THERE IS new draft legislation in the works that could severely curtail Americans’ rights to exchange files on the Internet or share copies of music or other forms of entertainment in digital and analog formats (you can download a PDF of the bill here). The same bill would also more firmly establish the legality of webcasting. It’s an odd pairing, to be sure, but it makes sense when you know who’s behind it.
“Fair use” is the legal use of copyrighted material without permission–for instance, quoting a book in a review, using parts of a song in a parody, or distributing copies of a newspaper article to students in a classroom. The concept is of long standing and is not controversial. “I think there is a general intuition that small-quantity, private, ad-hoc types of sharing are fair uses,” says R. Polk Wagner, who teaches intellectual property law at the University of Pennsylvania. “If my friend misses this week’s episode of ‘Friends,’ I can give him a videotape I made [of the show].”
