subject: (Fwd) EFFector 13.03: ALERT: public comments due on DMCA copyr posted: Mon, 20 Mar 2000 15:26:26 +0800
I forward this for lots of reasons:
1. current discussion on reverse engineering
2. more of a feel for the bullies in Washington
3. excellent example of online activism
4. EFF is publisher.
Stuart
------- Forwarded message follows -------
Date sent: Fri, 17 Mar 2000 18:15:05 -0800 (PST)
From: Stanton McCandlish <[email protected]>
Subject: EFFector 13.03: ALERT: public comments due on DMCA copyright rules
Send reply to: [email protected]
Organization: Electronic Frontier Foundation
To: [email protected] (effector mailing list)
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
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.
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.)
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!)
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.
Membership & donations: [email protected]
General EFF, legal, policy or online resources queries: [email protected]
Reproduction of this publication in electronic media is encouraged.
Signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of EFF. To
reproduce signed articles individually, please contact the authors for
their express permission. Press releases and EFF announcements may be
reproduced individually at will.
To subscribe to EFFector via email, send message BODY of:
subscribe effector-online
to [email protected], which will add you to a subscription list for
EFFector. To unsubscribe, send a similar message body, like so:
unsubscribe effector-online
to the same address.
Please ask [email protected] to manually add you to or remove you
from the list if this does not work for some reason.
search: