Re: Fair Use Guidelines for Multimedia

I would respond to Lisa Livingston's lengthy repost with two short news items:

American Library Association and Association of Research Libraries have both voted to NOT ENDORSE any of the CONFU guidelines, including multimedia. Their arguments are varied and complex, as a decision such as this should be. But in a nutshell they argue that the Internet is rapidly evolving, and that healthy experimentation is underway for educational uses of the Internet, and that adopting restrictive guidelines at this time would crimp that experimentation prematurely.

The URL's for the position statements of these two organizations, both large, and eminent, and essentially conservative organizations are:

   http://www.ala.org/washoff/alawon.alwn601.html

   http://arl.cni.org/info/frn/copy/copytoc.html

ALA states "In a time of rapid technological and policy evolution, the American Library Association has concluded that it is premature to formalize guideliens for the fair use of copyrighted materials in a digital information environment". Five paragraphs later, "Doing so may unduly restrain the proper application of fair use in the educational and research environments"...."Such guidelines may restrain fair use more than their developers intended".

ARL has a full page of articulated concerns about the multimedia guidelines at this URL:

   http://arl.cni.org/info/frn/copy/ccumc.html

And just to clear my good name, please know that it was Mr. Watters himself who used the phrase "sheep". I was merely agreeing with him. All the CIONFU documents use language that implies adoption of guidelines, "widespread endorsement" of guidelines", etc. Many library and educational professional societies have objected to the manipulative use of language in the CONFU guidelines as intimidating and coercive. Furthermore, many professional societies that have opted to NOT endorse the CONFU guidelines are now beginning the process to write what they consider more appropriate guidelines. Perhaps educators are in a good position to know what education needs.

Maryly Snow
Librarian
Architecture Slide Library
University of California, Berkeley
slides[_at_]ced.berkeley.edu

> To cni-copyright listserv readers,
>
> Lisa Livingston responded directly to Maryly's message re. the
> guidelines but has asked me to repost her response to the entire list.
>
> I would also like to add that if you are interested in reading all the
> guidelines and the CONFU interim report, it is very difficult to navigate
> to them through the USPTO website. I have provided a direct link to the
> CONFU website (as well as the complete Multimedia guidelines document
> (including a regularly updated list of endorsing organizations), on my
> guidelines page at:
>
> http://www.libraries.psu.edu/avs/fairuse/default.html
>
> Stan Diamond
> Member of the CONFU working group on Multimedia Guidelines
> <sxd[_at_]psulias.psu.edu>
>
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
>
> Dear Maryly,
>
>
> I have read a number of messages from educators about the new fair use
> guidelines for educational multimedia over the course of the past few
> months.
>
> While the vast majority of those messages indicate support for the
> guidelines, I am aware that there are other individuals and some assns
> that do not support or plan to use the guidelines. Certainly, everyone
> is free to choose whether or not they wish to use the guidelines. That
> is the magic of our country - of our Constitution. The guidelines
> provide educators with a new teaching tool. What they decide to do with
> it is up to them. After all, each educator knows what works best for
> themselves and their students.
>
>
> I believe that Berkeley did downlink the broadcast. I am sorry that you
> did not have the opportunity to watch the teleconference. Perhaps some
> of your concerns would have been addressed and some of your questions
> answered.
>
> Every downlink site received authorization to videotape the event. You
> might want to see who at Berkeley is holding that videocassette and
> take a look.
>
>
> In the meantime, I would like to share some information with you.
>
>
> The fair use guidelines for educational multimedia can be implemented
> by educators and students now. Work on them is complete. We have
> received broad endorsement. The Penn State website -
> http://www.libraries.psu.edu/avs/fairuse/default.html -
>
> keeps an up-to-date list of endorsers. Last week the guidelines
> received endorsement from the Educational Testing Service (ETS) and the
> Special Libraries Assn (SLA). So far this week - and the week is young
> - the guidelines were endorsed by the National Assn of Schools of Music
> (NASM).
>
> Additionally, the guidelines were adopted by the Subcommittee on Courts
> and Intellectual Property, Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. House of
> Representatives and are supported by the US Copyright Office and the
> Commissioner of Patent and Trademarks. Sufficient validation and
> endorsement is in place for educators and students to feel comfortable
> implementing the guidelines.
>
>
> The CONFU Interim Report includes the multimedia guidelines for reasons
> described on the CONFU website. You can access that site via the Penn
> State site mentioned above. By the way, that report identifies them as
> "Proposed Fair Use Guidelines for Educational Multimedia". They are
> "proposed" only in so far as being proposed for addition to the CONFU
> report. <bold>Again, the Fair Use Guidelines for Educational Multimedia
> are complete with necessary endorsements and validation and ready to
> use.</bold>
>
>
> I expect you are aware that the fair use guidelines that were developed
> in the 1970s did not receive unanimous endorsement either. Then, as
> now, there were parties with a vested interest that did not endorse
> those guidelines yet those guidelines -particularly the Off-Air Taping
> Guidelines have proven extremely helpful to students, educators and
> administrators over the years.
>
>
> Further, you encourage non-endorsement of the guidelines and ask Mr.
> Watters not to follow the sheep. I can assure you that those who have
> endorsed the guidelines have done so only after much discussion. The
> endorsing assns took into account the POV of their constituents and
> spent months discussing first - the reasonability of creating
> guidelines at all and then the words of the document itself. These
> individuals are not sheep. They are concerned and very dedicated
> leaders in the fields of education, communication, and government who
> realized a need existed and worked long and hard to reach consensus.
> You suggest that individuals "work with professional information and
> scholarly societies to develop suitable fair use guidelines for
> academia." That is exactly what our committee did. We all worked
> together - professional information and scholarly societies to develop
> suitable fair use guidelines for academia as well as representatives from
> government agencies and the proprietary community. Finally, I
> might remind you that "scholar" is a word of multiple meanings - 1) a
> student, a pupil and 2) a learned person. Technology is dramatically
> impacting today's world. Regardless of how "learned" each of us is in
> one area or another, we are all "pupils" of the technological change
> that permeates every nook and cranny of our society. I believe it is
> the truly wise individual that recognizes the importance of being both
> when the situation calls for it. The multimedia guidelines committee
> was simply loaded with those "wise" individuals.
>
>
> I, therefore, encourage Mr. Watters, his institution, and others to
> join us in our endorsement of the guidelines.
>
>
> Best regards,
>
> Lisa Livingston
> Co-Chair, Multimedia Guideline Development Committee
>
> Director, Instructional Media
> City College/City University of New York
> 5/220 North Academic Center
> 138th Street at Convent Avenue
> New York, New York 10031
> (T)212.650.6708 (F)212.650.6753
> lisa1[_at_]phantom.cct.ccny.cuny.edu
Received on Fri Feb 28 1997 - 23:53:37 GMT