Slashdot Mirror
DVD Cases: Help by Commenting to Feds on DMCA
Paul Burchard writes "The Copyright office is
requesting comments
by Feb. 10, 2000,
on how broadly to interpret the exemptions in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) to its provisions against circumventing copy-protection technologies.
As these features of the DMCA have been cited by lawyers from both sides in the DeCSS cases,
the interpretation of the exemptions appears to still be up for grabs -- your comments could make a difference." Get involved and do this now.
News for most americans: The rest of the world don't care about your laws.
Now when this is settled, let's talk about making this mirroring scheme more efficient. I'm talking spam. I'm talking buying the service of one of these hated spammers that ever so often sends you a nice pricelist of how many millions you can reach buy just paying $100, $200 or whatever the going rate is ...
I want to see the MPAA going after each and every single ISP, mailserver and end user receiving an email containing the CSS source. You know, those 3 millions or so ...
it's in my head
Could someone post their letter here so those of use who are not the best writers or just don't have as much info on this case can get an idea of what should go into these comments? I'd like to help but I'm not sure exactly what would be the most effective way to do it (unless "DeCSS rules!" counts as a good comment...)
My other
You can also help a lot by giving a donation to the EFF. They are playing a big part in the legal defense for DeCSS distribution.
The DVD case going on in New York is putting the DCMA to the test. We've already lost round one--the preliminary injuction was granted as all of you read.
This case has more significant ramifications than the California case that I'm involved with.
Please read the OpenDVD advocacy how-to at http://www.opendvd.org/advocacy.html
Flamers... please skip the rest of this message. We don't want your help.
The federal government is accepting comments via email at 1201@loc.gov. Use reason to argue why reverse engineering must be allowed for the purposes of interoperability.
The most obvious reason is that it promotes competition. It also empowers consumers.
Here's a summary of exactly what they are accepting comments on...
SUMMARY: The Copyright Office of the Library of Congress is preparing
to conduct proceedings to make recommendations in accordance with
section 1201(a)(1) of the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. 1201(a)(1), which
was added by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and which provides
that the Librarian of Congress may exempt certain classes of works from
the prohibition against circumventing a technological measure that
controls access to a copyrighted work. The purpose of this rulemaking
proceeding is to determine whether there are classes of works as to
which users are, or are likely to be, adversely affected in their
ability to make noninfringing uses if they are prohibited from
circumventing such technological measures. This notice requests written
comments from all interested parties, including representatives of
copyright owners, educational institutions, libraries and archives,
scholars, researchers and members of the public, in order to elicit
information and views on whether noninfringing uses of certain classes
of works are, or are likely to be, adversely affected by such
prohibition.
The purpose of this rulemaking proceeding is to determine whether there are classes of works as to which users are, or are likely to be, adversely affected in their ability to make noninfringing uses if they are prohibited from circumventing such technological measures. This notice requests written comments from all interested parties,
If you are going to respond by e-mail, here is the address of the OGC.
If you are going to use snail mail, comments should be addressed to:
David O. Carson, General Counsel
Copyright GC/ I&R, PO Box 70400
Southwest Station, Washington, DC 20024.
Never knock on Death's door:
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
Show some sanity! Write reasonable and calm letters. Do NOT flame. This is not your chance to rant about the evils of Copyrights and such. Flaming and generally being a jerk will get us nowhere, in fact it will probably hurt the cause more than you can imagine.
Read the Advocacy FAQs. Proofread you letter. Get someone else (hopefully someone who disagrees with you) to read and comment on it. Having a flood of flamers attack the Copyright agency could be the worst disaster possible for the DeCSS case.
Once again. Please, show some sanity and some respect. Write well reasoned and informative letters. DO NOT FLAME.
--Nick
I'm not a lawyer, and I don't play one on TV.
But this seems like a good thread to post case law
if you are a lawyer, or play one on DVD.
Some of this sounds more like "illegal tying" to force people to use particular playback technology for which royalties may be paid independent from those paid for the movies themselves. Also, what if somebody just doesn't want open source or Unix
users to be able to play DVDs. Could that be an "illegal boycott."
How many people have to suffer a harsh punishment before "cruel and unusual" returns zero?
http://www.sharedlib.org/DMCA_RFC.txt
Looks like they want emailed comments to be in either PDF, Word >= 7.0, or Wordperfect >= 7.0. Whatever happened to plain vanilla ascii? Since they're planning to put this stuff up on their website, one might have thought that ASCII or HTML might have been an acceptable format. Maybe they need to be enlightened about requiring closed formats themselves.
