Congress' latest COVID-19 relief bill will make it a felony to host the illegal streaming of media for commercial gain.
The new stimulus bill features a number of items unrelated to COVID-19 relief. A few key ones relate to the entertainment industry at large. The most eye-catching is a bill proposed by Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) that would make it a felony for commercial enterprises to exclusively profit off of unlicensed work. The text of the bill clarifies that the company in question must serve no other commercial purpose besides the illegal streaming of copyright material. The penalty could see violators facing up to 10 years in prison. As The Hollywood Reporter notes, the provision has not been widely viewed and the spending bill will be voted on later today.
Also noted by the outlet, this is not the first time such a measure has been attempted. Back in 2011, former presidential hopeful Sen. Amy Klobuchar tried to pass a bill that would target users who streamed illegal content. In a surprisingly savvy move, Fight for the Future, a not-for-profit focused on digital rights issues, crafted a campaign centered around Justin Beiber. As was rightly noted, the popular singer would run afoul of the law as his rise to fame came from uploading covers of songs to YouTube without copyright permission to do so. That bill ultimately failed to pass.
The new spending bill will also expand Section 180, a production tax deduction for film and TV productions that will benefit Hollywood during the current slowdown. A small claims court within the U.S. Copyright Office will also be established to address takedown notices, but the move has been met with a fair amount of controversy, with many worried about larger entities being favored and some even claiming the entire thing is unconstitutional.
The overall spending bill has met with plenty of controversy itself, given its proposed spending increase of $900 billion dollars, only a fraction of which will go towards individual stimulus checks of a mere $600. A sizable chunk will go towards bailing out various industries, including the struggling movie theater business. The latest relief bill will provide $15 billion to theaters and will also open up the Paycheck Protection Program to a wider range of media outlets.
Source: via The Hollywood Reporter