Orphan works passed the senate

[tmfabian]

Just got a letter from ASMP (well actually tons of letters the past few days about this) It's pretty bogus.

Dear ASMP member,

As we feared, the Senate moved quickly on its Orphan Works bill. The bill was approved on a voice vote.

That means that you should now focus all your effort on your Representative. As you know, other industries are lobbying hard, right now, to persuade the House to adopt the language of the Senate bill. This would not be good for photographers.

Please e-mail or call your Representative today and ask him or her to oppose the adoption of S. 2913 or its language in the House. You can find the name and contact information for your Representative at http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/. The list contains telephone numbers and links to send “electronic communications” to your Representative. You can find a letter that you can copy, paste, edit and send to your Representative, at http://www.asmp.org/news/spec2008/letter_model_HR5889.php. Please feel free to change the wording as you wish.

If you prefer to telephone, your message is simple: Please oppose any efforts to adopt S. 2913 or its language.

The time to act is now.

Thank you for your help and support.

[Tuolumne]

Does this have something to do with photography?

/T

[bsdunek]

Yes, it does!
http://www.nppa.org/news_and_events/news/2008/04/orphan01.html

It has to do with any copyrighted work - photography, writing, painting, music, any art. Your rights can be taken, and you won't be able to do anything about it. They did a similar thing with patents during the Clinton administration, when we went to UN patent standards. It now becomes harder to keep a patent.

Thanks for the update, tmfabian

[pachuco]

Wow, that sucks.... And congress wonders why they have such a stellar approval rating.

[crawdiddy]

Wow, that sucks.... And congress wonders why they have such a stellar approval rating.

Everyone hates Congress.

Except for their own Senators and Congressmen, whom they reelect with great frequency.

[Simon Larbalestier]

This is very bad news for the future of our images residing in the public domain. It has everything to do with Photography.

[Pablito]

VERY bad news. Watermarking will become absolutely essential if you put anything online....

(hi Simon!!)

[40oz]

Yes, it does!
http://www.nppa.org/news_and_events/news/2008/04/orphan01.html

It has to do with any copyrighted work - photography, writing, painting, music, any art. Your rights can be taken, and you won't be able to do anything about it. They did a similar thing with patents during the Clinton administration, when we went to UN patent standards. It now becomes harder to keep a patent.

Thanks for the update, tmfabian

Well, honestly, in the given information, it seems to me the big motivator is the ability to use images or other works without having to pay for them. In that sense, I am opposed.

However, if there is a fine movie in MGM's vault that the original customer has long since ceased as a business party, by all means run it on Turner Classic Movies and make a few bucks for preservation. I would think that those two cases could be accomodated.

[Simon Larbalestier]

Anybody who is in the business of selling images in the public domain, what ever medium is used, should be concerned about this - unless of course you're happy to give your images away for free. For me it's the only way i make my living.

[jbf]

Sent letters to all my representatives. Lets hope they do something about it.

[Roger Hicks]

This is another part of the current 'crisis of capitalism'. Manufacturers/producers/artists, the people who make actual goods, whether it be a motor-car, film (Agfa!), a song, a book or a photograph, are ever less the ones who make the money. Instead, it's the people for whom money is the sole focus and 'product'.

At the risk of being accused (yet again) of 'America bashing', does this not amount to a unilateral abrogation of international copyright law? In other words, is not everyone, world wide, affected by an American law that takes away hard-won rights? Or am I misunderstanding something? I sincerely hope so.

Cheers,

Roger

[charjohncarter]

My Representative's website won't work, maybe to many messages about the bailout. I'll try later.

[dazedgonebye]

This is another part of the current 'crisis of capitalism'. Manufacturers/producers/artists, the people who make actual goods, whether it be a motor-car, film (Agfa!), a song, a book or a photograph, are ever less the ones who make the money. Instead, it's the people for whom money is the sole focus and 'product'.

At the risk of being accused (yet again) of 'America bashing', does this not amount to a unilateral abrogation of international copyright law? In other words, is not everyone, world wide, affected by an American law that takes away hard-won rights? Or am I misunderstanding something? I sincerely hope so.

Cheers,

Roger

First, I'm certainly opposed to this bill and have made my calls...

Still, I'm trying to understand your point Roger. Are you saying that the provisions of this law run counter to some international copyright treaty that we've signed on to?

[sepiareverb]

I managed to get through to two of my three. I would expect they are all against this anyway- surprised Leahy is in on it.

[Roger Hicks]

First, I'm certainly opposed to this bill and have made my calls...

Still, I'm trying to understand your point Roger. Are you saying that the provisions of this law run counter to some international copyright treaty that we've signed on to?

On my admittedly limited understanding, yes.

Copyright is governed by the Berne convention, which I don't think includes exceptions for those who are too lazy or crooked to find the copyright owner.

