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Some things to think about for ... international domain name purchasers; airline pilots with heavy 401K investments in Motorola, those whose religions forbid the purchase of Sony video game consoles; cracked-website fetishists / voyeurs. And of course, anyone else who wants to read them. More below. [timothy whips himself:] As rjh points out, it's not the FBI that raided Steve Jackson, but rather the Secret Service.

OK, now all we need is Tom Clancy, Steven Segal and a bad script ... code_rage writes "Wondering why Iridium has not been deorbited yet? Still care?

There are still some parties attempting to purchase the Iridium assets for pennies on the dollar. One party is pursuing the 'aircraft black box in the sky' concept advanced by several people in various forums, including Slashdot. The Iridium case docket sheet is located [here] Items # 761 & 762 are interesting.

These rather large PDF documents are scanned images of briefs filed on behalf of a party who has been interested in buying Iridium since last year, for the purposes of creating a continuously telemetered aircraft "black box" capability, to enhance civil aircraft safety. These briefs read like a John Grisham novel (particularly 762)... "

That's one way of putting it. On the other hand, the docket reads like a catalogue of everything that could (and did) go wrong with a high-tech, high-budget business venture.

Does "Sega" mean anything anyhow? Lucianno Edwards passed on this tidbit about Sega. "As a followup to the post on your website about sega going multiplatform: Sega doesn't plan to develop games for rival consoles, but to license their hardware to rival consoles, in a bleem-like fashion, which will allow DC games to run on anything which has the DC chip in it. Technically Sony could release an add-on for PS2 and Nintendo for Gamecube.

Sega wouldnt be paying license fees yet they'd still be selling games on rival consoles. It makes a lot of sense from a bussiness prospective.

It's all official. No more rumors." One more Sega bit, same pingin' source: Fervent writes "It's going to be on a GD-ROM, and it will run ten classic Genesis games. More details are on this article at Daily Radar."

Anyong Haseyo, chin-gu. An unnamed correspondent writes: "The Guild of System Administrators has released documentation and resources related to the new multilingual domain names."

So if you want to snatch up all the cool Chinese translations of "Coca Cola," you can consult their list of Registry Services, Registries, Commercial Technical "Solutions Providers, Standards Organizations, etc. Besides which, GSA looks like a cool site to check out anyhow.

A fairly convoluted way to get some free books from O'Reilly scjody writes "You may remember Dilinger, who had his computers seized a few weeks ago. According to his webpage, it has been returned."

Perhaps the FBI has decided that waiting for years to return equipment (as they did for Steve Jackson) wasn't good for their public image. Sure sounds like a better outcome than I was expecting -- congratulations, Dilinger.

Dark Nexus writes "This article on MSNBC talks about how a City law restricting access to graphically violent or sexually explicit video games to those who are at least 18 or accompanied by a parent or guardian has been upheld by a federal judge." A ban on violent video games, more or less. It's important to note that this was just a preliminary injunction hearing; video game distributors filed suit to stop the law and the judge has refused to block enforcement of the law while the suit progresses. In theory at least, they could still win the suit. (In reality, the judge has already decided, of course.) If you want a dose of rhetoric to equal or exceed the DeCSS case, read the judge's opinion. Are video games speech? Is violence a new category of speech which receives no constitutional protections?

Jim Tyre writes: "Judge Kaplan's ruling is out." The actual judgment is a separate document. Note that the judgment forbids Defendants and anyone acting in concert with them from posting or linking to the DeCSS code.Update: 08/17 07:57 PM by H :Taken from an earlier post: The ruling is availible online. The New York Times has a concise statement concering the case - essentially, the judge rejected the arguement that computer code counts as free speech, and therefore should be protected by the First Amendment. However, it should be noted that this ruling was *expected* by the 2600 folks, as Martin Garbus, one of the lawyers noted. (Garbus, it should be noted, has been before the Supreme Court /19/ times). This will mean that the Appeal will go higher, and that means that if/when the judgement is overturned, it will affect more than just NY, as this would have.

A quote from the conclusion:

VI. Conclusion

In the final analysis, the dispute between these parties is simply put if not necessarily simply resolved.

Plaintiffs have invested huge sums over the years in producing motion pictures in reliance upon a legal framework that, through the law of copyright, has ensured that they will have the exclusive right to copy and distribute those motion pictures for economic gain. They contend that the advent of new technology should not alter this long established structure.

