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Carnage4Life is a nancyboy queer faggot of the worst kind.

If disney wants to discuss IP, they'd better take a look at This site.

Basically, Disney ripped their latest fiasco, Lost city of Atlantis, straight from Nadia, queen of the see, a terriffic anime job.

And they say they had never heard of Nadia... Take a look and see what you think.

~z

Well, why not? Government by a cartoon mouse seems to be working well enough for the patent office. =P

gnarf all your base are belong to usfoo as bar and. nar. you have no chance to survive

I don't think we need worry about abuse. For real abuse (read spam) we'll use a mixture of restricted access - like WEP keys and a "locals only" policy for associating - and for bogeyman abuse (read kiddie pr0n) if it really bothers you home in on the signal coming off their card. Anyway, such people rarely have the technical skill to conceal their activities, and tend to get caught. It isn't anything we need to worry about. I am more worried about getting disassociated from the basestation all the time.

Of course, don't forget to read Ballmer's emails! Here you will discover how truly difficult it is to decide what to do on the weekends... have a pizza party? A fash party? Go to the mall with all of your friends? Have a sleepover and call boys on the phone?

In short, if you haven't checked out Ballmer's site, you don't know what you're missing!

Of course if NASA was really smart, they'd talk to people who've already done this stuff, and simply license their tried and true technology...

Assuming I were to live forever, why should I want to?

Every 20 years, DisneyCo lobbies the world's major powers for yet another 20-year retroactive extension on its monopolies under copyright law. Assuming you live longer than DisneyCo, you'll finally get to see copyrights expire into the public domain.

Anyway, on to my question:

Say I'm buying rings for aging patients in the hospital. Would you guarantee that they wouldn't die in the next 90 days with the rings on? Would you guarantee that you'd have enough money in the bank to cover all the refund checks?

I admit it was kind of underhanded, but the request for a link to a picture just seemed too tempting to resist. For reasons that should be obvious, I didn't feel like checking to see whether the link worked. I was hoping very much that it was too ridiculous to be real. In case you missed the joke try goatse.cx.

Most of the power in an H-bomb IS due to fusion

Wrong. Check out the Federation of American Scientists, who have a remarkably accurate FAQ on the matter. Check out this link for details.

Or, for those who are goatse.cx averse, I'll just reprint a snippet of the FAQ here: The 5 Mt Redwing Tewa test (20 July 1956 GMT, Bikini Atoll) had a fission fraction of 85%.

The next claim of yours--namely, "It is naive of anyone to believe that nuclear weapons design is common knowledge"--is just as absurd. The principles behind nuclear-weapons design are straightforward and are taught in college classrooms to undergraduates. In the height of the cold war, nuclear-weapons design was published in the open literature. One physicist might write a paper detailing the particular physical properties of compounds exposed to extremely high radiation flux and whatnot, comparable to those found in the heart of a star--a perfectly acceptable scientific article, but when you say "heart of a star" I hear "in a nuclear weapon undergoing supercriticality".

The Manhattan Project was chaired by General Leslie Groves of the Army Air Corps/USAF, but all the principals involved were scientists. Have you ever tried to get a scientist to keep something a secret? They can't. They're genetically incapable of secrecy. It's right there in their DNA sequence, somewhere in that giant double-helix, that says, "if it's cool and it furthers our understanding of the cosmos, I've GOT to tell people about it!"

As far back as the early 1980s, the magazine The Progressive was sued by the United States Government to prevent them from publishing extremely detailed specifications and schematics of nuclear weapons. The DOE only withdrew the lawsuit after it became clear that to get an injunction against The Progressive, they'd have to declassify even more documents and put even more weapons-design material into the public record.

In the Manhattan Project days, it was VERY difficult to obtain large amount (mere pounds) of weapons grade U-235 and plutonium.

No it wasn't. Uranium is a very common element. You can refine it out of granite, for crying out loud. The difficulty has never been in getting fast-fissile material; the difficulty has been in separating it out. Yes, centrifuging it all out is tremendously power-intensive, but if you want the bang, you gotta pay the buck.

