Slashdot Mirror
More Threats From The MPAA
MattLesko writes: "Looks like the MPAA is now even going after those who link to copies of DeCSS, flying high on the recent ruling in their favor. 2600 has a copy of the letter they are sending out here , along with the usual lucid comments that we've come to expect from Mr. Goldstein." Some Slashdot readers have already written to say that access to their e-mail accounts has been yanked by (academic) providers for linking to DeCSS from their home pages. Has it happened to you?
If you are supposed to inform them of anyone who is linking to a site that links to DeCSS and so on, then do so.
Write a web crawler that looks for everone linking to X site. Then search for everyone linking to everyone who links to those site and so on. When you hit the threshold amount of your mail server (say 4-5 megs), send it to them and keep going.
Fairly soon, they will find out just how big that number is.
"What do you mean the MPAA is suing the *entire* Internet?"
"Trademarks are the heraldry of the new feudalism."
I am now more convinved than before that what I did was the right thing to do.
To the MPAA, and all who would follow in their footsteps: you may not censor me .
Now is when I really want to see some of the ol' cyberpunk magic...c'mon, Chinese government, post everything American and copyrighted...now!
The idea of the game is that you start at a web page of a competitor's choice and compete to find smut the fewest number of links away.
Bookmark pages, search engines, etc, are off limits as they make the game too easy.
It's probably too late for this to be read, but I've written a pair of perl scripts to encode a file be reordering the lines of a (different) text file. The scripts are available from the URL above, as is the css-descramble source encoded using the text of the DMCA.
--
--
Things are only impossible until they are not.
This is an intentional link to DeCSS.
Any site that has advertisements most likely at some point links to some pages that link either to search engines or directly to illegal material. Whereas those themselves can be unintentional, and thus legal, my link above states that it is a link to DeCSS. Thus, my link is illegal.
Too bad we don't have DMCA in Finland.
Blah. Plain insanity.
I think, therefore thoughts exist. Ego is just an impression.
Thought I'd add this thought I had since other posts here seem related.
It seems the terrain in this battle could be altered significantly if server vulnerabilities were used to insert a file (mpaa.html or decss.html) into the root directory of a large number of servers across the net. (Alternately an otherwise invisible text link or transparent gif link in a bottom corner of the page might work as well, to find mirrors, like the PI character in the movie the Net). The html file could contain source and multiple executables of the DeCSS code, and this file could be given a variety of related names or placed in subfolders, stegographed into gifs, inserted into Javascript, encrypted with a public key, etc., so that it is less detectable by administrators and mpaa search engine investigators while promising an unending morph of target and terrain.
Maybe if the MPAA ever gives up the server admins would be notified of the security holes they have.. but I am thinking that admins might even intentionally add this to their own systems since they could say it was placed there by a hacker. Leaving a security hole open intentionally might be a plausible defense in that case.
This thought came to me when I was considering a perl script published in a well known network security secrets book. A friend inexperienced in perl or hacking tried offhand to test his clients' NT servers and suddenly was granted System permissions three times out of three, score 3 for linux. This seems a far more interesting game for script kiddies too, why bother defacing some clueless government's page when they could screw the MPAA instead. There is also less damage on the part of those defaced.
Violence -- Speech may not take the form of violence nor incite violence.
Property Damage -- Same as above.
Criminal Speech -- Some forms of speech are criminal in nature. Treason, conspiracy to commit a crime, etc.
Encroaching on the Rights of Others -- This is why pro-life protesters can be made to stop blocking a clinic.
Trespass -- Freedom of speech does not equal the right to speak wherever and whenever you want. I can't deliver a political (or otherwise) speech in your house without permission.
Forms of expression outside the First Amendment -- Libel and obscenity have been prohibited from the very beginning.
Burden on Government function -- This is the basis of upholding the law against burning draft cards.
Copyright violations -- The Constitutional right of copyright supercedes most Free Speech rights.
Speech containing sufficient nonspeech elements -- Here is where code is most affected. If you had actually read the ruling, you would've realized that over half the ruling deals with code as Free Speech and how it can be limited. The First Amendment does not mean that the government is powerless, and it is realms where a form of expression contains significant nonspeech elements, such as code, where the government typically has the most power to limit speech. While I certainly am not a constitutional scholar, I am at least familiar with:
United States vs. O'Brien (1969)
Chaplinsky vs. New Hampshire (1942)
Rowan vs. Post Office (1970) All three are excellent examples of the government limiting forms of expression and the Supreme Court backing them up. Research them sometime.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
One: Post the code on non-US servers. AFAIK US law still doesn't apply outside the US. Preferably choose countries where there is lots of anti-US feelings.
Two: Wouldn't it be fun if, say China or Iraq started to demand that the major hollywood sites must be shut down? Surely something there can be considered "illegal" somewhere in the world?
Or better yet. If it enough to have "offending" material on your site, a lot of brits might want to shut down sites that link to a certain movie with Mel Gibson?
All opinions are my own - until criticized
An example would've been a link to 2600.com back when they actually hosted the code for purposes of linking to a hacker magazine. That would've have been illegal.
That wouldn't have been illegal.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Disclaimer: I am a lawyer, but I'm tired of putting up meaningful disclaimers. It's been a long, exhausting day, and I need a beer. If you want to act on what's in this message, go see a lawyer, licensed in your jurisdiction, who gives a crap.
I love the idea of reading it into the public record. If my hazy memory serves me, that's what happened with the Pentagon Papers back in the early 70s, and hell hath no fury like the Defense Department scorned. However, after it was read into the record, it was fair game. Then the journalists could report on it willy nilly without worrying about pesky security clearances and stolen documents.
The Speech and Debate Clause of the US Constitution protects Senators and Congresstypes from prosecution for acts taken in the course of official government proceedings (within reason). I'd love to see a Representative go to the well of the House and read DeCSS into the record. Maybe the EFF's lobbyists could try to pull that one off.
The unanimity of support for the DMCA can be broken by one Member of Congress who has the courage to stand up to the MPAA, RIAA and those who seek to congregate control over speech in the hands of faceless monopolistic multinational middlemen conglomerates.
Sheesh, it's definitely beer time. I reserve the right to retract all these statements after I've had two beers and an amount of sleep to be named later.
==
This post sponsored by the American Obstetrics Society:
This fight is indeed not about copying. Perfect bit-wise DVD copies are being made by the millions in Asia. This fight is about distribution control and price fixing. Maybe you guys remember regional coding. Maybe Americans may forget about it, but in Europe, where people have to wait 6 months longer for a new release to come out, we don't. As said before, the encryption key on the disc has to match the key in the player. This is a very easy way to control what players can play what discs. And like this they can keep disc prices in Europe higher than in the US.
greetings! i just got off the phone with Susan, (main mpaa number ext 343) who is a manager (i didnt ask which department). i was asking why certain individuals were being targeted with cease and desist letters while others were not. i also explained to her how the mpaa.org web site links (a series of links, 10) to the decss source itself. i also asked her if the mpaa was going to send cease and desist letters to itself and disney (goto.com). i invited her to read this story on slashdot and responses to get a clearer picture. she was friendly and was very interested in this discussion. she didn't know that through a series of links there are millions of law offending web sites out there (including most of the plaintiffs in the 2600 case). i'm hoping to infiltrate the mpaa employees with the truth so they can see how idiotic the mpaa's antics really are. cheers!
Hmmmmmmm... glad to see I'm not the only one who noticed that point
According to that all I have to do is put a link to a search engine on my site, or link to a page that links to a page, that links to a page (that links to a page, and on and on...), that links to a search engine of some sort, and BANG! I've just created a series of links that allows the downloading of DeCSS.
I haven't checked the links the MPAA has on their web site, but I'm sure you can eventually get to the DeCSS code from at least one of them, may take a while but I'm sure you can... Personally, I'm waiting for them to go after Yahoo and the likes, after all they ARE linking o sites that provide DeCSS or links to sites that link (and so on...)
On a not quite so related note, I personally think it would be funny if a significantly large number of people provided links to this DeCSS (don't worry, nothing illegal about it) and just create a little background noise for the MPAA to have to sort through to get the sites that link to the other/real DeCSS.
-GreenHell
"I won't mod you down - I feel the need to call you a twit explicitly, rather than by implication."
If I link to a page [that links to a page]* that links to a DeCss, am I in trouble?
If so, I'm removing my links to search engines...
Welcome to the collapse of 'civilized' society!
-- "Almost everyone is an idiot. If you think I'm exaggerating, then you're one of them."
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
I can't imagine that linking becomes forbidden here in Holland, no way!!! Why sending that E-mail to the whole world? Do they really believe that US law is universal?
Bizar technology?
Or, as someone else said, change the variables, or make the source code into something different that performs the same. But go a step beyond that. Publish it. I mean really publish it. Send it to a magazine that will print it for you. Truly get it protected under the first amendment. Or talk to those obfuscated perl contest winners and have one write an obfuscated perl script that will output decss when it is run, and have that published. Write into the letters column of your local newspaper, magazines, any chance you have of getting it published, do so!
Another possibility is to loveletter the source code, either in original or modified form (Note: I do not, repeat NOT endorse this nor would i like to see it. I'm a network admin and do not, repeat NOT need that headache again. The though just occurred to me while writing this ). The more places the code is published or spread, the more the MPAA will have to sue. If it achieves loveletter status in mailing itself around the globe (what, just about every other computer in the world in under 24 hours?) the MPAA will have to send cease-and-desist letters to everyone. Including themselves.
Heck, if the source in under 6000 characters, send it into that French space-time capsule that will be up for 50000 years. If not, break it up amongst several people with instructions on how to reassemble the code. Convert it into as many other programming languages as possible, convert the variables into other languages. Write a mathematical equation that is answered with the decss code. The possibilities are endless for this type of civil disobedience. Remember, you (i.e. dedicated hackers) are the smart ones, not them. If they were, you wouldn't have cracked the encryption in the first place.
Rent some time on public access TV and spend the half hour or so teaching people how to compile the source code, and then tell them to tape your show, and halfway thru have the source scroll up the screen so they can type it in later on. Or just dictate it. All those old floppy disks that you've been itching to throw away? Copy the source onto that and some literature about the whole case and the evils of the MPAA and distribute it to people at political rallies.
It can be done. Hell, I'm stupid and look at all these ideas I came up with. Maybe someone smart can think of something that will actually work! -dj
`/\/\
(^.^)
(")(")
not quite an analog pussy, just a cat that plays with vinyl
1. Create an MP3 of someone reading the DeCSS source code aloud with a Metallica or Dr. Dre song (the original, please, not a knockoff or Muzak version!) in the background.
2. Drop it onto both the MPAA's and RIAA's web sites. Make sure you put a link to the counterpart version on their home pages.
3. Sit back and watch the fun as they sue each other.
--
Someone you trust is one of us.
Very kewell! Let us know if the MPAA starts bugging you. Hope you get some good karma, your post is very interesting and "informative".
