Korean Job Discussion Forums

[mishlert]

Description
A group of protestors are fightng back against Music and Movie industry plans to ban the sale and use of CD/DVD-RW, VCRs, Ipods, Tivo and even tape recorders. Savebetamax.org is organizing a call-in day to Congress on September 14 to oppose new legislation that would undermine the Betamax decision (INDUCE Act). They are accepting registrations now.

Regular MegaGames readers will be familiar with the, music and movie industry-backed, efforts to overturn a court decision which over 15 years ago made it possible for people to own VCRs. The so-called Betamax decision was a Supreme Court decision that made the Betamax and all other VCRs legal. In Sony vs. Universal (known as the Betamax decision) the Court ruled that because VCRs have legitimate uses, the technology is legal, even if some people use it to copy movies. Of course, the movie industry was lucky it lost the case against VCRs, because home video soon became Hollywood's largest source of revenue. And the freedom to use and develop new technology that was protected by the Betamax decision set the stage for the incredible growth in computer technology we've seen in the last few decades.

The Betamax ruling is the only thing that protects your right to own a VCR, tape recorder, CD-burner, DVD-burner, iPod, or TiVo. It's that important. But new legislation that's being pushed through the Senate by lobbyists for the music and movie industries would override the Betamax decision and create a huge liability for any business that makes products which can copy sound or video. This legislation (formerly known as the INDUCE Act) would essentially give Hollywood veto power over a huge range of new technologies. And if they get this power, they'll definitely use it: just as they tried to stomp out the VCR in the 70's and 80's, the music and movie industries want to force all content to go through their own restricted channels.

[Demophobe]

It will never pass.

[the saint]

I find it fascinating that the OP mentions that what was initially seen as a threat in VCRs ended up being a major source of revenue for the industry.

The same seems to be happening with downloading. What does the future hold then? Interesting to speculate...

[mindmetoo]

Congress and the President long ago stopped actually balancing the needs of the public with the needs of big business. These days they simply say to business, "What do you need? We'll push through the legislation."

Remember the Sonny Bono extension of copyright from life of author + 50 years to life of author + 70 years, all so early images of Mickey Mouse didn't fall into public domain in 2003 (Pluto would have fallen into PD in 2006).

[mishlert]

Hey Saint, I did not write the article. I read it, and decided to share it; it's a cut and paste from Mega Games.

[the saint]