Slashdot Mirror
Australia Is Getting Its Own DMCA
biscuit nipple writes: "According to this article, our government snuck a little copyright law in under our noses. It just seems like a big moshpit of crap. Incidental copies of data, ie from an ISP, for transmission are ok, but deliberate copies (including proxy caches) are not." Also, "Libraries will have exemptions similar to the ones they already hold for distributing information but they will not be able to build up searchable collections, or provide material in competition with commercial providers." (Imagine if they applied that standard to books, too!)
The real culprit here is the WIPO copyright treaty, specifically article 11. It states that treaty members have to supply legal measures to prevent "circumvention of effective technological measures" used to enforce copyright. The rest of the treaty seems relatively fair, but article 11 forces members to pass DMCA-style laws. Once they have to do that the lobbyists move in and you know the rest of that story. The terms of the treaty DON'T mandate anything as overly restrictive as what we're seeing in the US - note the use of the word "effective" - but I suspect that legislators, in their woeful technological cluelessness, find it difficult to draft bills that don't cross the fine line of audience rights infringement.
The US constitution even protects us against its own inevitable failure (new laws widdle away bit by bit.) It is almost like it forsees it.
There are a few implications to this...
This logic also implies the military will never start a revolution on the part of the people. It dosn't (and didn't) jive with the doctrine of arming the people. They may, and hopfully some would, join in on the right side if first amendment does get you shot at. I don't think the founders forsaw the acceleration of arms that are not availible to the people.
People can and should speak their minds knowing this is behind them. That said if they shoot first, they automaticly lose in the eyes of the country. Whoever shoots first is wrong and creat es a clear and present danger, creating the scenrio for the just war from the other side.
The contitution (and any republic) counts on people to be willing to fight the govenment not only for themselves but free ideals. First with words and with arns if arms are drawn.
Everybody loves that TJ paraphase "Those who give up freedom for security are bound for neither." because as logical people they recognise that we are headed for the scenrio where we need the second amendment to keep us prepared. Few speak up, fewer listen and only some even care. With the media as corrupt as it is and bribery legal there is little recourse but dumping the Tea in the river and we know where that leads. Most of us are inclined to speak our minds but other (non-geek interest) oppressed groups don't understand the internet as well as we do to take advantage of it's benifits.
Educating people on seting up their own internet services, is where we can stop this before it comes to blows and bloodshed. The two greatest accompilishments of the net so far are concurent open source software devlopment (Linux,BSD,etc) and the threaded discussion group (Slashcode ,Usenet, and some mailing lists.) Notice Big media sites usually don't use threaded lists! Media blindly tell people the Internet will change the world without elaberating. We should elaberate! Teach the people of the world how to use Free Software and the Threaded Discussion Group and empower them with a voice louder than that damn TV. Lets stop a brutal war before it ever happens!
Novel theory: Modern Man evolved from psychopath
Were I actually to buy a PS2 I would get it modded to within an inch of its life, but quite frankly I need neither a new gaming console nor a DVD player. I've been enjoying secondhand Gameboy titles -- robust enough to survive into the secondary market and no region coding or copy protection (I love Liberty and my Bung Xchanger). And while they are fun for about the same length of time as a PS2 title, they are one tenth the price.
--
As much as I despise the DMCA, the most interesting thing about this article would have to be the name "biscuit nipple"...
Oh yes? Well such a meaningless article is typical of the Australian press (as if summarizing a whole act into 10 paragraphs is simple - I am being unfair). But its a bit hard to draw the conclusion you have made.
So.
Here are some useful links on the subject (including analysis - difficult for some slashdotters to read, but give it a try - and the actual amendments). Unfortunately some of these analyses are rather old due to the fact that the Act was proposed several years ago and passed last year:
http://www.gtlaw.com.au/pubs/digitalageaustr alia.html
http://www.roma.unisa.edu.au/08908/lect11/co mmentary.html
http://www.austlii.edu.au/au//legis/cth/cons ol_act/ca1968133/notes.html
http://www.efa.org.au/Issues/IP/copyright.ht ml
Oliver
Who, as usual, still hasn't thought up a clever sig.
