The Stop Online Piracy Act; Analysing the Law

This post aims to be an objective analysis of SOPA, as they stand at the time of writing. I will attempt to update this as and if the law progress. Obviously I have no familiarity with US lawmaking, which may be particularly evident in this post.

The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act (Protect-IP Act or PIPA) were introduced into the US House of Representatives and Senate respectively in the summer of 2011. They cover substantially the same material, and only SOPA will be analysed here. As their titles suggest, they are both aimed at reducing or restricting the online infringement of copyright, by targeting certain websites both directly, indirectly and through their financing.

Copyright – Should Fair Dealing be replaced by Fair Use?

The following is an independent research essay analysing whether or not the UK should adopt a general, fair use defence to copyright infringement similar to the one found in US law. It was produced as part of my degree course, although the submitted version varies significantly due to limits on the length. This is the “original” version and contains a detailed look at copyright, its scope, history and purpose, before examining the fair dealing and fair use defences. Sections of the essay will be appearing in stand-alone posts, in (hopefully) a more accessible form.

Copyright – Fair Dealing and Fair Use.pdf (161 kB)

What Makes Something Fair? – A close look at fair dealing

When copyright law was first introduced by the Copyright Act 1710, there were no defences available – is a registered book was copying, it was an infringement. Over the next two hundred years, judicial activism in this area led to a general defence known as “fair use.” The importance of this defence was recognised by Parliament and was included in the 1911 Copyright Act under the new name “fair dealing”.

Today, the fair dealing defences cover three main areas of permitted acts; private study and research, criticism and review, and news reporting. This is an exhaustive list and no other types of use can be covered. These defences are now found in the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act and added to these is an exception for education. While the requirements for each individual area are laid out in the Act, the definition of fairness is not given and so has been developed by the Courts.

Are You a Pirate? – The Vast Scope of Copyright

If you went out into the streets and asked members of the public their thoughts on copyright, I imagine you would end up with the following sorts of results. Most people respect copyright. They think it is a valuable tool for encouraging artistic works. Or they think it is a fundamental right that creators have to protect their work. Or they are not quite sure what they think, but they know copyright is important, that they would never infringe copyright and that only pirates and criminals would do so.

Now imagine going out into the street and asking those same people to sing or hum a few lines from their favourite song (or simply sing you Happy Birthday). I imagine that many people (provided you asked nicely) would be happy to oblige – after all, there is clearly nothing improper about doing so. Except there is. Arguably, such an act would count as an infringement of copyright; if the song was still covered by copyright (for songs, until 70 years after the death of the author(s) in the UK) the law makes it very clear that a “performance of the work in public is an act restricted by the copyright”¹ and that a “performance” includes “any mode of visual or acoustic presentation”.”² By merely singing or humming a few lines (arguably a “substantial part”) there is a prima facie infringement. That person would now be a pirate.

DDoS Attacks and the Law

[Originally posted at pirateparty.org.uk in January 2011]

Earlier this week it was announced that five people had been arrested across the UK in connection with distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on “major US companies across several industries” and was done on request from the FBI. While few details have emerged, it is understood that they were arrested under the Computer Misuse Act 1990. The aim of this post will be to examine the relevant part of this law and how it applies to DDoS attacks. As always, it should not be taken as legal advice, and any corrections and thoughts are most welcome.