In the wake of the J.K. Rowling/Steven Vander Ark decision (enjoining Vander Ark from publishing his Harry Potter Lexicon, see this article) comes word that the Right to Write Fund (RWF), which helped defend publisher Roger Rapoport in the suit, is raising funds to “help support other creative artists faced with legal threats or lawsuits,” according to Publishers Weekly. The RWF is currently a part of the Center for Ethics in Action (CEA), though part of their new drive is to get the Fund its own tax-exempt status.
CEA President Anne B. Zill, who is also the RWF’s treasurer, said “We want to bring national attention to fair use and First Amendment issues.” The RWF also intends to establish an educational repository dealing with both issues, which will be housed in the Special Collections and Archives of the Grand Valley State University Libraries in Allendale and Grand Rapids, Michigan. The archive will “collect and disseminate legal briefs, facts and analyses as well as literary and media accounts of copyright, trademark, and other intellecutal property statutes.”
Other groups supporting the effort include Standford University Law School’s Fair Use Project and Harvard Law School’s Citizen Media Law Projects. The director of the CMLP, David Ardia, is a member of the RWF’s Board of Advisors, and said “We are seeing far too many important works being scuttled because of baseless threats directed at creative artists by copyright holders who object to the use or criticism of their work.”
For more information about Right to Write, see righttowrite.org, email read at righttowrite dot net, or phone 207-232-6365.