116A Importation, manufacture etc. of circumvention device and provision etc. of circumvention service
(1) Subject to subsections (2), (3) and (4), this section applies if:
(a) a work or other subject-matter is protected by a technological protection measure; and
(b) a person does any of the following acts without the permission of the owner or exclusive licensee of the copyright in the work or other subject-matter:
(i) makes a circumvention device capable of circumventing, or facilitating the circumvention of, the technological protection measure;
(ii) sells, lets for hire, or by way of trade offers or exposes for sale or hire or otherwise promotes, advertises or markets, such a circumvention device;
(iii) distributes such a circumvention device for the purpose of trade, or for any other purpose that will affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright;
(iv) exhibits such a circumvention device in public by way of trade;
(v) imports such a circumvention device into Australia for the purpose of:
(A) selling, letting for hire, or by way of trade offering or exposing for sale or hire or otherwise promoting, advertising or marketing, the device; or
(B) distributing the device for the purpose of trade, or for any other purpose that will affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright; or
(C) exhibiting the device in public by way of trade;
(vi) makes such a circumvention device available online to an extent that will affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright;
(vii) provides, or by way of trade promotes, advertises or markets, a circumvention service capable of circumventing, or facilitating the circumvention of, the technological protection measure; and
(c) the person knew, or ought reasonably to have known, that the device or service would be used to circumvent, or facilitate the circumvention of, the technological protection measure.
(2) This section does not apply in relation to anything lawfully done for the purposes of law enforcement or national security by or on behalf of:
(a) the Commonwealth or a State or Territory; or
(b) an authority of the Commonwealth or of a State or Territory.
(3) This section does not apply in relation to the supply of a circumvention device or a circumvention service to a person for use for a permitted purpose if:
(a) the person is a qualified person; and
(b) the person gives the supplier before, or at the time of, the supply a declaration signed by the person:
(i) stating the name and address of the person; and
(ii) stating the basis on which the person is a qualified person; and
(iii) stating the name and address of the supplier of the circumvention device or circumvention service; and
(iv) stating that the device or service is to be used only for a permitted purpose by a qualified person; and
(v) identifying the permitted purpose by reference to one or more of sections 47D, 47E, 47F, 48A, 49, 50, 51A and 183 and Part VB; and
(vi) stating that a work or other subject-matter in relation to which the person proposes to use the device or service for a permitted purpose is not readily available to the person in a form that is not protected by a technological protection measure.
(4) This section does not apply in relation to the making or importing of a circumvention device:
(a) for use only for a permitted purpose relating to a work or other subject-matter that is not readily available in a form that is not protected by a technological protection measure; or
(b) for the purpose of enabling a person to supply the device, or to supply a circumvention service, for use only for a permitted purpose.
(4A) For the purposes of paragraphs (3)(b) and (4)(a), a work or other subject-matter is taken not to be readily available if it is not available in a form that lets a person do an act relating to it that is not an infringement of copyright in it as a result of section 47D, 47E, 47F, 48A, 49, 50, 51A or 183 or Part VB.
(5) If this section applies, the owner or exclusive licensee of the copyright may bring an action against the person.
(6) In an action under subsection (5), it must be presumed that the defendant knew, or ought reasonably to have known, that the circumvention device or service to which the action relates would be used for a purpose referred to in paragraph (1)(c) unless the defendant proves otherwise.
(7) For the purposes of this section, a circumvention device or a circumvention service is taken to be used for a permitted purpose only if:
(a) the device or service is used for the purpose of doing an act comprised in the copyright in a work or other subject-matter; and
(b) the doing of the act is not an infringement of the copyright in the work or other subject-matter under section 47D, 47E, 47F, 48A, 49, 50, 51A or 183 or Part VB.
(8) In this section:
qualified person means:
(a) a person referred to in paragraph 47D(1)(a), 47E(1)(a) or 47F(1)(a); or
(b) a person who is an authorized officer for the purposes of section 48A, 49, 50 or 51A; or
(c) a person authorised in writing by the Commonwealth or a State for the purposes of section 183; or
(d) a person authorised in writing by a body administering an institution (within the meaning of Part VB) to do on behalf of the body an act that is not an infringement of copyright because of that Part.
supply means:
(a) in relation to a circumvention device--sell the device, let it for hire, distribute it or make it available online; and
(b) in relation to a circumvention service--provide the service.
(9) The defendant bears the burden of establishing the matters referred to in subsections (3), (4) and (4A).
Well. This section is pretty draconian. So the best way of getting this watered down or removed when it comes up for review is to abuse it.
Here's what can be done to abuse this.
Invent a new "standard" of "encryption". It will be purposely weak, something like UUENCODE combined with something like XOR and multiplication on 8 to 40 bits. Easy to crack in other words. Encrypt "works" with it. Distribute the "works" freely, but sell the "reader" so people have to buy the "reader" to read the "works".
If anyone cracks the "encryption", then they are in violation of Section 119A, as posted here. And they can be sued.
--
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
The laws, of course, are not there to protect anyone who creates something. They are there to protect those who profit from others creations. Dont even bother trying to kid yourself about that one.
The problem is, they get to do it for fun now, because thats the reality of the creative industries today. The creative people behind the books/albums/articles today dont get paid. Musicians get to sign contracts where they get to pay the recording, pay for the videos, and get a minor percentage of the sales. If they're lucky they can pay the company back what they end up owing.
