uncertain, a clearer understanding of when fair use allows libraries to proceed without permission could be helpful. Exhibits and Public Outreach Several interviewees expressed frustration with what they perceived as the limits of fair use for designing and mounting exhibits, either physically at their institutions or virtually online. Many of the problems they encountered in connection with supporting research through collection digitization recurred in the context of creating digital exhibits. Donated collections often include copyrighted works of third parties (for instance, correspondence) that cannot be governed by licenses or copyright transfers made by the donor. Rightsholders are often difficult or impossible to find. Some collections might be exhibited in their entirety, but this raises questions about whether the exhibit is suitably transformative to make a fair use claim. Interviewees often hesitated over these issues in their exhibition projects. In particular, they worried that digital resources mounted in online exhibits could be downloaded from library servers and redistributed online, and they worried about their institutions’ liability for this redistribution. In many cases where interviewees proceeded with exhibits, their institutions incurred extensive costs, including staff time to deliberate on copyright questions, as well as licensing costs, and there were typically significant delays associated with these efforts. Interviewees responded to these costs and concerns by, reluctantly, distorting their practice in ways that are similar to the response in supporting scholarship: they favored exhibitions of public domain materials over more contemporary works, regardless of community interest or scholarly value they favored exhibits involving obscure or anonymous persons over those involving high- profile persons who they feared might be more likely to litigate they favored physical, on-site exhibits over virtual, online ones. Interviewees were aware of the ways in which their choices frustrated their libraries’ mission to serve patrons’ research and learning needs. Access for the Disabled In some cases, works in one format can be made accessible by creating a new, perhaps augmented, copy of the work, but creating that copy would typically violate copyright unless covered by an exception in the law. Knowledge of copyright law is thus essential to facilitating access, a core library function. RLI 273 23 Challenges in Employing Fair Use in Academic and Research Libraries ( C O N T I N U E D ) DECEMBER 2010 RESEARCH LIBRARY ISSUES: A BIMONTHLY REPORT FROM ARL, CNI, AND SPARC