Dear Doc: Ever since you wrote about Aereo, the company with bazillions of tiny TV antennas and video recorders, I have been waiting for them to come to my town, so that I could get a decent television picture (no more of that digital BRAAAAP every 16 seconds unless I stand next to the TV […]
Dear Doc: I have heard that the music and movie industries want Congress to add a new part to the Copyright Law, one that would say that it is a violation of a copyright owner’s rights to “make available” a copy of a work, even if the copy is never accessed by anyone. What gives? […]
Ask Dr. Copyright … Dear Doc: I write the songs that make the whole world sing. Unfortunately, with all that songwriting, I really don’t have the time to listen to every radio station that plays my songs, every online store that sells them, and every band, chorus, glee club, and lounge act that covers them […]
Dear Doc: A magazine editor has told me that if a magazine releases an issue before its copyright date, the magazine will lose its rights. I can’t believe that this is the law. Please tell me who’s right. Signed, Confused Author Dear Confused: You’re less confused than your editor! Under international copyright law, known as […]
Dear Doc: Last month, you promised that you’d continue your explanation of patents and copyrights with a rant about patents and trolls. So…? What, exactly, do you have against trolls, other than the fact that they live under bridges and threaten goats? Signed, Been Waiting a Month Dear BWaM: OK. So as not to disappoint, […]
Dear Doc: It seems that over the years, patents and copyrights have been in some kind of “Freaky Friday” accident, and have switched bodies. It used to be that patent was the big dog in intellectual property, but now, even big companies like Apple that win patent law suits can’t get the courts to stop […]
Dear Doc: I hear that soon, many Internet users will start getting warning notices if they illegally share copyrighted materials. Is this true? What happens if I get, say, 6 of these? How do they know? Signed, MovieAddict Dear Addict: The “Doc” has been watching this gathering storm for some time now. The “Copyright […]
Dear Doc: Well, 2013 has come and gone! Did anything happen in copyright law this year? Signed, Way too much time on my hands. Dear Sir: How DARE you! Have you not been reading the “Doc” every issue of this wonderful and scholarly newsletter? So much happened this year that the “Doc” has scarcely had […]
Dear Doc: While searching online, I came across thousands of books – not on Amazon.com, but on Google! I could actually read the pages of those books because the words matched what I had searched, and most of the books were scanned right from the library. That’s cool – and really useful, but I thought […]
Dear Doc: I know you’ve explained the legal concept of “fair use” before, but I have a question about that. Does it infringe an author’s copyright in a book to paraphrase one sentence from the book in a movie, if you give credit to the author, or is it fair use? Sincerely, Absolom Absolom, Mississippi […]