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27–003PDF 2005

FAIR USE: ITS EFFECTS ON CONSUMERS AND

INDUSTRY

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

COMMERCE, TRADE, AND CONSUMER PROTECTION

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND 

COMMERCE 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

NOVEMBER 16, 2005

Serial No. 109–78

Printed for the use of the Committee on Energy and Commerce

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/house

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE

JOE BARTON, Texas, Chairman 

RALPH M. HALL, Texas 

MICHAEL BILIRAKIS, Florida 

Vice Chairman 

FRED UPTON, Michigan 

CLIFF STEARNS, Florida 

PAUL E. GILLMOR, Ohio 

NATHAN DEAL, Georgia 

ED WHITFIELD, Kentucky 

CHARLIE NORWOOD, Georgia 

BARBARA CUBIN, Wyoming 

JOHN SHIMKUS, Illinois 

HEATHER WILSON, New Mexico 

JOHN B. SHADEGG, Arizona 

CHARLES W. ‘‘CHIP’’ PICKERING, 

Mississippi, Vice Chairman 

VITO FOSSELLA, New York 

ROY BLUNT, Missouri 

STEVE BUYER, Indiana 

GEORGE RADANOVICH, California 

CHARLES F. BASS, New Hampshire 

JOSEPH R. PITTS, Pennsylvania 

MARY BONO, California 

GREG WALDEN, Oregon 

LEE TERRY, Nebraska 

MIKE FERGUSON, New Jersey 

MIKE ROGERS, Michigan 

C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, Idaho 

SUE MYRICK, North Carolina 

JOHN SULLIVAN, Oklahoma 

TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania 

MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

JOHN D. DINGELL, Michigan 

Ranking Member 

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

RICK BOUCHER, Virginia 

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York 

FRANK PALLONE, Jr., New Jersey 

SHERROD BROWN, Ohio 

BART GORDON, Tennessee 

BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois 

ANNA G. ESHOO, California 

BART STUPAK, Michigan 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

ALBERT R. WYNN, Maryland 

GENE GREEN, Texas 

TED STRICKLAND, Ohio 

DIANA DEGETTE, Colorado 

LOIS CAPPS, California 

MIKE DOYLE, Pennsylvania 

TOM ALLEN, Maine 

JIM DAVIS, Florida 

JAN SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois 

HILDA L. SOLIS, California 

CHARLES A. GONZALEZ, Texas 

JAY INSLEE, Washington 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

MIKE ROSS, Arkansas 

BUD ALBRIGHT, Staff Director 

DAVID CAVICKE, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel 

REID P.F. STUNTZ, Minority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, TRADE, AND CONSUMER PROTECTION

CLIFF STEARNS, Florida, Chairman 

FRED UPTON, Michigan 

NATHAN DEAL, Georgia 

BARBARA CUBIN, Wyoming 

GEORGE RADANOVICH, California 

CHARLES F. BASS, New Hampshire 

JOSEPH R. PITTS, Pennsylvania 

MARY BONO, California 

LEE TERRY, Nebraska 

MIKE FERGUSON, New Jersey 

MIKE ROGERS, Michigan 

C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, Idaho 

SUE MYRICK, North Carolina 

TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

JOE BARTON, Texas, 

(Ex Officio) 

JAN SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois 

Ranking Member 

MIKE ROSS, Arkansas 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York 

SHERROD BROWN, Ohio 

BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois 

GENE GREEN, Texas 

TED STRICKLAND, Ohio 

DIANA DEGETTE, Colorado 

JIM DAVIS, Florida 

CHARLES A. GONZALEZ, Texas 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

JOHN D. DINGELL, Michigan, 

(Ex Officio) 

(II) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page

Testimony of: 

Adler, Prudence S., Associate Executive Director, Federal Relations and 

Information Policy, Association of Research Libraries .............................. 29

Aiken, Paul, Executive Director, Authors Guild, Incorporated .................... 62

Band, Jonathan, Netcoalition .......................................................................... 32

DeLong, James, Senior Fellow and Director, Ipcentral Information, 

Progress and Freedom Foundation .............................................................. 43

Hirsch, Frederick, Senior Vice President, Intellectual Property Enforcement, Entertainment Software Association ................................................ 56

Jaszi, Peter, Washington College of Law, American University .................. 16

Shapiro, Gary J., President and Chief Executive Officer, Consumer Electronics Association ........................................................................................ 22

Sohn, Gigi B., President and Founder, Public Knowledge ............................ 36

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

Black, Edward J., President and CEO, Computer & Communications Industry 

Association and the Open Source & Industry Alliance, prepared statement 

of ............................................................................................................................ 88

Jaszi, Peter, Washington College of Law, American University, letter dated 

November 22, 2005, to Hon. Cliff Stearns ......................................................... 97

Sun Microsystems, Inc., prepared statement of .................................................... 98

(III) 

(1)

FAIR USE: ITS EFFECTS ON CONSUMERS AND 

INDUSTRY 

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 2005

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE, SUBCOMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, TRADE, AND CONSUMER PROTECTION, Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in room 

2123 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Cliff Stearns 

(chairman) presiding. 

Members present: Representatives Stearns, Bono, Ferguson, 

Murphy, Blackburn, Barton (ex officio), Schakowsky, Ross, Towns, 

Green, DeGette, and Gonzalez. 

Also present: Representative Boucher. 

Staff present: Bud Albright, staff director; David Cavicke, general counsel; Andy Black, deputy staff director, policy; Chris Leahy, 

policy coordinator; Will Carty, professional staff; Julie Fields, special assistant to the deputy staff directory, policy; Terry Lane, 

press secretary; Larry Neal, deputy staff director, communications; 

Billy Harvard, clerk; Jonathan Cordone, minority counsel; and Jonathan Brater, minority staff assistant. 

Mr. STEARNS. Good morning. I am pleased to welcome all of you 

to the Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection Subcommittee 

hearing on ‘‘fair use.’’ The principle of fair use is an important if 

not well defined component of copyright law. Simply stated, the fair 

use doctrine allows free use of copyrighted material for purposes 

such as comment and criticism, news, reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. To determine whether a particular use is fair, 

four factors must be applied to the facts of the case. As with most 

simplifications, the devil is in the details and fair use is not short 

on details. The fair use doctrine is a list of factors applied after the 

fact and subject to broad interpretations by the courts, all copying 

is subject to challenge by the copyright holder. Fair use is a defense. The only way for someone to know whether a use is in fact 

a fair use is to finally resolve it through litigation. This can be costly and time consuming. 

Further, my colleagues, complicating the inherent tension surrounding fair use is a rapid advancement of digital media and the 

internet to allow flawless reproduction of creative material and 

light speed dissemination of that material across the globe almost 

instantaneously. Technologies such as browsing, linking, and 

streaming were not even imagined during the formative years of 

the fair use doctrine but now are at the heart of a debate involving 

2

fair use and the implications of rapidly involving technologies. I 

doubt we are going to solve all of these issues this morning. What 

I would hope is that we can have a reasoned and thoughtful examination of the law of copyright and fair use, how technology is making traditional fair use analysis and distinctions more nuanced, 

and how consumers are fairing in the middle of all of this. 

With today’s hearing, I also would like to lay the groundwork for 

further examination of H.R. 1201, my colleague, Mr. Boucher’s bill. 

H.R. 1201 would allow the circumvention of anti-piracy, encryption 

technology in cases when a user intends to make a fair use of the 

underlying work. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act passed in 

1998 (DMCA) created civil and criminal penalties for circumventing 

encryption in other technology designed to prevent tampering or 

hacking into copyright material. But it also can prevent fair use. 

I believe the effects of the DMCA to lock out consumers from the 

proper and fair use of material is a perverse result of the law. 

Also known as digital rights management or DRM, the DMCA 

also extends its prohibitions to those who sell or trade in technology design to break encryption technology or circumvent it. My 

colleagues, Mr. Boucher’s bill would allow for the development of 

technologies that assist consumers in fair use of copyrighted material. This is a noble pursuit but when we consider the real and 

growing threat of piracy and hacking, it becomes very obvious that 

such a policy could be easily exploited by criminals and hackers 

looking to make a fast buck on someone else’s creative genius. 

While I would like to explore the issues of H.R. 1201 that seeks 

to remedy, I think the cleaner solution to this lies in technology 

and not necessarily legislation. On that note, I have a number of 

issues that I would like to discuss here today. The first question 

I have is whether we have gotten any closer to that technology that 

would allow a limited number of protective copies to be made of 

copyrighted protected works. According to Mr. Valenti, who represents the Motion Picture Association before the subcommittee 

last year, he said, ‘‘Keep in mind that, once copy protection is circumvented, there is no known technology that can limit the number of copies that can be produced from the original.’’ So I would 

like to know about the state of the technology in this area today. 

I cannot think that this is not a solvable problem even though it 

is a challenge. Why don’t we make it the copyright equivalent to 

the race to the moon so to speak? We went to the moon 40 years 

ago. It seems to me technology should afford a means of limiting 

the number of copies we can make of a protected work. Absent 

promising news on the technology front, I assume we will have to 

allow the legislative process to work and see if that will yield a solution, although perhaps not the best one. 

In closing, as I said last year, I support fair and balanced intellectual property laws but I also understand that the rest of the 

world sometimes does not play by the rules. We have seen that in 

our hearings here many times. I believe there is a balance to be 

achieved here but I think technology is the best way to manage 

that balance and protect the rights of both the creators of works 

and the consumers who purchase, use, and improve upon them for 

the benefit of all. 

3

And so I welcome the witnesses today and I welcome the ranking 

member, Ms. Schakowsky. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Thank you, Mr. Stearns, for holding today’s 

hearing on the fair use of copyrighted material in the digital age. 

Technological innovations have once again opened the door of our 

subcommittee to legislative arenas that would not have been imagined just a few years ago. The internet digitization of information 

and E-commerce have necessitated the updating of laws that have 

been rendered ineffective or perhaps become too stifling because of 

technological advances. Today’s hearing focuses our attention on 

how the availability of copyrighted materials in digital format effects artists, consumers, researchers, librarians, and hosts of industries. 

Because of the unpredictability of where technology developments will take us tomorrow, we have to be careful on proposing 

to update laws. As we have seen in the past and as we will hear 

today about what has happened with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act or DMCA, closing loopholes could end up shutting doors 

to a range of innocent bystanders. With the passage of the DMCA 

in 1998 which was before I came to Congress, my colleagues made 

a significant attempt to contend with the new challenges that digital capabilities introduced to copyright law. The DMCA was meant 

to stop copyright infringement on new digital mediums. Unfortunately, by trying to predict where the ever-evasive nature of technology would take us, the DMCA was drafted with such broad 

strokes that it swept away the fair use provisions of the copyright 

law and has been abused by those who want to squelch competition 

in areas totally unrelated to copyrights. For example, manufacturers of garage door openers and toner cartridges have used the 

DMCA to try to prevent their competitors from developing alternative and cheaper models. Remember, they are not infringing on 

copyrights or violating any patents. 

Make no mistake about it, copyrights need to be protected and 

artists need to be compensated for the work. However, when a law 

pits artists against consumers, when millions of fans are called 

criminals, when companies can use the DMCA to prevent new 

products from coming to the market, when libraries may have to 

limit or charge for services they traditionally have provided for 

free, then in my view, the law needs to be fixed. 

I believe that Mr. Boucher’s and Chairman Barton’s bill, H.R. 

1201, the Digital Media Consumer Rights Act has opened the door 

to meaningful discussions about the overreaching applications of 

the DMCA even with the new questions and concerns it raises. I 

have met with artist groups, consumer groups, technology developers and believe that we can work together to craft a remedy to 

the DMCA that would protect artist copyrights, consumer rights, 

competition, and technological innovation. This is an exciting time. 

We are at a technological crossroads that is changing how we think 

about commerce, art distribution, and traditional consumer protection. It is our responsibility as lawmakers to make sure all voices 

are heard in this debate. 

I am glad that we are here today with so many people who are 

affected by the DMCA and its effect on fair use. I look forward to 

your testimony. 

4

Thank you. 

Mr. STEARNS. Ms. Blackburn? 

Ms. BLACKBURN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I had read through some of the testimony and just want to make 

just a couple of comments even though I basically have no voice 

today. It does not seem to shut me up much. 

I want to welcome our guests and thank you all for being with 

us and we are looking forward to hearing from you. I want to 

thank the chairman for the hearing today. I think it is a very important hearing. I think this is a critical, critical issue for our country. 

As I read your testimony, I find it is like when you say you cannot be a little bit pregnant so how do you go snip just a little bit 

of what somebody has created and where do you draw that line? 

It is like when my children were little, I would say, they would say 

something and it would be just a little white lie but little white lies 

lead to great big lies. And I think we have to begin to look at this 

issue not as just piracy, not as just snippets but we have to look 

at it as theft. 

And there is an underlying reason I think we have to do that. 

It is because you may call it fair use. One of my country music constituents in Tennessee looks at what you want to do and says this 

is fair use for technology to steal my work. And many in our creative community do that, look at it that way. I think that is dangerous. I think we have to be very careful in codifying something 

that would allow theft and it concerns me tremendously. It concerns me for the economic renaissance that I would love to see happen in this great Nation. And I see some of you laughing and shaking your head and that concerns me that you would make light of 

what is of great concern. The greatest asset this Nation has had 

is our constitution. The greatest asset this economy has ever had, 

ever had is the fact that private property ownership has been revered and has literally been held sacred. 

So I thank the chairman for holding the hearing. I thank each 

of you for being here. I look forward to talking with you, to questioning you, and to visiting you about this issue. 

Brother, I yield back. 

Mr. STEARNS. I thank the gentlelady. 

Mr. Gonzalez? 

Mr. GONZALEZ. Waive opening. 

Mr. STEARNS. The gentleman waives opening. 

Mr. Ferguson? 

Mr. FERGUSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for holding this hearing. It is one that I hope will clarify what constitutes 

fair use in the consumer marketplace. 

This issue of fair use is commonly misunderstood, it is often misinterpreted, and most disturbingly from my point of view, it is easily distorted. As someone who represents a district of industries 

that are leaders in research and development whether that is in 

healthcare or telecommunications or communications or high tech, 

I am acutely aware of the importance of an intellectual property 

protection and the responsibility that we have to protect intellectual property rights ensuring productivity and innovation and the 

5

deployment of the most advanced technologies and medical solutions for people all around this country and around the world. 

My wife and I have four young children and we frequently find 

ourselves as the role of the judge among them in deciding what is 

fair and what is not fair. Needless to say, our interpretation ends 

up being a bit different from our four young kids’ interpretation of 

what is fair. That being said, the notion of what is indeed fair can 

take on a life of its own, particularly in a court of public opinion. 

And as one of our witnesses today, Mr. DeLong wrote a few years 

back ‘‘A party who successfully grabs the label of fairness is on the 

way to victory.’’ 

Unfortunately when debating the issue of fair use, the fairness 

label has been used inaccurately to the advantage of those who perpetuate piracy and to the detriment of the copyright owners and ultimately the American consumer. As Members of Congress, we 

have to discard the labels and the easy to digest talking points and 

focus on what is actually permissible under the law. First and foremost, what is the fair use principle mean and what is it intended 

to cover? Some have contended that each and every person who 

buys a copy of a copyrighted work, a DVD or a CD for instance has 

full license under the fair use doctrine to make as many copies as 

they want without regard to the nature of the copying or the ultimate exploitation of the work. This is simply untrue. 

The determination of fair use is always, always based on an examination of facts ‘‘any particular case’’ including consideration of 

the four factors in Section 107 of the Copyright Act. Even a fair use 

determination in the Sony Betamax case which many here claim is 

the touchstone of fair use was based on a careful balancing of the 

four factors and limited in its outcome to one specific act, time 

shifting. 

Another argument we will hear is that under the principle of fair 

use, the public should have the ability to circumvent copy protection measures on DVD’s and CD’s so long as it is for a ‘‘non-copyright infringing use.’’ This subjective narrow view, frankly an optimistic view not only makes a substantial leap of faith that those 

who are using hacking tools are doing do for personal use without 

intention to steal, but worse, it undercuts the goal of the DMCA 

which was to promote experimentation and development of technologies, a goal more important now than ever in the digital age 

which is in full bloom. Intellectual property is our country’s greatest economic contributor. We should not devalue it by statutorily 

instituting a buy one get as many as you like free rule. 

At the end of the day, this hearing represents the beginning of 

what I hope will be a robust and healthy debate on the principle 

of fair use and intellectual property rights grounded in facts and 

not grounded in distortions. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

Mr. STEARNS. I thank the gentleman. 

Mr. Ross? 

Mr. ROSS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member 

Schakowsky for having this hearing here today. 

As a relatively new member of this committee, this is my first 

hearing on fair use and I am looking forward to the testimony of 

the witnesses and the dialog that follows. 

6

The copyright clause of the constitution authorized Congress to 

‘‘promote the progress of science and the useful arts by securing for 

limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their 

writings and discoveries.’’ The copyright law is ultimately commercial law. It protects the creator’s right to financially exercise his or 

her intellectual property. The fair use doctrine was codified in the 

Copyright Act of 1976 where four criteria were established to determine whether unauthorized use of a work is fair use or whether 

it is an infringing use. The history of copyright law is a history of 

law adjusting to new technology. Often these laws cannot keep up 

with the state of technological advances. As we know, the internet 

and digital technology have created new possibilities for methods 

of distribution, of popular entertainment such as music and film in 

addition to enhancing academic studies. 

Determining how fair use is applied in this digital environment 

in the concept of appropriate fair use is something we as policymakers must carefully consider as we contemplate new laws to protect the interest of creators while maintaining access for consumers. In the past, traditional methods of copyright enforcement 

often involve the holder against a middleman. Illegal replication 

and distribution were more centralized in the activities of a bootlegger or an innocent infringer. Today, digital technology has cut 

out the middleman which makes copyright enforcement more challenging. In addition, as the public’s consumption of digital products 

grows, the law and technology increasingly focus on digital means 

to protect copyright interest because of the great risk of piracy inherent in digital media exchanged over the internet. Thomas 

Freedman in his book, The World is Flat, talks in great depth 

about this very issue and the pros and cons involved in what the 

technology today is allowing us to do. 

Today, the House is scheduled to consider H. Con. Resolution 

230, the resolution expressing the sense of Congress that Russia 

provide adequate and effective protection of intellectual property 

rights. The U.S. Trade Representative estimates that U.S. businesses lost $1.7 billion in copyright and other intellectual property 

theft in the Russian Federation in 2004, $1.7 billion lost in Russia 

alone in 2004, that’s money that cannot be spent to further develop 

and enhance products and new innovation. 

The bill expresses concern about the failure of Russia to uphold 

international standards in the protection of intellectual property 

rights, a core American asset. This asset is not limited to the compensation received by those who create or publish material but also 

impacts the numerous jobs created throughout this country and the 

economic revenue communities depend on for further growth. 

Copyright itself is an engine of free expression because it supplies the economic incentive to create and disseminate ideas. I believe it is imperative that as more information and products become available in this digital environment, we do not weaken our 

laws which could result in making piracy easier and more prevalent. 

Again, thank you for having this hearing today and I look forward to hearing from those who have joined us. 

And with that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back my remaining 45 seconds. 

7

[The prepared statement of Hon. Mike Ross follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. MIKE ROSS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM

THE STATE OF ARKANSAS

Thank you Chairman Stearns and Ranking Member Schakowsky for having this 

hearing today. 

As a relatively new member of this Committee, this is my first hearing on Fair 

Use and I am looking forward to the testimony of the witnesses and the dialogue 

that follows. 

The Copyright Clause of the Constitution authorized Congress ‘‘To promote the 

Progress of Science and the useful Arts by securing for limited Times to Authors 

and Inventors the exclusive Right to their Writings and Discoveries.’’ 

Copyright law is ultimately commercial law; it protects the creator’s right to financially exercise his or her intellectual property. 

The fair use doctrine was codified in the Copyright Act of 1976 where four criteria 

were established to determine whether unauthorized use of a work is ‘‘fair’’ use, or 

whether it is an infringing use. 

The history of copyright law is the history of law adjusting to new technology. 

Often, these laws cannot keep up with the speed of technological advances. 

As we know, the Internet and digital technology have created new possibilities for 

methods of distribution of popular entertainment such as music and film in addition 

to enhancing academic studies. 

Determining how fair use is applied in this digital environment and the concept 

of appropriate fair use is something we, as policy makers, must carefully consider 

as we contemplate new laws to protect the interest of creators while maintaining 

access for consumers. 

In the past, traditional methods of copyright enforcement often involved the holder against a ‘‘middleman.’’ Illegal replication and distribution were more centralized 

in the activities of a ‘‘bootlegger’’ or an innocent infringer. 

Today, digital technology has cut out the middleman, which makes copyright enforcement more challenging. 

In addition, as the public’s consumption of digital products grows, the law and 

technology increasingly focus on digital means to protect copyright interests because 

of the great risk of piracy inherent in digital media exchanged over the Internet. 

Today, the House is scheduled to consider H. Con. Res. 230, a resolution expressing the Sense of Congress that Russia provides adequate and effective protection of 

intellectual property rights. 

The U.S. Trade Representative estimates that U.S. businesses lost $1.7 billion in 

copyright and other intellectual property theft in the Russian Federation in 2004. 

The bill expresses concern about the failure of Russia to uphold international 

standards in the protection of intellectual property rights, a core American asset. 

This ‘‘asset’’ is not limited to the compensation received by those who create or 

publish material, but also impacts the numerous jobs created throughout this country and the economic revenue communities depend upon for growth. 

Copyright itself is ‘‘an engine of free expression’’ because it supplies the economic 

incentive to create and disseminate ideas. 

It is imperative that as more information and products become available in this 

digital environment, we do not weaken our laws which could result in making piracy 

easier and more prevalent. 

Again, thank you for having this hearing today, and I look forward to hearing 

from those who have joined us.

Mr. STEARNS. I thank the gentleman. 

The chairman of the full committee, the distinguished gentleman 

from Texas, Mr. Barton. 

Chairman BARTON. Thank you, Chairman Stearns for holding 

the hearing today. 

The doctrine of fair use has a long history in our country. I am 

glad that we have such a distinguished panel today to talk about 

it. It is extremely important to protect people’s intellectual property 

and our copyright protections stem directly from our Nation’s 

founding document, the Constitution. If you think back at the time 

the formers and framers of the Constitution were meeting, piracy 

involved sailors with cutlasses and cannons and a taste for gold. 

8

Their only worry with the law was that if it caught them they 

would hang them. With some notable exceptions, today’s pirates 

are more likely to come armed with computers and pocket protectors. They still do not have much concern for legalities, however, 

and they still retain a taste for unarmed wealth. The framers did 

not anticipate the digital age but they did anticipate theft. It seems 

to me that they would have no problem identifying the modern pirates who steal other people’s creative ideas and sell it. 

As this subcommittee has explored with hearings in the past, 

international and domestic intellectual property infringement is a 

real problem and we must vigorously prosecute those who break 

the laws that deal with those types of situations. I think, however, 

that the people who wrote the Constitution would recognize the difference between a pirate and a consumer. Copyright owners for example do not have eternal and complete control over their works. 

Over the years and with the Constitution as their guides, the 

courts have determined and Congress had codified certain restrictions including the fair use doctrine. Simply put, consumers are allowed to use copyrighted works without permission of the owner 

under certain limited circumstances. These limited circumstances 

have been a strength of our system, not a weakness. They allow 

consumers who pay for works appropriate access to and use of and 

I want to accentuate appropriate copyrighted works. At the same 

time, ownership rights have been secured in order to encourage 

creativity and innovation. America is a Nation that values ideas 

and the freedom of Americans to innovate and to invent is another 

of our great strengths and fair use is a fundamental part of that. 

I am concerned that some attempts to protect content may 

overstep reasonable boundaries and limit the consumer’s legal options particularly in light of the emerging technologies that we are 

beginning to see in the marketplace. It boils down to this. I believe 

that when I buy a music album or a movie DVD, it should be mine 

once I leave the store. Who does not believe that? Does that mean 

that I have unlimited rights to use that DVD or that album? No, 

of course not, but the law should not restrict my fair use right to 

use my own property. Current law provides that I am liable for 

anything I do that amounts to infringement but current law also 

prevents me from making legal use of the content that is technologically locked even if I have the key. That just does not make 

sense to me. In defending this conflict, some say that fair use leads 

to piracy. Some even say that fair use is piracy. I do not believe 

that. I do not think it is. By definition, fair use is the use that does 

not infringe upon the owner’s rights. 

I am very interested in the state of content technology, content 

protection technology. Is it effective? Has it limited consumer’s fair 

use rights? How might these developments hurt consumers in the 

future? How is the consumer electronics industry been affected? 

How would it affect the research and scientific community? I look 

forward to finding some of the answers to these questions from our 

distinguished panelists today. I also look forward to a comprehensive discussion about the doctrine of fair use, its historic origins, 

its future, and the real world effects in the marketplace of today. 

Finally, I want to thank Mr. Boucher for his work on this issue 

and for helping to prepare us today in providing or at least recVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
9

ommend some of the witnesses that we’re going to hear from. He 

is not on the subcommittee but has done important work in trying 

to protect consumers fair use rights. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing. I look forward to participating in it. 

[The prepared statement of Hon. Joe Barton follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. JOE BARTON, CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON ENERGY

AND COMMERCE

Good morning. Thank you, Chairman Stearns, for holding this important hearing. 

The doctrine of ‘‘fair use’’ has a long history in our country, and I’m glad that we 

have such a distinguished panel to talk about the issue. 

It is extremely important to protect people’s intellectual property, and our copyright protections stem directly from our nation’s founding document. At the time 

that the Framers were meeting, piracy involved rogue sailors with cutlasses and 

cannon and a taste for gold. Their only worry with the law was that if it caught 

them, it would hang them. With some notable exceptions, today’s pirates are more 

likely to come armed with computers and pocket protectors. They still don’t have 

much concern for legalities, however, and they retain a taste for unearned wealth. 

The Framers didn’t anticipate the digital age, but they did anticipate theft. It seems 

to me that they would have no problem identifying the modern pirates who steal 

other people’s creative work and sell it. As this subcommittee has explored with 

hearings in the past, international and domestic intellectual property infringement 

is a real problem, and we must vigorously prosecute those who break the law. 

I think that the people who wrote the Constitution also would recognize the difference between a pirate and a consumer. Copyright owners, for example, do not 

have eternal and complete control over their works. Over the years and with the 

Constitution as their guide, the courts have determined—and Congress has codified—certain restrictions, including the ‘‘fair-use’’ doctrine. Simply put, consumers 

are allowed to use copyrighted works without permission of the owner under certain 

limited circumstances. These limited circumstances have been a strength of our system, not a weakness. They allow paying consumers appropriate access to, and use 

of, copyrighted works. At the same time, ownership rights have been secured in 

order to encourage creativity and innovation. America is a nation that values ideas, 

and the freedom of Americans to innovate and invent is another of our great 

strengths. Fair use is a fundamental part of that. 

I am concerned that some attempts to protect content may overstep reasonable 

boundaries and limit consumers’ legal options, particularly in the light of the emerging technologies that we are beginning to see in the marketplace. 

It boils down to this: I believe that when I buy a music album or movie, it should 

be mine once I leave the store. Who doesn’t believe that? Does it mean I have unlimited rights? Of course not. But the law should not restrict my fair-use right to use 

my own property. 

Current law provides that I am liable for anything I do that amounts to infringement, but current law also prevents me from making legal use of content that is 

technologically ‘‘locked,’’ even if I have the key. This doesn’t seem to make sense. 

In defending this conflict, some say that fair use leads to piracy, or that it is piracy. 

No, it isn’t. By definition, ‘‘fair-use’’ is a use that DOES NOT infringe on owners’ 

rights. 

I am very interested in the state of content-protection technology. Is it effective? 

Has it limited consumers’ fair use rights? How might these developments hurt consumers in the future? How has the consumer electronics industry been affected? 

How will it affect the research and scientific communities? 

I look forward to finding some answers to these difficult questions and to a comprehensive discussion about the doctrine of ‘‘fair use,’’ its historic origins, its future, 

and the real world effects in the marketplace. 

Finally, I want to thank Mr. Boucher for attending this hearing today to hear 

from our witnesses and discuss the topic. He is not on the subcommittee, but has 

done important work trying to protect consumers’ fair use rights. I want to welcome 

him, and commend him for his leadership on the issue. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. STEARNS. I thank the gentleman. 

Ms. DeGette? 

Ms. DEGETTE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

10

I will not make a long opening statement. I would like to associate myself with a lot of the comments people have made. I was 

reading recently about Google is going to scan full text of books and 

put it on the internet. That really raises an issue about how far 

we go with the fair use doctrine and that is why I am so delighted 

that you have decided to schedule a serious of hearings on this 

issue. And I look forward not just to this hearing but also future 

hearings to see where we put the balance between fair use and 

copyright protection because really copyright protection is the bow 

work of the intellectual, artistic, and commercial flourishing in the 

last few centuries in this country. 

And I yield back. 

Mr. STEARNS. The gentlelady yields back. 

Mr. Murphy? 

Mr. MURPHY. I thank you, Mr. Chairman. I also thank you for 

holding this hearing. 

As an author myself and when I have the concerns about what 

is happening with text of books it—I know how much time it takes 

to put into a manuscript, sometimes hundreds of hours including 

research goes into preparing a book. And certainly in any case 

whether it is text books or whatever that book may be, to use them 

for the standard issues of reviews, critiques, and scholarship all 

within the bailiwick of what copyrights should allows. But as we 

look at the ease by which other people may copy material as the 

gentlelady was just saying whether it is making it available on line 

or whatever the case may be, it is a concern that those people who 

are out there trying to make a living by writing in essence we are 

taking away their ability to make a living when it is distributed 

whether they are singers or songwriters, recording artists, authors. 

I wonder what would happen if similar things were done to just tell 

other professions that we could simply take their services and access it for free and provide that free on line and no on could charge 

for it anymore. What good is it to have a specialty? What good is 

it to even work if we open that up to the marketplace? 

So I am pleased we are having this hearing. I look forward to 

getting some answer to this and how in this new world of technology we can indeed protect the efforts and the work of so many 

who put in so much time and research into their creative endeavors 

and we need to make sure that we protect their part of the economy as well. 

And I yield back the balance of my time. 

Mr. STEARNS. The gentleman yields back. 

Mr. Green? 

Mr. GREEN. Mr. Chairman, I will waive opening statements and 

submit a statement to the record. 

Mr. STEARNS. The gentleman waives. 

Ms. Bono? 

Ms. BONO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to begin by 

thanking you so much for holding this hearing and the chairman 

of the full committee also for being so willing to hear me out all 

the time with my thoughts on this. I would like to thank our panelists for what is going to be a lively and spirited debate about something that is extremely important to us all. 

11

I just want to start by saying if we are going to talk about H.R. 

1201, I am a staunch opponent and I hope we can certainly slow 

down this movement of this bill if not stop it all together. I speaking for myself as a consumer, I am also a copyright holder. I have 

personally three iPods. I have gone through 5 or 6 for whatever 

reason. My children each have gone through two iPods. Now when 

I put my iPod when I connect it to my computer, the same list of 

songs is downloaded from iPod to iPod to iPod. Now is that technology mutual? I do not think so. I think technology is benefiting. 

I am paying the songwriter. I’m paying the royalty once 99 cents 

to iTunes. 

