U.S. Lawmakers Revive Copyright Bill
By: Jed Nottingham
Posted: 03/01/2007
U.S. Reps. Rick Boucher (D-Va.) and John Doolittle
(R-Calif.) have introduced an updated version of legislation
that would codify the traditional rights of consumers to
"fair use" of copyrighted works. The lawmakers said they see
"fair use" rights fading in the digital age.
"The fair use doctrine is threatened today as never before,"
Boucher said in a statement published on his website. "Historically, the
nation's copyright laws have reflected a carefully calibrated
balanced between the rights of copyright owners and the
rights of the users of copyrighted material. The Digital
Millennium Copyright Act dramatically tilted the copyright
balance toward complete copyright protection at the expense
of the public's right to fair use. The Fair Use Act will
assure that consumers who purchase digital media can enjoy a
broad range of uses of the media for their own convenience in
a way which does not infringe the copyright in the work."
First amendment attorney Clyde DeWitt sees things
differently.
"All of the sites that facilitate file-swapping of adult
video clips are postured to cause the same damage to the
adult video industry that Napster and its successors did to
the recording industry?and they all claim DMCA 'safe harbor'
protection in defense of being copyright-infringement
machines," he told AVNOnline.com. "Why pay 20 or 30
bucks for a DVD if you can download all of the scenes for
free? And the file-swapping sites must be profiting
handsomely from all of the traffic that they generate."
Two previous similar bills failed to gain traction, but the
Fair Use Act introduced on Wednesday removes a defense when
someone circumvents the copyright protections on a digital
work?which may overcome the objections of previous
detractors.
"What really bothers me is the idea of limiting the damages
for contributory infringement, inducement of infringement,
vicarious liability, or other indirect infringement," DeWitt
noted. "Why reward thieves? My prediction is that
Hollywood and the recording industry will put the brakes on
this in a hurry, and the adult industry should back them 100
percent."
Gill Sperlein, general counsel for Titan Media (which
recently filed copyright complaints in federal court against
file-sharing sites PornoTube, XTube, and Veoh.com)
also doesn't care for the bill.
"This bill simply makes no sense," he told AVNOnline.com.
"The DMCA already grants extremely broad protection to
legitimate service providers. The only companies that have
had negative court rulings are those that built businesses
based entirely on infringed content. The Internet makes it
possible for one person to share an illegal copy with
millions of worldwide users in a matter of seconds. This is
no time to be narrowing copyright protection. If anything, we
should be broadening it."
The bill also would limit the damages that
may be sought for "contributory infringement, inducement of
infringement, vicarious liability or other indirect
infringement," and includes a "narrowly crafted provision
codifying the Supreme Court's Betamax decision to eliminate
any uncertainty about a potential negative impact on the
Court's holding in the Grokster case," according to its
authors.
Supporters of the bill include a number of library groups,
the Consumer
Electronics Association, and the Computer &
Communications Industry Association.
