Some observations on Authors’ Guild suit vs. HathiTrust

From Kenneth Crews, who notes regarding orphan works:

The complaint is about much more than just the orphan work initiative at HathiTrust, but orphan works receive ample attention.  Orphans seem to be emphasized in the complaint as an example of the expanded use of the digital files that HathiTrust is clearly willing to pursue.  For the libraries and users, that may be a good thing.  For the rightsholders in this complaint, it is far overreaching.  Moreover, the complaint cites the Google Books case and the failed efforts by Congress to enact orphan works law to argue that orphans need a legislative solution—not a private innovation.

See http://copyright.columbia.edu/copyright/2011/09/13/authors-copyright-and-hathitrust/ for the full item.

And from James Grimmelmann, who concludes:

The Orphan Wars are upon us, I fear. We might have hoped that they would be the Orphan Discussions, or perhaps the Orphan Debates, but no. The Orphan Wars it will be.

See http://laboratorium.net/archive/2011/09/12/the_orphan_wars