The main reason most nations cannot produce nuclear weapons (specifically hydrogen-based nuclear weapons) is because they don't know how to arrange the materials

Nope. The engineering behind it is well-known. The difficulty comes in getting refined fissile material--world governments keep an excruciatingly close eye on stockpiles of refined fissile material (save in the former USSR, which is why it's a source of such concern to arms-proliferation wonks), and building facilities to refine raw material into enriched fissile material is considered extremely destabilizing to regional peace, and as such, is strongly discouraged.

ie. is it goatsex that is leading the way?
Or is it plain Jane erotica?
Or do people simply not care as long as it's free?

That's the kind of metrics I care about. Maybe we could loosen the religious right's hold on America if we could show that, indeed, most people in this country are depraved lunatics. After all we are a D E M O C R A C Y right?

Steven

Summary of the article:
Getting a limited view of the world and forming your opinions on that view is wrong.
People should be obligated to get a broader view of the world to form valid opinions.
"... Should sites really be forced by law to carry view points that are abhorrent to them, to mimic the press's deadly habit of balancing every single point of view with an opposite one, creating eternal arguments and stalemates that turn civic discussions into WWF matches?"
^-- By this argument shouldn't content blocking sites be obligated to have goatse.cx links?

Damn. I've been watching too many Disney flicks with my kids:

I'm not worried

It's not like I'm living under the sea.

It's the circle of life.

Be our guest.

It's a small world after all.

Coincidence? Or Vast Media Conspiracy?

besides all the theorical issues (free will, free speech) there are a couple of practical issues that I'd like to point out. It seems to me that we have to adapt rist our ideas to what is doable, instead of trying to adapt reality to our phylosophy.
first: computer generated graphics is going to be not distinguishable (by the typical perv-end-user who trolls online), so it will be hard to prove that one downloaded *real* child porn intentionally
second: generating child porn will at least 'start' from "real" images: or are all pornographist so good in CG that they won't even need a start point and will create a child image from scratch? third: what is the problem here, pornography as a concept or child abuse as a real fact? if the problem is pornography we could argue that it's just a form of expression. Sick, whatever you think. But still a form of expression for lonely people. If the problem is child abuse there's no issue here.
fourth: you are discussing this point under an US point of view. What if virtual child pr0n will be declared illegal in the us but legal in another country. Are you americans going to bomb them? Or even worse, to sue them? :)
fifth: In my opinion, a children who grows up in an "all-smiley-and-light" environment will be much more shocked when he/she'll face reality.

While it looks like this will eventually be a good place to look for stuff, it's failed several tests so far, and jumbled all but one.

A search for "sancho games" failed to bring up Sancho Games
A search for "White Wolf" (... productions, ... games, white wolf by its self) failed to bring up White Wolf
A search for "Disney" brought up Disney-MGM (not quite their home page, but close) as the 677th result, but never actually turned up www.disney.com
Searching for "Slashdot" failed to turn up Slashdot, though it nabbed a bunch of knockoffs and generic linux info.

I could understand a search for microsoft not turning up anything, on the basis that Microsoft isn't family-friendly, but of 3096 hits, doesn't Microsoft (for any reason, good, bad, *or* ugly) deserve at very least to be in the top 25%?

Success!: A search for "In Nomine" brought up Steve Jackson Games, as did a search for "Steve Jackson" but "sjgames" got me bupkis.

A search for "Milton Bradley" came up with AXIS & ALLIES - Games from Hasbro Interactive and Hasbro as the first hit. To be fair, the second search result that comes in when I search for "Hasbro" is a game by Milton Bradley. While equitable, I'm not sure this is what people are looking for...


While I commend you guys on the effort, and several years of dedicated work, it's got at least a few more years' worth of work to go before it starts getting usable for everyday searching.

To combat this, many 'fake' pictures of the ladies are being added to these 'engines's databases. These 'trojan horse' images feature the same women, however they are fully clothed, and contain advertising links to their homepage.

"This is a just a way for us to combat the theft of our hard work" Wippin' Wendy of HardCoreXXX had to say. "This just helps bring back our real customers."

No-one from any of the engines was avalable to comment.

Sorry 'bout the broken links shoulda checked them.

here's ones that work:

Walt Disney Company

Sony Pictures Entertainment, Inc.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc.

Paramount Pictures Corporation

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp.

Universal Studios, Inc.

Warner Bros.

