EFFector Vol. 13, No. 3 Mar. 17, 2000 editor@eff.org

EFFector Vol. 13, No. 3 Mar. 17, 2000 [email protected]

A Publication of the Electronic Frontier Foundation ISSN 1062-9424

IN THE 151st ISSUE OF EFFECTOR (now with over 23,000 subscribers!):

* EFF Alert: Copyright Office Needs Comments on DMCA
+ Intro
+ What YOU Can Do
+ Resources
* Administrivia

For more information on EFF activities & alerts: http://www.eff.org
_________________________________________________________________

EFF Alert: Copyright Office Needs Comments on DMCA

Alert issued Mar. 16, 2000. Please redistribute to relevant forums, until
Apr. 1, 2000

An HTML version of this alert is available at:
http://www.eff.org/ip/DMCA/20000316_eff_dmca_alert.html

Intro:

The Digital Millenium Copyright Act of 1998 (DMCA) is a so-called
"update" to the US copyright laws, that strongly favors the rights of
copyright holders over all others, and may interfere strongly with
fair use rights, the right to reverse engineer, the right to conduct
cryptographic analyses, and many other rights held by individuals and
by companies in other industries than information and entertainment
content. The law could even thwart libraries' and museums' ability to
archive information, and interfere with education and research in our
schools and universities.

The US Copyright Office in the Library of Congress has the job of
ensuring that implementation of the DMCA does not negatively impact
legitimate activities that should remain exempt from DMCA's
prohibition on "circumvention of technological measures that control
access to copyrighted works." The Copyright Office is asking for
public comments on its proposed rules and, in this instance, for
"reply comments" on previous comments submitted in an earlier round of
testimony.

The testimony covered many questions, but the most important ones are
covered in EFF's comments, at:
http://www.eff.org/ip/DMCA/20000217_eff_dmca_comments.html

The comment deadline is now Fri., Mar. 31 2000.

What YOU Can Do:

Read some of the most important prior comments (see below), and think
about them, then submit new comments that:
1. supporting our original comments and those of likeminded prior
respondents who are seeking continued protection of fair use,
reverse engineering and other rights;
2. criticizing the "infotainment" industry's anti-freedom position in
which their monetary interests would be protected at the expense
of all others; and
3. informing the Copyright Office of vital reverse engineering,
research, security, fair use and other rights and needs that would
be harmed by the Copyright Office accepting the content control
industry's position - they need really great, original examples,
especially from experts in technical and other fields.

Sending comments via e-mail:

Send to [email protected] a message containing the name of the person
making the submission, his or her title and organization (if the
submission is on behalf of an organization), mailing address,
telephone number, telefax number (if any) and e-mail address. The
message should also identify the document clearly as either a
comment or reply comment. The document itself must be sent as a
MIME attachment, and must be in a single file in either: (1) Adobe
Portable Document File (PDF) format (preferred); (2) Microsoft Word
Version 7.0 or earlier; (3) WordPerfect 7 or earlier; (4) ASCII
text file format; or (5) Rich Text File (RTF) format. (If you use a
modern e-mail program like Eudora, Netscape Communicator or MS
Outlook, simply use the file attachment command, and it will
automatically be sent in the standard MIME format.)

Resources:

The Copyright Office's Request for Reply Comments (for current round
of comments) + background:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/anticirc.html

Federal Register Notice with full instructions for sending comments:
http://www.loc.gov/copyright/fedreg/65fr6573.html

The Copyright Office's Notice of Inqurity (with questions for original
round of comments) + more background:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/fedreg/64fr66139.pdf (PDF file)

Full text of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, Public Law 105-304
(1998):
http://www.eff.org/ip/DMCA/hr2281_dmca_law_19981020_pl105-304.html

All prior comments (HTML index to PDF-format documents):
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments

Important prior comments (pro-freedom):

Electronic Frontier Foundation:
http://www.eff.org/ip/DMCA/20000217_eff_dmca_comments.html (HTML)

Assn. for Computing Machinery:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/171.pdf (PDF file)

Computer & Communiations Industry Assn.:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/224.pdf (PDF file)

MIT Media Lab:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/185.pdf (PDF file)

Library of Congress (National Digital LIbrary Program, and the Motion
Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Div.):
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/175.pdf (PDF file)
(Yes, even the Library of Congress itself criticizes the DMCA!)

Princeton University:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/235.pdf (PDF file)

Assn. of American Universitities, American Council on Education, and
Natl. Assn. of State Universities:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/161.pdf (PDF file)

American Library Assn., American Assn. of Law Libraries, Assn. of
Research Libraries, Medical Library Assn., and Special Libraries
Assn.:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/162.pdf (PDF file)

Important prior comments (anti-freedom):

Time-Warner Inc.:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/043.pdf (PDF file)

Motion Picture Association of America:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/209.pdf (PDF file)

Sony Computer Entertainment America, Inc.:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/190.pdf (PDF file)

You might also like to examine some of the intelligent comments
submitted by concerned individuals, such as...

Michael Sims:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/139.pdf (PDF file)

Prof. Peter D. Junger:
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/1201/comments/203.pdf (PDF file)

Hopefully YOU will add more such comments. Remember, the deadline is
Mar. 31.

Coming in the next issue of EFFector - an alert about UCITA, a bill
being considered by state legislatures that grants even more rights to
intellectual property holders at the expense of everyone else.

_________________________________________________________________

Administrivia

EFFector is published by:

The Electronic Frontier Foundation
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([email protected])

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