The following is a Special Report prepared for submission to the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) for distribution to it membership. The Report covers one of the fastest growing crime epidemics ever to sweep through our economy – Internet Piracy and copyright infringement of digital content. These crimes cost the U.S. economy billions of dollars in lost revenues, taxes, and wages each year, are expanding exponentially, and threaten to totally eliminate thousands of small software publishers, musicians, songwriters, artists, writers, and other creative content developers within the first few years of the new millennium. The Report uses three real life case studies (one currently in litigation) to help illustrate the enormous magnitude of this problem, to expose the identity and size of some the largest “white collar” infringement networks in the world, to highlight deficiencies in our current copyright laws, and to emphasize the sense of urgency needed to quickly find more workable solutions to these problems.

The Report was prepared in July 2000 for presentation to selected members of Congress, the U.S. Justice Department, the United States Copyright Office, and business executives from various U.S.-based copyright industries, including music, software, motion pictures, video, print publications, and television. The Report was authored by George P. Riddick, III, Chairman of U.S. Copyrights.com, LLC, and President/CEO of graphics software developer Imageline, Inc, of Ashland, Virginia. Mr. Riddick can be reached by e-mail at griddick@imagelineselects.com, by telephone at (804) 264-0731, or by private facsimile at (804) 264-0732.   - back to top -

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