[PADG:1304] Fwd: Chronicle article: Professors and Librarians Win Narrow Exemptions to Rules in Digital Copyright Act

[Tom Teper <tteper@xxxxxxxx>]

Good news for preservation from the Chronicle....

The U.S. Copyright Office has issued a handful of exemptions to the
Digital Millennium Copyright Act that may benefit media professors,
archivists, and other academics. Under certain circumstances, they will
now be allowed to circumvent access-control technologies on various
electronic media. 

Under one of the six exemptions, all of which will expire after three
years, professors of film and media studies can circumvent the
access-control technology of DVD's in their libraries to use clips of
films more easily in class. 

Peter Decherney, an assistant professor of cinema studies at the
University of Pennsylvania, was a central figure pushing for the
exemption, which was

announced late on Wednesday of last week. 

"I'm shocked by it and very pleased," said Mr. Decherney, who
noted that similar exemptions had been proposed and rejected in the past.
"I think it opens the door to more exemptions and greater protection
of fair use." 

Mr. Decherney had testified about the need for the rule change. "I
could show them how we use clips" -- pulled out for use in slide
shows, side by side, with text, and so on, he said. He also demonstrated
that changing DVD's manually and fast forwarding to relevant portions of
a film could eat up as much as 10 percent of class time. 

Observers considered this exemption the most applicable to academe. They
noted that the exemption did not define a "film and media studies
professor," and that it may not apply to professors in other
disciplines who simply use film clips for teaching. 

"It wouldn't necessarily include others who are not media-studies
professors, including students," said Alex Curtis, the government
affairs manager for Public Knowledge, an advocacy group that focuses on
copyright. 

Representatives of media organizations like the Motion Picture
Association of America opposed the exemption. They did not return calls
from The Chronicle on Monday. 

Five other exemptions were included in the

final rule, which was published in the Federal Register on Monday.
Some -- like an exemption that allows blind people to circumvent
access-control technology on e-books so that the books can be used with
screen readers -- were renewals of exemptions already in place. Others,
like an exemption that allows wireless telephones to connect to wireless
communication networks, seemed to have little application in academe.

Another exemption allows libraries and archives to circumvent
access-control technology on obsolete computer programs and video games
in order to archive and preserve them. This rule is a narrowed-down
version of a previous exemption that allowed consumers to circumvent
technology in such cases. 

The sixth exemption allows people to circumvent access-control technology
to test, investigate, and correct security flaws in the copy-protection
software included on audio compact discs. Sony BMG Music Entertainment
had secretly included such copy-protection software on CD's last year,
which caused a series of security problems. Edward W. Felten, professor
of computer science and public affairs at Princeton University, was a
leading proponent of the exemption.

Acting Associate University Librarian for Collections
Head of Preservation and Assistant Professor,
        John "Bud" Velde Endowed Professorship
University Library
246F Main Library
University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign
1408 West Gregory Drive
Urbana, IL      61801

Telephone:       217-244-8755
Fax:              217-244-4358