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Sen. Hatch to Introduce Wide-ranging Copyright Bill
The Importance of writes "C|Net News is reporting that a new copyright bill, to be introduced next week by Sen. Orrin Hatch, will likely overturn the Betamax decision (which held that VCRs were legal) and threaten all sorts of innovation. EFF broke the story and Copyfight has been all over it. Don't miss the comments of law professor Susan Crawford who says, 'This is amazing. Now we're waaaaaay beyond contributory and vicarious theories of liability, which are court-created and pretty darn broad on their own.' Text of the bill here and PDF."
the Induce Act was scheduled to be introduced Thursday by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah
Senator Hatch has a powerful incentive in attacking P2P networks (see #'s 7, 15, 18).
Oddly enough, by the same logic he's using in this legislation prescription drugs should be illegal because they can be used to kill as well as heal. But since the rest of his top contributors are pharma co's he isn't likely to raise that as an issue is he?
Sigs cause cancer.
Sigh. Is anyone actually surprised anymore by yet another attempt to remove more freedoms? I thought progress was being made with the bill to remove the more dangerous elements of the DMCA, and now a new "Free Speech Killer"... The world's going to hell in a handbasket.
I haven't been following too closely, but it seems like he just keeps coming up with stuff like this, and just keeps getting smacked down, because even an idiot can tell it's not reasonable. Why doesn't he find a new cause?
Orrin Hatch has been in the pocket of the recording industry for ages. Could it have something to do with the disproportionate royalties he receives for his avocation as a "popular song writer?"
I don't think it stands a snowball's chance in hell, but as it might, we'd better make sure to make our side of the case clear. Hatch may want to blow up our computers, but I hope there are some senators who realize that "He took away your VCR" won't go well on the campaign trail.
"Your Rights Online: Sen. Hatch to Introduce Wide-ranging Slashdot Execution Bill"
/. know about these bills.. someone has to do something, the general public needs to know whats going on.. having flamewars on /. isn't going to stop this.. Doesnt ANYONE have the ability to get this in major news outlets? No one from CNN or something reads slashdot?
/. about how our rights are being taken away and then no one else i know offline knows anything is happenning. FUCK!!!
Might as well, since it seems only people on
I'm so sick of reading on
It would be fine it the length of copyright was also reduced to say 7 years instead of the infinite lifespan copyrights have now. Not really infinite, but anything copyrighted right now will remain so long after I die.
The Induce Act stands for "Inducement Devolves into Unlawful Child Exploitation Act,"
See? Stop being mean to them. They're not corporate shills trying to control culture and take away computers. They're doing it for the children. Think of the children. Don't you care about the children? I, for one, welcome our new child-protecting overlords.
Best. Comment. Ever. Enjoy!
Only by offending consumers and performing in-house raids to confiscate VCR's and arrest their owners, is it possible to get the public outraged. Non-slashdot-readers don't hear about bad laws until they're passed. Outrage from the general public will wait until this passes.
I'm probably at the karma cap. Mod up a funny troll instead, it lightens the mood
That should make for some interesting news when nearly every household in America would be in violation of the law - what, are they going to storm down every home who has a vcr that is capable of 'recording'? They never cease to amaze me - whats next - the cassette recorder?? Or how about my camcorder?
Child Exploitation? Child Exploitation? This has about as much to do with child exploitation as it does with farming subsidies or strategic national defense. The only reason this has "Child Exploitation" in the title is so that Hatch et al. can demonize anybody who opposes this as "having voted against protecting children from exploitation".
This is not about protecting America's children against exploitation; this is about protecting the revenue stream of a powerful business lobby.
Senator, you're a schmuck and a tool. The afterlife, if it exists, will most likely be a very unpleasant place for you.
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Congress can't overturn a decision by the Supreme Court, thats a convenience of having a well-designed government. What they can do is change the law, which would effectively allow someone to sue using the Betamax issue all over again. If this case makes it to the US Supreme Court, the Court could choose to apply the new law, or the old, or throw out the new, or the old, or somewhere in between.
