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The period for filing amicus curiae (“friend of the court”) briefs in the appellate phase of the Georgia State University copyright and fair use case has closed, so it is a good time to take stock of who has weighed in on each side, and what their arguments look like. Even though this will be [...]
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A new ruling came out last week in one of the most interesting cases involving appropriation art, the ongoing dispute between photographer Patrick Cariou and appropriation artist Richard Prince. I wrote about the unfortunate decision from the district court back in 2011, and on Thursday the Second Circuit Court of Appeals reversed that decision, [...]
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In March the ACRL published a new White Paper on Intersections of Scholarly Communication and Information Literacy: Creating Strategic Collaborations for a Changing Academic Environment which looks at the ways in which the dramatic changes taking place in the environment for scholarly communication have necessary consequences for nearly all librarians, and especially those who [...]
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I am generally a poor speller, but even I understand that there are two Os in MOOC. So for added clarity, let me state up front that this post will focus on the first O — the one that stands for “open.” But I want to get to the discussion about that O in a [...]
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In the Supreme Court’s Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley decision, libraries caught a big break. But it was really no more than an affirmation of the status quo — libraries can still lend materials manufactured in other countries, students can still resell their textbooks regardless of where they were printed, and consumers and stores can sell [...]
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Before yesterday’s ruling in the Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons Supreme Court case, I had written a post about the oddity that copyright law is the only form of property right that does not include a specific mechanism by which the rights holder can lose their rights if they do not use the property [...]
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The decision in the Kirtsaeng v. Wiley case was released this morning, and the outcome is wonderful for libraries. I have not had the chance to read the whole opinion yet, but the upshot is that the Second Circuit rule that said that First Sale applied only to materials manufactured in the United States was [...]
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One of the most basic justifications for all forms of property rights, something every first-year law student is taught, is that these rights encourage the efficient use of property. Because property (usually) is a scarce resource, exclusive ownership rights help encourage people who value and will use the property. For the same reason, restraints on [...]
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I wrote this post several weeks ago, intending to explain the oddities of international copyright treatises that led to Antigua being poised to become a “copyright haven” that does not recognize US copyrights. Many other events intervened, but I think it is still worth posting for the sake of the explanation, which some readers might [...]
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As Duke University’s first Scholarly Communications Officer, Kevin Smith’s principal role is to teach and advise faculty, administrators and students about copyright, intellectual property licensing and scholarly publishing. 
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