Howard Berman: “this day has been a long time coming. Going back nine years as the technological capacity to make unauthorized copies of…”

“this day has been a long time coming. Going back nine years as the technological capacity to make unauthorized copies of copyrights works was rapidly expanding, some of us anticipated the need to enact legislation to protect technological measures used by copyright holders to protect their works. Last Congress, our former colleagues, Carlos Moorehead and Pat Schroeder, laid further groundwork for today's WIPO bill with their efforts to enact national information infrastructure legislation. Then in December 1996, the U.S. victory that produced two new international treaties, made the enactment of implementing legislation an urgent task. Today, under the leadership of the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble) and the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank), the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hyde) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers), our efforts have come to fruition. Passage of this bill is essential to implementation of the treaties around the world. Our leadership is necessary in order to gain passage of the treaties in other countries where the standards for intellectual property is much lower than our own. Make no mistake, American intellectual property and the almost unsurpassed contribution it makes to our balance of trade is at risk around the world. Piracy costs American creators $15 billion in sales.”