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  • The Public Domain or PD is expanding, admittedly at a rather slow rate (thanks, Sonny Bono!) but it is growing. 2020 marked a monumental year, for oh so many reasons, but for copyright and the public domain it meant that for the first time in a good long while, the expiry of copyright terms led to the expansion of the public domain. But what exactly is the Public Domain and why does it matter?

  • W&M Libraries staff have been hard at work over the summer months. A few of them were excited to share their favorite project. Meghan Bryant, head of special collections public services & instruction, shares about her partnership with Steve Prince, the Muscarelle Museum's director of engagement and distinguished artist in residence, and their plan to launch a workshop in the fall.

  • W&M Libraries staff have been hard work over the summer months. A few of them were excited to share their favorite project with the W&M community. Deborah Cornell, head of digital services, shares on leading a multi-year endeavor to build a new digital collections platform.

  • Intellectual Property is actually a relatively new concept, historically speaking. Rights to intangible property didn’t become codified until the Statute of Anne in the 18th century; this is widely considered the first legally binding document defining and establishing intellectual property. However, it’s still a far cry from our modern experience with Intellectual Property (or IP as it is lovingly and occasionally derisively referred).

  • Dr. Anne K. Rasmussen, Professor of Music and Ethnomusicology and Bickers Professor of Middle Eastern Studies, discusses her new book, Music in Arabia: Perspectives on Heritage, Mobility, and Nation, co-edited by Issa Boulos and Virginia Danielson.

  • Fair use can be tricky to navigate because the legal benchmarks for this exemption are intentionally vague. You’ll never actually know if your use of copyrighted material is considered fair use unless a judge decides (which usually means you’ve been sued). 

  • “Queer joy,” according to the corporate giant understanding, is made of brightly-colored silhouettes, hands clasped together, and flashy letters declaring “Proud” and “Love is Love.” This approach skyrocketed in popularity after the legalization of gay marriage by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2015.

  • Recently, several neighbors and I trekked up a narrow, muddy path through dense, jungle-like foliage. Bright, glossy leaves crowned by yellow plumes. Long branches arched above and crowded around. This tropical moment was not faraway and exotic but on College Creek, less than a mile from Colonial Williamsburg.

  • Copyright legally grants for a limited time the monopolistic use of a work. The copyright holder has the sole ability to make copies, distribute, edit, perform, and display. Rather than allowing all copyrighted works to sit in a vacuum where their uses are incredibly limited to everyone except the rights holder, certain exemptions are allowed. The most familiar to us in higher education is fair use.

  • Did you see our recent post introducing Open Educational Resources (OER)? If not, start there by clicking here. In this post we’ll walk through tips and tricks for finding OER in your field or discipline.

  • On the 17th of October 1834, a fourteen-year-old Chinese girl arrived on the shores of New York City. The ship’s passenger list included her name as “Auphmoy” which was later phonetically shortened to Afong Moy—because of this, we do not know her real Chinese name. So began Afong Moy’s story as the first known female Chinese immigrant to the United States.

  • Alexandra Flores, Instruction & Research Librarian and librarian to Anthropology, spoke to Assistant Professor, Dr. Andrea Wright, about her recently published book, “Between dreams and ghosts : Indian migration and Middle Eastern oil.”

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