Using “fairness” in IP Laws
There seem to be a major overhaul of intellectual property laws in India. And these amendments are bound to pester lot of DRM/DMCA proponents. According to the proposed changes “fair use” seems to have broader definition (when compared to USA) and as long as there is no intention to infringe, it’ll be considered as legal. Furthermore, the usage of tools like DeCSS for personal use is also legal.
Link to the article published on arstechnica: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/04/indias-copyright-proposals-are-un-american-and-thats-bad.ars
It would be interesting to see how DRM proponents react to these changes since these amendments are contrasting to what we have in the USA or most of the western world. Secondly, it raises the questions of “priacy”. In country like India where piracy is rampant, should it have an easy IP laws like these or much more stricter to clamp down the piracy.
However, these amendments give significant latitude to people who are looking towards some non-commercial personal/educational use. Current IP laws in US have very narrow definition of fair use. As we have seen in the class, under DMCA circumvention is unacceptable for any type of use. Ars Technica published another excellent article titled “Can we have fair use without fair use technology?” that debates about broadening the definition of “fair use” for non-commercial personal and educational usage.
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