Confessions of a Mad Librarian

Just found out:

U.S. Copyright Office § 1201 Rulemaking Hearing

Friday, May 1, 2009

The Palo Alto hearing will be held in Room 80 (moot court room) of Stanford Law School, 559 Nathan Abbott Way. The optimal location to park is Parking Structure 6 (PS6). Additional directions and parking information are available here: http://www.law.stanford.edu/directions/

The hearing agenda covers several classes of proposed exemptions to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act:

4A. Commercially produced and distributed DVDs used in face-to-face classroom teaching by college and university faculty, regardless of discipline or subject taught, including teachers in K-12 classrooms.

11A. Audiovisual works released on DVD, where circumvention is undertaken solely for the purpose of extracting clips for inclusion in noncommercial videos that do not infringe copyright.

5A. Computer programs that enable wireless telephone handsets to execute lawfully obtained software applications, where circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of enabling interoperability of such applications with computer programs on the telephone handset.

5B. Computer programs that operate wireless telecommunications handsets when circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of enabling wireless telephones to connect to a wireless telephone communication network.

5C. Computer programs in the form of firmware or software that enable mobile communication handsets to connect to a wireless communication network, when circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of lawfully connecting to a wireless communication network.

5D. Computer programs in the form of firmware that enable wireless telephone handsets to connect to a wireless telephone communication network, when circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of lawfully connecting to a wireless telephone communication network, regardless of commercial motive.

I know, spending all day listening to lawyers and gov bureaucrats talk about the minutiae of software and content containers and devices is not everyone's cup of tea. But DMCA exemptions are a great way for consumer and public interest advocates to fight for copyright balance, in a limited sense. And win! In a limited sense ...