Category Archives: Blog

Authors Alliance Presents Workshop on Fair Use at California Lawyers For the Arts

Posted February 8, 2018
photo of sharpened pencil and notebook

photo by Angelina Litvin on Unsplash

On Tuesday, February 13, Brianna Schofield of Authors Alliance will team up with Robert Kirk Walker of the Samuelson Clinic at the UC Berkeley School of Law to present a workshop on fair use with California Lawyers for the Arts. The workshop, “Demystifying Fair Use: A Crash Course For Authors”  will provide an overview of the law of fair use, explain best practices for fair use as developed by creative communities, and showcase our new guide to fair use for nonfiction authors.

The workshop is open to the public, and will take place at 7:00 pm in downtown Berkeley. For more information and to register, click here.

Dr. Danny Kingsley Joins Authors Alliance Advisory Board

Posted February 7, 2018

We are pleased to welcome Dr. Danny Kingsley of Cambridge University to the Authors Alliance Advisory Board. She joins a distinguished group of advisors who contribute valuable expertise and perspectives on academia, authorship, scholarly communication, legal matters, and publishing.

In her role as Deputy Director of Scholarly Communication & Research Services at Cambridge University Library, Dr. Kingsley focuses on implementing innovative research and publishing tools and policies in the digital age. She holds a PhD in Scholarly Communication from the Australian National University and a BSc in Science and Technology Studies from the University of New South Wales.

We look forward to working with her and our other advisory board members to create, refine, and improve the tools and services we offer to authors.

Rights Reversion Success Story: David G. Ullman

Posted January 31, 2018

Headshot of David UllmanDavid G. Ullman is Professor Emeritus of Mechanical Engineering Design at Oregon State University and an expert on product design and decision-making best practices. After securing a reversion of rights, Ullman published the sixth edition of The Mechanical Design Process, a leading text used to teach mechanical engineers the processes of product design. We asked Professor Ullman to share his rights reversion success story with us.

Authors Alliance: What motivated you to request your rights back?

David Ullman: When The Mechanical Design Process was first introduced in 1992, I insisted that it be priced at less than $50. I felt this was a fair price for a university text on the topic. McGraw-Hill, the publisher, agreed and released it at $49. Over the years, McGraw-Hill steadily raised the price over my protests. By 2017 the list price was $166. University bookstores sold it for $149. I contacted McGraw-Hill, protesting the price increases. I told them that I did not understand their business model, the price was usury, and they were killing the sales of the book. Where inflation would have taken the book to $85, they had nearly doubled that. Finally, in early 2017, when the annual sales for the fifth edition (2015) had dropped from 4,000 copies per year to 1,000, I offered to buy the copyright, and they agreed, at no cost to me. Thus, in November 2017 I released a new edition of the book at a price practitioners and students can afford: $49.95. It is interesting to note that as soon as the agreement was signed, McGraw-Hill’s list price was lowered by $30.

AuAll: How and when did you first hear about rights reversion?

DU: I always knew that it was possible to buy back rights. When I decided to request the rights back, I did a lot of online reading to be sure I understood the ins and outs.

AuAll: Could you walk us through the process of requesting your rights back?

Continue reading

Christopher Jon Sprigman Sheds New Light On Copyright and Creative Incentives

Posted January 23, 2018

Poster advertising a performance of La Traviata in 1853What do Wikipedia, 19th-century Italian opera, Bollywood movies, and fan fiction have in common? According to NYU law professor (and Authors Alliance founding member) Christopher Jon Sprigman, more than you might think. In a recent article in the Houston Law Review, Sprigman explains that these creative endeavors are all examples of how copyright principles can work in unexpected ways across different genres and audiences.

Conventional wisdom about copyright holds that it is a spur to creativity and provides financial and moral incentives for creators to produce new content. This may sometimes be the case—but does (and should) this core assumption always hold steady across a variety of contexts and creative communities? Sprigman suggests that the answer is no. Citing the examples above, he points to empirical studies which indicate that the link between copyright and creative incentives doesn’t always conform to theory in the ways we might expect. In some cases, a lack of stringent copyright norms seems to stimulate creative production, rather than hampering it. Research in this area is relatively new, and Sprigman’s work shows the way to intriguing new areas of inquiry that help broaden our understanding of how and when current copyright rules work in favor of creators and audiences—and when they don’t.