So I think it is important to realize fair use is alive and well with 

these issues. What scares me the most is that the revolution that 

we are witnessing that my colleague talked about is a very, very 

exciting one for technology and for content providers. I have always 

said the inner key is the creator’s greatest tool. I can, you know, 

we can talk about some song, we can hear it on the radio, we go 

home, we look it up on iTunes or either Yahoo, whatever we want, 

we find it and we hit enter and we have that song. But if we go 

forward with something like 1201 which basically guts DRM, Digital Rights Management, no longer allows this to work for us, it is 

going to stifle both technologies and the sale of intellectual property. 

So I have great concerns. And I often think about this fact. We 

have not talked about this with books. We do not say, okay, I just 

bought a new book, the great book on Lincoln’s political leadership 

and if I ruin it, if I drop it in a puddle of water going to Dulles 

Airport, do I call the publisher and say I bought that book once, 

I want another one for free, that is fair use? This is something we 

should talk about. Why can’t we? I have already paid for the intellectual property. I paid that writer for her work, why am I not entitled to a whole new book for free? But we do not think like that. 

I have already paid you once for property but the publisher and I 

do not want to send shutter through the publishing community 

right now. I know, you know, I am really speaking metaphorically 

here. But we are not talking about that. We pay the provider, we 

pay the content creator once, and we share that amongst multiple 

platforms. 

I think it is important when I talk to my colleagues about MP4 

files, movie files, we as consumers have gone, all of us in this room 

have probably, every Super Bowl we go out and buy the latest, 

greatest biggest screen we can find and we brag about it to our 

friends, I have got a 60’’ HDTV, you know, LCD screen whatever 

it is and this is what I have. But we’re also now going to iPod style 

1’’ screens that we are all going to buying for Christmas for ourselves so we are going to be staring at these little teeny tiny 

screens. Thanks to digital rights management, we can download 

different movies, we can download different television programs. 

But if we make it legal to circumvent encryption technologies that 

allow us to have that on our personal player, we are going to stifle 

this whole globe. 

So I have great concerns. I think that there have been mistakes 

made, there are no questions. I think people have made mistakes 

in being way too proprietary with their technology and protecting 

12

their content. But I think we need to partner with industry, Mr. 

Chairman and work with them and shape with them policies that 

say you own this, you have got this once, you can move it to multiple platforms. But I think to say remove encryption technology, 

let people ahead and make—and if it happens to be pirated, if it 

happens to end up on the internet, oh, well it was not my fault. 

I think that is reckless and I think it is dangerous to this country. 

As my colleague said too, I believe our country is the greatest 

Nation on this earth because of intellectual property whether it is 

writing song, whether it is writing a book, whether it is creating 

a patent, whatever it is, I think we need to hold those things near 

and dear. And I think this is a very important issue and I am hoping again we look at 1201 and we do not undo something that is 

very important to our country. So I look forward to hearing all of 

you in the question and answer. 

And again, thank you, Mr. Chairman, I yield back my time. 

[The prepared statement of Hon. Mary Bono follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. MARY BONO, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM

THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this hearing today. 

We are all very fortunate to live in a world where music, movies and other forms 

of entertainment are just a mouse click away. I’ve always maintained that the 

‘‘enter’’ key is the entertainment industry’s best friend if they manage to tap into 

this digital revolution. 

And yes, the onus is on this industry to adapt to the changing environment. But, 

they cannot make this successful transition if the federal government decides their 

intellectual property is free for the taking under the ‘‘fair use’’ doctrine. 

Mr. Chairman, there are some who suggest that technology will be stifled if Congress insists on protecting IP rights. I would assert just the opposite. Why would 

a company put financial resources behind a product that can be taken for free? 

Furthermore, under current law, technology and innovation are blossoming at the 

same time copyrights are protected. It seems as if there is a smaller, sleeker MP3 

player or gaming device coming out every week! Even founders of the illegal 

Grokster see a successful business model predicated on copyright protection. 

Our country has a long tradition of protecting property rights and copyright. We 

have frowned upon ‘‘takings’’ without permission or due compensation. However, if 

Congress amends the DMCA, ‘‘fair use’’ will resemble ‘‘unfair takings.’’ 

During recent debate, Congress rejected ‘‘unfair takings.’’ In a vote of 376-38, the 

House passed a bill to address the Supreme Court’s flawed decision in the Kelo case. 

Both Republicans and Democrats from across the political spectrum agreed that the 

federal government could not use ‘‘eminent domain’’ for economic development purposes. 

It is my hope that in relation to the new digital era, Congress does not allow ‘‘fair 

use’’ to embody the haunting specter of Kelo’s ‘‘eminent domain.’’ If we are to allow 

‘‘fair use’’ to run this course, we will not only undermine one of this nation’s most 

important industries, but will also weaken our position in protecting intellectual 

property rights internationally. 

I am glad we have an opportunity to explore this issue today. Believe me, I want 

the Internet to serve as the portal to entertainment. There are many exciting advances on the horizon. But, I hope Members keep one thing in mind: Property is 

property, whether we are talking about private property or intellectual property or 

whether we are seeking to protect ranchers or rockers. That is the history of our 

great nation and we must continue in this tradition. 

Thank you and I yield back.

Mr. STEARNS. I thank the gentlelady. 

Mr. Towns? 

Mr. TOWNS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and also thank 

you Member Schakowsky for arranging the hearing today. 

We will be addressing a very delicate topic this morning and I 

look forward to hearing from all of the witnesses. I am pleased to 

13

see the videogame industry represented here today. Any discussion 

of the impact of the fair use doctrine on consumers should include 

this important segment of the entertainment industry. 

The videogame industry has experienced significant growth in recent years and one reason for such growth is due to its meeting 

and often exceeding consumer expectations with regard to accessing and playing content. In 2004, the sale of computer and 

videogames in the United States topped $7 billion. And the global 

entertainment software market reached $25 billion. I look forward 

to this exciting vibrant industry to continue to flourish and to continue to meet the demands of its consumers. It must continue to 

be able to reasonably protect intellectual property. Further, it must 

have the confidence that Congress is not going to upset the balance 

that has resulted in a win-win situation for the videogame industry 

and its consumers. 

Today’s hearing is also about how to best balance consumer demand for content with the copyright holders ability to protect that 

content. These are both important goals. But as I see it, the marketplace is working fairly well. Content companies are using technology to develop innovative ways to protect their intellectual property while allowing consumers to make their personal uses that 

they want to make. Sometimes the technologies are not perfect as 

we saw recently with some content protection technology. But we—

but as we saw in that case and as we see it all the time, when new 

software is developed and released, the marketplace responds very 

quickly to consumer concern. So I firmly believe this is how the industry should be allowed to grow and we must allow it to be involved innovation. 

On that note, Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time 

and I am anxious and eager to be hearing from all of the witnesses. 

Thank you very much. 

Mr. STEARNS. I thank the gentleman. 

Anyone else seek opening speech? 

[Additional statements submitted for the record follow:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. BARBARA CUBIN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS

FROM THE STATE OF WYOMING

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this timely hearing on the fair use of copyrighted works. Copyright litigation has focused increasingly on digital media exchange and its inherent piracy risks. How these disputes are settled stands to impact in a very profound way the level and nature of consumer access to digital entertainment. 

Historically, copyright law has adapted in the face of new technologies, as have 

consumer expectations as to what constitutes fair use. When Congress passed the 

Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) in 1998, we could not possibly have foreseen the rapid advances in technology that would ensue in just a few short years. 

The public audience for digital entertainment has grown, along with technological 

restraints on the use of that entertainment. In particular, the ‘‘anti-circumvention’’ 

clause of the DMCA has allowed the content community to successfully limit the circumvention of digital copyright protections. 

Members of the content industry insist on the value of the DMCA for their continued ability to market and distribute their products. Consumer advocates, however, 

believe this protection regime jeopardizes their right to fair, noninfringing use of 

copyrighted works. This is one of many fair use issues likely to be brought up by 

today’s panelists, who represent both the content community and consumer rights 

advocates. 

I hope today’s hearing will help our committee better understand the growing tension between consumers, who desire to exercise the fair use of legitimately purVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00017 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
14

chased products, and the rights of the content industry to restrain the reproduction 

and distribution of their copyright protected material. 

Thank you Mr. Chairman. I yield back the balance of my time.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. GENE GREEN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM

THE STATE OF TEXAS

I’d like to thank the Chairman and Ranking Member for holding this hearing 

today. This is an important and complicated issue. I’m glad we’ll be adding to the 

knowledge we gained from the hearings we held last year through the members on 

the panel we’ll hear from today. 

This bill does strike to the heart of one of the most significant debates for the 

future of the digital economy—the regulation of intellectual property. 

With all of its promise, the digital age has also brought a tremendous amount of intellectual property piracy—the software industry reports losing $11 billion a year 

to software piracy, the motion picture industry another $3-4 billion, and the recording industry $4.2 billion. 

What is scary to people who make software, movies, and music is that those are 

the figures only the ones they can calculate. Even more losses from online piracy 

exist, but are very difficult to calculate. 

Numerous studies support the theory that many producers have been severely 

hurt by online piracy. And this is one of the few industries that has a positive balance of trade, reducing our trade deficit. 

The question before us today is: how can rampant piracy crimes be stopped or 

contained while society’s beneficial fair use rights are preserved? 

All the witnesses on the panel we’re going to hear from today were watching the 

Supreme Court closely when they ruled in MGM V. Grokster. In this particular ruling, the Court emphasized that the intent with which Grokster created and marketed Peer to Peer file sharing software was what made them liable for copyright 

infringement. Not the technology itself. 

This committee does not have the luxury of such specific examples of the creation, 

use and intent of using such technology in front of us. Should we pass legislation 

on this issue, it will have a broad impact on these industries regardless of what the 

circumstances may be. 

I supported the Digital Millennium Copyright Act when Congress approved it, so 

I do get concerned when I hear reports of the DMCA being used to eliminate aftermarkets for a variety of replacement parts. 

What is the point of having digital rights management at all, if someone can create software to hack it, post his hacking software on the Internet, and software pirates in China download it and start cranking out bootleg copies of the latest feature films all in one day? 

Consumers may be right to complain that they cannot fast forward through previews on their DVDs. But if the software that allows them to fast forward could also 

allow piracy, I do not think that is the proper balance. 

As a final note, I would like to mention one section of HR 1201 which falls directly 

under our jurisdiction—FTC labels for copy-protected compact discs. 

I think the recording industry knows that sufficiently informing the public of any 

changes to the CD format is the right thing to do in the first place. 

The recording industry certainly has a right to copy-protect their products, but 

Americans have been buying CDs for well over a decade now and have come to expect their CDs will work in all CD drives and players. 

If new copy-protected compact discs do not work in consumers’ CD players, the 

consumer reaction is likely to be very negative. 

I hope the parties involved can work together to avoid such situations. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this important hearing on the future of digital intellectual property protection.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. C.L. ‘‘BUTCH’’ OTTER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF IDAHO

Thank you for holding this hearing today, Mr. Chairman. In one respect, the 

issues of fair use and copyright protection are always changing, adapting to an everrapidly transforming technology market. Yet they always remain at the heart of the 

laws of this land. 

Less than a month ago, we met here to express our concern, frustration, and fear 

following the Supreme Court’s decision in Kelo vs. City of New London. Our outrage 

was universal and our alarm widespread at the implications of the Court’s ruling. 

And just two weeks ago we spoke loudly in favor of protecting private property, willVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00018 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
15

ing to fight tooth and nail if necessary, on the floor of the House when we passed 

the Private Property Rights Protection Act. 

To me this debate is no different, Mr. Chairman. And yet here we sit, no longer 

united in defense of the Fifth Amendment but in many ways trying to find a convenient exception to our laws which are laid so firmly on a foundation of private property rights. ‘‘Fair use’’ is often craftily disguised as a right and an entitlement, and 

we discuss it as though we are obligated to protect it. But deep down ‘‘fair use’’ is 

just another argument for taking someone else’s property to use for our own convenience. This argument and the one we found so repulsive in Kelo are one and the 

same. Some are tempted to separate ‘‘intellectual property’’ from our general idea of private property, but intellectual property is no different than the dirt on my ranch 

in Idaho. Our entire concept of democracy is based on our right to own, to innovate, 

and to benefit from our work. Without protecting those rights and making it worthwhile to turn an idea into something more tangible, we would not be the nation we 

are today. 

As a believer in the free market system, this debate about ‘‘fair use’’ concerns me 

on another level. About twenty years ago, we had a similar debate when a new technology called the VCR hit the market. The implications of this new technology 

seemed devastating for the industry. But a marvelous thing happened: rather than 

allow government regulation to harm both industry and consumer, the industry responded to consumers’ desire to see films at home and became innovative, building 

an economic empire in the video rental and retail industry as a result. Everybody 

won. While there are certainly differences in today’s debate over fair use, I believe one 

principle is the same: Consumer demand, not government regulation should lead industry response. 

It seems to me that the entertainment industries again have an opportunity to 

work with the software and device manufacturers to develop and sell products that 

meet consumer demand. Protecting intellectual property investments is the key element in achieving cooperation. Without these protections, all of these industries will 

ultimately suffer. 

I believe consumers have a voice and should be heard. That does not, however, 

obligate the government to mandate the industry response, especially since we are 

discussing a luxury product—not a right or a basic necessity to life, but a luxury. 

In closing, I do not believe Congress should promote policies that stifle investment, nor do I believe that this debate on ‘‘fair use’’ should be allowed to carve out 

an industry in which the rights of property holders do not apply. We are obligated 

to protect private property, discourage theft, and encourage investment into intellectual properties, not the other way around. 

I look forward to the witnesses’ testimony and thank the Chairman again for the 

opportunity to discuss this issue.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. GEORGE RADANOVICH, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

I thank Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing today on Fair Use and its effects 

on consumers and the industry. 

Rapid advances in technology have increased tensions between the content community and consumers. 

At the heart of the issue is the tension between attempts by content owners to 

protect and control the use of their works by means of technology and the consumer’s use of technology to make use of content under fair use. 

Private property and intellectual property rights have been an important part of 

this country’s existence since the inception of the Constitution. 

Protecting the intellectual property of our artists, writers and inventors from illegal reproduction and distribution should important to all of us, because without protection of these works, we may not be blessed books, music, movies, and art that 

is made available to us year after year. 

I am interested to hear from our witnesses today on their views of fair use and 

whether they believe there is a technological solution instead of a legislative one? 

Thank you again Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing. In closing I would like 

to say that I’m sorry that the Recording Industry, Motion Picture Association and 

the National Association of Broadcasters could not be here to discuss their views 

on this matter with us.

Mr. STEARNS. If not, we will move to our witness and I want to 

welcome all of them this morning. We have Mr. Professor Peter 

16

Jaszi from the University, excuse me, Washington College of Law, 

the American University; Mr. Gary Shapiro, President and Chief 

Executive Officer Consumer Electronics Association; Ms. Prudence 

S. Adler, Associate Executive Director of the Federal Relations Information Policy Association of Research Libraries; Mr. Jonathan 

Band who is here on behalf of NetCoalition; Ms. Gigi B. Sohn, 

President and Founder of Public Knowledge; Mr. James DeLong, 

Senior Fellow and Director, IPCentral Information of Progress and 

Freedom Foundation; Mr. Frederick Hirsch, Senior Vice President, 

Intellectual Property Enforcement, Entertainment Software Association; and Mr. Paul Aiken, Executive Director of Authors Guild, 

Incorporated. 

So I wish to welcome all of you and we’ll start out with you, Professor, your opening statement. Just turn the mike on and move 

the mike a little closer to you if you would be so kind. 

STATEMENTS OF PETER JASZI, WASHINGTON COLLEGE OF 

LAW, AMERICAN UNIVERSITY; GARY J. SHAPIRO, PRESIDENT 

AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, CONSUMER ELECTRONICS 

ASSOCIATION; PRUDENCE S. ADLER, ASSOCIATE EXECUTIVE 

DIRECTOR, FEDERAL RELATIONS AND INFORMATION POLICY, ASSOCIATION OF RESEARCH LIBRARIES; JONATHAN 

BAND, NETCOALITION; GIGI B. SOHN, PRESIDENT AND 

FOUNDER, PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE; JAMES DELONG, SENIOR 

FELLOW AND DIRECTOR, IPCENTRAL INFORMATION, 

PROGRESS AND FREEDOM FOUNDATION; FREDERICK 

HIRSCH, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ENFORCEMENT, ENTERTAINMENT SOFTWARE ASSOCIATION; AND PAUL AIKEN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, AUTHORS GUILD, INCORPORATED 

Mr. JASZI. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member 

Schakowsky, and members of the subcommittee, my name is Peter 

Jaszi and for the last 25 years, I have been teaching copyright here 

in Washington. 

So I am going to start by invoking academic privilege in trying 

to give a description of the fair use doctrine even more succinct 

than the chairman’s elegant summary of a few moments ago. In essence, the doctrine provides that when the cultural or economic 

benefits that will flow to the public from an unauthorized use of 

copyrighted material outweigh the costs it will impose on the copyright owner, that use should be permitted. Fair use is not piracy. 

Fair uses are non-infringing uses, not merely tolerated infringements. The law does not just accept fair use but actively encourages it. Although fair use is sometimes described technically in 

terms of legal procedure as a mere affirmative defense, it functions 

in the real world analogue and digital as an important entitlement 

for students, artists, teachers, librarians, writers, entrepreneurs, 

musicians, programmers, and ordinary consumers. 

As Mr. Ross noted, fair use was first codified as part of the general revision of the Copyright Act in 1976 but it has been a part 

of U.S. copyright laws since the decision of Folsom against March 

in 1841. Thus for more than 150 years, the success, the unparalleled success of our copyright system has stemmed from the fact 

that strong protection for owners consistently has been balanced by 

17

use rights that to paraphrase the Supreme Court, encourage others 

to build freely upon preexisting works and make their own contributions to cultural progress. Moreover, as the court recently reaffirmed in Eldred against Ashcroft, the fair use doctrine is a 

mechanism, a crucial mechanism by which copyright law recognizes 

and implements the free speech values of the First Amendment. 

Major industries such as motion pictures, poplar music, and computer software have prospered in part because innovators have 

been free to copy important elements of their predecessor’s work. 

Moreover it is because of fair use that we all can make many personal uses of the information products we purchase. Students can 

copy text or image from published sources to enhance a term paper 

or homework assignment. Music fans can combine selections from 

their record collections to make mixes for a family member’s birthday. And it is the freedom to read, view, and listen to information 

products assured by fair use that enables many consumers to move 

from absorbing the words, images, and notes of others to making 

their own creations. 

The reach of copyright law is constantly expanding to provide 

longer terms of stronger protection against more kinds of unauthorized uses than at any point in history. More than ever than fair 

use matters now. In the courts, the doctrine is being creatively and 

robustly applied to guarantee fundamental fairness and balance 

and providing useful guiding precedence. In other quarters, however, fair use is threatened. Some academics complain that fair use 

is too vague or uncertain to be of real value to users. It would, however, be a serious mistake for Congress to codify the doctrine in 

greater detail, precisely because the enduring strength of fair use 

lies in its dynamism and adaptability to change circumstances. Instead, I believe the best answer to this objection is for various user 

communities to articulate clearly their own shared vision of best 

practices in fair use, a process that I am happy to say is beginning 

to get under way. 

Self help cannot address other threats to fair use such as those 

posed by anti-circumvention laws. Thus for example, a teacher who 

copies short film segments to show in class. This is a classic core 

example of fair use can still be liable under Section 1201 of the 

Digital Millennium Copyright Act if he or she bypassed the so 

called CSS Code with which commercial DVD’s are sold. Such 

anomalies cry out for legislative regress. I would note that H.R. 

1201, the Digital Media Consumer Rights Act of 2005 introduced 

by Representatives Boucher, Doolittle, and Barton illustrates the 

kind of legislation that would be well calculated to provide that regress. 

Thank you for your attention. I look forward to trying to answer 

whatever questions you may have about this vital aspect of American copyright. 

[The prepared statement of Peter Jaszi follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF PETER JASZI, WASHINGTON COLLEGE OF LAW, AMERICAN

UNIVERSITY

My name is Peter Jaszi. For the last 25 years, I have taught copyright at the 

Washington College of Law of American University, here in the District of Columbia. In recent years, I also have represented the Digital Future Coalition on various 

18

1The DFC is a coalition of more than 30 trade associations, non-governmental organizations 

and learned societies representing a broad cross-section of the educational, high-tech, consumer 

and creative communities in the United States; it was organized during the run-up to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, and has continued to be active on current copyright policy questions. 

copyright policy issues.1 Today, however, I am testifying in my personal capacity 

about the critical importance of the ‘‘fair use’’ doctrine in American copyright law. 

Summary 

In the two centuries following the enactment of the first Copyright Act in 1790, 

the United States enjoyed an unequaled and unbroken record of progress that gave 

us, on the one hand, educational institutions and research facilities that are preeminent in the modern world, and on the other, entertainment and information industries that dominate the global marketplace. Schools, libraries and archives benefited from the operation of our copyright system, and the public reaped the reward; 

likewise, expanding American publishing, motion picture, music and software businesses generated not only wealth but also less tangible forms of public good. And 

this was as it should be. From its inception, the copyright system has operated both 

as a strong force for cultural development and as a powerful engine of economic 

growth. 

The success of traditional U.S. copyright law was not due only to the 

unprecedentedly high levels of protection it has afforded to works falling within its 

coverage. That success also stemmed from the fact that strong protection consistently has been balanced against use privileges operating in favor of teachers, students, consumers, creators and innovators who need access to copyrighted material 

in order to make—or prepare to make—their own contributions to cultural and economic progress. To put the point more simply, the various limitations and exceptions on rights that traditionally have been a part of the fabric of copyright are not 

results of legislative or judicial inattention; rather, these apparent ‘‘gaps’’ in protection actually are essential features of the overall design. As the Supreme Court observed more than a decade ago, in its Feist decision, the limiting doctrines of copyright law are not ‘‘unforeseen byproduct[s] of a statutory scheme . . .;’’ in fulfilling its 

constitutional objective, copyright ‘‘assures authors the right to their original expression but encourages others to build freely upon’’ preexisting works. And, as the 

Court recently has reaffirmed in Eldred v. Ashcroft, these limiting doctrines are the 

mechanism by which copyright law recognizes and implements the values of free expression codified in the First Amendment. 

Today, more than ever, fair use matters. In the courts, the doctrine is being creatively applied to guarantee fundamental fairness and balance. In other quarters, 

however, fair use is under threat. But the doctrine (like the vision of balanced copyright law that it represents) deserves to be defended and supported. Some of that 

support can come from the Congress of the United States, but much of it must derive from the various user communities that depend on the doctrine for the opportunity to make their cultural and economic contributions to our society. 

Some issues of terminology 

The term ‘‘fair use’’ can be used in two different ways—one loose and one more 

precise. Often, it is employed as shorthand to reference all the vital limitations and 

exceptions on the rights of copyright owners that are built into our system and have 

done so much to help fulfill the Constitutional objective of intellectual property: promoting the ‘‘progress’’ in ‘‘Science and useful Arts.’’ Over the years, U.S. copyright 

law has built up a catalogue of limitations and exceptions to copyright protection, 

including:

• The ‘‘idea/expression’’ distinction, which assures (among other things) that copyright protection does not attach to the factual contents of protected works; 

• The ‘‘first sale’’ principle, codified in 17 U.S.C. Sec. 109(a), which assures that (as 

a general matter) purchasers of information products from books to musical recordings can sell or lend their copies to others; 

• A variety of specific exemptions for educational, charitable and other positive public uses; and, most importantly, 

• The doctrine codified in Sec. 107 of the Copyright Act, which provides—in essence—that some other unauthorized uses of copyrighted works, not specifically 

covered by any of the other limitations just summarized, should be permitted 

rather than punished because their general cultural and economic benefits outweigh the costs they might impose on copyright owners. 

19

2 § 107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use 

Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, 

including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified 

by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including 

multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. 

In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors 

to be considered shall include—

(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature 

or is for nonprofit educational purposes; 

(2) the nature of the copyrighted work; 

(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as 

a whole; and 

(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work. 

The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding 

is made upon consideration of all the above factors.

‘‘Fair Use’’ under Sec. 107

It is to this last doctrine to which the term ‘‘fair use’’ refers in its more precise 

sense, and it is to this doctrine and its importance that my remarks today will primarily be addressed. That is because fair use (in this sense) has a special place in 

the array of limitations and exceptions to copyright. Of all the doctrines noted 

above, it has the greatest potential to grow and change with new technological, economic and cultural circumstances. Whereas many of the statutory exceptions to 

copyright are static, fair use under Sec. 107 is, by its very nature, adaptable and 

dynamic. For this reason, it operates as a kind of keystone in the edifice of our copyright system. It absorbs pressure from different sides (i.e., from copyright owners 

and copyright consumers), and in so doing it allows the structure to stand. Our fair 

use doctrine is unique—no other country has anything quite like it. Indeed, it functions as a kind of secret weapon in support of U.S. competitiveness in the international competitive marketplace. Fair use helps account for the innovative dynamism that has made our information industries the envy of the world. 

This particular concept of fair use has been a central and unquestioned feature 

of U.S. copyright law since 1841, when Joseph Story announced the doctrine in the 

case of Folsom v. Marsh. It was refined the courts in the century and a quarter that 

followed, and codified in 1976, as part of the general revision of the Copyright Act.2

That codification, however, had some unusual features. Rather than attempting to 

specify the contents of the doctrine, or to shape and regulate its future growth, the 

Congress merely provided a non-exhaustive list of four factors that (along with other 

unremunerated considerations) should be taken into account when a federal court 

is called upon to determine whether a particular challenged use of copyrighted material should be considered fair. When Sec. 107 was amended in 1992, to clarify that 

fair use applies to both unpublished and published works, its provisions retained 

this remarkable open texture. Thus, the dynamism of the doctrine has been preserved in the course of its codification. Today, in weighing the balance at the heart 

of fair use analysis, courts return again and again to two key questions: 

• Did the unlicensed use ‘‘transform’’ the material taken from the copyrighted work 

by using it for a different purpose than the original, or did it just repeat the 

work for the same intent and value as the original? • Was the amount and nature of material taken appropriate in light of the nature 

of the copyrighted work and of the use? 

Among other things, both questions address whether the use will cause excessive 

economic harm to the copyright owner. 

In this connection, there also are some misconceptions about the reach of the fair 

use doctrine that should be noted and corrected:

• Fair use need not be exclusively high-minded or ‘‘educational’’ in nature. Although 

nonprofit or academic uses often have good claims to be considered ‘‘fair,’’ they 

are not the only ones. A new work can be ‘‘commercial’’—even highly commercial—in intent and effect and still invoke fair use for its use of preexisting material. Most of the cases in which courts have found unlicensed uses of copyrighted works to be fair have involved projects designed to make money, including some that actually have. • Fair use doesn’t have to be boring. A use is no less likely to qualify as a fair one 

because the new work in connection with which it occurs is effective in attracting and holding an audience. If a use otherwise satisfies the criteria of the law, 

the fact that it is entertaining or emotionally engaging should be irrelevant to 

the analysis. • A failed effort to clear rights doesn’t inhibit a users’ ability to claim fair use. Everyone likes to avoid conflict and reduce uncertainty. Often, there will be good 

reasons to seek permissions in situations where they may not literally be reVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00023 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
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quired. When a would-be user’s good faith effort to do so fails, he or she loses 

nothing in terms of fair use rights. 

It also is important to note that fair use is not, as sometimes has been suggested, 

a mere negative byproduct of the economics of rights clearance in the analog information marketplace, which can be expected to whither away with the transition to 

digital. Rather, it is a provision of copyright law that serves an affirmative cultural 

and economic mission. It is likely to be more important than ever in the new information era. Nor does it detract from the importance of fair use to assert, as its detractors sometimes do, that it is not a ‘‘right’’ but merely an ‘‘affirmative defense.’’ 

This, I would suggest, is a legal quibble rather than a serious argument. The availability of an affirmative defense in a proceeding of certain factual circumstances is 

tantamount to a right to engage in the privileged conduct when those circumstances 

actually are present. In criminal law, ‘‘self defense’’ is classified as a defense for purposes of courtroom procedure. However, its recognition also functions as an affirmative authorization for some kinds of self-protective conduct the real world. The same 

analysis applies to fair use in copyright. 

Fair use today 

Although fair use has been a prominent feature of U.S. copyright since the inception of the doctrine, it truly has come into its own in the last several decades. In 

this period that, copyright law has become dramatically more restrictive in other respects. The last twenty years have seen extensions of copyright term, an expansion 

in copyright scope, a dramatic development in secondary liability for copyright infringement, and dramatic increases in civil and criminal penalties. All these developments have contributed to the importance of maintaining a legal space in which 

socially and economically productive uses of protected material can occur without 

risk of liability. The courts have responded both by reaffirming the applicability of 

fair use in a number of traditional contexts (such as critical quotation and educational practice), and by adapting the flexible doctrine for a range of new purposes 

(including copying that promotes healthy market competition). 

The benefits of a balance mediated by fair use 

It may be useful to provide some general illustrations of how the balance that is 

assured in our copyright law by the operation of fair use has served the twin goals 

of cultural and economic progress. It is common to note the self-evident proposition 

that the non-profit educational and library sector depends on limiting doctrines for 

many essential functions. Although schools and libraries are among the largest purchasers of copyrighted materials in the United States, their most typical and beneficial activities—from classroom teaching to scholarly research—would not be possible without the built-in fairness safeguard that fair use provides. 

It is less frequently noted that such major information industries as motion pictures and computer software came into being not despite the fact that filmmakers 

and programmers were free to copy important elements of their predecessors’ work, 

but because of it. They have continued to prosper under these conditions; likewise, 

fair use also is critical to a wide range of practices within the book publishing and 

music industries. It would not be going too far to say that the creativity and innovation that copyright exists to promote are fueled as much by this strategic ‘‘gap’’ in 

the law as they are by its strong protections. Individual creative artists understand 

this point well from direct personal experience, even though large copyright-owning 

media companies sometimes lose sight of it. Although the entertainment industries 

are legitimately concerned about ‘‘piracy’’ of copyright works, it is important not to 

confuse the activities they rightly condemn with the ordinary, lawful exercise of the 

various use privileges, including fair use, that are conferred by the Copyright Act 

itself. 

Equally important, fair use operates to the direct and immediate benefit of ultimate information consumers. It is because of fair use (and other limiting doctrines) 

that we all can make a broad range of personal uses of the content of information 

products we purchase, without fear of legal liability. Because of fair use, students 

can copy texts or images from published sources to enhance a term paper or homework assignment and music fans can combine selections from their personal record 

collections to make ‘‘mixes’’ for a family member’s birthday or anniversary celebration, all without any concern that by doing so they will violate traditional copyright 

principles. Nor is this all. Ultimately, it is the freedom to read, listen and view information products assured by fair use that enables many consumers of copyrighted 

content to become producers—to move from absorbing and repeating the words, images and notes of others to making their own creative contributions to the general 

store of cultural resources. 

21

3The ‘‘Untold Stories’’ project is described at www.centerforsocialmedia.org/rock/index.htm 

4The organizations are the Association of Independent Video and Filmmakers, Independent 

Feature Project, International Documentary Association, National Alliance for Media Arts and 

Culture, and Women in Film and Video (Washington, D.C., chapter). I will supply the Subcommittee with copies of the Statement upon its release. 

Some examples: fair use in filmmaking and film teaching 

For the last 18 months, my colleague Professor Pat Aufderheide (of the American 

University School of Communication) and I have been directing a project designed 

to investigate the ways in which documentary filmmakers interact with copyright 

law in the United States. Early on, we discovered how extensively and pervasively 

producer-directors in this increasingly popular medium must rely on the fair use 

doctrine if they are to fulfill their mission. Documentarians need fair use in order 

to quote limited amounts from copyrighted works (TV programs, literary texts, musical recordings, and other films). In turn, they need the right to quote to make critical comments about contemporary media, in order to illustrate the social and cultural phenomena they address in their films, to depict truthfully the often mediasaturated environments in which their human subjects are found, and (sometimes) 

to illustrate important historical events through archival footage.3 When 

filmmakers’ ability to employ fair use is frustrated (as is too often the case), their 

work suffers and their audiences are the ultimate losers. 

