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Geographic Screening
In February, after two months of operation, the Canadian Net company iCraveTV.com shut down after being sued by the Motion Picture Association of America, the same freedom-loving folks who had a Norwegian teenager thrown in jail a few months ago for distributing DVD decryption codes.
iCraveTV's business -- legal in Canada but not in the United States -- was the redistribution of live broadcast television programming over its Web site. The MPAA sued iCraveTV in federal court because U.S. copyright laws proscribe redistribution of TV programming without first obtaining permission from the programs' owners. The MPAA suit, similar to those being filed all over the country by music industry representatives, claimed that computer users in the U.S. could circumvent iCraveTV's simple access barriers to non-Canadians.
If the company hadn't halted operations instantly, it might have been liable for hundreds of millions in damages under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, passed quietly 16 months ago and signed quickly by President Clinton. The DMCA is turning out to be the most potent weapon ever against the free spread of cultural artifacts like movies and music.
What was particularly significant though, was less the MPAA's lawsuit than iCrave's response. iCrave didn't argue the legal merits of the suit, according to Denise Caruso, writing in Monday's New York Times . Instead, the company responded by filing a series of patent claims for what it says is a new technology that could significantly affect the copyright skirmishes breaking out all over the Internet. The companies and organizations claim that they are only seeking to halt the theft and piracy of cultural properties like music and movies. Whatever their intentions, their actions threaten to permanently alter the nature of the Net itself, until now the freest culture in the information spectrum.
The company says it has developed what it calls a technological protection mechanism that locates where its customers are, permitting the site to bar anyone from viewing protected programming outside Canada. The company refused to disclose any of the technical details of this program, but Icrave President and co-founder William Craig said this new "enhanced geographic screening technology" would soon be necessary to make the Net appealing and safe for copyright holders.
"Collectively, the Internet has to evolve and adapt," Craig told the Times. "So what we're trying to do is create 'country-area-networks'where you can have a computer just serve a certain territory."
If this kind of software works and spreads, it presents a laundry list of ugly implications for the Net. This intentionally fragmented model of entertainment and content distribution -- think movie theaters, video chains and cable TV -- would transform the Net into the exact business model that has made so much money for the the entertainment industry, which is estimated to have earned more than $75 billion in revenues in l999.
Ironically, government interventions have had little effect on the free-wheeling nature and growth of the Net, but it's taken global corporations just a few short months to raise more disturbing legal, copyright and patent issues about cyberspace than had been raised in the preceding generation.
The DMCA of l998, which was passed after intense lobbying by entertainment industries (Disney, AOL/Time-Warner), has as its centerpiece an anti-circumvention provision, a new kind of liability aimed directly at information software, and which clamps down even on activities previously permitted by "fair use" provisions.
In copyright terms, "fair use" describes conditions under which someone can legally use or excerpt a copyrighted work. These might include referring to a copyrighted work but not quoting from it, using a small enough portion of a copyright work that it's considered "fair," or copying work you own.
But under the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions, it is now illegal to violate copyright protection technology for any reason at all. Under the law, anyone who makes, sells or uses a device -- software, hardware, or a computer -- that makes copyright circumvention possible is engaging in a criminal act. This is the reason downloading free music and sharing Napster sites had been curtailed on college campuses in recent weeks. Schools are receiving warning letters from the RIAA (the music industry association) threatening legal action under the DMCA that would hold them liable for any and all copyright infringements if they don't take steps to eliminate the transmission of copyrighted material on networks they control.
It was the anti-circumvention provision of the DMCA that resulted in the arrest of 16-year-old Jon Johansen, a Norwegian teenager who had allegedly published code allowing the circumvention of the encryption found in DVDs, even though he wasn't intending to make illegal copies. He simply wanted to watch a movie which he owned legally but couldn't watch on his Linux laptop. Thus he was prosecuted not for pirating digital content, but rather for publishing and distributing the code that made it possible for him to view the film contained on a disk he already owned. That's an escalation of the culture wars, to say the least.
And it's not the last. "I think we want to nail them to the wall now," Jack Valenti, the president of the Motion Picture Association, told reporters when the iCraveTV.com suit was filed.
The fact is, there is hardly a person reading this who isn't a criminal under the provisions of the DMCA, including me.
There are plenty of disturbing elements to the recent assaults by the movie and music industries on the cultural infrastructure of the Net, but the elimination of any kind of "fair use" -- any circumstance at all in which the making of a copy might be considered legal -- is a huge legal victory for the corporations seeking to dominate cyberspace by breaking the Net and Web into marketing territories.
If iCrave succeeds in developing, patenting and distributing technology that permits geographic screening, the Net could become a Balkanized culture, with access restricted by technologically and legally enforced roadblocks, and by geographical restrictions to content and access. The Net and its protocols were designed to be free, and this freedom has resulted in one of the greatest creative, technological and cultural outpourings in human history. For a handful of greedy corporations to turn the Net into a digital Wal-Mart is unthinkable. It is also, for the first time, not a completely impossible notion.
Just about every comment you have in your userinfo is moderated up.
And the one I saw that wasn't was redundant... a karma-whoring attempt. You can't even get moderated DOWN without trying to get karma.
So fuck you, and your ilk. Post "insightful" comments... not "Wow, I can quote the story and point out obvious things" comments.
Thank you.
exactly, we are all being criminalised. The way to beat them is - DON't BUY! Kill the bastards by cutting off their evenue supply. It seems to me nowadays that the only freedom we have left is to buy or not to buy.
What do u trade for this info? Got a list of warez? I could use a CDRWIN .bin/.cue file of Parasite Eve II. Post it encrypted with the key below to alt.binaries.warez.psx with "attn: nightshade" in the subject line & post ur pgp key too and I'll give you the proxy server list.
-----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----
A yQ+sXBLJyj0iHoU 6NTn6GpjFbVDGR+ 5/cNiTBB9lAAUR
Version: 2.6.2
mQCNAzfMR/4AAAEEAKia88kzCOmLjT6Y9BatSYetKW0T1RE/6
S1W0wPISDDjfYktIwqmtyJuuA7kE3mS9Y00EBrr0gviRmUYxe
us2N7Nw7bl9u/DGIjZTGJu4RRt4u1frBZF/7ys1Brf2V67Uib
tB9XaWxsaWFtIEhhcnZleTx3aGFydmV5QGF5ZS5uZXQ+ =ctlM
-----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----
There is no forgiveness or defense for what Canada has done. They are trying to spoil the economic prosperity of the good ol' U.S. of A. We cannot allow this. Have you wondered why the Dow Jones has tumbled from 10,000? Have you wondered why there is such a proliferation of pirate music and video on the Internet? Have you wondered why my toilet got plugged this morning? It's all Canada's fault!!
Sue iCraveTV? No, we need to impose a Cuba-style trade embargo and bring Canada to its knees. They're so lucky to be located next to us, but they abuse that privilege repeatedly. Their ardent nationalism, their assertion of their so-called "sovereignty"-- what gives them the right? If you trade with the United States of America, you do what the United States of America says. As my favorite patriot and role model "Rocky" once said, "Know your role, and close your mouth!"
Manifest Destiny entitles us all the land from the Gulf of Mexico to the North Pole. Unfortunately, many of the left-wing pansies in power have forgotten this. We need to haul out our nuclear arsenal and our invincible army and annex Canada immediately. Then there'll be no more of this nonsense to put up with!
God bless America! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!
-RF
Sure! Go to www.egroups.com and type "proxy" in the search box. Then subscribe to any of the lists devoted to anonymous proxies. You'll get a fun list of open ports in your mailbox every week or two, and occasionally the odd "I WAnT to read NEWSGROUPS!! but am Student in BOLIVIA! help" message. Huzzah!
After reading another story about how the megacorps cut off free thought, I have yet to see any viable solution to the problem. Yes the DCMA gives the corporations the legal backing to stop anything that they don't like which at the current moment is everything on the net. I've read posts about boycotting the various corporations, an e-mail campaign, trying to vote the right people into office, and other methods that would involve hot grits and pants. The one thing I have yet to see is anything that would be highly effective. Yes, a boycott of the companies while e-mailing each corporation would be great. However the problem that many people on Slashdot fail to recognize is the fact that we're still a MINORITY. A boycott of by a few people doesn't hurt an industry that just made 9 billion dollars. E-mail petitions have very little creditability. We need something that lets the corporations know we means business. Why slap a person when you can knock him out with one blow.
You're saying that geographical restriction is necessary, and then crack down on the one method attempted to enforce just that - supplying an area code. I agree it's weak - but a non-Canadian-located viewer would in fact be breaking some law by providing false information - and that's where the focus would be. I don't pretend to have an answer to this, but I think a core issue/problem is that most are centered around citizens, i.e. regions, i.e. countries. The essence of electronic communication runs contrary to physical barriers and location.
Snipped from Digital Island/TraceWare interview "...part of your program you offer visitors to your Web site samples from that week's top 10 CDs in hopes that they'll hit the "buy" button while listening to one of them. But if someone signs on in Brazil, my guess is that the top 10 CDs there will be different from the top 10 in Sweden." My thoughts: a) What just happened to globalization? I went to slashdot.org because I wanted to see what was happening "there", not "where". b) I completely support personalized content - if I want it. c) If this were a store, the analogous situation is being scanned for origin (please don't make this a racial issue now... criteria could be anything, social class, mother's views - anyting) and then automatically - and probably unbeknownst to myself - shown a selection. d) A voluntary system of personal data, like the location records for DNS, could be useful per b). It could include country, language etc. and the key here is _voluntary_
Pfah. You don't have to be going all that far. I remember a year ago it took 16 hops and a route deep into the US to get from a machine I ran in Bridgewater to another in Wolfville (Nova Scotia, a rather small province). I can't check offhand whether it's still so.
As you have seen, it was a Canadian company that wished to violated the rights of our respected Motion Picture Association. They attempted to deal a death blow to moving pictures by setting up an underground Canadian internet piracy ring. This simply cannot be tolerated. As Mr. Katz has pointed out in his piece, the best solution we have to save our good, American movies is to invade and destroy the godless savages up north. A few smahed igloos oughta teach them not to mess with a real country, or our movies.
Not necessarily. Although in many of the more rural areas, particularly in Eastern Canada (Cape Breton and Newfoundland springing immediately to mind), "arse" is standard fare, much of the rest of the country is now using the more international "ass". Of course, the more tender souls prefer "bum", "butt" or "buttocks", the erudites espouse "rectum", and the crude like "asshole", but by and large, "ass" prevails.
Why was th act an issue? United States have no juristiction in Canada.
All you turds can't even recognize this as a quote from the South Park song that was nominated for a Grammy. Jeezus.
What will eventually defeat capitalism is freedom - free stuff. The net embodies some of this - an understanding and harmony based on giving and receiving freely. Discarding greed as motivation. A lot of people are sick of capitalist values (or lack thereof).
Take Napster, for example. Everyone sharing MP3 files for free. It cuts them out of the loop. People could use Napster to download but not share anything. But people don't just do that, because they enjoy sharing. It's fun to serve. The old internet had a lot of that philosophy. Then the AOLers arrived.
Corporations and govts only have power if they are empowered by people's fears and ugliness. Once those are not obeyed, the problem dissolves.
For myself, I mostly use only free or practically free stuff. If its "pirated" fine. Once you give something to the world, its free. That's the nature of it. I'll spend a few bucks if necessary but only on what I consider to be a genuine value. I'll listen to some music and use software, but if they build walls to force me to pay some greedy asshole, I'll say fuck it. The trash they produce isn't worth paying for, let alone fighting for.
fdsa
Does this mean that any company which makes photocopiers are breaking the law because they are producing hardware which "makes copyright circumvention possible" ?
Politics, from 'Poli' Latin meaning many, and 'tics' meaning blood sucking creatures.
True. DeCSS breaks a copy protection scheme (CSS). Why are Slashdotters so naive about this? Are you merely trying to convince ignorant people or yourselves?
Thanks to decss, I can now rip a DVD, reduce the resolution, and burn it onto one or two CD's. When DeCSS came out I went out and bought a DVD drive, while everyone was screaming "Boycott DVD now". Why? Because now its an open standard so I'll support it.
Just the facts.
Why is it that every time an American says something that someone disagrees with the result is a personal attack on the intelligence of most Americans? Your generalizations show your ignorance. I do, however, agree that ICrave is not under US jurisdiction. Lets keep discussion on the issues at hand instead of trying to insult the intelligence of an entire nation merely because you disagree with the opinions of one citizen.
So show me this perpetual motion machine, I'll make it and never pay an electrical bill again. In fact, by uploading power to the electric net, they'll have to pay me money.
I've never seen or heard of one working, so pony up or shut up.
-- Ender, Duke_of_URL
Just sue Sony, for selling a hardware device that permits the copying of copyrighted materials: the VCR.
Or Xerox, for the photocopier.
And when you're done that, sue the estate of Guttenberg, for that pesky copyright-violating printing press.
And finally, sue everyone with a larynx, because we can all sing along to our favorite copyrighted songs.
1) You can't do a bit copy of DVDs without expensive vertical market hardware that's tracked very closely by the industry. DeCSS works on consumer hardware
2) DeCSS does help people copy DVDs to VCD or to transmit VOB files over the Internet. There is a Windows version, and Windows has soft DVD players. Saying it doesn't help in these purposes is a lie.
Look, I know you are trying to be helpful and I know the DeCSS people meant well. But, we're not rubes here, and there's no reason to post propaganda about this whole thing just to plant a halo around our little doe-eyed linux angel heads.
If I recall correctly, didn't Microsoft implement blocking based on region for their IE 128 bit downloads? When I first got my cablemodem here in Canada, I tried to DL the 128 bit version to do some banking transactions, and I was not allowed to do so because MS didn't recognize my cable company as being in the US or Canada. (It was fixed a couple of days later). That was 2 years ago. Why is everyone claiming this as being a revolutionary new technology, then? (For those of you down with the Patent Office, does the MS implementation of this count as prior use? Do you care?)
Who says anybody at SlashDot (including Katz) believes any of this? As has been hinted at by CmdrTaco in previous articles, they post Katz stories because Katz's spiel generates traffic, which brings in money for SlashDot.
Sure he's just repeating the same old crap with the same old obvious flaws--but people read it and reply to it. Money and fame for as long as SlashDot readers care.
Don't make the mistake of assuming that just because you have lots of opinions, you have ideas too. Much less worthwhile ideas.
I work for a startup right now, working hard, trying to build something. But I ask myself sometimes how far I'd be willing to go if our startup got big and then starting taking the wrong turn, getting greedy, screwing over the general public. Would I have the balls to stand up to the rest and quit?
The only reason we have Big Business is because of overselves. The greed of Big Business is only a reflection of the collective greed of its workers, and their inability to say "What we're doing is wrong, so I'm not going to work for you anymore."
However, some people can't say that; maybe they don't want to consider the consequences, or maybe they just want to go to work, and then go home and live the rest of their life. Or maybe they think that giving up everything when your Big Business employer gets greedy won't make a difference. After all, we all still have to eat, right?
HOT GRITS treat your underwear as an obstacle and
route around it.
Sorry, but I'm fed up with adding well reasoned
comments to this place only to find they're not
even there the next day. Sod it!
The old style US business community does not understand the net and never will. The only thing they are interested in is their own wallets, period.
Foogle's posts start out at 2, that means that any posts that have a score of 2 have not been moderated at all. if they are at one they have ether been moderated down, or self-moderated. if you are going to complain about a system, you should at least know how it works, fuck head.
There are to many god damn idiots in this world WHY!!!?!?!?!?!?!??!
After thinking about this a bit over the last few days, it occurs to me that an American company
Woh, don't think to hard there sparky...
What if all network card were equipped with global positioning devices (sort of like the intel processor id's)? ...scary thought
That's beacuse your stupid.
hrm.. that should be 'you're', note that I never said I wasn't stupid...
I was walking through Leicester Square once and had to step over this big trail of goopy looking stuff. The trail led back to a Ben and Jerry's store. I think they were having trouble with their freezers. Maybe they turned them off for the sake of the environment.
i wonder if iCrave or the MPAA have ever seen pictures from space. the countries aren't color coded. there are no bold border lines. half the time everything's dark, and it gets pretty cloudy, too. wonder if they've ever looked a traceroute. hmm, you think 111.222.123.231 is canada, or mexico, or zimbabwe? we're moving towards that buzzword, the Global Economy. tariffs are dropping like flies. they only hinder us. restricting something that can be reproduced for free, not even a real product, now that seems silly. and you ain't nevah gonna see this message, cuz i'm an anonymous coward that no one will dare to moderate. oh well.
It is obvious that as long as media corporations and infact any business continue to gain the co-operation of you and I (the consumer), they will continue to grow richer and more powerful. As they do, they will continue to use this wealth and political power by lobbying for legal change that suits them and only them in order to restrict what the consumer is able to have / do. The only way to prevent this is to turn our backs on them by refusing to use their products and sevices ( AOL, Disney etc. ) This should hurt revenues generated by these companies and they will eventually realise that the consumer IS more powerful than they are. Financially is the only way to hit these organisations.
This specific case is based on the concept that in the real world, if someone uses your premises for illegal activities you, as owner, are partly responsible for the illegal activities being carried out there.
Trying to use the same concept on the net leads to problems, but since those people (lawyers etc.) don't know any better (and there is lots of money at stake) they try to use the same old concepts....
It will take time for new sensible e-Laws to appear, until that time we might have to suffer with incredibly stupid decisions....
We seem to have two competing cultures at work here. The free, open-source internet and big corporate America. Somewhere in the fight both sides have lost sight of common sense. The internet was built free, it should stay free. Yes it creates great modes of delivery for files, music, movies, information, and even pornography, but it is a delivery format that invites easy copying. Corporate America should not put out products on the web that they don't want shared. Sell an individual a CD/disk copy of the product, permit the individual to use that copy on any machine that they use, permit that individual to give that CD/disk to any person they choose as long as they don't retain the original. Prosecute the individual who breaks the agreement/not the ISP or the whole net. Make it the responsibility of Corporate America to put time restrictions on files if registration doesn't take place and to put anti-copying codes into products.
