Author: JT Smith
Barrister/IT author Denis Kelleher has written an essay for The Irish Times regarding the issues and controversy surrounding the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and Ireland’s Copyright Act 2000: “An odd feature of these new laws is that they may protect
copyright protection systems more strictly than they protect
copyright works themselves. If you copy a CD once, that is a
violation of copyright and you could be sued for damages by the
record company, which would be the cost of one CD or around
£15. However, if in order to carry out that reproduction you
remove what the Irish Copyright Act 2000 terms “rights
management information”, then, if convicted, you could be
sentenced to a 5-year term of imprisonment and a fine of up to
£100,000. The difference is that by removing the rights
management information, you may permit others to create
thousands or millions of copies.”
copyright protection systems more strictly than they protect
copyright works themselves. If you copy a CD once, that is a
violation of copyright and you could be sued for damages by the
record company, which would be the cost of one CD or around
£15. However, if in order to carry out that reproduction you
remove what the Irish Copyright Act 2000 terms “rights
management information”, then, if convicted, you could be
sentenced to a 5-year term of imprisonment and a fine of up to
£100,000. The difference is that by removing the rights
management information, you may permit others to create
thousands or millions of copies.”
