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Ehlers visits campus
By Stephanie Biesheuvel
Staff Writer
FILE PHOTO
Vern Ehlers, former professor and current U.S. Congressman, visited Calvin regarding copyright issues and legal implications.
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Since when do national copyright laws take precedence over headlining space accidents? It seems that in some cases, such as Representative Vern Ehlers’ recent visit to Calvin College, they do.
Ehlers was scheduled to speak on the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) at Calvin on February 3, but he almost didn’t make it. According to Abstraction board member Mike McDonald, Ehlers “was receiving a lot of pressure to be in Houston for the Columbia aftermath but he insisted on keeping his previous engagement with Calvin.” This might be due to the fact that Ehlers was a professor in Calvin's physics department for years before being elected to the U.S. House in 1993; after having served in the State House and Senate. Representative Ehlers was involved in the passing of the DMCA.
According to McDonald, Ehlers covered three basic topics. First, he gave his listeners an “overview of the legislative landscape for copyright protection.” He described the implications of copyrights regarding proposals concerning copyright issues.
He discussed topics such as broadband access and cable Internet access, facilities that are becoming increasingly popular. Finally, he covered the anti-trust legislation and the new digital economy. This is an issue because “the digital landscape is changing much faster than the legislative actions can keep up.”
Jeremy Frens, Assistant Professor of Computer Science and advisor for Abstraction, said "The main focus of the DMCA has been outlawing programs that would bypass the copy protections used to protect movies and music.”
The key issue is that technology has made it possible to produce perfect replicas of these things. “A Xeroxed book is not quite as good as the original, but an MP3 of a
song off a CD is just as good as the original,” said Frens. “Plus, it’s so much easier to copy digital information. Making Xerox copies of a book takes forever and requires a lot of work, but copying an MP3 is (usually) faster and is certainly much, much easier.”
The problem is that the DMCA reaches further than people want it to, right into fair use. According to Frens, fair use says that “We have the right to video tape TV programs and we have the right to make backup copies of our CDs and computer programs.” However, “These copy protections prevent us from copying a CD onto tape to listen to in the car. Even though we purchased the CD legally, the copy protection does not allow us fair use of its contents.”
This has major implications for those who copy music from the Internet or share MP3s with their friends. “According to national copyright laws, sharing MP3s with your friends is illegal, unless the right to copy the MP3 was explicitly granted,” Frens said. DMCA, as I understand it, says that it’s illegal to bypass whatever copyright protection is used to protect a digital product, even if your use is considered fair use. The music and movie industries complain that if they didn’t use copy protections and if it weren’t a felony to bypass the protections, then pirates would copy CDs and DVDs at will, sending and selling the copies, depriving the industries of their income.”
What are the chances of actually getting caught burning an MP3? According to McDonald, “There are attempts to sniff out who is doing large-scale file sharing.” The government may demand personal information from Internet subscribers who are suspected.
“This can be done without a warrant and without an official subpoena,” said McDonald. There are civil and criminal penalties for illegal actions. However, McDonald added, “Things are still shaking out as to how aggressively this can be enforced.”
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