Illegal Streaming

As is often the case when it comes to massive legislation spanning thousands of pages of text, lawmakers attached some unrelated line items to the latest COVID-19 relief package. Chief among them, as The Hollywood Reporter points out, is a provision that makes illegal streaming a felony. Introduced by North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis earlier this month, the “Felony Streaming” copyright proposal attaches felony penalties to commercial platforms which are dedicated exclusively to streaming unlicensed works. If found guilty of such actions, operators of these platforms could face up to 10 years in prison. Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar proposed similar legislation nearly a decade ago, but the bill was met with blowback as it left open the possibility for content creators — such a...