Another example of the importance of fair use comes from the educational context—specifically, the domain of media education. In our time, teaching media literacy is more important than ever, and various kinds of film and television studies 

courses are increasingly popular in institutions of higher and even secondary education. Effective teaching in this field, however, involves the use of visual illustrations to demonstrate an instructor’s points about the content and style of audiovisual works under consideration. The most effective teaching often occurs in the 

classroom where a lesson juxtaposes numerous short clips from various media 

sources for purposes of visual comparison and contrast. In short, one can no more 

teach media studies course effectively without media clips than a literature course 

without selections from literary texts. Effective media studies teachers take advantage of fair use in order to assemble ‘‘clip reels’’ of examples to accompany their lectures and classroom discussions. When they are unable to do so, their students pay 

a price in terms of forgone learning opportunities. 

The internal critique of fair use 

One potential threat to the survival of fair use as a useful tool for consumers and 

creators comes from an unexpected source—progressive commentators on copyright 

who argue that the doctrine simply does not go far enough, or fails to provide a level 

of clarity that would permit users to proceed with reasonable certainty. This argument overlooks, of course, the advantages (already noted) associated with a dynamic, flexible fair use doctrine. Unfortunately, however, this potentially self-fulfilling message has achieved considerable currency. Among the filmmakers with 

whom I have been working in recent months, for example, some individuals are reluctant to invoke fair use because either they themselves, or the ‘‘gatekeepers’’ (distributors, broadcasters, etc.) on whom they rely for access to audiences, cannot understand or will not place trust the doctrine. This is so, incidentally, despite the fact 

that in almost every court case where a documentary filmmaker has relied on fair 

use, the court has accepted this defense to a claim of infringement, thus shielding 

the defendant from liability. 

Even though it sometimes may be overstated, this friendly critique of fair use has 

a real foundation. Because of its situational nature, the applications of fair use to 

particular sets of circumstances are sometimes difficult to predict. The solution to 

this dilemma lies not with the Congress or the courts, but with disciplinary communities (filmmakers, historians, musicians, teachers, etc.) who rely on fair use. Each 

such community has the opportunity to articulate their shared understanding of 

what constitutes a reasonable level of unlicensed quotation from copyrighted works 

in particular contexts. Were they to do so in a balanced manner, after a full process 

of consultation, their conclusions would have great persuasive force. In this connection, I am pleased to say that this coming Friday, November 18, a group of national 

organizations representing independent documentary filmmakers will announce a 

‘‘Statement of Best Practices on Fair Use of Copyrighted Materials.’’ 4

The external threat to fair use 

In the last decade, one of copyright owners’ most significant responses to the uncertainty of the new communications environment has been to develop digital rights 

management (‘‘DRM’’) tools (sometimes referred to as ‘‘technological protection 

22

5The problem is exacerbated by the fact that, by design, anti-circumvention laws are insensitive to the distinction between the protected and unprotected elements of copyright works. 6 In particular, the ‘‘savings’’ language of Sec. 1201 (c), as it is generally interpreted, does not 

give a film teacher the authorization to engage in circumvention for purposes of fair use. See 

Universal City Studios, Inc. v. Corley, 273 F.3d 429 (2d Cir. 2001). 

measures’’ or ‘‘TPMs’’) to control access and use of texts, images and sounds in electronic formats, with the aim of preventing ‘‘piracy’’ and enabling new, and newly 

secure, forms of electronic information commerce on a ‘‘pay-per-use’’ model. Inevitably, however, the risk that such DRM’s may be hacked has loomed large in the 

concerns of copyright owners. From this concern has grown domestic and international political pressure for the creation of a new species of intellectual property 

protection: the so-called anti-circumvention provisions that are the centerpiece of 

the 1998 ‘‘Digital Millennium Copyright Act’’ (DMCA) in the United State, and of 

similar legislation elsewhere in the world. This new family of legal norms is not a 

development of copyright law, although it is superimposed on copyright; rather, it 

is a kind of ‘‘paracopyright’’ that provides for new rights, new remedies and—crucially—a new and exclusive set of exceptions. Thus, copyright’s traditional limiting 

doctrines, including fair use, do not apply as such in this new and evolving legal 

space. 

The U.S. legislation makes relatively few concessions to the access interests of follow-on creators and innovators. This problem already is acute in fields (such as 

encryption research) where essential information is incorporated into copyright 

works that are made available only in digital formats. It will become increasingly 

significant in other fields (including scholarship, criticism and education) as literary 

texts and (especially) audiovisual works migrate to exclusive digital formats.5 Thus, 

for example, the ability of media teachers to assemble clip reels of short excerpts 

from commercially available copy-protected DVD’s—a clear instance of fair use 

under copyright law—is threatened by the paracopyright regime of 17 U.S.C. Sec. 

1201. The narrow specific exceptions provided in the DMCA do not apply to this instance,6 nor is it clear that the special rulemaking procedure for devising a limited 

range of additional exceptions, specified in Sec. 1201(a)(1), could be successfully invoked by media teachers. 

Unlike the problem of uncertainty in fair use referred to in the preceding section 

of my testimony, the threat to fair use posed by anti-circumvention laws will require 

Congressional intervention if it is to be dispelled. H.R. 1201, the ‘‘Digital Media 

Consumers Rights Act of 2005,’’ as introduced by Representatives Boucher, Doolittle 

and Barton last March, is an example of legislation that would be well calculated 

to fulfill that important goal. 

Thank you for your attention to my views on this important doctrine, its place 

in U.S. copyright law, and the challenges that it currently faces.

Mr. STEARNS. I thank you, Professor. 

Mr. Shapiro, welcome. 

STATEMENT OF GARY J. SHAPIRO 

Mr. SHAPIRO. Thank you for holding this incredibly important 

hearing and thank you all for listening, those of you who already 

expressed strong views actually on both sides. 

To us fair use remains a very thin line protecting consumers and 

innovators. Of course commercial piracy is harmful. And as Chairman Barton indicated, intellectual property protection is incredibly 

important. But in our rush to crack down on pirates, we risk gutting a critical consumer right, fair right, fair use. Fair use is the 

right freely, freely to use copyrighted material without the permission of the copyright owner. Fair use ensures innovation because 

it allows us to invent new products for the benefit of the public 

even though they do disrupt existing business models. Fair use protected the Betamax VCR when MPA members tried to ban its sale 

to consumers. Without fair use, we would have no VCR’s no tape 

recorders, no DVR’s, no iPods, no TiVo’s, and no Slingboxes. You 

would not be able to find information on Google or forward an 

email. Each of these products and applications allows you to enjoy 

23

copyrighted works in ways that no one had anticipated and in ways 

which copyright holders at least initially did not like and they certainly did not authorize. 

American technological leadership in the age of the internet relies on the protection that fair use gives to innovators and to venture capitalists. But this protection is eroding. Until the Supreme 

Court’s Grokster decision this year, technology innovators were 

playing under the Betamax decisions bright line rule. A product is 

legal if it is capable of substantial non-infringing uses including 

fair uses. The Grokster opinion added a new layer, a new inducement test which leads innovators unsure of the legal status of their 

products. 

The content industry’s entire history is to challenge new technologies even after the Betamax decision MPA members successfully sued a competitor to TiVo into bankruptcy. Their complaint, 

that product allowed Americans to record, index and playback 

video content in their private homes. Similarly, the record companies sued and won against an internet site who helped consumers 

manage the music on the CD’s that they already legitimately 

bought and owned. And today, record labels have threatened suit 

against new portable XM and Sirius radios already for sale, despite 

the fact that the music industry is paid with each one of these 

sales. The RIA also wants to lock down new digital radios and control consumer’s ability to record free over the air radio programs 

in the privacy of their homes. Just 2 weeks ago in a hearing room 

down the hall, the head of the RIA said that Americans who record 

a song off a digital radio are guilty are piracy and should be subject 

to prosecution. 

The dark shadow of litigation hanging over the introduction of 

virtually any new product that manipulates content especially 

harms smaller entrepreneurs. Many are forced to change products 

or simply not offer them at all because they cannot afford the immense costs of copyright litigation even though they believe they 

could be vindicated in court. 

Now copyright law has repeatedly been strengthened by Congress and has never been so protective of the copyright monopoly. 

Our copyright term is not more than five times the length of the 

patent term and the penalties for infringement have been repeatedly and radically increased. Also what is considered infringing has 

also been expanded, so fair use is now all that protects inventors, 

investors, and consumers from an overregulated world, a world in 

which every use of every product must be authorized in advance by 

any copyright holder. And as the copyright monopoly expands, fair 

use needs to be strengthened not weakened. But instead, laws like 

the DMCA have reduced fair use as a defense for consumers and 

as a safe harbor for manufacturers. 

In response, Chairman Barton and Representatives Boucher and 

Doolittle have introduced H.R. 1201 to clarify the impact of the 

DMCA on fair use, ensure that consumer’s cannot be liable for otherwise legal conduct, and codify the Betamax case as preserved by 

the Supreme Court in Grokster. Another provision of H.R. 1201, 

which is especially important after last week’s news about copy 

protected CD’s hiding a window for viruses, requires simply that 

record labels post warnings on copy protected CD’s. This bill is 

24

1 CEA is the principal trade association of the consumer electronics and information technology industries and the sponsor of the International Consumer Electronics Show. CEA represents more than 2,000 corporate members involved in the design, development, manufacturing, distribution and integration of audio, video, mobile electronics, wireless and landline 

communications, information technology, home networking, multimedia and accessory products, 

as well as related services that are sold through consumer channels. Combined, CEA’s members 

account for more than $121 billion in annual sales. CEA’s resources are available online at 

www.CE.org, 

more necessary than ever. We endorse H.R. 1201 as a sensible way 

to preserve consumer’s autonomy and protect innovators in the 

21st Century. 

By preserving fair use, we will ensure that piracy is not confused 

with the right of families to enjoy lawfully acquired content when 

and where they choose. You also ensure American’s their fair use 

right to use the capabilities of new digital technologies to inform, 

communicate, and entertain. You will also ensure that any one 

copyright holder cannot dictate and control future innovations and 

you will increase the odds that the next iPod or TiVo will be invented in America. 

Americans should be able to use their property as they choose as 

long as they do not harm others. We tinker with our cars, we make 

music mix CD’s from our collections, we look for new ways to experience the content we buy, the products we use and the new 

versions we create. Freedom to use our property is something we 

take for granted. With digital products like music, movies, and software, only fair use can give us that freedom autonomy because 

every use of a digital product creates a copy. Limiting fair use allows copyright owners to enter our private space and dictate how 

we can use our property within our own homes and vehicles. Fair 

use is at risk and remains the only line protecting consumers and 

allowing innovation. At the upcoming international CES in Las 

Vegas, the world will see 2,500 companies——

Mr. STEARNS. I just need you to sum up. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. [continuing] unveil their most innovative products. 

These products shift content and time and space and allow you to 

manage it and they do disrupt existing business models. 

Thank you for holding this hearing on fair use. It is absolutely 

critical. And on behalf of the CEA and Home Recording Rights Coalition, I would be happy to work with you further. 

[The prepared statement of Gary J. Shapiro follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF GARY J. SHAPIRO ON BEHALF OF THE CONSUMER

ELECTRONICS ASSOCIATION AND THE HOME RECORDING RIGHTS COALITION

In Robert Bolt’s extraordinary 1960 play, A Man for All Seasons, Sir Thomas 

More, Chancellor of England, is challenged by his son-in-law, Roper, for adhering 

to the law, rather than exercising his own authority:

ROPER: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law! 

MORE: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the 

Devil? 

ROPER: I’d cut down every law in England to do that! 

MORE: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, 

where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? 

For consumers and for technologists, Mr. Chairman, fair use is one of the last 

laws standing today. Most of the rest have been flattened by congressional enactments, mandatory licenses, and court decisions that threaten to concentrate all 

copyright authority in the hands of a few large companies, in a few large industries. 

On behalf of the Consumer Electronics Association 1 and its more than 2,000 memVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00028 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
25

2The Home Recording Rights Coalition was founded in 1981 in response to legal and legislative threats to consumer enjoyment of new technologies. See www.HRRC.org. 3 CEA and HRRC believe nevertheless that this discretion was exercised unwisely in this instance. 

bers, and the Home Recording Rights Coalition,2 of which I am the chairman, I 

thank you, Chairman Stearns, Ranking Member Schakowsky, and the Subcommittee for holding this hearing on the importance of fair use to consumers and 

industry. 

Consumer fair use was the key to allowing consumer video recorders onto the U.S. 

market in the 1970s and 1980s—when members of the Motion Picture Association 

of America sought a court injunction against their sale to consumers. By a single 

vote, the Supreme Court held in 1984 that ‘‘time-shifting’’ of complete works, by consumers for private noncommercial purposes, was fair use, even though it occurred 

without the authorization, or even over the objection, of the copyright owner. The 

Supreme Court’s decision in this year’s Grokster case makes this holding all the 

more important, because the Court has now said that inventors and distributors of 

new technology can be found liable for copyright infringement based on ‘‘intent’’ to 

induce infringing uses. Sony, the Court says now, escaped liability for marketing the 

first VCR only because it was not clear at the time that it was unlawful for a consumer to make and keep a home recording, as Sony’s advertising encouraged them 

to do. In other words: without fair use, we would have no VCRs and no audio tape 

recorders, and today, we would have no TiVos, no DVD recorders, no iPods, and no 

Slingboxes. 

But the importance of fair use does not end with new products. Without it, I could 

not have shared with you the quotation with which I began my testimony—despite 

the fact that Mr. Bolt’s play is now 45 years old and that he himself died in England 

10 years ago. Without fair use I could not have quickly found this information in 

the on-line Wikipedia, or retrieved it via Google. Without fair use I could not have 

quoted the lines of the play to CEA and HRRC members. Indeed, without fair use 

there would be very few web sites I could usefully visit, very few informative emails 

that I could send, and far fewer hardware and software products with which to 

learn and communicate. 

The Nature of Fair Use 

Unlike the judge-created legal theories of secondary copyright liability, under 

which inventors and manufacturers can be held liable for the actions of others, fair 

use protection is statutory. It resides in Section 107 of the Copyright Act, and represents the consolidation of hundreds of years of common law precedent in which 

courts protected against the abuse of copyright owners’ monopoly power. It has origins in our First Amendment, because free expression includes the right to build 

on the ideas and accomplishments of others. More generally, it represents the balance between protection and innovation that can be traced back to the granting 

clauses of our Constitution itself, in which the rights to patent and copyright protection are created for a limited time, to promote the progress of science and the useful 

arts. 

Fair use is a vital part of the bargain that our founders envisioned between artists and the public: artists get certain rights in the work they create; the public gets 

to use those works in fair and reasonable ways. Three years ago in Eldred v. 

Ashcroft, the Supreme Court said that fair use is not a triviality—it is one of the 

key provisions that keeps copyright law in harmony with the First Amendment. 

Fair use, the Court said, was a major reason why Congress had the discretion to 

extend the term of copyrights—because users’ rights and autonomy were preserved 

by fair use.3

The concept of fair use is almost uniquely American. In most other societies, unauthorized uses must be the subject of enumerated exceptions to the copyright laws. 

In a rapidly changing technological and consumer environment, this is far from 

ideal. The truly innovative, popular new products, things like digital video recorders 

and iPods, allow consumers to enjoy copyrighted works in ways that no one had anticipated. No legislature could hope to lay out specific copyright exemptions for products like those before they are invented, and without an exemption, even investing 

in the development of a new product becomes far too risky. I think it is fair to say 

that American technological leadership—particularly in the age of the Internet—has 

relied largely on the assurance that our fair use doctrine has given to innovators 

and venture capitalists. But this may be changing. 

26

4Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc. et al v. ReplayTV, Inc., U.S. District Court, Central District of California, Case No. 01-09801, Complaint of MGM, Orion Pictures, Twentieth Century 

Fox, Universal City Studios, and Fox Broadcasting, ¶¶ 24-25, November 14, 2001 (emphasis in 

original). Pleadings in this case can be found at http://www.eff.org/IP/Video/ParamountlvlReplayTV/. 

The Importance of Fair Use 

Until the Supreme Court’s Grokster decision this year, most innovators and venture capitalists had a concise view of the law as a ‘‘bright line’’ test, based on language in the 1984 Betamax decision: If a new product has or is capable of substantial non-infringing uses, it is lawful to put it on the market. In this construct, a 

product designer or manufacturer understood that any product that had or was likely to have substantial fair uses was lawful. The Grokster opinion, however, seems 

to have turned this formulation on its head: Whether an intention to ‘‘induce’’ a 

copyright violation is found may now depend on whether any uses of the product, 

if they are urged and enabled by the manufacturer, investor, or distributor, are 

deemed unlawful as a matter of copyright law. 

The idea that product innovators, investors, and consumers should have to live 

in a world of only those uses authorized, in advance, by copyright proprietors, was 

exactly what the Supreme Court in the Betamax case said it wished to avoid. Such 

a regime would subjugate the intellectual property rights of patent owners, granted 

in recognition of their promotion of new technology, to the more easily obtained 

rights of copyright proprietors. The Betamax Court said that such a result would 

‘‘choke the wheels of commerce.’’ In Grokster, the Court did not say that any such 

result would be preferable or justified. The Court pointed out that even though 

Sony’s advertising for the Betamax VCR promoted uses such as the ‘‘librarying’’ of 

programs, such consumer conduct was not ‘‘necessarily unlawful.’’ 

This is the essence of fair use—giving consumers, innovators, and manufacturers 

the benefit of the doubt that the private, reasonable activity of consumers, and the 

productive activity of those inspired by copyrighted works is not ‘‘necessarily unlawful.’’ Now that the Supreme Court, in order to get at some ‘‘purposeful, culpable’’ 

practices of free file sharing services, has cut down the other legal protections that 

technologists thought they enjoyed, fair use is all that stands between inventors, investors, and consumers and a world in which all new products must be fully authorized, in advance, by any owner or distributor of any copyrighted material that a new 

device is able to store, reproduce, communicate or perform. 

The Threat To Fair Use 

Even before the Grokster case, some major motion picture studios were unwilling 

to accept the notion that the modern successors to the VCR could be marketed on 

an unauthorized basis. A competitor to TiVo was sued into bankruptcy in a case in 

which a complaint by three major studios attacked the basic recording, indexing, 

and playback features of a consumer home recorder. An entire chapter of the complaint brought by MGM, Orion Pictures, Fox Film Corporation, Universal City Studios Productions, and Fox Broadcasting specifically attacks standard features, found 

on any PVR product, as ‘‘inducements’’ to copyright violation: 

‘‘Defendants cause, accomplish, facilitate and induce the unauthorized reproduction of Plaintiffs’’ copyrighted works in violation of law. *** The ReplayTV 4000 

device provides expanded storage, up to (currently) a massive 320 hour hard 

drive, which allows the unlawful copying and storage of a vast library of material. *** ReplayTV 4000’s expanded storage and sorting features organize disparate recordings into coherent collections, and cause, facilitate, induce and encourage the storage or ‘‘librarying’’ of digital copies of the copyrighted material, 

which harms the sale of DVDs, videocassettes and other copies, usurps Plaintiffs’ right to determine the degree of ‘‘air time’’ a particular program receives 

in various cycles of the program’s distribution....’’ 4

This year, elements of the recording industry have threatened suit against innovative new, portable products that have been announced for the Sirius and XM satellite radio services—despite the fact that these products fall squarely under the 

protection of the Audio Home Recording Act, under which royalties are paid to the 

music industry and there is an express immunity from copyright suit. The Recording Industry Association also is seeking legislation to empower the Federal Communications Commission to ‘‘lock down’’ the functions of consumer radio receivers for 

the new Digital Audio Broadcasting service. Forty-three years since the first audio 

cassette recorder came to the U.S. market, the recording industry still wants to 

deny consumers the ability to record radio programs in the privacy of their homes. 

In fact, just two weeks ago during an appearance down the hall from this hearing 

room, the head of the RIAA complained that ‘‘the one-way method of communication 

27

[enabled by HD radio] allows individuals to boldly engage in piracy with little fear 

of prosecution.’’ In other words, the RIAA believes that when you, your staff, and 

your constituents tape a song off the radio, you have engaged in piracy and ought 

to be criminally prosecuted. 

The campaign for copyright absolutism has not stopped with attacks on consumer 

devices and long-standing consumer practices. Just this year, major publishing 

groups filed suit against Google, which has been working with major university libraries, and others, to digitize libraries as a tool in aid of research and education. 

Google will not make entire works available without authorization, and will withdraw from the program any work as to which the copyright owner objects, these 

publishers, apparently, pursue this case only in the name of absolute control over 

use—a direct affront to the fair use doctrine. 

The Encroachment Of Other Laws 

In 1998 the Congress passed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (the ‘‘DMCA’’), 

which prohibits ‘‘circumvention’’ of technical measures used in aid of copyright protection. While this legislation made a bow toward the fair use doctrine, it did not 

clearly or explicitly provide that legality of the intended use under copyright law 

was a defense to violation of the DMCA. 

So, for example, a use that courts and commentators universally agree is fair—

such as time-shifting a TV program to watch later—can be effectively made illegal 

by adding a technical lock to prevent that use. Time-shifting is legal, but if a consumer would have to violate the DMCA in order to exercise his or her right to do 

it, then the right becomes meaningless. As presently written, the DMCA therefore 

allows a single company to violate the balance of fair and unfair uses that the courts 

have developed over the past century. This consequence, perhaps unintended, has 

caused concern and uncertainty among consumers, small businesses, educators, librarians, and others. As you know, Chairman Barton and Representatives—Boucher 

and Doolittle have introduced—H.R. 1201 to clarify the impact of the DMCA on the 

fair use doctrine, and to codify the elements of the Betamax case that were preserved by the Supreme Court in Grokster and—most presciently—to require that 

consumers be warned against Compact Discs to which copy protection technology 

has been applied. CEA and the HRRC have endorsed H.R. 1201 as a sensible way 

to preserve consumers’ autonomy and protect innovators in the 21st century. 

Fair Use and Personal Autonomy 

Americans believe they should be able to use the things they buy in whatever way 

they choose, as long as their use doesn’t injure others. We tinker with our cars. We 

put radios in the shower. We look for new ways to experience the content that we 

buy, the Internet that we use, and the new versions that we can create. The autonomy and the freedom to use what we buy is something we take for granted. 

For digital products like music, movies, and software, fair use is what gives us 

that freedom and autonomy, because every use of a digital product creates an incidental copy. Limiting fair use opens the door to copyright owners to enter our 

sphere of personal autonomy, and dictate how we can use the products that we buy 

within our own homes and vehicles. 

Americans who believe in speed limits still won’t buy a car that’s electronically 

blocked from going over 70 miles per hour. We trust people to use their cars responsibly; legal enforcement kicks in only when they don’t. For music, movies, the Internet, and the digital products we use every day, fair use is what gives us that trust 

and autonomy, within our personal sphere, and saves legal enforcement for those 

who, as the Supreme Court said in Grokster, engage in clearly culpable conduct. 

Fair Use And Creativity 

The last few years have seen the rebirth of the feature-length documentary as a 

popular and socially valuable art form. Yet, denying that fair use applies, copyright 

owners have demanded stiff royalties from documentary producers for every billboard, every whistled tune, and every cellphone ring that appears in their portrayals of real everyday life. Jonathan Caouette’s acclaimed documentary Tarnation, 

which showed at the Cannes and Sundance film festivals this year, cost $218 to 

produce but required tens of thousands in licensing fees for incidental appearances 

of copyrighted material. Fair use, as it exists today, can and should help filmmakers 

like Jonathan Caouette get a fair deal. All that’s missing is that these filmmakers 

know their rights and are not bullied into giving them up. 

Even if one will never become a film producer or a songwriter, the First Amendment protects our rights to receive expression, as well as to send it. A fully informed 

citizenry is at the core of our democracy. We cannot afford to have our information 

and, indeed, our own history, managed by corporations on a 100 percent authorized 

28

5The legal rationale for such control is grounded in the copyright concerns of content providers. 6See, http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/19/busi

ness/19film.html?ex=1127793600&en=fb357f94a7634723&ei=5070&emc=eta1

basis any more than we can afford to have our technology and innovation managed 

that way. 

Fair Use Is A Check On Monopoly Power 

Given the relatively small number of mass media companies, and their size, it is 

daunting enough for a single corporation to control, in seeming perpetuity, a large 

portion of our cultural and historical heritage. It is even more daunting when these 

corporations band together as industry groups, and insist on the right to prescribe 

how their content will be enjoyed, and the technologies that can and cannot be used 

whenever any of their collective content is involved. We do not believe that either 

the Congress or the Supreme Court has envisioned them enjoying such power, but 

already they do. 

Already, content providers and distributors have been moving to announce in ad- vance that they will ‘‘license’’ only technologies and techniques that are satisfactory 

to them, and will not license, or will challenge, others. Already, the ability of competitive manufacturers to benefit from a 1996 Telecommunications Act provision 

that Rep. Markey and former Chairman Bliley introduced, to assure that competitive products can work directly on digital cable and satellite systems, has been 

slowed by the centralized control over product licensing by a technology consortium 

owned by the cable industry, ‘‘CableLabs.’’ 5

In September, the motion picture industry announced that is forming a similar 

central laboratory, reporting directly to the CEOs of the major motion picture companies: ‘‘MovieLabs.’’ The purpose of MovieLabs, according to statements attributed 

to a senior studio executive, is to fill ‘‘gaps in research on content protection left 

by consumer electronics companies and Silicon Valley.’’ 6 In reality, though, the market for such new ‘‘DRM’’ technologies has been highly competitive and more than 

robust. Something more seems to be going on. 

Thus far, DRM technologies have been licensed by the technology companies that 

develop them. Often, these companies are also developers of consumer products, and 

are reluctant to impose limitations on the usefulness of these products to consumers. Therefore they have negotiated with content providers about the nature and 

level of ‘‘protections’’ to be applied. In resisting the power of movie and cable monopolists who have complete control over product distribution, their only argument has 

been based on fair use—not necessarily as a consumer right to engage in specific 

practices, but as a public policy expectation, deeply engrained in our law and jurisprudence, that consumers and technologists must be afforded space and freedom 

consonant with their roles in our society. 

These negotiations have escalated to congressional and regulatory proceedings. 

The only technology mandate in the DMCA, Section 1201(k), requires that certain 

analog VCRs to respond to Macrovision copy protection technology. It is, however, 

limited by ‘‘encoding rules’’ that strictly govern when this technology can and cannot 

be triggered. Similarly, the FCC’s ‘‘Plug & Play’’ regulations for ‘‘Digital Cable 

Ready’’ devices acknowledge that an industry-wide license for products to attach to 

digital cable systems requires the mandatory application of certain copy protection 

technologies, but also strictly limits the circumstances in which these technologies 

can be triggered. 

These ‘‘encoding rules’’ do not state or approximate judicial outcomes; they are, 

rather, a set of expectations based on public policy. They are enormously difficult 

to negotiate and maintain in the face of the demands of copyright proprietors to control and specifically authorize every conceivable use of their products. In the case 

of the FCC regulations, the outcomes are open to review by the Commission whenever there is a new service, or a petition for a rule change. And the music industry—which negotiated the very first set of encoding rules with us and the Congress 

as part of the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992—is now trying to ignore the very 

AHRA rules it agreed to. It is asking the Congress for different and harsher impositions in new legislation, governing satellite and terrestrial broadcasts, that the industry has proposed to the House Judiciary Committee. 

It is only through the vitality of the fair use doctrine as a political expression of 

public policy that the concerted might and licensing pressure of the industries that 

sell and distribute content can be brought into some balance. This involves, of 

course, maintaining the vitality of Section 107 in the courts. It also requires, however, that the Congress maintain a legislative and policy balance with fair use in 

mind—

29

• That the Congress not conflate instances of mass, indiscriminate and anonymous 

redistribution of works over the Internet with the right of individuals and family groups to enjoy content in a modern and flexible home or family network 

that may embrace households in different regions. 

• That the Congress should not allow the technical tools to create and maintain 

such home networks to fall under the exclusive control of those who sell or distribute content, solely by virtue of their effective or concerted copyright monopolies. 

This Committee has played a key role in preventing or limiting such abuses. By 

holding today’s hearing on the fair use doctrine, your Committee and this Subcommittee continue their leadership in protecting the American public, American innovation, and American culture. On behalf of CEA and the Home Recording Rights 

Coalition, I again thank you for holding this hearing, and pledge our continued cooperation with you and your staffs.

Mr. STEARNS. Ms. Adler? 

STATEMENT OF PRUDENCE S. ADLER 

Ms. ADLER. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Schakowsky, and 

members of the subcommittee, I am Prudence Adler and I am 

speaking today on behalf of the Library Copyright Alliance or LCA. 

The LCA consists of five major library associations that represent 

over 139,000 libraries employing 350,000 librarians and other personnel throughout the United States. Our Nation’s libraries spend 

over $2 billion each year on all forms of information, thus we seek 

to ensure that our patrons have effective and long term access to 

these information resources. 

Thank you for including libraries in this hearing today on fair 

use. Fair use is central to our ability to achieve many facets of our 

library missions. Each day teachers, students learn, researchers 

advance knowledge, and consumers access copyrighted information 

due to exceptions in the Copyright Act such as fair use. For libraries and for consumers the fair use doctrine is the most important 

limitation on the rights of the copyright owners. It is the safety 

valve if you will of the U.S. Copyright Law for consumers. 

Fair use balances the rights of authors, publishers, and copyright 

owners with society’s need for the free exchange of ideas. Fair use 

provides the basis for our most important day to day activities in 

scholarship and education and safeguards our collective interest in 

the flow of information. Fair use has served us well because there 

is no fair use checklist. Importantly there is no bright line for fair 

use. Fair use is accessible, fair use is dynamic, it is inherently ambiguous and not easily defined but critically important in ensuring 

legitimate access to copyrighted work. 

In addition to fair use by library patrons on a daily basis, libraries also reply upon fair use to support a number of our activities 

such as print and electronic reserve and increasingly and more recently the digitization of copyrighted work. 

Publishers more recently have relied upon the licensing of copyrighted work in lieu of the acquisition of those works. Licensing 

provides publishers with greater control in the use of their work. 

How they are used, by whom, and at what cost. Under license 

agreements, a library is bound by the terms of that agreement and 

these agreements do not always reflect the exception and privileges 

of the copyright act such as fair use. 

As a result, we are witnessing an erosion of fair use and related 

library exceptions as licensing and technological controls built into 

30

licensed data bases can restrict the fair use rights of library users 

and of libraries. For example, technological controls can limit the 

numbers of copies of an article or the amount of text reproduced. 

It is important to note that once technological controls are built 

into a data base with copyrighted materials, it is very difficult if 

not impossible for libraries to negotiate exceptions in our license 

agreement. 

Moreover, if a license does not permit the preservation of copyrighted work and a library cannot exercise fair use through the license terms copyrighted works will be lost to future generations. 

Publishers had not undertaken preservation of copyrighted work. 

Instead it is libraries that preserve these works for future users. 

That is why the library community is a strong supporter of legislation to address these concerns, H.R. 1201. 