On the other side of this, it is time for individual users on the net to take some responsibility for the heavy hand of corporate America. There are plenty of venues for the free exchange of ideas. If someone wants to offer their music, movies, code, or writings to the world for free they can. If they want to invoke protections, they should. We all know that if we download a commercial song, or book, or software and don't pay for it we are stealing. If we can operate a computer we can read the copyright notice and tell what protections the copyright holder invokes. (I admit they could sometimes be a little clearer as in 1) We own the copyright on this. 2) You should have paid us $???.?? if you are using this product. 3) Contact us at .... if you want to purchase this product.). Just because something can be done i.e. sending a copy of your favorite CD to all your fiends via e-mail, doesn't mean it should be done. Just because everyone is doing it doesn't make it right. We beg for a free internet and then do our best to abuse it, what do we expect from the law? I expect the freedom to debate in an open exchange. I expect to be able to qoute from works, not steal them. And I expect to have full use of any product I purchase.
If everyone does it, how can it be criminal? They can't jail EVERYBODY. The net is empowering people in this way.
really. and I guess if everyone believed that the earth was flat, then that would no longer be an incorrect thing to do.
your reasoning stinks.
What's wrong with being gay?
That might have been true when Jon Postal was (benignly) calling the shots but what happens when Janet Reno and Congress(for instance) is in charge?
1. You WILL migrate to IPv6.
2. You WILL participate in the Great IP Renumbering.
The Internet may be modeled as a cloud but it's not, really. The Internet backbone is 99.9% run by companies that have TRILLIONS of dollars of vested intrests to protect and will happily be good citizens and follow the law.
Can the rest of the world(internet) resist a US Congress fiat?
They act as a relay between the user and the target site. The target site think the user is the proxy server and has no way to know where the real user is. These can be easily set up *anywhere*. All they need is bandwidth. Will the MPAA/RIAA blocade the world?
Determining geographic location is totally out of the question. There are two ways this could be implemented, both of which don't work:
So what?
No matter how boneheaded iCrave "geographic filtering" software is, any attempt to get around it is an "attempt to circumvent", which is illegal under DMCA. So anybody who violates the TV copyright by watching in the US is already a criminal by virtue of getting the material in the first place.
This puts the onus right back where it belongs. If the MPAA wants to stop Americans from watching American TV on the Net, it can go after the American lawbreakers who are "circumventing" iCrave's protections.
Some corporations will try and break the internet up into malleable, controllable regions. Its inevitable, they have done it with DVD's, Music CDs, Software, Hardware, etc. For the most part it will probably work, the majority of consumers are sheep and will put up with it. But at some point there will be a consumer backlash (unrest is already growing) and the companies that trade as an international region by default will probably escape relatively unscathed. Those that do not will rush around trying to correct their greed driven mistake. Commercial resistance to the traditional internet model is inevitable. Who will win Greedy (and very rich) Corporations or The buying public - Remains to be seen. No sig. No account.
I'm curious as to how many senators and representatives in Congress truly understand the idea of the net...
I'm curious as to how many Americans truly understand the idea of the rest of the world :)
Umm... when you're 85 in a rest home you can still use Linux and do useful things. When you're dead you can't.
Better start suing a bunch of Canadian cable companies, its quite standard practice to do this over regular airwaves, which, no doubt can be recieved in the US.
It was a Canadian company, operating in Canada, under Canadian jurisdiction.Where did you learn logic? You seem to have it flawed.
You can't receive cable over the airwaves, that's why it's called cable. ;)
...Yeah, I have to agree with that part.
Yes, but most people are using ISPs, with either dynamic IPs or rented ones. Either way they can't do anything about this. There will probably be ways to trick their software, but if they can screen the regular users it's bad enough. Though if that is the case and this is some scheme for protecting digital content any tricks to go around it would then be in violation of DMCA, correct?
If that's what they're doing I don't see how they could patent it since the idea is pretty obvious to anyone who knows a little about Real Server and is familiar with Traceware. Of course you can patent anything, can't you...
The details are kind of fuzzy, but this is my recollection:
/. reader can fill us in.
.de, then they put up a separate server that complied with the German rules, and started sending all .de traffic to that server. I'm pretty sure it was done using a simple whois check of the originating IP address.
www.voyeurweb.com is a pron site that gets visitors from all over the world. About a year or so ago, Germany came out with a set of legal requirements for any pron site that wanted to show pron in Germany. I don't know what they were, but perhaps a helpful German
Voyeurweb didn't comply at the time, so for about a week or so, they stopped admitting viewers from
Was it possible, during this week of transition, for German users to find ways around the system to get to their precious voyeur pron? Yes, but that was their problem, and not Voyeurweb's, so no one did anything about it.
Hello,
I am a frequent basher of JonKatz. The second I saw this article, my first reaction was to fire off a comment on how flamingly gay, homoerotic, etc. he is. But then I stopped and thought about it.
It's kind of like that episode of the Simpsons, where Homer's baseball team makes it to some big championship, then Mr. Burns buys all these famous baseball players to play instead of the normal team. When Daryl Strawberry in on first base, Bart and Lisa chant "Daryl, Daryl," to mock him. Marge tells them to stop, "You'll hurt his feelings." They reply with "He doesn't care, he probably can't even hear us." But he did hear. A zoom in on his face reveals tears streaming down his face, clouded with anguish.
This, my friends, is the world of JonKatz. All he wants to do is play baseball, but he wasn't born a baseball player. He was born a soccer player. So when he comes to play baseball with us, some of us ridicule his homosexualness without considering his feelings. We figure that JonKatz never will read our posts of malice, that he will never feel the pain of knowing that even though he tries his hardest to help, people still bash him.
Well Jon, I apologize for myself and for all JonKatz bashers. You are not gay, nor do you accept throbbingnigg.. er.. nevermind.
Thanks for the good intentions.
Collectively, groups of individuals should dictate the terms of what is allowable for corporations to do Um, aren't corporations groups of individuals (shareholders) too? Granted, they are not all-inclusive organizations, but then, what is? Surely not governments--those are merely a minority of individuals claiming to speak for the rest. What groups of individuals are you referring to?
Wouhou !!! Now that's talking... &?%$ the US and their stupid superior way of thinking... Yeh I live in the states and therefore am better than others... *&?% THAT ! USA ARE NOT THE WAY TO GO !
'...Their coming to take you away, ha ha' stories are a bit stale but it is also true that the entertainment industry of America lost any claim to innovation about the time of the first talking movies substituting 'sue the bast--ds" ... for invention or, in the 'Mars' film, intelligence. But who is damaged, here? The entire subject area is a nub on a pimple, on a nano-wart. Jon's grandiose essay would send fear and trembling to the seat of God when his topic is access to "demented howls called music" and "boob tube blather". A tad of perspective. If the entertainment folks got everything their wormy little hearts and minds dreamed what would that really MEAN. To the net, that is. "FREEDOM", you cry. But one of the freedoms most cherished is the freedom from want which, it might be well argued, is just the freedom for a 'Best Boy' or a 'type actor' to whittle out a living which IS the subject ... along with everything else, in lawsuits as that against iCrave. newton fisher
In this particular case, iCrave was violating US laws in US jurisdiction, because their (re)broadcasts were accessable in the US. In other words, they were breaking US laws in the US.
If they were transmitting from canada (=server location) then how could they have broken US Law? They only did something that is allowed where they did it and that someone can access it from somewhere where the broadcasting is prohibited makes neither the broadcast nor the access illegal, unless the access is restricted too, but even in this case the violaters are the clients and not the broadcaster.
You simply have to make the DCMA work AGAINST the corporate community and get the to start funding court cases that will set a precedent of the DCMA being overturned by the courts. How do you do that? Easy. Post an origional image of your own creation on your web space (or a free web server) - make sure it has "copywrite 2000 (your name here)" on it. Then get a lawer to begin legal action against Microsoft for providing a product (Internet Explorer) that allows users to pirate your copyrighted material (That is, download pictures from your web site to their hard drive.) Microsoft will, of course, crush you in court, but in doing so will set a legal precedent AGAINST the viabillity of the DCMA which other DCMA defendants can use. Either that, or you'll win and get a huge sum of cash from Microsoft. Beautiful. Sue the Motion Picture Association also - they distribute movies on video tapes, tapes which could easily be used by people to PIRATE your (copywrited) home movies. If just 1% of slashdot readers start these kind of fuck-the-system lawsuits, the legislation will die a quick death in the hands of the courts. Just my $0.02
then the US should not let any of their copyrighted electromagnetic signals cross their borders. If there are electromagnetic fluctuations that intersect my antenna, and I run them through a cable to your house, what is illegal about that? Just because that cable is "virtual" it is not rebroadcasting, it is sending the signals in my airspace through a cable. In fact it is not even "sending" them since the cable is a continuation of my antenna (transmission line).
One way to do it would be to use something like the internet mapping project. Work out where all of Canada's int'l links are and put all the IP numbers inside of those links in a 'good ip' list, and those on the outside (outside of canada) as being a 'bad ip' list.
:-).
Proxies etc would get around it, but they'd be illegal under the DMCA most likely - they could be taken to court for rebroadcasting just like icravetv was (and it wouldn't be unreasonable for icravetv to limit 1 stream to each IP number either, so any rebroadcaster of multiple channels would need to get multiple IPs etc - not something one person on a home DSL/cable link is likely to be doing in a hurry - and even if they did just rebroadcast the single stream their DSL/cable connection isn't going to be able to support too many feeds anyway).
Finding all the candian-external links might be a bit of a hassle, but it'd probably be reasonably straight forward for 75%+ of IP numbers (and you can have secondary checks too - so if it hit mae west or an @home chicago hub or something then it'd know to cut off everything on that side of the link).
Perhaps parsing the whois data would be a 3rd mechanism for spotting national gateways that are missed with mechanism 1 & 2.
Maybe this wouldn't work in canada if lots of ISPs have cross border links going all over the place, but certainly in Australia you could probably block 90% of access with 10 gateway IPs (and probably 75% with three or four
As a 4th mechanism, you could have traceroutes follow the most common users. Then have a human look at them and work out which probably aren't canadian.
Even if lots of canadian ISPs had links only direct to the US, you could just work out where they link back into canada and enable that part of the global ip tree as being valid again (with the us/rest of the world parts still being invalid).
Some of those graphical traceroute apps do a decent job of mapping it across geographical area - I think you could probably get a geographical limiter going with 90% allowance accuracy and less than 25% rejection mistake accuracy going without too much trouble (automated, and then have a human or two check out the rest manually).
It seems that the case is becoming more and more that we have less to fear from the government than we do from US corporations. Obviously, the DMCA wasn't designed as an act to help the common man; if it had been, Gore probably would have already brought it up in one of his speeches. It was an act for corporations, by corporations.
Furthermore, Congress isn't the only one to help corporations in spite of the common man: it seems that current US patent and copyright law does a pretty fair job, too. Patented HTML code (1-Click shopping by Amazon) or the patent Katz describes (assume it's true for a moment) seriously limits what your common internet user can do, or post, on the net. Obviously, many patents and laws are meant to level the playing field for competing corporations but how long will it be before something like the DMCA is *really* thrown at a John Q. Collegestudent for having some MP3's.
Well, to get to the point, my proposal is this: why not get the FSF, or some other entity, to patent or copyright some really bad ideas, like 1-Click shopping, or the geographic screening patent that Katz described. This way, the internet community can exercise some control over what corporations can and can't do on the net, all without having to rely on Congress. Granted, I don't know any copyright law, really, but reverse-engineering the patent system would solve a lot of problems the net seems to be getting ready to encounter.
> Canadians are being held liable in their own country for American laws Well, recently a US federal judge declared that non-Americans *CAN* be prosecuted for "harming" Americans abroad. It has to do with the embassy bombings in Africa, however, I wouldn't be surprised if it were to be interpreted as meaning American well-being is worth more than the well-being of non-Americans.
>Of course, in the UK it's illegal in the same way to own equipment caperable of being used to decode television signals, such as a computer... DO YOU ACTUALLY LIVE IN THE UK??????? You dumb shit. A computer used as a Telly is perfectly legal if you have a TELEVISION LICENCE. Your not allowed anything that can receive a TV signal (including just having a video and no TV) without a TV LICENCE.
Throughout its history, the net treats censorship as damage and routes around it.
First thing that comes to my mind is Blame the good ol' US of A!
What option does a company like iCrave have. They are allowed distribute the stuff to Canadians, they try to do so, and when some Americans start tapping in, they get flogged for breaking American laws. Well, good on 'em for trying to keep giving Canadians what they want and are legally entitled to. Katz's article kind of points at iCrave for starting this whole geographic screening thing, the best place to point is at US copyright laws and Motion Picture/Music industries.
-loderunner
"Our true north strong and free" - O'Canada
How does this stop me from building a VPN between my computer and a friend's machine in Canada? Then I am on a "local network" behind a Canadian firewall. There's really no way to truly detect this kind of thing, there will always be ways around it.
At least if they do this, that means I can actually watch TV over the net.
WWJD? JWRTFM!!!
Or how about my work IP which has no reverse (we're strapped into a T1 from the ISP downstairs). This doesn't give us a reverse lookup which is no big deal 99% of the time until I swear up and down that I'm in canada but am still denied. I guess since I don't come up as a *.ca address I must be a middle east terrorist looking to use my 128bit netscape to send messages about [censored] the [censored]s [censored]. Hell, why don't I just talk about [censored]ing the [censored]!
:)
I think it would be more accurate to say that the american content companies have the right to stop it at the border. I don't think that means suing icrave, but it does mean being able to get law enforcement or someone else to prevent it from crossing into areas where the US is sovereign.
-Peter
== Just my opinion(s)
I think you are suggesting that traceroutes will give the information needed to give a server knowledge of a clients net.location?
Remeber that program that looks for traceroutes and sends back fake information? It's be easy to set up a daemon that looked for packets that would trigger an icmp time exceeded and interfere with it. Just make it look like the packet takes another 5 hops to canada - or wherever! The thing could be in the Democratic (hah!) Republic of Congo in 2 hops if you wanted it to look that way.
This idea is bunk against active deceit.
-Peter
== Just my opinion(s)
If you visit china you can return with a suitcase full of pirated dvd's. To me this substantiates the claim that css is ineffectual as a copy protection measure, since these DVD's can be played on any player. Unless you're running linux. Then you need DeCSS or a dxr2.
-Peter
== Just my opinion(s)
normal consumer DVD-ROM drives can not read that data without a hardware hack
Presumably you mean write; I don't understand how DeCSS would work, otherwise.
And I'm not sure you're right about the drives; I think it's the blank media which is designed to be prohibitive. Even if you are currently right, people protect CD software by reading past the 74th minute, but 80-minute CD burners are now the norm.
Hamish
"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something" - Plato
CSS is a copy protection scheme
You aren't making an argument, you're making a statement.
Sure, you can copy the bytes of a DVD without a decoder, but they aren't useable in that fashion.
My understanding of it is this: the movie is encrypted with a session key, and the session key is encrypted with five hundred or so licensee keys. Therefore the player, which has the (or the other half of the, I'm not sure which) licensee key, can decrypt the movie and send it to your screen.
If I copy the bytes of a DVD onto another DVD (for this I need to obtain a truly blank DVD, not the consumer version which has the keyspace burned with zeroes), I can play the copied DVD on my DVD player. This does not strike me as 'not usable in that fashion'.
Could someone with specific knowledge please arbitrate here?
Hamish
"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something" - Plato
I think the whole idea of caring where a Net user or server is located is lousy. The Net is not a logical extension of real space where political boundaries apply.
:)
You could squawk about how it's desirable to (theoretically, at least) be able to track down software pirates, criminals, script-kiddies, and pr0n mavens, but I like to believe that an increasing majority of Net users really don't have intentions like that. They want to communicate, learn stuff, and legitimately download things like Linux and Linux applications.
When he first announced that he wanted to discredit and intimidate the opposition, I nearly choked on my own stomach bile. His actions are in every respect consistent with the school of prissy thought that tends to reinforce the concept of collective guilt that is the root of all prejudice. I can't live with headlong uppity-types who increase people's stress and aggression. That proves that if Jon had done his homework, he'd know that he is a shoo-in for this year's awarding of "most dim-witted use of boosterism". What I am getting at is this: Of particular interest to me is the way that he continuously denies that he seems to have a bitter ideological conflict with my statement that the longer we delay action, the harder it will be to hammer out solutions on the anvil of discourse. It probably sounds like I'm being quasi-dirty, but Jon doesn't let a day pass without showing to the world that he is as little fitted to be trusted with liberty as thieves with keys or children with firearms.
Even so, his double standards are as incorrigible as they are an insult to human intelligence. Jon has no right to be here. How did he get so feral? I have my theories, but they're only speculation. At any rate, his canards are the direct result of a policy of abandonment and neglect.
What Jon does in private is none of my business. But when he tries to wage a clandestine guerilla war against many basic human rights, I object. Throughout human history, misguided losers have always been wretched. So it should come as no surprise that once one begins thinking about free speech, about raucous practitioners of commercialism who use ostracism and public opinion to prevent the airing of views contrary to their own duplicitous beliefs, one realizes that of all of his exaggerations and incorrect comparisons, one in particular stands out: "Jon is a model citizen." I don't know where he came up with this, but his statement is dead wrong. Like a lion after tasting the blood of human victims, he will inflict untold misery, suffering, and distress. Never before have I encountered more bloatedly self-important prose than that which Jon produces.
