House Judiciary To ID Possible Consensus Copyright Issues in 'Coming Weeks,' Goodlatte Says
The House Judiciary Committee plans to identify in the coming weeks which issues in its Copyright Act review that the committee believes have “a likelihood of potential consensus and circulate outlines of potential” revamp legislation on those items, said Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., in a video Tuesday. Goodlatte released the video as part of a joint Copyright Office-Copyright Alliance event marking World IP Day. He used a similar CO event in 2013 to announce the start of House Judiciary's copyright review (see report in the April 25, 2013, issue). Several copyright stakeholders told us they believe the CO's IT and operational issues may be one of Goodlatte's top priorities, but said it's not clear whether there's a true consensus solution yet to those items or other areas of copyright law. House Judiciary's copyright review has targeted a wide range of issues, including the fair use doctrine, music licensing and Digital Millennium Copyright Act Section 512's notice-and-takedown framework.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
House Judiciary's legislation won't be "a solely copyright owner-focused bill nor a copyright user-focused bill,” Goodlatte said in the video. The committee “will convene stakeholders for further work on these potential reforms” after it identifies its legislative priorities, he said. “You have my personal commitment that as the review shifts to more focused work on potential reforms, the process will be transparent and [House Judiciary] will continue to ensure that all interested parties have the opportunity to weigh in on issues of concern to them.” Goodlatte said it will be “critical” for members of Congress to understand the potential impact of a potential revamp of any area of copyright law. “Simply changing a paragraph here and a word or two there in Title 17 may have a major impact far beyond its intended approach,” he said.
Goodlatte's comments surprised some. A music industry lobbyist said industry consensus in recent weeks was that House Judiciary planned to “sit on copyright reform issues until next year.” Goodlatte's comments may indicate only that he's actively trying to “bring people together to see if there is a small list of items that there is room for negotiation on and then go from there,” the lobbyist said. “My guess is he's thinking there are at least a few issues that people could agree upon based on [House Judiciary's] past hearings. If [Goodlatte] already had a clear list of priorities in mind, I think he'd have mentioned it.”
Copyright Alliance CEO Keith Kupferschmid and several others told us they didn't want to speculate on what Goodlatte's full list of priorities might be, but cited CO modernization as a likely focus. CO modernization “is on everybody's list” in some form and “may even be [Goodlatte's] No. 1 issue at this point,” Kupferschmid said. Digital Media Association General Counsel Greg Barnes noted CO modernization as one of Goodlatte's likely priorities because “you do have stakeholders from all different sides feeding into” the debate on how CO operations can be improved. Stakeholders have reached consensus the CO does need to improve its IT program and other processes, “but I see little consensus on how to solve that problem,” said Computer and Communications Industry Association Vice President-Law and Policy Matthew Schruers.
Goodlatte is already able to consider the Copyright Office for the Digital Economy (CODE) Act (HR-4241) if he decides to pursue CO modernization legislation, though “at this stage it's probably too early to tell whether he'd pursue something like the CODE Act or another formulation,” Kupferschmid said. “By no means has there been complete agreement even on [CO modernization] but you do have people coming to the table,” Barnes said. House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, and Rep. Ted Deutch, D-Fla., are also writing CO modernization legislation, a music industry lobbyist said. Chaffetz's office didn't comment.
Kupferschmid and Sandra Aistars, George Mason University School of Law Center for the Protection of Intellectual Property director-copyright research and policy, separately identified establishment of a small claims copyright court as another potential Goodlatte priority. “There's been a lot of talk lately on Capitol Hill” about creating a small claims copyright court or another small claims process since the Department of Commerce's Internet Policy Task Force urged “further consideration” in January of a 2013 CO proposal to create a small claims court (see 1601280065), Kupferschmid said. A small claims process would also aid in modernizing the CO “because you'd have fewer people relying on statutory damages and instead being able to use” that process to resolve disputes, Aistars said.
It's unclear what other copyright issues Goodlatte would be able to identify as having potential consensus solutions, especially because “the copyright agenda continues to be somewhat undefined,” Barnes told us. “There are a lot of moving parts” beyond House Judiciary's copyright review, including the CO's ongoing policy studies and the Department of Justice's review of consent decrees against the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and Broadcast Music, Inc.