We wrote here about the Congressional proposal to make the Register of Copyrights a Presidential appointee subject to Congressional approval, rather than a selection of the Librarian of Congress. That bill, HR-1695 (an updated version of which is available here), despite some expressed concerns from certain advocacy groups about the potentially making that position
Register of Copyright
Bill Proposes to Make the Register of Copyrights a Presidential Appointee
The Copyright Office is now a part of the Library of Congress, with the Register of Copyrights (the head of the Copyright Office) appointed by the Librarian of Congress. As part of its plans to review the Copyright Act, the House Judiciary Committee asked for comments earlier this year about structural reform of the Copyright…
January Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters – Quarterly Issues Programs Lists and Children’s Television Reports, Ownership and EEO Comments, Copyright Issues and More
Here we are at the start of a new year, and right away we have numerous regulatory deadlines for broadcasters. By the 10th of the month, all broadcast stations need to have placed in their public inspection files (online for TV and for those radio stations that have already converted to the online public file, and paper for the remaining radio stations), their Quarterly Issues Programs lists, documenting the issues of importance to their communities and the programs broadcast in the last quarter addressing those issues. TV stations have quarterly Children’s Television Reports due to be filed at the FCC by the 10th, addressing the programming that they broadcast to meet the educational and informational needs of children. Commercial TV stations should also add to their public file documentation to demonstrate their compliance with the commercial limits in programming addressed to children.
For TV stations, on the 1st of the year, new obligations became effective for online captioning. “Montages” of clips from TV programs, where all of those clips were captioned when broadcast, also need to be captioned when made available online. By July 1, clips of live and near-live programming must be captioned; however, they may be posted online initially without captions as long as captions are added to clips of live programming within 12 hours and to clips of near-live programming within eight hours after the conclusion of the TV showing of the full-length programming. For more on this requirement, see our article here.
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Public Comments Requested on Qualifications for Copyright Office Chief
There is now a vacancy in the top position at the Copyright Office, the Register of Copyrights, and the Librarian of Congress, who appoints the Register, has asked for comments on the role and qualifications for the new Register. These comments are due by January 31, 2017. While setting copyright law has…
The Next Congress Has Not Yet Begun, and Already Copyright Issues are Poised for Comment – First Up, Copyright Office Reform
While the new Congress will not begin until after the New Year, already copyright reform has been teed up to be on the agenda. Posted last week on the website of the House of Representative’s Judiciary Committee was an announcement that the committee would be posting policy proposals for copyright reform from time to time, and asking for public comment. The first proposal was posted with that announcement, looking at suggestions for reform of the structure of the Copyright Office.
The initial proposals are modest, suggesting that the Register of Copyrights be independently appointed (rather than being selected by the Librarian of Congress), that the Office has greater independence to appoint advisory committees and over its technology budget, and that there be authority to set up a small copyright claims adjudicatory process. We wrote about the small claims proposal that was advanced in Congress last year, here. We also have written about more sweeping changes that have been proposed for the Copyright Office, here, which apparently are not yet on the table. However, as this policy proposal solicits public comment by January 31, 2017, other ideas for the reform of the Copyright Office may be advanced in the comments that are submitted.
Continue Reading The Next Congress Has Not Yet Begun, and Already Copyright Issues are Poised for Comment – First Up, Copyright Office Reform