So while Orrin Hatch may be a sleazy politician, he's not the Darth Vader who will pervert and destroy the entire copyright system in the US. (yeah, yeah, the ??AA has already done that, ha, ha, +1 Funny)
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
...to vote Libertarian. Question for conservatives: What the hell do you see in Republicans these days? They've become a bunch of right-wing socialists at this point.
Originally, the Induce Act was scheduled to be introduced Thursday by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, but the Senate Judiciary Committee confirmed at the end of the day that the bill had been delayed. A representative of Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a probable co-sponsor of the legislation, said the Induce Act would be introduced "sometime next week," a delay that one technology lobbyist attributed to opposition to the measure.
Does anyone know who opposes this in the Senate? They deserve a cookie.
My reading of the bill is that the law would not overturn Betamax so much as explicitly prevent Betamax from being applied to digital media. Betamax and VHS were both analog formats with cumulative degradation, that is, a copy of a copy was degraded, and at enough generations the quality would be unusable. Perfect digital copies, however, do not have this limitation, and it is merely common sense that they should be covered by a different law. Betamax was a Supreme Court decision, and it cannot be overturned by an Act of Congress unless Congress retracts the right of Judicial Review. Rather, this law extends stronger protections to the more powerful (and therefore dangerous) process of digital copying.
Screaming and histrionics aside, I don't know how else you could prevent digital theft. For years, Democrats have argued that to stop gun crime, we must outlaw guns. This is common sense. Why now do we reverse our logic? To stop digital copying crimes, we must outlaw digital copying.
If guns kill people, then CmdrTaco's keyboard misspells words.
This would pretty clearly target the telcos, if you couldn't move the packets, nobody would be able to pirate this stuff.
This would pretty clearly target the network equipment manufacturers, if you couldn't move the packets, nobody would be able to pirate this stuff.
This would pretty clearly target Intel/AMD/Motorola and any other manufacturer of microprocessor that can be used to convert this pirated media into something visual/audible.
The list goes on and on.
Casca
There is just something wrong about advocating PRISON TIME for someone commiting a nonviolent offense WITH NO PROFIT MOTIVE. Unlike the previous boogeyman of drug laws, nobody is even being hurt here - hence the whole idea of fair use. There's just something fundamentally wrong here. These proposed bills are getting crazier and crazier.
Legislators in Canada (I am not an American. YMMV) looked at this and while recognizing a problem, rejected the notion of stiff criminal penalties for this kind of thing. This concerned me here enough to write a detailed letter to the committee reviewing these laws in Canada.
Control over media devices has another impact to - it's about control over the PRODUCTION OF MEDIA. With so much news and speech regulated THROUGH the media, this is tremendously important for the future of free speech in the USA.
Sigh, sometimes I think the world went mad while I wasn't looking. You just don't put people in PRISON for sharing a SONG with NO PROFIT. There is this thing called CIVIL law. Sue him into the ground, sure. Prison is where you put murderers and rapists - not copyright infringers. I wonder how many politicians in the USA would see the irony if they looked back at the treatment of international patents over historical timescales.
Arrgh! Please, get involved in this process and get organized. DO SOMETHING.
IANAL, but won't this have a "chilling effect" on technology? Isn't it one thing to go after people who break the laws, rather than going after people who might offer ideas on how to break the law (or ideas with other applicability)? I guess this is one of the reasons I can not find anything which will record streaming media on the internet, and I have looked and looked and looked. One of my professors has his lectures streamed on-line, and I wanted to copy it to watch it later, but could not. I guess with this law, if someone made software to copy that streaming content, it would be illegal. Oh well, less power to the people I guess.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
"Inducement Devolves into Unlawful Child Exploitation Act of 2004."
What!!???
Using peoples' fear of child exploitation as a tool to push through draconian copyright measures to help BigCorp Inc. is despicable.
Surely this _is_ child exploitation.
It's bad enough that there are sickos in society preying on children for their bodies without someone to then abusing that exploitation to steal their legal rights.
Fascist Alert.