Those at least work, not sure how helpful they are ;) (particularly since about 50% don't load uless you have Javascript enabled :()

Well, there you have it, a simple way to get to DeCSS from MPAA and Buena Vista (AKA:Disney). Have fun and remember that stealing isn't right, but neither is stopping free speach by threatening lawsuits.

Mage...

Prepare to witness the most concerted and massive engineering effort -- both social and technical -- ever undertaken by mankind: The digital equivalent of damming the ocean.

I wrote about this on Slashdot almost a year ago, in the vague hope it might become a featured article: The music and movie industies are working very hard to prevent you from using your lawfully-obtained material in any way they don't want. To that end, they have formed the Copy Protection Technical Working Group (CPTWG), which is working hand-in-hand with a ton of high-tech companies to bring pervasive copy protection measures to your PC.

I saved my original screed on the subject, and it's reproduced below, with appropriate updates. Bottom Line: Do not let them sneak this garbage past you or your friends. If you find that a product contains copy protection, don't buy it, and encourage others to do likewise.

____________________

Recent stories on Slashdot have told of the ongoing "tennis match" between digital content providers versus consumers and technically skilled people. The recent cracking of DVD's Content Scrambling System (CSS) lent ammunition to the opinion held by computing professionals and users that copy protection systems are doomed to fail. The effort has been likened to building a dam against the ocean; a foolish and useless exercise. In Slashdot discussion fora, the point has often been raised, "If you can perceive it, you can copy it. What are they going to do, encrypt the bits all the way to the speaker/electron gun?" If the Copy Protection Technical Working Group gets its way, that is precisely what's going to happen.

I received a piece of email spam today, which actually turned out to be useful (probably the only time that's ever happened anywhere). It directed me to a flat panel display industry group. Among others, one of the links pointed to the California Display Network, which had a link pointing to technical info on flat panel technology. Since I currently earn my living writing graphics card and display drivers, I clicked through to see what I could learn.

I found an entry for an overview of digital visual interfaces, provided by Silicon Image. As I reviewed the headings of the slides, one entry stopped me cold: Conten t Protection Status. Content protection? In a flat panel?? Yup: "Implementation of DVI content protection is suitable for PCs and monitors." [emphasis mine]

Thus began an evening of link clicking and Google searches to find out what this off-handed remark could mean. The slide made mention of the 'CPTWG'. This is the Copy Protection Technical Working Group, a consortium of content providers (movie companies), consumer electronics manufacturers, and players in the IT industry. This is the same group that developed CSS for DVD players.

One paragraph from the above page is particularly disturbing:

CPTWG has focused until now only on "casual piracy [sic]", characterized as what a grandmother can do in her home with her DVD. Piracy [sic] requiring even the level of expertise (and equipment) of her grandson, who might be an EE student, has been excluded from consideration. There is a growing awareness that a broader content protection effort may be necessary.

The most recent meeting of the CPTWG was yesterday, 8 December, 1999. Their meeting announcements may be found here. It costs $100 to attend. According to the site, their last meeting was on 11 April 2000. It's not clear if additional meetings have been held at regular intervals.

The attendance roster from the April meeting (RTF file) lists a very interesting, and possibly worrying, mix of organizations. A partial list of representatives included:

• MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America),
• AFMA (American Film Marketing Association),
• Sony Pictures Entertainment,
• Universal Studios,
• Warner Bros.,
• Disney,
• Paramount,
• CEMA (Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association),
• MEI (parent company to Panasonic), makers of consumer electronics,
• Pioneer, makers of consumer electronics,
• JVC, makers of consumer electronics,
• Philips, makers of consumer electronics and VLSI components (including video encoders),
• Sony, makers of consumer electronics, computers, and displays,
• Toshiba, makers of consumer electronics, computers, flat panels, disk drives, digital cameras, copiers, and laser printers,
• NEC, makers of computers, displays, printers, and telecomm equipment,
• Hewlett Packard, makers of computers, printers, and testing/measuring equipment (oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, etc.),
• Quantum, makers of disk drives,
• IBM, makers of computers, disk drives, and bunches of other stuff,
• Compaq, makers of computers,
• Apple Computer, makers of computers,
• ATI Technologies, makers of PC graphics cards,
• Dolby Labs, creators and licensors of audio enhancement technologies,
• Intel, makers of microprocessors, motherboard controllers, and graphics and peripheral chips,
• Microsoft, software market monopolists,
• Dow Chemical (I have no idea why they're here),
• DVD-CCA, licensors of CSS, and currently in court trying to prevent the spread of DeCSS,
• A number of law firms.

