in the world—backed by the Association of American Publishers (AAP) trade group—sued Georgia State University (GSU) for copyright infringement . . . GSU argued that posting excerpts in the e-reserve systems was a "fair use " of the material, thus not subject to licensing fees. GSU also changed its e-reserve policy to ensure its practices were consistent with a set of fair use best practices that were developed pursuant to a broad consensus among libraries and other stakeholders. . . .

But that was not enough to satisfy the publishers. Rather than declare victory, they've doggedly pursued their claims. It seems the publishers will not be content until universities and libraries agree to further decimate their budgets. As we explain in our brief, that outcome would undermine the fundamental purposes of copyright, not to mention both the public interest, and the interests of the authors of the works in question.

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"An Empirical Study of Law Journal Copyright Practices"

Brian L. Frye, Christopher J. Ryan, Jr., and Franklin L. Runge have published "An Empirical Study of Law Journal Copyright Practices" in the Review of Intellectual Property Law.

Here's an excerpt:

This article presents an empirical study of the copyright practices of American law journals in relation to copyright ownership and fair use, based on a 24-question survey. It concludes that many American law journals have adopted copyright policies that are inconsistent with the expectations of legal scholars and the scope of copyright protection. Specifically, many law journals have adopted copyright policies that effectively preclude open-access publishing, and unnecessarily limit the fair use of copyrighted works. In addition, it appears that some law journals may not understand their own copyright policies. This article proposes the creation of a Code of Copyright Best Practices for Law Journals in order to encourage both open-access publishing and fair use.

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Creative Commons Releases CC Search Beta

The Creative Commons has released CC Search Beta.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Our goal is to cover the whole commons, but we wanted to develop something people could test and react to that would be useful at launch. To build our beta, we settled on a goal to represent one percent of the known Commons, or about 10 million works, and we chose a vertical slice of images only, to fully explore a purpose-built interface that represented one type but many providers. . . .

After a detailed review of potential sources, the available APIs, and the quality of their datasets, we selected the Rijksmuseum, Flickr, 500px, the New York Public Library as our initial sources. Later, after discussions with the Metropolitan Museum of Art regarding their collection of public domain works, which were released under CC0 on February 7, 2017, we incorporated their 200,000 CC0 images as well. . . .

The prototype of this tool focuses on photos as its first media and uses open APIs in order to index the available works. The search filters allow users to search by license type, title, creator, tags, collection, and type of institution.

CC Search Beta also provides social features, allowing users to create and share lists as well as add tags and favorites to the objects in the commons, and save their searches. Finally, it incorporates one-click attribution, giving users pre-formatted copy for easy attribution.

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Metropolitan Museum of Art Puts Images of Public Domain Artworks under Creative Commons Zero (CC0) License

The Metropolitan Museum of Art has put images of public domain artworks under the Creative Commons Zero (CC0) License.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

This morning, we announced a major update to the Museum's policy governing the use and reuse of images in our collection: all images of public-domain artworks in the Museum's collection are now available for free and unrestricted use under Creative Commons Zero (CC0). This updated policy, known as Open Access, enables everyone to utilize more than 375,000 images of public-domain artworks in The Met's collection in any media without permission or fee.

See also: "Introducing Open Access at The Met."

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"Out of Print: The Orphans of Mass Digitization"

Mary Murrell has published "Out of Print: The Orphans of Mass Digitization" in Current Anthropology.

Here's an excerpt:

In the 2000s an interconnected set of elite projects in the United States sought to digitize "all books in all languages" and make them available online. These mass digitization projects were efforts to absorb the print book infrastructure into a new one centered in computer networks. Mass book digitization has now faded from view, and here I trace its setbacks through a curious figure—the "orphan"—that emerged from within these projects and acted ultimately as an agent of impasse. In legal policy debates, an "orphan" refers to a copyrighted work whose owner cannot be found, but its history, range of meanings, and deployments reveal it to be considerably more complex. Based on fieldwork conducted at a digital library engaged in mass digitization, this paper analyzes the "orphan" as a personifying metaphor that digital library activists embraced in order to challenge and/or disrupt the social relations that adhere in and around books.

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AAP and RIAA (and Others) Send Letters to Trump

The AAP and the RIAA (and others) have send letters to Donald Trump expressing copyright concerns.

