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Full-Text Articles in Law
Copyright’S Creative Hierarchy In The Performing Arts, Michael W. Carroll
Copyright’S Creative Hierarchy In The Performing Arts, Michael W. Carroll
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
Copyright law grants authors certain rights of creative control over their works. This Article argues that these rights of creative control are too strong when applied to the performing arts because they fail to take account of the mutual dependence between writers and performers to fully realize the work in performance. This failure is particularly problematic in cases in which the author of a source work, such as a play or a choreographic work, imposes content-based restrictions on how a third party may render the work in performance. This Article then explores how Congress might craft a statutory license to …
The Struggle For Music Copyright, Michael W. Carroll
The Struggle For Music Copyright, Michael W. Carroll
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
Inspired by passionate contemporary debates about music copyright, this Article investigates how, when, and why music first came within copyright's domain. Ironically, although music publishers and recording companies are among the most aggressive advocates for strong copyright in music today, music publishers in eighteenth-century England resisted extending copyright to music. This Article sheds light on a series of early legal disputes concerning printed music that yield important insights into original understandings of copyright law and music's role in society. By focusing attention on this understudied episode, this Article demonstrates that the concept of copyright was originally far more circumscribed than …
Judging Art, Christine Farley
Judging Art, Christine Farley
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
What is art? Surprisingly, this question is addressed in various places in the law. At these junctures, courts typically attempt to avoid making a judgment. Indeed, the law generally resists any definition of art. The reasons given for this are that these determinations are too subjective for the courts and that judges lack proper training and expertise. Thus, the doctrine of avoidance is the most stable and explicitly stated proposition to be found in these encounters. However, the question of whether an object is a work of art for treatment under the law is often unavoidable. This question gets resolved …
Whose Music Is It Anyway? How We Came To View Musical Expression As A Form Of Property, Michael W. Carroll
Whose Music Is It Anyway? How We Came To View Musical Expression As A Form Of Property, Michael W. Carroll
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
Many participants in the music industry consider unauthorized transmissions of music files over the Internet to be theft of their property. Many Internet users who exchange music files reject this characterization. Prompted by the dispute over unauthorized music distribution, this Article explores how those who create and distribute music first came to look upon music as their property and when in Western history the law first supported this view. By analyzing the economic and legal structures governing music making in Western Europe from the classical period in Greece through the Renaissance, the Article shows that the law first granted some …
The Lingering Effects Of Copyright's Response To The Invention Of Photography, Christine Farley
The Lingering Effects Of Copyright's Response To The Invention Of Photography, Christine Farley
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
In 1884, the Supreme Court was presented with dichotomous views of photography. In one view, the photograph was an original, intellectual conception of the author-a fine art. In the other, it was the mere product of the soulless labor of the machine. Much was at stake in this dispute, including the booming market in photographs and the constitutional importance of the originality requirement in copyright law. This first confrontation between copyright law and technology provides invaluable insights into copyright law's ability to adapt and accommodate in the face of a challenge. An examination of these historical debates about photography across …
A Primer On U.S. Intellectual Property Rights Applicable To Music Information Retrieval Systems, Michael W. Carroll
A Primer On U.S. Intellectual Property Rights Applicable To Music Information Retrieval Systems, Michael W. Carroll
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
Digital technology has had a significant impact on the ways in which music information can be stored, transmitted, and used. Within the information sciences, music information retrieval has become an increasingly important and complex field. This brief article is addressed primarily to those involved in the design and implementation of systems for storing and retrieving digital files containing musical notation, recorded music, and relevant metadata – hereinafter referred to as a Music Information Retrieval System (“MIRS”). In particular, this group includes information specialists, software engineers, and the attorneys who advise them. Although peer-to-peer computer applications, such as Napster’s MusicShare or …
On The Author Effect: Contemporary Copyright And Collective Creativity, Peter Jaszi
On The Author Effect: Contemporary Copyright And Collective Creativity, Peter Jaszi
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
As exemplified by the articles in this volume, recent scholarship on "authorship" reflects various influences. Among the most important are Michel Foucault's article, What is an Author?, and Benjamin Kaplan's book, An Unhurried View of Copyright. Since the late 1960s, these two texts have influenced work in literary and legal studies respectively. Only recently, however, have the lines of inquiry that Foucault and Kaplan helped to initiate begun to converge.
A Garland Of Reflections On Three International Copyright Topics, Peter Jaszi
A Garland Of Reflections On Three International Copyright Topics, Peter Jaszi
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
The United States is a party to many copyright treaties, including a network of bilateral arrangements with other countries and one regional agreement. I will concentrate on the two major multilateral agreements to which the United States is a party, the Universal Copyright Convention ("UCC") and the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works ("Berne Convention").
When Works Collide: Derivative Motion Pictures, Underlying Rights, And The Public Interest, Peter Jaszi
When Works Collide: Derivative Motion Pictures, Underlying Rights, And The Public Interest, Peter Jaszi
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
Dramatic motion pictures' are prime examples of what copyright law terms "derivative works' because they are almost invariably based upon one or more prior works. Derivative works are so-called because they borrow from original works whether or not those works are in the same media. The universe of derivative works is broad. It encompasses everything from stuffed toys representing cartoon characters to translations of serious-minded literature.