SENATE MOVES 2 COPYRIGHT BILLS PROMPTED BY P2P FILE-SHARING

That bill, S-2237 by Senate Judiciary Committee ranking Democrat Leahy (Vt.), cleared the Senate on a voice vote, along with a separate bill (S-1932) that targets distribution of pre- release works and the camcording of movies in theaters. S-2237 has drawn the opposition of P2P trade groups as well as some fair use advocates. “It puts the federal government in the role of plaintiff’s attorneys for the recording industry,” said Distributed Computing Industry Assn. (DCIA) Pres. Marty Lafferty.

Leahy’s Protecting Intellectual Rights Against Theft & Appropriation (PIRATE) Act was drafted in consultation with the Justice Dept., and is designed to give law enforcement more tools to pursue copyright infringement. Both the PIRATE Act and the Artists’ Rights & Theft Prevention (ART) Act by Senate Judiciary Property Rights Subcommittee Chmn. Cornyn (R-Tex.) that cleared the Senate Fri. were approved by the Judiciary Committee in April, also without dissent. But Lafferty said it was wrong of the Senate to move the PIRATE Act without any hearings. Senate Judiciary Committee Chmn. Hatch (R-Utah), an original cosponsor of both bills, never held a formal legislative hearing on the PIRATE Act, but Justice Dept. officials did testify on intellectual property at other committee hearings. Lafferty said “we believe that the ‘carrot’ of legitimate licensed content redistribution must be more fully supported before the ’stick’ of enforcement is revisited.” Using DoJ to pursue file-sharers when the agency is battling terror is a poor use of resources, he said.

The ART Act has drawn less criticism from the fair use community. Cornyn Fri. praised its passage, arguing that “high quality, yet illegal, copies of copyrighted material” are distributed by P2P “to millions of users on a regular basis… We are now one step closer to making thefts far more difficult, prosecution of criminals much easier, and the protection of consumers and artists much stronger.” While some states have laws against the use of camcorders in theaters, the ART Act makes it a federal crime. It also amends the No Electronic Theft (NET) Act to ensure the reproduction and distribution of pre-release works meets the economic threshold necessary to trigger NET Act enforcement. Copyright owners could recover damages from those who illegally distribute pre-release materials under the ART Act. “The digital age is making rampant theft easier and more damaging,” Cornyn said, “and the overlap between online file swapping and the production of counterfeit movies and CDs has become so blurred as to become indistinguishable.”

Along with Hatch, the other key cosponsor of the ART Act is Technology Subcommittee ranking Democrat Feinstein (Cal.). At the full committee markup, she said that in the world of intellectual property, “there is no greater priority than the passage of this bill.” Cornyn said it targeted “the low-hanging fruit” in piracy, so it would be effective. Also cosponsoring the bill are Sens. Alexander (R-Tenn.), Biden (D-Del.), DeWine (R-O.), Durbin (D-Ill.), Graham (R-S.C.), Kennedy (D-Mass.), Smith (R-Ore.) and Schumer (D-N.Y.).

The PIRATE Act was criticized by Senate Governmental Affairs Investigations Subcommittee Chmn. Coleman (R-Minn.) at the recent Future of Music conference, but no opposition was raised on the Senate floor. Alexander and Schumer are its other cosponsors. Both bills passed just before Congress entered a week-long recess in anticipation of July 4th. Despite its easy passage, Lafferty said “I seriously doubt this measure will get through the House.”