House Committee Votes to Ease Copyright Restrictions on DistanceEducation

[Ann Okerson <ann.okerson@yale.edu>]

Good news....

---------- Forwarded message ----------
This article from The Chronicle of Higher Education

  Thursday, July 18, 2002

  House Committee Votes to Ease Copyright Restrictions on
  Distance Education

  By ANDREA L. FOSTER



  The enactment of a bill that would make it easier for
  educational institutions to use films and songs in online
  instruction was all but assured Wednesday after a key House of
  Representatives committee approved the legislation.

  The House Judiciary Committee unanimously approved the bill,
  the Technology Harmonization and Education Act (S 487), on a
  voice vote without debate. It is identical to a bill the
  Senate approved in June 2001.

  The legislation would expand the exceptions under the
  Copyright Act of 1976 that allow colleges and schools to use
  copyrighted material for instruction without securing
  copyright holders' permission.

  The act allows distance-education providers to digitally
  transmit nondramatic literary and musical works. Under the
  bill, they would also be able to show students selected
  portions of movies, plays and other dramatic works.

  The legislation applies only to accredited, nonprofit
  educational institutions.

  Educational and media interests, which had long been at odds
  over easing copyright law for online instruction, had
  negotiated a compromise -- later formalized in the bill --
  more than a year ago.  But the chairman of the Judiciary
  Committee, Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., had held up the
  legislation. Mr. Sensenbrenner, a Wisconsin Republican, had
  indicated that he would only move the bill forward in tandem
  with another piece of legislation to create new protections
  for databases.

  Mr. Sensenbrenner relented, however, when higher-education
  interests made a recent push to have the technology
  legislation passed into law, and when he realized that
  database legislation would be difficult to move forward.


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 Copyright 2002 by The Chronicle of Higher Education