I recently became aware of the Database and Collections of Information Misappropriation Act (DCIMA, H.R. 3261), a horrible piece of work that would extend copyright-like protections to collections of factual data. EFF signed onto a coalition letter back in October, but it seemed that the bill would wither on the vine like it had for many years in a row. Instead, it got out of committee and is now waiting to be scheduled for a vote in the House. Hoping to stop it, I wrote EFF's action alert urging Reps to fight the bill. If you're not familiar, here's some background and a little bit about why you should care:

We're surrounded by free factual information, but there's a bill in Congress that would lock it all up. The Database and Collections of Information Misappropriation Act (DCIMA, H.R. 3261) extends extremely broad copyright-like protections to collections of factual data - data like the price of a TV, the temperature in Arizona or information collected during scientific research. DCIMA would allow companies to sue anyone who interferes with their ability to profit from data that they collect. In other words, academic researchers, public libraries, Internet innovators and other database users would have to pay up if someone else claimed to have assembled the data first.

The best known company behind DCIMA is Reed Elsevier, a Dutch publisher. It's the largest academic publishing house in the world. It owns thousands of journals and, notably, controls LexisNexis. Much of the content it publishes is not copyrighted by Reed (academic articles, news clippings, court decisions, research data), but it's in a unique place to gather the information and, under DCIMA, keep it out of the hands of competitors.

There are vague exemptions for "nonprofit educational, scientific, or research institutions," but the statute explicitly states that these exemptions have to be evaluated in court. In other words, a judge will get to decide whether a particular user falls under that exemption. Compared to today's world, that's a huge departure - researchers can currently use freely available factual information in whatever manner they desire. Under DCIMA, fear of litigation may keep would-be researchers from bothering.

Instead of providing missing tools for stopping database theft, DCIMA would allow companies like Best Buy to stop price comparison sites like Fatwallet.com from copying price information.

So I feel Frank's pain about the fact that this bill exists, but it's not too late to stop it.