[Random-bits] Coble database bill dead for now

[James Love]

http://www.newsbytes.com/pubNews/00/156576.html

By Robert MacMillan, Newsbytes
WASHINGTON, DC, U.S.A.,
12 Oct 2000, 1:20 PM CST

A controversial approach to protecting databases from misappropriation
will have to be reintroduced next year after its chances for any passage
this year have essentially been extinguished, said Rep. Howard Coble,
R-N.C.

    [snip]

Chairman Thomas Bliley, R-Va., whose own bill, H.R. 1858 - the Consumer
and Investor Access to Information Act - has received more support from
the high-tech industry than Coble's bill. IT industry groups largely
believe that Coble's bill would hinder the growth of electronic
commerce.

The Coble bill sets up a number of intellectual property protections for
database owners, but according to the Commerce Committee, makes them so
stringent that private citizens, companies and investors would be
punished by fines and jail time for the relatively innocuous
appropriation of material contained in other people's databases.

Opposition to Coble's bill is fierce, coming from many sources,
including the US Chamber of Commerce, AT&T Corp., MCI WorldCom Inc.,
Bell Atlantic Corp., and Yahoo Corp., as well as Bliley, Commerce
Committee Ranking Democrat John Dingell, D-Mich., and Commerce Committee
member Michael Oxley, R-Ohio.

One of Coble's star supporters, however, is the National Association of
Realtors, which chiefly is interested in protecting its Multiple Listing
Services database, especially after a member sold it to an outside
source, violating NAR code.

Judiciary staffers were unwilling to say how Bliley's retirement from
Congress would affect the strategies for supporting the Coble bill, but
one said that "there is forever a jurisdictional flare-up between these
two committees on these issues."

"It was very artfully drafted to invoke jurisdiction on their part," the
staffer said of Bliley's bill.