Copyright and the Use of Audiovisual Content
Introduction
AALL has a standing Copyright Committee to keep its members informed on copyright issues
facing law librarians. Its Issues page and its Blog do an excellent job of this. Because the Committee's
membership is limited, it cannot cover all copyright issues of interest to its members in equal depth. M/AV-SIS focuses specifically
on copyright issues affecting the use of audiovisual materials.
DVD Ripping and the Use of Video Clips
The Background
DVD ripping and other similar technological circumventions of copyright protection systems has long been common in academic
environments to create video clips for educational use. Until relatively recently, however, it was illegal in most circumstances. While
the use of video clips in the classroom and similar environments is protected by sections 107 and/or 110 of the
Copyright Act, the clips must be "lawfully acquired." DVD ripping is a technological circumvention of a copyright protection system
and thus is prohibited under 17 U.S.C. §1201(a)(1)(A) (absent a statutory exemption). Video clips created through DVD ripping would
not be lawfully acquired. Moreover, fair use is not a defense to technological circumvention.
The Statutory Exemption Generally
The Librarian of Congress is obligated under 17 U.S.C.
§1201(a)(1)(D) to publish any exemptions to the statutory prohibition against technological circumventions of copyright
protection systems. These exemptions last for a three-year period and are published in the Federal Register prior to being codified
in the Code of Federal Regulations.
The 2006 exemption applied only to a "film or media
studies
department" and "media studies or film professors." The 2010 exemption expanded that to "college and university
professors and by college and university film and media studies students" as well as "Documentary filmmaking" and
"Noncommercial videos."
The 2012 Statutory Exemption
The 2012
final rule expanded the exemption still further,
listing "(i) in
noncommercial videos; (ii) in documentary films; (iii) in nonfiction multimedia ebooks offering film analysis; and (iv) for educational
purposes by college and university faculty, college and university students, and kindergarten through twelfth grade educators."
Though as librarians M/AV-SIS members might wish that the exemption would be even more expansive (or permanently codified in
the statute itself), it is moving in the right direction.
The immediate practical effect of the exemption is modest. Many of those covered by the exemption were already making use of
DVD ripping and similar circumventions before the Librarian of Congress officially recognized them as legitimate. Nevertheless, few
(if any) of the parties filing comments treat the exemption as a mere formality. For additional information, read the 2012 ruling or the Comments and Reply Comments to the proceeding.