Re: droit de suite

On 04/10/2000, Robert Panzer <bigbusie[_at_]aol.com> wrote:
>
> On 2000-04-05, Tyler Ochoa <tochoa[_at_]law.whittier.edu> wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> > the owner of a painting DOES currently have the legal right to
> > "forbid others to see it, [and] forbid photos being taken or
> > reproduced."
> >
> > What happens if the copyright holder needs access to the original
> > in order to be able to reproduce it? There's no statute that says
> > the owner of the painting has to give the copyright owner access.
> > I think a reasonable right of access should be implied; but I've
> > only found one case that says so.
>
> Can you tell us what this case is? Is it the second decision after
> CCNV v. Reid? I recall that in this case, after the court established
> that Reid's sculpture was an independent work and not a work made for
> hire, that Reid (the creator and copyright owner of the work) tried to
> get access to the sculpture to copy it, but was denied by CCNV. The
> court then ruled that CCNV could not deny access.

That's the one.

> Tyler repeats this notion of access control in a separate post on
> April 5 but in the context of public domain imagery (Restrictions in
> Public Domain Performances):
>
> On 2000-04-05, Tyler Ochoa <tochoa[_at_]law.whittier.edu> wrote:
> >
> > It is extremely common for museums of all types to place terms and
> > conditions on the use of reproductions of works in their collections.
> > The museums' argument is that this is merely a contract, a binding
> > legal agreement. If you don't like the terms and conditions, you
> > don't have to agree; but they don't have to give you access because
> > they own the physical copies to which they are giving you access.
> > The counter-argument is the "public domain" is meaningless without a
> > reasonable right of access on the part of the public; and therefore
> > that the terms and conditions ought not to be legally enforceable.
> > But the current trend seems to be toward enforcing such agreements.
>
> Can you give us any specific cases or anecdotal examples of where these
> agreement have been enforced?

Not in the museum context; I was thinking of shrink-wrap cases, like ProCD v. Zeidenberg, 86 F.3d 1447 (7th Cir. 1996).

Tyler T. Ochoa
Associate Professor
Whittier Law School
<tochoa[_at_]law.whittier.edu> Received on Wed Apr 12 2000 - 21:52:20 GMT