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

The Digital Millennium 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.

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 1201@loc.gov 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.)

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/136.pdf (PDF file)

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