Here's the AAP letter.

Here's an excerpt:

Provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA"), which Congress enacted in 1998 to encourage online availability of popular copyrighted works while promoting a balance of interests and cooperation between copyright owners and Internet service providers in dealing with online infringement of such works, wildly succeeded in encouraging such availability. However, the relevant DMCA provisions do not achieve that intended balance and cooperation due to numerous instances of judicial misapplication and the unanticipated appearance of service provider business models that foster, exploit and profit from online infringement by their users while offering only token compliance with the law.

Here's the RIAA letter.

Here's an excerpt:

However, much more needs to be done. Search engines, user upload content platforms, hosting companies, and domain name registrars and registries should follow others' example to effectively stop theft and assure fair payment.

Further, there is a massive "value grab" as some of these corporations weaken intellectual property rights for America's creators by exploiting legal loopholes never intended for them—perversely abusing U.S. law to underpay music creators, thus harming one of America's economic and job engines.

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Draft Model Publishing Contracts for Digital Scholarship Released

Emory University and the University of Michigan have released draft versions of two model publishing contracts for digital scholarship.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

In order to ensure this contract meets the needs of both authors and publishers, we are soliciting feedback from authors, publishers, and other interested stakeholders, and will make draft versions of these documents publicly available for comment. Materials will be available for review until February 15, 2017, at which time we will incorporate feedback into a revised version of the documents, which will be shared publicly and available for adoption, reuse, and modification.

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Assessing the Operation of Copyright and Related Rights Systems: Methodology Framework

The Finnish Foundation for Cultural Policy Research has released Assessing the Operation of Copyright and Related Rights Systems: Methodology Framework.

Here's an excerpt:

The methodology, such as it is outlined in the framework, can serve as a basis for the formulation of copyright and related rights policies and strategies at the national level. It can therefore facilitate further development of the copyright system. The methodology framework consists of relevant key indicators that are useful in identifying trends and good practices while acknowledging the different contexts in which the national copyright systems operate. Assessing the operation of the copyright system increases transparency and provides an information base for public discussion on copyright policy.

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"Blockchain Technology as a Regulatory Technology: From Code Is Law to Law Is Code"

Primavera De Filippi and Samer Hassan have published "Blockchain Technology as a Regulatory Technology: From Code Is Law to Law Is Code" in First Monday.

Here's an excerpt:

To illustrate the extent to which blockchain code can assume the function of law, let us take the example of a hypothetical blockchain-based DRM system. Copyright law introduces "artificial scarcity" in the realm of information, by prohibiting (or constraining) the reproduction of creative works without the consent of the corresponding right holders. Yet, given the ease with which one can produce an identical copy of a digital work, copyright infringement has become widespread in the digital world. Since many years already, content providers have been relying on technological means (such as DRM systems, or other technological measures of protection) to restrain the way in which content can be accessed, used or reused by introducing a new set of technical rules, as a complement to the legal provisions of copyright law. Yet, most of these systems are limited by the fact that it is impossible to distinguish one digital file from another. By leveraging on the transparency and immutability of blockchain technologies, it is possible to restore the unicity and transferability of digital works, by linking every digital copy to a particular token on the blockchain. Authors can then associate these tokens with a particular set of rights to their digital works and trade them in the same way as they would trade digital tokens. Blockchain technology can thus be used to implement "artificial scarcity" at the level of each individual file—thus potentially allowing for the reintroduction of the first sale doctrine [11] in the digital realm, without the need to rely on any contractual or legal means.

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Finding the Public Domain: The Copyright Review Management System

Ithaka S+R has released Finding the Public Domain: The Copyright Review Management System .

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

The project team documented these lessons in a book called Finding the Public Domain: Copyright Review Management System Toolkit. The Toolkit shares practical insights gained in this effort in the hope of supporting others interested in copyright review. This brief complements the practical toolkit. It explains the history of CRMS and introduces the basics of the CRMS procedure. It then discusses some of the lessons, successes, surprises, and challenges of the work.

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"What Kind of World Is STM Living In?

The League of European Research Universities has released What Kind of World Is STM Living In.

