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Opinion
Smashing the Shackles of Intentionally Dysfunctional Technology
11/29/2006
By Terry Calhoun
Until last week, it hadn’t “clicked” inside my head that the Library of Congress could or would make specific exemptions to copyright laws. That might be because it d'esn’t do that very often, and it might be because the rulings can be pretty specific to defined groups of people. For example, one of the new exemptions permits film professors – only film professors – to legally break the CSS copy-protection technology on film DVDs in order to copy snippets for instructional use.
No, the ruling d'es not give professors permission to use such snippets under the fair use exemption that we already know about. They already had that right. This new exemption lets them, and only them, specifically break the copy-protection if they can. Even though fair use had previously let them use snippets, they were technically breaking the law by taking the snippets from protected DVDs. So they were in a catch-22 situation; able to use the materials for instructional purposes, but kept from actually doing so by technological Gordian knots.
As a group, the head librarian calls this latest ruling “Rulemaking on Exemptions from Prohibition on Circumvention of Technological Measures that Control Access to Copyrighted Works.”
The Librarian of Congress, on the recommendation of the Register of Copyrights, has announced the classes of works subject to the exemption from the prohibition against circumvention of technological measures that control access to copyrighted works. Persons making noninfringing uses of the following six classes of works will not be subject to the prohibition against circumventing access controls (17 U.S.C. § 1201(a)(1)) during the next three years.
1. Audiovisual works included in the educational library of a college or university’s film or media studies department, when circumvention is accomplished for the purpose of making compilations of portions of those works for educational use in the classroom by media studies or film professors.
Well, that’s not quite true. There are software programs out there to break the DVD protection and the professors were already doing it, but they could have been sent to jail for doing so. Now they can breathe easier – not an insignificant consideration in this Patriot Act era.
“I am very encouraged by the fact that the Copyright Office is willing to recognize exemptions for archivists, cell phone recyclers and computer security experts,” said Fred von Lohmann, an attorney with the civil-liberties group Electronic Frontier Foundation. “Frankly I’m surprised and pleased they were granted.” (Read More…)
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