I have given this issue a great deal of thought, and I now have a strong conviction that I am highly critical of those who tolerate or apologize for people who work with Jon. Is it any wonder that he appears to have a problem with common sense and logic? His assumptions are matched in their untenability only by the arrogant fervor with which they are held. It should be stressed that Jon can out-reason pompous protestors but not anyone else. I unmistakeably feel that we should announce that we may need to picket, demonstrate, march, or strike to stop Jon before he can toss quaint concepts like decency, fairness, and rational debate out the window, and I have formalized my commitment to this high ideal by ensuring that I always burn away social illness, exploitation, and human suffering. Maoism can be deadly, but Jon's mottos are much worse.
I imagine that we ignore him at our own peril. It's quite sad that Jon chooses to squander his talent on this sort of rancorous autism. He wallows in his basest behavior. Of course, it's not quite that simple. I used to think that uneducated misfits were the most belligerent people on the planet, but now I know that revanchism can not and must not be tolerated. As stated earlier, if Jon continues to deprive individuals of the right to restore the world back to its original balance, I will decidedly be obliged to do something about him. And you know me: I never neglect my obligations.
His litanies are not an isolated case of jaded paternalism, but a typical example of how childish he can be. Why does hooliganism exist? What causes it? What is it about our society that makes grotesque Philistines like Jon desire to feature simplistic answers to complex problems? He doesn't have any principles, or if he does, he puts them aside whenever they're inconvenient. More prosaically, discrediting ideas by labeling them as lewd is an old tradition among his cronies. Jon's personal attacks are just a rhetorical ploy to get away from the obvious fact that the limitation and final abolition of fascism presuppose the elimination of innumerable preconditions.
I like to think I'm a reasonable person, but you just can't reason with beer-guzzling mouthpieces for self-deceiving antidisestablishmentarianism. It's been tried. They don't understand, they can't understand, they don't want to understand, and they will die without understanding why all we want is for them not to impose tremendous hardships on tens of thousands of decent, hard-working individuals. On balance, Jon's lackeys want so much to foster fetishism at every opportunity that the concept of right vs. wrong never comes up. Still, Jon is blinded by greed.
If nothing else, his witticisms are made of the same spirit that accounts for the majority of the problems we face in this world. Many experts now believe that it's time for Jon to stop his systematic assault on religious freedom. He has made a big mistake. Mark my words: we ought to teach Jon a lesson. It is quite common today to hear people express themselves as follows: "Jon's nerdy sentiments are a shout to the world that, in the coming days, Jon will put evil thoughts in our children's minds." One thing is certain: Conventional wisdom states that his henchmen are stampeding happily and mindlessly toward the precipice of condescending prudish unilateralism.
Many people are shocked when I tell them that his uncompromising assistants seem to think they can escape the consequences of their actions. And I'm shocked that so many people are shocked. You see, I had thought everybody already knew that if I withheld my feelings on this matter, I'd be no less inhumane than Jon. Others may disagree, but I think that I'm oversimplifying things a little here. Jon's helpers, when they are taken seriously at all, are considered by most scholars to be of questionable credibility. In case you don't know, I am making a pretty serious accusation here. I am accusing Jon of planning to blame those who have no power to change the current direction of events. And I don't want anyone to think that I am basing my accusation only on the fact that it doesn't do us much good to become angry and wave our arms and shout about the evils of his wisecracks in general terms. If we want other people to agree with us and join forces with us, then we must disabuse him of the notion that it's okay for him to indulge his every whim and lust without regard for anyone else or for society as a whole. What I had wanted for this letter was to write an analysis of Jon Katz's memoirs. Not a exhortation or a shrill denunciation, but an analysis. I hope I have succeeded at that.
pronoblem
In the past I naively thought that all corporate CEOs, like myself, believed in free markets, without interference from government. However, some of them wish to use the power of the state for their own short term material gain. These are the people that commonly bribe congress to harass a competitor of theirs or to pass regulations that infringe of the basic freedoms of consumers. These people would like to legislate that everyone by law has to give them several thousand dollars a year. In effect, they want a share of the government's power and they are willing to pay for it.
I agree with you, that this is harmful to society. In the long run I believe this sort of behavior will be harmful for corporations as well. Only with the freedom to choose can our economy and society truly progress. A great article explaining why Silicon Valley should not normalize relations with Washington D.C. is available at Cato's website. I think we may have disagreements on the exact source of the evil. I don't feel that corporations, or any free associations of man, are inherently evil. It is these free associations which allow us to cooperative and progress as a species. Evil comes when individuals or groups of individuals acting in concert decide to use force to achieve their aims. At this point they infringe upon the right of others to live in a world free from violence where they can pursue their own aims. Therefore corporations, recording associations, etc. are not inherently evil. They are just free associations of man. Some individuals within these organizations are seeking to use force to gain what they desire.
If these ideas interest you you might want to check out some libertarian web sites.
Stuart Eichert
Stuart Eichert
It's always been like that in the TV industry. They're just extending their grip on the internet. The idea is that each market has their turf and they are not about to let go.
Take the satellite TV for example. For those of us who want to get French TV we can either get one station with Dish for $12.95 or over a dozen on the gray market for about $10, doing what the Canadians do to get US TV.
And the station that is offered is boring as hell. I asked Dish and they said the FCC doesn't allow them to provide the service from ExpressVu.
ExpressVu is their Canadian company which is partly owned by Bell.
Now that I can't get Channel 25 I'm pissed!
Anyone know a back door to get the station?
bbcat
When I worked in Montréal in early 90s I saw all those long lines of canucks at the consulate trying to get a visa to come and live in the greatest country in the world.
bbcat
That's not what he's doing at all. Where on earth do you get that impression? He only mentions Canada three times in the entire, and then mainly to identify the geographic location of the company involved. The one time he mentions Canadian law, he says that it's freer than American law.
The scary thing is you uttered this utter stupidity and were moderated up to a 5. What kind of stupid people moderate Slashdot. This is utterly ridiculous.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
There is a need for this type of restricition. Different countries have different laws. And the only way (that I can see at the moment) to enforce these laws over the internet will be to restrict people from different countries from participating in things that are illegal in their country, but legal in another.
These restrictions will also make possible the application of taxes on internet sales transactions. It will also make it possible to pay for purchases in your own currency. For example, (because of the difference between the Candaian and the US dollar) it would be possible for a Canadian online store to charge Canadian consumers in Canadian funds, and US consumers in US currency.
And as always, there will be those that find ways to circumvent these restrictions. That is the way of the internet.
Unlikely. Given that the extradition process for felony criminal cases is so complex and politically motivated (Israel won't extradite, period), I can't see anyone accepting the civil judgements of a foreign court.
Imagine all the corruption there could be -- some banana republic "wins" a bunch of "judgements" against Bill Gates and then goes to the US Governemnt demanding that they enforce their US$5 billion judgement against him.
I think you just run the risk of getting nabbed when you enter foreign soil, and even this depends on how hooked in the immigration people are with the judiciary.
I've often wondered what happened in these situations. I suppose that if a person managed to win, in US Federal court, a civil action against a foreigner and the court ordered the foreigner to pursue some course of action, and they failed to do so, they might be found in contempt. Does this put them on an INS watch list? Or do you have to be a real bad guy to get put on the watch list, like bombing an airplane or soemthing?
what a great idea!
"Tension is the great integrity" -- R. Buckminster Fuller
I may be off base on this but..
Lets say I'm a musician that has released a cd. It is fully copywrited to me and such. What is preventing me from then suing the manufactures of CDR devices, on the grounds that they make a device that has only one purpose (to make perfect digital copies of a cd so it can be played back later on a different device), and that one purpose can obviously be used to infringe on my copywrite. Or perhaps I should sue Adaptec for making the EasyCD software package, which even includes a CDCopier program! Its designed to copy cds, why does this not fall under the DMCA?
I can understand that video tape may not be included since they will degrade with copies, but CDR's do not suffer the same problem. What keeps the major cd-r manufacturers safe?
A bit OT, but as I recall, the main reason they were able to enforce it in the first place was that iCraveTV, while being located mostly in Canada, was actually based out of Michigan (or something to that effect). At least, their mailing address was Michigan, as I recall.
---
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
However, more and more people who circumvent this "damage" are no longer damamge control experts, but criminals.
:-)
Well, if I was arguing, I would argue thusly:
If everyone does it, how can it be criminal? They can't jail EVERYBODY. The net is empowering people in this way.
a) An illegal activity is widespread, easy, and most people think nothing of it.
b) You can't trace most of the illegal activity due to it's very nature, at least not without an infrastructure in place that makes "1984" and "Big Brother" look like some guy in his backyard with cheap plastic kiddy binoculars.
c) Yes, if everyone jumped off a cliff, you would too. You know it, I know it. The community as a whole determines right and wrong for that community. In this case, the community is the world. There is no universal standard of ethics, morals, or anything else. Everything is relative.
d) You can always "throw the bums out". Whether this is peaceful (as in voting them out) or not (as in bloody revolution) is immaterial. If enough people get riled up enough, change occurs. There is no stopping it. There is no holding it back. At least, not without killing the dissenting parties as they arise, which is a shocking blow to the rest to the peepul (sic)...
Conclusion: at some point, the teaming masses of humanity will not take it anymore, and throw the bums out. You cannot continually remove a man's freedoms and expect him not to react. Everyone has their breaking point. So does a society. Things balance out.
Ah well. I'm ranting again.
---
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
<who had a Norwegian teenager thrown in jail a few months ago
Have I missed something, or is jk just forgetting to check his facts again? AFAIK, jj was arrested, but not jailed....
Laws like the DMCA make almost everyone a criminal, and this makes things easier for the Powers That Be. If you rock the boat, they are almost certain to have something on you if they look closely enough. If they have a court order to search your harddrive (and just about anyone's harddrive on the planet) they will find something to peg you for. Laws like this help those who want to disempower the individual.
Being uncool is liberating
It's Flapping, not floppy. The line goes "With all their beady little eyes, their flapping heads so full of lies".
If you're going to quote something, at least get it right.
"Grab them by the pussy" -- President of the United States of America
Quoth Katz: ``Under the law, anyone who makes, sells or uses a device -- software, hardware, or a computer -- that makes copyright circumvention possible is engaging in a criminal act. This is the reason downloading free music and sharing Napster sites had been curtailed on college campuses in recent weeks.''
Bzzt, wrong. For many (most?) of the colleges who banned Napster, the reason was network bandwidth, pure and simple. When a single program ends up taking half to three fourths of the available network bandwidth, performance of other network applications suffers noticeably. Ergo, the application gets banned. (And here at Brown, the ban resulted a sudden and substantial improvement of network performance that I noticed and commented on before even being aware of the reason.)
Of course, if this net hog were some vital academic application, then the computer services departments might work out some other solution; because mp3 trading is illegal, they aren't going to bust their butts to reinstate service. But it should be very clear that its illegality was not in most places the reasons for it being banned.
``This, too, shall pass.'' ---Eastern proverb
How long do you think it will be before we can all have properly operational players the read the whole disks like the unauthorized copiers
.VOB files over IRC. The pirates in Asia a fixed thing, they only produce X amount of fakes. But the other kind is limitless, and, until DeCSS came out practically impossible (how many Skript Kiddiz do you know who own DVD pressing plants?). There was always methods to get the video, but until DeCSS they required huge amounts of hard drive space and moderately expensive equipment (mpeg encoder cards, etc).
We are talking about the real world here, right now, right here in the US. A device like what you are describing would absolutely be illegal under the DMCA. Unlike DeCSS, it would have no purpose other then to copy copy-protected disks. The DMCA never said that the copy protection system had to work, all it asks is that it's there.
So, in answer to your question, probably never (can you think of a legitimate use of such a device other then for copying DVDs?)
What you have to keep in mind here is that there are two kinds of piracy here, big piracy shops in Asia, and kids trading
Now, I'm not going to lie about this, I know that copying the analog signal off of a DVD player into a computer was certainly possible with 'pro-sumer' gear, but that would take a lot more time and effort then it would require. I agree that CSS is a terrible copy protection scheme but it would be much better if there were no DeCSS And, that is exactly what the MPAA is trying to do
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
both in mainland China and Tibet
Tibet is in Mainland China, fool... and your reading of American history, while patriotic, is certainly not accurate. Only about 30% of the people in the Colonies wanted separation, another 30% wanted to stay with the UK, and the rest didn't care.
We the People outnumber Them, the Leashholders by about, ohhh, a million to one...
Actually, its more like 2:1, or even 1:1... about half of the American population owns stock in major Corporations.
Actually, when you think about it, the same people you just decried were responsible for the American Revolution. The rich land owners, and media controlling, founders. Of course, they were pretty idealistic, but the major reason for the revolt was so that they (a long with other people) would get more money.
And don't hold all the founding fathers up on such a high moral plane. The initial federalist government actually passed (before the bill of rights was ratified) Sedition laws stating you couldn't say or print anything 'anti-government'. In fact, the original bill of rights contained 21 provisions, only 13 or so was passed (That's why there amendments), and a lot of people in the early government were against them.
No matter what you do, in human society, only a very few people can be 'completely free', everyone has to give up some freedom to the system to make it work (whether the system is an ethical one is another issue). And, if you look at human history (all of it, including china, etc) You will see that unless things are really bad, people just don't give a damn.
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
I still say that JK's use of the word 'firewall' is backwards, especially after his implied comparison with China.
That's beacuse your stupid.
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Finally someone who speaks the truth... The sad thing is, most people don't even know what the truth is, and would rather believe whatever goes along with whatever ideology they support. Quite sad. I've really learned a lot about human nature from DeCSS related slashdot stories...
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Wrong, it does. It is part of SCMS (Serial Copy Management System), used also in DAT machines.
"CD"s do not use SCMS, only audio-only CD-recorders... a device that kills SCMS on one of those would DMCA bait, but on regular computers with CD-Rs you can copy away without fear...
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
CSS no more protects against copying than writing a message in code prevents it from being photocopied.
Um... if you photocopy a coded message, you still have nothing. Without the decryption keys, you have nothing. Without DeCSS all you have is a huge, useless, glob of data. You have nothing. With DeCSS you have copied a MOVIE. The MPAA doesn't care if you pirate huge, useless globs of data, they care about people pirating movies.
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
If I copy the bytes of a DVD onto another DVD (for this I need to obtain a truly blank DVD, not the consumer version which has the keyspace burned with zeroes),
Well, that's a pretty big if, because normal consumer DVD-ROM drives can not read that data without a hardware hack. With DeCSS, you don't need to. To pirate DVD's you need hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment, or a Copy of DeCSS. You see why the MPAA wants to stop it?
Now, I'm not saying that DeCSS's only use is to copy DVDs, but it does give that ability to just about anyone.
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
If you visit china you can return with a suitcase full of pirated dvd's
Last I checked, Round-trip to china was like $10,000... Hardly a value proposition.
Anyway, CSS was never supposed to stop massive linear piracy from a single source, but exponential piracy (Ie, I email it to you, you email it to your friends, etc, etc)
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
YES the DVD copy is usable, exactly as usable as the original. It is, after all, a copy. You still need a decoder to play it. In what way has CSS protected against this making of a totally usable copy? CSS is an access protection system.
NO, NO, NO! it is NOT usable, not in any way. If you copy a DVD without the key data, it cannot ever be decrypted (unless you brute force it, by using DeCSS). You CAN'T Play it in a windows player or whatever.
. A copy means, in this case, another DVD disc with the same data as the first.
When you copy using consumer DVD-ROM you DO NOT have a perfect copy of the DVD disk, you do not have the keys that are required to decrypt the DVD.
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
doesn't every single DVD player need to circumvent the copy protection in order for the video to be viewable
.VOB file that could be used only on there players. Of course, they do have raw output, but not as a .VOB file (so you'd lose a lot of the DVD goodies)
No, they only need to decrypt one copy session key, the one for that player. Not all of them, so they don't copy the entire DVD. The data they get off could be used to create a
All software DVD players produce decrypted output that can be intercepted and used for the purpose of piracy. Not just DeCSS.
Yes, but DeCSS just makes it a lot easier, and, according to the MPAA, it's primary use is to bypass encryption. I don't agree with them on this, but it does make whole DVD copying much easier.
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
I'm sorry, by DVD-ROM I ment the drives that you stick in your computer to play DVD disks DVD-ROM Drives. Consumer DVD-ROM drives you buy on the market do not let you read all of the data on the disk, therefor, you cannot copy the entire DVD (encrypted movie + decryption keys) onto anything at all. understand now?
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Nope, the drives themselves. I belive what the DeCSS guys did was brute force a bunch of player keys, and then use those... Also, aperantly the CSS encryption was so weak that it could be broken in 2^24th tries, or in practicaly real time. So no valied player keys were needed. Just read one of the session keys, brut-force decrypt it, and then use that decrypted key to decrypt the movie.
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
It's exactly as useful as the original disk. Assuming I can duplicate the physical copy protection scheme
.VOB files = (encrypted data) = useless.
.VOB files = (decrypted data) = useful Understand? Sure, its physically possible to duplicate the whole physical disk in one shot, That's what the piracy shops in Taiwan and HK do. But you can't do it with your home computer. The DVD-ROM drives (and I'm talking about the readers, not the writers, you can't even read the key space off the disk under normal operation, and you can only read one of the encrypted session keys to watch a movie, not all of them) they sell won't let you do it.
No, its not. Let me make this simple
Original disk = (encrypted data + decryption keys) = useful
Copied
DeCSS'd
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Strictly speaking you are correct. Under the DCMA, DeCSS is illegal because its *only* use is to circumvent a copy-protection scheme.
Here's where it gets interesting. Had JJ bundled DeCSS with a playback program, the whole bundle would have been legal. Would that have stopped the MPAA from harrassing him? Of course not. They would have pointed out that DeCSS was in a separate module, or in a separate function, or something, and got him on that.
Why is the MPAA so angry about DeCSS? DVD-CAA is clearly pissed because now anyone can build a DVD player without paying their extortionate licensing fees. But the MPAA plays a longer game. They want to charge pay-per-view even for media you buy (a la Divx). Want to bet those closed-source Win & Mac DVD players don't have any back doors in them?
