OK you guys need to relax.
This is old news – go here
Years and Session Dates of the U.S. Congress
You will see that the 109th Congress ended in 2006 – that is when the Democrats took over the control of the committees. This bill died in committee.
And if you think that this is the first time that knowledge of this has come out, read this (where I first learned about it in 2006):
ASMP
Just look at the URL to find the PDF file:
http://www.publicknowledge.org/pdf/ow-act-2006.pdf
The date of publication is May 22nd 2006 – by my reckoning that was one election ago, where the sponsors of the bill were defeated – as I recall. Please note that the title is “Orphaned works of 2006” Mr. Lamar (author of the bill) is no longer the chairman of the committee. (The current Congress is the 110th)
Go here:
H.R. 5439 [109th]: Orphan Works Act of 2006 (GovTrack.us)
It looks as if the last action on the bill was in 2006. As far as I can see there has been no debate in the House of this bill. It does not appear that the bill has made it past the Rules Committee.
At these sites the bill appears to be dead:
ALA | Copyright News 2006 http://www.collegeart.org/pdf/caa-news-05-07.pdf search for 5439 - “the bill did not leave the Judiciary Committee before the session ended.”
Before you go off half cocked – do a little research and:
Put a Copyright © mark on your images.
When you publish an image to the web – use just enough compression to make it really ugly if someone “steals” it.
Embed the Copyright © Year – Owner, All Rights Reserved notice in the IPTC of your published JPEG’s.
Register the images with the Copyright office of your particular country.
Protect yourself - you have nothing to lose but what you own.
EDIT:
Clicked another button and got this:
ASMP
quote: "
We have great news! The latest Orphan Works bill (the Copyright Modernization Act of 2006, HR 6052) appears to have died in committee. On Wednesday, Sept. 27, the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), announced that he was withdrawing the bill from consideration at that markup session, which is likely to be the last one this year. He said that he did not see any reasonable chance that it would be signed into law in the current Congress. He also said that he plans to introduce another bill when the new Congress convenes next year." My bold. As Mr. Lamar is not longer the Committee chair - there was no reintroduction in 2007.
Also note: the article that stirs up this pot - never mentions the name of the Bill nor its Number in his article. A search for Orphan Works on Google did not provide anything with a date later than
2006. I think the ASMP would be all over this if a new bill would have been introduced - since they are a collection of mostly independent artists (photographers).
Edit - 2:
There are a series of hearings that are ongoing - to follow them go here:
ASMP
In the US - to the best of my knowledge - there is one (1) registry for copyright - that is the US Copyright office. It does cost you to register - always has, always will. Any change to Copyrights and the way they are handled will have to pass muster of the international community. (Berne Convention)
Edit - 3:
Went out to DPR and saw a similar 'OMG THE SKY IS FALLING" thread. In the thread there was this link:
Radio Free Meredith - Six Misconceptions About Orphaned Works
Read it - it is obvious that the Mark Simon is - over reacting? reading challenged? does not have a clue?
This web post is very good .
Edit - 4:
Read:
U.S. Copyright Office - Orphan Works
quote:
"In our study of the orphan works problem, the Office reviewed various suggestions from the copyright community.
These included creating a new exception in Title 17, creating a government-managed compulsory license, and instituting a ceiling on available damages. We rejected all of these proposals in part for the same reasons: we did not wish to unduly prejudice the legitimate rights of a copyright owner by depriving him of the ability to assert infringement or hinder his ability to collect an award that reflects the true value of his work. We also rejected proposals that would have limited the benefit of orphan works legislation to certain categories of works or uses. Both commercial and noncommercial users made compelling cases; moreover, these parties often collaborate on projects and both need the benefit of the law. Likewise, we concluded that there were significant problems with respect to all categories of works: published, unpublished, foreign and U.S. works." My emphasis.
This guy needs to learn how to "READ:.
The Elitist – formerly known as PDL
Originally posted by jbarnhart 
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