The Family Entertainment and Copyright Act of 2004, approved unanimously by the Senate, replaces the proposed Intellectual Property Protection Act, which was itself a consolidation of other draft copyright bills that have been put forward over the course of the last congressional session.
These include the Induce Act (otherwise known as the Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act), which proposed to make anyone who "intentionally induces any violation" of US copyright law liable for that violation, and the Piracy Deterrence and Education Act, which aimed to criminalise file-sharing; to demand funding for the Justice Department to initiate an internet use education program; and to give the FBI powers to create an anti-piracy program.
Consumer groups and civil liberties organisations objected loudly to the proposals, which they saw as being so broad as to attack any service or device that had the potential to be used for copyright infringement, and as forcing the taxpayer to fund the legal battles of the entertainment industry
The Act now approved by the Senate – in the lame duck session that precedes the demise of the current Congress – steers clear of such controversial measures.
Instead, among a host of small amendments to existing copyright law and, strangely, a large section relating to boxing standards, the Act targets the piracy of pre-release works and prohibits the "camcording" of motion pictures for unauthorised redistribution.
The Act will also allow devices such as ClearPlay's DVD player – which permits parents to edit inappropriate material out of films – to operate without breaching the law.