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November 17, 2005, 10:32 AM ET
Fair-Use Proponents Grilled in Congress
Library representatives, law professors, consumer advocates, and representatives from the electronics, software, and publishing industries sat before a Congressional subcommittee yesterday to testify about the fair-use doctrine of copyright law. The hearing concerned a bill called the Digital Media Consumers’ Rights Act (HR 1201), which would allow consumers to circumvent copy-protection software for otherwise-legal uses.
Prudence Adler, of the Association of Research Libraries, said that fair use was vital to libraries’ role in preserving and disseminating materials, but that licensing controls were starting to limit librarians’ ability to fulfill that role. Jonathan Band, a lawyer speaking on behalf of companies like Google and Yahoo, said that search engines relied on fair use to provide information to the public in the form of short excerpts of text or thumbnail images. Peter A. Jaszi, professor of law at American University, said that professors could be liable for copying clips of films to show in class, which should be allowed under fair use.
From representatives who oppose the bill, the group fielded questions that at times seemed to be clueless or hostile. Rep. Mary Bono, for example, a Republican from California, seemed to confuse owning a copy of a book with owning the copyright on its contents. She tended to ask leading questions, then demand a yes or no answer, cutting off any explanation. When Mr. Jaszi complained that copyright law was limiting use of materials in the classroom, Representative Bono asked him curtly: Has any professor been sued for using materials in the classroom—yes or no? No, said Mr. Jaszi, but he fought to add that many professors were afraid to use materials because of the law.
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