Filmmakers fighting “Happy Birthday” copyright find their “smoking gun”; ArsTechnica.com, 7/27/15

Joe Mullin, ArsTechnica.com; Filmmakers fighting “Happy Birthday” copyright find their “smoking gun” :

"t's been two years since filmmakers making a documentary about the song "Happy Birthday" filed a lawsuit claiming that the song shouldn't be under copyright. Now, they have filed (PDF) what they say is "proverbial smoking-gun evidence" that should cause the judge to rule in their favor.

The "smoking gun" is a 1927 version of the "Happy Birthday" lyrics, predating Warner/Chappell's 1935 copyright by eight years. That 1927 songbook, along with other versions located through the plaintiffs' investigations, "conclusively prove that any copyright that may have existed for the song itself... expired decades ago."

Even if the owner wasn't first, "Copyright law requires originality, not novelty." If the filmmakers' lawyers are right, it could mean a quick route to victory in a lawsuit that's been both slow-moving and closely watched by copyright reform advocates. Warner/Chappell has built a licensing empire based on "Happy Birthday," which in 1996 was pulling in more than $2 million per year."

State Of Georgia Sues Carl Malamud For Copyright Infringement For Publishing The State's Own Laws; TechDirt.com, 7/24/15

Mike Masnick, TechDirt.com; State Of Georgia Sues Carl Malamud For Copyright Infringement For Publishing The State's Own Laws:

"Two years ago, we wrote about the state of Georgia ridiculously threatening to sue Carl Malamud and his site Public.Resource.org for copyright infringement... for publishing an official annotated copy of the state's laws. This followed on a similar threat from the state of Oregon, which wisely backed down. Malamud has spent the last few years of his life doing wonderful and important work trying to make sure that the laws that we live by are actually available to the public. The specific issue here is that while the basic Georgia legal code is available to the public, the state charges a lot of money for the "Official Code of Georgia Annotated." The distinction here is fairly important -- but it's worth noting that the courts will regularly rely on the annotations in the official code, which more or less makes them a part of the law itself. And then, the question is whether or not the law itself should be subject to copyright restrictions. Malamud has long argued no, while the state has obviously argued yes, probably blinded by the revenue from selling its official copy of the annotated code."

It took two years, but the state has now done the absolutely ridiculous thing of suing Malamud. It is about as ridiculous as you would expect again focusing on the highly questionable claim that the Official Code of Georgia Annotated is covered by federal copyright law -- and that not only was Malamud (*gasp*) distributing it, but also... creating derivative works! Oh no! And, he's such an evil person that he was encouraging others to do so as well!"

ALA president calls for digital transformation of Copyright Office; American Library Association (ALA) Press Release, 6/12/15

American Library Association (ALA) Press Release; ALA president calls for digital transformation of Copyright Office:

"Today, American Library Association (ALA) president Courtney Young responded to the introduction of the Copyright Office for the Digital Economy Act (CODE Act) by Representatives Judy Chu (D-CA) and Tom Marino (R-PA):

“For more than 20 years, content creators, rights holders, legislators and public users alike have acknowledged that the U.S. Copyright Office needs to modernize its technological capabilities for the 21st century. Unfortunately, the recently introduced Copyright Office for the Digital Economy Act does little to address significant technology challenges impacting the U.S. Copyright Office.

“The bill’s proposal to make the Copyright Office an independent agency does not address the longstanding problems facing the agency, specifically that the Copyright Office’s information technology systems are woefully inadequate in serving both rights holders and the public in the digital environment. Much of the Copyright Office's shortcomings were detailed in a Government Accountability Office report published in March 2015. Instead of independent authority, the Copyright Office needs resources—both in the form of funding and technical expertise—to bring it out of the typewriter age.

“Rights holders, authors, publishers, libraries and the general public nationwide rely on the robust U.S. Copyright registration and recordation system to identify the copyright status of works. Comprehensive and accurate records in digital systems that can communicate with other digital systems are necessary to handle any transaction—whether one is trying to register copyright in order to proceed with legal action or whether one is just trying to identify who holds the rights to a particular work. In addition, progress should be made immediately to build the necessary digital storage facilities for digitally-born works.

