[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 93 (Friday, June 27, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Page S6726]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      WHERE ARE THE WIPO TREATIES

  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, for some time now the Judiciary Committee 
has been working on issues dealing with copyright protection on the 
Internet and the copyright rights of performers and sound recordings. 
The Digital Performance Right in Sound Recordings Act that I introduced 
was passed in 1995, and my National Information Infrastructure 
Copyright Protection Act was the subject of two hearings in the last 
Congress. The NII Copyright Protection Act was superseded by the 
Clinton administration's effort to deal with many of the same issues in 
the context of two new treaties, the World Intellectual Property 
Organization [WIPO] Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and 
Phonograms Treaty.
  These treaties were concluded successfully in Geneva in December 
1996. Since then, I have been eagerly awaiting the administration's 
draft of implementation legislation. To date, I have not received such 
legislation, and the Foreign Relations Committee has not received the 
treaties. I know that the administration shares the respect that I have 
for copyright, and I commend Bruce Lehman, the Commissioner of Patents 
and Trademarks, for the splendid work that he did on negotiating the 
treaties, but I am concerned that 6 months have passed without draft 
legislation for the committee to work on.
  Both WIPO treaties were completed in record time, because there was a 
sense of urgency about the vulnerability of U.S. copyrighted works to 
massive infringement by means of Internet access and about insufficient 
international copyright protection for sound recordings. Where is this 
sense of urgency now? Nothing has changed. Our copyright industries are 
still threatened.
  In 1994, copyright-related industries contributed more than $385 
billion to the American economy, or more than 5 percent of the total 
gross domestic product. This represents more than $50 billion in 
foreign sales, which exceeds every other leading industry sector except 
automotive and agriculture in contributions to a favorable trade 
balance. From 1977 to 1994, these same industries grew at a rate that 
was twice the rate of growth of the national economy, and the rate of 
job growth in these industries since 1987 has outpaced that of the 
overall economy by more than 100 percent.
  Yet these same industries lost an estimated $18 to $22 billion to 
foreign piracy in 1995. The film industry alone estimates that its 
losses due to counterfeiting were in excess of $2.3 billion for that 
year, even though full-length motion pictures are not yet available on 
the Internet. The recording industry estimates its annual piracy losses 
in excess of $1.2 billion, with seizures of bootleg CDS up some 1,300 
percent in 1995. These figures promise to grow exponentially as 
technology provides for quicker, more perfect digital reproduction, 
which is exactly why timely ratification of the WIPO treaties is so 
important..
  I urge the administration to complete its work and to send the 
treaties to the Senate. I would like to get the treaties ratified and 
implementation legislation passed during this session of Congress. That 
goal may already be unachievable because of administration delay. I 
hope not. I'll try my best.

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