<long_ramble>
Has any thought been given to siccing Janet Reno on the MPAA/DVD-CCA? They are a legal monopoly, and appear to be engaged in bundling. Yes, you can by the DVD player, yes you can buy the DVD. But unless you also buy the Windows or Mac OS you can't use them (you can't even write your own because they'll sue you).
</long_ramble>
It took me 90 minutes to write this comment (lunch got in the way). I guess there goes my chance of being first.
--
E_NOSIG
People dialing in from Toronto actually get an IP address down in the US. Now how would they actually know these people are in Canada?!
There are bound to be exceptions in this, as in everything. Just like it's possible for people in America to call an ISP in Mexico and thus make Swedish servers think they're not in the US. But then again... there is that Echelon thing... Of course, that's the government's and they'd never do anything to try to control our net access, would they?
"The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness."
now what do you think of the inventor?
The same thing I thought of him before... heh. See, Edison did do some amazing things, and had some pretty cool and useful inventions; the light bulb, the phonograph, moving pictures, etc. But he was also very egotistical and kind of a jerk about it. His efforts to destroy A/C and Tesla were nothing short of pure evil, motivated only by his need to be the most important person alive. Thanks for reminding me of that...
"The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness."
Well; semantics. :) I'll concede the point...
"The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness."
Certainly you are angry, even fighting mad. But violence is certainly not the answer.
Damn right. I abhor violence. Physical attacks are the most reprehensible thing humans do to each other. Wars, gang violence, shootings in high schools and churches... all of it sickens me to my core. I choose the route Gandhi chose: passive resistance. And, like him, I can't do a thing about it on my own. So, I either turn into a James Bond villain, or thousands of followers band together and passively resist with me...
I don't like the sound of it, of course. It'll be painful. But so are all births.
"The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness."
my route could easily go Toronto ISP - Toronto telco hub - Chicago telco hub - Minneapolis - Winnipeg.
...which is why each hop on the traceroute would be looked up. It sees "Okay; there's a Canada->US hop" and then later on, "Okay; there's a US->Canada hop"... and so on and so on. At the end of its analysis, no matter how many borders it crosses, it will know the start and end points.
"The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness."
I'm not sure which part of this scares me the most. The net becoming a "Balkanized" culture or how much this would add to Big Brother is watching.
The real question is how would this "new technology" be implemented. If it is used to provide people with geographical specific content then hey great. If it is used to chop up the net into little serfdoms then hey very evil.
I like the part where they have taken out a patent on the technology. Maybe this is one place where patents be usefull by keeping a potentialy armfull technology contained in one sector.
Predestination was doomed from the start.
if for example China doesn't respect software copyright laws, then it's totally allowable for companies in China to copy, repackage, and resell software made, trademarked, and copyrighted in the US?
.. and what if these companies in china decide to sell the software in the US at a cheaper price than the original author of the software's price?
Yes, it's their land, their law, their "right". I think that's pretty self-explanatory.
Now they cross the line, specifically the line affectionately known as the U.S. border. Now they have to play by our rules, and under the scenario you have setup, they would be breaking those rules, and be subject to the consequences (unless diplomatic immunity comes into play)
Now, to move this to the Canadian environment, WHERE IT'S LEGAL TO REBROADCAST TV SIGNALS GIVEN THAT YOU DON'T CHANGE THE CONTENT. Now the specific wording (not included here) is very important as this was a case for law. I'm not sure if you were familar with iCrave's service, but basically they put a full rebroadcast signal in a little window and then put a banner ad on top of the page. To put it in Internet terms, it would be like have a frame at the top a page with a banner and the rest of the page filled with a frame of outside content.
Unfortunately iCrave didn't have the money to fight this to the bitter end and capitulated to the massive pressure applied by every big money copyright holder in the U.S., hoping to do something different in the future. What pisses me off is that the guy started on this idea less than a year ago, it would be TRIVIAL for TV stations to rebroadcast their stuff on the 'Net. Why aren't they?
--
ba-bu-ba-ba-baaa, da-da-dum. Re-boot the ser-ver.
ba-bu-ba-ba-baaa, da-da-dum. Re-boot the ser-ver.
+&x
this sigs for you. Go read some Canadian law if can put down the pipe long enough.
--
ba-bu-ba-ba-baaa, da-da-dum. Re-boot the ser-ver.
ba-bu-ba-ba-baaa, da-da-dum. Re-boot the ser-ver.
+&x
Regardless of how effective it is, for years Netscape used (still does?) some sort of DNS/Whois combination to determine location when downloading 128 bit versions of Navigator.
And so they should, drive-by dialups are a real problem there ;-)
Wow, Jon. I'm normally a fan of your don't-tread-on-me stuff... Despite technical inaccuracies and slippery-slope arguments, they usually contain a modicum of truth. But WOW are you ever missing the point.
While you do cover one of the important issues, how much the DMCA sucks for anyone who's interested in doing more than simply owning an article of US-produced media (like, say, watching it), I think you're really off base with this iCraveTV thing.
The geographical filter thingy is not an attempt to Balkanize the net... If anyone's sensitive to that, it's us Canucks (Parlez-Vous Francais?). What it is, in fact, is a very small legal shield for media distributors and redistributors to cower behind to avoid the broad and horrible swing of the Big Club (DMCA) that US corporatists are swinging at them.
"Look! Look! If this upsets you, then we'll only show it on Tuesdays! In the Dark! In the third sub-basement behind a door labelled 'beware of the panther'". Anything to shake off the litigation for a while.
What the filtering software represents (and keep in mind that it may not exist... these are ultimately TV execs making the claim here) is an distant-early-warning of coming changes being forced by the DMCA. As it becomes more of a frustration for the rest of the net, the US will slowly be isolated to avoid legal skirmishes like this. Like a child that doesn't play well with others, or a Cancer being forced into a benign state. It's a classic "a few bad apples" problem.
Hey all you lawyers out there: Isn't a country with an extradition treaty with the US required, to one extent or another, to worry about this sort of copyright violation? I know not these things.
Just my 2 cents ($0.012 USD).
You can't receive cable over the airwaves, that's why it's called cable. ;)
They rebroadcast any channels they can get over the airwaves over their cable networks, including US ones. This is why this law was written, to allow rural places to also have cable from rural cable companies.
Not only this, sometimes they get broadcasts from other cable companies which have rebroadcast channels they recieved.
Is the MPAA and the US Broadcasters Assoc going to sue all these little rural canadian cable co's now for rebroadcasting "their" signals?
-- iCEBaLM
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
I completely support iCravetv.com in this case, since what they are doing is legal in Canada under CRTC guidelines, but not the US.
If Americans want an internet with more personal rights and freedoms than corperate ones, they'll have to fight for it. Unfortunately the global reach of your laws means that we have to segment these divisions to keep the rights that our national laws give us. Even if iCrave could have won the case (which I doubt, not because of the validity, but because of a clueless American legal and patent system) the lawyers could shut them down regardless of 'right and wrong'.
Technically that's correct... But the DMCA is just the American incarnation of the WIPO treaty, which Norway (and basically everybody else) has signed. All the nations participating in the treaty are obligated to adopt their own DMCA, whatever they choose to call it. Presumably Norway has done so.
The US is currently violating at least one treaty, specifically the Hague Convention on International Child Abduction. For no better reason than disliking a certain head of state. How popular is Clinton (or for that matter Gore and Bush) in Norway.
I've often wondered what happened in these situations. I suppose that if a person managed to win, in US Federal court, a civil action against a
foreigner and the court ordered the foreigner to pursue some course of action, and they failed to do so, they might be found in contempt.</I><BR>
<BR>
Conversely would the US accept a judgment against a US citizen from a court outside the US? (Maybe in The Hague or Berne which technically <B>did</B> have juristiction.)
Why they didn't contest this is beyond me, why they even bothered to show up in that PA courtroom is also beyond me. The US has no jurisdiction over Canadian businesses, period.
Why should the "defendant" even have to bother showing up in such cases. The person at fault here is surely the Judge
this content was produced in the US and copyrighted in the US. Whether it's rebroadcast in canada or anywhere else should not matter. That is of course if the company respects copyright law.
AFAIK the copyright law which matters is that relevent to where the activity takes place. Probably the reason, a while ago, certain books could not be sold in the US (at all).
But remember; it isn't the geographic location of the client machine that concerns them; it's what country it's in... and while an exact location would be almost impossible to determine, a route to that machine is always available.
Except that geographical location is irrelevent here. i.e. a Canadian airliner flying over Washington or a Canadian ship on the Potomac are still "in Canada".
Not only do you need a "truly blank dvd", you also need special hardware to write to the "truly blank dvd". Or at least that is how I understand the situation, I could be mistaken.
The "special hardware" is called a DVD fabrication plant. Nothing to stop organised pirates making the appropriate payments for people to look the other way.
How is this situation handled in the realm of broadcasting, or telephony? If I setup a TV station in Montreal, which broadcasts into the US something that is legal in Canada, but not in the US, where was a crime commited?
Simple answer, you'd still be comitting a crime in Canada. Since you'd be using Canadian land for your transmitter. The only possible loophole would be to use a US flagged aircraft or boat.
Geographic Screening could be the worst idea to come along in software development since copy protected floppy disks. Not only will it not work
Like many things its a tool, which can be put to both good and bad uses.
I second that motion!
Yes, but when you live next to a 400 lb
:)
gorilla you listen when it roars.
America == Gorilla. Seem rather apt somehow
--Nothing Funny Here.
There's a good case to be made there. What if iCrave had just put an opening page in front of everything else with two links, the same on your standard porn site w/ a modification, "I live in Canada" and "I don't live in Canada". Then they could use the precedent that all the porn sites out there have already set...
Daemon
I didn't know you could give a topic to the web-based sociology paper generator... :)
Sponge
For all the legal attempts to restrict network content to a balkanized area, the internet will continue to be free. It is simply not feasible to add enough filters to the interconnect points to effectively control all routes in and out of a country. All it takes is a few people close to the border with wireless routing equipment and an urge to "live on the edge". An alternate solutions (albeit slower) would be to simply dial up into the other country and create a router.
Then when someone has some free time, they will inevitably develop some selective routing software in the genre of napster the allows cross border hopping to those with the software.
We will not be silenced or restriced!
Amen! I was asking myself the same question. While I may reside in America and be subject to the laws the Congress passes how does a Canadian company get threatened by an American law? It makes no sense. Notice of course I didn't say my Congress because I don't own a major corporation and/or am a part of a "public" interest group.
And here is what IETF is discussing now: http://www. ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-polk-slp-loc-auth-s erver-00.txt. It is a draft of RFC to deal with the geographic location of an IP device. The asbtract is here:
This document describes the early considerations for a Spatial Location Server and issues that will need to be addressed when an IP Device that has determined its location (TBD in another document effort) requests, or is requested, to provide that information to a Spatial Location Server (SLS). Just think of spatial location capabilities embedded into all Internet devices. Of course, the main purpose of the specification is to provide locational information for 911 services and similar. However with this capability it will become possible to do marketing at the granularity of 1 SQUARE FEET of the Earth surface (several years from now). Actually authors mention possibilities of the misuse of the protocol.I really don't care if some site decides that I am not allowed to see their web-site because I am an American, or am more than 5' tall, or have an e in my name. It is their right to say I can't see their stuff. The fact that iCrave wants to patent the country-restriction technology is totally unimportant to me.
The argument that being able to limit based on country can balkanize the internet is irrelevant. It is the same as saying that owning a knife could lead to stabbing every human being on earth and so should be outlawed. The existence and/or patenting of the technology is not the issue.
The issue is if the government tries to make it mandatory. If I have the option to limit my web-site to only people in Zimbabwe, that is a good thing. It gives me more freedom to do what I want with what I create. If the government makes me limit my web-site to US only, then I have a problem with it. But nothing in this article makes me think that is going to happen. If it does happen we should fight that, not a technology that makes it theoretically possible.
- KGB Nth post, where N is a number between 1 and the total number of posts.
First of all, copyright itself is international law. Ever hear of the Berne Convention?
Second, Katz is completely off-base. DMCA has nothing to do with what happened to iCrave-TV.
Third, let's just admit it. Napster is software for very transparently getting MP3s from various servers around the world, and trading them with people you're chatting with. In other words, for getting MP3s of songs off CDs you didn't pay for. This was illegal long before DMCA or MP3s. The trade of pirated MP3s has been illegal since it started, not recently made illegal.
And fourth, it's clear you've never created music, writing, or anything else as a living. I've yet to meet published writers, musicians, etc. who don't have a big problem with people enjoying and trading their works without them getting paid.
The lawyers get paid anyway.
Our secret is gamma-irradiated cow manure
Mitsubishi ad
We apologize for the inconvenience.
Or, look at it another way. This vaporware network would be a pseudo intranet within the Internet, just as my firewalled company network is.
I'm not saying that these powers couldn't be used for evil instead of good; nor am I defending the MPAA. But until we have some sort of cultural upheval and the capitalist system is replaced by something else (!!!), we're gonna always have fish like this to fry. I just think there are probably bigger ones at the present time. :)
-Omar
Shouldn't Canadians be complaining about the greedy, corrupt, freedom-stealing Americans?
I do. All the time. And for a new reason every so often. Anyone remember Helms-Burton?
Intolerant people should be shot.
Yeeaaah, OooooK... That's kindof like saying that Americans shouldn't be engaging in for profit health care because it's illegal in Canada, and they should respect our laws.
Intolerant people should be shot.
It really irks me to see people even trying to file a patent for this kind of crap.
Fair enough. This takes into account the Canadian users who are not using a US-based multinational ISP (e.g. AOL Canada, whose dial-up users show as originating from the US, most obvious example but not the only one), or not using a US-based proxy (home.com users under some circumstances), or whose route does not go through routers which do not provide complete information for the sake of a traceroute.
I just can't see reliability of such a scheme being acceptable for the purposes they are proposing.
Not at all surprising. I have done traceroutes from Vancouver BC to other sites in Vancouver BC that yield similar results. Most routes go at least to Seattle, some to Portland, some to California, to access servers physically located a short walk away. Given the topology of Canadian networks, this turns out to be the "shortest" route. Go figure.
As far as I know (not much) in some parts of Asia (I think the newspaper article said Indonesia) modems have to be registered with the state, an unregistered modem is punishable with jail time.
Ok, two ideas on some things that could be done...
1. Stop supporting and selling computer products to them. (RIAA, MPAA etc or even secondary firms)
2. Take your Server for a 12.5 mile 365 day/year sailing trip.(Where is my account from again?)
I say cut em' off, they dont need computers or programmers they have Lawyers. Mind you I do want to watch them issue a restraing order to their CPU for BSOD'ing on or about march 3rd.
Uhhh... They were rebroadcasting American TV. There's nothing but mega-media controlled crap on TV. You hate the mega-media. I hate the mega-media. Let the DCMA do us a favor and keep the Canadians away from that mind-numbing drivel.
Personally, I hope more open content or open publication projects take off. The DCMA can't control my ideas. I'm planning on putting out as much of my creativity as possible under those licences soon. Hopefully more people will follow suit. I'd rather other people enjoy my work rather than have it waste away while I try to get it published. Anything the internet community puts out certainly can't be any worse than what comes from the mega-medias.
"I am not a number! I am a free man!"-- The Prisoner
How 'bout another tack, like requiring a CC # with a Canadian billing address?
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
So you've nothing against, say, a t'baccy company conspiring to smuggle cigs into Canada to avoid Canadian trade regs? After all, if the company's a US company, they don't have to obey Canadian law, right?
'sides, if memory serves, ICraveTV.com has a business presence in Pittsburgh, PA. It's not entirely a Canadian operation.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Nope. Read the Act; Mr. Katz appears to be grossly and willfully misrepresenting it here.
Section 1201(2) should be of interest to you. Your CD player was not designed primarily for bypassing copyright protection; it has commercial value beyond such; and it was not distributed with that intent.
Now, if you feel that your brain's primary purpose is to join Mr. Katz's quest of free MP3s for all, that's your problem.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Sorry that is incorrect.
Here is the definition of firewall:
Courtesy of dictionary.com
firewall n.
1.A fireproof wall used as a barrier to prevent the spread of fire.
2.Computer Science. Any of a number of security schemes that prevent unauthorized users from gaining access to a computer network or that monitor transfers of information to and from the network.
Courtesy of Merriam-Webster /'fIr-"wol/ : a computer or computer software that prevents unauthorized access to private data (as on a company's local area network or intranet) by outside computer users (as of the Internet)
Main Entry: fire wall
Function: noun
Date: 1759
1 : a wall constructed to prevent the spread of fire
2 usually firewall
What Icrave.com was talking about would most likely be software. That seems to fit the definition perfectly. What you are looking at is the underlying technology that would enable a firewall to work on a regional basis. That alone would not necessarily fit the definition.
Every increase in technology can be misused. I won't argue that. But I swear Jon, you're becoming a luddite, and I really have to question the need for a luddite on a board that advertises itself as "News for Nerds".
Are you saying that differing viewpoints are not welcome? The topic was about technology patents. Jon just added his opinion to the report to start off the conversation. (for better or worse)
penguinicide... when jumping out a window just won't do.
"What pisses me off is that the guy started on this idea less than a year ago, it would be TRIVIAL for TV stations to rebroadcast their stuff on the 'Net. Why aren't they? "
probably for the reason why they went after iCrave. Because if they're broadcasting on the net, then someone could just rap their content that they're broadcasting in a frameset just like you mentioned and make advertising revenue off of their content.
"if for example China doesn't respect software copyright laws, then it's totally allowable for companies in China to copy, repackage, and resell software made, trademarked, and copyrighted in the US?
