Professor Wins $240K In Fair Use Dispute

pickens writes "In a victory for Fair Use, Stanford Law School's Fair Use Project has announced that the estate of 20th century literary giant James Joyce, author of the landmark novel Ulysses, has agreed to pay $240,000 in attorneys' fees to Stanford University Consulting Professor Carol Shloss and her counsel in connection with Shloss's lawsuit to establish her right to use copyrighted material in her scholarship on the literary work of James Joyce. When Shloss used copyrighted materials in her biography of Joyce's daughter Lucia, titled Lucia Joyce: To Dance in the Wake, she had to excise a substantial amount of source material from the book in response to threats from the Joyce Estate. However following publication of the book, Shloss sued the Estate to establish her right to publish the excised material. The parties reached a settlement regarding the issue in 2007, permitting the publication of the copyrighted material in the US. Following the settlement, Shloss asked the Court to order the Estate to pay attorneys' fees of more than $400,000. She has now agreed to accept an immediate payment of $240,000 in return for the dismissal of the Estate's appeal. 'This case shows there are solutions to the problem Carol Shloss faced other than simple capitulation,' says Fair Use Project Executive Director Anthony Falzone, who led the litigation team."

Comments

The Good Fight

[whisper_jeff]

This case shows there are solutions to the problem Carol Shloss faced other than simple capitulation

Yes - the solution is to be lucky enough to find a lawyer that's willing allow their bill to get up to $400,000 but settle for $240,000 just so they can fight a legal battle that shouldn't be in front of the courts anyways. Almost half a million to fight a battle in which she was obviously right? It's wrong that that fight occurred at all... Thank goodness her lawyer was willing to go the distance.

Re:More An Issue of Censorship Than Copyright

[AliasMarlowe]

These allegations, if true, might well change my opinion of James Joyce. They would change my opinions of Finnegan's Wake and Ulysses not one whit.

Some solution

[residieu]

'This case shows there are solutions to the problem Carol Shloss faced other than simple capitulation,' says Fair Use Project Executive Director Anthony Falzone, who led the litigation team

Yes, there are solutions. If you can afford to put out $400k in lawyers fees upfront, and then only receive $240k of that back for a $160k loss.

Make the Lawyers Rich

[hardburn]

'This case shows there are solutions to the problem Carol Shloss faced other than simple capitulation,' says Fair Use Project Executive Director Anthony Falzone, who led the litigation team."

Yes, a solution that takes years to go through and costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. That's a great solution, if you're a lawyer.

Re:More An Issue of Censorship Than Copyright

[Attila Dimedici]

Would you think less of Joyce if you agreed that he sacrificed the mental stability and well being of his daughter to complete a novel? Would you think less of him if it was confirmed that he had contracted syphilis or that that is what caused him to go blind? Or that he wrote dirty letters to his wife? All these things may or may not be true.

None of them would in anyway cause me to think less of James Joyce, but then there is very little that could. I remember in 7th or 8th grade my English teacher went over the elements that made for a good novel. My English teacher the following year told me what a great writer James Joyce was because he didn't include any of those elements. I've never understood why he is considered a great writer.

Re:More An Issue of Censorship Than Copyright

[Jeremy Erwin]

None of them would in anyway cause me to think less of James Joyce, but then there is very little that could. I remember in 7th or 8th grade my English teacher went over the elements that made for a good novel. My English teacher the following year told me what a great writer James Joyce was because he didn't include any of those elements. I've never understood why he is considered a great writer.

Have you tried reading his books?

Re:More An Issue of Censorship Than Copyright

[Volante3192]

Have you tried reading his books?

Yes, the key word being 'tried.' Had to read Portrait for 12th grade English. It was such a heavy work, full of minutia and details, that it was very hard to pick up.

12th grade English class was fun: Portrait, Heart of Darkness, The Sound and the Fury, Wuthering Heights. I haven't slept that well prior or since.

Re:Ulysses is hard work but brilliant

[LandDolphin]

You're surprised that people will read a fantasy book set in a fantasy world for enjoyment but wont read another fictional novel set in the "real world" that you need to have a campanion book to read or have knowledge of Dublin Ireland in the 1900's? (Something that the Irish probably don't even have).

If you did not know, people read for enjoyment. Having to do research to understand a book does not equal enjoyment for a good majority of people as well and not getting the joke or refference.

Re:Proves my point

[cpt kangarooski]

Well, in Grant's day -- and even up until the late 1970's -- copyrights simply lasted for a term of years, with an optional renewal. Whether the author died during the term or not was entirely irrelevant. So yes, while it is a good idea for a copyright to be able to survive the author, it is a bad idea for a copyright's term length to have anything at all to do with the life of the author.

Better for copyrights to be predictable: they last for so many years from some initial date, such as the first publication of the work. Any unpredictable elements should a) be in the hands of the author, b) reduce the length of the copyright from the predictable maximum, rather than enlarge it. For example, we might grant a copyright for 2 years, where the copyright holder can opt renew it for another two years in the last six months, if he fills out a form and pays a token fee to indicate his interest. This could be done repeatedly up until the predictable maximum term length, at which point the copyright would expire. If the author failed to renew -- or failed to register in the first place -- the work would simply enter the public domain sooner than later.

I think it is very wrong to think of copyrights as a means for helping widows and orphans. The stark reality is that most creative works have no copyright-related economic value whatsoever. The few that have such value usually have very little, and that is mostly had straight away, with little left to be wrung out after a span of hours to weeks to months to years. The odds of writing a book that is a long-lasting and substantial financial success are roughly on par with winning the lottery. We would be appalled, and rightly so, at anyone who suggested that a person who wanted to support his wife and children after he died should buy lottery tickets. Well, in the vast majority of cases, an author who tried to write a book to accomplish the same purpose would be just as big a fool.

General problems -- like how to help provide for your surviving family after you have died -- demand general solutions. After all, we all face these problems, and anyway, most authors will not be able to help on the strength of their writing. A better solution than copyright to provide for widows and orphans would be saving and investing wisely, taking out life insurance policies, and promoting a social welfare system as a safety net. This way, everyone's widows and orphans can be helped out, rather than only those of successful authors.

And as for Grant himself, let's remember, he lost his money by putting it in a Ponzi scheme. If he'd been more responsible, he would not have needed to gamble on writing a book. A book that was largely successful because he had been a prominent general and president. But we can't all be war-winning generals and presidents, so let's not pretend that widows and orphans are sound reasons for copyrights. It's just a pathetic appeal to our emotions. Copyright needs to be rational.