As Copyright Gets a Starring Role, We're Cast as the Villains

• Many electronic books published with Microsoft's software cannot be lent, resold or even printed.

• The ultra-high-fidelity Super Audio Compact Disc format cannot be played on a computer, let alone copied.

• The Pressplay online music service lets you listen to music you've downloaded only while your subscription is paid up. Let it expire, and your tunes do as well.

If you want to retain the freedom to use things that you own, you should reject this trend. What can you do?

First, don't buy products that take away your traditional rights. Don't buy copy-protected CDs. Don't buy a digital television or a personal video recorder unless its manufacturer promises to give your money back if Hollywood makes it obsolete.

Then pick up a pen and write to your representatives in Congress. Tell them that government-mandated copy protection is a nutty idea.

If Congress cares to protect citizens before corporations, it should first enact the "Consumer Technology Bill of Rights" outlined by DigitalConsumer.org, a new lobby formed to stop the Hollings bill. This codifies the common-sense flexibility we've come to expect from movies and music that we own.

The companies backing the Hollings bill need to realize the depth of the anger they have stirred up by assuming that all customers are thieves. Without these people's dollars, the entertainment industry is doomed.

Just ask Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Association of America. "Without the consumer, we're dead," he said in a phone interview Wednesday. "We don't have a future."

If the copyright lobby continues this arrogant pursuit of security at all costs, Valenti and his ilk are going to find out how true that statement is.

Living with technology, or trying to? E-mail Rob Pegoraro at rob@twp.com.