This link is to an article in yesterday's New York Times. The piece is entitled 'Content makers are accused of exaggerating copyright' and is about a complaint made by the Computer and Communications Industry Asssociation to the US Federal Trade Commission. Here are the first two paragraphs of their complaint. You can read the full attack on their website home page.
The Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA) announced today that it has filed a Federal Trade Commission complaint on behalf of consumers against Major League Baseball, the National Football League, NBC/Universal and several other corporations. CCIA alleges that the named corporations have misled consumers for years, often misrepresenting their rights through deceptive and threatening statements. The complaint, part of CCIA’s newly sponsored DefendFairUse.org initiative, is aimed at exposing how media and sports organizations have systematically misled consumers with regard to their legal rights to use content, and to protect those rights in the digital age.
“Every one of us has seen or heard that copyright warning at the beginning of a sports game, DVD or book,” said Ed Black, CCIA President and CEO, during a press conference at the National Press Club. “These corporations use these warnings not to educate their consumers, but to intimidate them.”
A glance at the association's list of members shows how powerful they might be. Clearly, the main battlegorund is video where the owners of rights to sporting events etc are getting fed up with the constant abuse of these rights and are taking legal action against the owners of youtube, for instance. This seems to be a counter-attack. However, book publishers are caught up in the row - Penguin and Harcourt.
Thankfully Macmillan has not been named and we have no need to waste money on hordes of lawyers to defend us against these absurd charges. The warnings at the front of books are the result of legal advice and are what they are - neither misleading nor intimidating. It is ridiculous to imply otherwise and the CCIA should perhaps look at the legal small print which comes attached to the software its members sell - 'people in glass houses' comes to mind.
Copyright in the Internet age is indeed a complex and challenging issue for everyone but this sort of action does nothing to help. It merely siphons money to lawyers and creates antagonism where none need exist, provided that the legitimate rights of content creators (authors in the case of publishing) are respected and valued.
Our publicity triumph of the week relates to this story about the potential for treatment of patients in a minimally conscious state. So far we've had the front pages of The Guardian and Telegraph, a big banner in the Times and articles in the New York Times, Washington Post and LA Times, not to mention coverage on NBC nightly News, ABC News, the CBS Early Show and much else - not bad for 'hard science'. Of course, the story of an unconscious person 'waking' after six years is pretty amazing and newsworthy but it requires real skill to have the story reported (more or less) accurately and globally through all media. Congratulations to the whole team.