Can't Find ‘Orphan’ Authors? Writers Group Says It Had No Trouble

Several universities recently declared, against the wishes of the Authors Guild, that they will begin sharing digital versions of so-called orphan works—books whose copyright holders can't be found. Now the Guild has produced a surprise find to undermine the universities. The Guild announced that it tracked down the author of one of the orphan works that the universities plan to release this fall -- and that it did so with a simple Google search. The discovery is a public relations coup for the Authors Guild, and comes just two days after it filed a lawsuit to stop the schools from going forward with their plan. The discovery was announced in a triumphant blog post on the Authors Guild website. The organization claims a simple Google search allowed it to find J.R. Salamanca, the author of “A Lost Country,” a 1961 fiction work that was also turned into an Elvis Presley movie. The Guild says Mr. Salamanca was surprised and annoyed to discover that his work had been declared an “orphan.”