Read (or download) the full article on SSRN.

 

Resource Roundup: The Public Domain

Posted January 15, 2018

public domain image courtesy of the Library of Congress

The first day of Copyright Week is dedicated to the public domain and creativity. It’s an opportunity to reflect on the most recent Public Domain Day, which took place on January 1. On that date, a host of works entered the public domain in Canada, New Zealand, and Europe, as detailed here. But due to copyright term extensions that went into effect in 1998, those of us in the United States have been in a public domain drought for decades. We’ll have to wait until 2019 to freely access many works first published in 1923—almost 100 years ago.

Although some works first published in the United States in or after 1923 may already be in the public domain as a result of failure to comply with formalities, and some unpublished works may also be in the public domain, it can be devilishly difficult to determine when this is the case. We recommend Peter Hirtle’s Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the United States and Berkeley Law’s “Is it in the Public Domain?” Handbook to help you evaluate a work’s copyright status.

We at Authors Alliance are already looking forward to next January 1, when all works first published in the United States in 1923 will (finally) enter the public domain in the United States and become “free as the air to common use.” Read why in Molly Van Houweling’s post on how the public domain benefits authors.

In the meantime, check out Public Domain Review’s Guide for thorough guidance on how to find public domain works online.

Please Support Authors Alliance Today

Posted December 20, 2017

Can you help Authors Alliance remain the organization you turn to for copyright resources and for a voice of reason in copyright debates?

Authors Alliance Gift Campaign 2017

Since our founding, Authors Alliance has provided education and advocacy for a growing community of authors. Authors who want to keep their works discoverable and in the hands of readers. Authors who value a robust interpretation of fair use. Authors who want to revive their out of print books through termination or reversion. Authors who support integrity and attribution. Authors like you.

With our growing collection of resources, Authors Alliance helps you understand and manage the rights necessary to make your works broadly available now and in the future. We continue to celebrate the open access and reversion successes of authors who have been empowered to take control of their works. Our new Termination of Transfer tool unlocks the mysteries of the termination of transfer provisions of U.S. copyright law that give authors the right to get back their rights, and our templates help you exercise that right. Members and allies have embraced our newest guide, Fair Use for Nonfiction Authors, released just two weeks ago. We can’t wait to hear how the guide has helped you navigate your fair use decisions!

In the policy arena, we’ve advocated for your right to integrity and attribution and encouraged the Copyright Office to recognize the right to revive your work if it is no longer available commercially, as well as the right to revise your work over time. We’ve spoken up for your fair use rights by petitioning for exemptions to laws that could otherwise prevent you from making fair use of multimedia content in e-books. In a high-profile fair use case, we gave voice to academic authors whose motivation to write and publish scholarly works is grounded in their desire to share and advance knowledge. And we’ve voiced our support for modernizing copyright recordation so that you can increase the compensation for and dissemination of your works, and so that your works are less likely to become orphaned.

We have so much more in store for 2018, but we can’t do it without your support.

Brianna L Schofield bio photoWe rely on your donations to operate, and to lead us into the new year. With your support, Authors Alliance can release a new guide to help you decipher and negotiate publication terms, continue our advocacy for educational uses of copyrighted material, develop resources to help you make your works accessible to all learners, and so much more!

Please consider giving today to support our work. Every contribution truly helps us fulfill our mission to support authors who write to be read.

 

 

Brianna Schofield
Executive Director

Authors Alliance Comments in Support of Modified Exemption to Section 1201 of the DMCA

Posted December 19, 2017
photo of CD with padlock

photo by 422737 |CC0

Earlier this week, Authors Alliance submitted comments to the Copyright Office in support of a modified exemption to Section 1201 of the DMCA for multimedia e-books. The proposed exemption would allow all authors to access the clips they need to make fair use of video clips in their e-books. These comments were submitted as part of the seventh annual triennial rulemaking process for 2018, with the goal of building on the success of our previous efforts to advocate for fair uses of copyrighted content.