In closing, fair use reflects copyrights laws first amendment 

based principles of free speech and provides the basis for our most 

important day-to-day activities. Fair use safeguards our collected 

interest, our Nation’s interest in the flow of information which is 

in turn a source of cultural, historical, and economically valuable 

matters. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Prudence S. Adler follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF PRUDENCE S. ADLER, ASSOCIATION OF RESEARCH

LIBRARIES ON BEHALF OF THE LIBRARY COPYRIGHT ALLIANCE

My name is Prudence Adler and I am speaking today on behalf of the Library 

Copyright Alliance or LCA. The LCA consists of five major library associations—the 

American Association of Law Libraries, the American Library Association, the Association of Research Libraries, the Medical Library Association, and the Special Libraries Association. These five associations collectively represent over 139,000 libraries employing over 350,000 librarians and other personnel throughout the 

United States. These five associations cooperate in the LCA to address copyright 

issues that affect libraries and their patrons. Our Nation’s libraries spend over two 

billion dollars each year on all forms of information; thus we seek to ensure that 

our patrons have effective and long-term access to these information resources. 

Thank you for including libraries in this hearing today on fair use. Fair use is 

central to our ability to achieve many facets of our missions. Libraries are essential 

to the communities that they serve and to our Nation. Libraries preserve and provide access to our cultural, historical and scientific heritage; support and encourage 

research, education and lifelong learning; and provide a venue for community engagement on a host of issues. 

Libraries, like many other sectors, are undergoing significant transformation in 

this rapidly evolving digital environment. Today, researchers, students and members of the public can engage in sophisticated searching and manipulation of information including ready access to data, sound and image files, and more. Increasingly, the data and information available is both current and historical as many libraries, and others such as Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and the Internet Archive, 

digitize special collections that richly reflect the cultural and political history of our 

Nation. 

In this time of transformation, intellectual property policies have been and will 

continue to be central to the library community. Historically, the library community 

has relied on copyright law as the policy framework for balancing the competing interests of creators, publishers, and users of copyrighted works. Copyright law balances the rights of authors, publishers and copyright owners with society’s need for 

the free exchange of ideas. Provisions in the Copyright Act including fair use and 

related exemptions for libraries and educational institutions allow libraries to 

achieve our mission of providing effective public access to and the preservation of 

information in all formats. 

Each day teachers teach, students learn, researchers advance knowledge, and consumers access copyrighted information due to exemptions in the Copyright Act such 

as fair use. Fair use permits the use of copyrighted material without permission 

from the copyright holder under certain circumstances. For libraries and indeed for 

31

consumers, the Fair Use Doctrine is the most important limitation on the rights of 

the copyright owner—the ‘‘safety valve’’ of U.S. copyright law for consumers. 

Fair use or Section 107 of the Copyright Act allows reproduction and other uses 

of copyrighted works for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, 

teaching, scholarship and research. The statute sets forth four factors to be considered in determining whether a use is fair; including the character of the use, the 

nature of the work, the amount used in proportion to the whole, and the impact on 

the market for the work. Fair use has served us well because there is no fair use 

checklist. The four factors provide libraries and users alike with needed flexibility. 

And there is no need to import from other sections of the law the detailed list of 

conditions, prohibitions, and exclusions such as those found in the TEACH Act concerning distance education. Importantly, there is no bright line for fair use. Thus, 

fair use is dynamic, inherently ambiguous and not easily defined but critically important in ensuring legitimate access to copyrighted works. 

Library patrons routinely rely on fair use. A teacher, for example, might photocopy a few pages of a history text found in a library to hand out to her class. A 

student may include in a term paper a quotation from a novel checked out of a library while a researcher might give a copy of a journal article describing a laboratory technique to a technician who works for her. A small business owner may print 

out accounting tips from a website he accesses from a library computer. These are 

fair uses of copyrighted works. 

In addition to fair uses by library patrons, libraries rely upon fair use in support 

of a number of library activities. While U.S. copyright law does contain explicit exceptions for libraries and archives in Section 108, these exceptions do not cover 

every circumstance under which a library might need to use a work. Section 108 

specifically provides that ‘‘[n]othing in this section . . . in any way affects the right 

of fair use as provided by section 107 . . .’’ For example, library practices for both 

print and electronic reserves are based on fair use. 

For decades, libraries have provided access to materials selected by faculty as required or recommended course readings in a designated area of the library, with 

materials available to students for a short loan period and perhaps with additional 

restrictions to ensure that all students have access to the material. These materials 

are important to the course but do not warrant the purchase of an entire text by 

the student. Libraries have based these reserve reading room operations on the fair 

use provisions of the Copyright Act. 

More recently, as with other services, many libraries have introduced electronic 

reserves (e-reserves) systems that permit material to be stored in electronic form 

and accessed in the library or remotely by the student enrolled in the course. Ereserves systems are a more effective means to provide student access to needed 

copyrighted materials. E-reserves are an excellent example of the flexibility of fair 

use and demonstrate that it is technologically neutral in its application. 

Within the past decade, there has been a notable shift by publishers to license 

their works to libraries in lieu of the purchase of these works by libraries. Licensing 

provides publishers with greater control in the use of their works—how they are 

used, by whom and at what cost. Licensing access to copyrighted works versus the 

acquisition of the copyrighted work by libraries presents new challenges to both libraries and their patrons. Under license agreements, a library is bound by the 

terms of the agreement. These agreements do not necessarily reflect the privileges 

and exceptions of the Copyright Act such as fair use, preservation and interlibrary 

loan. For example, if libraries are unable through negotiation to include in the license terms the ability to perform preservation on copyrighted works, libraries can 

no longer exercise the rights that are otherwise available through the Copyright Act. 

Licensing and technological controls built into a licensed database can restrict the 

fair use rights of library users in a number of ways. Technological controls can limit 

the number of copies of an article copied or the amount of text reproduced. These 

amounts are controlled by the printing and downloading commands of the licensed 

database. Once technological controls are built into a database with copyrighted materials, it becomes difficult if not impossible for libraries to negotiate exceptions. 

Although libraries may preserve copyrighted works under Section 108 of the 

Copyright Act, there may be times that libraries choose to preserve copyrighted 

works under Section 107, Fair Use. If a license does not permit the preservation of 

copyrighted works and a library cannot exercise fair use due to the license terms 

and/or technological controls, copyrighted works will be lost to future generations. 

Publishers have not undertaken preservation of copyrighted works. Instead, it is libraries that preserve these works for future users. 

In closing, fair use serves a critically important role in the library and educational 

arena and in all sectors, both public and private. Fair use, in addition to reflecting 

in copyright law First Amendment-based principles of free speech, provides the 

32

basis for our most important day-to-day activities in scholarship and education. Fair 

use safeguards our collective interest in the flow of information—which is, in turn, 

a source of culturally and economically valuable knowledge.

Mr. STEARNS. Mr. Band? 

STATEMENT OF JONATHAN BAND 

Mr. BAND. Chairman Stearns, Ranking Member Schakowsky, 

and members of the subcommittee, NetCoalition appreciates this 

opportunity to testify on the importance of fair use through the 

internet. 

NetCoalition members believe in strong intellectual property protection. They own copyrights, patents, and trademarks and enforce 

them vigorously. Indeed, their most valuable assets are intellectual 

property. At the same time, NetCoalition members believe that 

overprotection of intellectual property is as harmful as under protection. Congress and the courts have carefully structured the copyright law to maintain the balance between the interest of authors 

and the control of their writings and supplied its competing interests in the free flow of ideas, information, and commerce. 

Fair use is an important means by which the copyright law 

maintains this balance. Fair use is particularly important in the 

digital environment where even the most basic functions require 

computers to make copies. Almost every activity on the internet involves copying, viewing a website, printing out a new article, responding to an email including an image from a website in a book 

report. I will provide three instances where fair use plays a critical 

role for internet companies, search engines, software development, 

and on line creativity. I then will discuss on threat to fair use. 

Search engines depend on fair use in their daily operations. A 

search engine firm sends out a software spider that crawls to 

websites and copies vast quantities of data into the search engine’s 

data base. As a practical matter, each major search engine copies 

a large percentage of the entire worldwide web every few weeks to 

keep the data base current. Significantly, the search engines conduct all this copying without the permission of the website operators. The search engines believe that fair use permits this copying. 

In other words, the billions of dollars of market capital represented 

by the search engine companies are based primarily on fair use. 

The fair use status of search engines has been considered in one 

case, Kelly v. Arriba Soft. There the Ninth Circuit concluded that 

fair use allowed the copying performed by a search engine. We will 

be hearing from the Authors Guild about the Google print library 

project. At this point, I would like to just say that Google will only 

be displaying short snippets of copyright books to users. Also any 

copyright owner can opt out of the project simply by asking Google 

not to scan his book into its data base. Because of the snippets and 

the opt out Google print will not harm any authors and should be 

considered a fair use by the court. 

Fair use is also critical to the inner workings of the internet. The 

interoperability between the many components that make up the 

internet can often be achieved only if developers through reverse 

engine the different software components. Software reverse engineering typically requires the making of temporary copies. Several 

courts have found that fair use permits this copying. Fair use faciliVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00036 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
33

tates political and artistic discourse on the internet. Bloggers for 

example frequently quote from articles or other bloggers. The internet is also full of parody. NetCoalition members encourage and 

benefit from this robust creative activity. 

Entertainment companies understandably seek to prevent infringement of their works through the use of Digital Right Management Systems. But such DRM’s typically preclude both fair and unfair uses. As DRM’s become more pervasive, Congress may need to 

consider mechanisms for preserving fair use. Additionally, Congress should exercise great care before mandating DRM’s. Such 

technological mandates will not only limit fair use, they will also 

impede innovation. 

In sum, as Congress fashions policies to protect the entertainment industry from large scale infringement over digital networks 

it must take care not to prevent lawful uses that enrich our lives. 

Thank you for your attention. 

[The prepared statement of Jonathan Band follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF JONATHAN BAND ON BEHALF OF NETCOALITION

NetCoalition appreciates this opportunity to testify before the subcommittee on 

the importance of fair use to the Internet. NetCoalition represents some of the 

Internet’s most innovative companies, including Bloomberg, CNET Networks, 

Google, Interactive Corp., and Yahoo!. NetCoalition members believe in strong intellectual property protection. They own copyrights, patents, and trademarks, and enforce them vigorously. Indeed, their most valuable assets are intellectual property. 

At the same time, NetCoalition members agree with Judge Alex Kozinski that 

overprotection of intellectual property is as harmful as underprotection. See White 

v. Samsung Electronics, 989 F.2d 1512 (9th Cir.)(Kozinski, J., dissenting), cert. denied, 113 S.Ct. 2443 (1993). The Supreme Court explains that the intellectual property system requires a ‘‘balance between the interests of authors and inventors in 

the control and exploitation of their writings and discoveries on the one hand, and 

society’s competing interest in the free flow of ideas, information, and commerce on 

the other.’’ Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studio, Inc., 464 U.S. 417, 429 (1984). 

Congress and the courts have carefully structured the copyright law to maintain 

this balance. Thus, while ‘‘copyright protection subsists . . . in original works of authorship fixed in any tangible medium of expression,’’ copyright does not ‘‘extend to 

any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery . . .’’ 17 U.S.C. 102. Similarly, the Supreme Court in Feist v. Rural Telephone, 

499 U.S. 340 (1991), stated that ‘‘the most fundamental axiom of copyright law’’ is 

‘‘that no one may copyright facts . . .’’ Id. at 353. Accordingly, ‘‘raw facts may be copied at will.’’ Id. at 349. 

The fair use doctrine is another means by which the copyright law balances ‘‘the 

competing concerns of providing incentive to authors to create and of fostering competition in such creativity.’’ Kern River Gas Transmission Co. v. Coastal Corp., 899 

F,2d 1458, 1463 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 952 (1990). The Supreme Court 

has described fair use as an ‘‘equitable rule of reason which permits courts to avoid 

rigid application of the copyright statute when, on occasion, it would stifle the very 

creativity which that law is designed to foster.’’ Stewart v. Abend, 495 U.S. 207, 237 

(1990). Just two years ago, Justice Ginsburg termed fair use as one of copyright 

law’s ‘‘built-in First Amendment accommodations . . .’’ Eldred v. Ashcroft, 123 S.Ct. 

769, 788 (2003). 

Fair use is particularly important in the digital environment, where even the 

most basic functions require computers to make copies. For example, for a user to 

view a website, the user’s computer must make a temporary copy of the website in 

its random access memory. Almost every other activity on the Internet also involves 

the making of a copy: printing out an interesting article; responding to an email; 

including an image downloaded from a website in an elementary school book report. 

The balance of my testimony will address three instances where fair use plays a 

critical role for Internet companies: search engines, software development, and online creativity. My testimony then will discuss some of the threats to fair use. 

34

FAIR USE AND SEARCH ENGINES

Internet companies rely on fair use in their daily operations. This reliance is most 

apparent with search engines, the basic tool that allows users to find information 

on the Internet. A search engine firm sends out software ‘‘spiders’’ that crawl publicly accessible websites and copy vast quantities of data into the search engine’s 

database. As a practical matter, each of the major search engine companies copies 

a large (and increasing) percentage of the entire World Wide Web every few weeks 

to keep the database current and comprehensive. When a user issues a query, the 

search engine searches the websites stored in its database for relevant information. 

The response provided to the user typically contains links both to the original site 

as well as to the ‘‘cache’’ copy of the website stored in the search engine’s database. 

Significantly, the search engines conduct this vast amount of copying without the 

authority of the website operators. Although the search engines will respect an exclusion header, a software ‘‘Do Not Enter Sign’’ posted by a website operator, the 

search engines does not ask for permission before they enter websites and copy their 

contents. Rather, the search engine firms believe that the fair use doctrine permits 

their activities. In other words, the billions of dollars of market capital represented 

by the search engine companies are based primarily on the fair use doctrine. 

KELLY V. ARRIBA SOFT

The application of fair use to search engines has been considered in one case—

Kelly v. Arriba Soft, 336 F.3d 811 (9th Cir. 2003). There, the Ninth Circuit concluded that the fair use doctrine permitted the copying performed by search engines. 

Arriba Soft operated a search engine for Internet images. Arriba compiled a database of images by copying pictures from websites, without the express authorization 

of the website operators. Arriba reduced the full size images into thumbnails, which 

it stored in its database. In response to a user query, the Arriba search engine displayed responsive thumbnails. If a user clicked on one of the thumbnails, she was 

linked to the full size image on the original website from which the image had been 

copied. Kelly, a photographer, discovered that some of the photographs from his 

website were in the Arriba search database, and he sued for copyright infringement. 

The lower court found that Arriba’s reproduction of the photographs was a fair use, 

and the Ninth Circuit affirmed. 

With respect to the first of the four fair use factors, ‘‘the purpose and character 

of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature,’’ 17 U.S.C. 

§ 107(1), the Ninth Circuit acknowledged that Arriba operated its site for commercial purposes. However, Arriba’s use of Kelly’s images 

was more incidental and less exploitative in nature than more traditional types 

of commercial use. Arriba was neither using Kelly’s images to directly promote 

its web site nor trying to profit by selling Kelly’s images. Instead, Kelly’s images 

were among thousands of images in Arriba’s search engine database. Because 

the use of Kelly’s images was not highly exploitative, the commercial nature of 

the use weighs only slightly against a finding of fair use. 

Kelly at 818. 

The court then considered the transformative nature of the use—whether Arriba’s 

use merely superseded the object of the originals or instead added a further purpose 

or different character. The court concluded that ‘‘the thumbnails were much smaller, 

lower resolution images that served an entirely different function than Kelly’s original images.’’ Id. While Kelly’s ‘‘images are artistic works intended to inform and engage the viewer in an aesthetic experience,’’ Arriba’s search engine ‘‘functions as a 

tool to help index and improve access to images on the internet . . .’’ Id. Further, 

users were unlikely to enlarge the thumbnails to use them for aesthetic purposes 

because they were of lower resolution and thus could not be enlarged without significant loss of clarity. In distinguishing other judicial decisions, the Ninth Circuit 

stressed that ‘‘[t]his case involves more than merely a transmission of Kelly’s images 

in a different medium. Arriba’s use of the images serves a different function than 

Kelly’s use—improving access to information on the internet versus artistic expression.’’ Id. at 819. The court closed its discussion of the first fair use factor by concluding that Arriba’s ‘‘use of Kelly’s images promotes the goals of the Copyright Act 

and the fair use exception’’ because the thumbnails ‘‘do not supplant the need for 

the originals’’ and they ‘‘benefit the public by enhancing information gathering techniques on the internet.’’ Id. at 820. 

With respect to the second fair use factor, the nature of the copyrighted work, the 

Ninth Circuit observed that ‘‘[w]orks that are creative in nature are closer to the 

core of intended copyright protection than are more fact-based works.’’ Kelly at 820. 

Moreover, ‘‘[p]ublished works are more likely to qualify as fair use because the first 

appearance of the artist’s expression has already occurred.’’ Id. Kelly’s works were 

35

creative, but published. Accordingly, the Ninth Circuit concluded that the second 

factor weighed only slightly in favor of Kelly. 

The third fair use factor is ‘‘the amount and substantiality of the portion used in 

relation to the copyrighted work as a whole.’’ 17 U.S.C. § 107(3). The Ninth Circuit 

recognized that ‘‘copying an entire work militates against a finding of fair use.’’ 

Kelly at 820. Nonetheless, the court states that ‘‘the extent of permissible copying 

varies with the purpose and character of the use.’’ Id. Thus, ‘‘if the secondary user 

only copies as much as is necessary for his or her intended use, then this factor will 

not weigh against him or her.’’ Id. at 820-21. In Kelly, this factor weighed in favor 

of neither party: 

although Arriba did copy each of Kelly’s images as a whole, it was reasonable 

to do so in light of Arriba’s use of the images. It was necessary for Arriba to 

copy the entire image to allow users to recognize the image and decide whether 

to pursue more information about the image or the originating web site. If 

Arriba copied only part of the image, it would be more difficult to identify it, 

thereby reducing the usefulness and effectiveness of the visual search engine. 

Kelly at 821. 

The Ninth Circuit decided that the fourth factor, ‘‘the effect of the use upon the 

potential market for or value of the copyrighted work,’’ 17 U.S.C. § 107(4), weighed 

in favor of Arriba. The court found that the Arriba ‘‘search engine would guide users 

to Kelly’s web site rather than away from it.’’ Kelly at 821. Additionally, the thumbnail images would not harm Kelly’s ability to sell or license full size images because 

the low resolution of the thumbnails effectively prevented their enlargement. 

Are other circuits likely to reach the same conclusion as the Ninth Circuit when 

reviewing the copying performed by search engines? They are, because the Ninth 

Circuit’s fair use analysis relied heavily on the Supreme Court’s most recent fair 

use decision, Campbell v. Acuff-Rose, Music, Inc., 510 U.S. 569 (1994). Thus, Kelly 

correctly noted that Campbell held that ‘‘[t]he more transformative the new work, 

the less important the other factors, including commercialism, become.’’ Kelly at 

818, citing Campbell at 579. Likewise, Kelly cited Campbell for the proposition that 

‘‘the extent of permissible copying varies with the purpose and character of the use.’’ 

Kelly at 820, citing Campbell at 586-87. And Kelly followed Campbell’s conclusion 

that ‘‘[a] transformative work is less likely to have an adverse impact on the market 

for the original than a work that merely supersedes the copyrighted work.’’ Kelly 

at 821, citing Campbell at 591. Perhaps most importantly, Kelly repeated the Supreme Court’s articulation in Campbell and Stewart v. Abend, 495 U.S. 207, 236 

(1990), of the objective of the fair use doctrine: ‘‘This exception ‘permits courts to 

avoid rigid application of the copyright statute when, on occasion, it would stifle the 

very creativity which that law is designed to foster.’ ’’ Kelly at 817. 

FAIR USE AND SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT

Fair use is also critical to the inner workings of the Internet. A user’s computer 

can access information stored on a distant server only because the software on the 

user’s computer, on the server, and on all the computers in between, can communicate with one another. This interoperability often can be achieved only if the software developer can reverse engineer the products with which it seek to communicate. And because of the nature of software, this reverse engineering, this studying of the operation of an existing product, can require the making of temporary 

copies or translations of the existing program. Several courts have concluded that 

fair use permits the copying that occurs during the course of software reverse engineering. See Sega v. Accolade, 977 F.2d 1510 (9th Cir. 1992); Atari v. Nintendo, 975 

F.2d 832 (Fed. Cir. 1992); Sony v. Connectix, 203 F.3d 596 (9th Cir. 2000). 

FAIR USE AND CREATIVITY ON THE INTERNET

The Supreme Court has observed that the Internet is ‘‘a unique and wholly new 

medium of worldwide communication.’’ Reno v. ACLU, 521 U.S. 844 (1997). It ‘‘constitutes a vast platform from which to address and hear from a worldwide audience 

of millions of readers, viewers, researchers and buyers.’’ Id. at 853. The Court marveled at the ‘‘vast democratic fora of the Internet,’’ id. at 868, including thousands 

of newsgroups, ‘‘each serving to foster an exchange of information or opinion on a 

particular topic running the gamut from, say, the music of Wagner to Balkan politics to AIDS prevention to the Chicago Bulls.’’ Id. at 851. Much of the commentary 

on newgroups and blogs involves quotations from articles or other commentators. Or 

it may consist of parodies of speeches or songs. Fair use makes this vital form of 

political and artistic speech lawful. And hyperlinking technology allows the commentator to link back to the original work. In this manner, the transformative fair 

36

use provides wider distribution to the original work. NetCoalition members encourage—and benefit from—this robust creative activity. 

THREATS TO FAIR USE

Entertainment companies understandably seek to prevent infringement of their 

works through the use of digital rights management systems. But such DRMs typically preclude fair uses as well as unlawful ones. As DRMs become more pervasive, 

Congress may need to consider mechanisms for preserving fair use. Additionally, 

Congress should exercise great care before mandating DRMs. Such technological 

mandates will not only limit fair use; they will also impede innovation. These activities permitted by the fair use doctrine must be distinguished from the unauthorized 

widespread distribution of entertainment content such as sound recordings and motion pictures. 

In sum, as Congress fashions policies to protect the entertainment industry from 

large-scale infringement over digital networks, it must take care not to prevent lawful uses that enrich our lives. The Supreme Court in a related context cautioned 

that ‘‘the interest in encouraging freedom of expression in a democratic society outweighs any theoretical but unproven benefit of censorship.’’ Id.

Mr. STEARNS. Ms. Sohn? 

STATEMENT OF GIGI B. SOHN 

Ms SOHN. Chairman Stearns, Ranking Member Schakowsky, and 

members of the subcommittee, thank you for inviting me to participate in this very important hearing. 

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Public Knowledge, we 

are a non-profit organization that is dedicated among other things 

to ensuring that copyright laws are balanced. And balanced is the 

hallmark of our copyright system and fair use is a key component 

of that balance. The ability to access and use copyrighted works for 

certain limited uses has been a driver of creativity, technological 

innovation, and the broad dissemination of knowledge. For consumers, fair use has resulted in a greater choice of movies, music, 

videogames, and computer software, a wider variety of useful and 

inexpensive gadgets on which to play that content, and the ability 

to quickly and cheaply create their own contents which is happening more and more these days. 

But fair use is in great peril. For the past decade, the fair use 

rights of consumers, your constituents have been chipped away little by little. While technology has advanced and consumers have 

come to expect that they can enjoy the content they buy when and 

where they want where at the same time seeing a dedicated and 

forceful campaign to restrict what consumers can lawfully do with 

that content. 

The content industries have employed a variety of strategies in 

the campaign against fair use. First, their successfully championed 

Digital Millennium Copyright Act which prohibits the circumvention of technological protection measures even for lawful uses. Second, many content owners employ restrictive and user license 

agreements which limit fair use. Third, the industries are seeking 

Government mandated technological protection measures like the 

broadcast flag and digital radio content protection which would restrict a variety of fair uses of digital, TV, and radio and would 

make once interoperable devices incompatible. Finally the content 

industries have promoted permissions culture in which even the 

most incidental use of a copyrighted work requires a high licensing 

fee or leads to a lawsuit. 

37

What has the shrinking of fair use meant for consumers? Here 

are just some of the lawful personal uses that prohibited under the 

current regime, ripping songs from a copy protected CD, their personal computers, or an mp3 player; making a digital copy of a DVD 

for playback on a video iPod, cell phone, or other portable device; 

making a backup copy of a copy protected CD or DVD; playing legally download music on a competing mp3 player or computer; and 

removing from a computer malicious digital rights management 

tools like the now infamous Sony-BMG rootkit DRM. And let me 

just say a word about the DRM because I think there is a lesson 

here. My organization does not oppose digital rights management 

as long as it is marketplace driven as opposed to Government driven. 

The lesson to be learned there is that consumers did not like the 

restrictions and the spyware in that DRM and they were outraged 

and it caused Sony to pull that DRM from the shelf. This is in contrast to the iTunes fair play DRM which people have accepted for 

limits in that DRM. If you have a Government mandated digital 

rights management scheme like the broadcast flag for radio content 

protection, consumers cannot protect themselves in the marketplace or express themselves in the marketplace. 

So I urge you to reject all efforts in Government mandated technological protection measures. This committee has a great responsibility to make sure that innovation will not be stifled and that consumers will have the broadest legal use of their digital media and 

technology as is possible. I urge you to reject the premise that your 

constituents are pirates and thieves and that they will not buy digital content if it were provided to them at a reasonable price and 

with the flexibility they have come to expect. Indeed, they already 

do purchase such content. For example, DVD sales and rentals last 

year totaled $25 billion and in just a matter of weeks of its launch, 

iTunes sold $1 million TV programs for use on the video iPod. An 

RIA chief, Mitch Bainwol recently predicted that legitimate online 

song purchases could surpass CD retail markets by 2007. 

In my written testimony, I have supplied four suggestions for actions you can take to reinvigorate fair use in the digital age. The 

most important of these is to reform the DMCA so that it permits 

circumvention solely for lawful purposes. Congress can address this 

in two ways. It can pass legislation like H.R. 1201 which specifically permits such legal activity and it can clarify and strengthen 

the DMCA’s triennial review process. Congress intended, expressly 

intended that this process be the fail safe mechanism that protected lawful uses from the unintended consequences of the DMCA, 

some of which we have heard about today. Instead, it has become 

a futile exercise for merely everyone seeking an exemption no matter how worthy. 

I urge the subcommittee to hold hearings on the triennial review 

process and a copyright office’s standard for granting exemption. 

Thank you again for the opportunity to testify today. I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Gigi B. Sohn follows:]

38

1Sony v. Universal City Studios, 464 US 417, 463 (1984). 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF GIGI B. SOHN, PRESIDENT, PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE

Chairman Stearns, Ranking Member Schakowsky and other members of the Subcommittee, my name is Gigi B. Sohn. I am the President of Public Knowledge, a 

nonprofit public interest organization that addresses the public’s stake in the convergence of communications policy and intellectual property law. I want to thank 

the Subcommittee for inviting me to testify on the vitally important issue of fair use 

and its impact on consumers and industry. 

SUMMARY

The hallmark of our copyright system is balance—creators and publishers receive 

a limited monopoly in their works in exchange for providing the public rights of access to those works. Fair use is a key component of that balance—permitting individuals to make limited, but important uses of copyrighted works without having 

to ask permission of the copyright holder. 

For over two hundred years, this balance, aided by fair use, has served creators, 

educators, libraries, consumers and the content and technology industries very well. 

It has resulted in greater creativity, greater innovation and greater consumer 

choice, and has invigorated the U.S. economy both for creative goods and technology. 

Over the past decade, however, a number of legal, technological and marketplace 

efforts by the content industry have put fair use in great peril. These efforts include 

laws like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which prohibits circumvention of 

technological protection measures even for lawful uses; end user license agreements 

(EULAs), that restrict fair use; government-imposed technology mandates like the 

broadcast flag, which put agencies like the Federal Communications Commission in 

charge of determining what technologies consumers can use to receive digital television and which also restrict fair uses of digital TV; and the rise of business practices that shrink fair use by requiring expensive licensing fees or denying permission for even the most incidental uses of copyrighted works. 

Congress can, and must, revitalize fair use for the digital age. While my list is 

not comprehensive, I suggest four places where Congress can start: 1) ensure that 

the DMCA protects fair use, whether it be through legislation such as H.R. 1201 

or by instructing the Copyright Office to follow the express intent of Congress that 

the triennial review be a ‘‘fail-safe’’ mechanism the purpose of which is to protect 

non-infringing uses; 2) reject any and all efforts to impose government-mandated 

copy protection; 3) pass legislation that protects individuals who make a good faith 

effort to locate copyright holders who cannot be found and 4) monitor the Google 

Print litigation and other related matters to ensure that search engines can continue to do what they do best—provide consumers with a comprehensive ‘‘card catalogue’’ of all the world’s information—whether the information is online or offline. 

CONSUMERS, CREATORS AND INDUSTRY ALL BENEFIT FROM A STRONG AND VITAL FAIR

USE DOCTRINE. 

Ever since the framers of the Constitution gave Congress the ability ‘‘to promote 

the progress of science and the useful arts by securing for limited times to authors 

and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries . . .’’ the 

hallmark of our copyright system has been balance. That balance ensures both 

strong protection for copyrighted works and unauthorized access to those works for 

certain limited uses. As the Supreme Court has stated ‘‘[t]his protection has never 

accorded the copyright owner complete control over all possible uses of his work.’’ 1

The idea behind this balance was simple—the framers understood that giving individuals the ability to access protected works would lead to even greater creativity 

and innovation. 

One of the key guardians of this balance is fair use. Fair use is a doctrine developed in common law and codified at 17 USC § 107 that permits individuals to make 

certain limited uses of copyrighted works without seeking permission from the copyright holder. The idea behind fair use is that creativity, knowledge-building, public 

criticism and innovation would be severely hampered, if not completely stifled, if 

artists, librarians, scholars, inventors and consumers had to seek permission from 

rights holders even for the most mundane use of a work. 

For most of the last two hundred years, this balance worked well for consumers, 

creators and both the content and technology industries. Because of fair use and the 

other limitations on copyright, the United States has been the unquestioned leader 

in the creation of artistic works from artists big and small, and our educational and 

research institutions are the envy of the world. Moreover, and particularly since the 

39

2http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIPlTeenslContentlCreation.pdf 

Supreme Court’s ruling in Sony v. Universal City Studios, which ensured the growth 

of legal technologies, the U.S. has been the world leader in technological innovation, 

particularly as new digital technologies have taken the world by storm. 

The benefit of this balance to consumers has also been enormous. Consumers have 

greater choice of movies to watch, music to listen to, video games to play and computer software to use. They have a wide variety of useful and inexpensive gadgets 

on which to play those movies, music, games and software where and when they 

want. Importantly, those gadgets permit consumers to create their own movies, 

music and games. Who could imagine, even three years ago, that people would be 

viewing movies and television programs on their cell phones? Or that AOL would 

be selling old sitcoms online? Or, that as a recent Pew Internet and American Life 

poll showed, 57 percent of online teens would create their own content for the Internet? 2

Fair use has benefited everyone largely because of its flexible nature. Whereas 21 

years ago the Sony Court talked about ‘‘time shifting’’ as a fair use, it is now commonly understood that the ability to play media on different machines in different 

places (space shifting) is a fair use as well. We must ensure that fair use remains 

flexible and vibrant in the digital age, so that new innovations will develop that enable new fair uses that we cannot foresee. 

Unfortunately, as I will discuss in the next section, the past decade has seen a 

shrinking of fair use in a way that has tipped the copyright balance not in favor 

of creators or consumers, but in favor of large content companies. New laws, technological tools and marketplace mechanisms are being used to limit legal uses of content beyond what the copyright law traditionally allows and beyond what the framers of the Constitution intended. If course corrections are not made soon, we will 

reverse the vibrant market for content and technology that has grown out of the 

traditional balance between control and access. 

