Editors Side Bar:
The following letter and 54 signatories represent an awe-inspiring testimonial to the dedication and hard work of a remarkable group, the Digital Future Coalition, under the direction of Skip Lockwood. Dr. Negroponte observed, "The digital revolution is over. We now live in a digital civilization." Those of us who are involved in education, (and truly, who is not), need to take part in the process by which this new civilization will function. We need to cohesively and clearly provide support to development of optimal teaching/learning environments. Here is the letter drafted by Mr. Lockwood and digitally distributed Œfar and wide¹ to focus on an issue of great import to education. The success accorded to his efforts is documented in the impressive list of signatories.

Dear Representative,

With floor action on "database" legislation likely, we write to urge you to support H.R. 1858, the Consumer and Investor Access to Information Act. We believe it strikes the appropriate balance between the interests of Information consumers and database owners. This bipartisan bill will preserve value-added downstream uses of information and protect the interests of consumers, educators, small businesses, scientists, and the high-tech community, while providing database producers with additional legal tools to protect their databases.

We fully appreciate the efforts to provide relief through the adoption of H.R. 354, the Collections of Information Antipiracy Act. We are concerned, however, that the measure could have unintended consequences that would hurt consumers, educators, small businesses, scientists, and the high-tech community.

For example, H.R.354 includes a broad prohibition on the use of facts and then relies on narrow exceptions to deal with issues such as fair use and value-added publications. In our view, the exceptions in H.R. 354 are too vaguely worded and will require extensive judicial interpretation to clarify. Moreover, we are concerned that H.R. 354 could lead to permanent monopoly control over downstream uses of certain information.

When database legislation reaches the floor, we believe you will better promote the interests of information consumers and the businesses driving our economy by supporting H.R. 1858 instead of H.R. 354. We therefore urge you to vote for H.R. 1858.

Respectfully,