When Capitol Hill doles out cash favors to Congresscritters' favorite contributors, it's called 'pork.' This isn't precisely that, but it's certainly an interesting look at how laws are constructed to protect certain special interests as well as advancing certain moral agendas.

In this case, the law is the "Piracy Deterrence and Education Act of 2004." In the main, the purpose of the law is to make it a crime to take a camcorder into a theater, film the screen, and then post that to the nets. So far so good.

However, there's some special language in there protecting a company called ClearPlay. These folks make a device that turns Hollywood films into more "family friendly" fare by editing out scenes that ClearPlay finds too risque'. Essentially it's post-release editing, and Hollywood wasn't happy about it. In fact, ClearPlay has been on the receiving end of at least one Cartel lawsuit.

At the same time that Congress has taken steps to protect nookie-nukers it is also attempting to outlaw commercial-skipping features such as those found in TiVo players. That company's lawyers are attempting to work with the compromise committee now - the Senate passed a version of the bill that sticks more closely to the original intent, without the pork provisions.