Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 15, No. 48.
Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
<http://www.princeton.edu/~mccarty/humanist/>
<http://www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/humanist/>
Date: Sat, 26 May 2001 06:36:26 +0100
From: NINCH-ANNOUNCE <david@ninch.org>
Subject: Eleventh Circuit lifts copyright injunction on "The Wind
Done Gone"
NINCH ANNOUNCEMENT
News on Networking Cultural Heritage Resources
from across the Community
May 25, 2001
Eleventh Circuit Court Lifts Copyright Injunction on "The Wind Done Gone"
<<http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/eldredvreno/wind_done_gone.html>http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/eldredvreno/wind_done_gone.html>
Court Order Conflicts with Eldred v. Reno statement
on Copyrights & First Amendment.
>Date: Fri, 25 May 2001 16:35:36 -0400
>To: cc@eon.law.harvard.edu
>From: Wendy Seltzer <wendy@seltzer.com>
>>on "The Wind Done Gone"
>
Citing the First Amendment to the Constitution, the Eleventh Circuit Court
of Appeals today lifted the injunction on publication of Alice Randall's
"The Wind Done Gone":
"It is manifest that the entry of a preliminary injunction in this
copyright case was an abuse of discretion in that it represents an unlawful
prior restraint in violation of the First Amendment."
The order frees Randall to publish her novel, alternately described as a
parody of or sequel to Margaret Mitchell's "Gone With the Wind."
The Eleventh Circuit's order is in direct conflict with the D.C. Circuit's
statement in Eldred v. Reno, that "copyrights are categorically immune from
challenges under the First Amendment." Rather than follow the D.C.
Circuit's limited First Amendment scrutiny of copyright's restrictions, the
Eleventh Circuit declared the copyright-based injunction to be an "unlawful
prior restraint."
Mitchell's estate won the earlier injunction from an Atlanta district court
on the claim that Randall's novel was an unauthorized sequel copied from
"Gone With the Wind." Randall argued that her work, told from the
perspective of Scarlett O'Hara's slave-born half-sister, was permissible
artistic comedy or parody, making fair use of Mitchell's work. Under the
56-year copyright term in effect when Mitchell wrote "Gone With the Wind,"
the entire world of Tara should have become public domain in 1993.
A copy of the order is online at
<<http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/eldredvreno/wind_done_gone.html>http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/eldredvreno/wind_done_gone.html>.
The Eleventh Circuit says an expanded opinion will follow.
Links to earlier commentary on the case may be found at the Openlaw/Eldred
v. Reno website:
<<http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/eldredvreno/>http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/eldredvreno/>.
-- Wendy Seltzer -- wendy@seltzer.com Fellow, Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School <http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/seltzer.html>http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/seltzer.html============================================================== NINCH-Announce is an announcement listserv, produced by the National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage (NINCH). The subjects of announcements are not the projects of NINCH, unless otherwise noted; neither does NINCH necessarily endorse the subjects of announcements. We attempt to credit all re-distributed news and announcements and appreciate reciprocal credit.
For questions, comments or requests to un-subscribe, contact the editor: <<mailto:david@ninch.org>mailto:david@ninch.org> ============================================================== See and search back issues of NINCH-ANNOUNCE at <<http://www.cni.org/Hforums/ninch-announce/>http://www.cni.org/Hforums/ninch-announce/>.
==============================================================
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat May 26 2001 - 01:45:08 EDT