Subject: database copyright swinging hard in favor of business
Curt Priest (cpriest@juno.com)
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1998 09:02:10 EDT
To: ROUNDTABLE@CNI.ORG Subject: database copyright swinging hard in favor of business Message-Id: <19980930.090130.4279.5.cpriest@juno.com> From: cpriest@juno.com (Curt Priest) Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1998 09:02:10 EDT
---------- message forwarded by Curt Priest <cpriest@juno.com> ----------
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1998 16:27:41 -0700
From: Alexander Fowler <afowler@eff.org>
Subject: Broad Coalition Opposes Database Protection Bill
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE -- September 29, 1998
Congress Poised to Turn Back 200+ Years of
Intellectual Property Law for Databases
Broad Private and Public Sector Coalition Rallies
Behind FTC Letter to Congress Raising Serious Flaws in Bill
Washington, DC -- The Federal Trade Commission sent Congress a letter
today outlining several serious flaws in a legislative attempt to
create new intellectual property protections for databases. An
unprecedented private and public sector coalition immediately rallied
behind the letter, which follows similar communications from the
Departments of Commerce and Justice, and called on Congress to defer
consideration of the "Collections of Information Anti-Piracy Act," to
the next session when necessary hearings could be scheduled.
"No entirely new intellectual property regime should be created without
thorough vetting by all affected parties, least of all one opposed by
many of the very businesses for whose benefit it was supposedly
offered," said Jean Cantrell of Dun & Bradstreet.
The bill, which would overturn 200+ years of Copyright law without
the benefit of even a single Senate hearing, creates a new form of
intellectual property for databases that was tacked onto the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) in the House of Representatives hours
before passage. The Senate passed a much different form of the DMCA,
which did not include database protection. A conference committee has
begun meetings to reconcile the two versions.
The bill would impact myriad databases, ranging from a list of 100
chemical compounds in an experimental drug or the 5,000 brightest stars
in the galaxy to a new Web-based collection of publicly-available stock
quotes. However, rather than protect the creative organization or
selection of the information, as copyright law does, this new right
would, in effect, allow control of the facts themselves.
"This would put simple facts under potential lock and key for the
first time in our history," said Adam Eisgrau of the American Library
Association. "This 'sea change' in American intellectual property law
will have been made despite the principled opposition of a 'Who's Who'
in the public and private sectors and without benefit of a single
minute of formal scrutiny by the Senate," he added.
"The database bill will undermine our much-hailed 'information
economy,'" said Jonathan Band, representing the Online Banking
Association. "This bill will overprotect information and chill
creation of innovative products and services. Many exciting new
Internet endeavors involve fact-based information services. These
companies and individuals draw information from many sources,
reorganize it, combine it with other information and offer valuable
new products and services to online consumers. Under the proposed
bill, such activities could trigger liability."
"In the end it is the individual investors who will be hurt," concluded
Frank Kelly of Charles Schwab, Inc. in echoing concerns held by
industry representatives about the monopoly power this new right would
confer, particularly for industries based upon a sole-source provider
of information. Brokerage houses already experiencing price increases
for access to stock quote information worry that the stock exchanges
could considerably hike prices. This point was also emphasized in the
FTC letter to Congress today.
"The FTC largely got it right," added Alex Fowler of the Electronic
Frontier Foundation. "If we're to successfully deal with online piracy
of databases, it must not happen at the expense of what made the
Internet possible in the first place, namely Internet users building an
open platform for accessing, collecting, and linking together bits of
information."
The education and research communities will be perhaps the first to
feel the affects of this new legislation. "We worry that the costs of
time and money this bill triggers will hinder science and research,
delay some projects and possibly kill others. The advancement of
knowledge depends on a researcher's ability to access and utilize
data," said Mark Frankel, Director of the Scientific Freedom,
Responsibility and Law Program of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science.
The coalition called for the House and Senate conferees to remove the
database bill from the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. "The database
bill has nothing to do with implementing the World Intellectual
Property Organization treaties and should not be part of this bill,"
said Prue Adler, of the Association of Research Libraries. "We can
achieve a workable and balanced compromise on database protection if
Congress makes time for all interested parties to engage in serious
discussions."
The broad spectrum of groups that oppose the database bill include
Internet companies, research scientists, value-added database
providers, librarians, consumer groups, educators, online brokerage
and banking firms, free speech organizations, telecommunications
companies and computer manufacturers. "These organizations and the
people and industries they represent all recognize the value of public
access to knowledge and information," noted Peter Jaszi, American
University Law Professor.
Among the groups which have communicated concerns about the database
legislation to Congress are:
Amdahl Corporation
American Association for the Advancement of Science
American Association of Law Libraries
American Association of Legal Publishers
American Committee for Interoperable Systems
American Historical Association
American Library Association
Art Libraries Society of North America
Association of American Geographers
Association of Research Libraries
AT&T
Ball Research, Inc.
Bell Atlantic
Bloomberg Financial Markets
Charles Schwab & Co., Inc.
Chief Officers of State Library Associations
College Art Association
Commercial Internet eXchange Association
Computer & Communications Industry Associations
Conference on College Composition and Communication
Consortium of Social Science Associations
Consortium for School Networking
Consumer Project for Technology
Digital Future Coalition
Dun & Bradstreet
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Emerging Communications, Inc.
Hyperlaw, Inc.
Information Technology Association of America
International Society for Technology in Education
MCI WorldCom, Inc.
Medical Library Association
Modern Language Association
Music Library Association
National Association of Elementary School Principals
National Council of Teachers of English
National Education Association
National Humanities Alliance
National Writers Union
NetAction
Online Banking Association
Practice Management Information Corporation
Society of American Archivists
Special Libraries Association
Storage Technology Corporation
Sun Microsystems
United States Catholic Conference
Yahoo!, Inc.
CONTACT INFORMATION
Adam Eisgrau, American Library Association, (202) 628-8410,
E-mail <ame@alawash.org>
Marc Pearl, Information Technology Association of America,
(703) 284-5351,
E-mail <mpearl@itaa.org>
Prue Adler, Association of Research Libraries, (202) 296-2296,
E-mail <prue@arl.org>
Jonathan Band, Online Banking Association, (202) 887-1555,
E-mail <jband@mofo.com>
Alex Fowler, Electronic Frontier Foundation, (415) 436-9333,
E-mail <afowler@eff.org>
LINKS TO FURTHER INFORMATION
Letter from Federal Trade Commission to Congress, September 28, 1998
(Not on the Web, yet...check http://www.ftc.gov/)
Letter to the Senate from 47 Companies and Organizations that Oppose
the Collections of Information Antipiracy Act, September 10, 1998
http://www.dfc.org/issues/database/jntltr/jntltr.html
Letter from Department of Commerce to Senate, August 4, 1998
http://www.itaa.org/dbadmin.htm
Letter from Department of Justice to Clinton Administration, July 28, 1998
http://www.acm.org/usacm/copyright/doj-hr2652-memo.html
Also check...
The Digital Future Coalition
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Alexander Fowler
Director of Public Affairs
Electronic Frontier Foundation
E-mail: afowler@eff.org
Tel: 415 436 9333; Fax 415 436 9993
You can find EFF on the Web at <http://www.eff.org>
EFF supports the Global Internet Liberty Campaign
<http://www.gilc.org/>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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