If you download the roster and read closely, you'll see every major piece of your computer represented. There is no doubt that at least one part of your computer -- your CPU, your RAM, your disk drive, your graphics card, your monitor -- is manufactured by one of these companies.

If you look further still, you'll see there are no consumer advocacy groups listed.

What are they all working toward? Quite simply, to prevent you from using your lawfully obtained digital material in any way they don't want.

Here's one example of how they'll do it: If you've visited Fry's or CompUSA recently, you'll notice that full-size flat panel displays are starting to appear. Currently, most of these displays are based on the old VGA analog signals, which are converted into the digital signals needed by the panels. The Digital Display Working Group is working on a new connector and signalling standard called Digital Visual Interface (DVI) that will allow computer displays to go all-digital. You won't need a DAC on the video card; the digital signals will be fed straight through to the display. Image fidelity will be much higher, since there won't be any intervening DAC/ADC conversions. Version 1.0 of the standard has been published and is available for download (PDF format). The DVI spec currently does not stipulate copy protection measures. However, plans are in the works to incorporate it.

Intel is one of the primary contributors to this effort. On Intel's developer site, they have some papers on copy protection for IEEE 1394 (Firewire) digital streams. In two separate articles, 1394-based Digital Content Protection: an Intel Proposal, and Content Protection for IEEE 1394 Serial Buses (the latter being a Powerpoint presentation masquerading as a PDF file), Intel outlines its proposal for protecting digital content over Firewire. By using cryptographic authentication techniques, a device offering digital content will "handshake" with other devices on the bus to assure that digital data is only received by, "compliant devices." In a revised overview of the proposal, IDF Talk: Content Protection for the IEEE 1394 Bus, Intel offers concrete implementation details, including:

• DSS (Digital Signature Standard)
• Diffie-Hellman key exchange for device authentication,
• Blowfish cipher for content encryption, with a keylength of 32-128 bits,
• Digital watermarking techniques to declare "rights" (right to playback, right to copy, etc.) to the receiving device.

The full proposal (currently version 0.91), with lots of technical detail, is mirrored on CPTWG's site (the links to Intel's site don't work).

Intel's proposal also recommends that the copy protection system be field-upgradeable to thwart ongoing attacks, and that it should be possible to revoke (read: disable) a device determined to be "compromised." (The tone of the proposals is also interesting. It's previously been thought that, because of USB, Intel is hostile to IEEE 1394. Yet these proposals suggest that Intel's quite enthusiastic about 1394... Once copy protection is incorporated.)

Intel's proposal mentions only IEEE 1394. However, it also mentions that there's nothing preventing the technique being applied generally to any bi-directional link. So for all occurrences of '1394', substitute 'DVI', and you've got an idea of what to look forward to in your new digital monitor. And your new DVD player. And your new HDTV set. And your new USB speakers.

Intel goes even further in their paper, A Framework for DVD-Audio Content Protection. In it, the author suggests that DVD-Audio recorders permanently remember the IRSC (International Standard Recording Code) of every song the device is asked to copy, so that it may only be copied once, period. They go on to suggest that the recorder could have a modem built-in to authorize (read: purchase) the ability to make additional copies.

In short, through this industry consortium, Hollywood proposes to exert control over every link in the digital chain, from the digital camera, to the disk drive, to the CPU, to the graphics card, to your display. They will decide what rights you have. Even if a court decides Fair Use includes multiple copies for personal use (such as assembling a video montage), it won't matter. Your computer will still refuse to make the copies (and probably fink on you, as well).

This coordinated effort is ostensibly to combat unsanctioned copying (which the industry chronically refers to incorrectly as 'theft' and 'piracy'). However, no one has ever been able to provably quantify the value of unrealized sales due to such copying. All dollar estimates that have been published are just that: estimates, based on idealized extrapolations of what-if scenarios. Moreover, although the industry claims to "lose" billions every year, they continue to post record profits. Finally, despite the proliferation of CDR drives and the Internet, most unrealized sales are the result of organized mass counterfeiting rings, not casual copying. None of the proposed methods I've seen appear to thwart mass counterfeiting at all. So clearly there's some other reason for all this.

