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The next word of art, so to speak, that is commonly used is storage. This is the next process. First, the material is converted into machine readable form, and then it is stored in what we call the memory core of the computer.

The next process the computer is capable of is manipulating and handling all of the information within the memory core of the computer system for subsequent retrieval.

Then, in response to an inquiry, the material is made available; in other words, is retrieved. Then it is ready for output.

What happens then is that either the material is displayed or a hard copy printout of a portion or a section of the text material that has been translated into the memory core of the computer system is made available.

This is the technology, these are the techniques of activity that are now being accomplished and will increasingly be accomplished more efficiently by computerized information networks. I keep referring to computerized information storage and retrieval systems, because information storage and retrieval systems, as I am urging so strongly, conceptually are books, manuscripts, journals, clay tablets, pictures any item on which man has been able to store his information so that he does not have to rely on his own memory.

Senator BURDICK. What you are saying, then, is that this computer is merely a 1967 clay tablet.

Mrs. LINDEN. Precisely. Of course, I think there are those hardware manufacturers who would not equate the places. But the conceptual function, the purpose is the same.

Through the generations, mankind has learned how more efficiently and in a more sophisticated manner to accomplish the same things. Just as mankind first walked, then rode a horse, then had a horse and buggy, then a train, then an airplane, then the supersonic jets. Actually, the purpose was the same. The purpose was to transport himself or possessions from one spot, geographic location, to another more efficiently. That is what computerized information storage and retrieval networks are intended to do. They achieve by a sophisticated electronic means what mankind has attempted to do and has done within a more primitive fashion via printing presses, via books, and via clay tablets.

An evaluation of the proposed copyright law relative to existing and prospective computer technology will, we submit, offer the answer to contentions that S. 597 does not appropriately respond to the new technology. Perhaps a brief overview of computer operation would help us at this point to get some notion of what the future may bring. Since the computer operates essentially with two digits, zero and one, it cannot, as I suggested earlier, operate directly with the characters of the alphabet. To store words in a computer, they must be translated into the binary numbers which constitute computer language. Presently this is accomplished by operators who use electric typewriters to copy the text, which is then internally translated into binary numbers. This translation is accomplished today by keypunch operators who create a deck of cards on which the words appear as holes punched into numbered columns. Automatic reading devices cannot read letterpress. They cannot read the printed page. The commercial production of these automatic scanning devices in quantity

is 5 to 10 years down the road. At this moment, the input of printed material is an expensive and time-consuming exercise that is not lightly entered into.

The storage capacity of today's computers is enormous and is developing rapidly. It is logically possible but at this time it is not economically practical to store all of the world's knowledge in a computer memory system.

Returning to the case of printed materials, what uses can be made of them by the computer? The reason I ask the question at this juncture is to suggest that this may not be the time to reach definitive language in legislation with respect to computer technology.

I am urging the consideration of the present state of the art as a background against which the proposed copyright law ought to be evaluated.

At the present time, the actual use of copyrighted material in computers is extremely limited. A survey undertaken in January showed that during the preceding six months 167 book publishers had received only 22 requests for permission to use copyrighted material in computers. During the same period, they had received and processed thousands of permission requests for other kinds of uses.

For economic reasons the computer uses of copyrighted material lie years in the future. We can only begin at this moment to consider what they may be. We know of three potential uses: (1) scholarly study, (2) information storage and retrieval uses generally, and (3) computer-assisted instruction. I should like to describe the present state of the art so that we may better be able to evaluate whether it is advisable, no, possible at this time to draft legislation regulating computerized uses of copyrighted materials.

In scholarly study, the whole of an author's works may be read into a computer and stored in its memory. The works may then be subjected to analysis to reveal characteristics of style, or sources of information. One author's work may be compared to another's. Stylistic analysis of this sort has apparently revealed that eight out of 12 of the Federalist Papers whose authorship had been in dispute were written by Madison.