FAIR USE IN THE DIGITAL AGE IS IN PERIL

The Supreme Court’s decision in Sony confirmed what had been a common consumer expectation since the invention of audiotape—that it is fair use for consumers 

to use the content and technology they buy for personal uses. Despite the content 

industry’s efforts to paint consumers as copyright thieves, enormous DVD sales and 

the growth of online music indicate that when good content is made available both 

offline and online at a reasonable price and with flexibility of use, consumers will 

buy it. Moreover, sales of personal video recorders (PVR) (like TiVo), MP3 players 

(like the iPod), wireless routers, portable DVD and video game players, and digital 

radios with playback (like XM to-go) indicate that what consumers expect and want 

to do with the content they buy is the ability to play it wherever and whenever they 

want. They also expect that the devices they own will work with one another—that 

a simple cable or port can, for example, connect a television set to a VCR or PVR 

or a computer to an MP3 player. 

Unfortunately, this expectation of flexibility, portability and interoperability for 

personal use is increasingly at risk. Even though our copyright law does not give 

copyright holders control over when, where and how a consumer uses the content 

she lawfully purchases, the content industry, in its zeal to control every use of its 

content, has employed a variety of legal, technological and marketplace mechanisms 

that limit consumers fair use of technology and content. They include: 

Paracopyright: Laws that Enforce Technological Protection Measures 

The speed, ubiquity and relatively low cost of digital networks present greater opportunities for copyright holders to make their works available to a wider audience. 

However, they also present copyright holders with a tremendous challenge—how to 

protect those works from massive indiscriminate redistribution over those digital 

networks while at the same time giving the consumer flexibility to make lawful uses 

of the technology and content they purchase. 

The content industry has attempted to meet this challenge through use of technological protection measures, otherwise referred to as Digital Rights Management 

(DRM) tools. While Public Knowledge does not necessarily oppose these efforts, so 

long as they are not government mandated, to the extent that these tools eliminate 

certain fair uses, the law should not prohibit their circumvention for that purpose. 

For example, certain DRM-protected CDs prevent the ripping or copying function of 

personal computer in the hopes of preventing unauthorized file trading. In some instances, those CDs will fail to play entirely. Similarly, many DVDs will not play on 

Linux-operated computers. The DMCA prohibits a consumer from circumventing 

40

3See http://www.chillingeffects.org/anticircumvention/

that DRM even to make an otherwise lawful personal use of the content they purchased. The DMCA’s chilling effect on fair use and on free speech have been well 

documented.3

Thus, as digital technologies and accompanying protection measures become more 

pervasive, laws like the DMCA virtually eliminate consumer fair use for certain content. The existence of the so-called ‘‘analog hole,’’ which permits redigitizing of captured analog content, is cold comfort to the ordinary consumer, who doesn’t know 

the analog hole from a hole in the wall. Although the content industry likes to tout 

the analog hole as the solution for limits on fair use imposed by the DMCA, it is 

now seeking a legislative vehicle to close the analog hole. Moreover, traditional 

copyright law does not judge fair use based on the technical methods by which it 

was made (using digital software or analog outputs); rather it looks to whether the 

use was otherwise lawful. 

Licenses that seek to replace copyright law with contract law 

Another way that large corporate copyright holders seek to protect their works is 

through the use of so-called ‘‘end user license agreements’’ or EULAs. These are the 

windows of legal jargon that you see when trying to install or download software 

or other digital content (click-through licenses), or the terms you agree to when 

breaking the shrink-wrap on your newest piece of software (shrink-wrap licenses). 

Without any negotiation, you are asked to waive fair use and other rights reserved 

to you under the Copyright Act and agree to a list of restrictions, some of which 

can include a limitation on criticizing the work without the licensee’s permission. 

The EULA that accompanied the Sony-BMG CDs with the now-infamous rootkit 

DRM (which left consumers vulnerable to viruses) provides a chilling example of the 

kind of restrictions consumers are subject to after, and without disclosure before, 

purchasing digital media. Some of the restrictions include:

• all rights terminate if a consumer fails to accept any update of the protection software; 

• all rights terminate as soon as a consumer files for bankruptcy; 

• Sony-BMG reserves the right to exercise technological self-help mechanisms 

against consumers, at any time, without notice; 

• consumers have no right to transfer any digital copies or software; 

• consumers are prohibited from reverse engineering, and changing, altering, or creating derivative works; and 

• consumers are prohibited from circumventing any restrictions that may be imposed by the software, regardless of whether or not they are ‘‘access’’ controls 

under the DMCA. 

Government Mandates Limiting Access to Content via ‘‘Authorized Devices’’

A recent strategy of the copyright industries is attempting to ensure that every 

technology that can receive and retransmit its content is ‘‘authorized’’ to do so by 

the government. The idea works like this: if a television, radio, computer, or other 

digital device is not pre-approved to receive or record content, then the technology 

is either illegal or will be otherwise rendered incapable of doing so. These types of 

technological mandates impose serious limitations on the ability of consumers to 

make fair uses of content. 

The so-called digital television broadcast flag scheme, adopted in November 2003 

by the FCC and vacated by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of 

Columbia last May, is a manifestation of this strategy. The flag scheme requires 

every device that can receive a digital television signal to read and obey a series 

of bits embedded in the signal that tell the device whether the content can be transmitted over the Internet. These devices, which include computers, cell phones and 

personal video recorders, in addition to TV sets, must be pre-approved by the FCC. 

The broadcast flag scheme limits fair use in several important ways. For example, 

if I have a non-flag compliant (and therefore unauthorized) Personal Video Recorder 

(PVR) hooked up to my flag-compliant (and authorized) digital television set, my 

PVR will not be able to make a perfectly legal personal copy of a ‘‘flagged’’ digital 

television program. The flag also prohibits excerpting of digital television programming and redistribution of some or all such programming over the Internet. Thus, 

if a congresswoman wants to send a digital clip of her performance on Meet the 

Press to staff in her district office, she cannot do so if the show’s creator embeds 

a flag in the signal. Or, if a media watchdog group like the Parents’ Television 

Council wants to post digital TV clips of its favorite and least favorite programs to 

its website, the broadcast flag would prohibit such activity. 

41

4Draft legislation, entitled the ‘‘Analog Content Protection Act of 2005,’’ was discussed at a 

November 3, 2005 oversight hearing entitled ‘‘Content Protection in the Digital Age: The Broadcast Flag, High Definition Radio and the Analog Hole,’’ before the House Judiciary Committee, 

Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet and Intellectual Property. 5Draft legislation, entitled the ‘‘HD Radio Content Protection Act of 2005,’’ was discussed at 

a November 3, 2005 oversight hearing entitled ‘‘Content Protection in the Digital Age: The 

Broadcast Flag, High Definition Radio and the Analog Hole,’’ before the House Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet and Intellectual Property. 6 available at http://www.centerforsocialmedia.org/roc/index.htm 

7 available at http://www.brandnamebullies.com. 

8 http://energycommerce.house.gov/108/Hearings/05122004hearing1265/Lessig1985.htm 

Not surprisingly, the motion picture studios are seeking to have the broadcast flag 

reinstated, and are also asking Congress to consider a technology mandate to close 

the so-called analog hole. This latter proposal would require every analog device to 

read and obey two copy protection technologies, and would impose a series of encoding rules that would prohibit certain fair uses of content.4 Moreover, closing the 

analog hole would eliminate the one safety valve for making fair use of digital content under the DMCA. 

Not to be outdone, the recording industry is seeking its own government-imposed 

technological mandate for new digital broadcast and digital satellite radio. Like Hollywood, they are seeking to place the FCC in charge of setting a standard for digital 

radio receivers that would prevent consumers from making recordings of digital 

radio for personal use.5 This would not only violate the Audio Home Recording Act, 

which specifically allows for recording of radio transmissions for personal use, but 

it would eliminate the decades-old practice of recording songs off the radio. 

D. Rise of the Permissions Culture 

Perhaps the most radical change with respect to how fair use is viewed and enforced involves neither law nor technology. Instead, it involves the increasingly common business practice of requiring permission for even the most incidental uses of 

copyrighted works. Sometimes obtaining that permission will require an obscenely 

high licensing fee. Other times, and particularly where the copyrighted work is to 

be criticized, a copyright holder will simply deny permission to use it. Often, and 

particularly if the subsequent work has a measure of success, those who rely on fair 

use can expect a lawsuit. In this ‘‘permissions culture’’ the copyright balance is 

turned into one where the copyright holder has complete control and fair use becomes, as some have said, ‘‘the right to hire a lawyer.’’ As a result, creators are often 

forced to change or stop their work. 

A good example of the shrinking scope of fair use can be found in Professor Lawrence Lessig’s book Free Culture. The example involves Jon Else, a documentary 

filmmaker who made a documentary about Wagner’s Ring Cycle. The scene at issue 

involved stagehands at the San Francisco Opera who are playing checkers. In a corner of the room, the television program The Simpsons is playing. When the film was 

completed, Else sought to ‘‘clear the rights’’ to use the few seconds of The Simpsons. 

It not only took a good deal of effort to find the copyright holder, but when he did, 

Else was told that it would cost him $10,000 to include the clip. Rather than risk 

a lawsuit, Else edited The Simpsons out of that segment of the documentary, even 

though it set a particular mood for that scene. 

Many more examples of the chilling effect of the permissions culture can be found 

in an excellent report from the American University Center for Social Media and 

the Washington College of Law entitled Untold Stories: Creative Consequences of the 

Rights Clearance Culture for Documentary Filmmakers,6 and in the book Brand 

Name Bullies: The Quest to Own and Control Culture, written by Public Knowledge 

Board member and co-founder David Bollier.7

FOUR WAYS TO STRENGTHEN FAIR USE IN THE DIGITAL AGE

I agree with those who argue that our copyright law, which was last completely 

revised nearly 30 years old, is inadequate to address creativity in a world of ubiquitous digital networks. Thus, I would urge this subcommittee to adopt Professor 

Lessig’s recommendation to this subcommittee in May 2004 that it ‘‘recommend the 

establishment of a serious and balanced study, . . . to consider fully how best to adjust the protections of copyright to the digital age.’’ 8

Regardless of the need to look at our copyright laws more comprehensively, I 

would like to suggest a number of ways Congress can help to revive fair use and 

bring back the balance to copyright the founders of our country intended. 

42

9http://energycommerce.house.gov/108/Hearings/05122004hearing1265/Sohn1995.htm 

10Letter from Nancy J. Victory, Assistant Secretary of Commerce to Ms. Marybeth Peters Register of Copyrights, (Aug. 11, 2003), available at www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/occ/dmca/dmca2003/

dmcaletterl08112003.html (footnotes omitted). 

1. Ensure the DMCA permits lawful uses 

As DRM tools become more pervasive and government imposed copy protection 

mandates become a possibility, it becomes increasingly important that those technological protection measures can be circumvented for lawful uses. 

This goal can be accomplished in two ways, neither of which is mutually exclusive. One way is for Congress to pass legislation like H.R. 1201, the Digital Media 

Consumers Right Act, which would permit circumvention of technological protection 

measures for lawful uses. 

A second way to accomplish this goal is for Congress to clarify and strengthen the 

DMCA’s triennial review process. As I explained in great detail when I testified before this Subcommittee in May 2004, when Congress passed the DMCA, it made 

clear both through the plain language of the Act and the legislative history that it 

intended to preserve fair use through the ‘‘fail safe’’ mechanism of the triennial review.9 For the most part, however the Copyight Office, which is tasked with conducting that review, has ignored the express intent of Congress and has placed a 

higher burden on those seeking exemptions. The Copyright has also construed the 

term ‘‘class of works’’ too narrowly and favored particular business models over fair 

use in denying exemption requests. 

This crimped interpretation of the plain language of the DMCA has twice caused 

the Assistant Secretary of Commerce, who is tasked with consulting with the Register on the review, to send a letter of protest to the Register. In 2003, the Assistant 

Secretary wrote: 

the standard set forth in the Notice of Inquiry (the ′′NOI′′) imposes a significantly heightened burden on proponents of an exemption, and is therefore inconsistent with the opportunity that Congress intended to afford the user community.10

The result has been that after two triennial reviews, the Copyright Office has 

granted four extremely narrow exemptions. The Copyright Office has just commenced its third triennial review, and there every reason to expect that they will 

maintain their crimped view of the exemptions process without Congressional action. Therefore, this Subcommittee should take the opportunity to hold hearings on 

the triennial review process and to clarify that the burden of proof that should govern the process should be that embodied in the plain language of the DMCA. 

2. Reject Government-Mandated Technological Protection Measures 

This Subcommittee should reject any and all efforts by the copyright industries 

to have the government mandate copy protection technologies and/or serve in the 

role of determining what technologies will succeed and which will fail. Such one size 

fits all technology mandates limit competition, consumer choice and consumers’ fair 

use rights. 

First, I must distinguish government-imposed copy protection mandates like the 

broadcast flag from marketplace copy protection initiatives. The latter allows consumers to express themselves in the marketplace with regard to the level of copy 

protection that they find acceptable. This is what happened with computer software 

in the early 1980’s. Consumers rejected software with very restrictive copy protection, and the market adjusted. 

Comparing iTunes Fairplay DRM with the Sony-BMG CD rootkit DRM demonstrates why the market is the better determinant of the proper level of copy protection. While like any DRM, Fairplay can be circumvented by the most determined 

pirates, it provides a speed bump that allows for legal uses while keeping honest 

people honest. As a result, iTunes has been wildly popular with consumers. In contrast, consumers nearly revolted over the Sony rootkit DRM, which left their computers vulnerable to viruses. In a matter of days, Sony-BMG responded by first attempting to provide a security patch, and have now temporarily halted production 

of those affected CDs. 

3. Fix the ‘‘Orphan Works’’ Problem 

Changing the permissions culture will be a long process, necessitating changes in 

business practice more than in the law. Strengthening fair use will certainly help—

the more creators, educators and consumers feel comfortable relying upon fair use, 

the more they will be willing to do so, and so far, at least, the courts have largely 

ruled in favor of the user. 

43

One way that Congress can limit the negative effects of the permissions culture 

is to ensure that creators have access to so-called Orphan Works—works under 

copyright for which the rights holder cannot be found. Currently, the law does not 

protect an individual who conducts a good faith search for a copyright holder, but 

cannot find him. If the individual uses the work, and the copyright holder resurfaces, the user is subject to the full panoply of penalties the copyright law provides. 

Earlier this year, the Copyright Office undertook a procedure for collecting public 

comments on how to fix the orphan works problem, and their recommendations are 

due at the end of the year. Remarkably, the vast majority of commenters, representing large content companies, college artists and public interest groups like 

Public Knowledge, largely agreed that the copyright law should provide a defense 

for those who engage in a ‘‘reasonable effort’’ or ‘‘good faith’’ search for the owners 

of orphan works. While there was some disagreement around the edges, for the most 

part, the participants agreed that Congress should ensure that the inability to find 

a copyright holder should not be a deterrent to creators seeking to use those works. 

4. Clarify Fair Use with Respect to Search Engines 

I trust that the members of the subcommittee are well aware of the debate and 

lawsuits surrounding the Google Print program. To review: Google is making digital 

copies of copyrighted and public domain works housed in five major libraries so that 

those copies can be searched using words and phrases from the books. When a 

search is requested for a work under copyright, a brief excerpt from the book appears, which includes the requested phrase surrounded by several lines of text. If 

Google were to digitize anything less than the entire book, the program would become useless —if you were the unlucky searcher who used a phrase that was not 

in the included text, you would not get the result you sought. The searcher is entitled only to a limited number of searches in the same document, and links to purchase the book are on each page of text. 

In Public Knowledge’s opinion, the prospect that millions of books may soon be 

available to be indexed and searched is incredibly exciting. It not only promotes the 

founders’ intent by increasing access to knowledge, but it also helps authors and 

publishers to promote their works by exposing them to anyone with an Internet connection. The Authors Guild and the American Association of Publishers disagree, 

and have sued Google alleging copyright infringement. 

This is not an open and shut legal case for either side. While it is generally understood and the courts have ruled that if a search engine gathers and indexes information already on the World Wide Web, that use is not infringing, the law is less clear 

with respect to information that is not already online. But the consequences of a 

court decision against Google could be staggering not only for that company and 

other search engines, but also for the future of the Internet itself. The Internet has 

become our virtual library—it is where we come to expect to find information about 

anything and everything. It has also become the great equalizer—bringing knowledge to rural and urban, rich and poor areas alike. If we limited access over the 

Internet only to that information that is only already available online, it would be 

like going to the Library of Congress and only being able access half of the books. 

Thus, I would urge this subcommittee to keep a close eye on the Google litigation 

to see if adjustments may need to be made in the future to protect the future of 

Internet searching and indexing and as a result, consumers ability to use the Internet to obtain the information they need and desire. 

CONCLUSION

Fair use remains vital to maintaining the balance in copyright law that has long 

benefited consumers, creators, innovators and the content and technology industries. 

But fair use threatened with extinction unless Congress acts to revive and strengthen it for a world of digital technology and digital networks. I thank the Subcommittee for the opportunity to testify, and I look forward to your questions.

Mr. STEARNS. Thank you. 

Mr. DeLong? 

STATEMENT OF JAMES V. DELONG 

Mr. DELONG. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and members of the—

is that on now? 

Mr. STEARNS. Yes. 

Mr. DELONG. It is an honor to be here today. My name is James 

DeLong. I am a senior fellow with the Progress and Freedom FounVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00047 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
44

dation which is a free market oriented think tank that studies the 

digital revolution and its implications for public policy. Within that 

context, I am the director of a project called the Center For the 

Study of Digital Property which is devoted to analyzing policies devoted or concerning intellectual property and we also go under the 

name IPCentral.Info and as a commercial, I urge you all to visit 

our website where we are engaged in spirited debates on many of 

these issues. 

My message here today is fairly simple and that is over the past 

200 years, the U.S. has developed a system for producing creative 

works of all kinds that depends on institutions and property rights 

and markets. And you may recall I was here about 3 weeks ago discussing Kelo and in my mind, these are all one big happy sort of 

continuum there. 

In the legal literature, you have certainly heard it from some of 

my legally oriented colleagues here today. There is a lot of obsession about the need for balance between creators and consumers of 

intellectual property. It is sort of as if the two groups were engaged 

in a zero sum game and what one gained the other must lose. I 

regard this focus is misleading and we do not talk about the need 

for balance in most areas of national or economic life. We do not 

talk about the need to balance the interests of automobile manufacturers and drivers or farmers and food consumers and such. We assume that we can establish rules governing markets and promoting 

markets and that within this structure producers and consumers 

can find their own balance. And you know the balances differ from 

individuals. You know, that is the great thing about a market. The 

idea that you find very much in the academic literature that a 

court is supposed to sit there sort of a super weigher of costs and 

benefits and then allocate things according to the social good is a 

nightmare. 

Now this system has served us very well not just in producing 

automobiles and food but in producing creative works, an explosion 

of creativity in this country. And I might add that in those areas 

in which we have departed from the market system are those areas 

where we seem to be getting in the biggest trouble. You know areas 

like healthcare and like education and where you gentlemen and 

ladies are being held most responsible by the public for the failures 

in. Now obviously in the area of creative works technology is presenting us with new challenges. 

And creativity used to be protected by a combination of technological impossibility and law. You know it was not possible really 

to steal a book because it cost you more to copy it on the copying 

machine than to get it via printout. You know you could not copy 

music. Movies on film might as well have been locked in a vault. 

Technology has made perfect replication possible and very cheap 

and a very important block of our protective system is eroding. You 

know, it is simply an impossibility and we are struggling to develop 

new forms of protection both technological and legal. 

Now in my view, fair use is best viewed within this context of 

the market system in creative works. It is a doctrine designed primarily to smooth out the workings in the market where it really 

might now work. And this isn’t a novel idea. I have an article in 

my files by Wendy Gordon going back to 1982 suggesting market 

45

failure is an organizing principle here. So it has some political content, you know, keeping authors from suppressing bad reviews is 

an important component, encouraging dissemination of news, encouraging political discussions. But I think for the most part when 

you look back a the cases, you find that fair uses usually exist 

when the transaction costs of getting permission to use something 

are out of all proportion to the economic value to the user or out 

of all proportion to the harm of the producer. You know, occasionally you hear sometimes uses where somebody doing a TV show accidentally showed a snippet of a television program playing in the 

background and then had to cut it out because they could not get 

the licensing. Well that should be fair use. There is no harm to the 

producer in all and the costs are just inordinate. 

Now one of the main things going on in technology, the internet 

is ringing transaction costs out of the system and so to a great extent this leaves much of fair use of the doctrine sort of in search 

of a rational. I mean the combination of digital rights management 

and consumer pressure is providing marketplace solutions to the 

problems that used to have to be resolved by the courts. And, you 

know, as Gigi was mentioning, one of things quite extraordinary is 

the speed of reaction on this whole Sony business. You know a couple weeks and problem seems to be—I only know what I read in 

the news but the problem seems to be pretty well on the way to 

solution. You know, that is good. It is called the market working. 

But in this context, I think it is very important to emphasize two 

points, one, free use is or fair use is not necessarily free use. I was 

looking for the quote this morning, I could not find it from a guy 

who is the Director of University Press and thus is on the pro-author’s side who was saying all active colleagues seem to think we 

get everything for free, that is called fair use. We you know that 

is not the way it is supposed to work. 

But it seems to me the most important thing in this is to urge 

the committee not to try to freeze rules based on the old technologies and the old ways of doing things. This will really only cripple things. And now for several years we hear comments about the 

content companies and their obsolete business models and all that 

sort of thing but in the real world as opposed to the world of academic extractions it seems to be the reverse of the truth, you know. 

As Ms. Blackburn and Ms. Bono pointed out the content field is 

electric with excitement and innovation and people pulling out all 

sorts of new things and figuring new things to sell you and all that. 

And, you know, people talk about the need for snippets of film and 

all that sort of thing. We are in a world where ring tones have suddenly become a multi-billion dollar industry. 

And believe me, you know, the happy thing about this is producers want to sell just as much as consumers want to consume 

and they will find a way. So in my mind, the people defending the 

old doctrines are actually the ones mirrored in old models and fearful of change. I think you should be very careful about imposing 

any rules on this. You should let the market work it out. And I 

think there need to be some rules on letting it work it out better 

but I think we will succeed and obviously I do not think you should 

codify existing doctrines of fair use. 

Thank you. 

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[The prepared statement of James V. DeLong follows:]

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Mr. STEARNS. Mr. Hirsch? 

STATEMENT OF FREDERIC HIRSCH 

Mr. HIRSCH. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Schakowsky and 

members of the subcommittee, thanks very much for holding this 

hearing. 

I appreciate the opportunity to testify on behalf of the Entertainment Software Association regarding the fair use doctrine and how 

it impacts our industry and its consumers. It is the position of the 

ESA that current law properly balances consumer interest in using 

copyrighted works with the protections content owners needs to 

continue creating innovative entertainment products to consumers. 

The ESA members are the world’s leading publishers of video 

and computer games including games for videogame consoles, personal computers, handheld devices, and the internet. ESA members 

produce more than 90 percent of the $7.3 billion in entertainment 

software sold in the United States in 2004. With annual worldwide 

revenues now exceeding $28 billion, our industry is one of the fastest growing entertainment sectors. The industry has more than 

doubled in size since the mid 1990’s generating thousands of highly 

skilled jobs in the creative and technology field. Our industry 

makes a tremendous investment in its intellectual property, developing and launching a top game often required to a team of more 

than 100 professionals working for more than 3 years with development and marketing costs often running $10 million or more and 

in the coming years they foreseeably range as high as $25 to $40 

million. Unfortunately, many of these titles fail to achieve profitability. 

Still the new generation of game consoles that will be launched 

over the next several months will require entertainment software 

publishers to risk even more significant levels of investment in 

gain development as the processing power of these new machines 

will permit more complex and realistic game design for further enhancing consumer’s game playing experience. 

Having now told you a little bit about our industry, the real 

question I am here to answer is how the fair use doctrine relates 

to the entertainment software industry and its consumers. Fair use 

doctrine is a legal defense under copyright law that allows for limited uses of copyrighted materials in certain cases that would otherwise constitute infringement. Fair use has always been determined on a case-by-case basis. The fact of each case must be evaluated under the copyright statutes four various factors to determine 

if a particular use of copyrighting materials entitled to the fair use 

defense. 

It is important to be clear about what the fair use doctrine is not. 

Fair use is not a right. It is a defense. Fair use provisions in the 

Copyright Act codify nearly 200 years of judicial experience in balancing the rights of copyright owners and social interests in areas 

such as research and scholarship. And when Congress passed the 

Digital Millennium Copyright Act or the DMCA in 1998, it provided a similar balancing mechanism when it created a rulemaking 

process to issue exemptions when it is determined that non-infringing uses of copyrighted materials are being harmed or threatened 

by the DMCA’s circumvention prohibition. 

57

Since the DMCA was enacted, two separate rulemakings have 

been conducted resulting in the prime location of a number of exemptions for certain uses and classes of work including two specific 

to the entertainment software industry. Perhaps more importantly 

since the DMCA’s enactment, we have seen an explosion in the 

number and variety of innovative entertainment products and services that are available to consumers. 

The entertainment software industry has been a leader in using 

new technologies to develop creative business models to provide 

consumers a wide array of options for accessing games. Consumers 

can access and sample games through rental outlets, game 

websites, demo disks in game magazines, or play games on a variety of platforms and services such as online game environments, 

pay to play sites, or an episodic game format, and in many cases 

without even purchasing a full game. Consumers can play games 

on their computers, their television sets, dedicated handheld devices, their PDA’s, and on their cell phones. 

Thus we think it is clear that the balancing mechanism by Congress widely adopting the copyright statute’s fair use provisions 

and the DMCA are properly servicing the communities of copyright 

holders and consumers. Critics to the DMCA argue that its enforcement constrains the exercise of so called fair use rights and that 

consumer expectations are not being met. In the case of the entertainment software industry, this cannot be further from the truth. 

The protections reported by the DMCA are essential to the vitality 

and continued growth of our industry. This industry has invested 

heavily in technologies that both prevent or reduce game piracy 

and enable the industry to place games in the hands of consumers 

through many different platforms and modalities. Without the 

DMCA’s protection for such technological measures, game publishers multi-million dollar investment in the development and 

marketing of new game products would become an exceedingly 

daunting proposition as our games would become immediately exposed to copying and abuse. And as this increased risk would undoubtedly inhibit the development of many new games, consumers 

would lose as well. 

ESA believes that the marketplace is where industry consumer 

expectations of our product use or access should be resolved. The 

entertainment software industry is a prime example of this marketplace principle, the fact that a product includes protection measures to prevent unauthorized copy and distribution has not affected 

its longstanding positive relationship with its consumers who have 

made our industry the fastest growing segment in the entertainment industry. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Frederic Hirsch follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF FREDERIC HIRSCH, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, INTELLECTUAL

PROPERTY ENFORCEMENT, ENTERTAINMENT SOFTWARE ASSOCIATION

On behalf of the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) and our member companies, I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity to discuss the Fair use doctrine and how it impacts the video game industry and its consumers. It is the position of the Entertainment Software Association that current law properly balances 

consumers’ diverse interests in using copyrighted works with the protections content 

owners need to retain the incentive to continue creating and producing innovative 

entertainment products for consumers to enjoy. 

58

The ESA is the trade association serving the public affairs needs of the world’s 

leading publishers of video and computer games, including games for video game 

consoles, personal computers, handheld devices, and the Internet. ESA members 

produced more than 90 percent of the $7.3 billion in entertainment software sold 

in the U.S. in 2004. In addition, ESA’s member companies produce billions more in 

exports of American-made entertainment software, driving the $28 billion global 

game video game market. Entertainment software is a vibrant and growing segment 

of the American economy, providing highly skilled jobs and ever-increasing exports. 

Entertainment software companies invest significant amounts of capital in each 

of their games and the intellectual property that these represent. Developing and 

launching a top game often requires a team of more than 100 professionals working 

for more than three years, with development and marketing costs often running $10 

million or more and may foreseeably range as high as $25-40 million in coming 

years. As with any hit-based industry, not all of these titles actually achieve profitability. Nonetheless, the demands of the game-playing market compel ESA members 

to continue to work even harder to develop faster and more exciting software, requiring larger investments in the programming and technology that will produce the 

effects and challenges that consumers seek. The new generation of entertainment 

software consoles that will be launched over the next several months will require 

entertainment software publishers to make even more significant levels of investment as the processing power of these new machines will permit more complex and 

realistic game design, further enhancing the game-playing experience for consumers. 

I. WHAT IS THE FAIR USE DOCTRINE?

‘‘Fair Use’’ is a legal defense under copyright law that allows for limited uses of 

copyrighted materials in certain cases that would otherwise constitute infringement 

of copyright. The fair use defense, one of the few exceptions to rights holders’ exclusive rights, balances the public interest in scholarship, research, commentary and 

the like with the artist’s interest in having the exclusive right to reproduce and distribute his or her work. When the use of a copyrighted work for such a purpose has 

been judged a ‘‘fair use,’’ it is not an infringement of the copyright, even if the use 

was made without permission of the copyright owner. Originally created by the 

courts, the fair use doctrine was codified in the 1976 Copyright Act. 

Fair use has always been determined on a case-by-case basis. There are no hardand-fast rules that dictate that certain uses are always fair (or never fair). The statute lists four factors (although others can also be used) that must be considered in 

determining whether or not the use is fair:

• The purpose and character of the use. Title 17, Section 107 recites examples such 

as copying for purposes of criticism, news reporting, teaching, scholarship or research. But those purposes do not automatically make a particular use a ‘‘fair 

use’’ under the statute. Not every use by a library or educational institution is 

necessarily a fair use under the law; 

• The nature of the copyrighted work in question; 

• How much of the work is copied or otherwise used; and 

• The effect of the use on the potential market for the work. This includes not only 

the impact on the current market, but also whether allowing the use (and others like it) could prevent a new commercial market from developing. 

In examining particular circumstances of copying, courts consider the statutory 

defense using the four factors listed above. It was on this basis that the Supreme 

Court Betamax decision in 1984 ruled that private copying of over-the-air TV broadcasts for the purpose of time-shifting was fair use. However, even that case did not 

apply the same rule to private taping of cable television or pay-TV broadcasts, nor 

did it address the copyright status of ‘‘librarying’’ (the practice of making a permanent copy of a television program), and no later court has cited the Betamax case 

as a basis for permitting ‘‘private copying.’’ Aside from a specific statutory provision 

that Congress enacted in 1992 regarding non-commercial home recording of music 

on cassette decks and the like, any other instance of personal copying must be evaluated under the statute’s four factors, in light of the particular facts in the case at 

hand, to determine if it is entitled to the fair use defense. 

The same is true of so-called ‘‘space shifting’’ or ‘‘platform shifting’’—for instance, 

copying a video game so that it can be played on a different technological platform 

than originally intended by the copyright owner. Here too, the fair use defense applies only after consideration of all four statutory factors, in light of the particular 

facts of the case. 

59

II. FAIR USE IS AN EXCEPTION, NOT A RIGHT

The fair use doctrine codifies nearly two hundred years of judicial experience in 

balancing the rights of copyright owners with social interests in research, scholarship and the like. The doctrine has worked work well to accommodate these goals 

while retaining incentives for creators to create and for publishers to invest in 

bringing new copyrighted products to market. It was for this reason that Congress 

adopted the principles of the fair use analysis into the copyright statute. 

