Subject: House Subcommittee recommends copyright bills to full House Judiciary Committee
David Green (david@ninch.org)
Date: Fri, 27 Feb 1998 09:53:43 -0500
Message-Id: <v02130500b11b944e5997@[207.181.85.110]> Date: Fri, 27 Feb 1998 09:53:43 -0500 To: ninch-announce@cni.org From: david@ninch.org (David Green) Subject: House Subcommittee recommends copyright bills to full House Judiciary Committee
NINCH ANNOUNCEMENT
February 27, 1998
HOUSE SUBCOMMITTEE RECOMMENDS COPYRIGHT BILLS TO FULL HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE
As reported below by Page Miller, the House Courts and Intellectual
Property Subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee yesterday approved the
"World Intellectual Property Organization Treaty Implementation Act,"
passing it on to the full House Judiciary Committee for its consideration.
The subcommittee rejected numerous amendments attempting to ensure that
legitimate circumvention of copyright protection software (by librarians or
for educational purposes, under the fair use defense, for example) would be
permitted.
David Green
===========
>Date: Thu, 26 Feb 1998 15:46:52 -0500 (EST)
>From: Page Miller <pagem@CapAccess.org>
>To: ncc-updates <76016.1415@compuserve.com>
>Subject: NCC Washington Update, Vol 4, #6, February 26, 1998 (fwd)
NCC Washington Update, vol. 4, #6, February 26, 1998
by Page Putnam Miller, Director of the National Coordinating
Committee for the Promotion of History <pagem@capaccess.org>
1. House Subcommittee Recommends Copyright Legislation
To the House Judiciary Committee
1. House Subcommittee Recommends Copyright Legislation To the House
Judiciary Committee -- On February 26 the House Courts and Intellectual
Property Subcommittee met to mark-up several bills, including two
copyright bills. In the "mark-up" the subcom mittee considered several
amendment to the bills and then voted to recommend their marked-up
versions to the Judiciary Committee. The two copyright bills on the
subcommittee's agenda were HR 2281, the World Intellectual Property
Organization Treaty Imple mentation Act, which was introduced last
summer and HR 3209, a bill to limit liability for copyright infringement
for on-line material, which was introduced on February 12 by
Representatives Coble (R-NC) and Goodlatte (R-VA).
The packed committee room and the 100% attendance of all the members of
the subcommittee indicated the high interest in these bills. In opening
remarks Representative Howard Coble (R-NC), the Chair of the
subcommittee, stressed that all members had had 72 hours to study his
amendments. He made clear that he did not like dealing with "surprise"
amendments. Representative Barney Frank (D-MA), the Ranking Minority
member of the subcommittee, used his time for opening remarks to give a
strong lecture to those on all sides of copyright issues, urging
everyone "to keep hysteria to a minimum." He noted that supporters and
opponents of this legislation have tended to conjure up the most
horrible but unlikely scenarios. "Partisanship and ideology," he said
are irrelevant to these bills and members are trying to reach
appropriate compromises. Both Coble and Frank indicated their interest
in "fair use" issues and that they had listened to the library
community's concerns during the hearings.
Following opening remarks, Coble introduced an amendment that would
assure that no criminal cases would ever be brought against a library,
archives, or educational institution under the provision of this law
regarding use of circumvention devices designed for gaining access to
copyright protection systems. Frank then offered a substitute amendment
that would include a new section to the law dealing with exemptions to
the circumvention provision for libraries, archives, and educational
institutions if the purpose of access was solely to browse in order to
decide whether to acquire the material. Coble clarified the differences
between the two amendments by saying that under his amendment it would
be unlawful but not subject to criminal penalties but under the Frank
amendment circumventions for browsing would be legal for libraries,
archives, and educational institutions. In the debate Representative
Conyers (D-MI) said that he opposed the Frank amendment which he
characterized as designed as "allowing browsing rights if you don't
steal anything." The Frank amendment was narrowly defeated by 7 nays and
6 ayes. McCollum (R-FL) was not present for the vote. The five members
voting with Frank were Sensenbrenner (R-WI), Pease (R-IN), Boucher
(D-VA), Lofgren (D-CA), and Delahunt (D-MA). The Coble amendment passed
on a voice vote.
Representative Boucher then introduced an amendment to section 1201 on
the "Circumvention of copyright protection systems" which deals with
devices "primarily designed or produced for the purposes of
circumventing protection afforded by a technological protection measure
that effectively protects a right of a copyright owner. . ." Boucher's
amendment would expand this section to clarify that the penalties did
not apply to circumvention devices that have "substantial non-infringing
uses." Representative Lofgren supported Boucher stressing the need to
avoid unintended adverse consequences that would stifle work on new
technologies. However, the subcommittee overwhelmingly rejected the
Boucher amendment in a voice vote.
The subcommittee then turned to Representative Lofgren's two amendments
which also addressed the issues of circumvention devices. Lofgren
emphasized that the purpose of her amendment was to make a distinction
between circumvention used to infringe copyright law and circumvention
that has no unlawful use, such as circumvention for purposes of
diagnosing computer problems, reverse engineering, encryption research,
and access to work in the public domain which is protected by old
encryptions. Coble noted that there was an upcoming mark-up on
legislation dealing with the maintenance and testing of computers and
that this issue could be considered under that bill. Although the
subcommittee rejected this Lofgren amendment, there was general
consensus on the subcommittee that more work needed to be done to ensure
unintended consequences prior to the mark-up by the full committee.
Lofgren's second amendment dealt with applying the "fair use" principle
which applies to use of copyrighted material for educational purposes to
the circumvention provisions. This amendment was also defeated.
By a large majority -- with only Boucher and Lofgren opposing -- the
subcommittee approved favorable as amended HR 2281 to the House
Judiciary Committee.
In introducing HR 3209 which would limit liability for copyright
infringement for on-line material, Coble noted that Representative
Goodlatte had spent over two years conducting negotiations between all
parties. Coble said that he believes this is a balanced bill, yet he
was also aware that there are many issues still unresolved. The
divisions on the committee concerning this bill were clearly reflected
in Conyers' opening statement in which he said that he thought the
courts were doing a good job and that providing a safe harbor for Online
providers could be a problem. Frank, Boucher, Lofgren, and McCollum all
had amendments. However, the subcommittee decided not to vote on the
amendments but to work among themselves prior to the full committee
mark-up to deal with the concerns raised by the amendments. The
subcommittee voted overwhelmingly to recommend the bill to the Judiciary
Committee.
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