The second potential computer use of copyrighted material is the storage of books or indeed of libraries in computers for indexing and abstracting and for printout or display of appropriate portions of text. Once again, for reasons of expense and practical utility, this use is also currently minimal.

Within the Federal Government, several agencies are using computers to cope with the flow of reports generated by Government funded research. Two aspects of those attempts by governmental agencies to deal with information flow are specially pertinent. First, the computers are now used not to store printed text but simply a bibliography of titles of the reports. Second, the materials referred to by title are not copyrighted materials. That is not to say that storing of entire texts will not be practical and commercially feasible in the next decade.

Closely related to these Government agency networks, are the slowly developing library networks such as the medical library network proposed 2 years ago by a group of eastern universities and the New York State library network announced a couple of months ago.

So far as we know, these networks use or will use computers only for bibliographic control. The exchange of copies of the texts will be by facsimile transmission.

In other words, it will be by some kind of photographic or what we call copying process. It will not be part of the output, so to speak, of the information stored in the computer mechanism of the network.

We are here concerned with computer storage of copyrighted materials, and it appears that at the present there is little evidence of immediate need for this kind of use except for indexing.

The third potential area of computer use of copyrighted materials is in computer-assisted instruction. This use also is in the most preliminary stages. The recent Presidential message on education proposed an experimental program for developing the potential of computers in education. It observed that computers are now used in educational institutions primarily for advanced research but can be used for other purposes "if we find ways to employ it effectively and economically and if we develop practical courses to teach students how to use it.”

In other words, it is not happening yet. It undoubtedly will, it undoubtedly should but it is not something that is presently in existence and can presently be regulated. In other words, it is a prospective use.

Furthermore, there is another point that ought to be borne in mind. That is that the materials used in individualized computer instructions bear no relationship whatsoever to existing copyrighted works.

When IBM began pioneering in this field, it created its own materials for calculus and German. It did not translate any existing textbooks into computer language for display on the student's screen. In short, there appears to be no present visible demand for the input of existing copyright materials into computers for computer-assisted instruction.

The conclusion is inescapable that before computer-assisted instruction can succeed, special materials must be created for it. But if these materials are to be denied the protection of copyright, who will spend the time and money required to produce them? The demand that has been made for unpaid, free input, manipulation, and display of copyrighted materials for closed-circuit transmission would forestall the creators of the very materials that are needed to make computers the great tool they can become in the future of American education.

To summarize the publishers' position briefly: the use of copyrighted materials in computers for scholarship, library interchange, and instruction is minimal at this moment. The requirements for such use in the future are still speculative. The demand for exemption from copyright for computer use is predicated upon speculative and prospective needs. I must emphasize that furthermore, it assumes that contrary to all previous experience, publishers would not be willing to deal with customers. It seeks regulatory legislation for something that barely exists. The normal pattern of legislation in this country is to provide rules of action in situations where private parties have failed to come to agreement and the interests of society are jeopardized by this failure.

At the moment, there is no practical collision of interests between copyright proprietor and computer users. The means of conference

and private negotiation have not been exhausted. They have barely been tried. Publishers are currently working out modes of action with the Office of Education.

We hope that this will be a prototype for negotiations with any and all others who seek to use copyrighted material.

We believe that this method of negotiation will produce required computer access to copyrighted materials at reasonable fees for all

users.

S. 597 makes no reference to computers, but the committee report which accompanied H.R. 4347 made specific applications of the language of the bill to computer usage. The report specifically recommended that the Register of Copyrights bring together in conferences the parties of interest in this usage after passage of the bill to work out their problems with a view to further legislation if that should prove

necessary.

Book publishers are prepared to go further. They would endorse provision in the bill or in your committee report for a study panel required to report within a fixed period of time to the proper committees of the Congress on the state of the computer art then prevailing, the needs for use of copyrighted materials and what legislation, if any, is needed. The requirements of computer usage are at present so little known that legislation now could be only a stab in the dark. But the art of computer use is growing so rapidly that a continuing study is essential.

