[FYI] Dirty rotten inducers - the law the IT world deserves?
<http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/06/26/hatch_induce_act/>
Dirty rotten inducers - the law the IT world deserves?
By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco
Published Saturday 26th June 2004 09:34 GMT
It may soon be possible to carry around an AK-47 assault rifle and an
iPod with you down the street - and be arrested for carrying the
iPod.
That's according to critics of a Senate amendment to the copyright
code proposed by Sen. Orrin Hatch this week called the 'Induce Act'.
He wants to make the 'intentional inducement of copyright
infringement' an offense, and this will extend liability to any
manufacturer of a device which plays infringed material, or a shop
that sells such a device, they say. Click Here
Hatch's terse amendment states that "the term 'intentionally induces'
means intentionally aids, abets, induces, or procures; and intent may
be shown by acts from which a reasonable person would find intent to
induce infringement based upon all relevant information about such
acts then reasonably available to the actor, including whether the
activity relies on infringement for its commercial viability," in
which caser the inducer becomes an infringer.
However, the amendment also says that "nothing in this subsection
shall enlarge or diminish the doctrines of vicarious and contributory
liability for copyright infringement or require any court to unjustly
withhold or impose any secondary liability for copyright
infringement." And it's contributory liability that the RIAA want to
see changed.
In his floor speech introducing the measure, Hatch said that once
people are given PCs, they are bound to infringe. (Many would agree
with him there). So he frames his bill as a protection. Hatch said
people weren't aware that they were breaking the law by running P2P
software, (citing work by Harvard's Berkman Center, which says the
Senator quoted them out of context) and therefore running "piracy
machines" that had been designed to mislead their users. Therefore,
his argument goes, the users are in need of protection from
'inducement'.
[...]
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