(Associated Press via NewsEdge) Mobile phone owners in the US will be allowed to break software locks on their handsets in order to use them with competing carriers under new copyright rules approved by the US Library of Congress.
Other copyright exemptions announced will let film professors copy snippets from DVDs for educational compilations and let blind people use special software to read copy-protected electronic books.
All told, Librarian of Congress James H. Billington approved six exemptions, the most his Copyright Office has ever granted. For the first time, the office exempted groups of users. Previously, Billington took an all-or-nothing approach, making exemptions difficult to justify.
But von Lohmann said he was disappointed the Copyright Office rejected a number of exemptions that could have benefited consumers, including one that would have let owners of DVDs legally copy movies for use on Apple's iPod and other portable players.
The new rules will expire in three years.
In granting the exemption for cell phone users, the Copyright Office determined that consumers are not able to enjoy full legal use of their handsets because of software locks that wireless providers have been placing to control access to phones' underlying programs.
Providers of prepaid phone services, in particular, have been trying to stop entrepreneurs from buying subsidized handsets to resell at a profit. But even customers of regular plans generally cannot bring their phones to another carrier, even after their contracts run out.
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