Defendants, on the other hand, are adherents of a movement that believes that information should be available without charge to anyone clever enough to break into the computer systems or data storage media in which it is located. Less radically, they have raised a legitimate concern about the possible impact on traditional fair use of access control measures in the digital era.

Each side is entitled to its views. In our society, however, clashes of competing interests like this are resolved by Congress. For now, at least, Congress has resolved this clash in the DMCA and in plaintiffs? favor. Given the peculiar characteristics of computer programs for circumventing encryption and other access control measures, the DMCA as applied to posting and linking here does not contravene the First Amendment. Accordingly, plaintiffs are entitled to appropriate injunctive and declaratory relief.

SO ORDERED.

Dated: August 17, 2000

Jim Tyre writes: "Judge Kaplan's ruling is out." The actual judgment is a separate document. Note that the judgment forbids Defendants and anyone acting in concert with them from posting or linking to the DeCSS code.Update: 08/17 07:57 PM by H :Taken from an earlier post: The ruling is availible online. The New York Times has a concise statement concering the case - essentially, the judge rejected the arguement that computer code counts as free speech, and therefore should be protected by the First Amendment. However, it should be noted that this ruling was *expected* by the 2600 folks, as Martin Garbus, one of the lawyers noted. (Garbus, it should be noted, has been before the Supreme Court /19/ times). This will mean that the Appeal will go higher, and that means that if/when the judgement is overturned, it will affect more than just NY, as this would have.

A quote from the conclusion:

VI. Conclusion

In the final analysis, the dispute between these parties is simply put if not necessarily simply resolved.

Plaintiffs have invested huge sums over the years in producing motion pictures in reliance upon a legal framework that, through the law of copyright, has ensured that they will have the exclusive right to copy and distribute those motion pictures for economic gain. They contend that the advent of new technology should not alter this long established structure.

Defendants, on the other hand, are adherents of a movement that believes that information should be available without charge to anyone clever enough to break into the computer systems or data storage media in which it is located. Less radically, they have raised a legitimate concern about the possible impact on traditional fair use of access control measures in the digital era.

Each side is entitled to its views. In our society, however, clashes of competing interests like this are resolved by Congress. For now, at least, Congress has resolved this clash in the DMCA and in plaintiffs? favor. Given the peculiar characteristics of computer programs for circumventing encryption and other access control measures, the DMCA as applied to posting and linking here does not contravene the First Amendment. Accordingly, plaintiffs are entitled to appropriate injunctive and declaratory relief.

SO ORDERED.

Dated: August 17, 2000

Jim Tyre writes: "Judge Kaplan's ruling is out." The actual judgment is a separate document. Note that the judgment forbids Defendants and anyone acting in concert with them from posting or linking to the DeCSS code.Update: 08/17 07:57 PM by H :Taken from an earlier post: The ruling is availible online. The New York Times has a concise statement concering the case - essentially, the judge rejected the arguement that computer code counts as free speech, and therefore should be protected by the First Amendment. However, it should be noted that this ruling was *expected* by the 2600 folks, as Martin Garbus, one of the lawyers noted. (Garbus, it should be noted, has been before the Supreme Court /19/ times). This will mean that the Appeal will go higher, and that means that if/when the judgement is overturned, it will affect more than just NY, as this would have.

A quote from the conclusion:

VI. Conclusion

In the final analysis, the dispute between these parties is simply put if not necessarily simply resolved.

Plaintiffs have invested huge sums over the years in producing motion pictures in reliance upon a legal framework that, through the law of copyright, has ensured that they will have the exclusive right to copy and distribute those motion pictures for economic gain. They contend that the advent of new technology should not alter this long established structure.

Defendants, on the other hand, are adherents of a movement that believes that information should be available without charge to anyone clever enough to break into the computer systems or data storage media in which it is located. Less radically, they have raised a legitimate concern about the possible impact on traditional fair use of access control measures in the digital era.

Each side is entitled to its views. In our society, however, clashes of competing interests like this are resolved by Congress. For now, at least, Congress has resolved this clash in the DMCA and in plaintiffs? favor. Given the peculiar characteristics of computer programs for circumventing encryption and other access control measures, the DMCA as applied to posting and linking here does not contravene the First Amendment. Accordingly, plaintiffs are entitled to appropriate injunctive and declaratory relief.

SO ORDERED.

