COPYRIGHT BILLS PASS CONGRESS

["Sloan, Bernie" <bernies@uillinois.edu>]

FYI........this will be of interest to liblicense subscribers in the U.S.

Bernie Sloan
Senior Library Information Systems Consultant
University of Illinois Office for Planning & Budgeting
338 Henry Administration Building
506 S. Wright Street
Urbana, IL  61801
Phone: (217) 333-4895  
Fax: (217) 333-6355
Email: bernies@uillinois.edu

> _________________________________________________________________
> ALAWON                                       Volume 7, Number 125
> ISSN 1069-7799                                   October 13, 1998
> 
>      American Library Association Washington Office Newsline
> 
> In this issue: (217 lines)
> 
> [1]  WIPO COPYRIGHT TREATY AND TERM EXTENSION BILLS CLEAR
>      CONGRESS; DANGEROUS DATABASE BILL DERAILED BUT BOUND TO
>      RETURN IN 1999
> [2]  DIGITAL MILLENNIUM COPYRIGHT ACT GUIDE
> [3]  COPYRIGHT TERM EXTENSION ACT GUIDE
> _________________________________________________________________
> 
> [1]  WIPO COPYRIGHT TREATY AND TERM EXTENSION BILLS CLEAR
>      CONGRESS; DANGEROUS DATABASE BILL DERAILED BUT BOUND TO
>      RETURN IN 1999
> 
> By separate voice votes taken on October 12 and 7 respectively,
> both chambers of Congress have approved the conference report
> (105-796) on the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (H.R. 2281) and
> on identical versions of the Copyright Term Extension Act (S.
> 505).  President Clinton has indicated that he will sign the
> bills.
> 
> Those actions bring to a close more than three years of intensive
> work by ALA, library supporters and other groups to shape the
> national and international debate over how best to update the
> nation's copyright laws for the digital age.  Significantly, the
> H.R. 2281 conference committee deliberately elected not to
> include in its report the Collections of Information Antipiracy
> Act (S. 2291/H.R. 2652), a proposal to provide sweeping new legal
> protection for collections of information, including those not
> presently protected by copyright.
> 
> While the legislative debate about how to implement the new WIPO
> copyright treaties and whether to add 20 years to the term of
> copyright protection may be over, both bills as finally adopted
> present ongoing opportunities and pitfalls for libraries,
> archives and educational institutions.  Moreover, fierce
> legislative debate over database protection is expected to resume
> in earnest shortly after the new 106th Congress convenes in late
> January 1999.
> 
> Here is a brief guide to what Congress has done in the Digital
> Millennium Copyright Act and the Copyright Term Extension Act ...
> and left libraries to do in the future:
> _________________________________________________________________
> 
> [2]  DIGITAL MILLENNIUM COPYRIGHT ACT GUIDE
> 
> PURPOSE:  Update the current Copyright Act for the digital
> environment and conform U.S. law to the requirements of new World
> Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) treaties negotiated in
> Geneva in December 1996. 
> 
> FUTURE LIBRARY ROLE:  As detailed below, assuring that all kinds
> of copyrighted works remain available for fair use (and other
> lawful uses).  The adoption of the Digital Millennium Copyright
> Act could depend in large part upon the success of librarians and
> library supporters in collecting and organizing evidence of the
> law's adverse or potentially adverse effects.  In addition,
> librarians will have the opportunity to assist the Register of
> Copyrights in making recommendations to Congress early in 1999 as
> to whether (and, if so, how) the Copyright Act should be updated
> to better facilitate distance education.
> 
> KEY PROVISIONS: ALA, together with other major national library
> associations and its partners in the Digital Future Coalition,
> has struggled to maintain the traditional balance in copyright
> law between protecting information and affording access to it by:
> 1) helping Congress to craft entirely new law with this balance
> in mind; and 2) updating information users' existing rights and
> privileges to take changed technologies and practices into
> account.  These efforts necessarily implicated many parts of the
> Digital Millennium Copyright Act identified with separate
> headings below: 
> 
> TITLE I:  NEW PROHIBITIONS ON CIRCUMVENTION OF PROTECTION
> TECHNOLOGIES
> 
>      *    Prohibits the "circumvention" of any effective
>           "technological protection measure" (e.g., a password or
>           form of encryption) used by a copyright holder to
>           restrict access to its material;
>      *    Prohibits the manufacture of any device, or the
>           offering of any service, primarily designed to defeat
>           an effective "technological protection measure;"
>      *    Defers the effective date of these prohibitions for two
>           years and 18 months, respectively;
>      *    During those two years, and then every three years
>           thereafter, requires the Librarian of Congress (through
>           the office of the Register of Copyrights), to conduct a
>           formal "on the record" rulemaking proceeding to
>           determine whether the "anti-circumvention" prohibition
>           will "adversely affect" information users' (both
