Digital Library Copyright Project
In This Section
The Berkeley Digital Library Copyright Project aims to investigate copyright obstacles faced by libraries and other like-minded organizations in their efforts to realize the full potential of present and future digital library initiatives. Our efforts are concentrated on both the obstacles themselves and the range of possible legal, technological, social, and market-based solutions to overcome them. Among other issues, we are specifically examining challenges with respect to orphan works, library privileges, digital lending, and metadata ownership. We are also examining a full range of possible solutions to some or all of these issues, including private ordering solutions, licensing, legislative reform, or the application of existing doctrines, such as the United States' fair use provision. We intend to be responsive to new legal developments as they arise and will add other specific issues to our research agenda as needed.
Project goals include:
- Identifying and clarifying the legal issues that must be addressed for digital libraries
- Bringing together libraries and other key stakeholders to understand concerns, and
- Developing recommendations for the legal and policy changes necessary to enable digital library initiatives
Research, white papers, conferences, workshops, and information on other project-related outputs and events will be available from this page.
About Us
The Berkeley Digital Library Copyright Project is generously supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
Principle investigators are Professors Pamela Samuelson, Jason Schultz, and Jennifer Urban. The project also draws upon the expertise of others in the Samuelson Clinic and across the Berkeley Law community.
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The Digital Library Fellow is a position created specifically to assist in the project's research outputs. David Hansen has been hired to fill this position for a two-year term. David joined the Digital Library Copyright Project in September 2011. Before coming to Berkeley, he interned in the Office of Scholarly Communications at Duke University Libraries. While there he worked on numerous open access and library copyright issues. David also worked with the UNC-Chapel Hill Law Library in a number of roles, most recently as their Graduate Assistant—a position designed to help transition library students into the profession of law librarianship. He is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Law, and is in the final stages of his coursework for a Master of Science in Library Science at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Library and Information Science.