Nashville copyright craziness -- success! Rematch on Mar 5

Yesterday's rally in Nashville to stop a new copyright bill that would put the expense of policing the movie industry's business model onto universities was a success -- the bill has been stalled and won't be reconsidered for ten days. Now it's time to get mobilized:

Just in the past few days we found out about this Bill they are trying to pass in the TN State Senate. SB3974, sponsored by Sen. Tim Burchett, forces any institution of “higher learning” to monitor all public university students and expel any who access copyrighted content. Since nearly everyone will access some kind of “copyrighted” content online - they will be forced to expel thousands of students from any public university!

Here’s the plan:

[1] Meet up with us next Wednesday (March 5th) to go to Nashville and protest! (5:00 AM - March 5th) we will have a bus - we will leave at 5AM in Knoxville (meet at COPYSHOP).

Gather at 8AM (if you can get there by yourself) on the corner of 6th and Union St in Nashville!

[2] NOW Email the Senators:
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]

Link, Link to video of Sen. Tim Burchett joking that the MPAA promised him that Matthew Mcconaughey would play him in a biopic

[#1 posted by Jeff , February 28, 2008 6:02 AM]

"Meet up with us next Wednesday..." Who is "us?"

[#2 posted by KKnox , February 28, 2008 6:21 AM]

I'm from Knoxville, TN and Tim Burchett is my senator. I'm also a professor at the University of Tennessee. This is only the latest of a large number of bone-headed ideas from Burchett. He's an embarrassment and an idiot.

[#3 posted by Jeff , February 28, 2008 6:59 AM]

Best of luck. I don't hear much about college protests over anything. You would think that by now there would be a few big anti-war demonstrations. Maybe the college youth of today is more interested in other realities, ones that do not tax the soul or body too heavily. I hope your group is very loud and clear.

[#4 posted by ktries , February 28, 2008 7:34 AM]

The "us" is a group of folks who work at the COPYSHOP/Art Gallery of Knoxville.

[#5 posted by nmcvaugh , February 28, 2008 11:00 AM]

Sent the following to the leg and a couple of papers. :-)

I'm a doctoral student in education. In a few years, I'll be considering where to apply for teaching positions. From what I've been able to gather about SB 3974, Tennessee will not be on my list. The reason is simple. The bill would require university networks not be used to "transmit copyrighted works". Unfortunately, a large part of instruction today involves students accessing copyrighted material online. This material is licensed and paid for, but is still copyrighted. A simple example illustrates this. If a person at UT Memphis were to access an online article from the Memphis Commerical Appeal, the university would be in violation of the law because newspapers are protected by copyright. The same applies to library materials which are supplied online.

In short, this bill would make university computer networks illegal, to the detriment of students, the community and the companies which serve them. While it is unlikely that the bill would pass legal challenge (and indeed would be opposed by copyright holders such as textbook and journal publishers), the fact that such a confused piece of legislation has been introduced does not speak well for Tennessee's educational system, at least so far as state legislators are concerned.

The bill's author clearly fail to understand copyright law. It is legitimate and legal to purchase and/or lease copyrighted material. The music, film and publishing industries rest on the assumption that people can legally buy or access their content. It is not legitimate or legal to steal copies of copyrighted material. Unfortunately the authors of this legislation fail to grasp this fundamental distinction, to the detriment of higher education. The author of this bill should spend some time studying law before attempting to make it.

Those wishing to read the bill as it currently stands may access it at:

http://www.legislature.state.tn.us/bills/currentga/BILL/SB3974.pdf

I suggest you do so quickly, before it becomes illegal.

Nate McVaugh
Education Doctoral student
University of Texas at Austin