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Posted on 07/30/2005 2:57:03 PM PDT by JRP0322
WASHINGTON--Congress remains reluctant to rewrite copyright law in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark decision on file-swapping--but Internet pornography on peer-to-peer networks is likely to be a legislative target this fall.
At a hearing convened Thursday by the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said that she and a bipartisan group of senators were "very concerned" that peer-to-peer software makers were not taking "active steps" to stop copyright infringement by filtering pornography from minors using the software.
"If you don't move to protect copyright, if you don't move to protect our children, it's not going to sit well," Boxer said.
Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, who chairs the committee, said he would be holding a hearing this fall geared toward illegal access to pornography through peer-to-peer software.
"We're going to get specific about this, pornography over the Internet. People tell me we can't do anything about it. I don't believe that."
Both Boxer and Stevens indicated that they would continue to seek legislation related to requiring filters on peer-to-peer software clients.
But Adam Eisgrau, executive director of P2P United, told the senators that any claim of a "technological magic bullet" to filter out illicit content "is simply false."
Stevens took a combative tone with the panel, composed of six representatives spanning the entertainment industry, Internet service providers, venture capital firms and peer-to-peer software companies.
"It doesn't sound to me like there's any motivation here for a mechanism to bring about some standards for the future as far as these organizations are concerned," Stevens told the panel.
Congress' attempts to regulate Internet pornography have been mixed--and mostly rejected by the courts. One attempt, the Communications Decency Act, was unceremoniously overturned by the Supreme Court, while the Child Online Protection Act and a library filtering measure were better received.
Several senators have publicly praised the Grokster decision. Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, reiterated in his opening remarks that he applauded the decision, which he said "made it very clear that stealing is unacceptable." But even he joined his colleagues in asking what file-sharing companies were doing to discourage piracy.
Each of the panelists largely discouraged Congress from taking any immediate action on the matter.
The closest anyone came to a push for legislation was Eisgrau, who suggested that Congress should reform the system of awarding damages to copyright holders.
Copyright holders currently can sue technology companies, individual inventors and investors for up to $150,000 per work infringed, but Congress should think about erasing that burden in favor of providing copyright holders solely with actual damages, said Eisgrau, who was also speaking on behalf of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Eisgrau recommended that Congress encourage the various stakeholders to come together "to intelligently and civilly discuss" a voluntary licensing system. He made clear that he was not suggesting that Congress impose a compulsory licensing system. (The idea is controversial. The Progress and Freedom Foundation, for instance, published a paper (PDF) this week warning of the dangers of compulsory licensing.)
Entertainment industry representatives said that the Grokster decision had placated their major concerns and dismissed the need for congressional action.
Said Fritz Attaway, executive vice president of the Motion Picture Association of America: "If ultimately this decision does not create the right atmosphere to deal with the piracy problem, then maybe Congress does need to act."
So they want to protect pornographers from minors engaging in copyright infringement...hmmm.
As far as I need to read.
Anybody consider watching what your kids do with a computer and slapping the crap out of them if they download something you don't want them to.
They are just doing the pornography work that Americans won't do.
Man, ain't that the truth. She's nuttier than a granola bar
Libertarian ping.To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here
Were a conservative concerned I would think it was truly about porn, but with Boxer et al I know it is about eventually silencing the bloggers and forums like FreeRepublic. They have control of most everything else but the internet is their undoing because the truth comes out here. They must control ALL information.
I don't know about the slapping part but how about monitoring what they surf. Gasp!!!! spending time with your child!
This reads as if they are more concerned with copyright violations than they are with the content. They can't ever stop it so the next logical step is to try and tax it.
Seems silly, doesn't it? It is silly.
The best thing they can do if they want to limit the amount of porn out there is to ignore enforcing copyright law on it.
The best thing they can do if they want to limit the amount of porn out there is to ignore enforcing copyright law on it.
Bingo. Remove any copyright protections on porn material period.
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That's what I thought just now when I saw this today here
Court nominee Roberts' panel rejected P2P ruling
By Brooks Boliek
WASHINGTON -- President Bush's pick to succeed Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was part of the three-judge panel that threw out a section of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that would have given entertainment companies an expedited way to identify alleged copyright pirates on the Internet.
In a December 2003 ruling, Judge John Roberts joined two other appellate court judges in overturning a ruling that the DMCA subpoena was constitutional. Roberts was nominated to the Supreme Court by Bush on Tuesday.
In its opinion, the panel dismissed arguments by the RIAA that P2P services are simply an extension of the central-server technology that was around when Congress approved the DMCA in 1998. The DMCA subpoena requires Internet service providers to turn over the identity without a judge's order. The panel rejected one of the RIAA's key arguments that the subpoenas were legal even if the P2P technology wasn't invented when the DMCA was approved.
"The RIAA argues that the definition of 'Internet' service provider (in the law is) applicable to an ISP regardless what function it performs with respect to infringing material -- transmitting it ... caching it ... hosting it ... or locating it," Judge Douglas Ginsburg wrote for the panel. "This argument borders upon the silly."
During questioning by the panel in September 2003, Roberts was one of the most active judges on the panel as he grilled attorneys representing the RIAA and Verizon. At the time, the battle over the DMCA between the nation's biggest phone company and Verizon was one of the most hotly contested in copyright law.
Roberts wondered at the time whether the fact that copyrighted files were publicly accessible on someone's computer necessarily means that the Internet user is illegally distributing those files.
"Isn't it equivalent to my leaving the door to my library open?" Roberts asked music industry attorney Don Verrilli. "Somebody may come in and copy my books, but that doesn't mean I'm liable for copyright infringement."
While Roberts expressed serious doubts about the viability of the subpoenas, he was equally concerned with Verizon's contentions that copyright holders should have to go before a judge.
"Shouldn't we read the law to solve the problems Congress meant to solve?" he asked Verizon attorney Andrew McBride.
McBride answered by spelling "S-O-N-Y" in a reference to the Sony Betamax case, which turned back entertainment industry challenges to the VCR. He told the judges that the RIAA's move was the same knee-jerk reaction to new technology that it has had from piano rolls to the computer.
But Roberts also questioned Verizon's motives.
"You make a lot of money off piracy," Roberts said to McBride, pointing out that people who download large collections of music traditionally favor high-speed Internet connections like those offered by Verizon's Internet subsidiary.
In the end, though, Roberts sided with Verizon, joining Ginsburg and Judge Stephen Williams as they ordered the lower court to vacate its order enforcing one of the RIAA's DMCA subpoenas and to granting Verizon's motion to quash the another subpoena. The appellate court's order was upheld by the Supreme Court when it refused to hear the RIAA's appeal.
While there was a pitched legal battle over the DMCA subpoena, losing it didn't matter in the end. The RIAA has compelled Internet service providers to turn over the names hundreds of times using a "John Doe" subpoena. While the "John Doe" subpoenas take more time and require a judge's signature, they have proved to be a potent weapon in the copyright holders' anti-piracy arsenal.
Roberts decision to join his fellows on the court in the opinion doesn't necessarily mean he would bring an anti-copyright bias to the high court. RIAA president and CEO Mitch Bainwol warned against reading too much into it, saying one opinion does not a justice make.
"That Judge Roberts ruled against us in a case involving the interpretation of a statute would not impact our views on his nomination," Bainwol said. "We will look at any nominee from a broad perspective, not on the basis of any single case. The question relevant to the industry is: Does the nominee show respect for property rights and constitutional freedoms? While we haven't had a chance to do a thorough review of his record, the answer at first blush seems to be yes."
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