[mythtv-users] Congress to Make Commercial Skipping Illegal

George Galt george.galt at gmail.com
Tue Nov 16 16:46:46 UTC 2004


On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 07:55:52 -0800, Wendy Seltzer <wendy at seltzer.com> wrote:
> IAAL :)
> 
> The scene-skipping amendment goes at the end of a section that starts
> "Notwithstanding the provisions of section 106, the following are not
> infringements of copyright:..."
> So the literal function of the Family Movie Act is to say that skipping
> movie scenes or making the technology to do so doesn't violate copyright or
> trademark law.  Yes, Hollywood directors and studios actually claimed that
> skipping parts of movies infringed their rights (see
> <http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/Huntsman_v_Soderbergh/>).
> 
> That doesn't mean you still shouldn't call your representatives -- there's
> a lot of other bad law being proposed in the so-called PIRATE Act:
> "cooperation" between ISPs and law enforcement that would bully ISPs into
> spying on their customers; authorization for the government to do the
> entertainment industry's work prosecuting civil copyright infringement
> suits; and expansion of criminal penalties for copyright infringement with
> lower thresholds that could trip up lots of average internet users.
> 
> --Wendy
> 
> 
> 
> At 10:20 AM 11/16/2004 -0500, Jonathan Link wrote:
> >IANAL, either, but this is clearly outlined by the Wired article.
> >The section you site pertains to Motion Pictures, not television, and
> >is meant to allow people to skip graphic/obscene parts of a Motion
> >Picture.
> >
> >-Jonathan
> >
> >
> >On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 09:12:09 -0600, spectro <spectro at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > IANAL, IHMO sec 212
> > > (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c108:5:./temp/~c108pY1lnE:e35066:)
> > > seems to grant an exception to devices that allow commercial skipping.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 09:53:06 -0500, George Galt <george.galt at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> > > > All:
> > > >
> > > > The House has passed HR 2391, which is being considered by the Senate
> > > > today (11/16).  Successful passage by the Senate will put this bill on
> > > > the President's desk late this year or early next.
> > > >
> > > > This bill makes it a violation of the Copyright Act to skip
> > > > commercials using a technological means (hardware or software) -- and
> > > > it makes it a violation to make the computer program that allows
> > > > people to skip commercials.  You can get information on the bill here:
> > > > http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d108:h.r.02391:
> > > >
> > > > and you can read the Wired story on the bill here:
> > > >
> > > > http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,65704,00.html
> > > >
> > > > My suggestion is call your Senators and Representatives and let them
> > > > know that it is ridiculous to make it illegal for you to skip
> > > > commercials (assuming you agree that it is).
> > > >
> > > > You can reach your Senators and Representatives through the Capitol
> > > > switchboard at (202) 224-3121 or (202) 225-3121.  Or you can email
> > > > them by going to their web sites, which you can find through
> > > > www.senate.gov or www.house.gov.
> > > >
> > > > George
> 
> --
> Wendy Seltzer -- wendy at seltzer.com
> Staff Attorney, Electronic Frontier Foundation
> Fellow, Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School
> http://www.eff.org/
> Chilling Effects: http://www.chillingeffects.org/
> 
> 
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> 
> 
> 

Wendy:

I could easily be wrong, but it seems that this works out to sort of a
double negative.  And while it doesn't directly say that commercial
skipping is illegal, the impression left is that it is.

Section 110 says that It is not an infringement of the copyright
owners rights under 106 to do any of the following 10 (and with this
act, 11) things.  So it is not an infringement to make computer
software that allows a member of a private family to skip portions of
a motion picture (defined by the Copyright Act as "audiovisual works
consisting of a series of related images which, when shown in
succession, impart an impression of motion, together with accompanying
sounds, if any" -- so it is NOT just a movie, but pretty much anything
shown on TV), so long as a copy is not "fixed" of the altered version,
which I believe a copy in RAM, even a partial copy, would constitute a
"fixed" copy under the Copyright Act, so the copy resident in RAM as
the computer is showing the commercialless version might qualify, and
so long as commercials or other promotional content is not the stuff
deleted.

So technically, we are back where we were.  The law doesn't say that
commerical skipping is definitely illegal, it just says that software
that allows it doesn't fall within this exception.  HOWEVER, my guess
is that any court hearing a case after this law has passed could
easily assume that Congress viewed commerical skipping as a copyright
violation (otherwise, why pass a law that allowed other forms of
skipping).

Just my two cents.  FYI, I'm calling my Senators.

George


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