Visit DC2600
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
www.mpaa.org -> (via click to enter)
www.mpaa.org/home.htm ->
www.mpaa.org/relatedsites/ ->
www.privacyalliance.org/ -> (via 'Resources' in banner at top)
www.privacyalliance.org/resources -> (via link all the way at the bottom)
www.eff.org/ ->
www.eff.org/pub/Intellectual_property/Video/ ->
eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/DVD/ ->
eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/DVD/resources.html ->
eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/DVD/DeCSS/ ->
www.zpok.demon.co.uk/decss/ ->
www.zpok.demon.co.uk/decss/DeCSS.zip
Even better... gets you a copy of it!!! 11 degress of separation from www.mpaa.org to an actual copy of the DeCSS archive (only 10 to a list of mirrors of the code).
Eric
So the judge says search engines are not trespassing, since they do not link knowingly. So, I assume I can link to a search enigne without breaking this broken law. What if I link to a search engine, giving it a querystring in addition to the hostname? Like...
I could go on, but I won't. I assume this would be legal, right?
--frank[at]unternet.org
Yes. Once again -- U.S. vs. O'Brien. The core of this Supreme Court case was O'Brien's argument that in burning the draft card as an act of protest, his actions took on First Amendment protections that superceded the 1965 amendment to the Selective Service act prohibiting the defacement and destruction of draft cards. This case was all about whether doing something illegal in an expressive manner as a means of protest made it legal. The clear precedent was established that, no, you cannot.
Thus, linking to DeCSS as a protest against the MPAA, which is exactly what 2600 was doing, is indeed not protected under the First Amendment according to Judge Kaplan's ruling. I disagree very strongly with the DMCA, but if you assume that it is indeed legal, then unfortunately you can only logically follow that linking in that fashion as protest is also illegal according to current case law.
Sucks, huh? I hope they find a good way to challenge DMCA itself. Kaplan really kind of glossed over that by saying that Congress must've considered the ramifications of the law and giving superficial supporting analysis. In math terms, DMCA was considered a postulate, not a theorem to be proven in its own right. Kind of ignores the whole purpose behind judicial review, doesn't it?
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Not going to work if the MPAA takes it seriously. Because of American pressure, the Swedish government passed (without hardly telling the people) a change to the Freedom of Information laws in the constitution in order to make Co$ happy.
I would get a link but the blurbs in the press were so tiny I doubt they even made it online...
There's probably a market for a straightforward player with better features. Like skipping the mandatory commercials on Disney disks. Or making a file of thumbnails, one per scene change, as a index to the disk. Or extracting and indexing the closed-captioning information. None of those is a circumvention of copy protection, or a copyright violation. They're useful features a PC-based player ought to have.
http://www.cubicmetercrystal.com/decss/
/*
, 0x36,0x2b,0x6e,0x2e,0x66,0x7b,
, 0xd6,0x0b,0x4e,0x0e,0x46,0x9b,
, 0x52,0x8f,0xca,0x8a,0xc2,0x1f,
, 0xd0,0x01,0x48,0x08,0x40,0x91,
, 0x34,0x25,0x6c,0x2c,0x64,0x75,
, 0xd4,0x05,0x4c,0x0c,0x44,0x95,
, 0x50,0x81,0xc8,0x88,0xc0,0x11,
, 0xd2,0x0f,0x4a,0x0a,0x42,0x9f,
, 0x56,0x8b,0xce,0x8e,0xc6,0x1b,
, 0xb6,0xab,0xee,0xae,0xe6,0xfb,
, 0x32,0x2f,0x6a,0x2a,0x62,0x7f,
, 0xb0,0xa1,0xe8,0xa8,0xe0,0xf1,
, 0x54,0x85,0xcc,0x8c,0xc4,0x15,
, 0xb4,0xa5,0xec,0xac,0xe4,0xf5,
, 0x30,0x21,0x68,0x28,0x60,0x71,
, 0xb2,0xaf,0xea,0xaa,0xe2,0xff
, 0x0b,0x0a,0x0d,0x0c,0x0f,0x0e,
, 0x19,0x18,0x1f,0x1e,0x1d,0x1c,
, 0x2f,0x2e,0x29,0x28,0x2b,0x2a,
, 0x3d,0x3c,0x3b,0x3a,0x39,0x38,
, 0x42,0x43,0x44,0x45,0x46,0x47,
, 0x50,0x51,0x56,0x57,0x54,0x55,
, 0x66,0x67,0x60,0x61,0x62,0x63,
, 0x74,0x75,0x72,0x73,0x70,0x71,
, 0x99,0x98,0x9f,0x9e,0x9d,0x9c,
, 0x8b,0x8a,0x8d,0x8c,0x8f,0x8e,
, 0xbd,0xbc,0xbb,0xba,0xb9,0xb8,
, 0xaf,0xae,0xa9,0xa8,0xab,0xaa,
, 0xd0,0xd1,0xd6,0xd7,0xd4,0xd5,
, 0xc2,0xc3,0xc4,0xc5,0xc6,0xc7,
, 0xf4,0xf5,0xf2,0xf3,0xf0,0xf1,
, 0xe6,0xe7,0xe0,0xe1,0xe2,0xe3
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,
, 0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff
, 0x50,0xd0,0x30,0xb0,0x70,0xf0,
, 0x58,0xd8,0x38,0xb8,0x78,0xf8,
, 0x54,0xd4,0x34,0xb4,0x74,0xf4,
, 0x5c,0xdc,0x3c,0xbc,0x7c,0xfc,
, 0x52,0xd2,0x32,0xb2,0x72,0xf2,
, 0x5a,0xda,0x3a,0xba,0x7a,0xfa,
, 0x56,0xd6,0x36,0xb6,0x76,0xf6,
, 0x5e,0xde,0x3e,0xbe,0x7e,0xfe,
, 0x51,0xd1,0x31,0xb1,0x71,0xf1,
, 0x59,0xd9,0x39,0xb9,0x79,0xf9,
, 0x55,0xd5,0x35,0xb5,0x75,0xf5,
, 0x5d,0xdd,0x3d,0xbd,0x7d,0xfd,
, 0x53,0xd3,0x33,0xb3,0x73,0xf3,
, 0x5b,0xdb,0x3b,0xbb,0x7b,0xfb,
, 0x57,0xd7,0x37,0xb7,0x77,0xf7,
, 0x5f,0xdf,0x3f,0xbf,0x7f,0xff
1 9);*/
;
1 9);*/
;
* css_descramble.c
*
* Released under the version 2 of the GPL.
*
* Copyright 1999 Derek Fawcus
*
* This file contains functions to descramble CSS encrypted DVD content
*
*/
/*
* Still in progress: Remove the use of the bit_reverse[] table by recoding
* the generation of LFSR1. Finish combining this with
* the css authentication code.
*
*/
#include
#include
#include "css-descramble.h"
typedef unsigned char byte;
/*
*
* some tables used for descrambling sectors and/or decrypting title keys
*
*/
static byte csstab1[256]=
{
0x33,0x73,0x3b,0x26,0x63,0x23,0x6b,0x76,0x3e,0x7e
0xd3,0x93,0xdb,0x06,0x43,0x03,0x4b,0x96,0xde,0x9e
0x57,0x17,0x5f,0x82,0xc7,0x87,0xcf,0x12,0x5a,0x1a
0xd9,0x99,0xd1,0x00,0x49,0x09,0x41,0x90,0xd8,0x98
0x3d,0x7d,0x35,0x24,0x6d,0x2d,0x65,0x74,0x3c,0x7c
0xdd,0x9d,0xd5,0x04,0x4d,0x0d,0x45,0x94,0xdc,0x9c
0x59,0x19,0x51,0x80,0xc9,0x89,0xc1,0x10,0x58,0x18
0xd7,0x97,0xdf,0x02,0x47,0x07,0x4f,0x92,0xda,0x9a
0x53,0x13,0x5b,0x86,0xc3,0x83,0xcb,0x16,0x5e,0x1e
0xb3,0xf3,0xbb,0xa6,0xe3,0xa3,0xeb,0xf6,0xbe,0xfe
0x37,0x77,0x3f,0x22,0x67,0x27,0x6f,0x72,0x3a,0x7a
0xb9,0xf9,0xb1,0xa0,0xe9,0xa9,0xe1,0xf0,0xb8,0xf8
0x5d,0x1d,0x55,0x84,0xcd,0x8d,0xc5,0x14,0x5c,0x1c
0xbd,0xfd,0xb5,0xa4,0xed,0xad,0xe5,0xf4,0xbc,0xfc
0x39,0x79,0x31,0x20,0x69,0x29,0x61,0x70,0x38,0x78
0xb7,0xf7,0xbf,0xa2,0xe7,0xa7,0xef,0xf2,0xba,0xfa
};
static byte lfsr1_bits0[256]=
{
0x00,0x01,0x02,0x03,0x04,0x05,0x06,0x07,0x09,0x08
0x12,0x13,0x10,0x11,0x16,0x17,0x14,0x15,0x1b,0x1a
0x24,0x25,0x26,0x27,0x20,0x21,0x22,0x23,0x2d,0x2c
0x36,0x37,0x34,0x35,0x32,0x33,0x30,0x31,0x3f,0x3e
0x49,0x48,0x4b,0x4a,0x4d,0x4c,0x4f,0x4e,0x40,0x41
0x5b,0x5a,0x59,0x58,0x5f,0x5e,0x5d,0x5c,0x52,0x53
0x6d,0x6c,0x6f,0x6e,0x69,0x68,0x6b,0x6a,0x64,0x65
0x7f,0x7e,0x7d,0x7c,0x7b,0x7a,0x79,0x78,0x76,0x77
0x92,0x93,0x90,0x91,0x96,0x97,0x94,0x95,0x9b,0x9a
0x80,0x81,0x82,0x83,0x84,0x85,0x86,0x87,0x89,0x88
0xb6,0xb7,0xb4,0xb5,0xb2,0xb3,0xb0,0xb1,0xbf,0xbe
0xa4,0xa5,0xa6,0xa7,0xa0,0xa1,0xa2,0xa3,0xad,0xac
0xdb,0xda,0xd9,0xd8,0xdf,0xde,0xdd,0xdc,0xd2,0xd3
0xc9,0xc8,0xcb,0xca,0xcd,0xcc,0xcf,0xce,0xc0,0xc1
0xff,0xfe,0xfd,0xfc,0xfb,0xfa,0xf9,0xf8,0xf6,0xf7
0xed,0xec,0xef,0xee,0xe9,0xe8,0xeb,0xea,0xe4,0xe5
};
static byte lfsr1_bits1[512]=
{
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
0x00,0x24,0x49,0x6d,0x92,0xb6,0xdb,0xff,0x00,0x24
};
/* Reverse the order of the bits within a byte.
