Journalism has changed a lot in the past decade, but media law courses in journalism school hardly at all, Ricardo Bilton writes: "Journalism schools rarely teach key digital legal topics such as net neutrality, encryption, the legal liability of retweets, and the 'right to be forgotten.' In a sense, media law courses at journalism schools are subject to the same problem that some journalism schools face as a whole: an institutional bias towards print and broadcast."
Law and journalism
Attorney Helen Sedwick answers reader questions on some finer points of copyrights, including when to copyright your work and when to seek permission to use someone else's: "Many people make the mistake of thinking that giving credit to the original illustrator, photographer, or writer is enough to protect them from a claim of copyright infringement. It’s not. If the original image or other work is subject to copyright, then assume you need to get permission to use it."
D.J. Pangburn talks to attorney Robert Penchina about a photographer's lawsuit alleging that a major photo agency is charging fees for the use of photos that she'd donated to the Library of Congress: "It wasn’t that these folks were licensing these works to the public that they couldn’t have gotten for free, but that they turned around and acted as if they were the copyright owner and now are threatening people and collecting money from people without her permission."
Few features of U.S. copyright law are debated more than fair use, the principle that brief excerpts of copyrighted material can sometimes be reused without the copyright holder's permission. Paul Raeburn summarizes some of the ins and outs: "The message to journalists is: Be careful. Unless, of course, you have a team of lawyers at your back. Fortunately, there are a few useful resources online to help science writers, podcasters, and editors sort all of this out."
Two University of California professors found themselves on the losing side of a "fair use" copyright question when they wanted to use three lengthy quotations from the New York Times in a book, Shan Wang writes: "Routledge, their publisher, required that they obtain formal permission or cut them down." A Times representative says the company offers licensing to any third parties who aren't comfortable that their proposed use is covered by the fair use limits.
A new report from the Knight Foundation suggests that First Amendment defenders may need new financial support now that many of their traditional backers have fallen onto hard times, Jonathan Peters writes: "The news industry, especially newspapers, has shaped American media law for decades by paying the bills to bring the big cases — to unseal court papers, to open meetings, to protect confidential sources, and to compel the disclosure of public records."
The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to review the Authors Guild's decade-old copyright infringement case against Google for its scanning and digitizing of copyrighted books: "The underlying issue — expansion of fair use in the digital age — remains in need of resolution, the Guild maintains." NASW had joined an amicus brief in support of the Guild's challenge. Background from the Guild. Coverage and analysis from Thu-Huong Ha, Adam Liptak, and Jeff John Roberts.
As an editor, Jack Limpert was sometimes sued, and he writes about the frustration of a deposition: "Things move slowly as the lawyers argue and make frequent objections, leaving the journalist to try to read the signals and avoid saying something that the opposing lawyers can use against you in front of a jury. Spend two days in a law firm’s conference room being deposed and you feel you’ve entered a parallel universe, one where the world of journalism seems far away."
Attorney Helen Sedwick discusses what happens when you want to use copyrighted work but can't find the owner to get permission, plus a proposed solution from the U.S. Copyright Office: "Orphan works include everything from World War II photographs to anonymous internet postings. Tens of millions of orphan works are hidden in libraries, museums, historical societies, not to mention attics. … In fact, some experts estimate that 90% of all copyrighted work is orphan work."
Attorney Helen Sedwick offers step-by-step guides for dealing with copyright infringement, including the details of filing "takedown notices" under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and how to report infringement to social media outlets, search engines, and e-book publishers: "The good news is writers have various options for dealing with content theft, and 99% of the time, they will not need an attorney. A little research and a few emails may do the trick."