Friday, August 01, 2008

Orphan Works Bill Dying!

If you make a living as an artist be it a photographer, writer, illustrator, musician, etc this is great news. The Orphan Works Bill basically "makes it legal for anyone to use a copyrighted work for any purpose to go ahead and use it without a license if they have made a "good faith, reasonably diligent search" to locate the copyright owner." So if I try calling or emailing the copyright owner and they don't answer back, does that mean I made a "good faith, reasonably diligent search" to find the copyright owner? The current draft of this bill is ridiculous and would kill the commercial art industry.

This had been big news lately and I'm happy to hear that it has been shot down (for now). It's still a good idea to contact your senators opposing this bill or any new versions that I'm sure will show up in the future. You can do that Here.

1 comment:

glorifiedg said...

Has it really been defeated? Last I heard it was hotlined and a hold was placed on it for further discussion, but I don't think that means this pass is over.

I have a hard time getting good current news on this bill. I blog about it, but I'm not always sure if my info is current.

If you have a better source for current news than the Illustrator's Partnership could you post it in a comment at my blog?

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