*/
static byte bit_reverse[256]=
{
0x00,0x80,0x40,0xc0,0x20,0xa0,0x60,0xe0,0x10,0x90
0x08,0x88,0x48,0xc8,0x28,0xa8,0x68,0xe8,0x18,0x98
0x04,0x84,0x44,0xc4,0x24,0xa4,0x64,0xe4,0x14,0x94
0x0c,0x8c,0x4c,0xcc,0x2c,0xac,0x6c,0xec,0x1c,0x9c
0x02,0x82,0x42,0xc2,0x22,0xa2,0x62,0xe2,0x12,0x92
0x0a,0x8a,0x4a,0xca,0x2a,0xaa,0x6a,0xea,0x1a,0x9a
0x06,0x86,0x46,0xc6,0x26,0xa6,0x66,0xe6,0x16,0x96
0x0e,0x8e,0x4e,0xce,0x2e,0xae,0x6e,0xee,0x1e,0x9e
0x01,0x81,0x41,0xc1,0x21,0xa1,0x61,0xe1,0x11,0x91
0x09,0x89,0x49,0xc9,0x29,0xa9,0x69,0xe9,0x19,0x99
0x05,0x85,0x45,0xc5,0x25,0xa5,0x65,0xe5,0x15,0x95
0x0d,0x8d,0x4d,0xcd,0x2d,0xad,0x6d,0xed,0x1d,0x9d
0x03,0x83,0x43,0xc3,0x23,0xa3,0x63,0xe3,0x13,0x93
0x0b,0x8b,0x4b,0xcb,0x2b,0xab,0x6b,0xeb,0x1b,0x9b
0x07,0x87,0x47,0xc7,0x27,0xa7,0x67,0xe7,0x17,0x97
0x0f,0x8f,0x4f,0xcf,0x2f,0xaf,0x6f,0xef,0x1f,0x9f
};
/*
*
* this function is only used internally when decrypting title key
*
*/
static void css_titlekey(byte *key, byte *im, byte invert)
{
unsigned int lfsr1_lo,lfsr1_hi,lfsr0,combined;
byte o_lfsr0, o_lfsr1;
byte k[5];
int i;
lfsr1_lo = im[0] | 0x100;
lfsr1_hi = im[1];
lfsr0 = ((im[4] >8)&0xff] >16)&0xff]>24)&0xff];
combined = 0;
for (i = 0; i >1;
lfsr1_lo = ((lfsr1_lo&1)>7)^(lfsr0>>10)^(lfsr0>>11)^(lfsr0>>
o_lfsr0 = (((((((lfsr0>>8)^lfsr0)>>1)^lfsr0)>>3)^lfsr0)>>7)
lfsr0 = (lfsr0>>8)|(o_lfsr0>= 8;
}
key[4]=k[4]^csstab1[key[4]]^key[3];
key[3]=k[3]^csstab1[key[3]]^key[2];
key[2]=k[2]^csstab1[key[2]]^key[1];
key[1]=k[1]^csstab1[key[1]]^key[0];
key[0]=k[0]^csstab1[key[0]]^key[4];
key[4]=k[4]^csstab1[key[4]]^key[3];
key[3]=k[3]^csstab1[key[3]]^key[2];
key[2]=k[2]^csstab1[key[2]]^key[1];
key[1]=k[1]^csstab1[key[1]]^key[0];
key[0]=k[0]^csstab1[key[0]];
}
/*
*
* this function decrypts a title key with the specified disk key
*
* tkey: the unobfuscated title key (XORed with BusKey)
* dkey: the unobfuscated disk key (XORed with BusKey)
* 2048 bytes in length (though only 5 bytes are needed, see below)
* pkey: array of pointers to player keys and disk key offsets
*
*
* use the result returned in tkey with css_descramble
*
*/
int css_decrypttitlekey(byte *tkey, byte *dkey, struct playkey **pkey)
{
byte test[5], pretkey[5];
int i = 0;
for (; *pkey; ++pkey, ++i) {
memcpy(pretkey, dkey + (*pkey)->offset, 5);
css_titlekey(pretkey, (*pkey)->key, 0);
memcpy(test, dkey, 5);
css_titlekey(test, pretkey, 0);
if (memcmp(test, pretkey, 5) == 0) {
fprintf(stderr, "Using Key %d\n", i+1);
break;
}
}
if (!*pkey) {
fprintf(stderr, "Shit - Need Key %d\n", i+1);
return 0;
}
css_titlekey(tkey, pretkey, 0xff);
return 1;
}
/*
*
* this function does the actual descrambling
*
* sec: encrypted sector (2048 bytes)
* key: decrypted title key obtained from css_decrypttitlekey
*
*/
void css_descramble(byte *sec,byte *key)
{
unsigned int lfsr1_lo,lfsr1_hi,lfsr0,combined;
unsigned char o_lfsr0, o_lfsr1;
unsigned char *end = sec + 0x800;
#define SALTED(i) (key[i] ^ sec[0x54 + (i)])
lfsr1_lo = SALTED(0) | 0x100;
lfsr1_hi = SALTED(1);
lfsr0 = ((SALTED(4) >8)&0xff] >16)&0xff]>24)&0xff];
sec+=0x80;
combined = 0;
while (sec != end) {
o_lfsr1 = lfsr1_bits0[lfsr1_hi] ^ lfsr1_bits1[lfsr1_lo];
lfsr1_hi = lfsr1_lo>>1;
lfsr1_lo = ((lfsr1_lo&1)>7)^(lfsr0>>10)^(lfsr0>>11)^(lfsr0>>
o_lfsr0 = (((((((lfsr0>>8)^lfsr0)>>1)^lfsr0)>>3)^lfsr0)>>7)
lfsr0 = (lfsr0>>8)|(o_lfsr0>= 8;
}
}
are you talking about standalone players that you hook up to the TV, or players for the computer?
what would be the point of dvd and a standalone player if the outputquality is crippled?
and what would be the point of crippling the video signal for a computer, if the computer can read the digital data directly, and do it's own decryption and create a good signal without the help of the player?
greetings, eMBee.
--
Gnu is Not Unix / Linux Is Not UniX
Okay, this deserves a response.
Have you ever considered the fact that the only reason you have this right is because another group of people deemed it so? Previous to the creation of the Bill of Rights, no government has such "inalienable" rights for its citizens. This supposedly intrinsic right that everyone supposedly gets by existing did not exist before that except in the rhetoric of natural law philosophers such as Locke.
Don't fool yourself. All rights are priviledges that other people extend to one another. There are no intrinsic human rights -- not even the right to be born anymore. It may not be too long before medical science allows the right to die to be taken away.
While I believe that the DMCA is a seriously bad piece of legislation, Kaplan's words in the ruling rang very true -- that the First Amendment is not a suicide pact for the government. Would you really like to live in a country where people were free to fire-bomb houses and roll over cars without impunity because it is a form of expression? Would you really like to live in a country that couldn't have ruled in favor of the government in Rowan vs. U.S. Post Office; a country where the government cannot stop commercial advertisers from forcing junk mail on you even after telling them you don't want it? Would you really like to live in a country where the expressiveness of an act could be used to justify any criminal action?
"Your honor, I am suing because his throwing me out of his house squelched my freedom to speak about the wonders of my church."
"Your honor, I realize that those secrets about nuclear weapon design could hurt the U.S. if passed into the wrong hands, but it is my right to tell them to whoever I want, wherever I want, and whenever I want."
"Your honor, there is nothing illegal about telling a group of people, even a violently upset group, to kill that black man. That they did it is their problem, not mine."
"Yes your honor, Company X was the original author of that piece of software, but there's nothing wrong with freely copying it, is there? After all, code is a form of speech. So what if it took them 3 years and millions of dollars to research? They should've invested some of that money in better server security. My freedom of speech supercedes their ownership."
"Your honor, my forcing of affections on the young lady over there were merely a positive expression of her good looks."
The fact is that all of the above examples are things that our government system -- the one that originated this "inalienable" right -- does rightfully reject each and every one of those arguments. Oh, and by the way, treasonous speech is illegal. Check the Constitution itself. However, rich case histories have shown that even Communist philosophers speaking of the overthrowing the American capitalist system were well within their rights to do so. (Gitlow vs. New York 1925) How do you think that square with the rich history of protest speech in America?
I swear, some people should get off their "inalienable" rights soapboxes and do some research on how the real world actually works.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
But what are the non speech elements associated with distributing a text file?
No, code itself contains significant nonspeech elements. Code is inherently a functional "machine" of sorts as well as being a method of communicating to humans how to make a computer go about a task. It is both a description of a task and the task itself. Thus code itself may be regulated. That is the argument here.
In the case of other forms of illegal speech, such as libel and obscenity, it doesn't matter what the transmission method is, such as "distributing a text file." It's the speech itself that is illegal, and the distribution of it can also be made illegal. This is the unfortunate case with the DMCA.
The judge cited cases because he had nothing else to work with, but there have been other cases involving things like schools attempting to ban messages on t-shirts, and appellate court rulings where the government was unsuccessful in stopping the posting of cryptographic source code that are by far more similar to the present case. I didn't see the judge spending any time distinguishing this case from those. I don't believe he could credibly do so.
Actually, in any case where you are potentially going up against the legal cannon that is the First Amendment, you have to really shore up your defense with precendents like US vs. O'Brien. Kaplan did acknowledge Bernstein vs. US DOJ, where the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that current crypto export legislation was unlawful prior restraint on code as a form of speech. It was with this in mind that he spent 40+ pages dealing with the legal justifications of restricting code in light of its speech elements. That's why he spent significant time covering the validity of censoring code under its non-speech elements.
But before we hang the judge out to dry, it's important to realize how limited his ruling really is.
It's unfortunately worse than you think. The American court system is riddled with precedents. Any significant ruling in a case that tests a law contains exhaustive reference to the judgements of other judges, not necessarily all at the federal level. Kaplan's ruling affirming the DMCA may lead to a whole new level of legislation restricting our actions. The injunctions you refer to were covered previously in the case. The ruling is something else entirely. Punitive damages have been awarded to the MPAA. Round one is already lost. We just have to see if we can survive round two.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Yes, I'm fully aware of that. In fact, I've been fully aware of that since the first time I heard it, when this first "illegal linking" topic came up.
Just because an idea is valid or important doesn't mean you need to hear it eight thousand times. My physics teacher used to repeat every single day that the velocity of an orbiting object pointed tangent to the circle. One day, about three months in the class, he said the words "tangent to the circle", and my friend started screaming and banging his head on his desk.
That's about the way I feel about "but search engines link to DeCSS!!" posts.
"Beware he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he deems himself your master."
And don't forget Google's web page caching facility. Its going to maintain that page for a good long time...
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
I have been thinking about this one for a while, guess it is time to try it.
Step 1. Post a web page named DeCSS, with DeCSS in the URL and some general information on the page that explains in great detail that the DeCSS code does not exist on that page. Also, no links to the DeCSS program on the page either.
Step 2. Sit back an wait to see how long the MPAA clueless train takes to fire off a letter.
Modified hack, have a link on the page to an empty file. Explain that it is an empty file. Goto Step 2.
Visit DC2600
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Th_ Unit__ _tat__ wa_ on__ a fr__ _ountry, but not anymor_.
matt
[This message edited by the MPAA.]
Curmudgeon Gamer: Not happy
I wonder how many spooks, cops, and hired goons (if there is any real difference...) are willing to end up with their brains on the walls to keep a few geeks from watching movies under Linux..
(which all in all is a moot point since there are no funcitonal MPEG players that even begin to run under Linux...)
---
Play Six Pack Man. I
Hypothetical situation...
I write an e-mail to a friend talking to him about the DeCSS. In that e-mail I write the URL which outlook automaticaly turn into an hyperlink my friend can click. Am I in trouble? Or is it Microsoft's fault??
"If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear"
Or go to every free web provider you can find and post the DeCSS source. They simply cannot afford to sue everyone!
--
Wooden armaments to battle your imaginary foes!
Therefore, by their own accusation, the MPAA are in violation of their MPAA order.
Anyone want to point this out to them?
(Needless to say, the court decision specifically mentioned "intent to link to decss code", so the average random linking that 99.9% of the links out there are harmless here.)