I, for one, welcome our new Mormon overlords.
...I would recommend that you do the same. Looks like a full court press while the Republicans control everything...too good an opportunity for the greedheads to pass up.....
Not intentionally trolling, but is it any wonder why other countries don't accept our way of governing with open arms.
US Ambassador sales pitch on democracy:
"So look, get get all this freedom in a 'democracy', but the trick, and you'll love this, is that you have the freedom to take away freedom. Now don't do it right away, give them 100 or so years and then start doing it slowly so that no one notices til it's too late. It also helps to get in bed with big business cuase oil or not, cash is king."
"Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a fat white guy who is threatened by change."
Utah. He's from Utah.
Since they "aid" and "abet" copyright infringement, normal CD Burners would also be illegal under this law. It's as if Sony Music wants Sony Electronics to stop making devices that are obviously designed solely to pirate their copyrighted works.
Ralph Nader called Washington DC a "corporate-occupied terrority," and I think we need little proof beyond this bill to bolster his claim.
Giant corporations walk into a congressman's office, just flat-out order him to introduce a bill that their lawyers wrote that suspends the Constitution so that they can make a little bit more money, and the congressman goes right along with it, apparently without a moment's hesitation.
As far as enforcing this law, I cannot imagine in a million years that any standard of fairness would even be considered in its application. As Drummond states in Inherit the Wind, "I say that you cannot administer a wicked law impartially. You can only destroy. You can only punish. I warn you that a wicked law, like cholera, destroys everyone it touches -- its upholders as well as its defiers."
When people who innocently use technology like TiVo and VCRs and CD burners start getting randomly sued and arrested by RIAA and MPAA members, I can only hope that the public outcry is strong enough to reverse the trend. But I fear that the opposite will happen, that we'll all be huddled under our bedclothes, shivering in fear that the giant corporations will come after us next. Terrified that armed corporate goon squads, deputized under the banner of protecting copyright, will break our doors down, confiscate our computers and home entertainment systems, and lead us off in handcuffs, we'll do anything to protect ourselves from them, even if it means testifying against a neighbor, friend, or family member. Boy, do I hope that I'm just being paranoid.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
These congressman are paid hitmen and are all corrupt because the system is about lobbying(which needs to be outlawed). Lobbying = Corruption. This should not be a lobbyocracy but a democratic republic.
Here we have another debate about copyright.
What do you think? Will we settle it this time? Will we have copyright anarchy or copyright enforcement? If we're too permissive, we'll have no information economy!
What a false dillemma.
Have you really seen how strict we're thinking of making our copyright rules?
Freedom and privacy are in themselves valuable. And strict enforcement of copyright is simply incompatible with freedom and privacy.
But, actually, neither freedom nor privacy are the most important reason to avoid becoming "too strict" about copyright.
Our _economy_ requires us not to be too strict.
Remember, our whole world is, and has always been, engaged in massive, systematic violations of copyright law. So let's look at why that is, and what purpose it serves, before we rock the boat too quickly.
For a minute, let's set aside mix tapes, and libraries, and the VCR, half your childhood singalongs in school and around the campfire - all of which are illegal, and might not have happened under a "strict" copyright regime.
Lets head to the everyday world of the home and office, where almost every other computer has some illegally duplicated software or media on it. Sooner or later somebody brought a CD or some music from home, or installed WinZIP without paying for it. Only WinZIP is the tip of the iceberg. Many of the most copied software titles are "programs for work." Microsoft's Office, or Windows. Visual C++. Macromedia's Flash or Director.
It gets copied because it's very expensive, and the people who want to use these tools can't always afford them.
This stolen software is used to do work. It writes school papers. It creates art projects. It produces other software, from desktop applications to web sites to video games (even some really big titles you've all bought in the store). It is used by the attorneys of companies suing other companies for copyright infringement, and certainly by the children of everyone concerned. "Stolen" media is present all around you, like air and water, in virtually every workplace, and in every home, used for writing love letters, wiling away hours in hospital beds, researching cancer, and even fighting crime and educating our children. (Yes, even police and schools have been prosecuted by the "BSA" - the software industry's copyright enforcement arm.)
