Slashdot Mirror

I note that the MPAA site www.mpaa.org is curiously lacking in contact information, even if it lists tons of officers (which makes me fear that they may have troops too). I found one address however: hotline@mpaa.org which is intended for snitches and I would be most surprised if the recipient or webmaster@mpaa.org, postmaster@mpaa.org, hostmaster@mpaa.org and domain administartive contact pegge@mpaa.org wouldn't be kind enough to forward greetings to Jack Valenti, capo de tutti capi of MPAA. Better safe than sorry so send your opinions to Don Valenti to all these addresses.

I note that the MPAA site www.mpaa.org is curiously lacking in contact information, even if it lists tons of officers (which makes me fear that they may have troops too). I found one address however: hotline@mpaa.org which is intended for snitches and I would be most surprised if the recipient or webmaster@mpaa.org, postmaster@mpaa.org, hostmaster@mpaa.org and domain administartive contact pegge@mpaa.org wouldn't be kind enough to forward greetings to Jack Valenti, capo de tutti capi of MPAA. Better safe than sorry so send your opinions to Don Valenti to all these addresses.

I note that the MPAA site www.mpaa.org is curiously lacking in contact information, even if it lists tons of officers (which makes me fear that they may have troops too). I found one address however: hotline@mpaa.org which is intended for snitches and I would be most surprised if the recipient or webmaster@mpaa.org, postmaster@mpaa.org, hostmaster@mpaa.org and domain administartive contact pegge@mpaa.org wouldn't be kind enough to forward greetings to Jack Valenti, capo de tutti capi of MPAA. Better safe than sorry so send your opinions to Don Valenti to all these addresses.

I note that the MPAA site www.mpaa.org is curiously lacking in contact information, even if it lists tons of officers (which makes me fear that they may have troops too). I found one address however: hotline@mpaa.org which is intended for snitches and I would be most surprised if the recipient or webmaster@mpaa.org, postmaster@mpaa.org, hostmaster@mpaa.org and domain administartive contact pegge@mpaa.org wouldn't be kind enough to forward greetings to Jack Valenti, capo de tutti capi of MPAA. Better safe than sorry so send your opinions to Don Valenti to all these addresses.

Looking over the MPAA website I found the following:

The MPAA contact / reward program for turning in pirates

To make a long story short the 800 number is: 1-800-662-6797 why don't some enterprising Slashdotters call up the MPAA on their dime and let them know what you think of this whole "piracy" fiasco.

Haddock, Salmon, Pike, Bass, Cod, Tuna

I knew this kid named Jimmy when I was growing up. Jimmy was, how shold I put it... "Special". Jimmy loved to eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. That's why I think pb & j is the appropriate smell for these guys

Nervous sweat is the smell for these guys and these guys too

For these guys it's obvious, rocket fuel.

And in the same spirit, that vomitey, greasy, sugarey, metallic smell you find near big rollercoasters for them

And the muddy, porcine smell you'd find around that prize-winning heiffer that just keeps eating and getting bigger for these freaks. Of course you know that animal is the main ingredient for the spiced ham smell that you'd find here

"Anyone with information on suspected video piracy operations is urged to call the MPAA at 1-800-NO-COPYS (1-800-662-6797). Callers who provide information that leads to the arrest and conviction of persons engaged in video piracy may be eligible for a reward. A separate reward will be paid to the first person who provides the location of a pirate video lab. The pirate lab must consist of 30 or more VCRs at one location used to produce unauthorized copies of MPAA member company motion pictures.

Information may also be furnished via E-Mail if directed to the email Hotline at the MPAA in Encino, California. Informants may remain anonymous if requested."

Or better yet, mail it to all these wonderful people:

MPAA Officers

Jack Valenti: President and Chief Executive Officer

William Baker: Executive Vice President and C.O.O.

Fritz Attaway: Senior Vice President - Government Relations and D.C. General Counsel

Simon Barsky: Senior Vice President - General Counsel

Gregory Goeckner: Vice President - Deputy General Counsel

Vans Stevenson Senior Vice President - State Legislation

John J. Collins: Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer

Bethlyn Hand: Senior Vice President - Administration, Director of Advertising Administration

Brad Hunt: Senior Vice President & Chief Technology Officer

Richard Taylor: Vice President for Public Affairs

Tod Cohen: Vice President & Counsel - New Technology

Robin Patino: Vice President - World-Wide Market Research

Paul Egge: Vice President - Information Services

Marsha Kessler: Vice President - Copyright Royalty Distribution, New Technology & Planning

Bonnie Richardson: Vice President - Trade & Federal Affairs

Nancy Thompson: Vice President - D.C. Administration

Cynthia Merifield: Vice President - Congressional Affairs

Marilyn Gordon: Vice President and Associate Director, Advertising Administration

Melissa Patack: Vice President and General Manager - MPAA California Group

Karin Krueger: Vice President, State Legislation

(So? I got a little link happy. Sue me!!)

• MPAA.ORG
  MCA.Com
  Paramount
  MGM
  Sony
  Disney
  Fox

All of the above URLs are active as either email addresses or contact form pages. I would suggest that now would be a good time to exercise the /. effect and your brains (don't just copy my message) on behalf of the websites targeted by the MPAA.

P.S. If any of the URL's don't work, please fix them. I felt like it was more important to get this posted than to triplecheck all the links.

email pegge@mpaa.org and ask to have your mirror of DeCSS be added to the list of "Related Sites", see if we can get the MPAA to sue itself.