Dated: August 17, 2000

MacRonin writes: "Electronic Privacy Information Center announces the DC Circuit Decision in USTA v. FCC (CALEA). The U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit has ruled that law enforcement agencies must meet the highest legal standard before using new surveillance capabilities. The court decision came in a legal challenge filed by EPIC, other privacy groups and the telecommunications industry to invalidate technical surveillance standards issued by the Federal Communications Commission last year. More details at: CDT Policy Post Volume 6. The court's decision is available."

Note that this case is fundamentally about money: the telecom carriers are suing the government because they feel that the government's desired surveillance abilities (mandated under the 1996 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act; this is where Carnivore was born) are too expensive to implement. If the government provided more money (half a billion tax dollars were given to the phone companies when CALEA was passed, but the companies want more), these objections would evaporate.

So there weren't any principles of privacy involved, at least in the beginning. But some civil liberties groups have grabbed on the shirt-tails of this case to make principled arguments - that the surveillance requirements are too burdensome and intrusive in principle, not just too costly. So this is actually a good result where the Court mostly agreed with the civil liberties people that the surveillors should have to get warrants for some of the information they were seeking to get without warrants, and other information may be unavailable entirely. Note however that "call location" information (the ability of cellular carriers to report to the cops which cell phone tower your phone is registered with, and therefore, probably where you are) will still be available to law enforcement.

sconeu writes: "Wired News is reporting that the Third Circuit Court of Appeals has struck down the Child Online Protection Act (COPA). The government's next move is to either appeal to the Supremes or ask for a full trial (IANAL - I don't understand why the radically different options)." The full decision is available on PACER. The appellate court was only affirming the temporary injunction against enforcement of the law that was issued earlier by the district court, there hasn't been a full trial of the law yet. Here's the ACLU press release.

Nick writes: "Salon has an interesting interview with Napster CEO Eileen Richardson. She brings up some good analogies about Napster, mp3 and the music industry." And nevertheless points out that the 9th Circuit Northern District court has ruled that Napster is not protected as a service provider by the DMCA: "Judge Patel's opinion is available in PDF form." Napster hasn't lost the suit yet but they've lost what could have been a valuable legal defense.

jesser writes, "The L.A. Times reports that a Web site operator is suing image search engine Ditto over copyright infringement. A lower court has already found Ditto to be exercising 'fair use' legally. One wonders why the Web site operator isn't happy that people can actually find his Web site, and also why he didn't submit his page to an image search with more money behind it ... and then sue it instead of Ditto." Here's the courtopinion - don't know how much longer that URL will be valid.

In one of the many submissions concerning the recent Connectix victory: Enosson writes, "The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has overturned the lower court injunction prohibiting Connectix from selling Virtual Game Station or using the Sony BIOS in developing new versions of it. The decision says that its use of the copyrighted BIOS in reverse engineering was "fair use," and that any "shoddiness" in the VGS product did not tarnish Sony's PlayStation trademark. The full text of the decision is available." There is also, as you would expect, mention of the ruling on the Connectix site as well.

As soon as Judge Jackson's decision was available for download (from this mirror site, among others), I was on the phone with Washington DC attorney Don Weightman, who often serves as the informal "Slashdot legal interpreter" on federal law, especially for antitrust and regulatory matters. Click below for a transcript of the phone conversation Don and I had as we read the decision together. Don makes some great points!

Don - This decision from Judge Jackson is the best legal field guide I've seen to the new economy. It's great. This judge really gets it!

Robin - What do you mean?

Don - The judge appears to understand why and how people have been fighting the battle they've been fighting about software. Where Microsoft has been getting its competitive advantage and what it's been doing to keep it. What's more, there's a clear account of the relationship between big fish like MS and perhaps Sun and Netscape and the thousands of smaller developer who have to cope with program interfaces and live and die on the the competitive possibilities that the big fish allow them.

Note: Don says to pay particular attention to Paragraph 18 of Judge Jackson's ruling, which says the market MS controls is for PC operating systems, and also says Mac, Linux, and handheld appliances aren't in the same "ballpark" as PC OSes. Two other critical paragraphs Don notes are numbers 33 & 34, where the Judge describes why he considers that MS controls that market.

Paragraph 38 talks about the economics of software and #39 talks about positive network effect, or "why if everybody else has a piece of critical software you have to get it too." Paragraph 50 specifically mentions Linux, but Don says "I'll leave that one to you guys to decide how spot-on it is." :)

Beyond that, you might as well read the decision yourself. Don says, again, "This Judge really gets it!

Now back to the questions...

Robin - Now what happens? Does every software company that feels MS ever abused it file on them?