/. so far on this (as well as most other sites carrying the DeCSS articles), plenty of valid reasons have been given, from those above, to just plain bad crypto being used, etc. Read the comments. Distill them into reasoned letters, and get them in!
Also, I urge everyone to act responsibly. Show them that we can give well-reasoned arguments for why DeCSS isn't covered by the DMCA's prohibitions. Spamming them isn't going to do anything to help us, and will likely hurt us in the long run.
Be sure to stress how DeCSS is designed so that Linux users can watch legally-purchased DVDs, and how DVDs can be copied without needing to decrypt them. In all the articles on
"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." --H.L. Mencken
I'm not sure if these comments will help as much as we might like. Federal bureaus establish guidelines as a practical way to put Federal laws into effect. The court would only pay attention to those rules if they had been in place long enough to constitute "common practice." And even then, the court could rule either that the law was bogus, or that the rules were.
Bureacratic guidelines are not law.
Since the Copyright Office hasn't even established the guidelines, they should not affect the judge's ruling. The judge might pay attention to strong public sentiment, but I believe the judge would be more likely to feel that, if the public wants the law changed (and the judge thinks the existing law is fine), then the public should vote for new representation.
The only way the comments would help is as evidence the EFF could use in court that DeCSS's intent is not piracy, but playback of legitimate content.
-----
Klactovedestene!
Remember, these are not geeks we are talking to. Some of these people are smart (but not on computers), and others are stupid. (I also know some stupid geeks, so the score is even) You need to talk to their level.
I strongly recomend analgies that they understand. For instance, I bought a manual for my car published by one "Haynes" company. For those who don't know, this company buys a car, and takes it apart. Point out to the beurocrats that they are reverse engineering and that any decision to prohibit reverse engineering computers must also prohibit reverse this company from reverse engineering cars.
If anyone else can come up with good examples, please post them. It would be nice if /. would then find the best of the best for anouther artical, but that might be asking too much.
While e-mail is okay, snail mail is better, so spend some money on stamps.
http://www.hackphreak.org/decss (Note: You'll get a 404 immediately, but it'll be there tonight.)
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon? :P)
(If you can't figure out how to E-Mail me, Don't.
I think the best way to state your case here (supporting DVDs or any medium, we'll stick to DVDs for this message) would be to make direct use of the DMCA's wording.
First, you can attack the "effective" clause. The DMCA only prohibits circumvention of things that "effectively controls access". You can say that the DVD encryption wasn't very effective to start with, though this is not a very strong argument.
You can encourage them to add DVDs to the exemption list because circumvention is necessary in order to gain fair use priviledges of the copyrighted work without using licensed players. The absolute denial of fair use priviledges without a license (or licensed player) from the DVD consortium should not be supported by law. Nowhere in the DMCA does it restrict fair use priviledges explicitly in this way.
Note that I am not a legal expert, etc, etc. Please read as much as you can from other posters and the various advocacy howtos to make sure your message is clear and makes a real positive difference.
Keep in mind that snail-mailing it to them will be a hundred times more effective than e-mail. It only takes a minute to write a letter in word, print out the envelope, slap a sticker on it, and throw it in the mailbox. PLEASE DO SO. There is a huge gaping distance between the written word and the electronic one - while geeks take e-mail as seriously (sometimes moreso) than realworld, the realworld holds electronic mail in the same regard. Keep this in mind if you're trying to make a difference!
and don't send plain email. you have to send a pdf file or a word document with sufficient information about yourself.
please write good,non-flaming,sophisticated comments and stick to the point. (the css case i 'an' example, not more - it's of course a very important one, at least for us.)
Remember, just like "A picture is worth a thousand words", a well written letter on high quality paper is worth a thousand stupid emails. Also remember that those who will be writing in on the other side are probably not geeks. Rather they are lawyers and businessfolks: people who are acquainted with coming across as a professional in all communications. As a result you can expect that there will be more than one letter from a lawyer on 100% cotton letterhead, crisp laser printing, civil logical writing showing up at that postal address. Geeks keep screaming that the politians and business people need to play by the Internet rules while on the Internet. Remember that this is going on in the meatspace world of business and law and to get noticed there you have to at least understand their rules.
LetterJ
The Glass is Too Big: My Take on Things
...so it's not a circumvention of copy protection.