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the opportunity of appearing here to present the point of view of the American Textbook Publishers Institute.

Senator BURDICK. Thank you, Counsel.

Am I correct in believing that the language in the House bill will be sufficient for the time?

Mrs. LINDEN. Yes, Senator Burdick, because at this time the House bill merely reiterates the concept of copyright and private proprietary rights in the framework of information storage and retrieval, and the pieces of hardware known as computers are not specifically referred to, nor should they be, just as the first copyright bill did not refer to movable type as such.

Senator BURDICK. Then you agree with the House bill?

Mrs. LINDEN. I do.

Senator BURDICK. And it is your thesis that it might be prematureto legislate further at this time?

Mrs. LINDEN. Yes, it is, because legislation usually is undertaken after mankind has had experience in a certain field and problems have arisen which require regulation and policing. We do not know quite yet what will be commercially feasible and what material will be used and the best manner in which it will be used. We can hardly regulate and police what we are not yet certain of.

In other words, we all agree, and this is more than merely an amorphous feeling, that computer technology is real, it exists, and is extremely useful and fascinating and worthwhile. The question as to how soon various uses will be made have not yet been answered. As recently as last week I spoke to representatives, executives of two of our major computer manufacturers. I used this analogy, and if you will bear with me, I would like to use it again. I have used it actually

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twice before, not only with them. I said, "Look, let us say we own a restaurant. Our catalog of copyrighted material is our menu. You come in, you are a computer user and manufacturer, or both. We are the restaurant owner and you want to eat. We say, 'Sure, we have a restaurant, here is our menu.' We say, 'What do you want to eat?'" Well, he does not know yet. Until he knows what he wants to eat, until he tells us what he is ready to pay for, how much he is willing to spend on eating, we can respond only very piously that we believe that it is a matter of public policy that all men who are hungry ought to be allowed to eat and that all restaurants ought to be available to feed them. But we cannot feed them until we know what they want. There can be no breakdown in our relationship until they tell us what they want and until and unless we refuse to supply the demand.

In other words, it is premature for either side to be accusatory or to predict the failure either of negotiations or of responsibility in their relationship. It is something that is in the offing and it will have to be handled.

I believe that just as in our society, in our economy, we have been resourceful enough to adapt to new technology in the marketplace, we will adapt to these pieces of hardware also; that after a study based on actual experience is in the hands of your committee, you would then be able to evaluate whether legislation or governmental interference of any kind is necessary, or whether abrasions of the marketplace have functioned appropriately again in our society.

Senator BURDICK I am somewhat impressed with your statement here that you are willing to continue the discussion with the people who might be using your materials after this bill becomes law

Mrs. LINDEN. Well, Senator Burdick, these are not mere pious statements. They are not even altruistic. They are practical. These people are our only customers. We deal with the educational community. They are the ones we sell our textbooks to; they are the ones who buy our reference books. It is not as though one morning in 1975 or 1980 the book printing business will stop entirely. There will be a new product line, computer input, but we will still be dealing with the same customers.

The likelihood of our refusing to deal with them is very, very remote indeed. I do think that historically authors and publishers have shown suficient responsibility, with the pressure and push of the economic marketplace, so that schools have gotten books. Every now and then there is a breakdown in the problem and there is a slight collision, and there is in every industry. But somwhow, they wear each other down and it works out.

I urge, certainly that at this juncture there has not been such a crisis, a breakdown in the needs of society to get copyrighted material that requires active legislation. In fact, I urge to the contrary, that it would be dangerous. It would fix positions, jell in the law, something that the law is not ready for, that society and the educational community and publishers and authors cannot take a stand on. They will all go out on a limb, no matter what we all say we want at this

moment. We cannot be sure.

Senator BURDICK. Senator McClellan?

Senator MCCLELLAN. I wish to compliment the lady for her presentation. I think it is very informative.

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