“We urge the U.S. Congress to support the investment necessary to transition the Copyright Office from a paper-based system to a digital system that uses the most effective digital technology, systems and software–to enable commerce, promote access to content, and to inspire the creators and artists of the future who wish to make use of the previous works. A successful overhaul of the Copyright Office’s information technology infrastructure cannot be achieved by securing the Copyright Office’s independence from the Library of Congress. We have a much more important problem to solve that cannot be fixed by changing the address of the Copyright Office.”"

The Copyright Office Belongs in a Library; Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), 7/23/15

Parker Higgins, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF); The Copyright Office Belongs in a Library:

"The ALA is correct. The way to solve the problems of the Copyright Office and the Librarian of Congress is not to separate the two. Rather, it's to dedicate resources better and push for more thoughtful leadership. On both counts, a smart choice for Librarian of Congress will help.

There are also historical reasons to leave it in place, dating back to the 1870 law that centralized key copyright functions in the Library. Most notably, the deposit requirement—that authors and artists submit copies of works they are registering for copyright—has provided enormous public value by building up the collection. Of course, the Copyright Office performs other functions. But operations like maintaining a catalog of registrations, providing technical assistance to legislators and executive branch agencies, and providing information services to the public are all better understood as being, on some level, library services.

So both ideologically and pragmatically speaking, any hasty moves to yank the Copyright Office out of the Library should be non-starters. The Copyright Office has an important role to play in protecting the public interest. It’s most likely to play that role if it answers to a Librarian."

TPP's Copyright Trap; Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), 7/22/15

Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF); TPP's Copyright Trap:

"One of the defining battles in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations is whether its signatory countries will standardize copyright terms lengths to a minimum term of the life of the author plus 70 years. This would effectively set the maximum duration of copyright holders' monopoly rights to over 140 years. This is the demand from rightsholder groups such as the RIAA and MPAA who advise the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR). A precedent for such a provision has been set in previous Free Trade Agreements with countries like Australia and Singapore.

But the world's leading economists agree that such an extraordinary long copyright term makes no sense. It provides no further incentive for creation and provides little additional income to creators or their families—except for a very small, successful minority."

People who pay for content but also infringe copyright spend more; ZDNet, 7/22/15

Chris Duckett, ZDNet; People who pay for content but also infringe copyright spend more:

"Consumers who flirt with the morally ambiguous line of content consumption spend more money, according to a survey released by the Australian Department of Communications.

Over a three-month period among respondents aged 12 and over, the survey found that those who consumed a mixture of copyright-infringing and non-infringing content spent on average AU$200 on music, AU$118 on video games, AU$92 on movies, and AU$33 on TV content. Consumers who only consumed non-infringing content spent only AU$126 on music, AU$110 on video games, AU$67 on movies, and AU$22 on TV; whereas pure copyright-infringing content consumers spent a mere AU$88 on music, AU$24 on video games, AU$53 on movies, and AU$8 on TV content...

"Rights holders' most powerful tool to combat online copyright infringement is making content accessible, timely, and affordable to consumers," Turnbull said on Wednesday."

Does the Copyright Office Belong in a Library? | Peer to Peer Review; Library Journal, 7/2/15

Kevin L. Smith, Library Journal; Does the Copyright Office Belong in a Library? | Peer to Peer Review:

"It has been a busy time for those of us who watch the doings of the Copyright Office. In addition to releasing a massive report on Orphan Works and Mass Digitization, about which I have written here, the Copyright Office (CO) is the subject of a piece of legislation introduced as a discussion draft on June 3. The bill, if it were officially introduced and ultimately enacted, would remove the CO from the Library of Congress (LC) and establish it as an independent agency of the federal government, under the Executive Branch. Then, while we were still considering the ramifications of this idea, came the announcement on June 10 of the pending retirement of Dr. James Billington, who has been the Librarian of Congress for the past 29 years.

These events suggest long-term changes for the copyright and library communities, and it is worth taking a moment to consider, especially, the impact of the idea of making the Copyright Office an independent agency.

The first thing that strikes me about the “discussion draft” of the proposed law to establish the Copyright Office as an independent agency—called the Copyright Office for the Digital Economy (CODE) Act—is that it never says why it is needed."