*note: This is the ONLY email contact i could find on the entire MPAA website, guess they don't like feedback, imagine that*

"This is a case of theft. The posting of the de-encryption formula is no different from making and then distributing unauthorized keys to a department store. The keys have no real purpose except to circumvent the locks that stand between the thief and the goods he or she targets."

It's not a valid analogy. It would be more appropriate to compare DeCSS to a set of lockpicks. Lockpicks are legal to buy and to use in your own home. The only thing that's illegal is when you use them to break into someone else's house.

Similarly, DeCSS should be legal for distribution and personal use. The only thing that should be illegal about DeCSS is using it to crack DVDs you don't own for personal gain.

Simon

Wouldn't it be neat if we e-mailed the MPAA, their attorneys, and our representatives in The Senate and The House with the following?:


To Whom It May Concern,

I am in posession of the css-auth code, the supposedly-illegal DVD decrypting programming code. I hereby turn myself in.

Respectfully,
Waldo L. Jaquith


"You know, if one person, just one person does it they may think he's really sick and they won't take him. And if two people, two people do it, in harmony, they may think they're both faggots and they won't take either of them. And three people do it, three, can you imagine, three people walking in singin' a bar of Alice's Restaurant and walking out. They may think it's an organization. And can you, can you imagine fifty people a day,I said fifty people a day walking in singin a bar of Alice's Restaurant and walking out. And friends they may thinks it's a movement.

And that's what it is, the Alice's Restaurant Anti-Massacre Movement, and all you got to do to join is sing it the next time it come's around on the guitar." - Arlo Guthrie

celebrated a federal judge?s ruling that will force a group of New York-based Internet hackers to stop the posting

The same story is run on Yahoo.

However. It seems like the "group of New York-based Internet hackers" have struck back.
www.2600.com is still alive, while www.mpaa.org is unreachable for me :-)

Hey, here is even 2600's link to it all: http://www.2600.com/news/1999/1112.html .
While I'm into linking - OpenDVD.org got so me good facts on the matter at hand.

"We have received information that at the above address there have been offers to provide instructions on defeating DVD encryption so that illegal copies of DVDs can be made."

Did the MPAA copyright the procedure for cracking their own encryption scheme? If not, I don't see how this relates to anything. I would think that providing instructions on building bombs would fall into the same category (illegal) if what the MPAA twits are asserting is true.. and it isn't.

23. The Copyright Act, Title 17 U.S.C. 1201(a)(2), provides that:

[n]o person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that --

(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title;

(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; or

(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title.

The Connecticut claim is filed against a mirror of 2600's article from November 12, 1999. The key phrase there is DeCSS, a free DVD decoder, that not only facilitated the creation of previously unavailable open source DVD players for
Linux - also allowed people to copy DVDs.
Note that the prase explicitely states a non-piracy purpose of DeCSS, and, it only talks about making copies - which by itself is not illegal (according to the Beta case from 84, IIRC).
The fact that they are going against a single mirror is strange - either they have no clue about the web, internet, etc., or they have found an otherwise "weak link" where they hope to establish an easy precedent.
I wonder if the defendant Hughes can post some more information here.

23. The Copyright Act, Title 17 U.S.C. 1201(a)(2), provides that:

[n]o person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that --

(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title;

(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; or

(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title.

FILM STUDIOS BRING CLAIM AGAINST DVD HACKERS IN FEDERAL COURT

Connecticut Claim

New York Claim

Note: The "New York Claim" document does not render properly in Netscape.

FILM STUDIOS BRING CLAIM AGAINST DVD HACKERS IN FEDERAL COURT

Connecticut Claim

New York Claim

Note: The "New York Claim" document does not render properly in Netscape.

FILM STUDIOS BRING CLAIM AGAINST DVD HACKERS IN FEDERAL COURT

Connecticut Claim

New York Claim

Note: The "New York Claim" document does not render properly in Netscape.

FILM STUDIOS BRING CLAIM AGAINST DVD HACKERS IN FEDERAL COURT

Connecticut Claim

New York Claim

Note: The "New York Claim" document does not render properly in Netscape.

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

Don't let anyone like Katz demonize you for not allowing your children to watch whatever they want whenever they want to.

That's not what Katz is saying. Katz is in no way demonizing good parents. He's talking about theater owners, ushers, etc. who TRY to be substitute parents by making "moral" decisions regarding what a child can or cannot see.
And I agree with Katz. Theater owners shouldn't be taking away a parent's right to decide what children see.
Additionally, they shouldn't be treating MPAA recommendations as law, enforcing them blindly. The recommendations are just that. They are guidelines for parents to decide what children can see. This is a good idea with poor implementation. I don't want to know what somebody else thought of the moral fiber of a movie; I would much prefer facts, such as the RSAC's implementation of a ratings system for software and internet content. It has a rating from 0 to 4 in each of the following categories: Violence, Nudity, Sex, and Language. If somebody sings "Uncle Fucker" it would indicate language. It doesn't just slap on the same rating someting gets if it has pervasive nudity and sexual themes.
In contrast the ESRB has a system that simply says "T" for Teen or "M" for Mature, etc. which is just as bad as the MPAA. While I'm rambling i may as well also complai about the RIAA's rating system for music: a "Parental Advisory" sticker of no parental advisory sticker. That's all-no explanation.
People should be free to make their own moral judgements based on facts, not fed somebody else's moral code and forced to accept it. People need to learn that morals are not universal, and they can't seek to have their moral judgements applied to everyone. People deserve to know more that just opinions: they deserve facts.