Sen. Orrin Hatch's Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act of 2004, formerly the INDUCE Act, has been put into THOMAS, Congress' database of legislation. The bill is actually very short, so here is the text of it:

To amend chapter 5 of title 17, United States Code, relating to inducement of copyright infringement, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the 'Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act of 2004'.

SEC. 2. INTENTIONAL INDUCEMENT OF COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT.

Section 501 of title 17, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following:

'(g)(1) In this subsection, the term `intentionally induces' means intentionally aids, abets, induces, or procures, and intent may be shown by acts from which a reasonable person would find intent to induce infringement based upon all relevant information about such acts then reasonably available to the actor, including whether the activity relies on infringement for its commercial viability.

'(2) Whoever intentionally induces any violation identified in subsection (a) shall be liable as an infringer.

'(3) Nothing in this subsection shall enlarge or diminish the doctrines of vicarious and contributory liability for copyright infringement or require any court to unjustly withhold or impose any secondary liability for copyright infringement.'.

As many news outlets have reported (Wired News, ZDNet), the bill makes anyone who "induces" any copyright violation liable in such a violation. When Hatch introduced the bill on the Senate floor last week, he offered an eight-page rationale (PDF), insisting that it is the makers of file-sharing software who encourage "children" to break the law! While Hatch uses the word "children" throughout his introduction, he sort of defines "children" to mean "children and college students": "These programs are used mostly by children and college students -- about half of their users are children." Is Hatch attempting to confuse congressmen and voters, implying that file-sharers "corrupt and exploit the innocence of children" by tempting them with file-sharing software? Does he mean college students or does he mean ten-year-old girls with frilly pink bows on their dresses? Clearly, he wants us to believe the latter, while the former is actually true.

According to a Pew Internet & American Life Survey conducted in 2003, "29% of Internet users have 'downloaded music files to their computer so they can play them any time they want,' and about 4 percent of Internet users do so on an average day." Additionally, the demographic group that does most of the downloading (in the Pew survey, downloading and sharing were analyzed separately) is hardly "innocent": "more than half of all Internet users between the ages of 18 and 29 have ever downloaded music and almost 10% of those in that age group are online downloading music on any given day." The survey also concludes that "students are also more likely to be music downloaders than nonstudents. Fifty-six percent of full-time students and 40% of part-time students report downloading music files to their computer. Only a quarter of non-students report downloading files."

People who provide files for downloading (sharing) have similar demographic profiles: "Not surprisingly, [file-sharers] are more likely to be younger, with 31% of the youngest adults aged 18 to 29 sharing files" and "[m]ore than a third (35%) of fulltime students and 28% of part-time students share files, while 18% of non-students report the same behavior."

"The children" is a trope being used to pass this bill.