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What Is The MPAA Up To Now?
Phlux writes "I was one of the original group of people sent letters by the MPAA back in March to stop posting DeCSS on the Web. I immediately removed the code from my site at that time. I have now been sent another letter telling me to cease and desist from linking to any other sites on the matter (there is a link to 2600 on the page). The standard list of threats apply. The page, and the text of the letter, can be found here." I think these form letters are sent with little or no human supervision. Which ought to be illegal in and of itself.
If I were you I'd report this to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. As anyone who keeps up with the news knows, they have some teeth, and if there's any suggestion of a cartel between movie producers and DVD manufacturers (using the CSS licence), I'm sure they'll want to investigate it. In particular, suggest that they might be using cases in other countries to muscle the open source community out of the DVD player business and artifically fixing the price of DVDs using the region coding system.
Let us know how you do.
sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
hmm.. I think I heard somewhere that in New Zealand (and maybe other countries) ALL DVD players sold are zoneless by law. Anyone in New Zealand got the MPAA letter? That may give the MPAA even more troubles..
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
Wouldn't you know. The wording of the judgement and the wording of the letter do not match at all well. Gosh. What a surprise.
The Judgement prohibits "(c) knowingly linking any Internet web site operated by them to any other web site containing DeCSS, or knowingly maintaining any such link, for the purpose of disseminating DeCSS . [my emphasis].
The implication is clear: a link to a DeCSS site for a purpose other than disseminating DeCSS (e.g. for the purpose of review of the whole issue, or of private study) is perfectly acceptable.
In my case, they avoid trial by taking a voluntary judgment. Mattel avoided a trial on their counterclaim by dropping the case.
Ihad asked them for information regarding their succesful wins, but they did not provide it. Maybe a stockholder in Mattel(other than me) should ask. I wonder how many cases that Mattel brought and actually won (meaning got more $$ then legal costs in a judgment).
Fight Spammers!
We're getting these letters, almost word for word, down here in Australia.
:) I know the mpaa dudes are scouring the web...
I imagine one day we'll be forced to remove the stuff from our web sites, but for now, decss is not illegal here in Australia, nor is it covered by any legal/court rulings. I have a dread feeling that one day I'll become a test case. I have no idea if I'll have the balls and stamina to go through with it. I hope so.
My site has received two threatening letters, but fortunatly my ISP has a set of balls, and is not only ignoring them, but has started his own mirror too.
I'm anonymous for a reason - I dun wanna provoke the fight before it's due
1. You're site still has a fairly blatent (indirect) link to the code ... "I encourage you to click here for a list of mirrors". You'd be hard pressed to defend this. If, however, you provided a link to" sites which provide further commentary on the DeCSS/MPAA matter", then the link to the code would not be so blatent and you could, imho, argue fair comment.
2. More interestingly, the form of words in the letter: "injunction against .. linking any Internet web site, either directly or through a series of links, to any other Internet web site containing DeCSS". is surely unenforcable. My site has a link to slashdot. Slashdot has a link to your site. Your site has a link to 2600. 2600 has links to mirrors of hte DeCSS code. So we're all implicated. Various UK Government sites link to my site. They're implicated. US Government sites link to UK government sites. MPAA probably links to US Government sites. They're implicated.
The logic appears to me that we should all stop linking to other sites, on the off chance that there is a route through which someone can get the the DeCSS code. To comply with the injunction, we should, in effect, dismantle the internet.
Further, we should not link to 2600 for any other reason than to highlight a DeCSS link; in other words, the injunction apparantly makes it impossible to link to 2600 for any reason.
So, to repeat, I suggest there must be plenty of scope under your free speech amendment to argue that the injunction is not enforcable.
Looking for a copy of DeCSS? The easiest way is to go to Disney's search engine and search for DeCSS. They will then LINK you to thousands of sites, something we're no longer allowed to do. This is still the slickest way possible to link to DeCSS mirrors. I doubled over laughing when I saw 2600 first post this. Ah hipocrasy.
Many large corporations use their size and wealth to bully the small guys (individuals and small companies) with the threat of large legal expenses.
Why do you think that Skala and Jansson caved in to Mattel? I did not cave in to Mattel, but I can understand why they did.
If enough people stand up to bullies, they may stop being bullies.
Fight Spammers!
Show me where I ever suggested that the human ought to comply with the C&D letter.
The argument above was that both the web site and the letter were instances of free speech. If the automated cease and desist is honored, that gives the machine more right to speech than the human (the machine's pervailed, the human's was squelched).
Please re-read my earlier comments. I never suggested that the recipient of the C&D letter ought to comply. Only that the sending of the C&D letter was free speech.
If I tell you to give me $10,000, that is free speech. It does not mean you have to give me $10,000. What is so hard to understand about that???
Never take moderation advice from sigs, including this one.
So what is a lawyer who is legitimately considering a lawsuit supposed to do, if C&D letters are outlawed as threats? Just file the suit without any attempt to resolve the dispute out of court?
Never take moderation advice from sigs, including this one.
Check out The Cluetrain Manifesto.
If anyone from the MPAA (or another likeminded organization) is seeing this, please.. read this book. Or, at least, the first chapter; it's online, and readable for free.