Framed! How Law Constructs and Constrains Culture | Culture on the Legal Cutting Room Floor

Documentary films are records of our culture. But our culture is full of legally protected objects - songs, films, signs, even logos or buildings. Sometimes filmmakers need to use pre-existing copyrighted material to tell a story. Sometimes they accidentally capture copyrighted work in their documentary footage. However,in order to distribute their documentaries, filmmakers must often clear the rights to every protected fragment of film or song - whether it is a focal point of the scene or merely an incidental or fleeting detail. This first panel will bring to light the intellectual property hurdles faced by documentary filmmakers, and the conflict between their need to access protected material, and their desire to protect their own works and maintain the integrity of those works after production.

Recorded on April 02, 2004.

Conference title: Framed! How Law Constructs and Constrains Culture.

Appearing: Jennifer Jenkins (Duke Law School), introduction ; Chris Hegedus ("Startup.com"), panelist ; Eric Saltzman (board member, Creative Commons), panelist ; James Boyle (Duke University Law School), panelist ; John Sloss (attorney, founder of Cinetic Media), panelist ; Orlando Bagwell (documentary filmmaker), panelist ; David Lange (Duke University Law School), panelist.