Maria Pallante, the current Register of Copyrights, along with Steve Ruwe, an attorney in the Copyright Office General Counsel’s Office, came to Nashville yesterday (Dec. 17th) to meet with a number of Nashville’s leaders in publishing and copyright. Maria presented parts of her vision for “The Next Great Copyright Act”, as well as addressing other areas of the Copyright Office.
She said a lot of great things, and was careful to NOT use the word “reform” when talking about what is being discussed in committees related to the Copyright Act.
She also mentioned, but did not dwell on, the idea of shortening the life of post 1978 copyrights to life plus 50 (rather than 70), unless the heirs update their registration with the Copyright Office. Not sure how I feel about that one.
Her complete speech from the Manges Lecture “The Next Great Copyright Act” can be viewed at the link below:
http://www.copyright.gov/docs/next_great_copyright_act.pdf
Now the push is to get DC to focus on Nashville to participate in a future round-table discussion related to changes in the law.
The sponsoring organization, The Copyright Society of the South, has posted links on their website for those of you who are interested in connecting for various newsletters, to read some of the mentioned lectures, or to connect with various legislative groups involved in the Copyright Law review process.
The Copyright Society of the South’s website is www.copyrightsocietyofthesouth.com.
Also, some discussion has begun on the Copyright Society’s LinkedIn page. Whether you were a part of yesterday’s presentation, or missed it and would like to see what others are saying, you may click below to join the discussion. Make sure you join the LinkedIn group.
ClearBox Rights 