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Full-Text Articles in Law

Copyright Law And Electronic Access To Information, Jessica D. Litman Oct 1996

Copyright Law And Electronic Access To Information, Jessica D. Litman

Articles

At the same time as we have been discovering the Internet’s enormous potential to enhance access to information and revolutionize the ways libraries do business, the Internet’s high profile in popular media has made it the focus of a wide spectrum of fears about the future. This paper focuses on pending proposals to amend copyright law to enhance the control copyright owners wield over the appearance of their works on digital networks. These proposals would stifle libraries’ use of the Internet. Libraries and their supporters must participate in the copyright debate, and think creatively about new models for copyright. The …


The Author In Copyright: Notes For The Literary Critic, Monroe E. Price, Malla Pollack Jan 1992

The Author In Copyright: Notes For The Literary Critic, Monroe E. Price, Malla Pollack

Articles

No abstract provided.


Copyright As Myth, Jessica D. Litman Sep 1991

Copyright As Myth, Jessica D. Litman

Articles

It has become fashionable to seek to formulate, or reformulate, copyright law as an expression of overarching grand theory. Perhaps the most prominent manifestation of this trend has been the recasting of copyright law in the mold of economic incentives; a more recent upstart competitor seeks to reclaim the debate by invoking the philosophical precepts of Hohfeld, Hegel and Locke. Occasionally, the literature gives us polite debates about which of the competing theoretical models is more misguided. Meanwhile, another voice in the copyright literature has been complaining that the law is remarkably unaccommodating of the actual process of creating works …


The Public Domain, Jessica D. Litman Jan 1990

The Public Domain, Jessica D. Litman

Articles

This article examines the public domain by looking at the gulf between what authors really do and the way the law perceives them. Part I outlines the basics of copyright as a species of property and introduces the public domain's place within the copyright scheme. Copyright grants authors" ' rights modeled on real property in order to encourage authorship by providing authors with markets in which they can seek compensation for their creations. Because parcels of authorship are intangible, however, the law faces *problems in determining the ownership and boundaries of its property grants. In particular, the concept of "originality," …


Copyright Legislation And Technological Change, Jessica D. Litman Jan 1989

Copyright Legislation And Technological Change, Jessica D. Litman

Articles

Throughout its history, copyright law has had difficulty accommodating technological change. Although the substance of copyright legislation in this century has evolved from meetings among industry representatives whose avowed purpose was to draft legislation that provided for the future,6 the resulting statutes have done so poorly. The language of copyright statutes has been phrased in fact-specific language that has grown obsolete as new modes and mediums of copyrightable expression have developed. Whatever copyright statute has been on the books has been routinely, and justifiably, criticized as outmoded.7 In this Article, I suggest that the nature of the legislative process we …


Performer's Rights And Digital Sampling Under U.S. And Japanese Law, Jessica D. Litman Jan 1988

Performer's Rights And Digital Sampling Under U.S. And Japanese Law, Jessica D. Litman

Articles

A year or two ago, one of my copyright students called to my attention a problem that seemed to him to pose unique difficulties for the copyright statute. The problem arises because of a technology called digital sampling.' Digital sampling is a new threat to performers' rights that has grown out of the combination of digital recording technology with music synthesizer technology. This threat is a very recent one. Indeed, the digital sampling problem is so new that copyright lawyers haven't yet figured out how to think about it.


Reexamining Intellectual Property Concepts: A Glimpse Into The Future Through The Prism Of Chakrabarty, Monroe E. Price Jan 1988

Reexamining Intellectual Property Concepts: A Glimpse Into The Future Through The Prism Of Chakrabarty, Monroe E. Price

Articles

No abstract provided.


Copyright, Compromise And Legislative History, Jessica D. Litman Jan 1987

Copyright, Compromise And Legislative History, Jessica D. Litman

Articles

Copyright law gives authors a "property right." But what kind of property right? Indeed, a property right in what? The answers to these questions should be apparent from a perusal of title seventeen of the United States Code-the statute that confers the "property" right.' Courts, however, have apparently found title seventeen an unhelpful guide. For the most part, they look elsewhere for answers, relying primarily on prior courts' constructions of an earlier and very different statute on the same subject. 2


State Arts Councils: Some Items For A New Agenda, Monroe E. Price May 1976

State Arts Councils: Some Items For A New Agenda, Monroe E. Price

Articles

These are no longer flush times. And one realm in which the lack of prosperity may prove harmful is the area of government support of the arts. Because the expansive middle-class patronage of the l 960's is gone, there is a hope that the government, state and federal, will play the role of Maecenas. Yet government intervention is now more cautious and more critical. The need for state support is high. Performing arts companies are in dire straits. Artists are unemployed. Nonetheless, government officials at all levels are undecided as to how to proceed. In California, for example, after months …