Friday’s Endnotes – 01/29/16

White Paper on Remixes, First Sale, and Statutory Damages — The Department of Commerce’s Internet Policy Task Force, led by the USPTO and NTIA, released its anticipated White Paper on copyright policy yesterday, highlighting a number of recommendations regarding the legal framework for remixes, first sale in the digital environment, and statutory damages.

The High Price of Free — The focus of this article is on web developers, but many of the points are relevant to other creative disciplines. “We know that not paying speakers and not covering speaker expenses causes events to become less diverse. The ability to give time, energy and professional skills free of charge is a privilege. It is a privilege that not everyone has to begin with, but that we can also lose as our responsibilities increase or as we start to lose the youthful ability to pull all-nighters. Perhaps we begin to realize how much that free work is taking us away from our families, friends, and hobbies; away from work that might improve our situation and enable us to save for the future.”

Some Pirate Sites Have Little Respect for their Users — Torrentfreak: “It’s a bitter pill but it needs to be said. While there are thousands that don’t, there are large numbers of pirate sites that fall way below the standards those who pay their bills deserve. Why some site operators sink to these levels isn’t always clear, but aggressive redirects, misleading advertising, fake virus warnings and malware are always unacceptable.”

Cosplay, Copyright and Fair Use — “Despite Public Knowledge’s attempt to have cosplayers believe otherwise (and support them and Star Athletica), cosplayers are not going to feel the brunt of any decision the Supreme Court makes on the designs of cheerleading uniforms. The highest court of the land is not ‘quite literally deciding the test by which the legal status of cosplay will be judged.'”

Torrenting the Oscars 2016 — John August, on a piracy group’s “apology-slash-justification” following a leak of 15 Oscar screeners: “So by leaking the movie before it was released, then backtracking, they’re pretty sure Miramax will make its money back because imaginary math is magic.”

A Primer on Oscar’s Sound Editing and Mixing Categories — Speaking of the upcoming Oscars (February 28), Variety explains two of the categories: sound editing and sound mixing. Contrary to common misconceptions, the former involves editing sounds while the latter involves mixing sounds.