Here's an excerpt:

4 September saw the International Association of STM publishers (STM) issue a response to the EC's proposed Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market, which flies in the face of LERU's views contained in its own Press Release. Amongst other things, STM is calling for the extension of ancillary copyright to cover academic publishing, implying that they will take legal action if this does not happen. . . . Ancillary copyright in this case would extend copyright protection, not allowing academics and universities freely to link to/use the world of information on the Internet, placing publishers in control of the information environment. LERU rejects this as counter to academic freedom and to the EC's vison for Open Science.

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"State of the Union 2016: Commission Proposes Modern EU Copyright Rules for European Culture to Flourish and Circulate"

The European Commission has released "State of the Union 2016: Commission Proposes Modern EU Copyright Rules for European Culture to Flourish and Circulate."

Here's an excerpt:

"I want journalists, publishers and authors to be paid fairly for their work, whether it is made in studios or living rooms, whether it is disseminated offline or online, whether it is published via a copying machine or commercially hyperlinked on the web."—President Juncker, State of the Union 2016

Read more about it at: "EU Announces Absolutely Ridiculous Copyright Proposal That Will Chill Innovation, Harm Creativity"; "EU Digital Copyright Reform Proposals Slammed as Regressive"; and "EU Copyright Plans a Big Win for Old Media, But Public Concerns Ignored."

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"Collaborative Academic Library Digital Collections Post-Cambridge University Press, HathiTrust and Google Decisions on Fair Use"

Michelle M. Wu has published "Collaborative Academic Library Digital Collections Post-Cambridge University Press, HathiTrust and Google Decisions on Fair Use" in the Journal of Copyright in Education and Librarianship.

Here's an excerpt:

Academic libraries face numerous stressors as they seek to meet the needs of their users through technological advances while adhering to copyright laws. This paper seeks to explore one specific proposal to balance these interests, the impact of recent decisions on its viability, and the copyright challenges that remain after these decisions

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"More than a House of Cards: Developing a Firm Foundation for Streaming Media and Consumer-Licensed Content in the Library"

William Cross has published "More than a House of Cards: Developing a Firm Foundation for Streaming Media and Consumer-Licensed Content in the Library" in the Journal of Copyright in Education and Librarianship..

Here's an excerpt:

This article will introduce traditional library practice for licensing multimedia content and discuss the way that consumer-licensing and streaming services disrupt that practice. Sections II and III describe the statutory copyright regime designed by Congress to facilitate the socially-valuable work done by libraries and the impact of the move from ownership to licensed content. Collecting multimedia materials has always presented special legal challenges for libraries, particularly as licensed content has replaced the traditional practice of purchasing and circulation based on the first sale doctrine. These issues have grown even more complex as streaming services like Netflix and Amazon and video game downloads through services like Steam have come to dominate the landscape. Section IV will describe the way that consumer-licensed materials, which not only remove the ownership that undergirds library practice, but also the ability to negotiate for library use, imperil the congressionally-designed balance. Section V will present a path forward for libraries to develop robust, cutting-edge collections that reflect a sophisticated understanding of the contractual and copyright issues at play.

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"Public Knowledge Launches Report on Systemic Bias at the U.S. Copyright Office"

Public Knowledge has released Public Knowledge Launches Report on Systemic Bias at the U.S. Copyright Office.

Here's an excerpt:

Today we're releasing our newest report, "Captured: Systemic Bias at the U.S. Copyright Office." This report examines the role of industry capture and the revolving door between the major entertainment industries and the Copyright Office, and the implications that capture has had on the policies the Office embraces. In the report, we investigate how the Copyright Office:

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"Library of Congress Might Become a Piracy Hub, RIAA Warns"

Ernesto Van der Sar has published "Library of Congress Might Become a Piracy Hub, RIAA Warns" in TorrentFreak.

Here's an excerpt:

The U.S. Copyright Office is considering expanding the mandatory deposit requirement for publishers, so that record labels would also have to submit their online-only music to the Library of Congress. The Library would then allow the public to access the music. The RIAA, however, warns that this plan introduces some serious piracy concerns.

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"Publishers Appeal GSU Copyright Case"

Andrew Albanese has published "Publishers Appeal GSU Copyright Case" in Publishers Weekly.

