Feist and facts: if data is protected will it be more or less available?

If a law such as HR 3261, the suggested new USA law which would protect database owners from. anyone, who "makes available in commerce" a "quantitatively substantial" part of the information in a database, were passed, it would discourage Web sites that provide free white pages listings and similar services. The law probably would not be that significant overall, given that many databases are already protected by contracts or other mechanisms. Without a better demonstration of a need, however, it seems pointless to introduce new laws into an area that already suffers from complex litigation of other kinds.