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 | After Three Years, Section 108 Report Is Greeted as an Accomplishment
Its report came over a year later than initially expected and its recommendations reflect considerable tension among many interests, but the Section 108 Study Group, charged with updating a key section of copyright law pertaining to libraries, has succeeded in delivering a report, and that alone is being touted as a significant step. What comes next, however, is still an open question, and legislation based on the report is not expected any time soon. "[The section 108 group] spent three long years looking at very complex and difficult issues," observed Prue Adler, associate executive director of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), noting that she and other stakeholders will want to spend more time with the report to better understand the thinking behind it.
Peter Givler, executive director of the Association of American University Presses (AAUP), a member of study group, told the LJ Academic Newswire that serving in the group was a "fascinating" and educational experience. "The thing you have to keep in mind is that this is not a report from the Library of Congress, but a report to the Library of Congress," Givler said. "The study group was extremely diverse; it included librarians, lawyers, lawyers who were also librarians, publishers, film and music industry people, photographers, and aggregators." Although the group originally was scheduled to deliver a report within 18 months, Givler said that once initial discussions began it became clear the report wasn't going to happen that quickly. "What I can tell you is that this was a very democratic process, and democratic processes are notoriously messy. It took a lot of time, a lot of discussion. There were a lot of knotty issues."
Indeed, the report reflects significant discussion on a range of issues relating to libraries and copyright, and also the ongoing friction between publishers and libraries in the digital age. Givler characterized this as a natural tension. "Sometimes we could get agreement at the top level quickly, but working it through is where things get sticky," he said, acknowledging that the group's recommendations are almost all contingent on a set of sub-issues being worked out. "Rapidly changing technology, meanwhile, was a constant theme. "How specific could we be, with the idea that the more specific you are, the more likely it is that five years later it will be out of date," he acknowledged. "That's another balance that has to be struck, but you can't just throw up your hands, you have to address this."
Givler said that over the course of the group's work-15 two-day meetings and three roundtables, along with many nights and weekends-the group was able to find some consensus, most importantly, on the issue of preservation in the digital age. "Libraries made a very good case for a preservation exemption," Givler told the Newswire. Currently under section 108, libraries are able to make backup copies of materials once deterioration begins, a point that the group agreed needed updating for the digital age. "With a book you have physical evidence of deterioration, but you can still read pages, but with a digital object, by the time you realize something is wrong, it's gone," Givler explained. "There is a real need to allow libraries to make copies preemptively."
While a preservation exemption would in theory be a good thing, Givler says, he readily concedes that the study group does not have all the answers as to how any new provision would work, stressing that the report is a starting point for further discussion. "From my point of view, the report's real value for LC is in giving them a road map for what the issues are, where it's going to be relatively easy to get agreement, where it isn't. It's a very complicated process."
In this election year, there is expected to be no legislative action on the report. The Copyright Office has alluded to holding hearings at some point, most likely in 2009. Even then, it remains unclear if there will be any legislative action at all to come from the report. "As we learned from the DMCA and the TEACH Act, opening the Copyright Act is something you have to be very careful with," Adler noted. "We will want to make sure that if we do open up section 108 there is no impact on section 107 [fair use] and that any changes to 108 do not diminish the flexibility we currently have."
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Amid Controversy, Hopkins Acts Quickly To Restore Blocked Search Term
Johns Hopkins University administrators acted quickly April 4 after it was learned that the search term "abortion" was blocked in POPLINE, a publicly-funded database on reproductive health. According to Hopkins officials, the search term "abortion," had been used over 25,000 times before February, but was disabled after USAID, the agency that funds POPLINE made "an inquiry" to POPLINE administrators over two abortion-related items in the database. Medical and reference librarians communicating on blogs and electronic discussion lists were among the first to blow the whistle on the action.
"Following this inquiry, the POPLINE administrators at the Center for Communication Programs made the decision to restrict abortion as a search term," explained Michael J. Klag, dean of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in a public letter. "I could not disagree more strongly with this decision, and I have directed that the POPLINE administrators restore 'abortion' as a search term immediately." Klag also said he would investigate why the term was blocked in the first place. "The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health is dedicated to the advancement and dissemination of knowledge and not its restriction."
A spokesperson for USAID, Sandra Johnson, told reporters at Wired that the agency did inquire about two documents she described as "one-sided in favor of abortion rights," a stance counter to the Bush Administration's. Johnson told reporters that administrators at Hopkins had "misunderstood" the agency's request, however, and said the agency was "glad" the search function was being restored.
Officials at the American Library Association, however, while praising Klag's "swift action," remained concerned about the circumstances that led to the term being blocked. "We are dismayed," reads a statement from ALA president Loriene Roy, "at the circumstances that caused the administrators running the POPLINE database to begin blocking any and all searches on the word 'abortion.' Any federal policy or rule that requires or encourages information providers to block access to scientific information because of partisan or religious bias is censorship."
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| Unbound: SUNY Press To Offer Electronic Editions of Frontlist Books
With the launch of its new DirectText (DT) initiative this week, SUNY Press has become the first university press in the United States to offer electronic editions of its frontlist titles. With monographs becoming increasingly expensive, often exceeding $75, SUNY Press officials say the new program is aimed at getting content into more readers' hands. Under the program, SUNY Press' frontlist titles will be available for download for just $20 directly from the Press's web site. Users can download and print PDF versions. A free preview option allows one to view the table of contents, the first two pages of each chapter, and an index of DT titles before purchasing. Dan Flynn, Director of Sales and Business Development at SUNY Press told the LJ Academic Newswire that making chapters or portions of SUNY Press books available for sale is also being planned.
To download a book, the purchaser of a DirectText book must register with PublishersRow.com, the program's vendor, to get a username and password, which places the book in the purchaser's "bookshelf." Users may register up to three computers to access a book in their bookshelf, Flynn explained, (for example, their home, work computers and a laptop). "The registered computers may view the DirectText book for 180 days online, may download the book as a PDF document, and may print all or portions of the book."
Press director Gary Dunham, who joined SUNY Press in January of this year, said the DT initiative is about "creating instant access to just-published scholarship" at an affordable rate. "If you want a prestige, jacketed cloth edition, you can still have it," Dunham said, "but affordability and immediacy are really the cornerstones of this program."
The DT initiative went live on March 30 with 20 titles. Approximately 50 titles will be available by the end of June, and an additional 60 will be available by the end of the year. Dunham says press officials will evaluate DT seasonally. "We look forward to its evolution," he said.
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| SPARC To Host Digital Repositories Meeting in November
SPARC, in partnership with SPARC Europe, SPARC Japan, and the National Institute of Informatics will host a digital repositories meeting November 17-18, 2008 at the Renaissance Harborplace Hotel, in Baltimore, MD. SPARC officials say the meeting comes on the heels of two "groundbreaking" developments, the recent vote by Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences to require that articles be placed in Harvard's institutional repository, and implementation of the new National Institutes of Health (NIH) public access policy. The meeting is designed to help stake holders to "explore next steps for the burgeoning open-archiving movement." Registration will open in May.
Organizers say the program will focus on four key areas: policy, new horizons, campus publishing strategies, and value-added services. The program will also feature "an Innovation Fair" to focus on new technologies, strategies, and approaches as well as "a practicum on marketing and advocacy." The program committee is seeking proposals for presentations. The deadline for submissions is May 30, 2008.
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Library Journal Academic Newswire
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