Update on State "Communications Services" Laws

stwrtpj writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation is reporting a breaking news item: Colorado Governor Owens has vetoed a super-DMCA-like bill similar to the one passed in Michigan." Felten has a comment on the Colorado bill. Tennessee is delaying their consideration of the bill. And Oregon's bill has died for now; see below for more.

babbage_ct writes "As has been reported on Slashdot before (see here, here, and here for just a few) the MPAA is pushing so-called Super-DMCA laws in states around the country. Well, score one for the good guys. Oregon's version, SB 655 is going to die. Turns out the sponsor was scammed by MPAA lobbyist. See the e-mail from legislative staff below.

From: "Staff SenCharlesStarr"
To:
Sent: Thursday, May 22, 2003 5:17 PM
Subject: Status of SB 655

Status of SB 655:

SB 655 is slated to die in committee this session. It is no longer an immediate threat, however, there will be a study commission appointed over the interim. Sen. Minnis decided that the issue was too complex to resolve this session. I will attempt to inform you when the commission is formed so that you can have further input. Oregon truly dodged the bullet on this. Some states passed the MPAA model legislation before the IT community even knew it existed.

The email you sent to Sen. Starr (and I hope all of the committee members) helped to stop this dangerous legislation. Good job! In case you're wondering why Sen. Starr sponsored this bill in the first place, it was requested by the MPAA lobbyist (who really is a nice guy) but Sen. Starr was told that it was a simple bill to update copyright law in relation to digital media. Yes, and a whole lot more! As the full impact of the bill became clear, Sen. Starr withdrew his support, which contributed to the bill's "unfortunate demise."

If you have any further questions, please feel free to ask.

Ken McDermott
Legislative Assistant
Senator Charles Starr
900 Court St NE S-312
Salem, OR 97301
staff.sencharlesstarr@state.or.us

Comments

Re:So...

[stratjakt]

Like my sibling post, I'd like to see what the EFF has ever accomplished.

Noone outside of slashdot has heard of them, so they arent waging a very effective campaign to "get the message out". They don't have any effect in any legislature at any level.

The EFF is a wanna-be ACLU, which is nothing but a bunch of lawyers bonded together to get their pictures on the paper with nuisance lawsuits (like suing an elementary school for having childrens drawings of santa on the bulliten board).

Fuck all lobbyists of all shapes and sizes.

Power for the people, and screw all the self interest groups on both side of the spectrum.

Re:Interesting

[The Bungi]

Well now, I'm so flatered that you went and looked at my lists of friends and then read my journal. That's quite the piece of detective work, especially from a useless - er, faceless - anonymous turdomanic piece of adulterated protoplasm.

"Cunt"? Bwahahahaha!