COPYRIGHT LAW REVISION WEDNESDAY, MAY 7, 1975 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON COURTS, CIVIL LIBERTIES, AND THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:10 a.m., in room 2226, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Robert W. Kastenmeier [chairman of the subcommittee] presiding. Present: Representatives Kastenmeier, Danielson, Drinan, Pattison, Railsback, and Wiggins. Also present: Herbert Fuchs and Bruce A. Lehman, counsels; and Thomas E. Mooney, associate counsel. Mr. KASTEN MEIER. The committee will come to order. We have met this morning to begin subcommittee hearings on H.R. 2223, introduced by the Chair, for the general revision of the copyright law. Ten years ago this month in this room the subcommittee began what turned out to be 22 days of public hearings on a bill having the same purpose, namely, the total revision of title 17, United States Code, the copyright law. The 1965 hearings, followed by many subcommittee meetings, resulted in a revision bill being reported to and passed by the House of Representatives on April 11, 1967. The Senate, however, failed to act on that bill and the House-passed bill expired. In September 1974, when the Senate at last did pass a copyright law revision bill, the involvement of the House Judiciary Committee in the nomination of Nelson Rockefeller to be Vice President prevented House consideration of the measure during what was left of 1974. However, the Congress did enact legislation creating a National Commission on New Technological Uses of Copyrighted Works, of which the President is to appoint the members. With the coming of 1975, Senator McClellan reintroduced the 1974 Senate-passed bill as S. 22, and the Chair introduced an identical bill in the House under the number H.R. 2223. Title II of the bills S. 22 and H.R. 2223, go beyond providing copyright law revision, and provide protection of ornamental designs of useful articles. In addition, the subcommittee has before it two measures directly related to the proposed revision. One of these, H.R. 5345, introduced by our subcommittee colleague, Mr. Danielson, would create a performer's royalty as part of the bundle of rights known as copyright. The other, H.R. 4965, introduced by Mr. Won Pat, would authorize the making of video tapes for transmission on noncontiguous cable television systems, that is, in places other than the 48 mainland States. (1) H.R. 2223, H.R. 5345, and H.R. 4965 will be placed in the record of the hearings at the conclusion of this statement. Article I, section 8 of the Federal Constitution empowers Congress "to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing to authors *** the exclusive right to their *** writings ***." At the very least, therefore, Congress has the constitutional obligation to determine whether and to what extent the progress of the useful arts will be promoted by congressional grants of exclusivity for the writings of authors. The purpose of the pending legislation is, in short, to bring up to date the copyright law which has not been substantially revised since 1909. It should be our commitment to correct this neglect, for the great and growing acceleration of technology and the resultant new uses of copyrighted works have rendered much of the existing law inadequate and obsolete. The subcommittee is pleased, this morning, to open the hearings by welcoming witnesses from the Library of Congress. We have the Honorable John G. Lorenz, Acting Librarian of Congress; Abraham L. Kaminstein, former Register of Copyrights who went through the 1965-67 hearings with us, and Barbara Ringer, also an old friend, the present Register of Copyrights. Mr. Lorenz, will you begin? [H.R. 2223, H.R. 5345, and H.R. 4965 are as follows:] 94TH CONGRESS 1ST SESSION H. R. 2223 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES JANUARY 28, 1975 Mr. KASTENMEIER introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary A BILL For the general revision of the Copyright Law, title 17 of the United States Code, and for other purposes. 1 2 United States of America in Congress assembled, Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 3 4 TITLE I-GENERAL REVISION OF COPYRIGHT LAW 102. Subject matter of copyright: In general. 103. Subject matters of copyright: Compilations and derivative works. 104. Subject matter of copyright: National origin. 105. Subject matter of copyright: United States Government works. 106. Exclusive rights in copyrighted works. 107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use. 108. Limitations on exclusive rights: Reproduction by libraries and archives. Sec. 2 TITLE 17-COPYRIGHTS-Continued Chapter 1.-SUBJECT MATTER AND SCOPE OF COPYRIGHT-Continued 109. Limitations on exclusive rights: Effect of transfer of particular copy or phonorecord. 110. Limitations on exclusive rights: Exemption of certain performances and displays. 111. Limitations on exclusive rights: Secondary transmissions. 112. Limitations on exclusive rights: Ephemeral recordings. 113. Scope of exclusive rights in pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works. 114. Scope of exclusive rights in sound recordings. 115. Scope of exclusive rights in nondramatic musical works: Compulsory license for making and distributing phonorecords. 116. Scope of exclusive rights in nondramatic musical works: Public performances by means of coin-operated phonorecord players. 117. Scope of exclusive rights: Use in conjunction with computers and similar information systems. § 101. Definitions As used in this title, the following terms and their variant forms mean the following: An "anonymous work" is a work on the copies or phonorecords of which no natural person is identified as author. "Audiovisual works" are works that consist of a series of related images which are intrinsically intended to be shown by the use of machines or devices such as projectors, viewers, or electronic equipment, together with accompanying sounds, if any, regardless of the nature of the material objects, such as films or tapes, in which the works are embodied. The "best edition" of a work is the edition, published in the United States at any time before the date of deposit, that the Library of Congress determines to be most suitable for its purposes. A person's "children" are his immediate offspring, whether legitimate or not, and any children legally adopted by him. A "collective work" is a work, such as a periodical issue, anthology, or encyclopedia, in which a number of contributions, constituting separate and independent works in themselves, are assembled into a collective whole. A "compilation" is a work formed by the collection and assembling of pre-existing materials or of data that are selected, coordinated, or arranged in such a way that the resulting work as a whole constitutes an original work of authorship. The term "compilation" includes collective works. "Copies" are material objects, other than phonorecords, in which a work is fixed by any method now known or later developed, and from which the work can be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise 3 communicated, either directly or with the aid of a machine or device. The term "copies" includes the material object, other than a phonorecord, in which the work is first fixed. "Copyright owner," with respect to any one of the exclusive rights comprised in a copyright, refers to the owner of that particular right. A work is "created" when it is fixed in a copy or phonorecord for the first time; where a work is prepared over a period of time, the portion of it that has been fixed at any particular time constitutes the work as of that time, and where the work has been prepared in different versions, each version constitutes a separate work. A "derivative work" is a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted. A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or other modifications which, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship, is a "derivative work." A "device," machine," or "process" is one now known or later developed. To "display" a work means to show a copy of it, either directly or by means of a film, slide, television image, or any other device or process or, in the case of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, to show individual images nonsequentially. A work is "fixed" in a tangible medium of expression when its embodiment in a copy or phonorecord, by or under the authority of the author, is sufficiently permanent or stable to permit it to be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated for a period of more than transitory duration. A work consisting of sounds. images, or both, that are being transmitted, is "fixed" for purposes of this title if a fixation of the work is being made simultaneously with its transmission. The terms "including" and "such as" are illustrative and not limitative. A "joint work" is a work prepared by two or more authors with the intention that their contributions be merged into inseparable or interdependent parts of a unitary whole. "Literary works" are works other than audiovisual works, |