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
Store the stuff on a server you run if you actually believe in the spread of DeCSS.
Your upstream provider can always terminate your service.
<O
( \
XGNOME vs. KDE: the game!
Will I retire or break 10K?
What we need to do to facilitate this is:
Don't like to DeCSS, link to Altavista's links to DeCSS. Link to Yahoo's links to DeCSS.
*FORCE* the MPAA to drag them into court if they want to drag us into court.
-
You know, not to be an obnoxious twit or anything (*grin*), but why can't someone create a bunch of source files which look like CSS but isn't (by changing a key or something)? Or distribute a file called 'DeCSS.zip' which contains a program 'DeCSS.exe' which is actually a version of "whack-a-mole" with various MPAA figure's heads?
The idea is that right now, I suspect the MPAA is simply throwing "DeCSS" into a search engine and sending threatening letters to everyone whose name pops up out of the list. By having a number of files out there which are not the CSS descrambler sources or executables, but are called 'DeCSS', we could theoretically tie up the MPAA in a bunch of potentially losing lawsuits as they in turn sue the wrong people, and are thus forced to spend more resources than they currently are.
Hey, if the MPAA wants to sue every person on the planet, let them--just remember to countersue for legal costs, lost wages and other costs related to protecting yourself against a frivolous suit.
If you really want to annoy the DVD Mafia, rename DeCSS *to* MPAA. Can you imagine the chaos that will cause in the DVD Mafia's legal team trying to stomp out DeCSS code?
The MPAA FAQ about DeCSS and hyperlinking says:
Q: What is this Motion all about?
Q: The MPAA is only asking the Court to enter an injunction against Eric Corley, a/k/a "Emmanuel Goldstein" and those persons acting in concert with him, in the use of DeCSS hyperlinks.
If they are only asking that EG get the injunction... then why all the letters?
Correct me if I'm mis-remembering, but doesn't the DMCA target software whose "primary purpose or use" is to bypass. . . ? Why not embed the code as a menu selection in an open source word processor?
--When you buy proprietary software, you don't get better software. What you get is the right to complain about it.
"circumvention device". The DeCSS is not a device until it is compiled and executed until then, DeCSS is nothing more than a bunch of symbols on a piece of paper or t-shirt. You publish code.
However, the MPAA does not say this. They tell website operators to "remove the circumvention device from your website." IANAL, but what kind of language is this??? See the letter that the MPAA sent cryptome.org today for an example of this.
They cannot say "please remove the code that you have published on your website" because publishing involves speech, which the DeCSS is. When it is compiled and executed, your computer becomes a decryption device , placing it under patent laws. Is the DeCSS patented? If it is, then the US patent office has already published it. Then it follows that it is your computer that is the circumvention device not the DeCSS code by itself.
Another thing that gets me is the mishmash of copyrights and patents. Two different things, or two different temporary "granted monopolies". People should not be allowed to use one "monopoly" to increase the power of the other (i.g. dealing in software patents), because that power has not been granted by the constitution. The constitution separates the two because they were intended to deal separately with two different things, not act together. For many years, they had about the same amount of power until "copyright creep" started taking place, continually increasing its power until now you have the DMCA controlling "devices" overtaking the power of patents. Software should either have a copyright or a patent, but not both. If it can be copyrighted, then I should be able to have rights like "first sale" and "fair use" that have been argued the century before last when a publisher put a EULA on the first page of a book. If the software is a patent (i.g. a device that configures a computer), then I expect to be able to copy it in twenty years when the patent expires (and I mean the actual software created by the company using the patent). Just because you flash a contract in front of somebody's face or toss it in with the shinkrap doesn't mean you can usurp somebody's constitutional rights, and I consider having patents and copyrights acting as two separate entities as one of those rights. What we see now is the result of abuse of these two constitutionally "granted" temporary monopolies (making it greater than the freedom of speech). Taking a power that was niether "implied" nor "granted", they shaft the public out of their due - the very reason why the constitution grants patents and copyrights in the first place.
What the MPAA is trying to do is extend copyright privilege to devices (even they have to refer to DeCSS as a "device", otherwise their arguement gets flushed down the toilet where it belongs) all the while basking in the newfound powers of the copyright law/DMCA.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
I suggest the name dvd-fair-use-decrypter.c
It would be best if you don't link to sites directly. That will force the free speech aspect to become more direct. Use the text of the url like this
www.warcloud.net/dvd-fair-use-decrypter.c
If they want to prosecute they will have to mention "Fair Use" every time they open their mouth. How can the press ignore the fair use angle now? People need to know that rights they had a few years ago have been taken away and why!
What's in a name? Where would Linux be if Linus named Linux Freeix.
Perhaps a short commented section in the beginning of the file explaining harmfull efects the DMCA's changes to American law would also help.
When Hollywood pork bellies violate us, Don't just wave the Flag, wrap yourself in it!
Novel theory: Modern Man evolved from psychopath
Remember, we don't LIKE the MPAA. We actually WANT them to do stupid stuff like this. The more obnoxious they get, the better the chances that the whole DeCSS nonsense will get SMASHED, and the concepts of free use and free speech will return.
We should really be greatful to the MPAA for being such wonderfully obnoxious poster-boys for the DMCA, especially before the October review by the Library of Congress.
I hope they do a make a LOT more stupid moves like this, and get a lot more people mad.
Aside...
DeCSS is personal use of encryption. Encryption is a weapon, according to the government. Limiting our use of DeCSS is impairing our right to bear arms, as protected by the constitution, as well as impairing our free speach. Maybe the NRA is our friend on this one.
(Tongue partly in cheek on that last bit, but only partly.)
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Has anyone here been to law school? Do they really beat you that stupid before you're let out upon an unsuspecting public?
---
Our ISP was complaining because it was sucking to much bandwidth. Right now we have it so it randomly redirects to one of a number of mirrors. (a cheap PHP load balancing scheme). Anyway, looks like some of the mirrors pulled it. If it doesn't download, keep trying. You'll hit a mirror (or the original there) and you'll get it.
I haven't gotten a letter yet, but I'll keep y'all updated. I've got a number of lawyers from all over the country (even Harvard professors) aching to defend this song if it goes to court.
In the mean time- keep on downloading! You may be among the first Americans to own the very first illegal protest song. That'll be a sad sad day in American history. (I don't think it'll happen though. Frankly, I think the intelligent ones are on our side.)
- If you're looking for the DeCSS program that's illegal (even if you're only going to use to to view DVD's in Linux), you can find it by starting here .
The difference is that one could argue that the above link was created with the intention to aid others in commiting a crime.However, since my intent was simply to communicate an idea, I should be safe from the MPAA, right? right?
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
The program can also be used in reverse, to combine the two files together. Whaddya think?
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
If DVD decryption were handled by plugins having a simple streaming-filter interface then the MPAA's regressive actions would have almost no impact whatsoever. Player designers would be able to release their software with just a no-crypto plugin (so that you can play unencrypted DVDs, of which there are many), and couldn't be taken to task for dependency on DeCSS, since they wouldn't be.
And then, users wishing to watch their own encrypted DVDs on such a player would have merely to acquire and load a little plugin, which could easily be circulated on Usenet in the traditional way. Easy.
It'd be great if DeCSS (or another clean-room implementation of DVD decryption) were given such a treatment. The dlopen(3) interface is trivial to use. Does anyone know whether the current DeCSS is amenable to such conversion?
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
You mean like this ??
I guess it's time to commit it to memory.
____________________________________
-- I beleve you'll like this -->
That's a good idea, but to make it even better, how about implementing such decryption code in the form of decryption plugins with a defined API that designers of players could use without getting themselves compromised, as I wrote elsewhere in this thread.
That would be as unstoppable as Usenet, which is pretty darn unstoppable.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
send decss source out as spam to everyone in the world
http://Lenny.com
The GO Network is owned and operated by The Walt Disney Company, an MPAA member. Here's a whole bunch of links from the GO Network to DeCSS source.
<O
( \
XGNOME vs. KDE: the game!
Will I retire or break 10K?
If I link to a page [that links to a page]* that links to a DeCss, am I in trouble?
If so, I'm removing my links to search engines...
Well, if you read the ruling, the judge acknowledges that you cannot outright ban linking to pages that contain direct links DeCSS among other content if you are not explicitly linking for the purpose of taking someone to the DeCSS link. This would have what is know as the "chilling effect" where people would be afraid to link to search engines, as you imply above. The "chilling effect" is unfortunately well covered in his ruling.
Basically, if I say, "Here's DeCSS!" and provide a direct link, then I am in violation of the clause of the DMCA prohibiting trafficking in copy-protection thwarting decryption software -- as I obviously should be under the letter of the law. I mean, just because it's not on my site doesn't mean I'm not guilty of helping people to get it. It's all transparent to the end user whether they are grabbing it from a server I own or a server owned by someone else.
However, you can't make a link illegal to a site that you didn't know contained DeCSS or a link that was made for other purposes. An example would've been a link to 2600.com back when they actually hosted the code for purposes of linking to a hacker magazine. That would've have been illegal. The grey area, I think, is if you linked to their DeCSS links page and told people what it is. I'm not sure about that one.
Anyway, don't worry about search engines. The acknowledged "chilling effect" prevents them from being a problem. Read the ruling. A grounding in constitutional law helps. (IANAL, but this is a big area of interest of mine.)
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
> Th_ Unit__ _tat__ wa_ on__ a fr__ _ountry, but not anymor_.
Because I was able to parse and reconstruct jvmatthe's comment, can jvmatthe throw me in jail for circumventing his access control mechanism?
If a link to a page that has DeCSS is illegal, then what about a link to a page that has a link to it?
Maybe the whole web is illegal since it's all interlinked.
I hope some judge has the common sense to rule that pointing to a crime isn't illegal.
I guess that was a nice act of civil disobedience, but it posts a list of 130+ sites the MPAA can write nasty letters to, so get your code NOW, because the ones that aren't busted now sure will be tomorrow.
Don't turn your neighbors in to the Gestapo. Make it hard for them to make a bust!
1. Take your copies of DeCSS and css-auth, and dork up about 51% of the code so its no longer workable code.
2. Call it DeCSS and css-auth, tar & zip it and put it up for download.
3. Give it to your friends. Link to each other. Post it on every site and link exchange you can.
MAKE THEM PROVE IT.
Remember WW2? The allied planes dumped aluminum foil out of planes to confuse Nazi radar. Get some DeCSS foil in the air instead of shining spotlights on the good stuff.
My metamoderation cancels your moderation
/. Cartel - Information Trafficing Professionals
--
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
Singing the DeCSS is one thing (and an interesting excercise in protesting as well) but to meet the real challenge, and show the incredible stupidity of the MPAA and cabal, can you get a major artist to record the song and include it on one of their CDs? Or better yet get it included as music on the soundtrack of a movie that will come out on DVD?
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
And if even that should be forbidden, what happens if i just mention that by entering a search string like DeCSS into your favourite search engine it will probably pop up about 50.000 web-pages discussing DeCSS, with a sufficient percentage of them linking to the actual code.
Will that be forbidden next? Or will all big search engines be forced to use "filter lists" to ban the bad words (i can imagine some people might then push on to get words like 'sex', 'nude' etc. on that lists). Why stop there, why not ban every mentioning of the 'evil word' altogether since otherwise people might get the idea to search for it.
