A key policy issue at Authors Alliance is our support for authors’ right to make fair use in the digital age. At the U.S. Copyright Office’s seventh triennial rulemaking session in April, we testified in support of an expanded exemption Section 1201 of the DMCA that would allow authors to bypass the encryption on DVDs, Blu-ray, and other media for the use of film clips in e-books for purposes other than film analysis, and in fictional works as well as nonfiction.
Following the 1201 hearings, the Copyright Office asked participants for additional information explaining why screen capture is not a sufficient alternative to circumvention for educational uses of “short portions of motion pictures” beyond film studies or other courses requiring close analysis of film and media excerpts.
Today, Authors Alliance joins with Library Copyright Alliance, Joint Educators, and the Organization for Transformative Works to explain why screen capture is not a sufficient alternative to circumvention. Our letter explains that many commercially released videos block screen capture programs, making the viability of screen capture as a sufficient alternative a moot issue. Moreover, a range of instructors have pedagogical reason for using quality excerpts, and screen capture programs produce deficient excerpts that do not meet the needs of instructors or authors.
For example, authors of multimedia e-books may want to magnify parts of the frame in order to call attention to specific details that are the subject of criticism and commentary in their work. Attorney and author Heidi Tandy, who writes fan fiction not only to create novel works but also to educate the public about fair use, hopes to create a multimedia fan fiction e-book offering analysis and commentary on the long-running television series Supernatural. To do so, she needs to capture small details from the television show, such as a set artifact or a character’s fleeting facial expression, and then blow up these details to analyze and comment on them. Given the well-documented flaws and degradation present in all screen-capture software, a screen capture requirement would prevent or severely hinder authors’ ability to make fair use using e-book technology.
For more reasons why screen capture is not a sufficient alternative to circumvention, click here or read our full letter below.