ALA Video Round Table to host Intellectual Property and Fair Use Annual Preconference

Contact: Lisbeth Goldberg

Chair, Video Round Table
703-228-6339
For Immediate Release
June 4, 2007

ALA Video Round Table to host Intellectual Property and Fair Use Annual Preconference

CHICAGO – The American Library Association’s (ALA) Video Round Table (VRT) will co-host “User Rights at Risk in Video and Film: Issues for Librarians Interested in Copyright Law and Fair Use" on Friday, June 22, from 2 to 6 p.m., at American University, Washington College of Law, 4801 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Room 603, in Washington D.C.

This preconference to ALA’s Annual Conference is cosponsored by American University’s Washington College of Law’s Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property and the School of Communication’s Center for Social Media.

The event will feature discussion of a major new national initiative to encourage reliance on fair use that produced the "Documentary Filmmakers' Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use." Faculty members Peter Jaszi (PIJIP) and Pat Aufderheide (CSM) will moderate.

Others speakers will include: Prue Adler, associate executive director, Association of Research Libraries, who is an expert on federal information policy and a leading advocate for the public interest in access to information; Jonathan Band, a Washington attorney who specializes in legislative and appellate advocacy on intellectual property policy issues; and Peter Decherney, media historian and assistant professor of English and cinema studies, University of Pennsylvania.

Tickets are $50 by May 18 for VRT members; $75 for ALA members; $125, nonmembers; and $34, student/retired members. Use registration code VR1. Onsite registration is $55 for VRT members, $80, ALA members; $15, non-members; and $40, student/retired members. Already registered? Add this event by visiting

www.ala.org/ala/eventsandconferencesb/annual/2007a/registration.htm#how.

VRT is the only organization within ALA that addresses issues related to video collections and services in all types of libraries. We understand 'video' to include all formats, analog, and digital; multimedia that includes video content; and the network delivery of digital or digitized video.

VRT membership includes librarians, archivists, and educators from a broad range of institutions and organizations. VRT actively recruits video producers and distributors, editors and publishers, and manufacturers of video equipment in order to discuss issues and find solutions to mutual problems.

VRT plays a strong advocacy role within ALA and forges alliances with other national film and video organizations.