The Copyright Office won't expand allowable circumvention of DVD copyright protections to allow schools to stream full movies or TV shows to students either in class or studying remotely at home. But it will extend the smart TV interoperability exemption to streaming devices.

That is according to the just-released final order on proposed exemptions to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) prohibition on circumventing copyright protections for DVDs and other sources of copyrighted content. That was part of the office's eighth triennial review of those exemptions.

The Copyright Office has historically rejected expanding the exemption from prohibition on copyright protected DVDs and Blu-Rays as overly broad. The current language limits the exemption to "short portions" of longer works. It did so again, despite the Biden Administration's support of expanding the exemption.

Copyright holders are historically reluctant to allow for copyright protection circumvention because that makes it easier for the content to be pirated by others and distributed for non-educational purposes.

"The Register concluded that the exemption should not be expanded or amended to cover copying for the purpose of performing full-length motion pictures for educational purposes," the report said.

The Biden Administration had pushed for the full-movie exemption. In a letter to the Copyright Office earlier this month, NTIA said it supported BYU's request to eliminate the "short portion" language in the DMCA, which the school said would allow it to circumvent the encryption on the DVDs in its library so they could be streamed to students having to work remotely during the pandemic.

Also: Copyright Alliance Presses for Protections

BYU also pointed out that computers have been phasing out the optical drives that would let students view its DVD library. "Essentially, BYU asks to be able to 'space shift' the works from one medium to another to facilitate remote learning especially because of the need to provide remote learning as a result of the pandemic," NTIA said in explaining why it supported the circumvention expansion for streaming.

The Copyright Office was unpersuaded.

But streaming did get some extra attention in the exemption for noninfringing circumvention for computer programs that operate smart TVs, smartphones and tablets to allow for the download of third-party software to enable interoperability or the removal of software applications. In addition to the renewal of that exemption, a new, related, exemption was added for video streaming devices.

The new exemption covers "routers and other networking devices....whose primary purpose is to run applications that stream video from the internet for display on a screen. It does not extend to DVD or Blu-ray players or to video game consoles.

The Copyright Alliance, which represents content creators, has asked President Donald Trump to stand up for copyright protections here and abroad, pointing out he has a personal interest in that protection.

One sign that the President, whose own copyrights include NBC's The Apprentice, may already be listening was his reported selection of Maureen Ohlhausen as interim Federal Trade Commission chair. She said Monday that "anything we are doing that is devaluing intellectual property rights inappropriately...will actually hurt the U.S economy and innovation down the road."

In a letter to the president Monday (Jan. 23), the group pointed to Trump's own IP.

"Throughout the long history of our country, few, if any, presidents have had a more sizable and diverse copyright portfolio than you," the group wrote. "Your experiences as a businessman have afforded you insights into the value and importance of copyright and how copyright protections help drive the U.S. economy and create millions of well-paying jobs and small businesses."

It said that it's important for copyright owners to get free-market value for their work, free of undue government regulations, and in the limited cases where the government does deem it necessary to set royalties, that fair-market value still applies.

Trump ran on a platform of boosting U.S. companies and cutting regulations, so unless there is a populist hiccup in that trajectory, he should be on the same page as the Copyright Alliance.