Join us for this in-person workshop & discussion featuring Dave Hansen, Executive Director of Authors Alliance.

Computational research techniques such as text and data mining (TDM) hold tremendous opportunities for researchers across the disciplines ranging from mining scientific articles to create better systematic reviews, or curated chemical property datasets to building a corpus of films to understand how concepts of gender, race, and identity are shared over time. Unfortunately, legal uncertainty, whether through copyright or restrictive terms of use, associated with text and data mining, machine learning and/or AI, can stifle this research. Recent copyright lawsuits, such as the high-profile cases brought against Microsoft, Github, and StabiltyAI underscore the legal complications. 

This workshop will survey existing law and policy and highlight pathways forward for researchers, including fair use and TDM-specific exemptions to copyright, particularly for users of materials covered by digital rights management (DRM) and other similar technology. We will also discuss limitations of the law and explore ways in which it might be improved. 

The workshop will be led by Dave Hansen, Executive Director of Authors Alliance. Authors Alliance is a nonprofit that exists to support authors who research and write for the public benefit. Dave is a copyright expert who has worked extensively on legal barriers to research, and is a PI for the Authors Alliance Text and Data Mining: Demonstrating Fair Use Project, which is generously supported by the Mellon Foundation. 

This interactive, in-person workshop will take place from 12pm-1pm, followed by an Q&A session from 1pm-1:30pm. Boxed lunches will be provided following the workshop. Participants who wish to remain for the optional Q&A session are invited to join for lunch. This workshop will take place at The Nexus in the Hayden Library (14S-130).

Please indicate your dietary restrictions or preferences in the registration form.