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SELECTED COPYRIGHT LAW DECISIONS OF THE U.S. SUPREME COURT is part of the wonderful site developed by Cornell Law School.
The selected decisions are from 1952 to 1994. This page includes a link to recent decisions on copyright law as well.
From the Standford University Libraries Copyright and Fair Use Site, this page is a good place to find out some of the subtleties of the public domain.
http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter8/8-b.html
Today there's a right column advertisement for Stephen Fishman's book The Public Domain, 3rd edition, and while I can find plenty of commercial web sites trying to sell the book, I'm still hunting up a review or some sort of critique worthy of putting here in the blog.
The Council on Library and Information Resources has provided several very interesting reports regarding copyright issues. Follow the link and you'll find the full text of the report named below online. On the same page are listed more reports of considerable interest.
"Since the beginning of commercial sound recording in the 1890s, Americans have been enthusiastic creators and prolific consumers of recordings. Almost every form of sound has been captured—from musical performances and whale songs to political addresses and oral histories. Entrepreneurs of the late nineteenth century created a consumer market for recordings, and the commercial sector has played a significant role in the growth of the recording industry and the innovation of recording technologies. Despite the popularity of sound, however, federal copyright was not extended to sound recordings until 1972. State laws protect all recordings produced before that date.
It is those state laws that libraries and archives must follow when making decisions about copying their fragile historical recordings in order to preserve them. Sophisticated tools for rerecording offer a means to copy fragile wax cylinders or lacquer discs once and forever. As a result, many libraries today can retire original copies from use and, at the same time, broaden access to these valued materials through the use of digital surrogates. But do these laws allow them to do that?"
Notice of Roundtable on the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Treaty On the Protection of the Rights of Broadcasting Organizations
"SUMMARY:
The United States Copyright Office (USCO) and the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) announce a public roundtable discussion concerning the work at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) on a proposed Treaty on the Protection of the Rights of Broadcasting Organizations. Members of the public are invited to attend the roundtable, or to participate in the roundtable discussion, on the topics outlined in the supplementary information section of this notice.
DATES:
The roundtable will be held on Wednesday, January 3, 2007 beginning at 1 p.m. and ending at 3 p.m. Requests to participate in the roundtable should be submitted no later than 5 p.m. on December 29, 2006. "
"The Digital Learning Challenge: Obstacles to Educational Uses of Copyrighted Material in the Digital Age"
Abstract: This foundational white paper reports on a year-long study by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, funded by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, examining the relationship between copyright law and education. In particular, we wanted to explore whether innovative educational uses of digital technology were hampered by the restrictions of copyright. We found that provisions of copyright law concerning the educational use of copyrighted material, as well as the business and institutional structures shaped by that law, are among the most important obstacles to realizing the potential of digital technology in education.
The emphasis on the use of music is very helpful, and I like the site arrangement.
The outline:
1 Introduction
2 Rights of Copyright Owners
3 Use by Educators
* Reproducing
* Recording
* Preparing Derivative Works
* Distribution
* Performance
o Face-to-Face Exemption
o Distance Education Exemption
+ Music for Worship Exemption
+ School Concert Exemption
* Display
4 Duration of Copyright
5 Penalties For Infringement