It serves no use in preventing people from illegally making DVDs, VHS recordings, or other format conversions. The bits can be copied identically onto other DVDs (with the appropriate manufacturing equipment), the video signal from a DVD viewer is sufficient to create production-quality VHS recordings, and one can video capture entire DVD movies with cheap and easily available computer hardware.
The primary purpose of this encryption was not to prevent copying, but to restrict viewing.
That means only viewing hardware produced under licence, and only in approved regions.
This is reverse engineering for the purpose of breaking the monopoly on DVD viewing devices (whether hardware or software). And the act of reverse engineering was done outside the country, so the US legality of whatever was done to produce the this tool is irrelevant, only the legality of its use and distribution.
If by electronic mail: Send to ``1201@loc.gov' '' a message containing the name of the person making the submission, his or her title, organization, mailing address, telephone number, telefax number and e-mail address. The message should also identify the document clearly as either a comment or reply comment. The document itself must be sent as a MIME attachment, and must be in a single file in either Adobe Portable Document File (PDF) format (preferred), or in Microsoft Word Version 7.0 or earlier, or in WordPerfect 7 or earlier.
If by regular mail or hand delivery: Send, to the appropriate address listed above, two copies, each on a 3.5-inch write-protected diskette, labeled with the name of the person making the submission, his or her title and organization. The document tself must be in a single file in either Adobe Portable Document File (PDF) format (preferred), or in Microsoft Word Version 7.0 or earlier, or in WordPerfect Version 7 or earlier.
Anyone who is unable to submit a comment in electronic form should submit an original and fifteen paper copies by hand or by mail to the appropriate address listed above. It may not be feasible for the Office to place these comments on its website.
All written comments (in electronic or nonelectronic form) should contain the name of the person making the submission, his or her title, organization, mailing address, telephone number, telefax number and e-mail address.
They don't want plain emails people. If you send comments, please try to put them in the preferred formats. Please try to write concisely and stick to the DMCA topic, not copyrights or DVD in general.
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
Well, I agree with you, plain text should be allowed.
But there should be a way for you to generate pdf. Are you using a *nix OS? Then use enscript to generate postscript, and ps2pdf to generate pdf. (There probably are many other ways to do this, but I thought off this way first).
There are probably ways to do it on most other OSs, but I also know a more general solution. Use this service from Adobe - it let's you translate a limited number (10 ?) of files from many formats into pdfs.
I use it as a handy little Microsoft Word translator. Of course, I'm still stuck with pdfs. But at least I can read those easily.
Preventive War is like committing suicide for fear of death. - Otto Von Bismarck
Reverse engineering should be made totally legal. By reverse engineering, I refer to that done in a clean room, out of concern and respect for trade-secret and copyright holders. Whatever it is said, copyright is important, so we should bear in mind not to undermine it. (Subject to the legal restrictions of course. My finger to those who exploit IP/copyrights for their own selfish gain. e.g. Amazon 1-click nonsense).
Why should this be. Primarily becuase we live in a unfair world, where American businesses dominate a large part of the global economy. I think Americans should look beyond their shores and not see the world as people to exploit, but as partners, where there is great chance for mutual cooperation.
The point is that DMCA goes both ways. The US should not always assume that they will continue to be dominant players in all sectors of the economy. Neither should they wish to (It is unfair - no nation should have that great a burden to bear. :-) )
Today, someone in Norway reverse enginneers American technology, producing DeCSS. Someday, the tables are going to reversed. Is the US going to be a hypocritical and laughed at by the rest of the world when it decides to break their own laws?
Like it or not, the DMCA is going to be piece of international law. It is inevitable as we move towards a global, integrated economy. It is necessary and essential that the US sets a good example now, by upholding the principle of reverse engineering. For the reasons of competition, innovation and interoperability.
It might be look like that today, industries represented by the MPAA are getting the wrong end of the stick. But things will change. These businesses do not, and will not take the long-sighted view. They are short-sighted. They want to hold on to their dinosaur like hegemony. They want to extend it. The government of the US cannot allow itself to become subservient to these corporations.
Personally, I have always believed that the greatness of a country is measured by how well it treats firstly, its own people and then next other small countries. Get your act together!
You must answer some or all of the questions posed in the request for comments for your letter to have any effect. Also, the questions will help focus your letters on the issues that are relevent to this situation. Here are the questions::
5. Specific Questions
The Office seeks comment on the following specific questions.