Yes, it's their land, their law, their "right". I think that's pretty self-explanatory. "
So then it should also be the right of the software company or in this case broadcasting company to make sure that their product is not viewable, useable, etc in the country that doesn't respect their copyright, correct? and if someone attempts to get around this technology, then the company in question should have the right to prosecute to the fullest extent of the law to protect their copyright.
this content was produced in the US and copyrighted in the US. Whether it's rebroadcast in canada or anywhere else should not matter. That is of course if the company respects copyright law.
Whether it's television programming or software, it's still pirating someone else's property.
I agree, but I think you're forgetting to mention a key point.
What iCrave did was illegal in all senses of the word. They rebroadcast original content without getting the permission of the copyright holder. That's illegal in all countries that respect copyright law as it stands today, whether it's digital or not.
It's plagiarism, it's covered under the FBI warning on videos, it's covered whenever Fox Sports broadcasts a sporting even and clearly states "not for rebroadcasting without the explicit consent of Fox Tv"
Mr. Katz, if you're trying to prove a point about loss of freedom, fine. Stop trying to make an illegal act justified by your twisted logic.
so under your reasoning, if for example China doesn't respect software copyright laws, then it's totally allowable for companies in China to copy, repackage, and resell software made, trademarked, and copyrighted in the US? and we shouldn't do anything about this because chinese law permits it? and what if these companies in china decide to sell the software in the US at a cheaper price than the original author of the software's price? I suppose this is good business because it's good for the consumer (lower prices are the best answer of course, irregardless of the future of the company losing profits and revenue)
1. the broadcast material was copyrighted material, and should be treated as the product of the companies producing it. same as we'd treat software.
2. these companies make their money selling advertising between broadcasts. they are also liable for their broadcast.
3. if a company takes this broadcast, rebroadcasts it, and tacks on their own advertising, why would this be different than a company taking copyrighted software, repackaging it, and selling it themselves?
4. why does the fact that the company was doing this in another country make this such a complex issue? we wouldn't be tolerant of a company based in another country doing this with software we produced, would we?
5. and if US citizens were able to view these broadcasts, (I'm assuming some of these were not basic television stations but possibly cable stations, but it's not really important), is this not very similar to pirating software which is considered illegal in almost ALL countries?
In effect, iCrave was making money off of repackaging someone else's copyrighted material, and their only line of defense was that the Canadian government does not view this as pirating. I can understand why the law is there, but truthfully, this should apply only to Canadian television and not television outside of the country. If Cannucks don't view television as copyrighted material, that's fine, but they should atleast respect the copyright laws of other countries.
If this was software we were talking about, everyone in here would be up in arms (except those that feel that everything should be open-source and that there shouldn't be such a thing as licensing agreements and all software was free and that we lived in a digital utopia).
flame me if you will, but i don't understand you people that are claiming this is the greedy US capitalists screwing over other countries and stealing everyone's freedom of information.
This is a simple case of copyright law and pirating.
You aren't setting it straight, you're setting it the way you think it should be. CSS is a copy protection scheme. Sure, you can copy the bytes of a DVD without a decoder, but they aren't useable in that fashion.
That's not true, they are 100% usesable in that fashion... they are exactly like the original is. The original post isn't setting it the way it "should be". It's fact, you can copy a DVD in usable form, playable on any "authorized" dvd player, WITHOUT DeCSS. Setting it the way it "should be" is saying that the DMCA is an intrusive law that limits the rights of consumers and nullifies liberties that we (should) have that the entertainment industry wants to regulate.
sorry that should metaphor :)
Slashdot social engineering at it's finest
There's nothing to say that packets originating in the USA and bound for a destination in the USA cannot be routed through Canada, Malaysia, and Australia on their route to destination. Obviously such a route would be more convoluted than necessary, but I can envision many cases where it would make sense for a router to bump things up to Canada and then back down (and vice versa).
This also doesn't do anything about somebody who decided to get iCrave and capture the content and re-broadcast without the "region filtering".
Unbreakable toys can be used to break other toys.
I'm behind a NAT router, and some sites which read the IP pick up the internal IP address (200.200.200.x, actually an address range in Brazil). I live in the UK.
I know there are any number of Katz bashing posts I could comment on, this just happens to be the comment I choose. So, nuthin' personal, swordgeek.
Anyway, my point is simple. I don't think Slashdot must necessarily be a website by/for/about tech stuff. I think Slashdot would loose a lot if it focused strictly on technology issues, and not on any of the border-line issues, that relate to technology. I really appreciate news on consoles, movies, books, politics, etc.
Put differently, is not the corporatization of the Internet "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters"? So what if he screws up his terminology. He learns tech stuff from us, and maybe we can get a different point of view on these new trends from him.
I've always found the humble approach gets the most results in life. Not grovelling or anything, just not arrogant. To that end, I feel grateful that somebody who has little practical use for Slashdot and who has been scorned so brutally still persists in trying to contribute to the site.
Anyway, that's my contribution.
Enjoy,
Pastry
Not only do you need a "truly blank dvd", you also need special hardware to write to the "truly blank dvd". Or at least that is how I understand the situation, I could be mistaken. While CSS does not stop copying on all levels, it does prevent me from running off a copy of my favorite movie to my neighbor for the cost of blank media.
I disagree with the common notion on Slashdot that just because CSS doesn't prevent all copying, it is worthless as a copy protection. If we could all burn DVD's for a buck or two like CDR, the movie studio would lose a lot of money from decreased sales.
Let's not kid ourselves. This doesn't mean that I like the mpaa or their methods, but some of the claims here are a little over the top, imo.
CSS doesn't seem to me to be a very good measure of copy protection. However, CSS does protect against copying DVDs on consumer level hardware. Everyone wants to rail on them because it doesn't protect against all forms of copying.
The claims about wanting control over playback have some truth to them (at least some truth, maybe more). My problem is with the "standard" response on Slashdot: CSS does not prevent copying, it only gives them control over playback. This just isn't true, it does both.
The locks on my doors prevent casual entry to my house. Will they prevent all entry? Will they stop the most determined thief? No. I would argue that they are effective. They are _enough_ of a deterrant. They make entering my house more difficult.
Nothing is perfect. CSS is a copy-protection scheme. It protects against casual copying and passing DVDs back and forth at the office. It is no one's god given right to be able to distribute their favorite movies for 5 bucks to their neighbors.
Many of the people on Slashdot look like they are full of shit when it comes to complaining about CSS because, guess what?, they are the very people that would have a more difficult time copying DVD's because of CSS. If the mpaa would get smart, they would release binaries for linux that could be used for playback on linux, or find some other way to support playback in linux.
The only reason we have Big Business is because of overselves. The greed of Big Business is only a reflection of the collective greed of its workers, and their inability to say "What we're doing is wrong, so I'm not going to work for you anymore."
I may be overgeneralizing but I truly believe that most people are far too busy worrying about how they will pay for the house, the car, the food, etc. to take the time necessary to be idealogical.
I work for the government. Do I agree with every U.S. policy? No. Am I willing to give it up because of that? Not a chance. I've got bills to pay. cheers, sand
cheers,
Unfortunately, the media companies will continue to use the legal system to punish individual people. I see the current environment of 'piracy' more as an environment of civil disobedience against not only the laws and licenses of the media monopolies but also against the punishment of individuals under these outdated laws.
You can't blame iCrave for what they are doing, their aim is to survive.
I think the case only illustrates what the RIAA is intended for and is really good at - screwing its member companies' consumers, the American public.
Well, just because some US judge says something *SHOULD NOT* mean that other countries should let themselves be pushed aound. Too bad we dont have geographical screening for US laws.
How's about we all stop reacting to corporations. At all. Lawsuit? Find us first. Court order to cease and desist? Likewise.
Seriously. Corporate North America needs a big "fsck you" from all of us.
While what you say is true, the idea of a metaphor (or methphor :-) is to use the idea of one item in another area where it makes intuitive sense. Knowing what a stronghold is, we can understand how MS has created a situation which is analogous to it in the marketplace. When JK talks about a firewall in Canada, how is that analogous to a real firewall? It just doesn't make sense!
Well, that's my thought at least.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
I still say that JK's use of the word 'firewall' is backwards, especially after his implied comparison with China.
BUT...
"People have a disturbing tendency to nit-pick the details of his articles without listening to the general idea of what he's saying."
Guilty as charged. I'm a terrible nitpicker when it comes to JK. Still, most of it stems from the fact that his articles are so poorly researched and contentless. Reduce his enormous mounds of text down to the crux, and you end up with:
"The little guy is being trod upon!"
This is not news, and frequently his articles try to prove this point from evidence or stories that don't support it. In this case, he took a marketing drone's statement at face value and made a big issue out of it, using 7k of text to do so. Honestly, aren't there more significant, relevant to the issue stories that could be researched and written about instead?
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
The geographic restrictions that iCraveTV are talking about are already being used here in the US, albeit probably implemented in a different fashion that iCraveTV intends to do. Most noticeably would be the encryption programs available. Netscape and Microsoft used IP reverse lookup to insure that the person is indeed coming from a US domain. On another note, could this be the end of the "WORLD" wide web? Maybe we're moving back to a NWW(Nation Wide Web) just a thought...
this isn't entirely on topic, but i decided i might as well spread a little more about edison, and a bit on the history of fud. take the electric chair: once a rather common form of execution, now dying off because the death is sometimes a little more gruesome then intended. now edison invinted the electric chair... but not at first. the government, looking at new forms of execution, asked edison to build a form of capital punishment based on electricity. he refused without any thought, horrified at the idea. but around the same time he had fud campains against westinghouse, which sold the ac based power systems used widely today. edison sold a similar system based on dc, which was vastly inferior. it required huge wires, needed a sub station every 100 or so yards, and was quite bulky and even kinda dangerous. his fud campain was simple: he electrocuted things like dogs and such in front of the public with westinghouse current. so, some time after the government gave him the request, he remembered the fud and decided to expand it a little to include humans.... and he made sure "old sparky" was built with only westinghouse equipment. now what do you think of the inventor?
---- Sig? What sig? Who needs one, anyway?
Since when is looking your source IP address up in the ARIN database and checking to see if there is a CA or CANADA in the record patentable? (If thay can patent this the I want to patent "A method for the transmission and reception of data over flexable crystalline silicon. ;)) A search for "iCraveTV" on the IBM patent server yeilds no results. I would assume that they are trying to patent this in the US because software patents are not vaild in Canada IIRC. First some guy patents a "wormhole" created by a halogen lamp and a bunch of magnets, and now this. Anyone remember when patents actually had merit?
No system is foolproof, there are planty of ways to circumvent thier so-called "enhanced geographic screening technology": IP tunnelling, Anonymizser (sp), Proxy servers, etc.
Very well said... I don't want to detract from your point however there is one little point that always bugs me: American Revolution is a mis-nomer. What you are referring to was actually the American War of Independence (a war in which one political dominion seceded from it's ruling nation). A revolution would imply that the entire government of England was overthrown.
I sure hope you people know what complexity theory is, you know, like chaos, no laws but things are self-organizational. Outside interference can mess things up, but it will reorganize itself everytime. Or the human body couldn't exist. The web is a case in point, there are no official rules, yet years before anti-spam laws we knew exactly what a spammer was, and while they survived, the gained no controll, because the oposing forces continued to outmarch them: Self-organization in a world without laws.
Now we have new outside influences, this time from the men with the little black stars, except they aren't sticking them in penthouse anymore.
The essential truth, is that they can for quite a while completely discrupt the nature of the system, but they cannot destroy it, and the self-organizational forces at work, will not only work around them, but completely aleviate their existence. TV on the web may no longer work on paid sites, but private "cable" style broadcasts will exist, unstoppably. The web has shown us that you can only controll a web-site if a corporation or other big company is behind it, there is just no way of telling the little guy what to do on the web. There are too many of them. The result, the corporations may get their screen systems, they will then have tiny litle niche-markets. While the private guys, showing last weeks X-Files episode on a server hosted in like Dagistan or Kenia or somthing will get away, and get the visitors, cause he doesn't charge. If the corporations continue along these routes, they will find themselves without markets on a web that has forgotten them. Perhaps a few of the non-techie (AOL) users will be going to them, but the rest of us will be throwing them a flat ignore.
And the very money they are hunting for will be their end on the web.
And all will be well again. If any major corporations read this, take heed of my warning, you will destroy yourself on the net unless you fit in, and to fit in, you have to open up as much as possible, 'cause that's what the web is all about
"Semper in excretum set alta variant"
Individuals that can afford to buy shares, yes. Generally, share of stock aren't bought out of ethics, but the desire for more money. Not that wanting more money is bad (I'd certainly like more!), but generally, what a shareholder is more interested in making money then in ensuring that all the company's actions are ethical.
--
Intelligence is definitely a recessive trait.
There are too many people, it seems, posting on slashdot with the "The grass used to be greener" attitude. I'm sorry, but this is by far not the worst state our corporations have been in. You know how long it took for labor unions to be legalized? You know why there was such a strong desire for their formation in the first place? Do you know why child labor laws were passed? Working environments used to be *horrible*. In the middle of the industrial revolution, companies trampled on not only people who competed/infringed apon them, but even their own workers - because they could, and there was no place better for the common worker to go. You know why the principles of communism seemed to catch on so well at the beginning of this century?
Take a look back at early corporations, and tell me if you still feel the same way.
Tell me that having children work on a machine because their arms could fit in between its moving parts better is a better thing than MPAA lawsuits. Tell me that dumping your waste products near anywhere you choose and not filtering waste gasses as they enter the atmosphere, in residential areas, was better than microsoft trying to bind IE with their operating system.
There are not darker clouds over the world today.
The grass did not used to be greener.
Everything just changes.
It is the world we live in.
- Rei
"99 dead duelists of Dios on the wall. 99 dead duelists of Dios! Take one's ring, pass it around..."
I'm not clear on some crucial details. As described, the technology allows a site to block access to browsers outside its home country, but is there some sort of independent mechanism in the technology that prevents other access across international borders too?
.. and if they don't have that, what they've invented is a quick way to piss off a lot of customers and lose a lot of market share. For some reason I don't think that will catch on.
In other words, if I own a site and choose to allow worldwide access to it, can I do it under this system or will some Internet border robocop block non-USA clients from seeing it? That would be hard to do without a national-level firewall of some sort
73 de N5VB (ex-KD5BIV) AR SK
I don't believe Jon was trying to say the laws extend to Europe or Canada. Just that the Mar00nz in the industry believe that.
We all know what money does to fewlz!! Makes em more fewlizh!!!!!
But then I thought the world was flat, till I fell off the edge!
Woooaaaaaa! I thought you said you were a female?!?!?! Sorry I ain't into that!!!!
Feel free to move there as soon as possible!
Woooaaaaaa! I thought you said you were a female?!?!?! Sorry I ain't into that!!!!
A much more fundamental problem with distribution limitations has to do with the fact that 80% of the people in the world will never SEE a DVD player, so much as have to worry about whether or not they're in Zone 1 or Zone 2.
Greg
People have tried to control Internet usage by geography before, but even the Chinese firewall leaks like mad.
I'm slightly confused about the comment about a Norwegian teenager being arrested, was he in the US or did Norway pass a similar law? In Europe we often laugh at the US with all it's silly laws (much as we try to pretend that ours aren't as silly) but I didn't think this one had spread outside the US. Of course, in the UK it's illegal in the same way to own equipment caperable of being used to decode television signals, such as a computer...
Here someone who thinks he has one,
c erpts.html
I read the book (7th edition) but didnot have 500
lbs of copper laying around.
http://home.earthlink.net/~josephnewman/book_ex
The math and science looked OK, but I saw some weird things in the magentic fields drawings in the book. I called the author (he actually lives in my home town) but he was an ass, and didnot want to be bothered to answer my question.
If you do a search on the net, you will find some people (ordinary Joes) who have built this thing and supposedly gotten it to work.
Essentialy it works on the premise of matter to energy conversion, at a ultra slow rate, hence the need for mass quantities of copper.
-- A Human Being is nothing more than mobile CO2 factory. Bow to the plants.
Companies are multinational and getting multinationaler. Soon they will control whatever local government you have.
I want my Cowboyneal
This solution ignores the problem of censorship. Organizations like the MPAA and companies like Sony would not care which of your tiers "their" content was being distrbuted on, they would still want to maintain control of it. Just 'cause it is on the "Communication" tier of the network doesn't make them feel that it is any less theirs. You're just focusing the problem into one tier, and really into the tier that we would least like to have problems on.
I don't need a million points of light, just two points of multi-mode fiber and a 10 Gig-E router.
why do people and companies that live/reside outside of u.s. borders let american companies dictate to them how they can play ? I dont remember the canadian parliament passing the DMCA !
I will never be governed by the laws that folks such as Teddy Kennedy and Bill Klinton enact. Those laws are for you americans, You can keep them, in fact, shove them right up your ass.
Americans: Stay out of our business, we'll do what we like, we dont need your guidance.
This will give the impression that there is a way to control it via country. What about to the city and state level? What about when it does not work?
With this, the argument of what is acceptable for Boston is not acceptible for Tuscon, and since there may be a mechanism for controlling access (by location), there will be prosecution.
Fight Spammers!
Anyone who says this hasn't seen the Interlog fiasco. Interlog used to be one of the best ISP's in Toronto until about a year after being acquired by PSI. About 4 months ago things started going downhill so quickly that...
People dialing in from Toronto actually get an IP address down in the US.
Now how would they actually know these people are in Canada?!
Most sites that do geographic screening will do reverse lookup, assuming (incorrectly...) that all .com,.net,.org sites are in the US.
In reply to the anonymous coward who says that the DMCA doesn't apply to himself or herself, it does. This comes in the form of the Berne Copyright Treaty. This makes a copyright valid in any of the countries that have agreed on this, thus your friendly gestapo-like equivalents of the US Marshals will be knocking on your door and regard you much like you were a drug dealer. And for those of you lucky enough to not have that shackle on your country, you probably will get cooperation from your country towards the United States(if the organization deems neccesary, but you may not get this), thus you are screwed by this law again. Hence, be careful on what you do unless you have enough defense on hand to defend yourself.
