DANGER! "Orphan Works" Copyright Bill

This sounds quite scary. I have not read everything available, but this does sound like an important issue for independent creatives of all varieties.

I've edited this post to add some info and cut back on the alarmist quotes of others. My point is just make people aware that these bills exist and to have us keep an eye on them and/or make your position known to your respective lawmakers.

I'm still trying to wade through the bills, but I have an inherent distrust of ...well everyting, but in this case specifically of people monkeying with copyright law. The little guy never seems to benefit from changes.

Some Info:

A more level-headed analysis by my friend Todd VerBeek in his blog. Todd thinks this legislations may be a good thing on the whole. ( Thanks for the comments and the info Todd - Info incorporated in this post. I think I got swept up in some of the alarm-ism. I try to avoid "ism"s as a rule. )

The American Society of Media Photographers' site and the Illustrators Partnership group's sites seem to think this is extremely dangerous, saying things like:

"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.

And so on in scary fashion. Check it out, form an opinion, sign a petition, contact your congresspeople and senators. Go to http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml to quickly find the phone number, address and e-mail of every U.S. senator, U.S. representative, and state legislator.

And, pass this info on!