More on H.R. 107, The Digital Media Consumers' Rights Act of 2003

Some testimony from Wednesday's hearing is available from the website of the Committee on Energy and Commerce. The comments of Gary Shapiro, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Consumer Electronics Association, are particularly enlightening:

"... One of the central failings of the DMCA is that it preserved fair use as a defense to copyright infringement, but more perniciously created the new crime of circumvention without a fair use defense. As a result, even if no infringement occurs when a consumer simply unlocks something he or she owns, he or she could be held liable under the DMCA. The Boucher-Doolittle bill would bring the two statutes into harmony by imposing liability under the DMCA only when it also exists under the Copyright Act...."