2017.12.18 Multimedia E-Books Modification Long Form Comment AuAll AAUP ...

 

As we wrote in the comment, “Electronic books continue to represent a well-utilized form of authorship that becomes more dynamic when multimedia elements are added. With modern technology, authors are now able to incorporate audiovisual content directly into their e-books for lawful fair use purposes. Multimedia e-books allow a unique experience not possible through simple static text and visuals. By allowing authors to embed non-static forms of content into e-books, multimedia e-book technology empowers authors to conduct scholarship, express new ideas, facilitate rich discussion, educate others, engage in creative expression, and share research and findings in a way that mere prose cannot.”

We also joined with EFF, New Media Rights, the Organization for Transformative Works, the American Library Association, the Association of Research Libraries, and the Association of College Research Libraries on a comment in support of one clear, easier-to-use exemption for video excerpts that would allow authors, educators, libraries, documentary filmmakers, remix artists, and others to use video snippets without fear of legal repercussions by copyright owners. The comment is available here.

We will continue to track the status of these proposed 1201 exemptions and to provide updates as the rulemaking process moves forward in 2018.

Model Publishing Contract Features Author-Friendly Terms for Open Access Scholarship

Posted December 14, 2017

The University of Michigan and Emory University have teamed up to create a Model Publishing Contract for Digital Scholarship designed to aid in the publication of long-form digital scholarship according to open access principles. It’s a terrific new resource for authors and publishers alike!

Developed by a team of library and university press professionals, the model contract takes into account the needs of a variety of stakeholders. The contract is shorter and easier to understand than typical publishing contracts, and it offers authors more rights in their own work, while still allowing publishers sufficient rights for commercial uses and sales. Associated documents include:

  • An introduction to the project
  • A guide to using the model documents
  • A customizable contract template in Word format
  • A sample letter for requesting permission to create and distribute digital copies of a copyright owner’s work
  • A glossary of legal terms

All of the documents are available online under a CC0 license, so they can be tailored to meet an author’s or institution’s specific needs. Even for those not currently negotiating a publishing agreement, the model contract provides useful information and sample language demonstrating author-friendly terms.

The model publishing contract is a great complement to one of our current projects here at Authors Alliance. We’re hard at work on a guide to understanding publication contracts—the fourth volume in our series of educational handbooks, due to be released in 2018. Our guide will explain various contractual terms from an authors’ rights perspective. We recommend the model contract project as an excellent example of a fair and workable document with a special emphasis on open access scholarship.

 

Demystifying Fair Use: Our New Guide, FAQs, and More!

Posted December 7, 2017

Fair use, as many of our readers know, can be a tricky concept to pin down. What exactly does fair use mean? What makes it such an important part of U.S. copyright law? What are the “four factors” that courts consider when evaluating claims of fair use? And, perhaps most importantly of all, how does fair use support authors’ research, writing, and publishing goals?

Authors who want to incorporate source materials with confidence, while also respecting copyright and the integrity of their fellow creators, may find themselves faced with more questions than answers. Fortunately, help is at hand!

Cover of the Fair Use Guide for Nonfiction AuthorsAuthors Alliance released a brand-new guide to Fair Use for Nonfiction Authors last week. Although the guide was designed around the needs of nonfiction authors, much of the information applies to authors across disciplines. After all, many questions and misconceptions about fair use overlap regardless of genre. The FAQ section of the guide addresses some common questions, such as:

  • Can I still claim fair use if I am using copyrighted material that is highly creative?
  • What if I want to use copyrighted material for commercial purposes?
  • Does fair use apply to copyrighted material that is unpublished?

Learn the answers to these and other fair use questions at our new Fair Use Resources page. While you’re there, you can also download a PDF version of the guide. A print edition is forthcoming in February 2018, and Authors Alliance members can sign up for the pre-order list by emailing us at info@authorsalliance.org.

If you’re not yet a member, we encourage you to join today! And if you value this and other Authors Alliance resources, please consider a donation to support our 2017 gift campaign.