I think i'll go and read Kerningham/Ritchie before they start burning books.
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
I seem to remember in one of the MPAA's briefs that they have had their e-mail down for a good while. I have no doubt that this was because of mailbombing or other hactivist activities. It has also helped them build their case against the immorality of 2600's position, which came through loud and clear from the judge's opinion.
What we need on this issue is more public support and awareness. Everyone (and I do mean everyone) that I have explained this case to has agreed that the MPAA has overstepped their bounds, however there's only so much that this type of communication can do.
But in a war of public opinion, taking the high road is often much more productive. People (i.e. general public) are scared of things they don't understand. When/if CNN finally does report on this issue (...), I think it would be better for everyone if it wasn't as an aside to explaining why the website for every major movie studio was inaccessible.
$.02, take it or leave it.
(and as the judge also pointed out, it was Congress that left us with the DMCA. Make your opinion and your reason known to them)
--
+&x
So now, if I ever want to see a movie in the future, it has to be on an MPAA approved machine and software? Even if its operation in the near future requires connection to a telephone for activation? If thier devices are buggy and crash after watching the manditory 10 minutes of commercials at the beginning of each movie?
Ah, yes. Now you see the whole danger of the DMCA. DIVX was the first shot in the war on consumer property rights, but the pay-per-use annoyance-ware model has not yet died. Witness the recent Slashdot story about the evil subscription textbooks that one company is pushing. In particular, read their PR page. They don't care about their customers -- students and campus bookstores. They don't have to. As long as they can lock you into paying for the rest of you life for something you could pay once for nowdays, and as long as they can prevent you for reselling your copy to someone else, they can keep pumping every student for money as much as possible. As a student who recently had to pay $300 for textbooks, at least 2 of which I will be using for years to come if not the rest of my life, I am very angry about this trend.
We are beginning a new age of corporate control over our lives and our very fundamental freedoms. As much as I disagree with him on other issues, Richard Stallman's "The Right to Read" is dead on the money. Keep these times fresh in your mind -- you'll be telling your grandkids one day what the "good old days" were like.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
As far as I know I did not breach my contract with the ISP, but they claimed that they can terminate my account simply because someone feels offended by its contents. I've told them that I'm going to sue them but received no reply. I'm going to see a lawyer next week.
Rather than suing your ISP, try beating them at their own game: post their name, and a list of a few other customers, and we'll send them a couple more of legalese letters claiming that such and such customer has breached some copyright somewhere. Eventually they will have to kick so many customers that it hurts their business. Hopefully, this makes them more critical vs lawyer's letters.
We could actually push this a bit further: if each Slashdot users picks one random web page per week, finds out the ISP via whois or some other means, and sends a "legal" letter, then these hoax letters will be so ubiquitous that nobody will take lawyer's letters serious any more.
Just be careful to chose your marks purely randomly, do not sign with your real name, and do not post the letters in your hometown, and this shenanigan will be almost untraceable. Result: a beautiful proof ad absurdum of this whole legal crazyness.
Unfortunately, the First Amendment isn't the blanket on censorship everyone thinks it is. Take the Supreme Court case U.S. vs O'Brien. This is the infamous draft card burning case, where O'Brien claimed that the 1st Amendment superceded the 1965 amendment to the Selective Service Act that prohibited the defacement of draft cards. To quote Justice Warren's opinion of the court:
This case is frequently brought up in cases like the DeCSS case, where nonspeech elements are important considerations and in the early commercial speech cases. This is the reason why flipping over someone's car because you were "expressing" your happiness that the Bulls won the championship game is still illegal. Unfortunately, the judge in the DeCSS case argued very intelligently about the constitutionality of limiting speech with the DMCA (with the exception of his "Congress must've considered this" arguments). Over half of his 90+ page ruling covers this issue. It's a good read.
While I severely disagree with the DMCA's ramifications, it is currently legal and looks to stay that way.
--
Get DeCSS -- The legal way... for now.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
For "Media Platform Accesssing Algorithm"
If that is a direct link to DeCSS on your page, then you are guilty of breaking the DMCA. (Boo hoo, IMHO.) However, your professor did not link to your page for the purposes of distributing DeCSS code. Neither he, nor anyone else further up the chain, are guilty of violating the DMCA. To hold otherwise would be to be in violation of the "chilling effect" principle often cited in First Amendment cases.
While I have issues with the judge's attitude towards 2600 and the guy who wrote DeCSS ("if that's truly the purpose it was written for"), his arguments on the constitutionality of limiting linking are very, very well argued.
---
Get your DeCSS protest t-shirt right here. One of the few remaining legal DeCSS links.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
I doubt that the MPAA has the ability to take every joe schmoe to court, just link/mirror DeCSS and ignore any shit they give you, the only people they will go after are people/organizations that are well known (2600, etc.) Oh, and sing/play the DeCSS Song in public, you'll get weird looks, but its worth it :)
Shine on, you crazy diamond.
Big suprise. Why face the threat of legal action when you can just kick off the user. I promise you, whatever makes people's jobs easier, they'll do. Nobody wants to be a martyr and get the sack.
Store the stuff on a server you run if you actually believe in the spread of DeCSS.
After actually reading the article (firewall problems) I can admit that I am truly botherd by the MPAA. They are using scare tactics to try and win there case. With no thought of due process or of an individuals right to free speech they are systematically trying to eliminate the material that they feel is objectional. not to mention they want our personal info from the ISP so they can come after us. Kind-of reminds me of the Nazi's... Just FYI, I happen to be married to a lawyer and after looking at the letter she says that all that they are trying to do is scare. If someone actually tries to fight this and takes them to court, again, this sort of thing will stop. They are using the weight of all those big words and threats of legal action the only "may" occure to force their will. They are hoping, and it looks like it is working, that ISP's and schools will give in rather than fight. I'm going to fight! Let worldnet try and shut me down!
___________________
___________________
He who laughs last... Thinks slowest
Well, there you have it, a simple way to get to DeCSS from MPAA and Buena Vista (AKA:Disney). Have fun and remember that stealing isn't right, but neither is stopping free speach by threatening lawsuits.
Mage...
Cause you can't get a tan from an amber monitor. If you do, there is something horribly wrong.
Hello,
:) let me explain.
Just scatter the entire source in a well organize web site on whatever come to your mind. And
clever people could produce a script wich retrieve the source from this site and reconstruct
the proper file:
I dont see a problem here.
Hum, so the source is the law braking thingy. Well there is a way around it
i.e:
In the light of the day, aN orphan is noThing but _ _ betweeN his father and is mother, but nothing is EQUAL in life, so 2 must be add to be right _;_.
So this sentence looks like this after parsing:
int n=2;
See. That's simple, no DeCSS name, The code is in the site, on the page and you can even link to the parser script (in what ever language Python, Perl, JAVA, even VB or C#) wich can change name at will.
Happy Hunting guys !!
assert(expired(knowldege)); core dump
Here it is: create a program that calculates the checksum of the movie, so you can "verify" it. Then the primary purpose of the program isn't to DeCSS it anymore. But you have to be able to DeCSS it to get the checksum on the movie and not just the encrypted data.
People who read about DeCSS
People who talk about DeCSS
People who listen to people who talk about DeCSS
People who think about DeCSS
People who have ever used the letters c,d,e & s in any way, shape or form
But, hey it's a free contry... right...
Vote Naked 2000
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
can you get busted for linking to a singing version of DeCSS?
If so, Slashdot is about to get nailed!
--
What happens when you outlaw guns
At present, the geeks who want to watch DVDs on Linux are the ones with their brains splattered on the walls. The MPAA is doing the splattering.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
the article states:
Actually, we can do BOTH of these solutions at once. The solution is to distribute deCSS widely, but not link to it - but make it understood how to acquire it easily.
Everyone with a domain should put deCSS in webroot. Don't link to it, but make it standard - you should be able to go to any website you want and type in http://www.domainname.com/deCSS.zip and bingo! you download the file. But nary an <a href=""> anywhere!
Every webmaster on every site, commercial, private, personal, educational - should put deCSS in webroot. I dream of the day when we can get:
webmasters, unite! rise up! insidiously spread the Code! Civil Disobedience on a grand scale!
let's show the MPAA it isn't linking per se they should fear, but the power of people to resist in an organized way when their rights are taken away for corporate gain. or, more colloquially...
The First Rule of Link Club is: you don't talk about Link Club
The Second Rule of Link Club is: YOU DON'T TALK ABOUT LINK CLUB.
The Third Rule of Link Club is: if this is your first night, you WILL put deCSS in webroot!
JOIN LINK CLUB! spread the word...
JOIN !LINK CLUB!
Don't blame me - I voted for Howard Dean. http://dean2004.blogspot.com
It's illegal to traffic cocaine... It's illegal to posess cocaine... It's NOT illegal to tell someone where you think they can get cocaine... It's NOT illegal to tell someone how to purify cocaine... It's NOT illegal to give away cocaine-purifying procedures & instructions.... It's NOT illegal to teach someone how to make a nuclear bomb.... It's NOT illegal to tell someone where to get a nuclear bomb... It's NOT illegal to tell someone where to get materials for making a bomb... BUT... It's illegal to display/distribute DeCSS source code... It's illegal to TELL/SHOW someone where to get the source code... Is it just me? Or is the MPAA so scared shitless about losing their lambourghini's that they're trying to make everyone who LINKS DeCSS source code look like felons?? You know they know NOTHING about what the internet when they start hiring people to search for DeCSS on the internet and fire off an email to each person who hosts it. I wonder how many guys they hired for that job. For every site they shut down at least 2 more will pop up within a week by the same person. Don't they realise (cdn spelling) that what they're doing is futile? They already spent 4million bucks U.S.D. on the 2600 trial to stop 2600 from posting/linking decss.... and what did that get them? NOWHERE. The people at 2600 probably just shrugged off the judge's verdict and removed the tags from their site! The MPAA are probably kicking themselves in the ass now for wasting $4 million bucks that they could have spent on new rims for their cars. And guess where that money came from... I wonder how much more money they're going to spend on those guys typing in 'decss' on search engines before they realise that they're just shoving their money up their asses and shitting all over the internet. And what about this Professor who testified? Are they going to make a criminal out of someone who has a Masters and Ph.D in computer science simply because he hosts DeCSS in many many different (& creative) forms?
My suggestion is to start posting the DeCSS sources and binaries to various newsgroups over and over. Probably best to use an anonymizing service to avoid legal entanglements. I don't think even the MPAA can get a link to a generic newsgroup banned. I.E., "We hear that someone is posting DeCSS to alt.source-code, but check for yourself. Even if they could, someone could just post the newsgroup name itself.
"If I have seen further than other men, it is by stepping on their glasses." - Michael Swaine
It's not steganography, and it's not even very clever, but a question arises. This is a gif. It's not text, and thus compiler readable. It's not anything that can be read immediately, so is this illegal?
http://www.chaos.org/img/main/news/de cssx.gif
Opinion: Scientology is a cult you should avoid. Follow the
Looks like they plan on actually trying to remove something from the web. Looks like a good test of the often-sigged adage that the Internet views censorship as damage and routes around it. Why not post the DeCSS code (can I even say it without being sued?) under a different name? It's going to be awfully hard to track down if it starts appearing under many different names.