Here's an excerpt:

Following their second district court loss in eight years of litigation, the publisher plaintiffs in Cambridge University Press vs. Patton (known commonly as the GSU e-reserves case) have again appealed the case.

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"European Copyright Leak Exposes Plans to Force the Internet to Subsidize Publishers"

The EFF has released "European Copyright Leak Exposes Plans to Force the Internet to Subsidize Publishers" by Jeremy Malcolm.

Here's an excerpt:

A just-leaked draft impact assessment on the modernization of European copyright rules could spell the end for many online services in Europe as we know them. The document's recommendations foreshadow new a EU Directive on copyright to be introduced later this year, that will ultimately bind each of the European Union's 28 member states. If these recommendations by the European Commission are put in place, Europe's Internet will never be the same, and these impacts are likely to reverberate around the world. . . .

The Commission's proposal is to award publishers a new copyright-like veto power, layered on top of the copyright that already exists in the published content, allowing them to prevent the online reuse of news content even when a copyright exception applies. This veto power may last for as little as one year, or as many as 50—the Commission leaves this open for now.

This kind of veto power has been described as a link tax—notwithstanding the Commission's protestations that it isn't one-because when the publisher controls even the use of small snippets of news text surrounding a hyperlink to the original article, it essentially amounts to a tax on that link. The result, as seen in Spain, will be the closure of online news portals, and a reduction in traffic to news publishers.

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"Write up! A Study of Copyright Information on Library-Published Journals"

Melanie Schlosser has published "Write up! A Study of Copyright Information on Library-Published Journals" in the Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication.

Here's an excerpt:

INTRODUCTION Libraries have a mission to educate users about copyright, and library publishing staff are often involved in that work. This article investigates a concrete point of intersection between the two areas—copyright statements on library-published journals. METHODS Journals published by members of the Library Publishing Coalition were examined for open access status, type and placement of copyright information, copyright ownership, and open licensing. RESULTS Journals in the sample were overwhelmingly (93%) open access. 80% presented copyright information of some kind, but only 30% of those included it at both the journal and the article level. Open licensing was present in 38% of the journals, and the most common ownership scenario was the author retaining copyright while granting a nonexclusive license to the journal or publisher. 9% of the sample journals included two or more conflicting rights statements. DISCUSSION 76% of the journals did not consistently provide accurate, easily-accessible rights information, and numerous problems were found with the use of open licensing, including conflicting licenses, incomplete licenses, and licenses not appearing at the article level. CONCLUSION Recommendations include presenting full copyright and licensing information at both the journal and the article level, careful use of open licenses, and publicly-available author agreements. External Data or Supplements:

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"The Economics of Book Digitization and the Google Books Litigation"

Hannibal Travis has self-archived "The Economics of Book Digitization and the Google Books Litigation."

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

This piece explores the digitization and uploading to the Internet of full-text books, book previews in the form of chapters or snippets, and databases that index the contents of book collections. Along the way, it will describe the economics of copyright, the "digital dilemma," and controversies surrounding fair use arguments in the digital environment. It illustrates the deadweight losses from restricting digital libraries, book previews, copyright litigation settlements, and dual-use technologies that enable infringement but also fair use.

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Finding the Public Domain: Copyright Review Management System Toolkit

The University of Michigan Library has released Finding the Public Domain: Copyright Review Management System Toolkit.

Here's an excerpt:

This toolkit is divided into three main parts. It is primarily designed for copyright review of books, but it is also useful for a range of copyright review activities. The first part of the toolkit consists of a series of preplanning documents, one or more of which can be used in early-stage project meetings to build your team and plan your approach when faced with key questions. . . .

The second part of the toolkit dives deeper into the practical considerations facing a copyright review project, including project leadership, the legal fundamentals for copyright review, technical elements, and observations related to project personnel. . . .

The third part of the toolkit includes reports on pilot projects and a series of appendices. Together these form valuable documentation from the [Copyright Review Management System] project.

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"After Copyright Win, GSU Seeks $3.3 Million from Publishers "

Andrew Albanese has published "After Copyright Win, GSU Seeks $3.3 Million from Publishers" in Publishers Weekly.

Here's an excerpt:

After winning a key copyright decision, attorneys for Georgia State University want the publishers who brought the suit to pay more than $3.3 million dollars in fees and costs.

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