by CREEC | Jun 25, 2014 | Accessibility
CREEC congratulates defendant Hathi Trust (accessible-book-scanners), intervenors the National Federation of the Blind, other amici, and appellate advocate extraordinaire Dan Goldstein of Brown, Goldstein & Levy, for their victory in Authors Guild, Inc. v. Hathi Trust. As BGL’s press release explained: The case arose when the Authors Guild sued five universities and the HathiTrust, a service at the University of Michigan that administers digital copies of the millions of print books in university libraries scanned by Google and universities. To date, this collection includes more than 11 million digital books, and it is expected to grow to more than 20 million when the project is completed. The University of Michigan, starting in 2008, permitted scholars with documented print disabilities full access to this digital collection. To protect this access, the National Federation of the Blind and several blind scholars intervened and responded to the Authors Guild claim that making the digital copies available to the print disabled violated the authors’ copyrights. In the decision, the Second Circuit rejected the Authors Guild’s claims and held that making the digital copies available to the disabled was a “fair use” under the Copyright Act. This is an amazing accomplishment in the effort to provide full print access for people with a wide range of disabilities ( including blindness, dyslexia, quadriplegia, and others) that make it difficult to interact with a traditional book — “codex” if you’re being professional; “dead trees” if you’re being snarky. Dan was interviewed about this case on NPR as well. Congrats to all on this important...
by CREEC | Jun 24, 2014 | News
Last night, Team CREEC exercised its right to enjoy mediocre baseball and excellent junk food! For our second team this month, we went to see the Colorado Rockies play the St. Louis Cardinals. After dashing home to grab sweatshirts, we all met up at Sullivan’s Steakhouse in the shadow of Coors Field for a pre-game meal. Over burgers, crab cakes, beer, and an intriguing platter of “kale-artichoke dip,” we discussed erudite topics such as Cristiano Ronaldo’s performance in the World Cup, the pros and cons of 14er weddings, and the always fun subject of Denver real estate. When it was time for the Rockies to play ball, we walked over to the stadium and settled in for an evening of watching impressive athletic feats, dodging fly balls, and groovin’ to the Rockies at-bat soundtrack. Unfortunately, the former attraction seemed to have missed the memo. In a stadium dominated by fans sporting red Cardinals paraphernalia, the Rockies couldn’t seem to get on base. Several out-of-the-park home runs by St. Louis didn’t help the situation, and soon we were looking at a 5-0 game. Luckily, our 3rd-tier seats afforded us some excellent views of the baseball diamond, as well as the beautiful sunset over the Rocky Mountains in the background. Highlights of the game include an instance in which a Cardinal broke his bat (and then proceeded to hit a home run with the new bat), watching the groundskeepers at work, and of course, Charlie Blackmon. Despite the enthusiastic home crowd and festive atmosphere, the Rockies proved unable to get any runs on the scoreboard. Before long, the sun had sunk...
by Amy F. Robertson | Jun 11, 2014 | Accessibility
New rule: when we arrive at a hotel at 2:00 in the morning — a hotel that has confirmed by phone and fax that it has reserved for us a room with a roll-in shower — to find, after unloading our voluminous luggage (shower chair; giant duffel; garment bag; suitcase; suitcase; computer wheelie; backpack), checking in, and tipping the helpful bellman who has transported this unGodly collection of luggage to the room, that the room has only a tub and that, in fact, no room with a roll-in shower is available that night (“night”), there will be a member of the ADA defense bar available on-call to secure alternative accommodations and to provide a nightcap of very very expensive Scotch. These are the facts: 1. The hotel had at least one room with a roll-in shower. 2. The hotel confirmed — several times* — that it had reserved a room with a roll-in shower for us. 3. This was incorrect. When we arrived, there were no roll-in-shower rooms available. 4. The hotel had at least one non-roll-in-shower room available — the one with the tub that they sent us to with our mule-train of luggage in tow. 5. At least one of the rooms with a roll-in shower was occupied by someone who did not need it (this fact related to us by the night manager). This is the law: 1. Title III of the ADA prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in places of public accommodation, including hotels. 42 U.S.C. § 12182(a). 2. ...
by CREEC | Jun 10, 2014 | News
Show your support for the Civil Rights Education and Enforcement Center with a mug, button, t-shirt, or tote bag. Check out our online store over at Zazzle! We’ll be adding awesome new items...
by CREEC | Jun 10, 2014 | News
We are very excited to announce that Marissa McGarry has joined CREEC as an Investigations Coordinator and Paralegal! Marissa graduated from Harvard College in 2014 with a B.A. in Government and East Asian Studies. While in school, Marissa focused on international security policy, but she was always interested in becoming more involved in the field of civil rights (beyond spamming all of her friends’ social media feeds with important news articles). Now, at CREEC, Marissa assists with cases while also helping to coordinate CREEC investigations. We can’t wait to have another set of hands on deck as we expand our Investigations and Testing...
