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First Sale rights in danger

The First Sale doctrine is one of those modest little sub-paragraphs buried in the copyright law whose importance far outweighs its length. It says, in brief, that you own what you’ve bought. Couldn’t be more obvious, right? Think again. There’s a reason it ended up in the copyright statute. Vernor v. Autodesk is a case [...]

Fixing Fair Use

Picked this one up on Ars Technica: “Copyright Reform Act tries fixing fair use with seven words.” Which is intriguing, considering the oceans of verbiage expended on the subject in the last few years. The CRA [Copyright Reform Act] is a new project from Public Knowledge, with much of the heavy lifting being done by [...]

Doncha just hate it when your swank apartment has a cheap kitchen?

This just makes my little worries and concerns seem so minor.  Wait, wait, was that a chicken bone that just fell on my head? NO TECHNOLOGY IS INVOLVED IN THIS BLOG.

IMLS wiki “UpNext” opens for comments on the future of museums and libraries

Visited the IMLS website lately?  What’s new, you ask?  Well just this week a press release announced the launch of UpNext, a wiki dedicated to a discussion of the future of libraries and museums.  UpNext is a platform created to allow interested folk to engage in conversation around the recently published Future of Museums and [...]

Contest-Making the Case for Preservation Action to Save Collections

Jeanne Drewes sent this along this week so I thought I’d share it: We all know how hard it is to lift the sense of urgency and priority for preserving collections, especially in our economically tight and digitally oriented times. The American Library Association’s Association of Library Collections and Services (ALA-ALCTS) is sponsoring a competition [...]

Carved In Stone

There never has been and there never will be a digital recording format that lasts forever. – David Pogue – CBS Sunday Morning A couple of recent events have reminded me of the precariousness of our digital data. One was the moment I stepped on a PhotoCD (remember those?). It was a real one, not [...]

Museums aren’t cricket!

Thanks to my fantastic teaching assistant, Julie, for bringing this article to my attention, from Intelligent Life magazine (Winter 2009).   In it, professional cricket player, Ed Smith, asks the question “Are we too professional?” I’d be the first to admit that museums don’t have a lot in common with professional cricket, but I nearly fell [...]

We’re Not Alone

I don’t own a Toyota although I do buy Japanese cars. I currently own a 2009 Mitsubishi Spyder Eclipse which allows me to tan while driving, albeit from the neck up. I have not experienced any acceleration problems, that weren’t of my own doing. Neither have I experienced any braking problems that weren’t of my [...]

A rolling stone carries no (oops) domain…

Read the article and be afraid, be very afraid. Go back, check your own records, is there anything you’ve forgotten?

Under-employed and loving it (for now)

It’s Valentine’s Day and also my birthday.  I won’t tell you how old I am–just know that I’m really, really old and can remember when museum registrars used to keep records with big flat stones and chisels. But in keeping with my New Year’s Resolution to blog more, whine less I thought I’d blog a [...]