Rihcard Koman, Free the Orphans: A Look at the Case of Kahle v. Ashcroft, O'Reilly Network, May 6, 2004. Koman relates an anecdote of an editor who wanted to republish some journal articles, but the copyright holder was deceased and his heirs could not be located. Such works are the "orphans" referred to in the title; "works that would have gone out of copyright when their creators failed to renew a copyright claim under the old law but which are now kept in prolonged copyright" (as a result of the Copyright Act of 1976's elimination of copyright renewal.) That forms the basis of the Kahle case, as it challenges the constitutionality of such "automatic, implicit copyright."
Posted by
Garrett at 5/10/2004 02:50:00 PM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