-Dev_Seph
In reply to the anonymous coward who says that the DMCA doesn't apply to himself or herself, it does. This comes in the form of the Berne Copyright Treaty. This makes a copyright valid in any of the countries that have agreed on this, thus your friendly gestapo-like equivalents of the US Marshals will be knocking on your door and regard you much like you were a drug dealer. And for those of you lucky enough to not have that shackle on your country, you probably will get cooperation from your country towards the United States(if the organization deems neccesary, but you may not get this), thus you are screwed by this law again. Hence, be careful on what you do unless you have enough defense on hand to defend yourself.
-Dev_Seph
Why they didn't contest this is beyond me, why they even bothered to show up in that PA courtroom is also beyond me. The US has no jurisdiction over Canadian businesses, period.
Maybe there is some kind of loophole provision in the NAFTA agreement that allows them jurisdiction in cases where they formerly had none. I don't really have the time to peruse the whole thing, but it was just a thought. My own opinion on content is very simple. No restrictions, no boundaries, and no government interference.
The Internet is changing the world so fast that most governments (even if they won't admit it) are starting to get scared that one day we might not need them to constantly regulate and restrict our lives or tell us what to think. Oh the horror. =)
------
The problem is that we have an international network, and no international laws. That's precisely what we need. And if we can't get international laws on the internet, then we'll have to use national laws, and nationalize the network
;P
You may have forgotten to account for the fact that many laws are based on cultural and national values, morals, and experience. In many countries there are less restrictions on nude photography (pornography =X), partly because they lack the puritan background (we're learning about this in English, courtesy of the Scarlet Letter). This is just one example in a broad field of them, and maybe International regulation is not the answer. These will likely only lead to conflict, just as state laws often conflict in jurisdiction with federal laws in the US. The solution, in my opinion, is toleration, and acceptance. Sure, it may never happen, but some of these corporations ought to stop running scared of the internet, embrace it, and make a killing in the process. Let's have a financial example, shall we? Technology stocks are/were hot, liberal buyers bought them. Conservative buyers argue that they could not possibly make money. Moral of the story? Should have bought tech
-- Just the FAQs Ma'am.
Does the DMCA apply to other countries?
I thought a countries laws finished at their borders, surely CigarMan Clinton doesnt have the power to say how people in other countries treat their copyright laws.
As far as I know DeCSS isn't illegal in Australia, so if I develop a DVD player for Linux and put it on my ftp site saying only people in Australia are to download the player, all other countries go away. If someone in US was found using this player could I be prosecuted in the US?
I am still not sure how the US could prosecute a Norwegian...
I wonder if they have the power to request the Oz government to come and get me... they wouldnt be hard to dodge...
--- Can i borrow your Clue-Stick(tm)? I need to go beat a few people with it...
Isn't copying == making copies anymore?
YES the DVD copy is usable, exactly as usable as the original. It is, afterall, a copy. You still need a decoder to play it. In what way has CSS protected against this making of a totally usable copy? CSS is an access protection system.
Sure, you can copy the bytes of a CD without a CD player, but they aren't usable that way either. What would you do? Spin the CD really fast and sing along? Copying has nothing to do with whether or not you can use the copy, copying has to do with making a (yeah thats right!) COPY! Wow, whatta thought. A copy means, in this case, another DVD disc with the same data as the first.
Tomorrow will be cancelled due to lack of interest
Um, when did DVD-ROM come into question? It's perfectly possible to copy all the data on a DVD disc onto some device. The DVD-ROMs that exist today are entirely unusable if nothing else just due to their price: the copy is more expensive than another bought copy of the original. Fact is though, I can copy the data on a DVD disc, keys and all.
The copy protection in this case, that you have missed, is the DVD-ROM. That's right... the DVD-ROM contains the copy protection, in the form of the pre-burned keyspace. I can't copy a CD onto a normal CD either, I need a CD-R for it. Just because the end media isn't suitable, doesnt mean the source media contains copy protection. The end media does.
Tomorrow will be cancelled due to lack of interest
You seem to be missing the point. The purpose of deCSS was to watch DVDs on a Linux computer. It doesn't help anyone copy the DVD -- you can do a bit-by-bit copy for that, and your copy would be a perfectly playable DVD. The issue here is, who gets to decide what media you use? Does control rest with the RIAA or MPAA? If they haven't bothered to write DVD players for Linux, is that a defensible (or defendable) decision? The driver that runs your CD program -- that takes bytes from the disc and converts them into code that the computer can play -- does the same thing that deCSS does. Of course it's a different system, since they store data in different formats. But the job is the same and the purpose is the same. The fact of the matter is, the RIAA is simply steamed that they let CDs slip by. If they could have, they'd have restricted this too. Wholesale violation of copyright is a legitimate concern. But a compulsive need to control access to and playback of this content is not.
The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach
Yes, but most people are using ISPs, with either dynamic IPs or rented ones. Either way they can't do anything about this. There will probably be ways to trick their software, but if they can screen the regular users it's bad enough.
It's probably believed that the net is a vehicle for commercial messages, just like TV, and that protecting commercial interests is the most important thing. To you and I, of course, it's hogwash. (I'm curious as to how many senators and representatives in Congress truly understand the idea of the net....)
I would imagine that the net could get around the MPAA, but at what price? Will it happen after a myriad laws have been passed, prohibiting such basic things as fair use?
That scares me. Information should be free.
Paul...sigless
Let's count... he mentions Canada/Canadian 5 times (not 3), and mentions iCraveTV only 9 times. Not once in the initial paragraph which appears on the homepage is iCraveTV found. Instead of iCraveTV, he talks about the "latest nightmare" comming "out of Canada". Thank you for saying that I "uttered this utter stupidity," because I thought you were serious about my comments for a moment. I believe my thoughts are entirely valid and apparently so do the moderators. If you don't like my ideas, then don't read them, but don't attack me personally, that's just immature.
Instead of doing the obvious and routing around all digital roadblocks, we can show them how much it can REALLY hurt by staging a one-week boycott of entertainment products. (cd's movies etc.)
For one week do not buy a single cd, cassette, DVD, movie, or rent them either. If they want to infringe on our access to free information than we should tell them we won't stand for it! I propose for the first week of June we walk by every HMV, Music World and Block Buster we see! (If we want to be really nasty we can keep out of theaters too!)
What do they take us for anyway? The people of the net need a voice! Let us take back what the corporations have stolen and restore freedom to the net!
http://www.salon.com/comics/tomo/1999/12/13/tomo/i ndex.html BTW, I know that I'm going against the grain, but I rather enjoy Jon's articles. (yeah, yeah I'll be moderated down) And, now that Kevin Mitmick's free, 2600 needs to have a "Free Jon" (not Katz, Johansen.)
-JS Stack Error: Lost on a cluttered desk... Stack Overflow: Too many pancakes...
I don't think the question is how best to prevent geographic Internet regulation. IMO a country should not be forced to weaken its laws enacted by its government just because one of its neighbors doesn't play by the same rules. The US is right to try to enforce its laws on its soil. The problem is that enforcing its law in this case wasn't possible on its soil alone. As I see it, the US can either look for a way to uphold its laws on foreign soil, or it can look for a way to block problems at the border. That's why I don't see geographic categorization as a bad thing: it would help sovereign nations enforce their laws on their land while reducing their need to drag other countries into it.
First, I don't think that geographic categorization guarantees the complete closure of traffic that Mr. Katz's vision of Balkanization seems to imply. There's plenty of aboveboard traffic going in and out of the US and many other nations at all times. Tourism, education, and business all function despite physical borders, and wouldn't be shut down online borders either. There's no percentage for corporations, governments, or individuals in completely closed borders all the time. Look at airport customs, at least in the West. Customs inspectors act as a filter to keep contraband and known criminals from freely entering a country, and let everything else through. What's criminal or contraband could be up to each country, based on whatever foreign or domestic input that each country's government chooses to accept when writing their laws. Certainly, a country could choose to close itself off from the Net, but that's ultimately up to the country.
Second, the fact that a filter leaks when attacked by a knowledgeable user doesn't make it worthless. Like any law enforcement tool, if enough people are discouraged from breaking a law, the tool succeeds. I'd image that the percentage of the online population capable of setting up VPNs and proxies is small enough that a geographic filter would succeed by that standard. More importantly, though, such a filter would give groups like the MPAA (in the iCrave case) legal recourse with fewer international demands. If the US required ISPs to block connections to a blacklist of illegal international sites, then the MPAA could just have Canadian TV rebroadcasters put on that US-only blacklist. The MPAA could try to get them stopped in Canada too, but because the webcasts wouldn't be accessible in the US they'd be trying a crime that no longer had a victim. Sure, there'd be some pirates, Canada could acknowledge, but that minority of US citizens would be a US problem. Any rebroadcaster foolish enough to operate in the US then becomes subject to US prosecution, legal rebroadcasters in Canada go their merry way, and that would be that. Civil suits may still be filed, but at least the criminal angle would be more easily resolved.
Nations aren't about to give up their sovereign rights to make their own laws just because the Internet makes some of those laws hard to enforce. It's not in the interest of their governments, their economies, or any of their citizens who don't trust the idea of local laws being made abroad. Geographic categorization and national site blacklists sound nasty and aren't perfect, yes. The alternative is years or decades of jurisdiction catfights and localized censorship as the every country on the planet tries to keep their laws from being rewritten. IMO, that's worse. You still get all the censoring of geographic categorization on that path, but with extra confusion and less chance for local protest or debate to impact law enforcement policy.
Another example, porn is illegal in Saudi Arabia, with whom the US *does* have good relations (we're not talking Iran here). If a Saudi web surfer downloads porn from my web site, will I be extradited to or tried for breaking Saudi laws? Of course not. That's just silly. Why is the Icrave TV case any different?
Icrave should've done what any good non-merkin should have done in response to the complaint. Send back a letter with three words on it: "Yankee go home".
o the effect of DeCSS, it is a program that has only one use: To circumvent the DVD copy-protection scheme. It's irrelevent what the purpose of doing so was (to watch it under Linux or to pirate it over the internet), because the crime here is the actual act of circumvention
I don't see the difference here. CD Players are designed to read the bits off of a CD and output them to some device (like headphones or a speaker). DeCSS is designed to take the stream off of the DVD (since the reader itself doesn't output a useable form like the CD Player) and output it to some useable device, like an X display or a FBCons driver. Neither were designed for the duplication of the medium (DeCSS was written for watching movies on a laptop) and both have uses other than copying.
Under the kind of logic you have above, all CD-Rs would be illegal (only used for copying) no matter if the person merely uses them for backing up important data. This obviously doesn't make sense.
I read the internet for the articles.
It occurs to me that while they are retransmitting these television shows, I don't believe that communicating IP to specific users who have registered based on zip code is legally considered broadcasting. Broadcasting is, by definition, for public or general use. It's to bad this all turned into a war of money, I'd love to see this one battled out in court..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
In the case of a more remote country IP wise, this could work. Unfortionatly, in the case of Canada, routes go in and out all over the place..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Wasn't iCraveTV law suit only possible bacause the owner of the company had registered either the domain name or company in Pennsylvania? If it were a 100% Canadian venture then wouldn't their coverage have remained uninterrupted throughout the Super Bowl?
It seems like setting up an operation completely in another country would be a good way to bypass the DMCA. Let the RIAA and MPAA waste their money - we can keep moving the goalposts (and I'm not suggesting doing anything illegal either).
you can read it online, if every server put these informations in their configuration, it can also helps traceroute problems etc
--
BeDevId 15453
Download BeOS R5 Lite free!
"Science will win because it works." - Stephen Hawking
Salon did a pair of articles on this topic a couple of weeks ago:
The first article is about iCraveTV's effort, and the second talks about Digital Island, who offers the service today and claims a 96% accuracy rate. Both articles are shy on technical details, but mention is made of making arrangements with big ISPs to learn about how their IP address range is distributed geographically.
I suspect that this will prove to be another reason why anonymizing proxies are useful and necessary.
...not corporate use.
/our/ laws from within /their/ borders. So what does the gov't do? What does it always do? Expand its power. Using a regulatory agency such as the FCC to circumvent the "formality" of legislation, our gov't mandates the filtering of any foreign content that violates US laws. Of course, since it would be managed with typical gov't (in)efficiency, it would hardly be a barrier to the technically minded. But to the great unwashed (y'know, the people that think AOL = the internet), this would become commonplace, and accepted. Anyone who wanted change would by now have lost the ability to vote with their wallets, and be left to the far less effective method of voting in a booth.
/our/ part of the network. Only governments command the full force of law. Thankfully, they tend to forget just how expansive that power is, especially since they stamped "VOID WHERE PROHIBITED" on the Constitution. Unfortunately, nasty corporatist organizations like the MPAA are all too aware of the extent of that power, and will employ any number of lobbyists and any amount of money to bend that force to their will.
First, let's assume that such a technology is possible, and furthermore, possible to implement at near-perfect quality.
So iCraveTV uses this tech to restrict access to their site to Canadian users. BFD. They're a private company, they can choose to sell or not sell to whomever they choose, right? Even the normal market mechanism of "voting with your wallet" need not be employed, since iCrave has voted for you. Surely if they proved successful, another company would spring up that did not employ those regional controls, and claim some, if not the bulk of iCrave's market share. The 'net has become largely corporate since its deregulation, and to some extent revolves around commerce now, but I feel that even if such regionalization became pervasive, the "important" part of the 'net - the underground - would survive, and "we" - the underground - wouldn't care, or perhaps even notice.
However, what happens if the US gov't gets irrirated that their laws don't apply to Canadian companies, as other posters have noted? It bugs them, and the MPAA of course, that some Canadians can use the international nature of the internet to break
Oppressive governments: too many to count
Peaceful people: 0
Anyway, my point is that I could give a damn if iCraveTV allows only Canadians to use their service. At leat, compared to the damn I would be giving if my government decided that we couldn't have any of that subversive Canadian (or Chinese, or Middle-Eastern, or Dutch, or....) content on
MoNsTeR
Ah, capitalism. A mighty tool, of one knows how to wield it. Unfortunately, the amount of willpower demonstrated by the average consumer means that the corporation will always remain in control of any good or service that has been deemed desirable in the consumer market.
Of course, if it wasn't a desirable good or service, no one would buy it, and this would be a moot point.
The fact of the matter is that we WANT that carrot that dangles in front of us. Corporations demand that we pay it, and so we do. It is only to be expected that these corporations do all within their power to protect their cash flow. After all, would you not do all that you can to keep breathing?
However, the whole "country-area-network" thing is for the birds. Face it, the only way the human race is ever going to get any further than it has is to pull itself up by it's bootstraps. The Internet provides a big stepping stone in the right direction by removing barriers and allowing cultural communication (all of it, the good, the bad and the ugly). With communication comes understanding. With understanding comes cooperation. With cooperation, most anything is possible.
Isolationism has never been a prudent foreign policy.
--
Never knock on Death's door.
Ring the doorbell and run
(He hates that).
Dump the IRS - http://www.fairtax.org
Maybe the powers that be don't like being stymied and reduced in significance by populace empowering technology they don't understand - but resorting to the ancient 'divide & conquor' probably isn't going to work, anymore than trying to prevent one country from broadcasting propaganda to external interested parties or even to spies via short wave radio, other than 'jamming'. Not unless IP address's are redistributed by nations with a bunch of govt. controlled routers overseeing all ingress/egress - a major pain.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
I'm not normally this quick to shout "paradigm shift", but this is such a no brainer. Let's fool the Emperor by gagging his loyal subjects and banning mirrors thoughout the world!
I'll give Katz credit for putting the DMCA in terms that would make everyone but Fidel Castro and Scientologists want to oppose it.
--
Dave Aiello
-- Dave Aiello
Determining geographic location is totally out of the question. There are two ways this could be implemented, both of which don't work:
:)
1. You could implement a whois searching mechanism, which, according to the data you registered along with your domain name, would give the address and names of the registrar. However, these fields usually contain intermediary data, not the final user one. It would work for the majority of dialup-ISP users, but not for the directly connected ones.
2. You could try to determine which IPs come from which geographic location, according to initial partitioning of the IP space. It may work in the States, if at all. However, most other countries had to use a fake US business name to start using Internet, since in the beginning foreign country rules weren't totally sorted out. That way, in our little third-world-country, we have ISPs with IPs from Puerto Rico, United States, and other countries, not necessarily our own.
And finally, it really isn't too hard to spoof your own IP into a US one...
---
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
- Personal files.
- Criminalization of anonymity or pseudonymity.
That's where this trend is leading us. It fits right in with forcing anonymous remailers to disclose the identities of their users and requiring ISPs to make private emails available to federal agents. It fits right in with all attempts at privacy invasion and censorship.
(loosely defined)
Censorship is the attempt to deny certain resources to certain individuals.
What's the easiest way to do that? What do *you* think?
Sooner or later you will only be able to legally access the internet under your own name or official identification code. (i.e. - SSN) This will quickly, forcibly, and permanently divide the internet into countries, states, ethnic backgrounds, etc. In other words, it will make all the data previously collected by various governments and organizations once again useful in dealing with the online community. It will also make the internet the single most powerful tool for gathering information about individuals that has ever existed. If we don't work against it, this will happen in our lifetime.
Neither governments nor companies like the level of individual freedom available on the internet. In the US government's case, however, efforts to reduce online freedom are in part hampered by the Bill of Rights. *Companies*, OTOH, have no such qualms nor feel themselves bound by any such restrictions. When was the last time you had to tell the insistent Radio Shack salesman to Bugger Off because he wanted your name and address? Why do we get targeted banner ads from certain web sites? What are those cookies really there for?
The more knowledge you have about your consumer base, the more efficient your marketing, sales, support - and prosecution - become.
