Re:Create Coalition Urges Against Copyright Bills Threatening DMCA Section 512
Re:Create Coalition-affiliated copyright stakeholders urged Congress to avoid passing copyright legislation that would threaten Digital Millennium Copyright Act Section 512 safe harbor provisions or the DMCA notice-and-takedown system. The current notice-and-takedown arrangement helped online giants like Amazon and Google grow exponentially since DMCA passed in 1998, with e-commerce now contributing more than $8 trillion to the global economy annually, stakeholders said during a Monday briefing. There's escalating interest in how the House Judiciary Committee will prioritize the copyright policy issues it plans to tackle in legislation related to its Copyright Act review.
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House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte's, R-Va., planned release of his copyright legislative priorities is continuing to generate interest and speculation but “obviously anything that threatens the safe harbors or undermines the notice-and-takedown system would be something that we would strongly oppose,” said Re:Create Executive Director Joshua Lamel in an interview: “We're advising [Goodlatte] not to consider” pursuing such legislation. Goodlatte is expected to release his copyright legislative priorities soon, as a precursor to a more substantial legislative debate during the 115th Congress.
The current notice-and-takedown framework has enabled many content creators to use content on YouTube and elsewhere to open up new revenue streams, said Google Senior Policy Counsel Katie Oyama and others during the briefing. Oyama credited Disney's decision not to seek the takedown of YouTube fan-made videos containing songs from the 2013 animated movie Frozen with generating viral interest in the film that helped it remain in U.S. theaters far longer than expected. Frozen remained in U.S. theaters for 34 weeks and earned more than $400 million domestically, said the Internet Movie Database. Section 512 safe harbors have also expanded online users' ability to distribute their works, particularly those meant to be part of the “gift economy” that focuses on free distribution of fan-made works, said Organization for Transformative Works Legal Director Betsy Rosenblatt.
Existing U.S. copyright law has “imperfections” but creates the best balance to allow industries “that are built on fair use” to thrive, Oyama said. The notice-and-takedown structure also gives due process to all copyright stakeholders, she said. There's “still a lot of work that needs to be done” to improve U.S. copyright law, but Section 512's provisions have created a necessary fair use structure that shouldn't be cast aside, said Medium Corporate Counsel Alex Feerst. Maintaining the current online content economy requires that copyright law continue to allow a regime that “really encourages building [on content] that came before,” Rosenblatt said: “There's nothing that's truly … original in this world” anymore. Copyright law at least partially recognizes that reality, particularly via the current interpretation of the fair use doctrine, she said.
An advertising campaign is planned, led by Azoff MSG Entertainment CEO Irving Azoff petitioning Capitol Hill for a DMCA revamp that would rein in Google and others that flourished by “devastating the livelihoods of musicians and songwriters.” The ads, to run in The Hill and other Capitol Hill-focused publications beginning Tuesday, contain a petition from Paul McCartney, Taylor Swift and nearly 200 other recording industry stakeholders. RIAA and the top three performing rights organizations -- the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, Broadcast Music, Inc., and the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers -- and other signatories. “The existing laws threaten the continued viability of songwriters and recording artists to survive from the creation of music,” the ad said. “Aspiring creators shouldn’t have to decide between making music and making a living. Please protect them.”