A great deal of helpful information is packed into this slim volume, with the main text running 155 of the book’s 223 pages. Appropriately, Gathegi offers considerable explication of U.S. copyright law. Discussion of copyright, which makes up four chapters, focuses on content owners, rights granted to those owners under copyright law, duration of rights, and granting of rights to others, respectively. Because copyright connects to other legal matters, it is discussed in subsequent chapters. The last of the thirteen chapters in the handbook covers international aspects of copyright, which improved my understanding of rights associated with materials produced outside of the United States. Explanations of these sometimes less familiar topics are generally clear. For instance, I found the discussion of the first-sale doctrine in an international context to be particularly lucid. A recent article on this topic, whose relevance was originally lost on me, was clarified after reading Gathegi’s explanation about the first-sale doctrine’s relationship to the right of reproduction.1

Despite the handbook’s clear legal explanations and summaries of issues, the connection of these principles to daily library practices is weak; additional explanations clearly situated in the library context are needed. Each chapter ends with a hypothetical scenario presumably intended to serve the context-setting and cohesive functions that are lacking in the work. Unfortunately, the hypotheticals are not tied specifically to the chapter in which they appear, so information from later chapters may be needed to address the scenarios. In addition, the hypotheticals themselves feel artificial and are poorly developed. An appendix provides potential responses to the hypothetical scenarios, but only at an abstract level. More useful would have been for the author to describe how a library would come to realize that it needs to address the issues raised by the hypothetical scenarios.

While lawyers such as Gathegi need to be detailed when discussing legal issues, such detail should have been set aside at times in this book. For example, Gathegi provides a lengthy discussion of the mechanics of both the Copyright Royalty Board and the copyright arbitration panels it replaced. Gathegi states, “For historical purposes, it is interesting to compare the setup” (129). Although knowing the basics of determining copyright royalties may be necessary, thoroughly explaining the appointment processes to a board that no longer exists is not useful to this book’s audience. Throughout the work, similar unnecessary details distract from the key points to which a librarian should be paying attention.

Balancing the narrative’s detailed discussions are sixty-two textboxes of “notable points” interspersed throughout the book and smartly collocated as an appendix. These textboxes highlight the key points of a topic. For example, one set of notable points offers fair use considerations in the context of digital classrooms (94). In addition to notable points, several checklists also appear in the text and an as appendix. For example, one helpful checklist notes considerations for using audiovisual work in online distance education, which is governed by the Technology, Education, and Copyright Harmonization (TEACH) Act (95).

In his discussion of copyright and related laws such as the TEACH Act and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), Gathegi also covers aspects that are not as frequently discussed.² A chapter discusses the provisions of DMCA that limit the liability of Internet service providers (ISP) when copyright is infringed. Although the connection could have been articulated more clearly, Gathegi notes that a library can be defined as an ISP, making this issue important for librarians to understand. He makes similar connections with other areas of law, some of which are less likely to come to mind than copyright. For example, libraries may be used to thinking of licenses as part of an acquisitions process for electronic journals, but may not have thought of licensing as a consideration of music that is used in a library podcast.

The Digital Librarian’s Legal Handbook is recommended as a resource for all librarians and information professionals with an interest in intellectual property issues. For libraries that are digitizing or making born-digital available online, Gathegi’s work also may point out areas of consideration that may have been overlooked, such as the role of international treaties, privacy requirements, or state trade secrets law. The logical arrangement and helpful appendixes, including text from the Code of Federal Regulations, make this a handy tool, particularly when used in conjugation with other resources.³