In recent years, with the emergence of digital technologies and the rapid deployment of the Internet, consumers have seen their ability to access, use, copy and 

transmit digital material vastly expanded. Consumers’ use of these digital technologies has been a huge boon to the entertainment software industry, which benefited from consumers’ increasing comfort with using computers and the Internet. 

Unfortunately, it has also led many computer and Internet users to abuse digital 

materials protected by copyright. 

In 1998, Congress enacted the ‘‘Digital Millennium Copyright Act’’ (DMCA). The 

DMCA was the foundation of an effort by Congress to implement United States 

treaty obligations and to move the nation’s copyright law into the digital age. The 

DMCA implements two 1996 World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) treaties: the WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms 

Treaty. The foundation of this effort was to make digital networks safe places to 

disseminate copyrighted works for the benefit of consumers and copyright owners. 

Specifically, the treaties require legal prohibitions against circumvention of technological measures employed by copyright owners to protect their works. Congress 

determined that current law did not adequately protect digital works and that to 

promote electronic commerce and the distribution of digital works, it was necessary 

to provide copyright owners with legal tools to prevent widespread piracy. As a result, the DMCA implements the treaty obligations by creating new prohibitions in 

title 17 on the circumvention of technological protection measures that protect access to a copyrighted work and the manufacture or sale of devices that permit such 

circumvention. 

The most common critique of the DMCA has been that its enforcement constrains 

the exercise of fair use ‘‘rights.’’ However, no such rights are defined in the copyright statute, nor have any such rights been identified in U.S. case law. What U.S. 

law does provide for, through its codification of the fair use doctrine, is a certain 

degree of flexibility with respect to certain uses of copyrighted works that, although 

they may be infringing, may qualify for an exemption for the people engaged in such 

uses. This is the balancing mechanism that Congress wisely adopted and has served 

the communities of copyright holders and consumers so well over many years. 

Congress continued to retain the balancing of competing interests when legislating in the area of copyright protection. When Congress enacted the DMCA, it balanced the new provisions against circumvention of copyright protection measures by 

ensuring that consumers would continue to have the ability to make non-infringing 

uses of copyrighted works in the digital environment. Congress created a tri-annual 

rule-making process to be conducted by the Librarian of Congress in conjunction 

with the Copyright Office to determine whether non-infringing uses of copyrighted 

materials are being harmed or threatened as a result of the circumvention prohibitions in the DMCA and to formulate exemptions as necessary. 

Since the DMCA was enacted, two rule-makings have been successfully conducted. 

In each rulemaking, the Copyright Office held numerous hearings around the country, reviewed evidence and testimony from hundreds of interested parties and considered numerous proposals for new exemptions. In both proceedings, it found evidence that certain users were not able to make certain non-infringing uses of certain 

classes of works that it deemed, on balance, likely to benefit certain consumers and 

unlikely to impact copyright holders. As a result, the Librarian issued exemptions 

for such uses of those classes of works from the prohibition against circumvention 

of technological protection measures. Specific to the entertainment software industry, exemptions were granted for 1) malfunctioning or old computer programs failing 

to permit access and 2) video games in obsolete formats to the extent libraries and 

archives wish to make preservation copies. 

Unfortunately, because of the use of the term fair use ‘‘rights’’ in attacks on the 

DMCA, fair use and the DMCA are often contrasted as reflecting oppositional doctrines. Some point to recent cases, such as efforts to break the encryption of DVD 

movies and the well-publicized DMCA criminal case against a Russian programmer 

accused of circumventing the copy protection for Adobe System’s e-books, as reasons 

to re-examine fair use. However, neither case has anything to do with that doctrine. 

In both cases, the defendants were charged with trafficking in tools that strip off 

encryption and leave formerly protected material ‘‘in the clear’’ for any use, fair or 

60

piratical. In fact, both fair use and the DMCA reflect Congressional efforts to adopt 

a level of protection for copyright, balanced against certain uses by consumers that 

may qualify either as exempt under fair use or non-infringing under the DMCA. 

III. WHAT EFFECT DOES FAIR USE HAVE ON THE VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY AND ITS

CONSUMERS?

In our view, any debate in Congress over these issues should be predicated on a 

complete understanding of the ways the entertainment software industry has sought 

and succeeded in meeting the legitimate needs of our consumers. The video game 

industry is a leader in successfully meeting consumer expectations for access to, and 

use of, video game content. 

Our industry has always been digital and did not need to convert from older formats to the digital environment. As a result, entertainment software companies 

have, for years, been leaders in developing creative business models that provide 

consumers a wide array of options to sample and play games. Without built-in marketing vehicles like radio, film trailers, and music television, the video game industry has had to develop innovative marketing strategies to generate excitement in 

new game products. As a result, the industry has used a variety of approaches to 

allow consumers to sample and play parts of games and, in some cases, entire 

games prior to purchasing:

• Rental: Under federal law, console video games are the only form of software that 

may be rented without the permission of the copyright holder, and over the 

years video game rentals have become a big business for retailers, allowing millions of people to play games without purchasing them and generating nearly 

$7 million dollars at retail in 2004. • Game Websites: Our companies routinely make ‘‘levels’’ of games available for free 

download on their own company sites, or through independent game websites. 

Through these sites, consumers can enjoy free access to games for a period of 

time to play and to sample prior to purchase. • Demo Disks: Game companies provide several levels of games to publishers of 

gaming enthusiast magazines prior to or soon after release in the form of CDROMs that are inserted into the game magazines. From these demo disks, consumers can then sample literally dozens of new and popular games for free on 

their PCs. 

The video game industry has developed additional means and technologies to deliver game product to consumers for use in a variety of formats to accommodate different consumer preferences:

• Massive Multiplayer Online Games: An entire gaming culture has been built 

around massive multiplayer games involving hundreds of thousands of individuals. Consumers pay a monthly subscription fee, usually between $10 and $15, 

to play with and against players from all over the world. 

• Free Games: More than 30 million Americans now play board, card, trivia, and 

other casual games online at least once a month, typically for free. 

• Pay to Play: Other games are available online to play for an hourly or daily fee. 

• Episodic Games: Some games are delivered to consumers in episodes, with players 

paying a fee to receive each new level. 

The entertainment software industry has a strong and proactive track record in 

voluntarily providing information about our products to customers. Consumers of 

video games have known and accepted for years that video game hardware systems 

and computer and video game software are copy-protected in various ways. For example, there is no legitimate expectation on the part of consumers to copy a 

PlayStation game for use on a GameCube or an Xbox, or to copy a PC game for 

use on a dedicated game console. Our industry’s consumers know that the games 

they purchase are embedded with certain technological restrictions. The use of technological protection measures has not interfered with the entertainment software industry’s ability to meet consumer expectations with regard to access, play, portability, and ability to make full use of a game title. 

A key factor to bear in mind is that game publishers are able to meet consumer 

demand for game products in these different forms and modes of access through the 

use of technologies that permit qualified or conditional access. Without such technologies, and most importantly, the ability to protect the integrity and use of such 

technologies, game publishers would be unable to respond to the increasing diverse 

consumer demand for game software on these many different platforms and modalities. 

The protections afforded by the DMCA are essential to the vitality and continued 

growth of the entertainment software industry. It prohibits: 1) the circumvention, 

or ‘‘hacking,’’ of technological measures that game publishers use to control access 

61

to and/or prevent piracy of their products, and 2) the development and distribution 

of tools to enable such hacking. Without this protection, the development and digital 

distribution of new game products would become an exceedingly daunting proposition because publishers would be placing at considerable risk the tens of millions 

of dollars spent in developing and marketing game products. 

Because of the nature of the game software business, technological protection 

measures are a critical element of game publishers’ ability to distribute and market 

their products. Unlike some of the other content industries, where products either 

pass through a sequence of media or enjoy prolonged life cycles, the active sales 

cycle of a new game release is often only a few months long. It is therefore critical 

that the game industry provide its products maximum protection from piracy during 

the short window in which they have to sell copies of their games after release and 

recoup the millions of dollars invested in the development and marketing of these 

game products. 

This is the reason that our industry has invested heavily in technological protection measures, as these help to limit the damage that game publishers suffer from 

pirate versions of their games. For example, video game consoles have built-in access controls designed to prevent the playing of counterfeit versions of the games. 

These self-help protection methods act as ‘‘digital locks’’ that regulate unauthorized 

access to the game content. The DMCA’s legal protections for these measures provide additional remedies for our industry to use against those who would undermine 

the use of these measures by promoting their circumvention. 

Unfortunately, game publishers’ technological protection measures are often circumvented and an unprotected version of a game may become available in the days 

following its release. The resulting copy is a perfect copy that can be available for 

any purpose, not just non-infringing uses. In the digital world of today, the ‘‘single 

copy’’ will quickly become thousands (and ultimately, millions) of equally high-quality copies distributed instantly around the world. Billions of dollars worth of pirated 

entertainment software products are present in worldwide markets today and there 

are illegal devices such as ‘‘mod chips’’ and ‘‘game copiers’’ which circumvent access 

controls and allow for play of counterfeit games. 

The entertainment software industry remains concerned about attempts to chip 

away at the protections afforded by the DMCA and other statutes in the name of 

fair use. As noted earlier, the DMCA provides those interested in seeking exemptions to the application of its circumvention provisions with a process for doing so. 

Many have taken advantage of the last two rulemaking processes to proffer suggestions for exempt uses and some have obtained the exemptions they were looking for. 

Indeed, a new DMCA rulemaking process has recently begun and new proposed exemptions will undoubtedly be considered. The process works; there is no need to undermine the DMCA or other applicable statues at this time. 

Those who seek to weaken the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provisions in order to 

promote so-called fair use ‘‘rights’’ may not be aware of the dangers that this poses 

to copyright holders, particularly the entertainment software industry. No technology exists to ensure that circumvention is done for only legitimate or non-infringing purposes. Any technology or device capable of ‘‘enabling significant non-infringing use’’ may also be capable of permitting rampant piracy. More to the point, 

should Congress enact proposals to allow circumvention for purposes of making fair 

use or the making and distributing of circumvention devices for purposes of making 

fair use, ‘‘mod chips’’ and ‘‘game copiers’’ will be legal and this would be devastating 

to the video game industry. 

IV. CONCLUSION

The ESA and its members strongly endorse the Congressional judgment that led 

to the codification of the Fair Use doctrine in the U.S. copyright statutes and the 

enactment of the DMCA. Each reasonably accommodates the needs and interests of 

copyright holders and the consumers of their products. We believe that the marketplace is where legitimate industry and consumer expectations over product use or 

access should be resolved. The entertainment software industry is a strong example 

of this marketplace principle—an industry whose products include protection measures to prevent unauthorized copying and distribution and whose positive relationship with their consumers since the inception of the industry has made us the fastest growing segment of the entertainment industry. 

As an industry that uses technology extensively to meets the challenge of everchanging consumer demands, our industry would be unnecessarily and unfairly 

harmed by legislation aimed at altering the delicate balances embodied in Fair Use 

and the DMCA. Accordingly, we urge Congress to reject any efforts to erase the 

legal protections on which our members rely to bring innovative new entertainment 

62

software and technologies to the marketplace in forms and modalities designed to 

produce the highest levels of consumer satisfaction.

Mr. STEARNS. Thank the gentleman. 

Mr. Aiken? 

STATEMENT OF PAUL AIKEN 

Mr. AIKEN. Mr. Chairman, I am the Executive Director of the 

Authors Guild, the largest society of published authors in the country and we have a 90-year history of contributing to debates before 

Congress on the proper scope and function and copyright law. It is 

an honor and a privilege to be here today for the Authors Guild to 

continue to serve that role before this committee. 

When people discuss policy issues about copyrights, they often 

talk about balancing the public’s interest against that as a rights 

holder. The public’s interest is frequently cast in terms of the public domain. As is the overriding public benefit of copyright is the 

creation of materials that can be used for free. The public domain 

does provide a benefit to society but that is not the primary means 

by which the public benefits from copyrights, not by a long shot. 

Copyright allows authors and other rights holders to work in a 

free market economy. Copyright transforms author’s creative efforts, their investment of countless hours of work on their manuscripts into marketable goods, licensable products. A fortunate and 

talented minority of prospective authors find publishers for their 

works. A published book of course is no guarantee of success. The 

authors and publisher’s investments may be for naught but authors 

and publishers accept those risks and with a good book, some luck 

and a bit of marketing skill the authors and publishers investments will pay off in the marketplace and readers will value the 

book. That book and other books like it, the books that readers 

value, the books that the public, academic, and corporate libraries 

choose to acquire for their collection are the primary public benefit 

of copyrighting. I am speaking now of the book publishing industry 

but the same paragon applies to the newspaper, magazine, music, 

movie, and software industries. It is the products that result from 

the market created by copyrights that are the fundamental and appropriate public benefit of the copyright system that primarily and 

powerfully fulfills copyright’s constitutional purpose of promoting 

the progress of science and the useful arts. 

It seems so obvious but people seem to lose their bearings when 

discussing copyrights. There is a market for food in this country 

which functions pretty well. No one seriously doubts that there is 

a public good in the existence of this system that one has to pay 

for a sack of potatoes does not mean that there is not a tremendous 

value to the public and the investments and the efforts of the farmer, distributor, and grocer in getting those potatoes to the store. We 

may wish those potatoes were cheaper, we may even want them to 

be free but none would argue the public benefit of a market for food 

is dependent on the availability of free potatoes. 

So it is with public domain. Public domain is a fine thing but it 

is and always has been merely a nice byproduct of the copyright 

system. The real public benefit of copyright easily 90 percent of the 

value is the creation of progress promoting rights that the marketplace values. 

63

What does all of this have to do with fair use? The same sorts 

of arguments are brought to bear in fair use debates. We are told 

essentially that in order for copyrights to fulfill its constitutional 

purpose and provide a real public benefit, we have to make sure 

that their use is adequately bought. This misapprehends primary 

value of copyright and the role of fair use in the copyright system. 

Fair use has traditionally helped define the boundaries between 

commerce and free expression. Between the commercial incentives 

secured by copyright and the rights of free expression protected by 

the first amendment. 

Section 107 mediates between protected expression and free expression by setting forth four factors for the court to consider 

whether use is fair. Factors intended to permit the except, you 

know, copywriter rights needed for new creative expression so long 

as the effect on the commercial market for the work is minimal. 

And unfortunate use, result of the use of four factors to determine 

the balance of fair use is that fair use appears to be a bit mushy. 

Advocates of all stripes can and do read into fair use what they 

care to read into it. 

Search engine firms have discovered books. All the major firms 

now have book digitalization’s under way. Google is looking at 

hooking with major American libraries and one British library in 

its massive book scanning and storage effort. Some of these libraries are offering Google only public domain books but the University 

of Michigan and reportedly Stanford are offering up works still protected by copyright. Google seems to have figured something out. 

There is a demand for searching these books, a demand that warrants the investment of a reported $200 million, a demand that 

Google is determined to satisfy because Google is a sensible profit 

seeking enterprise believing its investment will pay off and increase visitors to its sites and increased ad revenues. 

Google senses a competitive advantage in making copyrighted 

books searchable but Google says that is copying of these books, 

that its scanning of countless copyrighted volumes, and using optical character recognition technology to digitize the text of those 

works to create files to assemble into a new unimaginably vast 

data base that all that copying and use of these works would be 

fair use so it does not need a license from anyone for this copying. 

For good measure, it is handing over a digital copy of its—to its 

partner libraries and telling them it is okay to post the works on 

their website. That too it appears is to be considered fair use. And 

since no license is needed in Google’s view, Google does not have 

to give rights holder contractual assurances of the security of the 

data base. Could a back up tape go straight from Google or one of 

its partner libraries unleashing a couple hundred thousand copyrighted works sent to the internet? It sure seems possible. We will 

have to trust that that is under control. The list of companies——

Mr. STEARNS. I just need you to sum up. 

Mr. AIKEN. Sure. That lose critical data grows daily. We do not 

believe the courts will share Google’s radical expansive and devastating view that the scope of fair—of the scope of fair use. At 

some point, we believe that Google will do the right thing and look 

to a licensing solution for the use it wants to make of these millions of works. That would be good news. A negotiated license could 

64

pave the way for a real online library, something far beyond the 

excepts Google intends to offer to its Google library program. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Paul Aiken follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF PAUL AIKEN ON BEHALF OF THE AUTHORS GUILD

Mr. Chairman, I represent the Authors Guild, the largest society of published authors in the country. The Guild and its predecessor organization, the Authors 

League of America, have been leading advocates for authors’ copyright and contractual interests since the League’s founding in 1912. Among our more than 8,000 current members are historians, biographers, poets, novelists and freelance journalists 

of every political persuasion. Authors Guild members create the works that fill our 

bookstores and libraries: literary landmarks, bestsellers and countless valuable and 

culturally significant works with unfortunately modest sales records. We have 

counted among our ranks winners of every major literary award, including the 

Nobel Prize and National Book Award, as well as United States Presidents, members of the Senate and, no doubt, distinguished members of the House of Representatives. 

We have a 90-year history of contributing to debates before Congress on the proper scope and function of copyright law. It’s an honor and a privilege to be here 

today, for the Authors Guild to continue to serve that role before this committee. 

Copyright and the Public Interest 

When people discuss policy issues about copyright, they often talk about balancing 

the public’s interest against that of the rightsholder. The public’s interest is frequently cast in terms of the public domain, as if the overriding public benefit of 

copyright is the creation of material that can be used for free. The public domain 

does provide a benefit to society, but that’s not the primary means by which the 

public benefits from copyright. Not by a long shot. 

Copyright allows authors and other rightsholders to work in a free market economy. Copyright transforms authors’ creative efforts, their investment of countless 

hours of work on their manuscripts, into marketable goods, licensable products. A 

fortunate and talented minority of prospective authors finds publishers for their 

works. These authors enter into essentially joint venture agreements with their publishers, licensing the right to print and sell their works in exchange for an advance 

and the prospect of shared profits in the form of royalties. (Contrary to widely held 

belief, the advance is generally modest, merely defraying some of the author’s investment of time and money in creating the manuscript.) 

A published book is no guarantee of success, of course, the author’s and publisher’s investments may be for naught. That’s how it is in an entrepreneurial system, not all efforts pay off. But authors and publishers accept those risks, and with 

a good book, some luck and bit of marketing skill, the author’s and publisher’s investments will pay off in the marketplace, and readers will value the book. 

That book, and other books like it, the books that readers value, the books that 

public, academic, and corporate libraries choose to acquire for their collections, are 

the primary public benefit of copyright. I’m speaking now of the book publishing industry, but the same paradigm applies to the newspaper, magazine, music, movie 

and software industries. It’s the products that result from the market created by 

copyright, the newspapers and movies and software programs that are still under 

the protection of copyright, that are the fundamental and appropriate public benefit 

of the copyright system, that primarily and powerfully fulfill copyright’s constitutional purpose of ‘‘promot[ing] the progress of science and [the] useful arts.’’

This seems so obvious, but otherwise clear-thinking people seem to lose their 

bearings when discussing copyright. There’s a market for food in this country which 

functions pretty well. No one seriously doubts that there’s a public good in the existence of this system. That one has to pay for a sack of potatoes doesn’t mean there’s 

not a tremendous value to the public in the investments and efforts of the farmer, 

distributor and grocer in getting those potatoes to the store. We may wish the potatoes were cheaper, we may want them to be free, we may even think that potatoes 

want to be free, but none would argue that the public benefit is dependent on free 

potatoes. 

Or take the Ford Foundation. It does, I’m sure, much good work. Some might 

argue that this is the public good that resulted from Henry Ford’s company, that 

he and his family were able to endow this charitable institution. But the Ford Foundation’s good works, significant as they are, pale in comparison to the public benefit 

of the Ford Motor Company’s products, automobiles. Ford revolutionized the indusVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00068 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
65

try, bringing independent, speedy transportation within the reach of working families, and the public valued this product tremendously, responding by buying Ford’s 

cars by the million. (Ford’s other great product, of course—it’s other great benefit 

to our society—is good-paying, benefit-rich jobs.) The real public benefit of Ford is 

a direct result of the automobile market—cars that people value and the jobs to 

build those cars—the charity is just gravy. 

And so it is with the public domain. The public domain’s a fine thing, but it is, 

and always has been, merely a nice by-product of the copyright system. The real 

public benefit of copyright, easily ninety percent of the value, is the creation of 

progress-promoting works that the marketplace values. 

Fair Use & Authorship 

What does all this have to do with fair use? The same sorts of arguments are 

brought to bear on fair use debates. We’re told, essentially, that in order for copyright to fulfill its constitutional purpose and provide a real public benefit, we have 

to make sure fair use is adequately broad. This misapprehends the primary value 

of copyright, as we’ve seen, and the role of fair use in the copyright system. 

Fair use, originally a judicial doctrine, now codified in Section 107 of the Copyright Act, has traditionally helped define the boundary between commerce and free 

expression, between the commercial incentives secured by copyright and the right 

to free expression protected by the First Amendment. 

Authors are big fans of copyright, of course, because authors like to get paid, but 

they’re also big fans of traditional, transformative fair use. 

Say an author is writing a history of The Great Depression and finds a recent 

article in which some scholar says that the Depression was caused by the stock market crash of 1929. This drives the author nuts, because she believes it’s well established that the stock market crash was only one of several factors causing the Depression. She wants to quote from this article to show just how wrong-headed it is, 

but the article is protected by copyright and its author may not be inclined to grant 

her permission to excerpt the work. What does our historian do? She uses it anyway. She copies a reasonable amount of that article, enough to make her point, and 

puts it into her own book, surrounding it with her commentary and criticism. She 

demolishes that scholar’s thesis, using his own words against him, and there’s nothing that author can do about it. 

That author can do nothing about it, at least in terms of her use of his copyrighted work, because this is classical, transformative fair use of the original author’s work. She’s taken part of his copyrighted work and transformed it, including 

it in a new creative expression, something completely unlike his work. As a society, 

we see real value in this sort of transformative borrowing from another’s work, it’s 

a vital part of the marketplace of ideas that free expression is meant to encourage, 

and it’s everywhere: book and movie reviews, of course; biographical and historical 

works; novels and plays; poetry and songs. 

Section 107 mediates between protected expression and free expression by setting 

forth four factors for a court to weigh in considering whether a use is fair, factors 

intended to permit the excerpting of copyrighted works needed for new creative expression, so long as the affect on the commercial market for the work is minimal. 

An unfortunate result of the use of four factors to determine the bounds of fair use 

is that fair use appears to be a bit ‘‘mooshy.’’ Advocates of all stripes can and do 

read into fair use what they care to read into it. 

Fair use is now often seen as another flavor of public domain, and that’s perhaps 

one way to think of it, but it’s of an entirely different nature than copyright’s real 

public domain. Fair use doesn’t mean free use of entire works—that’s the realm of 

genuine public domain. Fair use, in fact, has been transmuted by some into free use 

or good use or any other use that some interest group, industry or corporation wants 

to make of copyrighted works without paying for them. This isn’t, and shouldn’t be, 

what fair use is about. If we keep our eye on the true role of fair use—permitting 

the creation of new creative expressions without harming the commercial market for 

the work—we won’t lose our way. 

The Idea/Expression Dichotomy 

I should mention one other important way in which copyright law accommodates 

the First Amendment. Courts have interpreted copyright law to protect creative expression in copyrighted works, but not the ideas contained in those works. When 

people speak of copyright preventing the free flow of ideas, they are wrong, flat out. 

Copyright encourages and speeds the flow of ideas. 

One prominent copyright scholar, Paul Goldstein of Stanford Law School, describes the idea/expression dichotomy as creating a vast commons coursing through 

every copyrighted work—the publicly held and freely copyable ideas the work conVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00069 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
66

tains. If a particular author has creatively expressed an idea so well that another 

feels compelled to copy that particular expression, then one needs permission, that 

is, a license. That’s as it should be—well-crafted expression should be compensated, 

or the borrower should simply limit the excerpt to the bounds of fair use. 

The Internet & Fair Use 

The Internet is often described as a disruptive technology. There’s no doubt that 

that’s true—just ask travel agents or those in the music industry. Authors and publishers have had a taste of this disruption, as used bookselling, a somewhat quaint 

enterprise before the Internet, has seen explosive growth online, certainly displacing 

some royalty-paying sales of new books. That displacement will only grow with time. 

But the Internet also offers opportunities. Search engine firms have discovered 

books: all of the major firms now have book digitization efforts under way. Earlier 

this month, Microsoft announced an agreement with the British Library to scan 25 

million pages from the library’s collection. Those pages will be made available at 

MSN’s Book Search site next year. It’s just the start for Microsoft and the British 

Library, we’re told, Microsoft is investing a reported $2 million, just to get the ball 

rolling. Yahoo is also in the game, announcing last month that it’s working with a 

group called the Open Content Alliance, which includes Adobe Systems, HewlettPackard, and the libraries of the University of California and the University of Toronto, to scan books that will be made available through Yahoo’s search engine. 

Since that announcement, Microsoft has signed on, to make the books accessible 

through its search engine as well. In building their databases of books, the Microsoft 

and Yahoo efforts are properly sticking to scanning works that are in the public domain or those for which they receive permission. 

Not so with the mother of all book scanning and storage initiatives, Google Library. Google is working with four major American libraries, the libraries of Harvard, Stanford and the University of Michigan and the New York Public Library, 

and one British library, Oxford University’s Bodleian Library. Some of these libraries are offering Google only public domain books, but Michigan and reportedly Stanford are offering up works still protected by copyright. 

Google seems to have figured something out: there’s a demand for searching those 

books, a demand that warrants the investment of a reported $200 million. A demand that Google is determined to satisfy, because Google, a sensible, profit-seeking 

enterprise, believes its investment will pay off in increased visitors to its site, and 

increased ad revenues. Google senses a competitive advantage in making copyrighted books searchable.1We bet Google is right. If books were digitized and 

searchable on the Internet, we bet Google could turn a good profit by allowing its 

legions of users to search that database. And what a mind-boggling database: an 

assemblage of the nation’s copyrighted books, the result of the efforts and investments of hundreds of thousands of authors and thousands of publishers, served up 

in handy excerpts by Google’s computers. 

But here’s the bad part. Google says that its copying of these books—that its scanning of countless copyrighted volumes, then using optical character recognition technology to digitize the text of those works to create files to assemble into a new, unimaginably vast database, surely one of the largest databases ever assembled—that 

all of that copying and use of these works, would be fair use, so it doesn’t need a 

license from anyone for this copying. For good measure, it’s handing over a digital 

copy to its partner libraries, and telling them it’s OK to post the works to their 

websites. That, too, it appears, is to be considered fair use. 

Since there’s no license needed, in Google’s view, Google doesn’t have to give 

rightsholders contractual assurances of the security of their database. Could a 

backup tape go astray from Google or one of its partner libraries, unleashing a couple hundred thousand copyrighted works onto the Internet? Sure seems possible. 

We’re asked to trust that that’s under control. The list of companies, meanwhile, 

that lose critical data grows daily. What successes do hackers have at breaking in 

to the sites of Google and its partner libraries? There’d be no contractual need to 

report this, so it would likely go unreported. Security experts tell us that most data 

losses to hackers go unreported, and we don’t doubt it. No contract, no reporting, 

no control. ‘‘Trust us’’ security. 

What about other companies that want to do the same thing? When we first filed 

suit against Google, we mentioned to reporters our concern that others would see 

the same business opportunity and join in. Microsoft and Yahoo, as I’ve discussed, 

have since jumped in, but in a manner that appears to respect copyright. But if 

Google gets away with its vast database, Yahoo and Microsoft won’t stand still. 

They’ll make their own databases of copyrighted works, just to keep pace. They 

probably would be joined by Amazon, which has been investing heavily in its search 

engine, and has a strong interest in protecting its position in online bookselling. 

67

So we might have four or more companies, each pursuing private gain, digitizing 

the stacks of libraries. We’d have to trust each of them, naturally, and no doubt 

their partner libraries, not to misplace backup tapes or let down their guard against 

hackers. 

Specialized databases wouldn’t be far behind. WebMD might want to digitize a 

couple medical libraries for excerpting by its users. Fair use, naturally. Veterinarians, chemists and electrical engineers have their needs and websites, too. Harry 

Potter readers, science fiction fans and Civil War buffs wouldn’t be far behind. All 

one needs is a scanner and a few hundred dollars worth of software to get going 

with a workable system. These digital databases would all be secure, not to worry. 

Trust us, but don’t audit us. 

What remedy would authors and publishers have if these databases are deemed 

to be fair use copies but one of them is hacked into or its collection of digital books 

otherwise finds its way onto the Internet? If we’re fortunate, the negligent party 

would have substantial resources, but stating a claim against that entity might well 

be impossible. There’s no license, so there’s no breach of contract. We’re postulating 

that the copy is a non-infringing fair use copy, so there’d be no remedy under copyright. And the defendant would have a strong argument that copyright law preempts any state law cause of action. Plaintiffs might well find themselves shut out. 

What about uses by the partner libraries? The only contractual obligation imposed 

on libraries—at least in the sample available to us from the University of Michigan 

contract with Google—allows the University of Michigan to use the works at its 

website. No mention in the contract of limiting browsers to so-called fair use 

snippets. The contract also contemplates sharing the works with other academic libraries. The threat to the market for academic books couldn’t be clearer or more 

direct. If Google and the University of Michigan are correct in their interpretation 

of fair use law, then profit-minded publishers and royalty-seeking authors would be 

wise to abandon that market. 

What if the University of Michigan is wrong, and its uses overstep the bounds 

of fair use? Authors and publishers could just sue for damages, right? No, we’d probably be out of luck, as a state institution protected by the 11th Amendment, the 

University of Michigan is immune from damages claims under copyright law. 

Fair Use & The Market for Online Delivery of Books 

Recent developments make it appear likely that Google intends to leverage its interpretation of fair use into more than just ad revenue profits. In the past few 

weeks, there has been a spate of announcements, from Amazon, Random House and 

Google, of various schemes for selling and renting the right to view books online. 

Whether readers will accept these business models is anyone’s guess, but at some 

point, someone will likely discover the equivalent of iTunes for books, and online 

book sales or rentals will take hold. 

If Google can scan all copyrighted books into its databases as a fair use, then it 

may well establish its search engine as the dominant and unassailable portal to online books, the portal that readers and prospective buyers of online books would 

turn to first. It’s not too much of a stretch to imagine that Google might do as any 

right-thinking corporation would, use that dominance to extract favorable terms, a 

high percentage of all proceeds derived from the sale or rental of books through its 

portal. 

In this way, and the irony certainly won’t be lost on the publishing industry, 

Google could turn authors’ and publishers’ own works, their own vast libraries of 

works, against them, securing the upper hand for the indefinite digital future. All 

it takes is a couple hundred million dollars, and an expansive view of fair use. 

The Role of Licenses 

Fortunately, it need not come to that. We don’t believe the courts will share 

Google’s radical, expansive, and devastating view of the scope of fair use. At some 

point, we believe that Google will do the right thing, and look to a licensing solution 

for the use it wants to make of these millions of works. It’s too early to discuss what 

such a license would look like, but its general outlines might be guessable. Revenues, in the form of some reasonable split of advertising income, could be paid to 

authors and publishers. Rightsholders would have the right to review Google’s security protocols, and Google would be obliged to contractually guarantee the security 

of its database. And a negotiated license could pave the way for a real online library—something far beyond the excerpts Google intends to offer through its Google 

Library program. 

I would like to thank this Committee for holding this hearing and inviting us to 

participate.

Mr. STEARNS. I thank the gentleman. 

