Lessig on Orphan works

Good Stuff

"The alternative I propose is a kind of copyright maintenance procedure (like patent maintenance). It differs from the Copyright Office’s proposal in three critical ways:

First: It applies just to old works, not to new works. For works after enactment, copyright owners get a 14 year grace period where they need not worry at all about any orphan work requirement. For work published between 1978 and today, there’s no orphan work requirement until 2021. And for work published before 1978 (in a time when formalities were the norm), there is no requirement until 2012.

Second: It applies to published “United States works” only — not to foreign works or unpublished work.

Third: The requirement it imposes after the 14/5 year delay is registration. But not registration with the copyright office; instead, registration with a private registrar approved by the copyright office. No government run registries here. Instead, something more like a DNS for copyright."