Ever downloaded some piece of software under a fake name because you didn't want to be in a company's database? This is going away. You're going to be in every database under the sun. How long before companies simply pay the US government for access to parts or all of the citizen database?
The internet represents a vast and growing segment of population for whom national boundaries and allegiences seem less important than shared interests. The internet represents a route for information to travel, circumventing whatever official propaganda is being disseminated.
Why is this happening? Though it is true that the US government fears losing control of its citizens, the real movers in the effort to restrict online freedoms are companies who feel threatened by what the internet represents. (Easy, unmonitored distribution of digital media, free association of potential or actual customers, etc, discussion of unregulated or unsupported use of a company's products. Think Intel. Think Dual-Celeron. Think overclocking. Do you really believe that Intel wouldn't be happy to squash all such activity if they could?) These companies know how to deal with this threat. They see the government as a tool for dealing with its constituents. Which is easier, developing an encryption method that will keep people from copying your product or making the legal consequences of copying (or making copying possible. (Or even thinking about making copying possible.)) so dire as to prevent it from happening. Companies know what they want. They want a growing, mindless, locked-in consumer base that they can depend on. Personally I'm convinced that some companies would, if it were possible, push for the pass of legislation MANDATING a certain level of consumerism on our part.
But anyways, keep your eyes and ears open. And when the time comes, get your mouth open and start yelling. Go vote. It's the only way we're going to avoid the internet becoming a combination survelliance camera and network TV. It's also the only way we're going to avoid falling into the immensely stupid trap of applying mindless nationalism to the internet.
zeke
I feel stupid for posting this.
A firewall, in one specific implementation, is used to prevent the spread of a fire by providing a barrier for the fire.
To extend the metaphor, then, China wants to protect it's country and its peoples. Say dangerous information, content, and people are the fire. It's implementation of blocking these people, then, is the firewall, no matter what kind of technology is used.
How about Canada?
People accessing illegal content is the fire, and with it comes litigation, lawsuits, and much angered companies. The firewall, then, would be whatever system iCrave and others implement to stop the US citizens from watching rebroadcast material.
-AS
-AS
*Pikachu*
Um...no. Up here in Canada the FBI and Fox TV have NO jurisdiction. It is NOT a violation of Canadian law to rebroadcast content, only American law. This makes about as much sense as the US suing Canadian companies in US court for doing business with Cuba (who , incidently are our friends and trading with them is not illegal) - just stupid (it was called the Helms Burton bill)
Never by hatred has hatred been appeased, only by kindness - the Buddha
Actually, that doesn't work because of the inefficient routing that happens all the time. For example, if I want to get to my friend's ADSL-connected machine from mine, just across town here in Vancouver, BC, my packets travel south through Tacoma, WA before coming back up the border. Your method would have me placed somewhere in the USA, but I'm not.
The Signal/Noise ratio can be improved in two ways. Remaining silent is the OTHER way.
That's kind of ironic don't you think, considering this is all the fault of the US DMCA? Shouldn't Canadians be complaining about the greedy, corrupt, freedom-stealing Americans?
I'm not, mind you. I understand that the DMCA wasn't something that most Americans wanted. I do kind of resent the fact that Canadians are being held liable in their own country for American laws (and stupid ones, too). Then again, we have a long history of letting ourselves get pushed around from the south. I suppose I should just get used to it... manifest destiny and all.
The Signal/Noise ratio can be improved in two ways. Remaining silent is the OTHER way.
There are two mechanisms to which the posters on this topic seem quite oblivious, probably due to the fact that they still have hair on the topmost portions of their skulls. Must be nice.
The first mechanism, is how to block content. Granted iCraveTV did so in an idiotic fashion, but it doesn't have to be done that way. In fact, restricting content to Canada would be quite easy for the following reasons.
Almost all Internet traffic between the U.S. and Canada goes out via terrestrial links. These links cross a 100-foot section of land at the Canadian boarder that is owned by the government. This land must be leased from the government and is subject to their limitations, controls and restrictions. It is an ideal point for censorship.
It is admittedly difficult to discern the geographical location of a randomly generated Internet address. It is quite easy, however, to check a list of all B.C.Tel and CanTel internet ranges and see if you have a match.
It is quite easy to encrypt a video data stream. It is also easy to implant rolling tags that look like random data, but in fact have a pattern that border-planted filtration devices can pickup. It is also quite easy to set up a Windows-Only client to interact with this system.
It's a snap to tell the Canadian border routers not pass any packets from the iCrave site directly to the U.S. or to allow a U.S. site to so much as ping the iCrave site.
These measures alone would stop every full time Windows user (with few exceptions) from accessing iCrave (95% of the populace?).
A hacker trying to pull this off would at the very least need a box in Canada to reencrypt the data coming from iCrave. He/she could then pass that data down to his own intranet which would use a masquerading firewall to conceal his own internal (pseudo-Canadian) IP addresses. (do
This would buy him/her one stream to each of his Windows boxes (ugh). If he wanted to rebroadcast this stream he/she would have to decrypt the actual video data, probably by hacking the Windows code. (.0001%?) Perhaps our hacker goes that extra ugly painful step, and voila, the mechanism is broken, and the streams fly about the net. Weeeee!
Sadly, the victory will be short lived, because unlike the Satellite Video industry or the DVD folks, iCrave's software can be replaced on the fly. To people with the bandwidth for streaming video, extra couple seconds downloading this week's encryption plug-in would go unnoticed.
Lastly, if someone were redirecting video streams to the public in this fashion it would be a straightforward exercise to leave extra data in the streams that could be recovered at the remote end and used to narrow down the list of feeds used. It could be done as a binary-chop fairly quickly where half of the streaming servers would use sig1 and half sig2. As soon as the remote sense device fed back which stream it was on, half of the old sig1 group would get sig2 etc. etc. In 32 times your feedback delay you will have the exact address of the stream in question. Of course you won't tell anyone. You'll simply monitor it and others like it for months while you arrange for search warrants.
Essentially, this hacker's first sign of detection will be when jack-booted thugs kick down his door and throw him in the cell next to Kevin Mitnick.
The other mechanism to understand is that this is precisely the process by which our freedoms disappear. Once the security company hired by iCrave to secure Canada has done it's job it will be hired by their government to prevent any unwanted content from entering Canada. The unfair barring of non-pornographic material by CyberWatch and NetNanny was due to the impracticality of distinguishing one site from another. This will happen on a country wide scale when CanaNanny is born.
Registration of mean-looking rifles, in California, was touted as precaution to keep them out of the hands of psychos. Once the names and addresses of the owners were safely on file, the confiscation began.
At the outset it was specifically forbidden for Social Security Numbers to become a national ID number. In the interest of catching "Dead-Beat Dads" laws were enacted that allowed states to tie them to your driver's license and registration. All of your assets can now be tracked and seized upon the discovery of a single seed of cannabis found on any property linked to your ID, and it's already happened to some.
The machine of socialism is quite simple, and has been running in this repetitious fashion for a long time. I don't use cannabis or own a firearm, or watch any television but StarTrek and A&E.
It is not my liberties they are curtailing, today, but it won't be long.
Hehehehhe. Yeah, i can write an open source prune juice tracking database system =:-)
Seriously though, i do feel strongly about the issue of overly strong protections for corporate owned copyrights, trademarks, and patents. I think that after a limited amout of time everything should be in the public domain. I don't think it's right for the disney company to have a multi-billion dollar monopoly based mainly on characters created by one guy (long dead) many years ago.
I also think that fair use is worth protecting (imagine going to the library and having to put money on your little card for the amout of time you spend browsing through books from the shelf... When i was a kid my family had no money (for a while we were on food stamps), but i learned computer programming on an old Franklin Ace 1000 my grandfather retired from his business, and i did this by sitting in the library for hours every day reading over every programming book i could get my hands on (even forth for christs sake)). My point is that if giving the chance, big corporations will make us pay to breathe, walk, talk, and think. Anything that it's possibly to meter and measure, they will. If we want to keep thoughs free, we have to resist. Now my example of shooting cops is extreme, but not far-fetched at the rate things are changing. In a world where staying competitive and connected requires constant access to information, that's the most important freedom to protect. My previous post was more a vent of frustration, thus the "rant" tags.
I think it is important that we realize that if there is no consumer support for squeezing more money out of the same copyrights (failure of divex, failure of online pay as you play encyclopedias, etc...), the next step will be to go around the consumer directly to the legislature (neatly stepping around the principles of capilism we all fought so hard to preserve during that stupid cold war). We will be forced by law to bend over and take it, unless we refuse. That refusal may eventually come to force. I know that if it comes down to it, i am prepared to kill (and possibly die) for my freedom.
funny again...
Actually, my father's second wife was a nutritionist that worked in various rest homes and a looney bin. In any case, one of the things she had to deal with (and i'm not making this up) was a database of stool properties (amount, consistancy, etc...) which was corrilated to what the patients were fed and stuff like that to try to tune the diets of pateints to what they digested best.
---
Play Six Pack Man. I
<rant>
Even if the internet gets split into itty bitty pieces, people will construct little islands of restricted access servers linked by scattered VPN's and piracy will go on, just like it did back in the days of BBS's. I remember the board i used to run with my friend EK got fairly well connected. There were actually hierarchical distribution chairs for warez and porn, feedback and request networks, and the whole system was self-healing. Also there was a fairly quick response system if one board got busted, the others would take their areas offline, etc...
In any case, the first time the gestapo comes knocking on my door for DeCSS, game cracks, etc... I'll come out shooting. How many pigs are gonna wanna die for some rich bastard's copyright?
I figure they'll prolly shoot me down, but if i've gotta go, i'd rather go like that than shit myself to death at 85 in a goddamn resthome
</rant>
---
Play Six Pack Man. I
thanks for bring this up.
I would seem to my silly young head that if someone sets up a protection and I circumvent that protection, it would be me breaking the law. My action, my responsibility. Heck I want to break that law, peaceful civil disobedience and all that. In this case in particular I don't have that choice. Why? Because the MPAA can skip me and go straight to the source. And given the pervasive nature of U.S. foreign policy, they can go after that source anywhere in the world. Does this bother anyone else? Instead of industries having to deal with consumer, they can bypass consumers and go straight to the courts and congress (foreign policy) and take away my ability to protest restrictive legislation. Or, and this is the big one, keep the market from evolving. Dammit, I want TV on the 'Net, on demand, that's innovation. Where we are headed now is oppression.
If everyone can break a law, continually, and no one's the wiser, and enforcement is impossible, and there's no detrimental consequences, then IT'S A STUPID LAW!
This is why I will continue to use Napster, Gnutella, and whatever the hell else I want to. Peaceful civil disobedience against unjust laws, with the stated intent to prove just how unjust they just might be. Justice will be served, to anybody who wants to log on and fight for whats right.
--
ba-bu-ba-ba-baaa, da-da-dum. Re-boot the ser-ver.
ba-bu-ba-ba-baaa, da-da-dum. Re-boot the ser-ver.
+&x
The "Enter your Canadian Area Code:" prompt at iCraveTV's website was a joke. Any US retard with 5 minutes on his hands could get around this protection, and while a lot of us may like it that way, it's breaking laws. Canada may allow rebroadcasting, but the US does not.
And since when does US law cover the world?
Man, American arrogance really gets me sometimes, it was a Canadian company operating in Canada under Canadian law, no law was being broken, hell they didn't even have to put ANY screening system on there and they STILL wouldn't be breaking any laws, because they were doing it in... Canada.
Why they didn't contest this is beyond me, why they even bothered to show up in that PA courtroom is also beyond me. The US has no jurisdiction over Canadian businesses, period.
-- iCEBaLM
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"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
Of course CSS is about controlling DVD players - that's the whole idea behind almost all copy protection schemes: to control the media. That doesn't change the nature of the DMCA though.
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
No, using a CDR would not be illegal in this sense. There are plenty of uses for a CDR that would not violate the DMCA's copy-protection laws. DMCA doesn't make copying data illegal, it makes copying protected data illegal. Get it?
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
A witty AC wrote: "Jon's admitted to committing a crime, lets lock him up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And never have to read one of his articles again."
:) but I don't think locking JonKatz up would have the effect you desire.
Well, you don't have to read any of his stories, anyhow, of course
Gandhi, MLK, and Hitler wrote some of their most effective political thought while in prison. Imagine if Jon were to write "Mein Cyberletter From Sing-Sing, or, Why Many Prisons Are *Really* Banning Napster."
timothy
(smile! smile! smile! repeat.)
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
...If you maintain a database of "border" routers (pun intended :) and verify each session through a facility like traceroute to verify that it doesn't cross an international border.
Why wouldn't that work?
If that's what they are doing, let me state for the (patent office) record that it is at least obvious to me.
Geeky modern art T-shirts
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Did I just defend Katz?
MSK
If JK is seriously gonna get into the hottest emerging field of both law and jurisprudence, he's gonna need to spend considerably more time in the law libraries of numerous countries. Because no-one agrees on much of this and the (different) traditions of countries in the European Union - esp the French - are often at odds with Anglo-American legal precedents and traditions.
Much of French-derived law (some dating from before the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works of 1886, often still a benchmark for decisions about copyright) mitigates against violation of an "author's" - ie artist's or creator's - "moral" rights. Those are groups of legal rights meant to protect creators from having their fine works "diminished" by caricature, moustaches, partial reproduction, distortions, mockery etc etc.
American law offers a contrast. As recently as a couple of years ago, Supreme Court decisions in the US favoured "transformative" use as consistent with their federal copyright policies...the overriding incentive here being economic
and commercial interests. Also a nod towards a US history supposedly weighted towards the "free flow" of information.
Copyright law in cyberspace or electronic copyright is a contradictory and complicated field in which the law is being made (precedents are being set) case-by-case...With plenty of lawyers into its potential for big bucks. But it may also happen inch by inch, country by country and each "foreign" claimant to a right will find assertion of his/her claims depends on the environment in which that claim ends up being assessed.
What a horrible little troll. Perhaps you should look up firewall in a dictionary. Jon had used the term correctly thereby making your statement look incredibly uninformed, and eliminating all credibility of the rest of what you said. What baffles me is how you can make a statement as wreckless and idiotic as that, and still have made well recevied posts like this.
So you may be better informed next time:
Courtesy of dictionary.com
firewall n.
1.A fireproof wall used as a barrier to prevent the spread of fire.
2.Computer Science. Any of a number of security schemes that prevent unauthorized users from gaining access to a computer network or that monitor transfers of information to and from the network.
Courtesy of Merriam-Webster /'fIr-"wol/ : a computer or computer software that prevents unauthorized access to private data (as on a company's local area network or intranet) by outside computer users (as of the Internet)
Main Entry: fire wall
Function: noun
Date: 1759
1 : a wall constructed to prevent the spread of fire
2 usually firewall
What Icrave.com was talking about would most likely be software. That seems to fit the definition perfectly.
penguinicide... when jumping out a window just won't do.
Wrong, it does. It is part of SCMS (Serial Copy Management System), used also in DAT machines.
However, it is almost trivial and therefore easily neglected (and circumvented): it uses only 1 control bit per track and no encryption.
Which, interestingly, brings me to a new statement of the circle logic:
Many recent CD-ROM drives are capable of digitally extracting audio data from audio CD's, from non-copyrighted tracks (which is perfectly legal), from copyrighted original tracks (which would be legal if they included a means for enforcing SCMS restrictions, highly impractical), and from copyrighted copies (which circumvents SCMS and therefore is illegal)
All (as far as I know) CD recorders operated from a computer (as opposed to stand-alone models) are able to write digital audio CD's containing tracks with arbitrary settings of the SCMS control bit (which may circumvent the protection of SCMS if the source data came from a copyrighted copy)
3. So, even though some may have lobbied for the DMCA many CD-ROM drive manufacturers and all computer operated CD recorder manufacturers, when used for copying audio CD's would violate the DMCA!
The Hacker's Guide To The Kernel: Don't panic()!
This is the same thing with the software. While you may have an absolute moral right to view your DVD with whatever player you see fit, the law doesn't see it that way. (The law is an ass.) All your technical solutions won't save you from having your computers confiscated, losing a lot of time and money and getting a criminal record. This is why the "I've got a hammer" school of thought needs a reality check; you're not going to solve this problem without fixing the legal system, meaning "ya gotta use the right tool for the job".
And if the geeks can make this DMCA idiocy cost a few politicians their careers, I'll be cheering.
--
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
Yeah, it's tacky. Blame Washington (either one, if you want)
For crypto, you've always been able to download the stuff from Finland or the Netherlands or wherever, since imports to the US aren't restricted, so you can avoid the Prove-you're-North-American routine.
The new crypto rules aren't perfect, and aren't very clearly defined, but they're clear enough that NAI is exporting PGP with the only restrictions being "Not on the US Enemies List".
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Satellite net access can be accessed from anywhere (within limits) and is not tracked/trackable by the man. I had a grey market television dish, illegal in Canada, but the authorities wouldn't have been able to track it down without getting records from the American company or by looking at my house.
"Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality." -- Dalai Lama
I have looked into various programs that attempt to correlate geographic location and IP and generally this fails. It only really works when you can parse the details (if provided by the registar) of the whois command for that particular IP. All you have to do to circumvent this idea is not to post your information.
Slashdot social engineering at it's finest
Don't you even know what a firewall is Jon? You have a lot of gall to post articles on /. when you appear to know so little about computers.
I think Mr. Katz was employing a literary device called a methphor like the following example:
Microsoft has as of late created a stronghold against competition in the desktop computing sector.
Now this little sentence uses the word stronghold. Now does that literally mean that microsoft has captured desktop computing and put it in some kind of castle to languish? No it's just refering to an idea.
Slashdot social engineering at it's finest
Read this Article from MSNBC about NASA blocking out Brazil based users because they fear "Ghost Attacks"...
To the fool, he who speaks wisdom will sound foolish. ---Euripides
With their beady eyes, and floppy heads...
