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The RIAA trying to kill "fair use" |
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Written by Michael Salsbury
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Saturday, 18 February 2006 |
It's sad to see the death of the "intent" of intellectual property law. For example, patents
[wikipedia.org] were intended to protect inventions for a period of
time to allow the inventor to capitalize on a technology they had
invested time, effort, and money into developing. After that period of
time, the technology would become free to everyone and the world would
gain unfettered access to a new invention, having given the inventor
time to earn a profit from it. Today, patents are being used by one
organization to bully another, or to blackmail it, or put it completely
out of business, usually by patenting something blatantly obvious (like
a method for opening and closing a door). Copyright law
[wikipedia.org] was intended to allow creative professionals the same
kind of window from which to benefit from their creations, after which
they would become part of the common body of literature available to
the public. Thanks to companies like Disney being deathly afraid of
losing their famous rodent's image, copyright law was extended to
wholly inappropriate lengths. More recently, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) [wikipedia.org] was passed, further limiting the public's ability to use and access stored information and music. The Recording Industry Artists' Association
(RIAA) [wikipedia.org] is currently fighting to make copyright law even
tougher, claiming that the ability of consumers to copy music from
their CDs to their computers or iPods isn't granted under the "fair
use" provisions of copyright law but instead is a "favor" they're doing
their consumers. They are, of course, mistaken.
The fair use
[wikipedia.org] provisions of copyright law allow for things like
school students to write papers quoting information from copyrighted
books without violating the law. The same provisions allow the student
to make copies of information in those books for educational purposes,
provided there is no intent to defraud or resell the copies. The laws
allow us to make backup copies of computer software, music, and other
media in the event that our original copies are destroyed or damaged.
The freedoms permitted under "fair use" law are not "favors" that
publishers give us. They are requirements dictated to the publishers
by our government. Publishers like the RIAA want to take that freedom away from us.
We need to be diligent and make sure we do not let that happen.
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 02 March 2006 )
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