Persons submitting comments need not address all questions, but are
encouraged to respond to those as to which they have particular
knowledge or information. Persons submitting comments are encouraged to
submit concrete evidence, examples and data supporting their responses
to these questions. Such submissions will carry greater weight than
unsupported allegations and predictions.
In response to each question, persons submitting comments are
requested to distinguish between (a) their response with respect to the
current state of affairs, and (b) their response with respect to the
state of affairs that is likely to exist during the period between
October 28, 2000 and October 28, 2003. For example, in responding to
Question No. 3, persons submitting comments are requested to state (a)
what technological measures that effectively control access to
copyrighted works exist today, and (b) what new technological measures
that effectively control access to copyrighted works are likely to be
introduced between October 28, 2000 and October 28, 2003. In discussing
the state of affairs that is likely to exist during the period between
October 28, 2000 and October 28, 2003, persons submitting comments
should explain the basis for their projections.
A. Technological Measures
1. What technological measures that effectively control access to
copyrighted works exist today?
2. Do different technological measures have different effects on
the ability of users to make noninfringing uses? Can and should the
Librarian take account of those different effects in determining
whether to exempt any classes of works from the anticircumvention
provisions of section 1201? If so, how? In determining what constitutes
a class of works?
B. Availability of Works
3. How has the use of technological measures that effectively
control access to copyrighted works affected the availability of such
works to persons who are or desire to be lawful users of such works?
4. Are there specific works or classes of works that, because of
the implementation of such technological measures, have become
unavailable to persons who desire to be lawful users of such works? If
so, identify those works or classes of works and explain how they have
become unavailable.
5. Are there specific works or classes of works which, because of
the implementation of such technological measures, have become less
available to persons who desire to be lawful users of such works? If
so, identify those works or classes of works, explain the ways in which
they have become less available, and explain whether those works or
classes of works are also available in other formats to which such
technological measures have not been applied.
6. If there are works that are available both in formats to which
technological measures have been applied and in formats to which
technological measures have not been applied, to what extent can the
works in the latter formats substitute for the works in the formats to
which technological measures have been applied?
7. Are there works or classes of works that are available only
electronically and only in formats to which such technological measures
have been applied? If so, what are they?
C. Availability of Works for Nonprofit Archival, Preservation, and
Educational Purposes
8. Has the use of technological measures that effectively control
access to copyrighted works affected the availability of such works for
nonprofit archival purposes? If so, how? Are there specific works or
classes of works that have been affected in this respect? If so,
identify them, explain how they have been affected, and explain whether
those works or classes of works are also available in other formats to
which such technological measures have not been applied.
9. Has the use of technological measures that effectively control
access to copyrighted works created problems with respect to the
preservation of such works? If so, how? Are there specific works or
classes of works that have been affected in this respect? If so,
identify them and explain how they have been affected.
10. Has the use of technological measures that effectively control
access to copyrighted works affected the availability of such works for
nonprofit educational purposes? If so, how? Are there specific works or
classes of works that have been affected in this respect? If so,
identify them, explain how they have been affected, and explain whether
those works or classes of works are also available in other formats to
which such technological measures have not been applied.
11. For purposes of this rulemaking, in classifying works that are
to be exempted from the prohibition against circumvention of
technological measures that control access, should any classes of works
be defined, in part, based on whether the works are being used for
nonprofit archival, preservation, and/or educational purposes? (E.g.,
``new broadcasts'' may not be an exempted class of works, but ``news
broadcasts used in the course of face-to-face teaching activities of a
nonprofit educational institution, in a classroom or similar place of
instruction,'' may be an exempted class.) Explain why or why not.
D. Impact on Criticism, Comment, News Reporting, Teaching, Scholarship,
or Research
12. What impact has the use of technological measures that
effectively control access to copyrighted works had on the ability of
interested persons to engage in criticism, comment, news
[[Page 66143]]
reporting, teaching, scholarship, or research?
13. What impact has the use of technological measures that
effectively control access to copyrighted works had on the ability of
interested persons to engage in noninfringing uses of such works,
including fair use and activities permitted by exemptions prescribed by
law?
14. Are there specific works or classes of works with respect to
which the ability of interested persons to engage in criticism,
comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, or research has been
hindered because of the implementation of such technological measures?
If so, identify them, explain how such activities have been hindered,
and explain whether those works or classes of works are also available
in other formats to which such technological measures have not been
applied.