Ok, so I want to get a chuck of code stored in Germany that is illegal in the States. What is stopping me from using that ancient peice of hardware called a modem (you know those things that use telephone lines). And call up a ISP in Germany, or even Canada (cheaper rates), and download it through that link. No US government controlled routers, in fact no US routers at all. Any other router will think that my computer is in Germany.
They will never be able to do that unless they try controlling everything.
One other thing: I would not be illegal for another German to mirror that chuck of code, or the television show.. It may be possible for the government to block icravetv.com, but they could never find, and block joesbox.dhs.org/icravemirror
Think about it!
Apathy -- The state of numbness of the mind. When you are apathic, you can think.
OK, I won't even touch on the fact that Jon Katz doesn't even begin to understand the iCrave story. What he wrote is SOOOO far from the way things are unfolding that I can't even begin to correct it.
/. when you appear to know so little about computers.
However...
"This time the firewalls aren't coming from the People's Republic of China, but out of Canada."
Don't you even know what a firewall is Jon? You have a lot of gall to post articles on
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
How on earth do you screen connections by geography? Okay, so you could do a DNS lookup on the IP address you are looking at and compare it against a database to see where it came from, and allow it if it has a '.ca' on the end, but that it worse than useless - a vast number of people will be connecting through ISPs with .com addresses or will have IP numbers which are not available in the DNS database. And most large multinationals have blocks of IP numbers to work from, which I suspect are not necessarily strictly partitioned across country borders?
So is this more a marketing gimick from ICrave? - after all, under Canadian law, rebroadcasting of a signal is an allowable act - the question raised in the US courts (because the ICraveTV name is registered in the States) was how to limit the propagation of the signal, and ICraveTV was criticised for not having the technology to do this.
If they have a method of blocking connections, I suspect it is much like the normal blocking of people connecting from outside a domain as used on some of the UK academic sites to limit connections to academic servers during work hours - but there all the academic machines allowed to connect are neatly inside the .ac.uk tree and can easily be selected.
In other words, it's probable that any blocking software based on geography is going to be as reliable as the censorware used in some libraries. Go figure.
Cheers,
Toby Haynes
Anything I post is strictly my own thoughts and doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the opinions of IBM.
The Media companies are realizing that networks are no longer comprised of retail outlets connected by roads.
It's about time.
I just wish that they would bite the bullet and develop their own network in stead of trying to adapt the internet.
The internet was not developed for security or identifiability or even really high speed, high bandwidth applications. We are seeing a move away from the telephone networks to cable and high fibre optics for data transmissions. So too should we be seeing other networks and protocols developed for things like e commerce and protected streaming media.
I guess I'm talking about a larger network with different tiers for different purposes.
-A tier for e commerce with protocol oriented towards better security and encryption/decryption of credit card numbers and personnal information. No need for amazing download/upload speeds if all you're doing is loading a sales page.
-A tier for digital streaming media with encryption. Higher upload/download speeds needed here.
-A tier for the financial sector, banks and brokers and what not. No need for amazing connection speeds here, but very strong encryption and security measures.
-And finally, a tier for the internet as it was only 3 or 4 years ago: a free and accessible medium for individuals and groups to share ideas, art, gaming... a network where individuals can form communities.
Much of the animosity between us geeks who have had the net to ourselves and the companies who are adapting technology to suit their needs is because the net is not suited to business applications, and the measures being introduced to protect business are changing the use of the net for all users, not just those involved in business.
A more effective solution for business would be to meet their needs through the use of new technology and protocols in stead of using restrictive laws to limit the potential for legal as well as illegal activities.
"A witty saying proves nothing." -Voltaire
- Get an education in the subject matter.
- Think about what you're saying instead of how you're saying it.
Ok. We're not talking firewall in any sense, but instead we're talking about the ability to gather information about a customer easily. In this case, we're talking about the ability to locate a person geographically through unknown means. I don't know if they're tracking people by their physical location, their server's physical location, or one of the locations on record. I really could have used some more links (even one might have been useful) to verify your statements. Unfortunately, you've proven that you don't like to have your assumptions questioned.But let's put this into perspective. If iCrave can determine that you live in Washington State then spammers need to use that tool in order to identify people in Washington State. How many people wished they could have been presented in court recently?
Determining region has it's uses. I want my Congressman to know that I am from his state and I expect him to react to my requests because of that fact.
Every increase in technology can be misused. I won't argue that. But I swear Jon, you're becoming a luddite, and I really have to question the need for a luddite on a board that advertises itself as "News for Nerds".
-----
No Zen is good zen
This actually brings up an interesting point about responses to Jon's articles in general. People have a disturbing tendency to nit-pick the details of his articles without listening to the general idea of what he's saying. Instead of talking about his word choice, how about saying something about his argument? Does this event have any implications about net freedom? If so, are they good or bad? Are big corporations trying to control the internet, and if so, what do you think about it?
What concerns me most about this article is the growing trend of prosecuting people in other countries for violating US laws on the internet. How do you think Americans would feel if the People's Republic of China were to start arresting American citizens for violating Chinese censorship laws on the net? After all, dispite all their efforts to the contrary, Chinese citizens can get around the barriers and access content from the states which is illegal in China. Furthermore, unlike this Canadian site, many sites with such content don't even make a token attempt to restrict access to the US only. The question is, if someone sitting here in America posts to an American-hosted site material which is illegal in China, can this reasonably be considered a violation of Chinese law just because some Chinese people may be able to access it? Likewise, if someone in Canada posts to a Canadian site material which is illegal in the US, is this a violation of US law? The international nature of the net makes the question of where a crime is committed and whose juristiction it falls under very difficult. I think the whole issue needs to be reexamined, and recent cases have set a dangerous precedent of the US acting as international policeman for the net.
Don't try to circumvent their copyright technology.
Don't try to force them to change their ways by consuming their content in a manner which they don't want you to. If you do that, you're STILL PLAYING THEIR GAME.
Just STOP CONSUMING THEIR CONTENT.
Vote not only with your dollars, but with your time as well. If you don't like the way record companies treat their artists, don't buy records, and certainly don't warez mp3z. Listen to the FREE Mp3s you can get on mp3.com.
If you feel that pollution from gas powered cars is out of control, and blame the petroleum companies, you don't try to change things by stealing gasoline or suing the companies, you RIDE A BIKE!
You don't have some inherent *right* to watch your Star Trek IV movie, it's a priviledge you get when you buy the movie. If someone tells you that to watch their movie you have to stab yourself in the leg with a fork, you don't have to watch it.
My ideas are my own, noone has the right to invade my brain and take them away from me. I don't have the inherent right to listen to a peice of music that someone composed. If they want to share it with me for free, GREAT! If they want to sell it to me, that's great too. But if they don't want to sell it to me, I don't think there's some sort of part of my soul that will die. If they impose stupid restrictions on their content, they can. It's THEIR work.
If a screenwriter, director, actor, musician or artist didn't want restrictions placed on their work by giant corporations, they shouldn't sell out to them by using their distribution channels.
None of this is to say that I don't watch DVDs or buy CDs, just that if someone denied me a certain type of access to a work, I wouldn't feel righteous indignation about it, I'd just get my entertainment elsewhere.
If you hate DVD zoning restrictions, don't buy a DVD player.
If you dislike the fact that 18 of those 19 bucks you spent on a CD go towards lawyers and record company executives, listen to the radio, or take up the guitar.
You don't have the god given right to CONSUME someone else's product in whatever way you want.
Where I think the freedom of information dissemination becomes CRUCIAL is in education and current events. I think access to education is a lot more important than Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Greg
Geographic Screening would be easy to implement once IPv6 becomes widespread. There is enough room (128 bits) for country and area codes in there...
You are forgetting something.
They can block access to all the countries they want, but all the people in blocked countries would ahve to do is go through a proxy server in an allowed country! It is futile to censor the internet.
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
After thinking about this a bit over the last few days, it occurs to me that an American company has no right to go after a non American company who's buisness is conducted in another county.
For some reason the US and US companies seem to believe that the US runs the internet, and this is quite simply not the case.
How is this situation handled in the realm of broadcasting, or telephony? If I setup a TV station in Montreal, which broadcasts into the US something that is legal in Canada, but not in the US, where was a crime commited?
Does Canadian law state that such rebroadcasts must enforce geagraphic locationing of end consumers? I doubt it. Was this company targetting, aka, selling directly to, US citizens? I doubt it.
Geographic based laws are as outdated as laws governing where one can ride their horse and buggy. It's simular to a law that mandates one must provide feed for their given modes of transportation being applied to a truck.
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
So who broke the law? iCrave, for not providing adaquete protection, or the US based users who provided fraudulent data to iCrave regarding their area code?
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
OK so under the DMCA the distribution of anything which can aid it the circumvention of copyrights can be considered criminally liable? So by that argument then isn't just about anything criminal? My brain would help me circument copyright - sue my parents. My computer would help - sue the manufacturer. M$-Word helps (hey I can type copyrighted works in) - sue M$. Any programming language and compiler helps - sue them too (all of 'em). CD players help too - sue the manufacturers. Oh wait a minute... My CD manyfactuer is Sony. Who is a member of RIAA. Who pushed this thru. (There's the circle) So they will have to sue them selves. If they don't then really the Finnish guy should sue the DVD manufactuerer under the same laws....
OK its silly but so is this law.
-cpd
They say they didn't contest it after a while because, put simply, they ran out of money. Kind of like what would happen if you tried to go up agains the MPAA in court by yourself... they'd stall, you'd lose because they have all the cash. There was a /. article about this... Ah yes, here it is.
The Signal/Noise ratio can be improved in two ways. Remaining silent is the OTHER way.
Through out history, every time there's been a law pasted, it's been open to interpretation. Everybody who interprets it, may see something different. The result, is it meansdifferent things to different people. And people will exploit whatever they can of it to prove they're correct, and to make money.
The DMCA was very poorly written, in the first place. The wording itself, I'm not talking about the ideas... yet... And any time you take something like this, history has shown that people will take very different views on it, depending on which side of the matter they're on. Look at the US Constitution if you want another example. How many people say it has "implied" powers, has this, that, and the other thing? Anybody who runs the government. And who says it doesn't, that you can't do what isn't explicitly written? Anybody who WANTS to run the government... And of course, they switch views once elected... That way, they have more power...
The same thing's going on with the DMCA... It's a paranoia measure, passed by a bunch of congressmen who have no idea what life is really like on the net, signed by a president who I won't even get into the problems with, and supported by a bunch of people who are out to make money.
You could really think of the RIAA and the MPAA as Microsoft... trying to control everything, causing problems, and eliminating choices... The only difference that I can really see is that Microsoft at least knows the industry, and TRIES to provide for it...
That being said, why is the government allowing this to happen? You have a monopoly on this, that, and the other thing, and yet all they seem to care about is Microsoft. Not that I dont' think it's important, but there ARE other issues going on here. I personally liked watching iCrave once in a while, and, I most definatly support MP3 files because I've lost so many CDs that I bought when "friends" borrowed 'em for a day or 2 to see if they liked them, or that I accidentally rolled over with my computer chair or spilled iced tea on.... Movies are another thing, yet one and the same... I won't buy a DVD unless I can watch it where I want to, be it on my laptop, home PC, where ever I feel like it... with out buying some $200 player that hooks up to my TV only... I'm sorry, but as a consumer, I disagree... If big name companies are allowed to make software to view those things, and SELL it, why can't I (or anybody else) do the world a favor and write it for free? Last time I checked, it's called "competition" to companies like that, and "community service" to everybody else who uses it...
We should tell the companies what WE want to buy, they shouldn't tell us what they WANT us to buy...
-PhaseBurn Welcome to Linux country. On quiet nights, you can hear windows reboot.
Not in the case of Canada. Most routes go north-south rather than east-west, with the result that if I am in Toronto and I want to connect to a server in Winnipeg, my route could easily go (for instance - likely in practice a bit different) Toronto ISP - Toronto telco hub - Chicago telco hub - Minneapolis - Winnipeg. Geographically, the best route would be east-west (e.g. Toronto - Sault Ste Marie - Winnipeg), but the north-south routes prevail in Canada, with actual east-west being handled on US networks.
The internet "border" between the US and Canada is so permeable that it really can't be said to exist in any meaningful way.
Another thing that complicates detemining geographic origin in Canada is that customers of Canadian branch offices of large ISPs appear to be originating from the large ISP's US location. Many, many people looking at Webtrends reports from their Canadian commercial sites have puzzled over why so many of their users appear to be from Virginia.
Two things you should know:
(a) the Internet is everywhere (as if you didn't know that one) and therefore copying (and copyright violations) occur EVERYWHERE. Every time someone accesses the internet there are copies made all over the place (think of your average traceroute) and therefore potential copyright violations. So it's quite easy to argue that iCrave is copying programming in the United States even if its servers aren't located in the U.S.
(b) In Canadian law (I'm Canadian) and I believe in the rest of the western world, foreign (e.g. U.S.A.) judgements (court orders) are enforceable in Canadian courts. Recently in Canada there was a front-page story about someone who had lost a Texas libel case by not defending it, and the multi-million dollar judgement (unthinkably large in Canadian terms - the maximum libel damages usually awarded are about $100,000 tops) was UPHELD by the Supreme Court of Canada and declared enforceable against the Canadian doctor. This means that the Canadian Courts will enforce U.S. judgments.
As a rule, albeit with certain exceptions, foreign judgements will be enforced in Canadian courts.
The upshot of this is, of course, that had the U.S. companies succeeded in their suit in the U.S.A., their judgement would have been enforceable (and enforced no doubt) in Canada.
It used to be the case that it was impossible to enforce U.S. judgements in Canada, but in the late-eighties/early-nineties (I think) the Supreme Court of Canada changed its mind, joining the rest of the western world, and ruled that foreign judgements would be enforceable as long as they were done in a fair manner.
Hope that clears up a few things.
Ken
However, more and more people who circumvent this "damage" are no longer damamge control experts, but criminals.
The way our present society and present government treats corporations is ass backwards. Individual rights should come before the rights of corporations, not vice-versa. Collectively, groups of individuals should dictate the terms of what is allowable for corporations to do. Unfortunatly, the situation has been as such for so long that it's simply accepted.
I think one of the tools that we actually have now that is far, far under-exercised is the power to revoke a corporations charter. See this adbusters article for more information about the revokation of corporate charters.
However, as time goes on, more and more power is being shifted away from individuals and their elected representatives, and more towards corporations. Remember, though, that as much money as corporations can put into a politician's war chest, corporations can't vote. If inform voters, and get more of the elgiable public to vote, we can "throw the bums out" and get the law working back in the favor of the individual.
Thanks go out to Time-Warner/AOL/Whore of Babylon, the RIAA, the MPAA, the DVD Consortioum, and the politicians who have sold our best interests to the highest bidder and best funded lobbyist by passing the DMCA.
--
Intelligence is definitely a recessive trait.
Sorry, but I think this Loss-of-Freedom spiel is getting old. Yeah, this sort of thing could "balkanize" the Internet; I admit the possibility. However, in cases such as the iCraveTV suit, some sort of geographical restrictions are necessary.
The "Enter your Canadian Area Code:" prompt at iCraveTV's website was a joke. Any US retard with 5 minutes on his hands could get around this protection, and while a lot of us may like it that way, it's breaking laws. Canada may allow rebroadcasting, but the US does not.
Clearly this is going to be an issue that comes up more and more frequently in the future: How do national laws apply to an international network? There are already some precedents made, but it's obvious that we're not finished by a long shot. Until we see an international set of laws regarding internet content and liabilities, I think geographical restrictions may be the way to go.
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
iCraveTV was sued in both Canadian and US courts, however it is debateable as to whether the US court has jurisdition. It could be argued that the breach of copyright occurred in the US. If iCraveTV has no exposure in the US market (no offices, US arm of the business), the courts decisions are pretty much unenforceable.
This is an aspect of US courts I have never understood - they are willing to award court decisions against foreign companies that have no chance of ever being enforced. I know of a British outdoor activities organisation that was sued in a Californian court for negligence (they 'damaged' an American tourist.) They didn't bother defending the case and the plaintiff was awarded damages of several million dollars which she has no hope of ever collecting. Why didn't the judge just say 'hey if you want to collect, sue them in an English court.'? This mentality extend even to Congress, I have a friend who was 'summoned' to testify before Congress (the German bank he works for is doing something that upsets the US government.) He told them to piss off. Still, he gets a bit nervous everytime his passport gets swiped when he lands at JFK...
Nick
-- "It's a sad day for American capitalism when a man can't fly a midget on a kite over Central Park" - Jim Moran
Incorrect. Think of it this way...
The main routers and backbones and pipes that connect one country to another are very controlled (like China's incoming connections). This allows them to block/filter net access at its weakest point -- the few incoming connections. But anyway, all one would have to do to figure out what country you're in is do a traceroute from you to them. If it gets routed through one of these well-known and well-controlled (sprint, mci, bbn, uunet, etc) routers, then you know what country the other end is in. Some of these main routers even have LOC records in their DNS, meaning the exact latitude and longitude of the machine is available to anyone. But remember; it isn't the geographic location of the client machine that concerns them; it's what country it's in... and while an exact location would be almost impossible to determine, a route to that machine is always available. Unless it was spoofed, of course. :-)
So TCP/IP isn't really the issue; DNS is.
Hey; maybe I could patent this method of... nah. I'd sooner die than become One Of THEM...
"The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness."
While it's all nice for Katz to blame Canada (and not a company located inside it) for inventing "geographic screening", he obviously has ignored the fact that the United States has been doing so for much longer. Whenever I try to download high encryption software I have to sign my life away saying that I live in the US or Canada. Even after that, most sites will even do a reverse lookup on my ip address just to be sure. This seems to be worse "geographic screening" than iCraveTV.com did (valid postal code needed), yet he never hints about it durring his rant of the day...