RE: Another post about the Georgia State:Cornell "case"

["Hoon, Peggy" <phoon@uncc.edu>]

I am gratified to hear from Peter directly about the "Cornell" 
guidelines or situation or victory or whatever it was 
characterized when it first occurred.  I did compare, as Peter 
suggests, the before and after policies many times, because I was 
baffled how the events could be portrayed as this big victory, as 
it was in the popular press.  I finally decided that it fell 
under the "If you say it loud enough and strongly enough, some 
people will believe anything" category.  Thanks for the insight, 
Peter -

Peggy Hoon
Scholarly Communications Librarian
UNCC
________________________________________
From: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu 
Sent: Tuesday, June 21, 2011 7:29 PM
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: RE: Another post about the Georgia State copyright case

A small clarification to Kevin Smith's comment below:  The 
copyright checklist in use at Cornell was developed after the AAP 
had withdrawn from direct confrontation with the University.  It 
was prepared by Cornell's legal staff, without any input from the 
AAP.

And I would challenge Tabb's characterization that Cornell 
"capitulated" to the AAP in the first place.  We should know 
better than to trust the press statements that the AAP issued to 
make it look like it had won something.  In fact, if you compare 
the previous ereserve policy to the current electronic course 
content copyright guidelines, developed by a faculty group in 
response to the discussions with the AAP, you will see that the 
new policy is actually more open to fair use analyses than the 
old one.  It was developed in the firm belief that decisions that 
centered around the creation of print anthologies in commercial 
copy operations (the MDS and NYU cases) were not applicable to 
what libraries and universities do: making available 
noncommercially and efficiently to students a selection of 
materials that they can elect to view or print as part of their 
educational endeavors.  There was no discussion between Cornell 
and the AAP over what constituted acceptable fair use, and I 
don't think any agreement could have been reached on the issue.

One of the most pleasant surprises about the GSU case has been 
that Georgia State has been as forthright in defending fair use 
as I think Cornell would have been had the disagreement 
continued.

Peter Hirtle