Oh, and wouldn't that cause another problem, in that all the court documents are probably identifying the code by that specific name, if its a different name then they need to go back into court and spend MORE money on this. If we keep it up we could bleed em dry over time - or they will eventually realize the stupidity of their stance and give up.
In any case, this sets a dangerous precedent for the internet.
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
What else could I do except withdraw the deCSS stuff and relocate.
So MPAA, when are you outlawing your own players?
http://www.tonytee.nl/DECSS/mirror-list.shtml
I got the quote from here. I don't know where he got it..
The MPAA is going after those who distribute the DeCSS source code, AND after those who link to those distributing it.
The DeCSS code is a matter of public record, among the court documents of the case, and is available under the Freedom of Information Act.
How long before the MPAA should logically sue the US government for posessing and distributing DeCSS?
Let's all write to the relevant court and request a copy of the court records - and find out.
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
The REAL jabber has the user id: 13196
What you do today will cost you a day of your life
Guys,
;)
:)
I cannot say how glad I am that this song has taken off the way it has, but as the Admin of joeysmith.com, I am BEGGING you guys to mirror this and make either Joe Wecker or I aware of it.
joeysmith.com is a 386/16 mb RAM running linux, apache, and php. It is hosted for me by a local ISP because I am friends with both the CEO and all of the SA's. But when they called me on Monday, they had to ask me to tune it down a bit, as I was using an entire T1 that is supposed to be shared among other co-locates.
If you have a mirror, you can email me, or webmaster@joeysmith.com (heh. that's me, too.
Note: The more mirrors, the less burden there is on each one, so mirror and encourage your friends to do so!
This may be a strange issue to come up with, but since the internet is linked in many ways, how come they would not have to actually sue the entire world (if they sue site who link to sites that link to site that ...)
-- Martial MICHEL
...Try the courts. Isn't anyone else disturbed by this trend of using Judicual Branch as a place to set legistlative agendas? There would be no possible way the MPAA could convince any state or the US Congress to pass their stiffling laws but the MPAA can sure sue the heck out of people. >-(
So now, if I ever want to see a movie in the future, it has to be on an MPAA approved machine and software? Even if its operation in the near future requires connection to a telephone for activation? If thier devices are buggy and crash after watching the manditory 10 minutes of commercials at the beginning of each movie?
Anyway, there are enough links to the DeCSS in previous stories on /. that I don't think that
my silly little post is going to make much difference. Heck,there are some people with links
to DeCSS in their signatures.
As for it being illegal to make the links, at this point the only ones who are barred from making links to DeCSS are 2600. Until slashdot has been sued and lost their own case, the links are legal here. The lawyers sending out the cease and desist letters in hopes of intimidating people into removing the links. Few of us have individually have the resources to defend ourselves from these attacks, but luckily sites like /. do.
And if enough of use our ability to wage civil
disobedience, hopefully MPAA will either lose
or give up.
I find it very unlikely that the part of this DeCSS decision outlawing linking will hold up. It would really cripple the web.
I may disapprove of what you link to, but I'll defend to the death your right to link to it.
Anyway, if it gets to the point where /. (wants|has) to remove account, they can have it.
It won't be a place I want to hang around. Of
course I don't find that possibility bloody likely.
Preventive War is like committing suicide for fear of death. - Otto Von Bismarck
Well the problem is that a judge WOULD forbid everyone on the planet from ever using open source code in any program ever.
Not possible. No European government would give a good God damn about what Judge Fucknutz in Podunk Idaho rules. No Judge in the US has the jurisdiction to ever compell anyone outside of the country to obey him/her.
And then all of a sudden a new precident is set that screws over open source development. Welcome to the wonderful world of the commercial internet.
You can't win a war by runing away. Look at what heppened in the US during the 1960s. What good would have been done if the black people in the southern states of the US had just sat back and refused to do anything?
A commercial internet is what worries you? What do you think we have now?
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
IANAL, but if the decision was with regard to linking to a DeCSS site, can it continue over to other linking actions. The decision sets s precident, but is it about handling DeCSS or all linking? I hope this will be clarified, or dealt with in appeal.
Yes and no. If a user of the ISP sets up the mailer service, then it's the user who may be sued and not the ISP. (Avoids the deep pockets problem.) However, if the ISP itself sets up the service, then the ISP may be sued. The provision in the DMCA protects ISPs from their users, but it doesn't give the ISPs the freedom to break any laws they want themselves.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
This is sad that a judge would be that clue-less or corrupt to allow such a ruling to exist. What if I modify the DE-CSS code? then it wouldnt be the same thing! or make a functional binary and distribute that.... then it isn't the code, it's a collection of 1's and 0's.. Alas, the corruption level or stupidity of the judges in this country would probably land me in prison.
Why did you get a life sentence? "I tried to watch a DVD on a Linux box."
Dont it make you proud that the United states judicial system is 100% worthless.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
The federal court's area of jurisdiction determines how much impact the decision has on things. It's only applicable in Kaplan's jurisdiction (Which, I'm pretty sure is only on the East Coast, covering just the area around New York state.). Outside, another judge or the circuit or supreme court must make a decision on the situation before it's binding in those jurisdictions.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
quoteth the mpaa, "linking any Internet web site, either directly or through a series of links, to any other Internet web site containing DeCSS."
it's a whole new kevin bacon game! let's see how many links deep it takes the MPAA companies to link to DeCSS...
$ wget -r -l 0 -H www.mpaa.org ; grep --recursive -i DeCSS * | grep -i href
mmm... sucking up bandwidth...
Altavista search for DeCSS
Google search for DeCSS
HotBot search for DeCSS
Are these search engines breaking the law?
for Content UnScrambling System. :) Makes more sense than DeCSS anyway.. De Content Scrambling System?
Among their demands is that the ISP's
3) advise us of the name and physical address of the person operating this site;
Surely that would be illegal ??!!
Start here, at the MPAA's "Related Sites" page.
Look near the bottom of that page, and follow the link called "United States Department of State, Office of the Coordinator for Business Affairs," which will lead you here.
Now, click that ugly ass purple "Business FAQ" button, which will lead you here
Scroll down until you find a link to "State and Local Government on the Net", in the answer to the fifth question from the bottom. That will lead you here.
Now, there's a big 'ol box on the left that lets you search Google! Type in "DeCSS", and find a mirror near you! So boys and girls, let me ask one little question:
Q - Who should go to jail?
A - The MPAA and the United States Government!
Ya know, I should be an attorney instead of an engineer... this is just too easy...
--
--
Just lurking, thanks!
Why? Because it is formatted, in HTML, to be a giant ASCII-art version of the OpenDVD logo, expressing my belief that DVDs should be open and viewable by anyone, anywhere, free from restrictions, on any OS.
--
-Esme
Instead of starting another country, why don't we take this one back?
We can start by voting for Ralph Nader: http://www.votenader.org/
Where is the government when megacorp cartels like the MPAA start using blatantly illegal bully tactics against citizens? Isn't protection against this the main justification behind establishing governments and paying them taxes?
It's times like this when I wonder if there truly exists a political idea for a government that both stays out of the private lives and property rights of citizens (ala Libertarianism), that will also keep the corps in check. Currently, NONE of the political systems in the world do this. For example:
Capitalism- Corps rule
Socialism- replaces the corps with the government doing the same thing or worse
Republic/Democracy/Parlaiment- Allows the corps to buy influence.
Libertarian Reoublic- Would maximize the influnce of judges, as everything would be regulated in the courts.
Just some thoughts... Maybe we Slashdotters can come up with a form of government that can keep government out of people's lives yet keep corps in check
In 2000 America, is a non-lawyer truly free?
I fancy myself as a bit of a weekend tinkerer and I cordially invite all Slashdot readers to try, and to comment upon the below improved version of DeCSS called "PooPoo". PooPoo is somewhat similar to DeCSS but subtly different.
The MPAA will likely have a hard time scraping all the PooPoo from the Internet but, hey, shit happens right? One might imagine MPAA lawyers in their polished Oxfords having a hard time with PooPoo in court too, as lines like "we've got to stop the flood of PooPoo!" and "right now PooPoo is floating around everywhere" will likely fail to amuse federal judges after awhile.
Get PooPoo! It's the SHIT!
Start a campaign to have EVERYONE put 'deCSS' in the meta tags of all html docs... there'd be so many false hits, the MPAA'd HAVE to read every page...
> afraid. Imagine how quickly the tide could turn against MPAA if they tried to push around Yahoo! or AOL.
That's precisely the problem, though.
MPAA will sue whom it pleases, when it pleases. The Yahoos and Googles and AOLs don't have to worry; MPAA won't bother suing them. MPAA's goal is to put the fear of God into the little guys. Us. The ones nobody cares enough about to defend. When they've chilled reverse-engineering for the sake of interoperability (even though explicitly permitted by DMCA) out of the public eye, they'll have won. The search engines can only index what gets developed and released.
Of course, they'll never do it - the next DeCSS-type application will be released anonymously, through real anonymous channels, as opposed to pseudonymous channels. A post on USENET via an anonymizing remailer through a poorly-configged NNTP server that doesn't include NNTP-Posting-Host: for instance.
Sigh. Didn't we go through this in way the hell back 1995 with alt.religion.scientology and the internal cult docs that wound up mirrored around the world?
It seems the only difference between then and now is that we're up against the part of the movie industry that isn't run by the Cult. (Although MPAA is just as clueless about how the 'net works as the Cult was, they seem to be somewhat more adaptable, albeit far less entertaining. ;-)
I wonder what happens if someone reads DeCSS into the Swedish Parliamentary records. Let's see the MPAA try to take that down! They can arrest a Norwegian, but can they shut down an entire foreign government?
It reminds me of Arthur Miller's "The Crucible". When Abigail implicated her powerless enemys and the downtrodden of the village, the Powers That Be (in this case the tribunal) did her bidding. As soon as she got too big for her britches and had the audacity to threaten the head of the tribunal, he quickly shut her down, she was forced to flee, and the Salem Witch Trials were over.
My advice to the MPAA: Be careful who you step on, because if you step on a gorilla, he'll smash your face in.
No matter how many copies of the DeCSS float about, it won't change the MPAA's ability to sue. Yeah, it'll take them forever and a day to go after every single infringer, but the fact remains that it will still be illegal.
The judge ruled that "any technology which circumvents CSS is illegal", by virtue of the DMCA.
That, I believe, is where the real problem is... fighting the MPAA (regardless of how one goes about it) won't amount to a hill of beans as long as the DMCA, or at least this interpretation of it, is allowed to remain.
Until the DMCA is thrown out, or at least significantly altered so that this interpretation cannot be construed in court, no independantly developed (esp. open source) DVD players can ever legally exist.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Search engines don't fall under this ruling because they don't know they are linking to "illegal" material
...is legal, but...
...is not.
Perhaps someone ought to let them know, then. With apologies for the tone of that response, I do think the concern about a legal ruling on linking isn't completely FUD.
My concern is that any law that is enforceable based on the intent of the offender can be abusively (selectively) enforced. I'm sure there are a number of people out there who would be happier if 2600 were silenced. This may be the case, but it should not be why 2600 is litigated for this violation, and others are not.
