THE FUTURE AND YOU Podcast, and "FAIR USE"

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msfry
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Post by msfry »

One podcast I follow is THE FUTURE AND YOU, with Steven Euin Cobb. He's a futuristic host who interviews scientists, inventors, think tankers, professors, sci fi authors, etc. discussing everything futuristic. Last night I listened to these fascinating podcasts:

Episode January 28, 2015 - he talks about the publishing of thousands of modern government, university and scientific papers online, which may already be public domain, or subject to Fair Use (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use). WOW! This would give us a lot more material to work with!!!! I recently read on the Katrina report: A Failure Of Initiative, which I presume fell under this category. So I hope you'll tell me more about this!

Episode February 28, 2015 - Steve discusses the rapid changes in computer technology, and at around 7 minutes gives Librivox a nice plug.

His website: http://www.stevecobb.com
MaryAnnSpiegel
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Post by MaryAnnSpiegel »

Michele,

The Hurricane Katrina report was published by the US government and so not under copyright:
From the wiki on copyrights:
Published works that fall into one of the following categories may be included in the Librivox catalog:

Works published in 1922 or earlier (the copyright has expired in the U.S. on these works),

Works authored by the U.S. Government (these works are not eligible for U.S. copyright protection),

Works which Project Gutenberg has determined are in the public domain (the Project Gutenberg website does include some works which are not public domain in the US, so be sure to check the PD status on the “Bibrec” tab for the work you are interested in)
I don't believe that the fair use doctrine would expand the material we can record for LV. The tests for fair use are:
17 U.S.C. § 107

Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 17 U.S.C. § 106 and 17 U.S.C. § 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include:

1 the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
2 the nature of the copyrighted work
3 the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
4 the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
Just a quick review . . . first, LV doesn't fall into any of the categories cited where fair use is not a violation of copyright (such as criticism, comment, news reporting and teaching.)

For test 1, while we are not making audio recordings for commercial purposes, we do release them into the PD where other can use them for commercial purposes. We are also not adding something new (as you would if one quoted a bit of the work in another work or a review). Therefore, I think it's pretty clear that what LV does with a text would fail test 1.

For test 3, we would be reading the entire copyrighted work, not a portion of it. That would likely fail test 3. You can quote a portion of a work under fair use, but fair use can't be read so broadly that you can copy the entire work and do with it what you want.

For test 4 - the author of a copyright work has the right to control who makes an audioversion. Making a LV version would affect the copyright owner's ability to monetize the copyright work in an audio form, so we likely fail that test too.

Worth asking the question, but all in all, hard to see how a LV recording of a copyrighted text would meet any (let alone all) of the requirements of the fair use exception to copyright infringement. And since we have no cadre of lawyers ready to defend us if we are sued and make new law in this area, it's best if we steer clear.

MaryAnn
msfry
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Post by msfry »

Thanks for that thorough explanation. I understand about the lawyers. We must be careful. How does one access a list of U.S. Government papers?

Steve also inferred research papers that the government funded with public money, but published under a University's banner, might be coming to be viewed as public domain. The definitions will probably continue to change as time goes on.
Kangaroo692
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Post by Kangaroo692 »

Would works published by the U.S. Government that are not books, just papers. Like for example, from the US Forest Service's "Treesearch" website, "Proceedings of the 16th biennial southern silvicultural research conference", it's not really a book, so would it be eligible to be recorded for LibriVox? (it's PD)

(Not that I necessarily want to record it, just picked a random one from the website.)
chocoholic
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Post by chocoholic »

Most (but not all) US government publications are in the US public domain. Ones that are in the PD are eligible to be recorded for LV. The one you mention is 407 pages, so somebody would really, really have to want to record it. (Meaning, not me :))
Laurie Anne
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