15. Are there specific works or classes of works with respect to
which the ability of interested persons to engage in noninfringing uses
has been hindered because of the implementation of such technological
measures? If so, identify them, explain how such activities have been
hindered, and explain whether those works or classes of works are also
available in other formats to which such technological measures have
not been applied.
16. For purposes of this rulemaking, in classifying works that are
to be exempted from the prohibition against circumvention of
technological measures that control access, should any classes of works
be defined, in part, based on whether the works are being used for
purposes of criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship,
or research? Explain why or why not.
17. For purposes of this rulemaking, in classifying works that are
to be exempted from the prohibition against circumvention of
technological measures that control access, should any classes of works
be defined, in part, based on whether the works are being used in ways
that do not constitute copyright infringement, e.g., as fair use or in
a manner permitted by exemptions prescribed by law? Explain why or why
not.
E. Effect of Circumvention on the Market for or Value of Copyrighted
Works
18. In what ways can technological measures that effectively
control access to copyrighted works be circumvented? How widespread is
such circumvention?
19. Has such circumvention (or the likelihood of circumvention) had
any impact on the price of copyrighted works? Please explain.
20. Has such circumvention (or the likelihood of circumvention) had
any impact on the availability of copyrighted works? In particular
formats or in all formats? Please explain.
21. Has such circumvention had any other impact on the marketing of
copyrighted works? If so, please explain the impact and which works or
classes of works have been affected.
22. Do the answers to any of these questions relating to the effect
of circumvention on the market for or value of copyrighted works depend
upon the class of work? Please explain.
F. Other Factors and Questions
23. For purposes of this rulemaking, what criteria should be used
in determining what is a ``class'' of copyrighted works?
24. With respect to any adverse effect on use of or access to
copyrighted works that has been identified in response to any of the
preceding questions, is there an explanation for the adverse effect
other than the presence of technological measures that effectively
control access to copyrighted works?
25. Has the use of technological measures that effectively control
access to copyrighted works resulted in making copyrighted works more
widely available? Please explain.
26. Has the use of technological measures that effectively control
access to copyrighted works resulted in facilitating lawful uses of
copyrighted works?
27. Are there other factors that should be taken into account? If
so, please identify and address those factors.
28. What other comments, if any, do you have?
29. Do you wish to testify at a hearing to be conducted by the
Copyright Office in connection with this rulemaking?
Sig goes here
It's important to note that there are a number of specific questions that they are seeking answers to. This includes examples of current technological access control and whether it works or not. This includes the impact of said access control on both content users and providers. A prime example of this could be Macrovision on VHS. It is relatively cheap and easy to circumvent, but almost nobody bothers to do so to copy a video tape.
The interoperability issue is important here as well, one (or more) of the questions relate to how access control can limit legitimate use of content. DVD CSS is a prime example, you purchased a DVD, you're licensed to view it, but cannot because there is no viewer for the operating system you use. LiVid circumvents the access control technology for the purpose of legitimate use (viewing a DVD). The fact that it can be used for illegitimate uses is irrelevant to the Copyright Office.
A good strategy for your comments would be to copy the questions from the web site and submit answers to them point by point. These are the questions they want to resolve, those that clearly take the time to study and write clear, concise answers for each will receive more attention than the rambling flamebaiters.
I've wrestled with reality for 35 years and I'm happy to say, I finally won out - Elwood P. Dowd
Say "pdflatex letter.tex"
You should get a letter.pdf. You can verify it's readible with gv/gs (Assuming you have the Alladin GS that can read PDF files) or acroread (Assuming you have a libc5 system or the libc5 compatability libraries.)
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Well, I think this is a good opportunities to express yourself and your position (and please DON'T FLAME, this would be worse than a suicide because you would cause harm to every consumer) but I am an European and I would like to know if they would accept letters from us non-American.
I ask that because they say "This notice requests written comments from all interested parties" and given that America has a distasteful habit to put pressure on other countries to adopt their ways (like the software patent stuff) I feel myself concerned with the outcome of all this.
Do you think I should send them a letter and specifiy clearly that I a not a citizen of the US of A???
On the same subject, if you are not American I don't think this would be a good idea to mess things up by posturing AS an American, this would be as bad (if not worse) as flaming them.
"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be development of an easy way to factor large prime numbers." Bill Gates,
- Download LyX
- Use the "letter" template to write your letter
- Export to postscript
- use ps2pdf to create a PDF file
- Send it to the LOC.
