Re: Copyright Extension Bill Passes Congress

On Fri, 30 Oct 1998, Joseph P. Riolo <riolo[_at_]voicenet.com> wrote:
>
> I believe that you are not on this list (CNI-COPYRIGHT) long enough
> to be familiar with Albert Henderson's position, which for some is
> seen as high protectionist. Two of some points that illustrate his
> position is 1) the fair use should be eliminated and 2) Xerox copiers
> are "evil" (he did not say the word "evil" but one can get such
> impression from his posts).

This misstates my ideas. I never stated fair use should be eliminated or that Xerox copiers are "evil" or its equivalent. Copiers don't kill knowledge, administrators do.

Both "fair use" and cheap photocopying have led to abuses of copyright, authorship, libraries, publishers and the pursuit of knowledge. In particular, the "enemies of the library" as described by Walt Crawford and Michael Gorman have seized on this combination (of fair use and photocopying) to excuse cannibalizing library finances to support growth of other programs that I would call "administrative bloat." [FUTURE LIBRARIES. Chicago: American Library Association. 1995. Chapter 7]

Administrators have kidded researchers, students, and instructors with the promise that "access" to essential materials is provided by resource sharing rather than an up-to-date browsable collection. Even in the face of faculty senate advisories that the promise has failed, they continue to seek "relief from the growing costs of providing access to an ever-expanding volume of scholarly output." [To Publish and Perish. Policy Perspectives. 7,4. March, 1998. Co-sponsored by the Association of Research Libraries, The Association of American Universities and the Pew Higher Education Roundtable. 12 pages. Published by Institute for Research on Higher Ecucation, 4200 Pine St 5A, Philadelphia PA 19104-4090. 1-800-437-9799. http://www.irhe.upenn.edu/pp/pp-main.html]

The above cited report admits further, "The descriptive handle that most readily attaches to the rising cost of scholarly publication is 'the library problem' -- a seemingly permanent imbalance between the funds accorded to research libraries and the volume of scholarly output these libraries are expected to purchase and manage."

The library problem would go away, IMHO, if AAU institutions and their ilk would restore teaching and research to top priority.

Albert Henderson, Editor, PUBLISHING RESEARCH QUARTERLY <70244.1532[_at_]compuserve.com> Received on Mon Nov 02 1998 - 22:38:29 GMT