The thing that puzzles me most is why the computer and consumer electronics industries haven't told Hollywood to take a hike. Intel's copy protection proposals state, in bold letters, "No content protection = No Hollywood content." This belief is taken as axiomatic by all the players, and appears to be the driving force behind the entire effort. This belief is also false.

Audio on CDs are recorded as plaintext, and the music industry continues to earn rapacious profits. Even the with the advent of CDRs, no music industry executive in his right mind would suggest dropping CD sales and going strictly with cassettes and vinyl. If nothing else, the manufacturing costs for CDs are lower than those for cassettes and vinyl. Likewise, DVDs are tremendously cheaper to produce than videotapes. Videotape duplication is a labor-intensive process; DVDs can be stamped out automatically. The savings in cost-of-goods alone would more than balance against any unrealized sales from casual copying. Corporate shareholders, always mindful of the bottom line, will also demand that the studios move to the cheaper, higher-quality process, copy protected or not.

The fact is that the computer and electronics firms are in the driver's seat, and are free to dictate how the new digital formats will work. Hollywood will use whatever format becomes popular, whether it has copy protection or not. They may grumble about it, but they'll use it. The economics afford them little choice.

We are only now beginning to explore the social and ethical consequences of a Star Trek-like universe where everything can be infinitely duplcated at zero cost. We have no idea where things will end up. But now is not the time to start erecting electronic walls and imposing artificial scarcity. The ignoble and richly-deserved death of DIVX showed -- fairly unequivocally, I thought -- that consumers want to make free, fair use of their digital media, without interference from outside. I believe its death reinforces the future toward which we've been pushing for centuries: Increased abundance at reduced cost. We can only hope that the lesson of DIVX will be repeated until it is learned.

Schwab

I realized that something were fundamentally wrong with copyright laws when I realized that Disney owns the right to Winnie-the-Pooh. In my mind, Disney has no moral right whatsoever to make any profits from the ongoing abuse of the Winnie-the-Pooh character, in fact, what Disney is doing to the character, I find mostly highly immoral.

I think their service sucks. I can see how their service is really innovative, but its just not cool. I think I would be really pissed if links magically appeared in all of my usenet posts, especially to products that I do not endorse.

The real solution is the reponsibility of the web browser designers--pages that have refresh meta tags should not be part of the browser's history, unless user-enabled.

The GO family of sites appear to be implement this properly. Try www.disney.com for example.

I submitted this to Slashdot's Your Rights Online section some weeks ago, but it was rejected. I think the article is pertinent here.

Recent stories on Slashdot have told of the ongoing "tennis match" between digital content providers versus consumers and technically skilled people. The recent cracking of DVD's Content Scrambling System (CSS) lent ammunition to the opinion held by computing professionals and users that copy protection systems are doomed to fail. The effort has been likened to building a dam against the ocean; a foolish and useless exercise. In Slashdot discussion fora, the point has often been raised, "If you can perceive it, you can copy it. What are they going to do, encrypt the bits all the way to the speaker/electron gun?" If the Copy Protection Technical Working Group gets its way, that is precisely what's going to happen.

I received a piece of email spam today, which actually turned out to be useful (probably the only time that's ever happened anywhere). It directed me to a flat panel display industry group. Among others, one of the links pointed to the California Display Network, which had a link pointing to technical info on flat panel technology. Since I currently earn my living writing graphics card and display drivers, I clicked through to see what I could learn.

I found an entry for an overview of digital visual interfaces, provided by Silicon Image. As I reviewed the headings of the slides, one entry stopped me cold: Conten t Protection Status. Content protection? In a flat panel?? Yup: "Implementation of DVI content protection is suitable for PCs and monitors." [emphasis mine]

Thus began an evening of link clicking and Google searches to find out what this off-handed remark could mean. The slide made mention of the 'CPTWG'. This is the Copy Protection Technical Working Group, a consortium of content providers (movie companies), consumer electronics manufacturers, and players in the IT industry. This is the same group that developed CSS for DVD players.