Don - I'm going to read to you from paragraph 93 ... "It is Microsoft's corporate practice to pressure other firms to halt software development that either shows the potential to weaken the applications barrier to entry or competes directly with Microsoft's most cherished software products." These are Judge Jackson's words for what happens to you if you try to compete with Microsoft. A lot of software company will be sharpening their word processors tonight...

Robin - How do you think consumers will react?

Don - When they realize that they've had to pay more for computers because MS has charged high prices for their OS, they may take the issue more personally. It's close to certain that someone, somewhere will file a class action suit.

Robin - What about the "browser wars" that actually started the whole thing? Where do they fit into all this?

Don - It looks as if (he stops for a moment to laugh some more) the Judge is finding that MS went after Netscape with both guns blazing, giving Explorer away with one hand and preventing Netscape's installation on new computers with the other, and that all of this was done for anti-competitive purposes. The other thing I'm seeing on the browser wars is that it's pretty clear that the Judge did not buy MS's story on why MSIE was bundled with Windows. He says, "Microsoft's actions have inflicted [collateral] harm on consumers who have no interest in using a Web browser at all" because Win98 runs more slowly it would if they hadn't put the browser in.

Also in paragraph 173 -- which I just quoted part of -- it says,"Microsoft has forced Windows 98 users uninterested in using [it] to carry software that, while providing them with no benefits, brings with it all the costs associated with carrying addtional software on a system. These include performance degradation, increased risk of incompatibilities, and the introduction of bugs."

Note: (At this point Don starts laughing and says, "It gets even better..") Really, you do need to read the decision for yourself! Don says, "You get the feeling that the Judge is a disgruntled Windows user!" But unlike most disgruntled Windows users, this one has the power to do something about it. Right on, Judge Jackson!

Robin - But Don, all the lovely legal language and Windows-knocking aside, isn't this decision going to end up getting appealed forever?

Don - Yes. However, it is unlikely that an appellate court will want to get its hands under the hood of the relationship between Windows and browsers and between MS and its competitors at level of detail shown by Judge Jackson's findings. It's possible to overturn this but it would be hard.

Robin - Don, how much do you figure MS has spent on legal fees so far, and how much more are they going to spend before this is over?

Don - I'm guessing that they've spent more than $50 million so far. And when you say "when all this is over," if you include the industry suits and class action suits brought by private plaintiffs, you could could be talking about real money. Even for MS.

Robin - What's "real money"?

Don - It depends on whether someone nails them for damages. A $10 rebate for each customer who has bought Windows would run into billions. When you add in the damages that could be claimed by other software makers besides Netscape [like Corel], and by users who ended up with MS products, perhaps at excessive prices, because others weren't available, then only the sky is the limit.

Robin - Do you think Bill Gates will have a "House For Sale" ad in the Seattle newspapers next Sunday?

Don - It depends on how fast and far Microsoft's stock price drops. It's already started to drop, according to a story that just went up on ZDNet.

Robin - Don't forget: all that happened today was that Judge Jackson decided MS was naughty. He didn't say what kind of punishment they should get, which he won't do until he hears a whole new set of arguments. Don's best guess is that the ruling on punishment won't come out "until early next year."

Don Weightman and I will try to get a "Microsoft antitrust legal issues" follow-up together by sometime next week. Or perhaps you would like to do it? If so -- and if you're qualified -- e-mail roblimo@slashdot.org and we'll talk about it.

- Robin "roblimo" Miller

Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson has released his initial finding of facts - which appears to be very favorable to the government. Judge Jackson agrees with the government's assertions that Microsoft holds monopoly power in operating systems in the Intel world. Now, note of course, that is just an initial finding - now the two sides debate the penalties against Microsoft. Check out the government web site for the Findings of Fact - though it's running pretty slow there's a mirror as well. The info is all over the news as well. Thing sound grim - click below for a quote from the Judge:

"Microsoft has demonstrated that it will use its prodigious market power and immense profits to harm any firm that insists on pursuing initiatives that could intensify competition against one of Microsoft's core products," Jackson wrote in his findings. "The ultimate result is that some innovations that would truly benefit consumers never occur for the sole reason that they do not coincide with Microsoft's self-interest."

Ouch. Pretty harsh words from the Judge. No one knows what the penalties will be, and the possibility for a settlement between the Government and DOJ are much more probable now, as Microsoft knows the way the judge feels about it. Things are gonna be different, though.