The folks over at the Electronic Frontier Foundation have put together a tidy rundown of the current state of Orphan Works copyright legislation. From the post:
Orphan works are those whose owner cannot be located. Others who would like to use and share these works may hesitate to do so out of fear that they could later be found liable for copyright infringement because they didn’t get permission. ...The Orphan Works legislation would help resolve those fears and, in the process, encourage the display and re-use of these “lost” works.
Read copyfighter Larry Lessig's op-ed piece on the Orphan Works Act here. Read Ars Technica's take on the Orphan Works situation here.
Eldred.cc is a site dedicated to continuing the effort toward Orphan Works reform.
Related: More on the intellectual property debate from the EFF. My mother just got me a copy of the book Permissions: A Survival Guide. When I've read and digested it I'll post thoughts here.