One paragraph from the above page is particularly disturbing:

CPTWG has focused until now only on "casual piracy [sic]", characterized as what a grandmother can do in her home with her DVD. Piracy [sic] requiring even the level of expertise (and equipment) of her grandson, who might be an EE student, has been excluded from consideration. There is a growing awareness that a broader content protection effort may be necessary.

The most recent meeting of the CPTWG was yesterday, 8 December, 1999. Their meeting announcements may be found here. According to the December meeting announcement, the next meetings will occur on 11 January, 2000, and 9 February, 2000. It costs $100 to attend.

The attendance roster from the November meeting (PDF file, sorry) lists a very interesting, and possibly worrying, mix of organizations. A partial list of representatives included:

• MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America),
• AFMA (American Film Marketing Association),
• Sony Pictures Entertainment,
• Universal Studios,
• Warner Bros.,
• Disney,
• Paramount,
• CEMA (Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association),
• MEI (parent company to Panasonic), makers of consumer electronics,
• Pioneer, makers of consumer electronics,
• JVC, makers of consumer electronics,
• Philips, makers of consumer electronics and VLSI components (including video encoders),
• Sony, makers of consumer electronics, computers, and displays,
• Toshiba, makers of consumer electronics, computers, flat panels, disk drives, digital cameras, copiers, and laser printers,
• NEC, makers of computers, displays, printers, and telecomm equipment,
• Hewlett Packard, makers of computers, printers, and testing/measuring equipment (oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, etc.),
• Quantum, makers of disk drives,
• IBM, makers of computers, disk drives, and bunches of other stuff,
• Compaq, makers of computers,
• Apple Computer, makers of computers,
• ATI Technologies, makers of PC graphics cards,
• Dolby Labs, creators and licensors of audio enhancement technologies,
• Intel, makers of microprocessors, motherboard controllers, and graphics and peripheral chips,
• Microsoft, software market monopolists,
• Dow Chemical (I have no idea why they're here),
• A number of law firms.

If you download the roster and read closely, you'll see every major piece of your computer represented. There is no doubt that at least one part of your computer -- your CPU, your RAM, your disk drive, your graphics card, your monitor -- is manufactured by one of these companies.

If you look further still, you'll see there are no consumer advocacy groups listed.

What are they all working toward? Quite simply, to prevent you from using your lawfully obtained digital material in any way they don't want.

Here's one example of how they'll do it: If you've visited Fry's or CompUSA recently, you'll notice that full-size flat panel displays are starting to appear. Currently, most of these displays are based on the old VGA analog signals, which are converted into the digital signals needed by the panels. The Digital Display Working Group is working on a new connector and signalling standard called Digital Visual Interface (DVI) that will allow computer displays to go all-digital. You won't need a DAC on the video card; the digital signals will be fed straight through to the display. Image fidelity will be much higher, since there won't be any intervening DAC/ADC conversions. Version 1.0 of the standard has been published and is available for download (PDF format). The DVI spec currently does not stipulate copy protection measures. However, plans are in the works to incorporate it.

Intel is one of the primary contributors to this effort. On Intel's developer site, they have some papers on copy protection for IEEE 1394 (Firewire) digital streams. In two separate articles, 1394-based Digital Content Protection: an Intel Proposal, and Content Protection for IEEE 1394 Serial Buses (the latter being a Powerpoint presentation masquerading as a PDF file), Intel outlines its proposal for protecting digital content over Firewire. By using cryptographic authentication techniques, a device offering digital content will "handshake" with other devices on the bus to assure that digital data is only received by, "compliant devices." In a revised overview of the proposal, IDF Talk: Content Protection for the IEEE 1394 Bus, Intel offers concrete implementation details, including:

• DSS (Digital Signature Standard)
• Diffie-Hellman key exchange for device authentication,
• Blowfish cipher for content encryption, with a keylength of 32-128 bits,
• Digital watermarking techniques to declare "rights" (right to playback, right to copy, etc.) to the receiving device.

The full proposal (currently version 0.91), with lots of technical detail, is mirrored on CPTWG's site (the links to Intel's site don't work).

Intel's proposal also recommends that the copy protection system be field-upgradeable to thwart ongoing attacks, and that it should be possible to revoke (read: disable) a device determined to be "compromised." (The tone of the proposals is also interesting. It's previously been thought that, because of USB, Intel is hostile to IEEE 1394. Yet these proposals suggest that Intel's quite enthusiastic about 1394... Once copy protection is incorporated.)

