Law Commons^™

Cracking The Copyright Dilemma In Software Preservation: Protecting Digital Culture Through Fair Use Consensus, Peter Jaszi, Patricia Aufderheide, Brandon Butler, Krista L. Cox

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

Copyright problems may inhibit the crucially important work of preserving legacy software. Such software is worthy of study in its own right because it is critical to accessing digital culture and expression. Preservation work is essential for communicating across boundaries of the past and present in a digital era. Software preservationists in the United States have addressed their copyright problems by developing a code of best practices in employing fair use. Their work is an example of how collective action by users of law changes the norms and beliefs about law, which can in turn change the law itself insofar …