HRRC asks FCC 'Don't strangle digital audio radio'

HRRC said there is also nothing in either the Copyright Law or the Communications Act giving the FCC authority to regulate digital audio receivers or recorders. To the extent the Congress has addressed digital audio recording, it did so through the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992 (AHRA), in which the Congress delegated duties to other Federal agencies, but not to the FCC. Moreover, the AHRA contains a specific exemption from copyright liability for digital audio recording devices.

In treading on the turf of the AHRA, HRRC said, "the FCC would be barging into a thicket in which it lacks the power to do any clearing, cutting, or planting."

HRRC at CES

An ancient Sony Betamax VCR on display at the Home Recording Rights Coalition's booth to commemorate the January 1984 U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Betamax case, which established Americans' right to tape programs off the air and to dub other recordings "for personal use."

The first piece of A/V equipment you encounter after passing through security and entering the main hall of the CES is decidedly not high-tech. It's a venerable Sony Betamax videocassette recorder so ancient that it still has channel-selector dials, as in "Don't touch that dial." The Home Recording Rights Coalition put it on display in its prominently located booth to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Betamax case, in which Hollywood studios sued to block sales of the first VCR on grounds of copyright infringement. The case ended with a January 17, 1984 U.S. Supreme Court decision that made home video recording safe in the U.S. '” and consequently enabled VCRs to help propel the consumer-electronics industry to record growth. (Not so incidentally, videotapes also made billions for the movie studios.)

The Betamax deck is there to remind show-goers and the press that home recording rights are again under attack today by the same forces. One of the most important issues facing the HRRC and the industry in the months ahead relates directly to the coming high-definition DVD systems. Specifically, the HRRC is concerned that the FCC will allow "downresolution" '” the deliberate softening of picture detail '” of HDTV programs as a copy-protection method. This technique could cut the pixel resolution of HDTV-compatible component-video outputs by some 75% '” bad news for high-definition DVD recorders.