Linking itself, and hypertext, is the foundation of the web as we know it today. We're posting on the web now, and not gopher, because of the ease of navigation brought on by hypertext on the web. Free links propagated the web. Restricting links conceivably could irreparably damage it. Therefore, it is reasonable to be concerned about limitations on that ability to freely link, for reasons other than fear, uncertainty and doubt.
Lastly, it is interesting that the definition of a link is the href, and not the address.
So...
http://www.lemuria.org/DeCSS/
http://www.lemuria.org/DeCSS/
I guess it just depends on what the definition of link is.
---
"The Constitution...is not a suicide pact."
"Life. Don't talk to me about life."
Obviously, the outrage here is the length to which this can be taken. Back in the day, would I have been libel for linking to 2600 because they then linked to DeCSS? For that matter, you could hold search engines that return responses to DeCSS links for not filtering out those pages. Hyperlinking is as much a form of constitutionally-protected speech as a journalist taking pictures of someone shooting heroin or a newspaper providing a map of an area known to have crackhouses. Simply because they point to some illegal act (perhaps easing someone's ability to break the law), cannot mean that the acts themselves are illegal. Hyperlinking is personal expression and ought to have the same constitutional protections as other speech.
Can what is formed say to that who formed it, "Why have you made me thus?"
What if I leave the link out, but just tell you where it is. I have not linked to the document and the only thing I have given is a written description of where it is...
Still illegal ?
(stupid short subject line, forcing me to use obscure dialects...)
Is it the DeCSS program specifically that they claim violates the DMCA, or is it any mere description of how to decrypt DVDs?
I'm curious about whether this is an "is source code speech?" issue.
--------
Has anyone entered the DeCSS code into the KEO database?
http://www.keo.org/uk/your_message.html
That way DeCSS can survive 50000 years...
Use Zope!
Now, I'm not saying mail bomb. I'm saying well thought out, to the point, well-informed messages. I mean, this situation is outrageous.
Does anyone think this might help? I mean, the direct outrcry of thousands of outraged voices cannot be ignored, especially with elections coming up, and hopefully a few candidates that might actually pay attention to what the voters say.
If something like this doesn't work, then we are witnessing the complete and total breakdown of a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. I was under the impression that this kind of government "shall not perish from this earth."
Now, if you will excuse me, I have some emails to write.
Cheers, Me.
This post has been spell-checked with Tipo-Fnider1.07b2
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
I'm writing you this letter through actual tears of distress at the disheartening developments and outcomes of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Never in my life have I seen a single piece of legislation give so much power to corporations at the expense of consumer rights and individual liberties. Of all the amendments in our Bill Of Rights one has stood out above all others. For good reason it is the First Amendment. Our founding fathers did not make it the 3rd, 6th or 10th. In the most recent case, Judge Kaplan in the DeCSS vs. MPAA trial ruled that not only was source code (which can be written on a T-shirt or even spoken) not protected speech, but that even linking or pointing people to that code is also illegal!
I'm not sure what I am asking you do only that if you don't already understand the frightening implications of these trends, I'm urging you to do so now before its too late. Since it was Congress who passed this draconian piece of legislation, it is Congress who must overturn it. I would like to see legislation that again puts private citizens first, and corporations second. Laws that protect the liberties and freedoms of individuals against over-zealous corporate interests. It must finally be asked if intellectual property protections as strict as those found in the DMCA are worth sacrificing the liberties guaranteed by the Constitution?
On the Internet there can be no genuine freedom of speech unless source code is a protected form of speech. This principle is attacked however by U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in his ruling that, "society must be able to regulate the use and dissemination of code." The judge then enjoined Eric Corley, publisher of 2600 magazine, from assisting his readers from even linking to the code that unlocks DVD content. My head is spinning from the implications of all this. No longer is the criminal itself culpable, but discussing the details of it or pointing to people who do is also now criminal. Such a legal precedent could easily bring a typical journalist to court for the simple act of point out a newly discovered crack house! In the realm of anti-piracy/pro-intellectual property legislation, dangerous precendents like these are being set in courts cases like Napster and DeCSS. No longer are the people doing the pirating liable, but any technology that has the potential to be used for piracy is also illegal. This same logic could easily apply to the Internet itself. It's equivalent to making cars illegal because they have the potential of being used by criminals to conduct bank robberies or kidnappings. Unless I am corrected, technology has never been the culprit, only the user of such technology is culpable. In a murder trial we don't hold the knife trial, only the user of the knife. But now with the help of statutes within the DMCA, people like the MPAA and RIAA are trying to outlaw any and all technology that has the potential to facilitate piracy. If successful, we could say goodbye to the PC, the fax machine, the telephone, the Internet as we currently know and love them, as they all have the potential to be used for piracy. And here I suspect is the real agenda, which is to outlaw any technology that doesn't give them complete control over all its content. As such complete control would be the only sure fire method of fully defeating piracy. This is a chilling prospect. Imagine everything we say, do and watch through media is tightly controlled, filtered and censored through the power of monopolized corporate interests.
Dangerously, a consortium of companies called the Copy Protection Technical Working Group (CPTWG), are already discussing plans to make such a reality possible by changing the entire array of media technologies and internet protocols. Changing the technology is one thing, but making it illegal to create anything else is another. I don't know about you, but the thought of corporations forbidding individuals from producing and distributing media or building their own computers or running their own software should be completely repugnant to anyone with principles of a free society. To legally support the position that the common man is fit only for mindless consumption is a despicable point of view, and to forbid otherwise is a shocking development that speaks volumes about the perspective and motivation of current corporate culture. Assuming corporations do manage to pull this off, then the individual user will no longer be able to distribute their own music or creative work freely online, as doing so would by definition mean using a format easily copyable and cheaply distributed - a technology they want to outlaw! Their reasoning is if such a format exists, as it does now in the case of mp3, then pirates will use it to duplicate copyright works. This is true, just as the automobile allows criminals to conduct bank heists or kidnappings. Is this reason enough to outlaw automobiles?
It all boils down to one salient fact. Now that duplication costs have fallen to zero, what you have here is nothing less than a corporate power grab attempting to create artificial scarcity where none exists. A desperate attempt to maintain previous monopolies of media distribution and revenue streams in the face of advancing technology. Luckily for us, the Pony Express didn't try to the same with the advent of the Telegraph.
Advancing technology has always changed the nature of society and the rules of business while bringing prosperity to millions. These new peer-to-peer file sharing technologies promise to do the same. May you have the wisdom to see past the current struggles of business in transition, by allowing these liberating technologies to flourish.
Respectfully Yours,
www.enthea.org
It's just a very handy utility for web developers: http://www.pigdog.org/decss/
A monkey is doing the real work for me.
It's simple:
Set up a P.O. Box to which people are instructed to send $1 (to cover expenses), plus the address they wish to have the source code mailed to. The provider then ships a printed copy of the source code embedded in an essay (of social and political merit) about the dangers of viewing source code as anything less than speech.
No violation of previous precedent (even non-binding) exists, and the first amendment argument is suddenly on very well-established ground.
Furthermore, the MPAA legal team gets to jump through the extra hoops of subpoenaing the P.O. Box provider, attempting to identify the parties actually responsible for the distribution of the source (be smart-- create a "collective" box or something-- don't rent it in the name of whomever is responsible for the distribution), etc. The internet makes for easy access to information and communication-- a dream for anyone attempting to shut down (scare into submission) a lot of information sources at once. Let's give them a bit of leg work to do.
---sig---
If they don't compile and test each alleged infraction, and they sue you, could you countersue for damages?
Any number of changes from subtle syntax errors to replacing whole modules with the first ammendment could be done to make it legal under the DMCA.
Just make sure you don't include any instructions on how to fix it.
What if they sue you for linking to something that diddn't work?
I bet we could get about 100 Million dollars from the MPAA this way if they persued a bunch of us.
It's not a short path because the MPAA and associates are all a bit insural, but here's one path:
http://www.mpaa.org
http://education.indiana.edu/cas/tt/v2i3/v2i3toc.h tmlu /iub/n g_the_Web/Meta_Search_Engines/l n g_the_Web/Portal_Sites/m
http://www.mpaa.org/home.htm
http://www.mpaa.org/relatedsites/index.htm
http://www.tvguidelines.org/
http://www.tvguidelines.org/resource.htm
http://www.medialit.org/
http://www.medialit.org/othersites.html
http://www.med.sc.edu:81/MEDIALIT/
http://education.indiana.edu/cas/tt/v2i3/tv.html
http://education.indiana.edu/cas/tt/tthmpg.html
http://webmaster.iu.edu/cgi/iub.pl?www.indiana.ed
http://www.iub.edu/
http://www.iub.edu/compute/
http://www.indiana.edu/~librcsd/internet/_Searchi
http://www.indiana.edu/~librcsd/internet/tree.htm
http://www.indiana.edu/~librcsd/internet/_Searchi
http://www.yahoo.com/
http://dir.yahoo.com/Entertainment/
http://dir.yahoo.com/Entertainment/Video/
http://dir.yahoo.com/Entertainment/Video/DVD/
http://www.pzcommunications.com/decss/articles.ht
http://www.pzcommunications.com/decss/main.htm
http://www.pzcommunications.com/decss/where.htm
http://www-ec.njit.edu/~adt6247/
http://www-ec.njit.edu/~adt6247/DeCSS.zip
With 26 links (inclusive), I'm certain someone can do a better job.
I don't see it on your homepage yet. Join us.
If it's already there, I missed it and it should be more prominent, perhaps in hundred point graphics like those other four links on your page.
Well, in U.S. v. O'Brien (1969), the actual illegal action was the "destruction or mutilation" of a draft card. In Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire (1942), the actual illegal action was "any offensive, derisive, or annoying word to any other person who is lawfully in the street." The illegal actions in the DeCSS case are:
Copying the movie for non-fair use purposes.
Breaking encryption used for copy-protection purposes without the permission of the copyright holder.
Distributing tools to aid in breaking decryption used for copy-protection without the permission of the copyright holder.
The Free Speech component is the distribution of the code. The first is already illegal, and as for the second, there isn't really any constitutional protection on methods of reading, so it can "safely" be limited.
No one's managed to make the Anarchist's Cookbook illegal yet, have they? And anytime a building blows up, the media gets to report about how they made the bombs, yes? This is only differnet because it doesn't even cause physical damage to people.
I honestly have no clue how come the Anarchist's Cookbook isn't illegal. Doesn't it incite violence? I know that that's illegal. I don't honestly know why it isn't illegal. Maybe there isn't a law against distributing bomb-making plans. I don't see why there isn't, though, as far as I understand constitutional law.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
How about a new feature for Mozilla:
If an "http://someaddress.tld/path.html" is found in plain text on a web page (i.e. not in <a href="...">...</a> tags) then mark it up as a link anyway, as is done for such links in plain text emails in the mail reader.
Then we won't even need to drag & drop the link into the address bar to activate plain text links (like the ones 2600 are still allowed to have).
2600 can't be expected to take down the plain text version of an address, as that's even _more_ restrictive than the current ban on linking. (And if they were restricted from this, the free speech issues would be even _stronger_ on their side)
And Mozilla can't be held responsible, as this is just an extra piece of functionality that helps in the general case, and which is mostly implemented anyway (in the mailnews module).
Pity Moz's in feature freeze. And a pity my Copious Free Time (tm) appears to have dried up right now, otherwise I might be tempted to grab a copy of the source, plow through it & have a go myself...
