Copyright Office Issues NPRM to Correct MLC’s ‘Erroneous’ Dispute Policy on Post-Termination Blanket License Royalties — Your head can start spinning if you think too long about the intersection of termination rights, statutory licenses, and mechanical reproductions. But the Copyright Office has recently waded into those waters because it needs to answer the important question: who gets paid.
C-IP2 2022 Fall Conference Panel Discusses Copyright Under Pressure — Last month, I participated on this panel as part of C-IP2’s annual fall conference. This article summarizes the discussion, which focused on “the current state of copyright law, the pressures it has come under in recent years, and their differing perspectives on how the digital world is shaping copyright” and covered issues such as “enforcement techniques, trends in fair use, and the impact of evolving technology on copyright.”
Survey: Creators describe tense relationship with social media — From Axios, “In Patreon’s survey of more than 1,500 creators (some of whom do not use Patreon), 70% say they feel social media platforms put them at a disadvantage, but 60% say they are reliant on those platforms to showcase their work. Seventy-five percent of creators said in response to survey questions they wish to make more diverse work, but feel compelled by social media algorithms to keep putting out what may perform best.”
Move Slow and Fix Things — Although this article focuses on admissions in elite universities, it makes a broader point about how nowadays, innovation and disruption is privileged over maintaining existing things. I see a parallel to broader discussions of copyright. That is, notwithstanding copyright’s requirement of originality, the legal framework is built around the maintenance art and knowledge, supporting, for example, the intellectual and creative labor that goes into scientific, cultural, and entertainment institutions. Many challenges to copyright over the past several decades have portrayed it instead as a “barrier” to innovation. That portrayal deserves closer scrutiny.
Meta defeats photographer’s lawsuit over Facebook embedding, for now — Unsurprisingly, a district court in the Ninth Circuit remained bound to that Circuit’s “server test” for determining infringement of the public display right.