Intel's proposal mentions only IEEE 1394. However, it also mentions that there's nothing preventing the technique being applied generally to any bi-directional link. So for all occurrences of '1394', substitute 'DVI', and you've got an idea of what to look forward to in your new digital monitor. And your new DVD player. And your new HDTV set. And your new USB speakers.

Intel goes even further in their paper, A Framework for DVD-Audio Content Protection. In it, the author suggests that DVD-Audio recorders permanently remember the IRSC (International Standard Recording Code) of every song the device is asked to copy, so that it may only be copied once, period. They go on to suggest that the recorder could have a modem built-in to authorize (read: purchase) the ability to make additional copies.

In short, through this industry consortium, Hollywood proposes to exert control over every link in the digital chain, from the digital camera, to the disk drive, to the CPU, to the graphics card, to your display. They will decide what rights you have. Even if a court decides Fair Use includes multiple copies for personal use (such as assembling a video montage), it won't matter. Your computer will still refuse to make the copies (and probably fink on you, as well).

This coordinated effort is ostensibly to combat unsanctioned copying (which the industry chronically refers to incorrectly as 'theft' and 'piracy'). However, no one has ever been able to provably quantify the value of unrealized sales due to such copying. All dollar estimates that have been published are just that: estimates, based on idealized extrapolations of what-if scenarios. Moreover, although the industry claims to "lose" billions every year, they continue to post record profits. Finally, despite the proliferation of CDR drives and the Internet, most unrealized sales are the result of organized mass counterfeiting rings, not casual copying. None of the proposed methods I've seen appear to thwart mass counterfeiting at all. So clearly there's some other reason for all this.

The thing that puzzles me most is why the computer and consumer electronics industries haven't told Hollywood to take a hike. Intel's copy protection proposals state, in bold letters, "No content protection = No Hollywood content." This belief is taken as axiomatic by all the players, and appears to be the driving force behind the entire effort. This belief is also false.

Audio on CDs are recorded as plaintext, and the music industry continues to earn rapacious profits. Even the with the advent of CDRs, no music industry executive in his right mind would suggest dropping CD sales and going strictly with cassettes and vinyl. If nothing else, the manufacturing costs for CDs are lower than those for cassettes and vinyl. Likewise, DVDs are tremendously cheaper to produce than videotapes. Videotape duplication is a labor-intensive process; DVDs can be stamped out automatically. The savings in cost-of-goods alone would more than balance against any unrealized sales from casual copying. Corporate shareholders, always mindful of the bottom line, will also demand that the studios move to the cheaper, higher-quality process, copy protected or not.

The fact is that the computer and electronics firms are in the driver's seat, and are free to dictate how the new digital formats will work. Hollywood will use whatever format becomes popular, whether it has copy protection or not. They may grumble about it, but they'll use it. The economics afford them little choice.

We are only now beginning to explore the social and ethical consequences of a Star Trek-like universe where everything can be infinitely duplcated at zero cost. We have no idea where things will end up. But now is not the time to start erecting electronic walls and imposing artificial scarcity. The ignoble and richly-deserved death of DIVX showed -- fairly unequivocally, I thought -- that consumers want to make free, fair use of their digital media, without interference from outside. I believe its death reinforces the future toward which we've been pushing for centuries: Increased abundance at reduced cost.

Nevertheless, the CPTWG and the organizations supporting it are blindly moving forward. It may turn out it's impossible to dam the ocean, but they're gearing up to give it one hell of a try. We can only hope that the lesson of DIVX will be repeated until it is learned.

Schwab

Our bodies are currently copyrighted, if only by the lack of technology to copy a person ;)

Seriously, copyright has nothing to do with how something works - it only deals with unlawful duplication. I can read my dad's personally autographed copy of bill gates' latest book (anyone have a clue where I could figure out how much that's worth?) a million times and not break the law, but the instant I duplicate it, I'm breaking the law.

Scanning a person is not "copying" them. It is, however, a privacy issue which is rather blurry under current law (technology always runs faster than the legal system). Honestly, I'd bet that their new system is no less intrusive than an X-ray. Its virtually impossible to, through clothes, get an image that looks like what the person looks like without clothes, due to lighting and texture issues; don't expect any airport pictures of you to be showing up on a net porn site any time soon.

