Talking Fair Use! Q&A Chat With Patricia Aufderheide, 1pm PT

from the techdirt-book-club dept

Fri, Jun 8th 2012 12:39pm — Mike Masnick

Okay, folks at 1pm PT join us for a Q&A discussion with Patricia Aufderheide, co-author of Reclaiming Fair Use. We published a bunch of excerpts: here's the first excerpt, the second excerpt, the third excerpt and the fourth excerpt, so check them out if you haven't had a chance to read the book. And then join in and ask some questions or provide your own thoughts on the book.

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Filed Under: book club, live chat, patricia aufderheide, reclaiming fair use

8 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2012 @ 1:02pm

Question: How do you "reclaim" something that has only been in pure expansion for the last 30 years?
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- RD, 8 Jun 2012 @ 1:34pm
  
  Re:
  "Question: How do you "reclaim" something that has only been in pure expansion for the last 30 years?"
  
  Is this a trick question? Or am I not reading it right? How can you claim fair use has been expanding for the last 30 years when, in fact, ALL efforts are being made to limit or exterminate them at every single turn, in every single instance?
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  - Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2012 @ 2:07pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Umm, it starts back at betamax (huge expansion of fair use) and continues today through websites and such that make use of images and clips without fear. It also includes things like Google's image system (ruled as fair use) and other similar situations.
    
    There is way more fair use today than there was 30 years ago. I am trying to figure out what we had 30 years ago that is missing today, and needs reclaiming.
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    - Digitari, 8 Jun 2012 @ 5:24pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      "The DMCA modified the law that the Sony decision was based upon in several ways, and new interpretations are still being handed down."
      
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Corp._of_America_v._Universal_City_Studios,_Inc.
      
      I guess research is not your strong point
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      - Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2012 @ 7:16pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        Umm, hate to disappoint you, but even with that, fair use is still MASSIVELY larger than it was 3 decades ago. What are we reclaiming?
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        Anonymous Coward, 8 Jun 2012 @ 8:00pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        This seems to be a perspective issue.
        
        That AC seems to think that fair use was a narrow set of circumstances that were expanded, when everyone else thinks that fair use applied to everything except some carefully defined specific circumstance.
        So where everyone else sees things like the Betamax case as an attempt to limit fair use, he sees it as an expansion of fair use.
        It is likely that his perception is a deliberate choice and rational argument will be wasted on him.
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        Anonymous Coward, 9 Jun 2012 @ 6:17am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
        I think you miss the point.
        
        30 years ago, "fair use" was a pretty limited thing, legally it was a bare minimum concept. Since the betamax case, the definition of fair use has expanded dramatically, and many more uses of copyright material have been deemed legal and acceptable (Hello google images!).
        
        That means that, in any legal sense, the definitions of what is fair use have expanded very rapidly indeed.
        
        I think you are the one with the perception issue, you are making assumptions that were just not legally true or factual.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jun 2012 @ 5:21pm

One can claim that the definition of fair use has expanded, but for one to claim that the definition of copyright has not changed is sheer disingenuity. For instance, it might be fair use to back up one's media, but with the DMCA making bypassing the DRM to do so illegal, the allowance to back up media is moot.

When you have people claiming that taking photographs of food is infringing on the chef's IP, and CEOs demanding that SOPA was needed to legally block criticism and parody, I find it very hard to take seriously anyone who claims that fair use has expanded/the definition of copyright has been left unchanged or reduced.
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