68

I will start with the questioning here and Professor Jaszi, let me 

start with you. I am in my home and I have got a CD or a DVD, 

do I have the right to make a single copy in your opinion, for my 

own personal use? It turns out that I have a—I live in Washington, 

DC, and I have a home in Florida and occasionally I want to listen 

to music in Washington and I find it is in—up here and so I will 

make a copy. Can I make a copy either for a DVD or a CD? Do 

you think that is a legitimate use that I should have a right to do? 

Mr. JASZI. Insofar as copyright law which incorporates the principle of fair use is concerned, I think the answer to that question 

is unqualifiably yes. 

Mr. STEARNS. Okay. Do I have right to do more than one copy 

because I also, perhaps let us say, I am just postulating, I have another house, a beach house. Can I make a third copy, a second 

copy? So then I would have the original plus a copy in Washington 

and now I have a copy at my beach house. 

Mr. JASZI. Again, as long as you are working within the zone of 

personal use, I think the answer is yes. 

Mr. STEARNS. Could I go so far to extend, extrapolate that and 

say that I have a right depending upon my location, my car, my 

iPod, my homes, can I continue to make copies for my personal use 

forever for the different locations? 

Mr. JASZI. We are talking here about your own personal——

Mr. STEARNS. Okay. What about my family, my sons, I have 

three boys. Let us say, you know, I have got this neat song I think 

you would like, can I make copies and give it to them? 

Mr. JASZI. I think that is a much more difficult case. 

Mr. STEARNS. Okay. And so you would not think that that is not 

correct. 

Mr. JASZI. Not necessarily. 

Mr. STEARNS. Okay. Ms. Bono had mentioned all these iPods that 

she and her daughters have. And my son, each of my sons has an 

iPod and right now they cannot go from iPod to iPod with their 

songs so Scott cannot give his collection to one son and he cannot 

give to another but Sony as I understand it, the—their MPT 3 you 

can do that. Is that acceptable for my sons to trade songs between 

them? I do not mean one song to download maybe 100 songs from 

one——

Ms. BONO. Would the chairman yield? 

Mr. STEARNS. Yes. 

Ms. BONO. Excuse me, but you can go iPod to iPod absolutely 

with the use of one PC. 

Mr. STEARNS. Okay. 

Ms. BONO. So you connect both iPods to that same PC. 

Mr. STEARNS. Okay. So I stand corrected, you can go from iPod 

to iPod. I mean is that acceptable in your opinion that her daughters or my son can go from iPod to iPod? 

Mr. JASZI. Again, I think that as long as we are talking now 

about copying for use outside the personal media space of the original consumer, wholesale copying along those lines cannot easily be 

justified under the doctrine of fair use. I would make, I would 

reach a different conclusion if the question were related to the 

sharing of a single song that was of particular interest to one user 

who wanted——

69

Mr. STEARNS. Okay. 

Mr. JASZI. [continuing] affirmatively to make——

Mr. STEARNS. Jack Valente, he is head of the Motion Picture Association at our last hearing said he says it is incorrect and it is 

against the law. He wants to be sure that it is fully understood 

that you cannot even make one copy and he mentioned not even 

for one for personal use. So you seem to be disagreeing. Does anybody disagree with the Professor here strongly and would like to 

comment? 

Mr. DeLong? 

Mr. DELONG. Yes. It seems to me that this problem which is obviously very difficult under fair use doctrine where you are trying 

to assess the costs and benefits and everything is very easily solvable in a market and that is that if you want one copy, you are 

going to pay less than the person who wants 2, 3, or 20. And, you 

know, problem solved. If your children each want copies, you know, 

they will pay a little more than the person who only wants one. It 

is simply trying to see that——

Mr. STEARNS. Your solution is to say you cannot make any copies 

unless you get reimbursed from—that there should be a flag in the 

CD, a DVD that——

Mr. DELONG. Yes. 

Mr. STEARNS. [continuing] says bingo my son wants to make a 

copy, he has got to get the password and pay, instead of 99 cents, 

he can pay 50 cents. 

Mr. DELONG. Yes. Believe me they will event ways of doing this. 

They will event two for one. There could be all sorts of ways of 

doing this. But the fundamental question is well two, one why 

should the person who needs very light use subsidize the whole 

family of somebody else. And second, why get embroiled in it as a 

legal doctrine? Why get the courts embroiled in it when the market 

will solve it——

Mr. STEARNS. Well, Mr. DeLong, your point is well taken because 

my sons then go to their friends and they pretty soon if they are 

visualizing themselves after the Thanksgiving dinner downloading 

to their iPods or their MP3 iPod type Sony’s then they would probably do it with their friends. 

You know I have said from the beginning, I said it in my opening 

statement, there must be some technological way to solve this problem with a flag so that maybe if we have the final solution that 

you can do one copy, if you try to do more than one copy, then you 

have to go ahead. Does anybody care to—yes, Mr. Shapiro? 

Mr. SHAPIRO. Yes, Chairman Stearns, the Audio Recording Act 

actually it was a negotiated agreement if you will between the 

music industry and the technology industry and they basically 

agree that you can make an unlimited number of copies off an 

original but no copies from that copy. Now this was done before the 

internet and it was a reasonable compromise which everyone 

agreed upon and Congress actually enacted and it kind of set the 

standard. But I think moving to distinguish here, the law, although 

I would like to agree with Professor Jaszi, the law is basically unclear. We do not know. I was at—a reporter asked me the question 

yesterday at a press conference, the exact same question you asked, 

you know, can I tell my readers that they can make copies? Well 

70

before the Supreme Court, the content industry lawyer argued that 

you can of course you can make a copy of your own CD. And indeed 

when Congress considered earlier legislation, they talked about the 

right to record off a radio. There was a four colloquy where it was 

absolutely clear that you had the right to record off the radio. But 

some in the content community have taken a legal position that is 

absolutely unacceptable to make any authorized copies and there 

is really no such thing as fair use in that area. I think there is a 

better way. The law can resolve some things but I think Congressman Bono said it well. I mean there are certain issues in morality 

stealing is stealing is stealing. And morality sometimes takes over 

here and is not—the law can only go so far. Sharing some music 

with a friend to the extent that it exposes that friend to a new artist is not a bad thing. They may go out and buy that CD. It also 

may displace the sale. It is a balancing test but you need the ability to do that and you do have to have the constraint of morality. 

Mr. DELONG. But sharing a new taste is a good thing too and 

we don’t say you should get the ingredients for free. I mean, you 

know, fair use and free use are entirely different things and the 

fact is, you know, when technology is ringing the transaction costs 

out of these, we are far better off just to rely on markets than to 

put courts in position as being central planners as to what is fair. 

Mr. STEARNS. My time has expired. 

Ms. Schakowsky? 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Although one can copy a Martha Stewart recipe and pass it on to others freely. 

Mr. DELONG. Well there are—I did not say we were going to 

solve all the tough issues. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Okay, all right. I wanted to ask Ms. Adler, I 

am very concerned about lots of uses but primarily I am concerned 

about libraries which I think are fundamental to our democracy in 

so many important ways and to our history. And so I wanted to follow up on some of the things you said. 

You stated that libraries are being forced to shift from purchasing work to getting access licenses from—for use from publishers. Are publishers stopping libraries from buying books? Are 

you being pushed into license agreements because of fear of copyright infringement? So if you could explain that a bit? 

Ms. ADLER. Certainly, I think it is a combination of factors as we 

saw the rise in the availability of information in electronic form 

particularly in the context of journals. Publishers move from predominately print based offerings to electronic particularly we also 

see the rise of E-books, electronic books that are beginning to be 

introduced more and more in libraries. That is not to say we still 

do not have large number of volumes and tangible books in our libraries but predominately the use is licensing and as I mentioned, 

it is because it provides greater certainty to the publisher as to 

how that information will be used and protected. Typically you will 

see in our libraries that we will be negotiating licenses on behalf 

of an individual institution or through Consortia and it is in that 

context that we will try and imbed in our license agreements as 

many exceptions that match or mirror what is in the Copyright Act 

as possible but that is a very, very difficult and uphill battle for 

us to achieve. 

71

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. And is it possible that these licenses may end 

up requiring that you charge patients fees for services that otherwise you provide for free? I mean do you foresee that as a potential 

problem or not? 

Ms. ADLER. That is not—the way the library fortunately or unfortunately, the library community seeks to make access to information as transparent as possible to our users. Our goal is for them 

to have the most effective and easy access as possible. And so what 

we try and do through our license agreements is to make sure that 

they do not have problems accessing that information and that 

there would be additional charges then for example. We will absorb 

those in the license agreement on behalf of our user community so 

that we do everything that we can to make sure that there are not 

additional——

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Well let me ask you this. Would that put additional financial burdens then on libraries? 

Ms. ADLER. Absolutely. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Okay. 

Ms. ALDER. Without question. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. And you also raised the issue of preservation 

of materials. Could you elaborate on that a bit? I mean that ought 

to be a concern I think to all of us if that is a major function of 

libraries and that we could potentially lose that function. 

Ms. ADLER. It is an enormous concern for the library community. 

The library community, that is our charge, that is our mission to 

provide long-term effective access and preservation of all information regardless of format from cuneiforms on up to electronic resources and it has become such an issue for us as we move to licensing these resources where we do not have the tangible item per 

se to preserve. And if there are conditions in a license that prohibit 

us from preserving those electronic resources, there is nothing that 

we can do about that. And most recently, the Mellon Foundation 

came out with a call to the community that they see this as a crisis 

and that they are hoping that all sectors both private and public 

and foundation, the foundation community deal with this crisis and 

preservation of our information resources. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Thank you. 

I wanted to ask Mr. Aiken or just have him comment on something. My understanding is that in addition to consumers that 

there actually are authors who seem to support the Google print 

project. I just wanted to read you a quote from a Chicago author. 

I represent a part of Chicago. It says ‘‘Dear Google, your search engine is the primary way that people find their way to my website 

and consequently my book. I asked my publisher for my book to be 

included in Google print. I was told they did not do that. Lack of 

exposure is the primary reason that at book like mine would fail 

in the marketplace. Please let me know if I can do anything to 

help.’’ And I understand there are dozens of testimonials like this 

on Google’s website and on the bloggs and so I am wondering why 

we cannot just deal with this opt out for authors and allow others 

who would support this idea to go forward? 

Mr. AIKEN. There are of course tens of thousands of authors out 

there. It is no surprise that Google has been able to find a dozen 

or two that that——

72

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Well, first of all, let me say that some I think 

have found Google. I mean you are making it sound like they have 

scouted around to find those so——

Mr. AIKEN. I do not know the circumstances under which 

those——

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Okay. 

Mr. AIKEN. [continuing] appeared at Google’s website. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Right. 

Mr. AIKEN. There is nothing inconsistent with having works be 

available on line and being licensed for that use. We are not opposed to the idea of making books searchable online. We are opposed to it being uncontrolled without a proper license. Because a 

Google collection copyright is a search engine exception to copyright and any search engine large and small and there are dozens 

would be able to take advantage of it. And the security concerns 

are real and on the internet we think it could easily lead to widespread piracy. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Thank you. 

Mr. STEARNS. The gentleman from Texas. 

Chairman BARTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I mean it is obvious I am a supporter of fair use and my name 

is on the bill along with Congressman Boucher and Congressman 

Doolittle so I am biased here. 

But I have a question to those of you that oppose the bill. If I 

go to Wal-Mart or Best Buy or Home Depot, almost anyplace that 

sells video and audio equipment, I can get home recorders, I can 

get CD burners, I can get blank tapes, I can get blank CD’s. Should 

we outlaw those devices? Anybody think we ought to outlaw them? 

Let the record show nobody said we ought to outlaw them. 

Ms. BONO. Can I answer since I am opposed to the bill? 

Chairman BARTON. Well if we cannot outlaw those, those can all 

be used. Those of you that oppose the concept of fair use those can 

be used to make a copy of something. And according to the most 

radical opponents of the bill, you cannot make a copy of anything. 

There is no fair use. And that just flies in the face of reality. It flies 

in the face of the marketplace. It—you know, everybody in this 

country is a criminal and I just do not believe that. So I do not 

know why we cannot agree to find a compromise where—I do not 

want the folks that Ms. Blackburn and Ms. Bono and others supports so strongly, the creative people in this country, I want their 

copyrights protected. I want their creativity protected but current 

law codifies that you can make a limited number of copies of certain things for your own personal use. I just do not see why we 

cannot somehow find a meeting of the minds on this. 

Let me ask my friend, Mr. Shapiro, is it technologically possible 

for your industry to create and manufacture and sell equipment 

and the materials that are used in that equipment that would technologically allow a small number of copies but it would be a small 

number. Is that technologically possible? 

Mr. SHAPIRO. I will answer that of course, I just want to answer 

your first question actually but I will answer both very quickly. 

Chairman BARTON. Well I appreciate that. It is so kind of you. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. You know what has happened in the last couple of 

weeks is emphasized the importance of 1201 because now the fixes 

73

that are being put up by Microsoft and things like that, they are 

actually, I believe they are violations of the Digital Millennium 

Copyright Act because you have to circumvent the copyright protection scheme just to basically save your computer. So I think if 1201 

was ever important, it is much more important in these last 2 

weeks because a lot of people’s computers are in jeopardy. And in 

a sense, some companies are in a sense violating the law to protect 

people’s computers. Now that is not the observed result that Congress intended but it does make 1201 more important. 

In terms of the ability of any of our 2,000 member companies of 

the Consumer Electronics Association to actually come up with the 

types of products you are talking about, there are technologies 

which I am sure can be—and products can be built to limit the 

number of copies. There are challenges though obviously because 

you could always somehow make an analogue copy of something 

and pass it along and things like that and there is always, you 

know, if you build a better mousetrap you do get smarter mice. I 

think you really have to rely upon the fact is distinguishing what 

is a commercial purpose from a private purpose. 

Chairman BARTON. But even if it is a private purpose, I agree 

you cannot make unlimited copies. If I have for Christmas if I—

it’s not legal for me to go buy one CD and then burn it for all 40 

of my relatives. You know, that is a private use but, you know, I 

think it is okay if I buy one and burn one for my home and one 

for my car or one for my condo in Washington and, you know, but 

I am not trying to let people under fair use set up a commercial 

operation. That is not what this bill is about. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. Under the Audio and Recording Act, Congress has 

decided that for digital audio copies at least you can make an unlimited number of copies off of one CD but you may not make any 

copies of those copies but actually the equipment is now designed 

and set up that way. Plus when you buy a digital audio home recording product, you are actually paying a royalty that goes to the 

copyright owners. You are paying for the hardware and that money 

is collected and divided among copyright owners. So in a sense, 

Congress has actually addressed the question about directly in the 

Digital Home Recording Act. I think the questions are coming up 

now because those that entered that deal want to look at it again 

and obviously the internet has had an impact. 

Chairman BARTON. I want to ask Mr. Hirsch a question. First it 

is just a personal question. Are you any relation to a Steve Hirsch 

who went to Johns Hopkins and went to graduate school with me 

at Perdue? 

Mr. HIRSCH. No, I do not believe so. 

Chairman BARTON. Okay, well, he is a good guy so. I am sure 

you are good guy, too. That was not to imply that you were not. 

My question to you is your trade association, the products that 

the folks that are in your association manufacture and sell who 

gets royalties from their sale? Royalties or residuals or things like 

this? 

Mr. HIRSCH. It is the people who own, the creators of the game, 

the people who own the copyright in the game. 

74

Chairman BARTON. But if their licensed in other countries, the 

creator gets that, I mean does everybody who participates in the 

creation get a royalty or just a very few of the people? 

Mr. HIRSCH. Well it is a—copyright is a collective enterprise in 

the game development business and it is generally the game developing company or the——

Chairman BARTON. Well for example if you have the Madden 

football game, does Mr. Madden get a royalty? Does every NFL 

player who’s represented in the videogame get a royalty or does the 

creator of the software package get a royalty or do all of those people? 

Mr. HIRSCH. Well, I mean the royalty schemes for various games 

operated differently. Obviously to some extent, to the extent that 

third party intellectual property, their likenesses, the trademarks, 

et cetera that are being incorporated into a game, there are royalties that are generally paid out to the owners of this——

Chairman BARTON. But the point I am driving at in the video industry, if Tom Cruise does a movie or Lucille Ball did the I Love 

Lucy Show, their contracts allow that if that is shown on TV or repeated or shown in the movies again, they can get some residual 

or some royalty. But in the music business if George Strait records 

a song and it is played on the radio, the songwriter and maybe the 

producer gets the royalty or the residual but Mr. Straight does not. 

He only gets when they sell his record or sell his CD or whatever 

it is he gets a one time payment but he does not get, it does not 

keep coming over and over again. And in your—so in your business, these fees that are accrued, I am just trying to figure out who 

gets them? Is it just the producer that gets them or does everybody 

in the chain get them? 

Mr. HIRSCH. It is the company that created the game so that the 

employees of that company would obviously benefit to the extent 

that that company is able to recoup its investment. 

Chairman BARTON. Okay. My time has expired, Mr. Chairman, 

thank you. 

Mr. STEARNS. Mr. Gonzalez? 

Mr. GONZALEZ. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

And let me start off I guess with an observation. We are talking 

about the anti-circumvention clause and the exception carved out 

for fair use and I do not see why we have to do violence to either 

and I know the chairman of the full committee would like for some 

sort of technological fix or compromise and hopefully we can do 

that. For you all, the interested parties and with vested interests 

to rely on us to come up with that, I think can be a little dangerous 

experiment. But we did recognize one thing. I think we call agree 

that when it comes to proprietary rights, it is going to be very difficult for someone to go out there to protect them by trying to sue 

them or enforce them, millions of times over because that is what 

we are talking about now is that technology has empowered individuals to collect, copy, and disseminate information like never before. So it is real hard legally to try to enforce that right in that 

type of environment. 

So my first question will go to the Professor and then the second 

question everyone for their own opinion and read on the thing. And 

I’m looking here at Mr. Band’s written testimony. The Supreme 

75

Court explains that intellectual property system requires a ‘‘balance between the interests of authors and inventors and the control 

and exploitation of the writings and discoveries on one hand and 

society’s competing interests in the free flow of ideas, information, 

and commerce on the other. The question to the good professor is 

can technology by empowering individuals, millions and millions 

with the ability of course to copy, disseminate, store, reproduce, do 

all these things, at some point, do you just reach this particular 

juncture where fair use is rendered or let’s say protecting or proprietary rights is rendered meaningless by fair use. That is going to 

be the question. I mean can technology move us forward to where 

you have so many individuals that are capable of compromising 

whatever this proprietary right was in the past that the environment is totally changed. That the law and the principles that underlie proprietary rights is actually going to be changed fundamentally. Can technology do that in this particular instance? I say no 

but I want to hear your opinion. 

And then to the rest of you and quickly of course because—but 

I was given the additional time because I had no opening statement and I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman. What is the objectionable behavior we are really trying to address? I heard individuals 

today saying that you know this could impact artists, teachers, students, librarians, documentary filmmakers, but really is that the 

case? Now I have heard Mr. Shapiro and I think he said well the 

distinction would be between private and commercial use. And that 

sounds good and I am not real sure where we would go with that 

but that does sound pretty solid. But then I heard Ms. Adler say 

that the technological or tech controls do impact the practical use 

and application of fair use. So that is something else that we never 

think about. Well and maybe this is a way that we can protect it 

but by allowing that, then it does impact legitimate fair use. So 

that question goes what is the objectionable behavior we are really 

trying to address realistically and I do not want you all to go and 

use Chairman Stearns’ son and his iPod and such. I really want 

to know what we are here all about. But first, Professor, is it Jaszi 

or——

Mr. JASZI. Jaszi, yes. 

Mr. GONZALEZ. Jaszi. 

Mr. JASZI. Thank you very much. It is a wonderful question and 

I think the answer may put me a little bit at odds with some of 

my colleagues at this table and perhaps with some of the members 

here today as well because I do not believe, in fact, that information environments or copyright law are undergoing a fundamental 

cataclysmic change as a result of changes in technology. There 

have, in fact, been changes in technology including changes in technology which have put greater and greater power to reproduce and 

to distribute into the hands of individuals throughout the history 

of information markets. And copyright law has not had to be remade in each of those cases. In fact, I think, the enforcement problem that you reference in your question is part of a much larger 

issue like the income tax system. The copyright system works and 

functions only on the basis of ultimate respect by consumers. No 

amount of enforcement whether it is technological or legal will ever 

make those who wish not to disobey or who choose to disregard 

76

copyright into law-abiding citizens. That is, I think in the end a 

hopeless project whether it is to be accomplished by draconian technological or by draconian legal means. The greatest risk as far as 

I can see in the current arms race that is taking place between 

copyright owners and copyright users around technologies and digital rights management is that gradually the public is losing its respect for this critical aspect of our legal system. And when that respect is gone, then no amount of enforcement and no amount of 

technical ingenuity will bring it back. 

Can I take a crack at your other question, too, because I think 

that the concern that I tried to articulate is precisely the concern 

that resides with the practices of a wide range of user groups who 

have always been able in the past to make use of fair use, to add 

value to what has gone before and to control new content to the 

commonwealth of available material. And I gave the example of the 

teacher who wants to use film clips in a classroom as an example 

of a situation in which traditional copyright fair use would apply 

but no exception is likely to be available under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. So one can multiply those examples in terms 

of students, in terms of young musicians who are coming up and 

trying to learn their trade by imitating and copying the styles of 

others before they develop styles of their own. We can multiply 

those examples. 

I want if I can to take a certain amount of issue with Mr. 

DeLong’s earlier statements that this is really all about markets 

and transaction costs. That vision of fair use really approximates 

where the courts and the academic world were 20 years ago. And 

since then over the last two decades there has been a consistent 

movement in the courts and in the academic world toward a recognition that fair use is not simply about greasing the wheels of 

the market but about promoting cultural progress in all of its 

forms. And that is why the courts have moved more and more to 

the formativeness standard in their analysis of fair use issues. So 

I think it would be a mistake to think of this only in terms of antipiracy enforcement on the one hand or the facilitation of markets 

on the other. Much more is at stake here. What is at stake is literally the future of our culture. 

Ms. BONO. Would the gentleman yield for clarification? 

Mr. GONZALEZ. Sure. I have only 16 seconds but if the others 

would still attempt to answer the underlying question of the objectionable behavior, yes, Ms. Bono. 

Ms. BONO. Yes or no, I’m sorry to—has there ever been a case 

brought against a classroom for showing a snip of a film? 

Mr. JASZI. I am sorry I——

Ms. BONO. Has there ever been a case brought against a teacher 

for showing a clip of a film in a classroom? 

Mr. JASZI. No, but there were many who bought——

Ms. BONO. Thank you. 

Mr. JASZI. Can I finish the answer, please? There were many 

law-abiding features——

Ms. BONO. I’m sorry——

Mr. JASZI. [continuing] forego the practice because of the DMCA. 

Mr. STEARNS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Ms. Blackburn? 

77

Ms. BLACKBURN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I am going to see if the voice will hold out for this a couple of 

points about Chairman Barton’s questions on equipment. No one is 

seeking to outlaw equipment that allows creators and inventors to 

grow in craft and bring forward an idea and craft a trade to create 

a product like a songwriter or a musician to create something to 

get it ready to move to the marketplace where it can be a commodity that does have an economic value. We also want to be sure 

that those that create that product such as individuals that Mr. 

Shapiro works with have the ability to retain the right to be paid 

and compensated for their ideas that do become tangibles and commodities and deserve to be paid. 

Professor Jaszi, I think if I had been one of your students you 

and I would have feisty debates. I think that when I hear someone 

use the word draconian and apply that in a constitutional framework that it is of concern to me. I do not think there is anything 

draconian about the constitution of this Nation or about the Fifth 

Amendment and I would, a yes or no will do on this, I would think 

that you probably agree with the Kelo decision if I am understanding what you are saying today. 

Mr. JASZI. I am sorry, what——

Ms. BLACKBURN. Do you agree with the Kelo decision from the 

Supreme Court? Are you not familiar with that decision? 

Mr. JASZI. What? I am not hearing very well, I am afraid. 

Ms. BLACKBURN. Kelo, K-e-l-o. 

Mr. JASZI. No, I am not familiar with that decision. 

Ms. BLACKBURN. You are not familiar with that. I would recommend to you and Mr. Chairman, I would like to submit for the 

record, I do not think this has been submitted, an article by Mr. 

DeLong that I actually read last night and I have got it on my desk 

pertaining to the Kelo decision. I would like to submit that article 

for the record. 

[The article follows:]

[Release 1.7 August 2005]

ONE DEGREE OF SEPARATION: KELO & H.R. 1201

By James V. DeLong 

Everyone knows the game Degrees of Separation, where one finds the connection 

between two seemingly distant people. 

The same game works for seemingly unrelated policy issues. For particular example: it takes only a single hop to get from the recent eminent domain case Kelo v. 

New London to H.R. 1201, a bill on intellectual property and technological protection measures (TPM) in the U.S. House of Representatives. 

The Fifth Amendment to the Constitution says that private property may be 

taken for public use only if just compensation is paid. The phrase ‘‘public use’’ has 

always been assumed to be a limitation, meaning that a state cannot take for a 

strictly private use, simply transferring property from A to B, even if it compensates 

A. 

In Kelo, the Supreme Court addressed the issue whether this long-standing assumption has any real content, and its answer was ‘‘not much.’’ New London took 

Ms. Kelo’s house because it wanted to transfer the property to a redevelopment authority, which had some grandiose plans for the area. This was good enough to meet 

the public use requirement, said the Court, since: ‘‘For more than a century, our 

public use jurisprudence has wisely eschewed rigid formulas and intrusive scrutiny 

in favor of affording legislatures broad latitude in determining what public needs 

justify the use of the takings power.’’ 

Of course, it would be pretty hard to fail a test that requires nothing but some 

sanctimonious verbiage. As Justice Scalia said in an earlier case: ‘‘Since [a harmVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00081 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
78

preventing] justification can be formulated in practically every case, this amounts 

to a test of whether the legislature has a stupid staff.’’ 

Kelo has been met by a rush of criticism from both left and right, most of it refreshingly Adam Smithian. The gist is that it is simply not a proper function of government to decide that B can make better use of property than A. If this happens 

to be true, then the free market provides the perfect remedy—let B buy it. 

Perhaps there is also a growing sense that the government raven for pork to distribute to favored constituencies is already out of control in spending tax money, 

and that giving it carte blanche to redistribute property in general is the road to 

perdition. (If this sense is not growing, it certainly should be.) 

But at least Ms. Kelo got paid for her property. Pending before the U.S. Congress 

at this very moment is a bill designed to take property from a bunch of As and give 

it to a bunch of Bs, only without paying a cent to the As. And it, too, relies on a 

test composed of sanctimonious verbiage that could be failed only by the deeply stupid. 

The bill is H.R. 1201, the Digital Media Consumers’ Rights Act of 2005, and the 

background is the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which is section 1201 of the 

Copyright Act (hence the H.R. number). The DMCA makes it illegal to crack technological protection measures (TPM)—commonly called encryption—used to protect 

copyrighted content. The DMCA also makes illegal the distribution of code cracking 

tools. 

H.R. 1201 would repeal this ban insofar as the code cracker or the toolsmith 

wanted to obtain, or help others obtain, access for purposes of making ‘‘noninfringing use’’ of a work. 

There are indeed lots of noninfringing uses of copyrighted works, most of them 

created by the courts under a doctrine called ‘‘fair use.’’ The doctrine is a grabbag—

it includes such uses as excerpts for book reviews; some transformative uses, whereby a work forms a foundation for broader efforts; political commentary. There is a 

dash of transaction cost thinking—it can be fair to photocopy an article for educational purposes if getting permission is a long and arduous process. 

Because of the variety of purposes crowded into the doctrine of fair use, it would 

be is a dull code cracker indeed who could not attach a plausible claim of fair use 

to almost any work. Want to write a class essay on ‘‘Images of the Mafia in American Art?’’ Surely this commentary entitles you to get The Sopranos by hacking into 

the encryption that protects HBO. Want to compose ‘‘Variations on a Theme of the 

Grateful Dead′′? Then hack your iPod to access the raw code of their music. 

Note that such arguments would justify not just hacking by the nerd elite, but 

mass distribution of code-cracking tools. And, of course, once the tools are available, 

or the decrypted copies are available, then there is no way of controlling them. And 

the IP involved has then, for all practical purposes, been seized from all the As who 

used to own it and redistributed to all the Bs. 

No one, including the backers of H.R. 1201, is so dumb as not to know that this 

would be the effect. Their precise goal is to abolish IP rights in favor of some mystical commune wherein all IP is free as the air and creators are compensated by 

government. Like the New Haven Redevelopment Authority, they have a grandiose 

plan. 

Current fair use doctrines were invented in a different technological age. They 

need to be rethought to fit contemporary circumstances, and this is indeed happening in the marketplace. Consumers are making known that they want some ability to copy CDs, for example, and the TPM people are setting up systems that allow 

it, to a limited extent. 

Other new divisions of property rights between creators and consumers are being 

negotiated out through marketplace experimentation. The last thing needed is a 

heavy-handed legislature deciding that it can decree how this complex territory 

should be redeveloped, and then trampling over both property rights and market 

processes. 

Ms. Kelo lost in the Supreme Court, but Congress need not replicate the error.

Mr. STEARNS. So ordered. 

Ms. BLACKBURN. Thank you. And Mr. DeLong, I thank you for 

that. I thought it was very insightful and I agree one degree of separation between Kelo and the affront to private property rights 

there and to intellectual property rights. I think we have to be 

very, very careful how we approach this issue. 

Mr. Shapiro, you can never play poker, my friend, your face tells 

the whole story. 

79

Mr. SHAPIRO. That is what my poker mates say. 

Ms. BLACKBURN. Yes, I am sure. We have—your industry’s content and tech industries have been working together for a long time 

to create products that meet consumer demand and desires and I 

wish that we could see more participation between you guys and 

some of the content producers. I would like to see more participation. We would like for everybody to get along and——

Mr. SHAPIRO. Can I respond? 

Ms. BLACKBURN. No, you may not. But there is a lot of discussion 

around to level one which would essentially allow consumers to 

hack through the content protection in the name of fair use. And 

sir, that is very—of great concern to me. So I have got to question 

for you. As we are looking at this and looking to address this issue 

because sure everybody is concerned about what would be an allowed use and then what oversteps and becomes theft. So do you 

think that the method currently provides enough flexible options 

for individuals that want to look at in home use and do you think 

that we need to actually go in here and legalize hacking tools and 

theft tools? Do you think we need to do that? 

Mr. SHAPIRO. I am not sure I understand your question but I will 

answer what I think I heard. I think you asked about the marketplace providing solutions to some of these problems. 

Ms. BLACKBURN. It seems to provide a lot of options right now. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. And I think the market—if you look at Apple 

iTunes and some of the evolving—and I assume mostly you are 

talking about the audio world, music services. I think the marketplace is quickly——

Ms. BLACKBURN. Audio and video both. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. I am sorry? 

Ms. BLACKBURN. Go ahead, I am sorry. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. I think the marketplace is quickly providing solutions. I think the music industry made a very bad mistake by just 

selling CD’s and not giving consumers any options on them and 

fighting the internet. Now they have turned around, it is a little 

late but it is happening because most people want to do the good 

thing. And we have worked with the content community. Jack Flint 

and I set up the group that created the DVD standard which is a 

basic standard that by all accounts has worked very well. And you 

did say that no one is seeking to block equipment. That is totally 

not true. Indeed the RIA is pushing legislation which would make 

this Delphi-XM product illegal. They are trying to say you can only 

record for 30 minutes continuously. That would deny me the opportunity to listen to this hearing on XM radio played back later. So 

there is a whole bunch of products that have been tried to make 

illegal. I could talk about Clear Play, I could talk about Replay. I 

could talk about the VCR itself. There are so many products which 

would have been thrown off the market and some of them were. 

