The new head of the Copyright Office, Register of Copyrights Karyn Temple, was emphatic in her assertion that the Sec. 119 compulsory license that allows satellite operators to deliver distant TV network signals without negotiating with broadcasters has outlived its usefulness and needs to go. 

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The license is up for renewal at the end of the year as part of the STELAR Act, with MVPDS arguing it should be renewed and broadcasters that it should go away. 

That was among a host of issues Temple addressed, and was queried on, in a House Judiciary oversight hearing Wednesday (June 26). Others included blanket music licensing, video streaming piracy and the notice and takedown regime for suspect online content. 

Judiciary shares jurisdiction over STELAR and other video licensing issues with House Energy & Commerce. 

Temple also put in a plug for a copyright small claims court so that individual artists without deep pockets could still work within the system to protect their content.  

Related: House Makes First Pass at STELAR

Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) pressed Temple on the Copyright Office's (longstanding) support for sunsetting the distant-signal license created in the STELAR Act. That allows satellite operators to import a distant network affiliate signals (from L.A. and New York), when a local market lacks one for a number of reasons, including that the satellite operator--in this case DirecTV--does not deliver any local stations in a market, or a market lacks one of the Big Four affiliates. DISH delivers local stations in all markets, but DirecTV does not in about a dozen markets. 

Johnson asked how that would impact the 800,000 who still get distant TV station signals via that license. 

She pointed to the different ways to get content, YouTube, streaming services. But Johnson said that given that broadband is not yet available in the "far reaches" of the county, that still posed a problem.  

Temple said that while satellite operators, who want to keep the license, cited those 800,000, she also pointed out that the use of the license had dropped precipitously and it was not clear the 800,000 figure was households and could include RVs and other types of entities (the license covers truckers and sports stadium tailgaters as well). She said she did not think there would be significant harm to rural communities if the license were allowed to expire (as broadcasters want). 

But Temple was not done having to defend that position. Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-Tex.) pressed her on whether maintaining the license would somehow be a burden on the office or deflect it from other issues, like an IT upgrade all agreed was needed.  

Escobar did not address that directly, but again said the the license had reached the limit of its effectiveness. She said the office would certainly continue to enforce the license and collect the royalties--which have dropped by 85%-99% in recent years. But that given that drop in royalties and rise in alternative viewing options, she did not see the license as being effective. She said the compulsory license, which prevents a copyright holder from negotiating individually for their work product--should only be used when there is market failure. Since there is no more market failure, she said, it should go away.  

Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Wis.) said she was concerned about those truckers and RV users and asked what their options would be and whether the office had considered grandfathering them.  

Temple said said once again that given the disnificant drop in usage of the license, there would not be a significant market harm to rural communities and that the free market, rather than a compulsory license, will take care of the issue.  

Lesko asked the committee's chair, Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) to keep those 800,000 in mind, even if that was a relatively small number. She said that when the service is taken away, she assumed they would not be happy.  

On the issue of artists without lots of money for legal fees not having equal access to copyright protection, Temple pointed out that the Copyright Office has provided support over the past few years (as far back as 2006) for a small claims "tribunal" within the office. She said that the "costs and burdens of federal copyright litigation effectively prevent those who do not have extensive resources and the high‐dollar cases from bringing suit to enforce their rights or to obtain a declaratory judgment of non‐infringement." 

During her questioning, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) asked if Temple would be willing to look at the issue of blanket licenses, where broadcasters have to pay all four music licensing organizations, as the office looks at music licensing consent decrees--Lofgren said that that blanket license regime was complicated and expensive for broadcasters. Temple said she would definitely be willing to look at that issue if Congress wanted her to.  

One thing Congress did want the Copyright Office to look at is how the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) notice and takedown regime for suspect online content was functioning. 

Asked when a required Copyright Office report to Congress would be coming out on that DMCA Sec. 512 regime, she said the office would be drafting the report over the summer and hoped to have it ready by the end of the year. But she also pointed out that there were some 90,000 comments to review, as well as input from a recent roundtable on the issue. She agreed with Rep. Ben Cline (R-Va.), who asked about the report, that a lot has changed since the regime was instituted.  

Cline pointed out that video streaming piracy costs jobs and billions of dollars and asked what the office was doing about it.  

Temple pointed out that it was not an enforcement agency, but advocated for strong protections, which was a reason that for the past several years it has proposed that Congress make illegal streaming a felony. Currently, while distributing pirated copies of videos is a felony, streaming them is not. She said toughening the penalty for streaming was one thing Congress could to to help stem online video piracy. 

The White House has come out against a proposed amendment to reauthorization of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act reauthorization that its backers say provides the necessary constitutional protections while giving intelligence authorities the ability to target terrorists and other overseas targets. The amendment is scheduled to be debated on the House floor Thursday (Jan. 11)

FISA allows for the accessing of communications with foreign entities, but legislators from both parties have been looking to rein in warrantless searches of the communications of U.S. residents (when they are on the other end of those communications). It is just the latest attempt to address that issue.

The USA Rights Act, co-sponsored by Reps. Ted Poe (R-Tex.) and Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), is expected to be introduced as an amendment to the FISA bill.

Related: Wyden Seeks Info on E-Mail Info Collection

"The USA Rights Act reforms Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to end warrantless backdoor searches of Americans' calls, emails, texts and other communications that are routinely swept up under a program designed to spy on foreign targets," Poe said. "This sweeping authority has been clouded in secrecy, in part because the government refuses to answer essential questions about how it impacts Americans, including who can be targeted and how many American communications the government collects. Despite arguments to the contrary, the USA Rights Act allows the 702 program to continue to be used to target terrorists and agents of a foreign power without a warrant, it simply adds a clear warrant requirement when we search this data on U.S. Persons."

The White House sees it very differently, terrorism and national security, as it has in defending what its critics see as heavy-handed immigration policies.

"The Administration strongly opposes the 'USA Rights' amendment to the FISA Amendments Reauthorization Act, which the House will consider tomorrow," the White House said in a statement late Wednesday. "This amendment would re-establish the walls between intelligence and law enforcement that our country knocked down following the attacks of 9/11 in order to increase information sharing and improve our national security. The Administration urges the House to reject this amendment and preserve the useful role FISA’s Section 702 authority plays in protecting American lives."

In November, House Judiciary Committee chair Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) and ranking member John Conyers (D-Mich.) introduced the USA Liberty Act, which partially closes the "backdoor" loophole through which Americans' communications--if they are on the other end of that conversation with non-U.S. resident--can be viewed without a warrant. Reps. Poe and Zoe Lofgren want to shut that door completely.

Congress has been trying for years to agree on the right balance of privacy protection and going after foreign threats to national security.

“We call on Congress to protect Americans’ 4th Amendment rights," said Computer & Communications Industry Association President Ed Black. "We oppose any renewal of FISA that fails to close the ‘backdoor search loophole,’ which permits the continued searching of Americans’ incidentally collected communications without a warrant based on probable cause. We urge members to support the USA RIGHTS Act Amendment or any amendment that would protect Americans’ communications from unreasonable, warrantless access.”