Perfect enforcement of copyright has never been possible, or even close - so only egregious violations of it are prosecuted (big companies that could afford it, but chose not to pay, or stalls on the street - actually trying to sell the stolen goods). The rest pass by, unremarked, uncredited - often even without our noticing.
This stolen softare, present in everywhere, from the halls of giants like EA, Microsoft, and IBM (despite their own best efforts to stop it) to little companies all over the country, has been used to do work that made billions of dollars in the marketplace.
Copying, whatever its costs, has enormous benefits. It's like a magic lubricant, empowering our business and creative activities and enriching our lives - subtracting the mythical "last 5%" from the copyright holder, while adding 500% to the society as a result.
Imagine if a poor person could magically borrow a wealthy man's house. He could shower, eat in the kitchen, he could read the wealthy man's books, change into the wealthy man's clothes, and when walking out the door, get a better job.
Now what if millions of poor men could all live in the rich man's house at the same time as its owner did, without anyone ever meeting each other? What if the kitchen was always full no matter how many people it fed?
This is the magical world of "intellectual property" - where the very term "property" makes us want to protect our ideas as though only one person could possess them at a time. Yet we all know that's not true. Ideas have a different set of rules. As has been observed many times already, "Intellectual Property" many not be
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
Hey, I'm in Utah, and I've never voted for him! I have had a personal vendetta against him for the last 4 years! Everyone I know is *WELL* aware of where I stand on these Hatch-inspired bills and why. I have personally sent him several emails as well as snail mail letters expressing my sentiments as a constituent for his legislation attempts. He is not representing me or anyone else in Utah that I know of. The only thing I can figure is that he is representing someone with deep pockets or he is *WAAAY* off the deep end. (Lest you think all of us in Utah are mindlessly voting Republican!)
Change your name to Homer Junior! Your friends can call you Hoju
A past scandal in congress was over institutional supporters of politicians buying lots and lots of a book written by that politician. Maybe the books were in a warehouse or distributed free to members afterwards but the money was "royalties".
The above paragraphs probably have nothing to do with each other.
Congress can't overturn a decision by the Supreme Court, thats a convenience of having a well-designed government.
Your "well-designed government" was designed by this thing called The United States Constitution, which states, in no uncertain terms:
Of course, The Constitution ain't the most politically correct document these days, and goodness knows the courts don't give a damn about it...Hatch is a conservative Mormon who has denounced pornography in the past and who suggested last year that copyright holders should be allowed to remotely destroy the computers of music pirates
I think they misspelled "moron"
Beauty is in the eye of the beerholder.
From what I have heard, Hatch is a very amiable, likable guy. People who have told me that have also told me he is completely full of BS. The folks in particular I am thinking about who met him came away with an overall good impression, saying "he's a really nice guy" but were also somewhat frustrated because he would pretend to answer their questions but really just gave them a stream of BS (that sounded good, but looking back it was clear he didn't know what he was talking about). Unfortunately, folks like this slip through the cracks and into office a lot in a democratic system; I think that's the bad we take with the good.
I think if Hatch were up for re-election in November, he might get the boot (even in the ultra-conservative state of Utah). But his term isn't up until 2006. There is a good Democrat running against him then, I wish I could remember his name, that might have a shot. But I am just worried that with 2 years left to go, Hatch has plenty of time to do some positive PR work to help his image.
I'm also pretty sure that he's got himself covered in regards to any possible charges of being bribed by lobbyists, PAC's, etc. He's probably too smart for that.
However, I can't but help feel that he is a traitor. He is un-American, and I hope that he loses re-election. The 1st Amendment is 1st because of its importance to America, and the 1st Amendment is America.
You attack the 1st Amendment, you attack America.
So, Mr. Hatch: ES&D.
