Howard,
Regarding your question concerning limiting fair use rights by contract. Section 108(f)(4) of the Act, contains a statement that "nothing limits the right of fair use or any contractual obligation assumed by the library at any time when it obtained a work for its collection."
My long-term assumption was that for libraries general fair use rights were available but if the library had signed a contract or license agreement to the effect that it would not duplicate certain works in the collection.
More publishers seem to be going to this type of license agreement; Dun & Bradstreet has long had this kind of restriction on its printed materials, but it is a signed license.
While section 108 applies only to libraries and archives, it seems to me that subsection (f)(4) makes it clear that by contract a library can alter what would be basic fair use.
This is limited to libraries, so perhaps the same ability to limit fair use rights does not exist for other parts of the Act.
What do others think?
Lolly Gasaway, Director of the Law Library & Professor
of Law, University of North Carolina.
Received on Thu Apr 07 1994 - 13:19:35 GMT
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