Section 106A, Rights of certain authors to attribution and integrity, discusses copyright owner rights to integrity including the ability to prevent the destruction of a work of "recognized stature". Subparagraph (c)(2) states [quoted in entirety]: "The modification of a work of visual art which is the result of conservation, or of the public presentation, including lighting and placement, of the work is not a destruction, distortion, mutilation, or other modification described in subsection (a)(3) unless the modification is caused by gross negligence."
Subparagraph (c)(2) basically allows the restoration of a damaged photo and recognizes that such efforts are not considered a violation of the work.
One has to be concerned when the keynote justification, used by the Register of Copyrights, for creating an orphan law, is false. Just for chuckles, I googled photo restoration services and none I looked at had any FAQs that stated they would not restore an old photo due to copyright concerns. I won't take you to task for not knowing this fact, but you may want to take a different critical perspective of these bills when the number one person in the copyright office is either lying or incompetent and cannot be trusted to accurately describe the laws that she is responsible for following and protecting.
Your blog has unfortunately lulled a lot of people into complacency such that they will not try to oppose this bill by writing to their legislators. I don't think you expected what you wrote to snowball the way it did. You've had a number of people give you different perspectives and correct some of the misconceptions that snuck into your initial blog on the subject. I'd hope that your earlier positions have been modified with the new information at your disposal, including the actual bills that have moved this from an intellectual discussion to a real one. You'll still have a different perspective than a photographer or artist that has to worry about the ease at which their works can be orphaned. This is an important subject that should not be glibly dismissed.
There truly is no reason for any copyright owner to want to see one of these bills passed into law. There are better means to protect and preserve our history without giving commercial entities wide latitude to safely infringe copyrighted materials because it is difficult to locate the copyright owner. It would be stupid for any copyright owner to willingly give up some of the legal rights they currently have for nothing in return.
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Photo restoration is allowed under current copyright law
Date: 2008-05-18 01:08 am (UTC)Subparagraph (c)(2) basically allows the restoration of a damaged photo and recognizes that such efforts are not considered a violation of the work.
One has to be concerned when the keynote justification, used by the Register of Copyrights, for creating an orphan law, is false. Just for chuckles, I googled photo restoration services and none I looked at had any FAQs that stated they would not restore an old photo due to copyright concerns. I won't take you to task for not knowing this fact, but you may want to take a different critical perspective of these bills when the number one person in the copyright office is either lying or incompetent and cannot be trusted to accurately describe the laws that she is responsible for following and protecting.
Your blog has unfortunately lulled a lot of people into complacency such that they will not try to oppose this bill by writing to their legislators. I don't think you expected what you wrote to snowball the way it did. You've had a number of people give you different perspectives and correct some of the misconceptions that snuck into your initial blog on the subject. I'd hope that your earlier positions have been modified with the new information at your disposal, including the actual bills that have moved this from an intellectual discussion to a real one. You'll still have a different perspective than a photographer or artist that has to worry about the ease at which their works can be orphaned. This is an important subject that should not be glibly dismissed.
There truly is no reason for any copyright owner to want to see one of these bills passed into law. There are better means to protect and preserve our history without giving commercial entities wide latitude to safely infringe copyrighted materials because it is difficult to locate the copyright owner. It would be stupid for any copyright owner to willingly give up some of the legal rights they currently have for nothing in return.
Richard Gagnon