Re: droit de suite

On Wed, 12 Apr 2000, Marty Hayes <9ball[_at_]hostsite.net> wrote:
>
> On Mon, 10 Apr 2000, Lance Purple <lpurple[_at_]netcom.com> wrote:
> >
> > Yes, but being "fair use" may no longer be a defense, thanks to the
> > Digital Millenium Copyright Act. Particularly in the CyberPatrol
> > case, the fact that anti-copying technology is present might mean
> > that no "fair use" is possible unless the holder permits it. THAT
> > is one of the reasons I say copyright law has gone too far lately.
>
> I don't see how that example differs from the Copyright Act as it
> stands. You suggest that fair use may be negated unless the owner of
> the rights permits it because of anti-copy technology. However, I
> don't see that as being materially different from the courts' reduced
> tolerance toward copying without permission since the establishment of
> licensing schemes, which make it easier and more cost-effective to get
> permissions.

Then do you agree that there needs to be a change to the law, to grant whistle-blowers the right to copy in such cases? Mattel is certainly not going to grant a license to CyberPatrol's list of censored URLs to reporters bent on showing the public that the product is badly flawed!

If such copying is "fair use" under the 1976 Copyright Act, but then can be banned under the DMCA, corporations can conceal all evidence of wrong-doing from the media, just by keeping it in electronic form. What a pity for the tobacco industry that they neglected to digitize and encrypt all their memos, then shred the paper originals...

Lance Purple
<lpurple[_at_]netcom.com> Received on Thu Apr 13 2000 - 11:24:23 GMT