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
Well, if you thought the DeCSS lawsuits were frivolous, you're in for a new type. This would effectively ban the LAME-type projects that are source-only in order to avoid copyright infringement. Yep - you're 'inducing' violations by providing a means to distribute illegal copies of copyright materials. What about audio rippers? Well, if they can be inducing violations, they're infringing. Forget about fair use. All you need to ban some product is an example of its use for copyright infringement and a benevolent judge that would accept some broader definition for 'intentional'.
Also, this will be a generalized ban for any devices non-compliant with future equivalents of the broadcast flag in other fields. Maybe even selling the old non-compliant devices, as they're sure to be used for an infringing purpose.
I hope I'm wrong, but remember, if the wording of the law allows it, sooner or later someone WILL use it.
I love the idea of a sponsored congressman. They should go to work each day dressed like those NASCAR drivers. Logos all over the place, head to toe. He pauses in the middle of his speach to take a refreshing drink of Coca-Cola. Ahhhhh.
Hell lets stop pretending anymore. Lets create corporate representatives and get our elected ones back. All these probablems coming from the fact that corporations are seen as people in the eyes of the law. Make the House, the Senate and the Market. People elect the first two, corporations vote for the third and can't contribute to the others.
You think CNN cares? They're owned by Time-Warner, one of Hatch's bigger contributors.
This is the problem, and the agenda behind Republican media deregulation. If your content producers and your media are the same thing, and have a government-granted monopoly, you control the culture. Instant police state.
This bill is one small step in Hatch's plan to destroy the Internet.
The entertainment industry is also pursuing this through another vector: through WIPO. If the U.S. signs the new WIPO treaty, then Betamax will be overturned even without Hatch's bill. See my Nov. 8, 2003 blog entry U.S. corroborating with WIPO to overturn Betamax decision and also eliminate public domain.
perhaps this is a bit off-topic, but I've about had it up to here with copyright.
Let my put it this way, in the good old days of the middle ages if you wanted a book, say the bible, you would aquire a transcription: not a copy. Some monk or whatnot would actually create the article by hand, painstakingly.
Therefore the idea of illegal copies was nonexistent - because it would take forever to make such a copy. you were essentially paying for the transcription service, not really the intellectual property contained within the work - if you were paying at all, that is.
then came the gutenberg press, a great creation, and fun to say too. Copies could be made in a much more effecient manner, but the consumer was still paying for the service more than the copies; after all the bible was the first thing printed - and unless you consider tithe a type of royalty - no money was payed for the creators. I think tithe is more like a membership charge.
Still, the concept of the consumer making thier own copies was unheard of - unless that consumer had a press and the expertise to use it.
Up until the 60's consumers didn't really have any good methods for making cheap copies of any intellectual works; books, music, movies. But then the xerox, and then the magnetic cassete tape.
Basically i'm saying that the current methods of copy protection are a backwards technology. you see, because the freaking consumer now has the ability to create documents that have all the quality expected. The gutenberg press is in every household in the form of HP and Memorex.
Copy protection, IMO is tantamount to sabatoge. It impedes the capability of the consumer to utilize thier equipment to it's full extent - in effect decreasing the functionality.
Money is a great example of this; it is vital that cash be as difficult as possible to copy. But, it is a chasing of the tail. you see, the money of the 20's can probably be duplicated fairly accurately via consumer-level hardware. Money is a type of proof saying "hey, this paper says what i'm worth, you must trust me because george washington says so"; but the physical document (dollar bill) can be duplicated - Gold, not so easy; goods and services likewise. In other words, the value contained within the bill is an illusion. (all value arguably is, but the value of a doctor in times of emergency is not so etheral - service and goods my friends; the only real values).
Eventually, if the hardware manufactures are smart enough, and industrious enough, consumer-level will match corporate-level in every aspect.
Already, consumer-level music is oft-times better than corporate-level; likewise with movies; and likewise with software (read: consumers created linux).
Copy protection should be illegal.
It is worth noting that Senator Hatch has a long history of supporting legislation that tramples upon constitutional rights and civil liberties, this man is definitley an enemy of your rights and the constitution, anyone in Utah really needs to remember to vote and get this bastard out of Office. He has waged war on the Bill of Rights long enough. M
This brings up an interesting point. People hate Communism. Do you know why? Because Communism involves the State stepping in and telling you where you can live, how much money you can make, how much of X product you can purchase, what ideas you are allowed to express, what church you can go to, and so forth. The State takes away your rights.