Replay was in bankruptcy, its product does not exist. Its competitor 

TiVo does simply due to litigation. So, yes, the content community 

does want to make all these products illegal. 

Thank you. 

Ms. BLACKBURN. Okay, thank you. 

Mr. Band, if I can come to you for just a moment. In your testimony, you have a sentence in there as the DRM’s become more perVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:54 Jun 08, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00083 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 F:\DOCS\27003.TXT HCOM1 PsN: JOEP
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vasive, Congress may need to consider mechanisms for preserving 

fair use. Does NetCoalition support or oppose H.R. 1201? 

Mr. BAND. Congresswoman, NetCoalition currently does not have 

a position on that specific piece of legislation but we are worried 

about the general phenomenon of DRM and the possibility that it 

could have a chilling effect on fair use and other lawful uses so, 

you know, as the legislative process moves forward, you know, we 

may have to take a specific position but currently we are more concerned about the general pattern and we are also concerned about 

things like the broadcast flag which would be again technological 

mandates. We are concerned about the precedent that that sets for 

Congress regulating technology. You know we heard a lot about the 

marketplace but that would certainly be an instance of Congress 

fiddling with the marketplace. 

Ms. BLACKBURN. Okay, thank you. 

I yield back. 

Mr. STEARNS. Ms. Bono—no, excuse me. 

Ms. BONO. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. STEARNS. Mr. Ferguson, I beg your pardon, Mr. Ferguson. 

Mr. FERGUSON. Let me just give you my thanks. Some of you are 

really lucky that Marsha Blackburn does not have her voice today. 

We are not but some of you are. 

Chairman Barton asked a question before about technology and 

VCR’s and CD burners and whatnot and asked if we should make 

them illegal and I have not had a chance to ask him where he was 

going with that. But clearly nobody thinks we should make illegal 

devices or technologies that have a perfectly lawful use. It is sort 

of like asking somebody the question should we make cars illegal 

because they might be used as a getaway vehicle in a bank robbery. Well of course not, they have a perfectly legitimate use. We 

should not make them illegal but that does not mean that those devices do not also have an illegitimate use or perhaps a use which 

is not legal. I just thought that would be worth sharing. 

A couple of questions, one for Ms. Sohn, first, thank you all for 

being here today and this is a really vigorous debate and I am glad 

that we are having it. Ms. Sohn, you and perhaps others have kind 

of described this balance between the rights of copyright owners 

and the rights of consumers and how, I do not know if you specifically have said this but some have said you may subscribe to this 

that that balance has kind of been thrown out of whack a little bit. 

And based on that claim, those who are putting forth that claim 

have asked Congress to kind of correct that imbalance in favor of 

consumers. I do not see how consumers are being harmed by the 

current copyright system, by the regime that is currently in place. 

I mean if anything, current copyright regime seems to have provided consumers with more copyrighted works available in more 

formats at more varied price points offering greater flexibility than 

at any time in history. I mean just several years ago you could not 

go buy a $15 DVD much less get a song for 99 cents from iTunes. 

You could not get last nights episodes of The Office on demand for 

a buck. You could not download an audio book. All of these new 

offerings for consumers depend on digital rights management technology of one kind or another. In light of this, I do not know how 

someone can contend that DRM’s adversely effect fair use. It seems 

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to me that without DRM’s a lot of this content would not even be 

there. Consumers would not have these products to make fair use 

of at all. 

I just want to ask you if you could perhaps talk about how, explain to me how gutting 1201 can possibly be to the advantage of 

the consumer when frankly it will discourage industry from placing 

a lot of these products in the stream of commerce to begin with. 

Ms. SOHN. Well I have to say I agreed with just about everything 

you said. 

Mr. FERGUSON. Well we are making progress. 

Ms. SOHN. And we are making progress absolutely but there is 

one caveat to that. And that caveat is that the ability to make fair 

use is limited by some of those digital rights management tools. 

Now I will reiterate for about the hundredth time is that my organization does not oppose digital rights management. But the problem is to the extent that some of those tools diminish or limit people’s fair use ability, ability to make fair use or products. There 

needs to be a very narrow exception for lawful uses of the circumvention rule and that I——

Mr. FERGUSON. How is the bill that we are talking about a narrow exception? I mean that is the most optimistic view of, you 

know, we are talking about—some folks are saying well this bill 

would just open the door a crack like this but it would do nothing 

to prevent the next person from kicking that door wide open. 

Ms. SOHN. Look, pirates do not rely on fair use, okay. I mean, 

you know, pirates will do what they do whether there is, you know, 

fair use or not or whether there is DRM or not. 

Mr. FERGUSON. But that—now it seems to be——

Ms. SOHN. What this bill does—let me—if you would not mind 

if I finished, what this bill does is allow people who want to make 

legitimate uses of digital products to do so. And the criminals will 

still be subject to all the strong enforcement, all the strong penalties of copyright law. 

Mr. FERGUSON. I have limited time. I want to ask Mr. Band a 

question. I am going to start a new website. I am going to call it 

Snoogle. All right. And I am going to copy all of Google’s technology 

and their artwork and their search results verbatim. I am going to 

make a perfect digital copy except I am going to change the spelling. I am going to call my site something completely different from 

Google, I am going to call it Snoogle. It is an educational site. Is 

there a problem with that? 

Mr. BAND. Yes, that would be a trademark violation. 

Mr. FERGUSON. Have you trademarked Snoogle? 

Mr. BAND. No, but I think it would be likely to confuse consumers and then that is the touchtone issue with trademark law 

is it likely to confuse consumers. Now it is conceivable that you 

might be able to make a fair use because there is a fair use defense 

in trademark and, you know, you would be able to try to convince 

a court that that would be——

Mr. FERGUSON. It is just for me but I mean obviously I would not 

be able to keep somebody else from using it too. If it is just for me 

that would be okay, right? 

Mr. BAND. No. 

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Mr. FERGUSON. Why, if there is a fair use, if it is just for my own 

personal use. 

Mr. BAND. Well personal use—there is no—fair use in trademark 

is different from fair use in copyright. 

Mr. FERGUSON. Okay. 

Mr. BAND. And there again you are putting it on website. 

Mr. FERGUSON. I am not a lawyer as I appreciate your enlightening me on it. 

Mr. BAND. In any event, you are making it, you are putting it 

on a website and making it publicly available so there is a possibility that it would be confusing to consumers and that would be 

the issue that the court would have to look at. 

Mr. FERGUSON. So it is Google’s intellectual property? 

Mr. BAND. That is right. 

Mr. FERGUSON. That they want protected and they do not want 

to stolen. 

Mr. BAND. Under trademark law that is right. 

Mr. FERGUSON. Fair enough. I think my time is up. 

Mr. STEARNS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Ms. Bono? 

Ms. BONO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I have so many notes here, I appreciate it. Mr. Shapiro, you 

talked about the Delphi little handset you have there which I own 

a couple myself. But is there not in fact a paradigm of business 

that allows for the broadcast of music and that is different from the 

business model of buying music? Does the—does it change? I am 

listening to broadcast satellite radio, digital radio whatever it is 

going to be and suddenly now I own this song. Is that perhaps a 

violation of two different agreements though that I as a songwriter 

for one, publisher for two, performer for three perhaps, are there 

not two different sets of rules that adhere to in broadcast as to a 

purchase of music? 

Mr. SHAPIRO. My understanding the rules governing copyright 

and broadcast are somewhat, in fact, very different than some of 

the others and there is really two types of digital broadcast. There 

is a national satellite footprint which is XM and Sirius——

Ms. BONO. Right. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. [continuing] in competition with each other and 

then there is the local emerging one called HD Radio but both are 

very, very threatened by the proposals before Congress now. 

Ms. BONO. Well they are threatened but there is also some sort 

of confusion again as the copyright holder not a performer but if 

I were—and something that Chairman Barton was talking about 

was performance royalties and there is a difference between performance mechanicals, songwriters. There is a whole bunch of different sets. The music business is so very complicated. But you are 

changing simply by recording that music from a broadcast right to 

purchase rights. And there is some sort of confusion with that No. 

1. But also you are concerned your sole concern when you just 

spoke was the sale of these gizmos. It is not the sale of—you are 

not talking about protecting the guy. You are upset because gee we 

might not be able to market all of these great devices that are 

going to come to market based upon exploiting intellectual property. 

83

Mr. SHAPIRO. Well Congressman Ferguson talked about all this 

tremendous growth of intellectual property and creativity. I kept 

thinking it is all created by technology and that is what allows it. 

And in a sense they are mutually dependent industries they——

Mr. FERGUSON. What——

Mr. SHAPIRO. Would the gentleman yield? All the creative new 

intellectual property has been created by technology? It has allowed it to occur. What I am saying is that they are symbiotic industries. This great growth in technology has allowed a renaissance in creativity which has gone a little bit less corporate in 

more individuals so every American and everyone in the world is 

a creator. It is phenomenal. And that is what the——

Ms. BONO. That is the point. Reclaiming my time. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. I am sorry. 

Ms. BONO. It is—no, please do not apologize. It is great ideas. I 

do not care whether you are creating technology or you are creating 

music or movies or a book, it is great ideas that we are all trying 

to protect. You are also trying to protect the sale of hardware based 

upon the great ideas and that I think is my colleague’s point as 

well. Also the Chairman mentioned earlier iPods and he was trying 

to explain to me or staff was that technologically I was wrong 

about iPod to iPod. I said iPod to iPod via a PC or some sort of 

central dissemination point which is true. Not only that now you 

can go into BMW, BMW is now marketing a spot for your iPod so 

nobody, I do not know a single copyright holder, I do not know a 

single songwriter, single author who is saying I do not want people 

to enjoy my work. I do not want you to enjoy it in your house, in 

your car, in your kitchen, on the airplane ride here. I do not know 

a single person who has said that. And I a little bit take offense 

to Ms. Sohn saying that we are calling our constituents thieves and 

pirates because we are not saying that at all. 

You know, but my biggest question and I would like to go right 

down the row yes or no if we can. Is it imperative that we pass 

this this year or can we give this a year or two to work out and 

let the market work its place. I will preface that by saying Mr. 

Shapiro said is it is imperative now because of 2 weeks in light of 

what Sony did. Sony has a patch out there. They have done a mia 

copa, we all have it, we have all seen it. There is a patch out there 

to put that genie back in the bottle. So under you know, sort of removing that argument because of Sony, do we have to do this now? 

Can the market continue to evolve into answering some of these solutions for us? So if we could start with the Professor and yes or 

no can we give it a year or two to look at this and work at it a 

little bit more? 

Mr. JASZI. My answer would be that if possible that legislation 

should be enacted now. 

Ms. BONO. Okay, thank you. 

Mr. JASZI. We have had 7 years——

Ms. BONO. Okay, if we can do it—I am sorry but a yes or no 

down the row would be great. 

Mr. SHAPIRO. It is never too early to do the right thing. 

Ms. ADLER. I would echo the previous two, the answer is yes. 

Thank you. 

84

Mr. BAND. As I said before, NetCoalition does not have a position 

on 1201 but if we are taking more time on 1201, we definitely 

should take more time on the broadcast flag and other digital 

rights mandates. 

Ms. SOHN. Yes, we should pass 1201 and we should let the market work. 

Mr. DELONG. 1201 would not only legitimize the idea of fair use 

it would——

Ms. BONO. Yes or no, I’m sorry. I made the guys I am opposing 

say yes or no so I——

Mr. DELONG. You should give it another century. 

Mr. HIRSCH. We agree. We think that you should let the marketplace work this out. 

Mr. AIKEN. The Authors Guild has no position on this. 

Ms. BONO. All right, so obviously as one would expect with a—

yes, 5 to 2, well gee did it start out that way? We will not mention 

that. But again, I—my last question is for Ms. Adler. 

How do you preserve books? Why—I think that there is really in 

your argument to me there is a huge underlying issue of the tangible versus non-tangible. How do you—does a publisher give you 

a second copy of a book or if somebody destroys a book is the publisher—do they have to give you another book for free? 

Ms. ADLER. No. The item that is in our collection is what we 

work with. And we preserve tangible items under very different circumstances. There is Section 108 of the copyright allows us under 

certain circumstances to preserve books and different formats 

under different circumstances. And sometimes we look to fair use 

to preserve as well if there are circumstances under 108 that do 

not help us preserve those items. But in the case of books where 

the Copyright Act explicitly gives us that privilege, if you are asking how do we physically go about it, there are a number of techniques that we undertake related to preservation. Many books 

printed early in the century were printed on acidic paper and they 

are deteriorating very quickly. 

Ms. BONO. Okay. But that is also public domain anyway by now. 

Correct? 

Ms. ADLER. Not necessarily, some are, some are not. And what 

we are trying to do, there is in fact a program that the National 

Endowment for the Humanity supports called the Brittle Books Initiative which is now focused on both books microform and digital 

as a way of preserving these cultural resources in our libraries for 

future generations of users. 

Ms. BONO. So does that—but does that involve the whole copy of 

that copy where the artist——

Ms. ADLER. Yes. 

Ms. BONO. [continuing] does not receive anything? 

Ms. ADLER. Yes, because the library has purchased that information resource previously. And we have legitimately purchased it 

tangibly and have the rights to do that under the Copyright Act. 

Ms. BONO. But if you had to buy a new book, would you ask the 

author to exempt that purchase from his right to earn money off 

of that new book, if you were to buy a second copy? 

Ms. ADLER. We often do buy second copies in libraries. 

85

Ms. BONO. And do you pay the author for that work, the second 

copy? 

Ms. ADLER. Usually we are not buying through—from authors directly in libraries, we are buying through large publishing companies then those royalties will go through the publishing companies 

back to the author. 

Ms. BONO. So you do not ask for some sort of exemption because 

you have already bought the intellectual property portion of it once 

before. Correct? 

Ms. ADLER. We have not—we have bought the book, we have not 

bought the intellectual property that the author may have. We 

have certain exemptions to use it legitimately through the Copyright Act. 

Ms. BONO. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, I see that my times has 

expired. Thank you. 

Mr. STEARNS. The gentlelady’s time expired. 

We have the author of the bill who is not a member of the subcommittee but a member of the full committee and we are going 

to allow Mr. Boucher to ask questions. Mr. Boucher? 

Mr. BOUCHER. Well Mr. Chairman, thank you very much for recognizing me even though not a member of the subcommittee and 

I also want to thank you and Chairman Barton for scheduling this 

hearing to examine the importance of fair use to all people in our 

society. I want to say a particular word of thanks to the witnesses 

for taking their time with us this morning and particularly thank 

those who in the course of their comments have mentioned the 

need to enact H.R. 1201. 

H.R. 1201 really proceeds from a fairly straightforward assumption and that is when people purchase digital media, they should 

be able to use that media for lawful purposes and technical protection measures should not be put in their way as long as the purpose for which they intend to use the CD or the DVD or other 

media they purchased is entirely lawful and would not in any way 

violate the copyright law. 

I was particularly taken by the comments of Ms. Sohn during her 

testimony in which she outlined a number of instances in which 

people who purchase media would need to be able to bypass a technical protection measure to use that media fully and to completely 

enjoy the rights that should go to the purchaser of that product any 

time that media is bought. Do you happen to have that list with 

you again? I would like for you just to emphasize that both for the 

record and to the members of the subcommittee if you happen to 

have it handy. 

Ms. SOHN. Absolutely, and I would also include Professor Jaszi’s 

example that teachers try to use excerpts of DVD’s and cannot do 

that without violating the DMCA. But let me repeat the list. A consumer cannot rip songs from copy protected CD’s to their personal 

computers or iPods. A consumer cannot make a digital copy of a 

DVD for playing back on their video iPods, cell phone, or other 

portable device. A consumer cannot make a backup copy of a copy 

protected CD or DVD. A consumer cannot play legally downloaded 

music on a competing mp3 player or computer so if you, you know, 

buy iTunes, you cannot play it on a Real Player and vice versa. 

And finally, a consumer cannot remove from a computer malicious 

86

digital rights management tools which may have spyware in them 

like the now infamous Sony BMG root kit DRM. So that is just, I 

think that is just six or seven but there are a lot more which I 

would be happy to provide if the subcommittee would so want. 

Mr. BOUCHER. Well thank you very much, Ms. Sohn. I think 

those are good and graphic examples of why the technological protection measure provisions of Section 1201 stand in the way of the 

ability of digital media purchasers to use the media in lawful forms 

in a manner that enhances their enjoyment in the work and therefore the value in the work itself. 

Let me get members of the panel to respond to what is typically 

the argument raised in opposition to H.R. 1201 and that is that 

somehow if 1201 is adopted and technical protection measures can 

be bypassed for lawful purposes, that this change in the law rebalancing as I think it is the rights between the owner of the content 

and the user of the content would somehow encourage piracy. I 

mean this is the argument that we hear that allowing bypass for 

a lawful use would therefore encourage people to bypass for unlawful uses. Who would like to respond to that argument? Mr. Shapiro? 

Mr. SHAPIRO. I can only respond by saying I have no clue the 

connection with piracy, it just does not exist. But I do want to add 

one to Gigi’s list which is my personal favorite and one of the reasons I do this with such passion is that when you are watching a 

movie, a DVD, to fast forward through the ads for the upcoming 

movies is something you should be able to do. And that is something we hear from a lot of frustrated consumers who buy DVD 

players and they want to know why they cannot. 

Mr. BOUCHER. All right, thank you. 

Mr. Band? 

Mr. BAND. Even though NetCoalition does not have a specific position on H.R. 1201, I just wanted to note that before we heard 

about CSS which is the encryption system on DVD’s and we heard 

about the huge market for DVD’s which I think someone said was 

about a $25 billion market now, it turns out that there is an easy 

way to get around CSS. It is called DECSS, and it is widely available on the internet. If you were to do a Google search, you would 

probably find, you know, 300,000 sites on the internet where 

DECSS can be downloaded not withstanding the fact that it is 

widely available, you still have this $25 billion market. So I think 

the point is is that most people want to follow the law and even 

though there are—there is a way to break the law using DECSS 

to circumvent the DVD’s for unlawful purposes, most people choose 

not to do that. 

Mr. BOUCHER. Well let me simply underscore that H.R. 1201 

clearly says that the only time a person may bypass technical protection is if they are doing so for a lawful purpose, for example exercising a lawfully protected fair use right. If a person is bypassing 

for an unlawful purpose in order to commit piracy of the work, that 

person is just as guilty under H.R. 1201 as he would be under current law. And that being the case, I really do not see any validity 

at all to the argument that if 1201 is adopted it would encourage 

piracy. The act of piracy would remain just as unlawful under this 

bill as it currently is. 

87

The gentleman who raised his hand, I am so far away I cannot 

see your sign. 

Mr. HIRSCH. Rick Hirsch with the Entertainment Software Association. 

Mr. BOUCHER. Yes. 

Mr. HIRSCH. My job at ESA, among many things, is I am responsible for our enforcement programs with respect to piracy of game 

product. And, you know, one of the consequences of permitting, I 

thought the exercise that Chairman Stearns engaged in with the 

Professor at the beginning was very interesting because we kept 

moving the line along in terms of the many different copies that 

could be made. At what point would something cross over the line 

from fair use into non-authorized use that is not fair. Part of the 

problem here from an enforcement standpoint is that permitting 

circumvention of access controls for certain purposes albeit legitimate threatens to open the flood gates to piracy and it is not that 

every consumer is a pirate, it is just from an enforcement standpoint we cannot be in everybody’s homes to determine whether—

what purpose they are putting these uses to. And the way we deal 

with that, and believe me we are—our industry is a real confluence 

of technology companies and software and content companies so we 

seek to address that through the use of technology to promote the 

uses that the game community is seeking. 

Mr. BOUCHER. Well I appreciate your comment and my time has 

expired. 

Let me simply say that it is hard for me to imagine that if the 

law is on the books in very clear form saying that to bypass for an 

illegal purpose is illegal, that somehow adopting that law allowing 

bypass for legal purposes would in any way encourage the illegal 

use. 

Mr. Chairman, I thank you again for having the hearing and permitting me to ask questions. And I thank the witnesses for their 

participation. 

Mr. STEARNS. I thank the gentleman. 

We are now out of time with—there is no one else that seeks any 

further recognitions or questioning. We want to thank your forbearance in all the members. I would just note that a parting comment 

that I have as chairman that if we had a unified DRM system that 

was clear and conspicuous for consumers, it is a possibility that 

some of this could be resolved and in all deference to the chairman 

so I would say to industry that sometimes if you do not want legislation, just work together to get this unified DRM system that all 

consumers can understand. 

With that, the subcommittee is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:20 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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November 22, 2005

The Honorable CLIFF STEARNS

Chairman 

Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection 

Committee on Energy and Commerce 

United States House of Representatives 

Washington, D.C. 20515-6115

DEAR MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to appear last 

week at the hearing on the effect of fair use on consumers and industry. In my prepared testimony, I promised to transmit the Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement 

on Best Practices in Fair Use after it was released on November 18. Please find copies attached to this letter for the members of the Subcommittee. In addition, I have 

transmitted an electronic copy to Mr. Billy Harvard. 

Owing to the acoustics in the room, I did not hear the name of the case when 

Representative Blackburn questioned me. Having reviewed the webcast and of 

course recognized the Supreme Court precedent about which she asked, I would like 

to take this opportunity to respond substantively to her.As you know from my testimony, I favor the preservation of copyright fair use through HR 1201, the Digital 

Media Consumers’ Rights Act. But it does not follow that I also endorse the majority’s position in Kelo v. City of New London, 125 S. Ct. 2655 (2005). 

In my view, there is no simply reason to suppose that there should be a correlation between advocacy for American citizen’s fair use rights and support for governmental takings of private land.The two legal disciplines, throughout history, have 

been unrelated, and real property jurisprudence has never been viewed as precedent 

for copyright (or vice versa). Thus, it is no surprise that experts in the copyright 

legal community have not given much consideration or credence to suggestions of 

any impact of Kelo on copyright. 

In any event, organizations such as the American Conservative Union, which have 

been highly critical of Kelo as an invasion of property rights, also have endorsed 

the approach of HR 1201 as one well calculated to safeguard the person freedoms 

of American citizens.There is no contradiction here. This is because real property 

and ‘‘intellectual property’’ are entirely distinct in their origins, their goals, and 

their subject-matter. Contrary to the suggestions of Mr. DeLong of PFF at the hearing, tangible property and intellectual property are as fundamentally distinct not 

just as apples and oranges, but as potatoes and poetry. 

Copyright is a newcomer to the field of property rights, invented by legislatures 

and courts over the last few centuries to serve the goal of encouraging creativity 

in society.By striking contrast, the ancient institutions of real property are grounded 

in the physical reality of scarcity and the ethical concept of stewardship. Because 

land is finite in amount and subject to overuse, Anglo-American law always has assigned rights in particular parcels to individuals (the King, a grantee or a purchaser 

of title) in order to assure that the resource is maintained. Intangible words, music 

and images are neither naturally scarce nor vulnerable to waste. In fact, the real 

value of information actually grows when it is shared. As Jefferson put it, mental 

productions are like a candle flame: ‘‘He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lites his taper at mine, receives 

light without darkening me.’’ 

Thus, copyright assigns private property rights in only some intangible mental 

productions, and then only to the limited extent judged necessary to provide incentives for creators. This conservative approach is made manifest in the U.S. Constitution, which, by its terms authorizes Congress to provide intellectual protection only 

for a ‘‘limited term′′. (Rights in real property, by contrast, last forever.) Moreover, 

Congress is authorized to provide no more protection than is necessary to fulfill the 

goal of ‘‘promoting Science and the Useful Arts.′′

The bundle of rights that Congress has given copyright owners, as embodied in 

section 106 of the Copyright Act, is partial and incomplete when compared with the 

authority enjoyed by landowners. Moreover, even the finite rights that the Copyright Act gave content owners are further limited by the affirmative rights that following sections give to consumers and citizens. These include, of course, the right 

to make ‘‘fair use’’ of a copyrighted work that was the subject of last week’s hearing. 

Section 106 of the Copyright Act begins by noting that all of the listed rights of a 

copyright owner are ‘‘Subject to sections 107 through 122,’’ i.e., the explicit limitations and exceptions to those rights as enacted by Congress. Likewise, section 107, 

which codifies fair use, is characterized as imposing ‘‘Limitations on exclusive 

rights’’ of copyright owners. Thus, fair use is not a ‘‘taking’’ of rights of a copyright 

owner. Rather, Section 107 clarifies that a copyright owner does not have any right 

98

to preclude, control, or license fair uses. To put it simply, if the right has not been 

granted to the copyright owner, then fair use remains the right of our citizens. 

H.R. 1201 does not create a new fair use right and it doesn’t put Congress in the 

position of deciding now what constitutes fair use. That has been and will remain 

a decision for judges to make.The bill only assures that American citizens will be 

able to continue to make the same kinds of educational, personal and artistic uses 

of existing material that have been permitted for at least the last 165 years. H.R. 

1201 preserves the freedom of ordinary consumers to use technology and digital content they lawfully have acquired. It is only fair they enjoy this freedom, especially 

because its exercise in no way diminishes the commercial value of a Hollywood 

movie or an RIAA member’s music on a CD. 

Finally, contrary to Mr. Aitken’s assertion at last week’s hearing, the ‘‘public domain’’ is not a byproduct of copyright but the natural state of affairs that copyright 

has partially displaced. If anyone has standing to complain (metaphorically) about 

government ‘‘takings’’ of rights to art, literature, and music, it is members of the 

public, who have seen use rights such as ‘‘fair use’’ diminished by recent legislation 

(including the anti-circumvention provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright 

Act).By introducing H.R. 1201, Representatives Boucher, Doolittle and Barton have 

taken an important step to restore these culturally vital public entitlements. 

Thank you again for providing me with the opportunity to participate in the hearing. 

Sincerely yours, 

PETER JASZI, Professor of Law and Director, 

Glushko-Samuelson Intellectual Property Law Clinic 

cc: Ranking Member Schakowsky 

Representative Blackburn

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SUN MICROSYSTEMS, INC. 

Thank you for the opportunity to submit our views for the record. Sun Microsystems is an industry leader in the development of highly scalable, highly reliable 

network systems and services. Our technologies power the world’s most important 

markets. Sun’s philosophy of sharing innovation and building communities is at the 

forefront of the next wave of computing: the Participation Age. 

Central to Sun’s success has been our commitment to fostering the Internet as 

a place of innovation, creation, and communication. It is our belief that industry and 

government should each do their best to keep it that way. 

Twenty years ago the Court ruled in the Sony Betamax decision that devices capable of substantial non-infringing uses were legal, even if such devices could be 

used in copyright violations. As Justice Breyer wrote in a concurring opinion in the 

Grokster case, ‘‘There may be other now unforeseen non-infringing uses that develop 

for peer-to-peer software, just as the home-video rental industry (unmentioned in 

Sony) developed for the VCR.’’ His point—stopping technologies when they are 

young and evolving could kill off great promise and benefits that lie down the road. 

That is why the Court specifically focused on bad behavior while leaving the old 

Sony standard alone. Exactly right—don’t constrain the technology; constrain bad 

actors. 

Innovation has flourished, and this country has reaped the rewards, because 

Internet technologies enable the rapid, widespread, and often anonymous flow of information. Combine that free flow with advances in digital media—photography, 

video, music—and you have an amazing opportunity for wide-scale experimentation 

and creative expression. 

Just think: Two decades ago, home computers brought us a revolution called desktop publishing. Now home users have the tools to create professional-quality movies 

and music—and a way to share them with others. This has opened up new markets 

and new revenue streams for content owners and software developers among others. 

It has also helped us continue the march forward into new realms of expression—

artistic, political, academic, and personal. Much of this progress owes its existence 

to fair use. 

Lately, though, the Internet has become a place of conflict and contention. Why? 

Because people are worried about what happens to content that carries a copyright. 

If it is easy to copy and transmit, how can we make sure artists are compensated, 

as they should be, for their creative work? 

Just as important, how can we do so without quashing experimentation and innovation? 

Artists should be compensated. There is no question about that. But in our rush 

to defend their rights, we should not overrlook the second question. We believe public policy should encourage innovation and free-speech. It should, as always, seek 

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to balance the rights of individuals with the greatest public good. As Justice Breyer 

noted, ‘‘copyright’s basic objective is creation and its revenue objectives but a means 

to that end.’’ (That is why, for instance, copyright protection does not last forever. 

More is gained in the long run from sharing.) 

One of the great values of the Internet is that it has become a forum for borrowing, mixing, developing, and tinkering. After all, in both science and art, 

innovators build on each other’s work. In the words of director Martin Scorsese, 

‘‘The greater truth is that everything—every painting, every movie, every play, 

every song—comes out of something that precedes it... It’s endlessly old and endlessly new at the same time.’’ We must not make the mistake of entrenching the 

endlessly old at the expense of the endlessly new. 

So the developing discipline of digital rights management, or DRM, needs to respect experimental, standing-on-the-shoulders-of-giants aspects of the Internet. 

DRM technology should be designed to respect legitimate needs and current rights 

of honest users (including backups, format changes, excerpting, and so on). 

While the Internet certainly makes managing the rights for movies and music 

more complex, we believe that it is sounder economic and social policy to foster the 

architectural, business, political, and public freedoms that have enabled the Internet 

to be a place of innovation than it is to overly restrict the flow of digital information 

in an effort to meticulously account for every instance of the use of content. 

What’s more, the free flow of information is fundamental to democracy. In the 

shift to new forms of media and communication, neither technology nor law should 

limit the public’s rightful access to information. Again, if we can go back to the intellectual well one more time, Justice Breyer rightly acknowledged that ‘‘the copyright laws are not intended to discourage or to control the emergence of new technologies, including (perhaps especially) those that help disseminate information and 

ideas more broadly or more efficiently.’’ Very true. So where do we go from here? 

We think there is a broad set of solutions in which the rights of content creators 

can be balanced with the common public interest in order to foster vibrant innovation. To that end, we would like to propose the following principles of digital rights 

management:

• Innovation flourishes through openness—open standards, reference architectures, 

and implementations. 

• All creators are users and many users are creators. 

• Content creators and holders of copyright should be compensated. 

• Respect for users’ privacy is essential. 

• Code (both laws and technology) should encourage innovation. 

Fair use is an important value in American jurisprudence. We want to encourage 

such usage, for academic purposes, for criticism, for parody --- and for uses we have 

not yet even considered. Yet in a technical world that enables perfect digital copies, 

fair use can terrify content owners. So there will need to be a balance struck: one 

that enables fair use, but also enables ways of determining who has abused the system. 

Some content owners are pressing for DRM systems that would fully control the 

users’ access to content, systems with user tracking that limit access to copyrighted 

material. We instead prefer an ‘‘optimistic’’ model whose fundamental credo is ‘trust 

the customer.’ Excessive limitation not only restricts consumer rights but also potential, as such solutions strongly interfere with the creation of future works and fair 

use of copyrighted content. 

In an ideal world, solutions should encourage information flow, including the capability for creating future works. Certainly there will always be ‘‘leakage’’ and illegal behavior. Where that occurs there should be diligent enforcement of owners’ legitimate rights. BUT, we think it is better that solutions provide auditing and accounting paths that, while respecting privacy of honest users, also permit copying, 

manipulation, and playback. 

Systems that encourage the user to play with digital material, to experiment, to 

build and create, will be a win for consumers, for technology developers, and for content producers. The Supreme Court has spoken to these issues on various occasions 

and it did so with restraint most recently in the Grokster case. Now it is up to technologists, artists, developers, users, and rightsholders to move ahead in a balanced 

and forward-looking manner. If we do, it will be a win for the Internet and for society.