Alternately, you could print it out from the PS and wow everybody with the awesome typesetting quality of TeX.Glad to be of service,
jwb
How is this DeCSS different from any number of prior /LEGAL/ reverse engineering attempts?
Well, for one they are giving away the product of their reverse engineering...Reverse engineering has a precedent...but giving it away doesn't
should it matter?
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
How is this DeCSS different from any number of prior /LEGAL/ reverse engineering attempts?
Well, for one they are giving away the product of their reverse engineering...Reverse engineering has a precedent...but giving the results away might not
should it matter?
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Software is very similar to a book, and the copyright laws have long been established in an acceptable manner regarding books. Software is just a list of instructions, like a book is a list of words. You read a book by examining the words in order, just as you use software by examining the words in order. I know a blind girl who puts her textbooks on a scanner so that her computer can read them out loud to her. In the same manner, a computer reads the instructions in software and performs a task. Saying that people cannot reverse engineer software is like saying that only computers have the right to read books.
I suggest using an analogy similar to this in your letters.
this is fascinating - what this whole bruhaha seems to be about is generating a new revenue stream, not only from the media, but from the PLAYBACK device as well - like has been said, it's not about copying, but under the guise of restricting access, they claim the right to charge yet another fee - whether paying for a license to the media AS WELL AS paying for a license for something to view the media with will stand up in court, that's the 64 billion $$ question. Maybe these guys are also salivating over M$'s billions, where youse pays for the server, you pays for the client, and then you pays once again for the client to access the server. The more you pay, the better it is! Put another nickle in...
The Scarlet Pimpernel
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
The Library of Congress is empowered to study only particular aspects of the affects of 1201(a)(1). This is not a forum to attack other bad aspects of the copyright law, such as the length of copyrights, and it emphasises actual and expected harms to yourself. The form of submission and the exact questions are explictly laid out in the RFC
Other resources you might want to consult are. The text of the DMCA itself. Relavent sections are 1201(a)(1) (the section under review),and sections 1201 (c),(d),(e),(f),(g),(h),(i),(j) (exceptions to the section under review).
As the questions in the RFC make clear. Personal experience as a copyright producer, distributor, or consumer is the most valuable. Actual harms, such as not being able to view a DVD under your chosen operating system are valid are probably the most persuasive. Try to come up with monetary costs of compliance. Like "it would cost me $100 for Windows + $50 worth of harddrive space + $X for a DVD viewing program to view my legal DVD's on my computer without using a program contravened by 1201(a)(1)". Note that inconvenience in and of itself is not at issue.
Use as many other examples as you can think of, variety is the spice of life. Security information is another major issue. Notwithstanding the relief granted by 1201(j), 1201(a)(1) seem to prohibit sites like rootshell and bugtraq which may not be able to freely post reverse engineered security information because it facilitates infringment.--
"L'IT c'est moi!"
either way, there's a chance that any comments getting posted on a government website are going to be read by some people outside of slashdot (read: people who don't already approve of or don't already understand decss).
anything that increases public awareness of what the DVD forum is doing to restrict freedom of information is good. public opinion _does_ affect both court and law.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
Copy-protection schemes merely add another level of encoding to the information, requiring different information to be applied in order to extract it, but not differing qualitatively in that the information needs to be decoded regardless. So as far as I can see, this section of the code adds no protections whatsoever to copy-protected or encrypted information.
But in order for the lawyers to see that, they have to be able to understand how the law as phrased relates to the processes they are regulating. It's clear to me that they do not.
And the brethren went away edified.
>we are also free to do as we please with our possessions.
Right, and I think 'possessions' is at or near the crux of the matter. If you buy a DVD, your perception of your rights to use that recorded media as you see fit ovbiously are different than what the DVD CCA would like. You want to be able to play it whenever you like on whatever device you prefer. They don't want you to play it on a device or system that they can't control and exact some kind of membership fee or other tax.
I've seen arguments back and forth about whether piracy is an issue with the prohibitive costs and bandwidth restrictions, but I think a far more compelling motivation in all this is to keep all the lisencees in lock-step and keep under their control who can manufacture systems that can play DVD CSS'ed information.