Now we are faced with more and more right-wingers who want to regulate our lives to death to satisfy a few greedy entertainment executives. Load a "bad" program? Go to jail. Buy a VCR? Go to jail. Devise an algorithm to uncripple your own media? Go to jail. This is the world that faces us, if this agenda is successful.
Bill of Rights? We're talking about legislation specifically designed to take our rights away.
Now, back under your bridge, Troll.
dinner: it's what's for beer
If every piece of technology that can be used to violate copyrights is banned, how is the RIAA/MPAA going to make their CDs/DVDs?
=================
Unix is very user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are.
"If you make a product that has dual uses, infringing and not infringing, and you know there's infringement, you're liable." Wouldn't this automatically make all copy machines illegal? IANAL, but they seem to fall precisely into the same category as the VCR. I don't see anything that restricts this bill to digital media. I'm sure there are more ripple effects as well, but that one certainly jumped out at me. KeS
Well then, next we should be banning:
1. Cameras - they can be used to take pictures of infringing or unlawful material.
2. Tape Recorders - they can be used to produce an audio copy of infringing or unlawful material.
3. Cell Phones - they can transmit infringing or unlawful material.
4. Magazines - in case anybody prints infringing or unlawful material.
5. Books - see point 4.
6. The internet as a whole - transmission of infringing or unlawful material.
...
I know I'm exagerating a bit, but it seems to me this law is like trying to kill a fly with a nuclear bomb - you'll get the desired effect, but totaly blow away things you did not intend to do. I feel innovation will be stifled because companies will be afraid of "possible infringement" and don't want to be liable.
I only hope that Congress wakes up and sees the impact of this law ... but I'm not holding my breath.
It is not our abilities that show what we truly are... it is our choices.
I wanted to express my dismay at the continuing assault on the public's rights with regards to Sen. Orrin Hatch's forthcoming introduction of legislation that amends Title 17 and the copyright laws. The "Inducement Devolves into Unlawful Child Exploitation Act" that Senator Hatch is preparing to introduce contains an amendment to Title 17 in Section 2 of the Act which has nothing to do with the unlawful exploitation of children. Specifically, the amendement appears to make it a crime for anyone to develop, discuss, buy, sell or recommend tools or information that will allow for the "fair use" rights of average citizens to be realized if these tools might also be used for copyright infringement.
Are we going to outlaw the VCR Senator? Are we going to go to jail for using copy machines? Are we going to discourage research into cryptography by academia and computer security professionals such as myself? Are our legislators going to continue catering to the special interests that are lining their war chests with contributions or are they going to stand up for the public's right to use content they purchase as they wish?
The worst part of this is that Senator Hatch is hiding this amendment inside of a bill supposedly designed to punish unlawful child exploitation. Now what person in there right mind would come out in opposition to laws against unlawful exploitation of children? It is a totally underhanded ploy by Senator Hatch to pass legislation aimed at helping some of his largest contributors, while sneaking it into a bill that would make a colleague think twice about voting no on the other provisions hidden inside.
I urge you to work hard to strip the copyright law changes from this bill when it is introduced into the Senate and, if not abandon them completely, at least address them separately. These deserve to be argued on their own and not as part of some other bill or compromise.
Finally, the Supreme Court ruled against Hollywood in the 1984 Betamax case when they determined that any device capable of a substantial non-infringing use was legal. The Audio Home Recording Act of 1992 shored up the rights of the average citizen and made home taping legal given the properly used equipment and blank media. Let's build on these rulings and continue to represent your constituents rights, not trample them into the ground. If the old business models of the media conglomerates cannot adapt to the technology of today or the future, then they need to come up with a new business-model or go broke. Our legislature should not be in the business of restricting the public's rights so that outdated companies that do not innovate and move with the times continue to survive.