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CBDTPA / SSSCA Won't Be Passed This Year, Say Leahy

filrock writes "It looks like we'll have a little breathing room before the CBDTPA/SSSCA becomes law. Senator Leahy, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee is against the bill. Read the article on Wired. Good to see someone in the Senate with some common sense."

13 of 230 comments (clear)

  1. What does he want? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Leahy will only pass a bill with such a name as the JLTDMCAWWTTTAAOYRAMAP (Just Like The Digital Millenium Copyright Act, We Will Try To Take Away All Of Your Rights As Much As Possible)

  2. Don't let your guard down by chennes · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This only delays it a year, which is a notoriously short amount of time. We can't say to ourselves "Good - now I can go back to bed." This give all of us another year to deluge our representatives with letters expressing the danger of this legislation. We can't keep relying on people like senator Leahy to save our asses for us. WRITE!!

    1. Re:Don't let your guard down by SomeoneYouDontKnow · · Score: 5, Informative

      And don't forget that this thing could still find its way into another bill as an amendment. That's how the CDA was passed, as an emendment to the 1996 telecom act.

      OT: If one of the admins is reading this, could you go in and delete or modify the post that screwed up the page formatting?

      --
      That light you see at the end of the tunnel might be from an oncoming train.
  3. More common sense needed... by dciman · · Score: 5, Informative

    Now, someone in the congress should take notice to the obsurd proposal the RIAA has to charge extra fee to internet raido stations. The Screen Savers had the founder of WOLF FM on the other night talking abotu this issue and it amazed me. The guy does this out of his own pocket basically and already pays the normal fees that any other broadcast radio station pays. Now they want to charge him MORE than that, on a per user basis that is retroactive back to 1998!!! He would have to literally pay millions of dollars if he wanted to stay broadcasting.

    This is all about the RIAA wanting to put indepent people out of business...period. They want to control every outlet that consumers have to get content.... and it is disturbing. People need to get their haeads out of their asses and stop this. Call your Senator daily....write letters....send email... and spread the work. We shoudn't have to deal with this "everything in the world must be copy protected crap."

  4. What are his motives? by Screaming+Lunatic · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Leahy says he will block the bill, but he doesn't state why. What are his intentions? Does he feel the bill is just a plain bad bill or is their some lobby group he is looking out for? I think it's usually the latter when senators try to block bills. Or it could be just partisan politics. PK

    1. Re:What are his motives? by SomeoneYouDontKnow · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Leahy is an oddity in Congress. He's someone who seems to have his principles and sticks to them. He really seems to understand that there's such a thing as the First Amendment.

      I wonder if there's a chance that Slashdot could do an interview with him. I'd like to see that happen.

      --
      That light you see at the end of the tunnel might be from an oncoming train.
  5. Re:Good, but not the end of things by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    Just want to set your facts straight: The Hollings bill is a Senate bill; there is no Speaker in the Senate, only a Majority Leader, who is a DEMOCRAT -- the party closer to Hollywood. You can bet the Republicans, who get less that 30% of what Democrats get in soft-money from Hollywood, will favor tech (really big-business) over content (somewhat big-business).

    Slacker

  6. Interesting... by lie+as+cliche · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...considering the source. Isn't Wired owned by Viacom, which also owns Paramount / Blockbuster / Showtime / UPN etc.? How nice to be reassured by corporate film interests that we can stop worrying about copy protection initiatives for a while.

  7. Fight it at the constituency... by loucura! · · Score: 5, Funny

    Most of the USian population could care less about time-shifting, or space-shifting, they don't care about fair use rights, they just want their entertainment in pre-packaged slices, like 'American' cheese.

    Buuuuut...

    Most of the population 'hates' pr0n, especially the Southern Baptist Convention and their ilk.

    Too fight the CBDTPA, we should mount a campaign against it claiming that it protects the illicit profits of pornographers, after all, what is most traded on the Gnutella network?

    --
    Black and grey are both shades of white.
  8. Heres what we need to do folks by HanzoSan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We need a fund, slashdot or some group can setup a fund so we can all donate 10 bucks or so, to a fund, this money money will be used for advertisements. Instead of petitions we need donations which advertise our point of view to the public and tell the public which politicians are on our side and which arent.

    We can raise the money online, through rallies, etc etc

    We can get this money. It takes a group to colllect the money, a banner for hundreds or thousands of sites to post all over the web linking to this, and just hang the banner on your site. And of course IRL donations

    --
    If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
    1. Re:Heres what we need to do folks by The+Cat · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Good idea. Just FYI:

      A 30-second midday ad on a nationwide cable network in about 60 million homes runs only a few thousand dollars. Probably be seen in an average of 4 million homes, roughly.

      Just a thought.

  9. Re:We could have a Republican Senate next year.... by Chris+Johnson · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Well now that's interesting, because Orrin Hatch is not happy about what happened to the DMCA he helped to create, and he has NO love for the entertainment industry. This is the guy who has been in support of Napster. I think it is extraordinarily unlikely that he would support this in any way.

    Rather nice that no matter who ends up in the control position, they don't trust the entertainment industry (they'll take the money, but it doesn't guarantee 'results', evidently)

  10. A letter to Feinstein by Voivod · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm sure it'll just end up in a wastebin somewhere, but I just wrote the following letter to Diane Feinstein, who is my representative.

    ---------

    Dear Mrs. Feinstein,

    I'm just writing to let you know that I will not be voting for you in the next election. I've been a Californian all my life, and have always voted on Democratic party lines. However, due to your shamefull sponsorship of the so called "Digital Television Promotion Act" which is a direct attack on not only the technological innovation which makes the state you represent great, but also attack on the lives and careers of millions of the citizens you represent, I will never again vote for you.

    Looking at the giant campaign contributions you have received from media groups, I somehow doubt that your decision was actually based on considering the pros and cons of the bill. In the unlikely event that you are actually interested in facts on the situation, I beg you to do a little research into the repeating, inevitable reaction that media groups have shown throughout this century to new technologies, from VCRs and digital audio all the way back to the original record players, change threatens the pocketbooks of these industries, and they fight with all their power against these ultimately unstoppable trends. The sad thing is that in almost every case these dinosaurs ultimately benefit from these trends in reaching broader audiences with more interesting products.

    Are you blind to the fact that this last cycle was fought just 20 years ago, and that expensive Senators such as yourself rallied along side the movie industry to fight off the horror of the VCR, which (they claimed) would bring an end to American culture in waves of piracy? Instead, now billions of dollars each year are added to the banks of these same media companies because of that innovaction which they fought blindly to stop. What happened to that world where every living room was to feature a "copying device" (VCR) which would drain the entertainment industry dry? Today, the cast is the same, the script is the same, but the new terror is the threat of that den of piracy known as the Internet.

    Looking back, you may see your own reflection in the voices of senators from 20, 50 or even 80 years ago, who having found themselves solidly in the pockets of these frightened elephants proclaimed that no effort should be spared to protect these monied interests from the horrors of change. Have some shame and reconsider your foolish stand with them, so that they will again wake up and take advantage of this new medium instead of fighting it. In any case, you have lost my vote, and it will be a happy day for me when you are out of office.

    Sincerely,