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an archival quality copy of the work to be released must be provided to the Library of Congress so that it can later be made available to the public,
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Publishers already have to do this. Orphan works means that copyright is already not clear because of death or demise of either author or publisher. I know this is an issue in the music industry as many record labels went belly up and recordings from the 40s-70s have been orphaned. For instance, the
Let's Pretend series is completely orphaned.
I think it's reasonable for the author or the children of the author of a book to retain the rights to have the work produced in a visual realm (i.e. movies), but I think publishing rights were more reasonable at 25 years from publication unless renewed BY THE AUTHOR. Why should $$ from these works be inheritable or forever protected under a corporate shield?
Anyway, I want to see what happens as a result of the new law that returns the publishing rights back to the author after 35 years regardless of contract. It just started in January, so let's see how it works.