It is frequently interesting, and sometimes appalling, to see how a court that does not usually deal with copyright issues reacts when confronted with one. Judge Amy Berman Jackson of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia is certainly not a complete novice regarding copyright, but the issue she confronted in Drauglis V. Kappa Map Group must certainly have been a new one for her. It is a case involving the scope and interpretation of a Creative Commons license, and Judge Jackson deals quite well with it, in my opinion, in a decision issued last week. But she is drawing lines in this case that I am quite sure will be discussed and readjusted over the next few years. The facts in the case pose a situation that anyone familiar with CC licensing could probably have seen coming. Art Drauglis, the plaintiff, took a quite lovely photograph of a scene in rural Maryland that he calls “Swain’s Lock.” There is no…
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