copyright issues
Well I was certainly happy to read about the Bridgeman/Corel case in Digital History, since it addresses exactly what I planned to do to put some images on my site (in my case, take digital pictures of images already reprinted in books). I imagine the book publisher had to pay the libraries to use the images, but I have to say, if the only difference is that I could go down to the Library of Congress and take a picture of the picture there, I don’t feel all that guilty. The fact that Corbis can claim the rights to images in the public domain, though, is pretty shocking.
Also shocking is the fact that music will not be in the public domain until 2067! Unfortunately, I would recommend steering clear of getting into music licensing if you can avoid it…we had a lawyer and signed a contract about licensing rights and publishing rights (two separate things–two separate costs–two separate groups who make money) and I still don’t understand it all. This seems a shame, though, to lose access to historical music, since the Internet would grant access to it as never before (especially music recorded in outdated formats). Hopefully we can talk about this more with our guest speaker.
In contrast, it was somewhat refreshing to read the standards for fair use in filmmaking. At least there it seems like there is some leeway (assuming you can get your hands on whatever it is you want to use). I thought all of their points were logical and, well, fair. It’s interesting, though, that these same standards can’t quite be applied to music…