(Entertainment-NewsWire.com, November 28, 2012 ) Kent, UK -- Wired magazine has reported federal copyright regulators’ decisions on requests for exemptions to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), the 1988 law which on its face prohibits actions to “circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access” to copyrighted works.
Every three years, the U.S. Copyright Office invites requests for temporary exemptions from the DMCA. The regulators can authorize an exemption for three years, if it finds an overriding consumer interest.
Digital rights advocates in late October learned regulators had rejected their calls to make lawful copying DVDs for personal use and to allow owners of game consoles to modify them to run additional software.
The decision makers, Librarian of Congress James Billington and Register of Copyrights Maria Pallante, ruled in those cases that existing controls were needed to combat software pirating, and distinguished game consoles from smart phones. For smart phones, an earlier-approved exemption allowing so-called “jailbreaking”, owner modification of manufacturer-set encryption controls, won renewal.
Public Knowledge, a digital-rights group, had asked regulators to give lawful purchasers of DVDs the right to make copies for their personal use. They sought a ruling that, for example, a music DVD lawfully purchased for use on a computer could be copied to play on different devices and on other platforms. Such purchases include that of iPods.
While many programs have been devised to decrypt DVD encryption, the decision means DVD purchasers cannot legally use them.
A Public Knowledge spokesman reacted to the decision by saying it “flies in the face of reality” by undercutting pre-DMCA “fair use” rulings for such personal use as non-commercial space-shifting. The Motion Picture Association of America had adamantly opposed the request. The regulators did create a new exemption to DMCA for circumventing DVD encryption controls “to make use of short portions of the motion pictures for the purpose of criticism or comment.”
The Electronic Frontier Foundation had requested an exemption to allow game console modifying, often called “modding,” so console owners could legally hack their devices to run other software. The digital rights group argued the change was needed so console owners could play home-grown games or let scientists add Linux to use the consoles like computers. Game makers strongly opposed the request, and in denying it regulators ruled the change would enable consoles to play pirated games.
While renewing the exemption for hacking smart phones, regulators refused to expand it to tablets, saying ebook readers and handheld video game devices might also be considered tablets. They did, however, renew an exemption allowing encryption circumvention of e-books to enable read-aloud functions for the visually impaired.
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