If you're a linux user, you've probably already got this program installed. To begin, open a text editor and begin with these lines:
\documentclass{article}
\title{*YOUR TITLE HERE*}
\author{*YOUR NAME HERE*}
\begin{document}
\maketitle
Then, you can go ahead and type your comments; remember LaTeX ignores spacing between words and sentances, it modifies the spacing to format the document better. % and $ need to be escaped with \, and when you are done with the document, end it with this line:
\end{document}
That's the whole banana. Now run latex *filename.tex and then dvips *filename*.dvi -o *filename*.ps and then ps2pdf *filename.ps* *filename.pdf* to get a PDF file. If you want to do it in a slightly more complicated way, you can add \usepackage{hyperref} right between \documentclass{article} and \title{*title*} and then run pdflatex *filename*.tex to get a better PDF file out.
Better introductions are available on the net, as are good books and good help.
Daniel
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21 January 2000
A Comment.
Librarian: I seek to comment on questions 3, 4, 18, 21 and 22 posed in DOCID:fr24no99-23, "Exemption to Prohibition on Circumvention of Copyright Protection Systems for Access Control Technologies" with regard specifically to the class of copyrighted works known as DVD (Digital Versatile Disk).
DVD's are a popular new format for the distribution and playback of motion pictures. The DVD format is controlled by a standards organization known as the DVD Consortium. To ensure and safeguard against unlawful duplication, the content has been encrypted; only a DVD player (a console unit or computer software) authorized by the DVD consortium is allowed access to a decryption key. This key is necessary for playback.
Computer software for the playback of DVDs is widespread and common for both Apple Macintosh computers and PC's running Microsoft Windows. However, there is currently no software for several other PC based operating systems: Linux, BSD, Solaris, OS/2, and several others, nor do any companies with a license from the DVD Consortium have any plans for creating such software. Thus, there is a significant population of computer users who cannot lawfully use DVD technology, namely those running Linux, BSD, Solaris, OS/2 or any other non-Microsoft Windows operating system.
It is my opinion that those who reverse engineer DVD encryption systems to ensure interoperability of DVD products on officially unsupported platforms should be exempt from the clauses in the DMCA prohibiting circumvention of access control technologies. I have in mind, of course, the authors of deCSS, software designed to defeat DVD encryption, and the LiViD project, a group working on creating a DVD player for Linux (which relies on deCSS, and is intended for legal viewing of properly acquired DVDs).
This leads into question number eighteen, twenty-one and twenty-two: with the widespread availability of deCSS, nearly anyone with a computer and some knowledge of computer programming may decode a DVD. To this point DVD encryption has been very weak; this of course facilitated its circumvention. Even if it had been strong, though, it would have been circumvented eventually: no security is perfect. Suppose, for example, that DVDs have been given newer, incredibly strong encryption technologies that ensured only licensed players could decrypt a DVD: it could still be circumvented by merely tapping the cable that connected a player to a television: this signal could be captured and recorded onto another format. Take also into account that most motion pictures are released onto VHS tapes: this format has no built in security at all, yet motion picture producers still use the format widely, because it is popular. Thus, even if copying DVDs becomes widespread, I dare opine that sales of motion pictures in any format will not be harmed.
Thus, I posit for your consideration, that access control technologies are in the end potentially harmful to consumers, as it can, under certain (and not uncommon) circumstances limit availability of copyrighted works to those who wish to lawfully obtain them, as evidenced by the problems with DVDs. Further, I posit that a lack of access control technology has not hurt copyright holders in the past: if illegal copying of VHS cassettes or CD audio disks had been widespread enough to cut deeply into their sales, entertainment companies would have dropped the format for something different: neither VHS nor CD format have been dropped, nor are there publicly available plans to do so in the foreseeable future. Therefore, I further argue that any circumvention of access control technology does not and cannot harm producers of copyrighted content; further, I conclude that the availability of access control circumvention is a boon to the consumer, allowing for greater choice of formats and an insurance that any given format will be interoperable with any and all hardware and software that are capable of interoperating with said format.
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yes, you wrote the software all by yourself
(but we'll say you stole trade secrets)
yes, you did it without signing an NDA
(but we'll say the shrinkwrap license counted)
yes, you did it without stealing code
(but we'll say you illegally reverse engineered it)
yes, you did all this solely for the purpose of viewing dvds
(but we'll say you did all this solely for piracy)
yes, you purchased your dvd discs and drive legally
(but we'll say that your fair-use rights don't count)
yes, you have never created an illegal copy of any of our titles
(but we'll say that you are a thief and a pirate)
we are above the law because we have more money than you
we control your courts and we write your laws
democracy, freedom, liberty... not for you...