Of course the theory is that people will make their best efforts to trace the copyright owner, but I can't help wondering how hard they will try.

Cheers,

R.

[pesphoto]

i dont understand why they would even consider passing someting like this???

Maybe Bush will veto it? or is it too late?

[JohnTF]

If you find "A tribute to Steve Goodman", you will see a photo I gave Steve years ago as the cover, and Steve and John Prine wanted me to do an album cover, but their manager was not so friendly.


Steve died at a young age, and the Tribute album is, AFAIK, to benefit his family, so I am not likely to ask for money, but a credit line would have been nice.

I did send an email to the producers of the album, and they ignored me, so what else is new, however, this bill will make it entirely easy and legal to do this kind of thing routinely, as I understand it.

Probably my ego bothering me, however, Steve was a great guy, and I had met his family, plus John Prine, Steve, Bonnie Raitt and I killed a bottle of Southern Comfort in Philadelphia while Steve was acting as MC, almost resulting in Steve falling off the stage, well maybe they did forget my name. ;-)

I think it is perhaps more common than uncommon, but it should not be law.

Copyright over the long haul has generally been a mystery, at least to me, but you have to ask why they are doing this if not to screw someone out of rights which are fragile enough right now.

There is a website using my work now, in which I created the prints delivered for expenses partly paid, and the web site came much later, and again, not even credit.

Reminds me of a friend remarking after an image of mine was stolen from an exhibit, "At least they liked it enough to steal it"

If anyone is in Mary Bono's district, her late husband whose seat she took over, was generally supportive of copyright, she is in California, and he had lots of Nikon RF, Leica, Contax, etc. cameras plus he was sympathetic to this cause, so I would think she would be an excellent representative to email.

Email on the way, regards, John

[tmfabian]

the worst part about this whole thing is that not a single senator opposed it in voting

Sep 26, 2008: This bill passed in the Senate by Unanimous Consent. A record of each representative's position was not kept

That's it...i'm doing wedding from now on...seems like that's one area that's relatively unaffected by this.

[sepiareverb]

the worst part about this whole thing is that not a single senator opposed it in voting



That's it...i'm doing wedding from now on...seems like that's one area that's relatively unaffected by this.

Not hardly. How many times have you seen a credit for a wedding picture?

[tmfabian]

Not hardly. How many times have you seen a credit for a wedding picture?

how often are people going online to download other peoples wedding pictures as their own?

That was what I was thinking anyway...I'm not always in my right mind either though...so...I wouldn't rule out the possibility of me being an idiot on that statement. :D

[JohnTF]

Website for accessing the representatives for Ohio are jammed, probably with the stock market thing, I plan on hitting up one congressman with whom I worked when we both were kids at the local paper. I emailed Mary Bono, but her website specifically asks only for email from her district. I bought a couple of Sonny Bono's cameras from her a few years back, seemed a most pleasant and reasonable person to correspond with.

[FifthLeaf]

Lawrence Lessig, law professor at Stanford, wrote this good piece about the Orphan Artworks bill back in May: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/20/opinion/20lessig.html

This should help understand why the bill is such a bad idea.

[JoeV]

I can appreciate Roger's position. In a better world, countries would respect one another enough to honor international conventions and agreements.

We shouldn't expect an international court to deal with this issue until more pressing issues -- like war crimes, for instance -- are settled.

~Joe

[hawkeye]

The issue for all of us is that copyright violation is a commonplace occurrence. Pictures are always being copied and downloaded and used in small ways that none of us ever get paid for nor ever even know about.

Think of the church lady who copies an image from a magazine or website for use in a small church's newsletter. The picture gets used and you and I will never know about it.

The problem lies in the copyright law as it stands which really forces the photographer to track down and prove the violation of copyright. JohnTF experience is not so unusual.

Even lawyers aren't the answer because as in John's case some many uses are so muddled in other factors. If the abuser doesn't have deep pockets you aren't going to get any damages and to spend a lot of time fighting for a use fee of a few dollars isn't worth it.

We are in a hard place and the Orphan Bill will make it harder. We need to fight it but we need an alternative. A law that sets minimum damages for copyright violation and an easy way for copyright holders to pursue payment for use.

Steve

[JohnTF]

With everything jammed for electronic messages, and as it seems most repesentatives do not wish to hear from anyone outside of their district by email, I would recommend using snail mail to contact as many representatives at their local offices as possible.

I am being told if you write to the Washington office, your letter will be delayed two weeks for security.

You can write to any representative, the local office addresses are on the web pages linked to the links posted above for individual congressmen.

I am thinking that someone opens it and counts it, passing the numbers along.

Possibly, everyone should write to Kucinich, his background was in Journalism and Communication in his education and he worked for the Cleveland Plain Dealer. He has a recognized name as well.

John