What are Orphan Works and why does anyone care about them? (No, this is not a post about Charles Dickens and the working orphans who populate his novels. I’m an Our Mutual Friend fan myself – see here about these digressions. Sorry.)
1) “Orphan works” described here and here.
2) Why does anyone care? The usual: Life, art, money, legislation, and Justice, Truth and the American Way.
3) A sampling of websites on the subject, though there are, as you would expect, zillions of others:
If you are following this dispute (and I last posted about it here), you might want to do a little reading about copyright, the history of commercial and official legal publishing, and vendor neutral citation (yes, all of these are entertwined) – unless you want to sound ill-informed (or worse) when you Comment about the issue on the various blogs and news sites that are running stories about this dispute.
1) For fun, start with Bound by Law, the copyright comic book by Keith Aoki, James Boyle, and Jennifer Jenkins.
2) A very interesting, provocative, and readable article: “Neutral Citation, Court Web Sites, and Access to Authoritative Case Law, by Peter Martin, 99 Law Library Journal 339 (Spring 2007) will give you an idea how much and how long these issues have been debated. (Quite a few of the articles in this issue are equally provocative, including an update to one of my favorites: “Why Do We Ask the Same Questions: The Triple Helix Dilemma Revisited,” by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic.)
Public Resource dot org has created this web page devoted to this dispute (about which I last posted here.)
(Among other things, it says “Kibbitzers welcome.” I thought in this state (Oregon) they were called Kitzhabers?“ Oy 🙂
Wondering about what homestead exemptions are? (See Steve Duin’s column in May 15th, 2008 Oregonian, Sleeping dogs and the Berkman trial.)
Note: Exemptions generally, in the context of debtor-creditor law (bankruptcy, debt collection, etc.) can get very tricky, so if you are more than curious, i.e. you are looking your creditors in the eye or over your shoulder, please consult a legal professional for advice.
Pro se litigants, and new lawyers, will ask us questions about how to “publish a legal notice.” Does it have to be in the newspaper? Which newspaper? What does the notice have to say?
Here are a few pointers, but as always, you’ll need to do some additional legal research and drafting yourself:
1) Oregon Revised Statutes (use index, including but not limited to Chapter 193)
(I last posted about this dispute here.)
Ars Technica: Fight shaping up over Oregon state law copyright claim (May 13th) (I’m not too sure about Nate Anderson’s “Out West” and the “tumbleweed” references, but we need all the lightness we can get when tempers get hot. I’m a Shane gal myself 🙂
The law librarian wonk (me) also has this to say:
Selected recent (April and May) postings on this dispute, about which I posted previously here :
1) Loaded Orygun has a summery posted 5/12/08.
2) From ZDNet Government: Oregon says its law is copyright (and a link to the letter with the June 2nd deadline notice from public dot resource) (and other ZDNet posts with Oregon tags).
In self-defense (too many questions taking too long to answer) I created this guide on How to Find Oregon Appellate Court Briefs. (You can see why there were all those questions!)
If you have anything to say about the guide, constructive or otherwise (well, maybe not those remarks), please leave a Comment or email my Law Library.
Selected recent postings on this dispute, about which I posted here.
1) From ADF Alliance Alert: Oregon threatens over statutes copyright? (with a link to this post at The Volokh Conspiracy (and associated Comments)
2) J’s Scratchpad: James Grimmelman: Copyright, Technology, and Access to the Law: Old Problems and New Solutions
More articles on this dispute (some “old”, some new):
1) From Boing Boing, Via WisLaw, comes this on May 2nd: “Archivists to Oregon: your laws aren’t copyrighted, so there!”
(BTW: If you haven’t see the short animation film, Gerald McBoing Boing (also here, from IMDB), you’ve missed a real treat.)
2) Also, this story from Et Seq, Update on the Oregon Revised Statutes CopyFight, with a direct link to this April 17th, 2008, story: Oregon goes wacka wacka huna kuna
Oregon Legal Research Blog