>           individuals and institutions) "ability to make
>           noninfringing uses" of "a particular class of
>           copyrighted works" (NOTE: the term "class" was
>           deliberately left undefined, but is intended to be
>           fairly narrow, e.g., history texts, digital maps, or
>           personal finance software);
>      *    Requires that the Librarian issue a three-year waiver
>           from the anti-circumvention prohibition with respect to
>           any class of work to which the new law has adversely
>           affected (or is likely to affect) access for fair use
>           and other noninfringing uses;
>      *    Exempts nonprofit libraries, archives and educational
>           institutions from criminal penalties and allows for
>           nullification of any civil fine when such an
>           institution can demonstrate that it had no reason to be
>           aware that its actions violated the new law;
>      *    Expressly states that many valuable activities based on
>           the Fair Use Doctrine (including reverse engineering,
>           security testing, privacy protection and encryption
>           research) will not constitute illegal
>           "anticircumvention;" 
>      *    Makes no change to the Fair Use Doctrine, or to other
>           information user privileges and rights;
> 
> TITLE II:  LIMITATIONS ON ONLINE SERVICE PROVIDER LIABILITY
>      *    Exempts any "online service provider" or carrier of
>           digital information (including libraries) from
>           copyright liability based solely on the content of a
>           transmission made by a user of the provider's or
>           carrier's system (e.g., the user of a library computer
>           system);
>      *    Establishes a mechanism for avoiding copyright
>           infringement liability based upon the storage of
>           infringing information on an online service provider's
>           own computer system, or upon the use of "information
>           location tools" and hyperlinks, if the provider acts
>           "expeditiously to remove or disable access to"
>           infringing material identified in a formal notice by
>           the copyright holder.
> 
> TITLE IV: INCLUDES DIGITAL PRESERVATION AND DISTANCE EDUCATION
>      
>      DIGITAL PRESERVATION
> 
>      *    Updates the current preservation provision of the
>           Copyright Act (Sec. 108) to:
>           -- expressly permit authorized institutions to make up
>           to three, digital preservation copies of an eligible
>           copyrighted work;
>           -- electronically "loan" those copies to other
>           qualifying institutions;
>           -- permit preservation, including by digital means,
>           when the existing format in which the work has been
>           stored becomes obsolete.
> 
>      DISTANCE EDUCATION
> 
>      *    Charges the Register of Copyrights with reporting to
>           Congress within six months of the bill's effective date
>           on "how to promote distance education through digital
>           technologies";
>      *    Encourages the Register to formulate such
>           recommendations as statutory proposals
>      *    Specifies eight factors to be considered by the
>           Register, including: "the extent to which the
>           availability of licenses for the use of copyrighted
>           works in distance education through interactive digital
>           networks should be considered in assessing eligibility
>           for any distance education exemption...." 
> _________________________________________________________________
> 
> [3]  COPYRIGHT TERM EXTENSION ACT GUIDE
> 
> PURPOSE: To extend by 20 years the length of protection afforded
> to works created by both individuals and corporate copyright
> holders.
> 
> FUTURE LIBRARY ROLE:  By taking full advantage of the limited but
> important exemption described below, libraries, archives and
> nonprofit educational institutions can minimize the practical
> impact of this unfortunate legislation.
> 
> KEY PROVISIONS:
> 
> *    Extends the term of copyright from "life +50 years" to "life
>      +70 years" for individual authors and to 95 years from 75
>      years for corporate "creators";
> *    Applies both prospectively and to all works still under
>      copyright on the bill's effective date;
> *    Includes an exception permitting libraries, archives and
>      nonprofit educational institutions to treat a copyrighted
>      work in its last (new) 20 years of protection as if it were
>      in the public domain for noncommercial purposes, provided
>      that: 1) a good faith investigation has determined that the
>      work is "not subject to normal commercial exploitation," and
>      2) such use of the work stops if the copyright owner
>      provides notice to the contrary (even if the work had never
>      before been exploited). 
> _________________________________________________________________
> 
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> Contributors:                                        Adam Eisgrau
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> _________________________________________________________________