Judy Nakari sent me a disturbing email this morning; some of you might have gotten it too.
This is not an internet hoax. It's real, and if you're an artist, it affects your livelihood.
Under current copyright law, in effect for the last 30 years, your visual art is copy protected whether or not it is registered or carries the copyright symbol.
This week, the U.S. House of Representatives is expected to introduce the Orphan Works Act of 2008. If you care about protecting your work, you're against it. It will have the effect of wiping out any copyright on visual art now in existence, throwing your work into the public domain. If you wish to protect your work (each and every separate piece) you will have to digitize it and register it with private sector registries as yet uncreated, for a fee as yet unestablished. I say registries because this bill places no limit on how many separate registries there could be.
An interview with Brad Holland of the Illustrator's Partnership is here.
What can we do? The fastest, easiest thing is to sign a petition here.
For those of you more ambitious, here is contact info for our Representatives:
Gabrielle Giffords: 881-3588 or (202) 225-2542 or send an email through here.
Raul Grijalva: 622-0198 or 202-225-2435 or email through here.
Feel free to pass this on.
Sincerely,
Randy
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1 comment:
I've emailed Gabby and Raul! It was easy, didn't hurt a bit, and you can too!!
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