- Rei

[ Reply To This | Parent ]

Just remember check those URLs!

So what's the moral of the story? Find yourself a medium that you control, don't depend on renting space from other companies. How you do that is up to you.

So what do you do when all mediums are controlled by large corporations?

You see, people always think that government is the sole threat to free speech on the Internet, and it is a threat, but it's not the only one. Industry could, conceivably and very possibly, create a barrier-to-entry so high (the reason the internet is so free and inspiring is that the barrier to entry is so low) that the few who can afford to run a website are the ones who control the majority opinion.

You've already seen that happen with television, radio, and newspapers. They're all controlled by conglomerates who create economic barriers to competition. And since it's usually an oligopoly, and not a monopoly, and since it's not technically holding people back (by force of law) from free press, people claim that this is still a free country.

I say, stop bothering to get up and arms when the government claims it can censor or control the internet. They can't, they don't know how. But industry does, because they've been censoring and controlling mediums for years. It's nothing new to them. It's not oppression, they say, it's economics. But whatever they call it, the end result is the same.

So how do we combat this? We need to do all we can to keep the cost of the Internet down. At times like this, Free Beer can equal Free Speech. Linux, and the cooperative in San Francisco which sells T1 lines at cost is a fantastic example, and I wish I could see more situations like this crop up. It would also be nice to see the computer industry unionise but that's a whole different post.

In the end, if you don't want to see the Internet get gobbled up into the stomachs of the bloated plutocrats, it is up to you to make sure it doesn't happen. Keep the internet cheap and open to anybody, and you'll insure that the internet will be cheap and open for your own needs.

Michael Chisari

Enforced morals via censorship is bad, but there is also a time and a place for everything. Most libraries don't carry visual pornographic materials (one of the local libraries where I grew up used to carry Playboy, not sure if they still do) and thats their right. It shouldn't be the governments job or responsibility to provide, enforce or mandate filtering however.

Some people are going to have a problem with libraries censoring or discouraging pornography as well. Get over it, go buy a magazine or rent a video. Most forms of media or libraries are censored in one form or another. Slashdot is censored in the form of having editors. The editors only post articles which from their point of view fit in with the editorial guidelines they've set forth: News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters. I might feel that to me "The Internet Archive of Invasively Nude Female Geeks" fits in with the mandate, but its up to Rob and Hemos and others whether it gets posted.

Likewise I can walk down the hallway to our company library and look at the magazines: IEEE Circuits and Systems yes, Hustler no. Do I feel offended that I can't get pornography here? Nope, I'm free to do that on my own time. I would be offended if the company decided to filter out certain websites. I wouldn't be offended if I were repremanded for visiting them on company time though.

The committee has been told, many times, in many ways, that this is technically impossible and that trying will cost heaps as people start using https: and such technologies by default. This seems to imply checking against an address list; let's run a sweepstake on how long it takes the first cracker to post the censorship site's own URL/IP on its list, plus a few others like *.gov.au.

You can't scan SSL and friends for content! Picture this:

This web page is being checked.

Please click on this link in approximately fifteen years after our server farm has broken your SSL key to ensure that what you're trying to fetch isn't naughty. We apologise for the inconvenience.

Sure, valid point, but you can't advertise if you don't get any hits. Therefore, if enough people say, I like your product A, but if you continue practice B I will switch to competitor C. So, if you like Alta Vista (I do) hit the mailto link. Otherwise, what do you care? In general, if the internet didn't have value to people, specifically certain pages, then companies wouldn't advertise on them. It is nice to think of an open source and free and and advertisement-free world, but it is not going to happen. Advertisements are good for the internet because it provides an influx of money to sites which *can* result in improved services, as well as providing a market for mass-appeal sites. Sure, maybe advertiser-free sites can do the same or even a better job, but the internet isn't just for hackers anymore; it is full of people who want to see Mickey Mouse dance (or whatever he does) when they go to disney.com in IE4+. That being said, let the people who put up with ads do so, it will only propagate interest in the internet and allow things that will benefit us all (ex. companies deciding it is worthwhile to provide DSL and cable modem services and compete [ie, drive prices down] with others currently offering these services)