“Rep. Rick Boucher is finally ready to try and dismantle a key part of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Boucher, a Virginia Democrat, said last July that he wanted to amend the DMCA to permit certain “fair uses” of digital content, such as backing up an audio CD by bypassing copy protection technology.
In an interview on Thursday, Boucher said he now has sufficient support — from the tech industry, librarians, and Internet activists — to feel comfortable introducing his bill “in the next month.”
“If I had introduced it six months ago, you wouldn’t have seen this kind of support,” said Boucher.
As soon as it’s introduced, Boucher’s proposal seems certain to be targeted for defeat by content lobbyists including Hollywood, the recording industry and the publishing industry.
Boucher plans to rewrite section 1201 of the DMCA, which says, “No person shall circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title.”
It doesn’t require that the person bypassing the scheme is doing it to infringe on someone’s copyright. Boucher believes that people should be allowed to circumvent technological protection for research, criticism or fair use purposes, such as reading an encrypted e-book on another computer. ”
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