Why doesn't the gene pool have a life guard?
For non americans, and americans who have forgotten hisotry: in the 1850s it was legal to own black people, and require them to do labor for you in some southern States of the US. In Minnesota this practice was illegal. A southern person brought his slave to Minnesota. The US surpreeme court eventially ruled that the black man could be legally owned in Minnesota! Soon after the Civil war was faught and eventially eliminated the practice of owning people in all states of the US.
Notice several things: the above case went a lot farther then we currently are. The above case when lost in the courts wasn't over yet. Lets hope we don't have to go to war to keep our rights, but rest assured some folks are willing to if need be.
> That's it I'm either running for president on a purely technological platform or I'm starting my own country...who's with me?!!!
Instead of starting another country, why don't we take this one back? After they finish smashing the second amendment, this won't be an option.
M.G.
Excessive forking causes un-wanted children.
OK, so it's illegal to mirror and link DeCSS?
No problem. Let's all mirror and link DeCSS.
After a little searching, I found a site that has developed a nice smokescreen. It's a program, called DeCSS, which removes Cascading Style Sheets from HTML pages. Comes complete with a mirror and linking kit. Nothing illegal about that.
Check out my site for a DeCSS mirror and instructions.
-Todd
---
"The details of my life are quite inconsequential..."
dig @dmca.really.fuckingsucks.net dmca.really.fuckingsucks.net. axfr |
grep decss | sort | cut -b5-36 |
perl -e 'while(){print pack("H32",$_)}' |
gunzip -c
There are some great bomb-building instructions on many sites on the web. I imagine it is legal to link to them -- even though the instructions have the potential to create physical harm!
There are many sites on the internet re-distributing the DeCSS source. If i link to eighter it or documents describing the technical aspects of DeCSS, I am liable for causing damages?
The two examples range between two extreme degrees. I consider plans for physical devices more harmful than plans for viewing information. But we must face that much of the world we encounter is capitalist. The MPAA recognizes that its winning this case is crucial to funding its continually increasing profits. This is not about "what is right." It's about "limiting control of the playing devices" -- though not directly. Limiting control to copyrighted works is an indirect ploy to get the most profit. They have found a way and have successfully sought support of the law in their favor.
Like the MPAA, we cannot say "what they're doing is wrong" because, under the law, they are correct. The only way to make good for us is to get the DMCA dismissed or rewritten. As US Citizens, we are not above the law, thus we cannot ignore the law. The only way we can do something is to support changing the law or getting directly involved by running for political office..
I'm not about to discuss how, but this is all we need to do... "of the people, by the people, for the people" -Abraham Lincoln.. if you don't get anything out of that quote you should think about it for a while..
I think we can all agree that constitutes a link. But how about ?
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
Dear MailBox Mania:
We have become aware that the owner(s) of P.O. Box 6102 has been using that P.O. Box to distribute literature containing computer code that is used to circumvent the encyption method used on DVD's.
The owner(s) are in direct violation of the DMCA. You will hand over the name and physical address of these people to us.
Thank you,
Murderers, Pugilists, Assassins, and, Arsonists (MPAA)
It wouldn't fly. The MPAA would actually have to *gasp* get a court order and would be prevented from making a blanket demand.
This is not the way to build a lasting empire.
Is this not the equivalent of giving up and heading underground? We are dealing with an issue that is so much larger than a simple decryption algorithm than it is almost incomprehensible. The fact that 2600 was sued over DeCSS is almost incidental, they were sued for linking and were told by a US judge that it was illegal. Do we want to be in the position of splitting up all of the content that someone (or some company) finds objectionable? To borrow conceptually from the NRA: Today they'll take away our DeCSS, tomorrow they'll take something else. They'll do it so slowly that we'll never notice.
The real evil of this ruling is that it makes it possible for a company to prohibit you from disseminating information if they don't agree with it, never mind what is being done with that information. Can't we just focus on how to stop the seemingly endless parade of freedoms that are disappearing rather than the myraid of ways to make it hard for the MPAA to stop DeCSS?
Icebox
A lot of people have pointed out that "ah, it doesn't matter, we can point to search engines that locate the code", or something of that kind.
Only this doesn't work, because if every direct link to the code is removed (I'm not saying it will be - I'm just pointing out that the argument is flawed), the search engines probably won't index it forever.
try http://www.2600.net
some filters miss that one
Visit DC2600
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
As Eric Corley points out (rather sarcastically) on the 2600 website, what about search engines that link to deCSS? can they be held accountable? After all, when you type in a search at google, the site simply produces a list of LINKS to whatever you searched for. The criminals!
Brought to you by Frobozz Magic Penguin Fodder.
1) The order only applies to the defendants and persons acting in concert with them. If you dont fall into that catagory you are under no legal obligation to cease posting DeCSS. However, you may become the next test case. In otherwords, an acedemic institution would be the perfect test case for the free speach issues raised in this case - no stigma of "hacking." 2) The linking portion of the order against the defendants specifically states: that the link must done "knowingly...for the purpose of disseminating DeCSS." In otherwords, if you link to a site without knowing it links to a DeCSS site and without the purpose of directing people tothe code, it wouldnt count even if the order applied to you.
I'd be willing to bet, they would only threaten a little guy.
Fight Spammers!
because those other programs are hacks to licensed DVD player software. DeCSS is the only decryption method that is suitable for inclusion in an unlicensed player, because it's built from scratch.
...
The real agenda of the MPAA is to control the DVD player market. They have contracts with the player manufacturers where they say that, in exchange for access to the CSS decrypting algorithms, the player manufacturers promise to never build a DVD player that can output unencrypted digital video, or analog video without Macrovision degradation.
A DVD player based on DeCSS would not be subject to these restrictions, and would result in a better, more consumer-friendly product. This would destroy the market for MPAA-crippled DVD players, and end their player market stranglehold.
It's all about control
So, a link to DeCSS is illegal, eh? And so is a link to a link to a link to ... DeCSS. How about a link to a page offering cryptographic analysis of CSS encryption, with the understanding that certain 'examples' will be provided? The link in fact DOES point to a page containing a cryptographic analysis of said encryption, and provides some (innocuous / faulty / whatever) examples, but refreshes in 3 seconds, taking the user to a page with DeCSS.zip Obviously, the owner of such a page would get a letter because the MPAA doesn't care whether they have the legal right to bully others around, but would such a letter carry legal weight?
Another scenario:
What if a page of mine were to be attacked by some script kiddie who happened to post DeCSS there? If the MPAA couldn't prove I was aware of the content, am I still responsable?
At what level of removal from the actual DeCSS code does one become an innocent again? Unless I misread something (possible, since I wasn't looking for it), it's not illegal to have a copy of DeCSS, just to provide it to others. If I talk to a friend of mine about the case, making reference to a printed copy I happen to own, and then leave the room, leaving it on a table, am I guilty of 'trafficking, etc.' in DeCSS if my friend snags it? What about a floppy?
If willingly providing the code is illegal, how about theft of the code?
If Microsoft can claim that publicly-available documents are intellectual property and can control access to them accordingly, can I post DeCSS somewhere under password protection (password = 'password' or 'DeCSS' or other easily-guessable string) for 'my own personal use'? A password is about as worthwhile protection scheme as CSS, so it's covered by the DMCA, right? So I can claim I am effectively controlling access, right? And since I'm the only one who knows the password (anyone who so much as guesses is doing so illegally, trying to circumvent the intellectual property control scheme, right?), I'm not providing it to the public, right? And if I told a friend about it, and s/he posted on a page that going to my page and using the password 'DeCSS' could get a copy, that's not my problem, right?
The MPAA has made rediculously wide-ranging claims as to their intellectual property rights, some of which have been upheld, but can they really expect to be able to stop every possible distribution mechanism without to resort to something so all-encompassing that not even the most dim-witted (or technologically illiterate, to be fair) judge wouldn't dream of passing it? Does that greedy, holier-than-thou organization really expect to outwit, intimidate, bully, and/or legally force over 5 billion people to cower before their demands?!? Yikes! Why do such people always end up in positions of power?
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
Second, everyone b&ms on that slashdot or yahoo or any search provider will be hunted down and shut down. If you read Kaplan's findings, the important distinction is the intent to link to the decss source. If I linked to slashdot, with a link that read : "Visit Slashdot, News for Nerds", and sometime, Rob decided to turn slashdot into a decss code haven, I would bet that the MPAA could not do anything to me as I never intended ot link to /. code. On the other hand, if I had "Here's the DeCSS code:", MPAA could easily be over me. Places like /. or yahoo which only accumlate data without filtering would also be exempt, because of the common carrier provider aspect (although the Napster trial questions this as well).
Making linking illegal, of course, is a violation of 1st amendment rights and hopefully will be shut down on the appeals process.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
We should find out who the mpaa's service provider is and send them a letter detailing why the mpaa's website should be shut down. (CC the letter to slashdot, too, of course.) Once it is shut down, as it must be under the current ruling, the public may start to understand what this means.
Remember, information is in OUR hands now, and we can keep it this way with legal tactics like this.
-Ben
There aren't enough people with enough common sense to start a fight to over through the mass ignorance.
Quite why they are getting their panties in such a wad about casual use of DeCSS is a little beyond me anyway. How long will it be until DVD writers become affordable, and some hacker figures how to make straight bitwise copies of a DVD? CSS or no CSS it doesn't matter when you make a bitwise copy!
Motion picture DVDs store a decryption key in a special area on the disc. All writable DVDs will have that special area preburned to zeroes, so even a bitwise copy of a DVD won't work.
Unless you pre-decrypt the data with DeCSS.
Why CSS was bothered with in the first instance, I don't know. It's a bit like I always wondered why copy protection schemes were always tried on the Amiga (they were always cracked).
An excellent question.
In order to manufacture DVD players, you need to obtain a copy of the CSS decryption algorithm and a key from the DVD-CCA. Before they give you the algorithm and key, you have to sign an agreement that says that you will, among other things, never manufacture a DVD player that can output unencrypted digital video, or macrovision-free analog video.
Since a DVD player built on DeCSS would not require a license from the DVD-CCA, someone constructing a DVD player around DeCSS would not be bound by the requirement that the player only put out a degraded signal.
This would wreck the market for MPAA-crippled DVD players.
Hence, in order to prevent the appearance of DVD players on the market that are capable of putting out top quality digital video, the MPAA must fight to suppress DeCSS. Obviously they cannot eliminate it, but they can and are eliminating the possibility of circumventing their market control over what features are allowed in DVD players. In other words, their hidden agenda is succeeding, and all the talk here about making billions of copies of DeCSS completely misses the point. Copying is the red herring. It isn't what this fight is about.
(Emphasis mine.)
This is preposterous.
I have a link to DeCSS on my homepage.
A former college instructor has a link to my homepage on his "Former Students" page.
This instructor's main page has a link to his "Former Students" page.
Some guy I've never heard of has a link to the instructor's main page.
Therefore, some guy I've never heard of is breaking the law because another guy I've never heard of is hosting a copy of the DeCSS software and I happen to have a link to it on my Web page.
Ridiculous. Eternal vigilence will be required to ensure that idiots like the MPAA and the RIAA don't turn the Internet into one big police state.
--
--
The New World Order is upon us, and it's about damned time.
Camaron de la Isla 'When I sing with pleasure, my
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -- Goethe