Special collections

We have a couple of questions relating to Section 233-A of NYS Education Law, the "Museum Property Law". The law as written seems to only address totally undocumented objects and recent loans, but it also seems to have clear implications for the many partially documented objects and very old loans we have to deal with.

[NOTE:  For some initial background on New York's law governing museums and loaned/donated items, see Special collections not recorded on institution's ledgers]

(Question has been slightly modified to maintain anonymity)

Menus can be works of art.[1]

"Art" of course, is a subjective term, and has no precise, stand-along definition in copyright law.[2]  So more importantly for this discussion, a "menu" can be a composition of such originality and substance, that it is protected by copyright law.

We received some questions from a chartered museum about weeding from the museum's internal research library:

Put your sneakers on.  These questions require us to jump through several analytical hoops.

Hoop 1