CL AUS NATIONAL COMMISSION ON NEW TECHNOLOGICAL USES OF COPYRIGHTED WORKSX BD The National Commission on New Technological Uses of Copyrighted Works, in compliance with that portion of its mandate which instructs it to examine questions concerning computer uses of copyrighted works, has designated a Data Base Subcommittee to prepare a preliminary report concerning the manner in which automated data bases should be dealt with. by copyright. That report, containing the recommendations of the Data Base Subcommittee, is herewith presented for public comment. It has not been adopted by the full Commission, which will base its final report to the President and the Congress upon response to this document, further hearings, and the results of several studies now in progress concerning the economic, public interest, and consumer questions associated with the issues before the Commission. Appended to the report are the individual views of those Commissioners who desire at this time to comment upon the Subcommittee's recommendations. Written comments or requests for the opportunity to testify on this subject at future Commission meetings should be addressed to Arthur J. Levine, Executive Director, National Commission on New Technological Uses of Copyrighted Works, Washington, D.C. 20558. Requests to appear must be received by August 1, 1977, so that the Commission may plan appropriate hearings early in the fall. Written comments would be welcome at any time but should be submitted by September 1, 1977. REPORT OF THE DATA BASE SUBCOMMITTEE TO THE NATIONAL COMMISSION ON NEW TECHNOLOGICAL USES OF COPYRIGHTED WORKS The automated data base represents a new technological use of a type of work long recognized as eligible for copyright. Dictionaries, encyclopedias, and tables of numeric information are all forms of data bases which antedate the computer by many decades, and for which copyright protection has been, and will continue to be, available under applicable copyright law. Under the new law a data base is a compilation and thus a proper subject for 1/ copyright. This entitlement to copyright is not diminished by the fixation of the information content of a data base in a medium requiring the 2/ intervention of a computer to accomplish the communication of content. Accordingly a data base, whether printed in traditional hard copy or fixed 1/ Section 101, P.L. 94-553 defines "compilation" as a work formed by the collection and assembling of 2/ Section 102(a), P.L. 94-553, provides that Copyright protection subsists, in accordance with |