How many people will see this article two days from now, after it has faded into the archives of "old slashdot news"? I suspect that there will be a bombardment of comments to the copyright office today that will trickle off as we near the deadline.
I propose that an ad banner should be created, pointing to a central source for advocacy, (http://www.opendvd.org maybe?) ... Containing by then a copy of this story, an advocacy mini-howto, and a link to the copyright office comment box. If this ad were to run on the Andover network of sites (and maybe also be picked up by traffic-heavy sites with opendvd-friendly admins as well... linux.com?), we might get more thurough feedback on this important issue, even after the slashdot effect dies away.
What do you think?
-Mike
So does anyone actually use deCSS for anything? I read all the comments since the controversy began and found only 1 person who actually tried to use it. This is a controversy based on principle and has nothing to do with being able to watch DVDs on a Linux box. As such, we can only expect the MPAA to win as students lose interest in fighting. Nobody's complaining about not being able to write mp3 encoders anymore.
The "reverse engineering" exemption in the DMCA must be interpreted to permit any activity with the effect of overcoming illegal tying by content vendors.
I suggest mentioning tying when commenting on this issue. Tying arrangements, sometimes called "tie-in sales", where you have to buy something you don't want to get something you do want, are the issue monopolies usually lose antitrust cases on. IBM lost this one several times (compatible mainframe peripherals) AT&T lost (long distance), and the movie industry lost (forcing "B" movies on theater owners). So there's good history here to remember and exploit.
Oh God! This is funny! I've never read a more blatant (and stupid troll).
You think the commercial piracy operations in Thailand, China, Russia and other countries haven't been working on decrypting the pathetic 40-bit encryption for the day when they won't be able to sell videotape through their channels? You think they don't have access to anyone who has a good hacking mind and who they can pay a really good salary?
Oh, incidentally, the point of eliminating fair use, controlling the players, etc. is because they could care less about your DVD collection. They want you to have to buy the same content again... and again and again and again and again. And if they eliminate the idea that you actually own the DVD you bought and have a right to view its content, then they'll be able to do just that.
Oh, and don't assume that every radical dude wearing a Linux T-Shirt is unarmed and hasn't spent time at a firing range... you might be unpleasantly surprised. (At least you won't look stupid by posting poorly written trolls to Slashdot... ever again.)
You know, you lawyers for the DVD CCA are getting really desperate...
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
Could someone give us the poop on region codes, please?
From what I picked up in an earlier discussion, they sound like nothing more than software support for a price-fixing scheme. If this is the case, then it should perhaps be mentioned in our statements (and may well be grounds for a class-action lawsuit, to boot).
But if "price fixing" is a misinterpretation/misrepresentation of the function of region codes, then of course they should not be mentioned. So if you've got a clue on this, please share it with those of us who don't. Thanx.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Price fixing plus preventing movies from being distributed on DVD before being released in the cinemas in the same countries. I hear that they sell much better in these "late release" countries, because everyone has been watching reviews and trailers for ages.
Actually this has been ruled illegal in some countries (or at least one: New Zealand). It probably would be in the US, if it wasn't that it is profit mainly for US companies, and most of the releases come out first in the US.
Section 1201(a)(1) of the DMCA (the section used to sue the DeCSS distributors) explicitly is not about copying but about access control. Obviously there is a big difference, since copy protection is the entire historical purpose of copyright law, not access protection.
Private fair use puts some reasonable limits on copying, but private access to legally purchased copyrighted materials is a fundamental right and the DMCA restricts it by making the tools to achieve that access illegal.
--
"L'IT c'est moi!"
You can often run a self extracting executable through unzip to uncompress the data.
--
"L'IT c'est moi!"
The 1201(a)(1) only protects copyrighted work. When the first CSS protected DVD work is no longer copyrighted, it will probably be legal to distribute DeCSS since it will then have the legitimate commercial use of decrypting public domain DVDs. This will occur in around 2090. The chances of DVDs still being playable then seem slim.
Even worse, congress seems bent on extending Copyrights indefinitely. Disney can't loose the copyright on Mickey after all. Copyrights have been extended retroactively (how's does retroactive copyright promote art?) at an average rate of one year per year since 1962. So if you think that DMCA is unconstitutional on time grounds, read Opposing Copyright Extension and be prepared to get really mad.
--
"L'IT c'est moi!"