>
> But the point I wanted to raise, had to do with intellectual property
> rights and copyright.  If the Enola Gay didactics were to have been scanned
> and put up on the net for all to see, would this have been a violation of
> copyright? Intellectual property rights?  I think it is a wide open
> question.  Those labels were the fruit of someones intellectual efforts.
> Do those labels belong to the individual(s) even if not published?  Or to
> the SI (and by extension the amurican taxpayer)?  Anyone got any thoughts?
 
You are right. They are probably subject to copyright. U.S. Government publicati
ons
are in principle not copyrightable, but there are all kinds of exceptions and
loopholes to that rule. The Smithsonian is not an organ of government in the
strict sense (I looked it up: if I remember correctly, the U.S. Government
Manual sez it's an "Independent Trust Instrumentality") and the Smithsonian's
books, recordings etc. _are_ copyrighted, as we all know. Copyright also gives
the holder a right to _prevent_ publication if that is their choice.
 
I can imagine a situation (_strictly_hyopthetical_, mind you) where the actual
authors of the exhibit texts might like to publish their work in some other
venue but the NASM, wishing to avoid further embarassment, might act to
prevent it. And they could do that. Now that would be really ironic.
 
I think the ethical issues are pretty murky, though. These texts are, and
should be, news. They are a matter of public concern. We have just watched
while a costly, embarrassing fiasco has been played out, over an institution
that is taxpayer funded at least in part. The exhibit was scotched, at least
in part, because of pressure from elected government officials. Numerous
pressure groups have had their chance to go over the primary sources, while
the ordinary citizen's access to the same documents and the chance to _make_
up_our_own_minds about it has been practically zero.
 
I have just been looking back over most of the Washington Post articles that
Hank Burchard kindly gave citations for. Working backwards from the present,
I got as far as the September 26 article, which is the really, really fine
in-depth piece in the whole lot. I'm sorry, but most of the stories since
then tend to focus more on the rants from all of the usual suspects than
on the doomed exhibition itself. I find the whole thing really reminiscent
of a couple of earlier episodes where I felt the mainstream press coverage
was lacking in any meaningful connection to primary sources -- one was the
1991 Civil Rights Bill, the other was the Lani Guinier nomination. And then
you could get to the sources if you knew where to look. This thing is
just going to be buried.
 
At one time, twenty or thirty years ago, I think some courts might have
upheld the "public's right to know" over a copyright challenge in a situation
like this. Now -- I seriously doubt it. I really feel like we've been had,
folks.
 
Speaking only for myself, not my employer.
--
David Condon, Librarian                   |        [log in to unmask]
Cleveland Museum of Natural History       |
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