Kyle K. Courtney

Kyle K. Courtney is a lawyer, librarian, and nationally recognized expert in copyright and information policy, with extensive experience at the intersection of law, libraries, and education. Currently the Executive Director of the Social Law Library, he previously served as the Director of Copyright and Information Policy for Harvard Library, where he provided strategic leadership on intellectual property, licensing, privacy, and digital access rights for Harvard Library.
 

A leading voice in the national conversation on digital equity, Mr. Courtney is a founder of the eBook Study Group and serves as an advisor to the American Law Institute’s "Restatement of the Law of Copyright" project. He is frequently sought after as a speaker on fair use, licensing reform, and the legal challenges posed by emerging technologies.
 

His scholarship and commentary are widely published, with contributions appearing in The Hill, Politico, American Libraries, Library Journal, The Journal of the Copyright Society, and others. For his work in advocacy and public policy, he has received several prestigious honors, including the IP3 Intellectual Property Award from Public Knowledge and the Public Access to Government Information Award from the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL).
 

Mr. Courtney holds a J.D. with Distinction in IP Law from Suffolk University Law School, a MSLIS from Simmons University, and a BA in History from Mary Washington College.
 

The Architecture of Collection Resilience: Building Knowledge Systems that Outlast Disruption

​For a millennia, the library stack was built on physical ownership. Today, the rapid shift to conditional digital licensing has replaced the permanence of copyright's first sale doctrine with a fragile "permission culture," threatening preservation and access of the public record and our culture. In an era where a vendor can simply pull the plug on access, how do libraries ensure the survival of their collections?

​Rather than viewing disruption merely as a threat, this keynote explores how to harness it as a catalyst for "Resilient Access." Moving in the shadow of recent case law, we will dissect how restrictive contracts actively undermine both statutory library rights and mission. By shifting the battleground from federal copyright stagnation to state-level laws, libraries are actively disrupting the publishing status quo.

​Attendees will leave with a clear roadmap for how to support a more "Permanent Stack." It is time to stop treating information access as a conditional lease and start equipping library workers to build a resilient fortress using law, technology, and community.