Re: petition for US authors, artists, and musicians

Brenna Lyons wrote:
> I haven't seen Digital Millennium do much good. Scrapping it and  
> simply focusing on copyright itself would work for me. And, to be  
> blunt, I'm all for sampling, with a VERY SMALL allowable percentage,  
> applied to any sort of materials. IOW, if someone used a paragraph  
> from a novel or two minutes of a
> movie, as long as they gave the source and weren't libeling or  
> something, is it that much damage? Giving the source credit and a  
> limit on percentage handles that, though the music industry would  
> HATE it...and so would Disney, which is why it will never pass.

Actually, the example you used would almost always be declared to be  
fair use, in almost every situation I can think of. And fair use is  
already allowed for in our current law.

>
> Then again, I haven't seen any of the government agencies supposedly  
> helping
> curb internet piracy doing any good either. Hell, one of them asked  
> me what
> an e-book WAS (back when the FBI was still in charge of the show).  
> And he's
> supposed to be effective, in any way, shape, or form? Sigh...

Could be worse. Could be dealing with IRS auditors, some of whom are  
the dumbest people I have ever met, and all of whom, as far as I can  
see, are completely, utterly and stunningly clueless about book  
publishing.

I once had an auditor declare (in tones of great triumph) that he had  
proof that our company wasn't a book publisher. We didn't have  
printing presses, you see.   . . . .  Yeah, riiight. In our NYC  
office. On the top floor of a Fifth Avenue skyscraper. (Actually, we  
didn't have them in our warehouse, either, but he'd never been there.)

When I pointed out that NO large, or even middling, publishers (at  
that time) owned presses, he claimed that we all must, because  
printing and publishing were in the same SIC code. (They're not. Same  
group of codes, though.)



Let's face it, our regulators and legislators have no foggy clue about  
what we do in print, let alone e-publishing. They never have, and they  
never will. Which is, of course, one of the things that had the AAP  
and AG so scared about the likely outcome of the Google suit, and so  
willing to do an obviously problematic deal.

My solution: Put a pillow on the part of the wall I use most often for  
head banging when the nitwittery gets to be too much for me. Or  
something. (Anyone know where I can get a copy of the late, much- 
lamented, Miss Snark's cluegun?)


Marion Gropen
Gropen Associates, Inc.
By-The-Question Consulting,  Tools for Publishers, & Classes
www.GropenAssoc.com
Her blog: www.GropenAssoc.com/blog





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