On October 12, the United States Copyright Office published a Notice of Inquiry regarding its long-awaited study on ancillary copyright protections for publishers. The study will focus on the effectiveness of existing protections for news content online, including under the Copyright Act, as well as whether the United States should create additional protections for news content and what the scope of any such new protections should be. It follows a request from Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) in response to international developments in the European Union and Australia. The European Union adopted an ancillary copyright for news publishers in 2019, allowing news publishers to better protect their content online and negotiate for payments with the online platforms, while Australia introduced its media bargaining code earlier this year. The notice sets out multiple questions of particular interest to the Office and requests comments from interested stakeholders by November 26. The Office is also planning to conduct a public roundtable on December 9, with the requests to participate due by November 12. Read more about the study here.
Members of the News/Media Alliance staff have contributed to this post.