So what is the incentive today? Copyright law isnt about the creative people anymore. Most end up not owning their own works anyway. The RIAA even tried to sneak in an amendment in recent law that would make all music works for hire.
Copyright could be completely revoked, and the artists who create today would still do it tomorrow, because there isnt any difference anymore. BECAUSE THEYRE NOT THE ONES GETTING PAID.
The only thing that would be lost are the industries forcefeeding the world with whatever poor kids theyve conned today.
What is the incentive today? Most artists would do a lot better at eating and buying a house and travelling and looking after themselves if they played a lottery. In this country we have at least a few hundred each year who make money that way... and maybe about 10 writers who can survive on their writings.
In other words, if you can get your hands on a device, you are allowed to use it
That's the same type of law they use for pornography here in the states. You're not allowed to make porn or transport porn in any way, but if you happen to have some around you're allowed to watch it. The effect of this law is to make porn (true pornography, failing the three-point test and all that) effectively illegal. The cops *can* bust into your house if they hear you have porn there, because it's assumed there's no way you can get it other than making or transporting it.
circumvention device means a device (including a computer program) having only a limited commercially significant purpose or use, or no such purpose or use, other than the circumvention, or facilitating the circumvention, of an effective technological protection measure
Under that definition, the DeCSS code itself is definitely illegal, but any Linux DVD player is fine because it definitely has a purpose other than simple decryption of the video data.
I disagree. Any Linux software, because it is freely available, would seem to me to fit under the heading of 'limited commercial use'. The above clause could be read as making illegal any Open Source Software that does any kind of decoding whatsoever.
Scary stuff, Aussies. I assume there's a way you can still fight this bill?
Genocide Man -- Life is funny. Death is funnier. Mass murder can be hilarious.
Well, you can still order your modded DVD players from NZ, or bring one back after going on your ski trip.
NZ law also specifically permits parallel importing, which upsets a certain large maker of suspect software, and the US govt. which is considering trade sanctions if NZ leaves the law in place.
This sounds so much like (alcohol) prohibition in the 1920s... you couldn't make booze, you couldn't import it, you couldn't sell it, but if you had it, you could drink it.
So instead of bars, they had speakeasies. You paid for memberships in "private clubs", and when you got there, the owner just happened to have some booze, and he'd generously give some to you and your guests.
The irony, of course, is that the Bronfmans - yes, those Bronfmans - got their start in running booze across the Canadian/US border during the Prohibition era. The company ended up being called "Seagram's". Maybe you've heard of it?
Ah.. but broadening DVD usage to include linux users sounds like a significant commercial purpose. Not for the makers of DeCSS, but for the moviemakers. Just a thought...
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
All the Intercontinental carriers should do nicely out of this. All they need to do is cache it overseas and resell their own bandwidth as overseas transmission. If noone here has the right to cache anything, it seems like a real nice way of plumping up the bandwidth usage on the major national and international carrier, which.. you'll never guess! Is owned by the government and being plumped for sale.
Nice way to instantly bump up your own profits.
toeslikefingers.com - because
The US, EU and Australia should drop any last pretense of acting in the interests of ordinary citizens and finally create the "People and Families That Matter Act" (PTMA).
Excerpt:
"The PTMA shall guarantee uninterrupted wealth, power and social dominance for the privileged elite of the early 21st century until, and if at all possible beyond, the heat death of the universe.
Any unauthorized discussion of the PTMA by persons not explicitly covered by this Act shall be considered terrorism."
Night
---
(C) Copyright Forever and Ever and Ever
ME ME ME All Rights Reserved and Defended By the Full Weight of the US Military
MINE MINE MINE (C) Copyright Copyright Copyright Copyright ALL MINE This Post Not Authorized for Use By Anyone Who Has Not Paid Me In Full ANY UNAUTHORIZED MEMORY OF THIS POST IS A VIOLATION OF MY COPYRIGHT AND SHALL BE PROSECUTED TO THE FULL EXTENT OF THE LAW
Actually, I think they do apply that standard to books. When a book comes through on ILL, the library doesn't have the right to photocopy it and put it on file for future reference. They can just distribute the book that they received to the person who requested it, returning it to the lending library afterwards. Similarly, under this law, the library can't keep a copy of every document viewed on its computers to create a local collection. Whether this is a sensible regulation in the case of Internet data is another question, but it is analogous to the situation with books.
As to competition with commercial sites, I assume they're saying that the library can't buy a subscription to a pay-only site and make that available for free for everyone who comes to the library. I think that's perfectly reasonable. If a library user pays for such a site and wants to access it from the library, that would be different, of course.
All of which is not to say that I'm defending the DMCA (and DMCA-like legislation), but we shouldn't be getting upset about the wrong aspects of the legislation either.
- circumvention device
So, it looks like DeCSS is out, LiViD is in.A device (including a computer program) having no, or only a limited, commercially significant purpose or use other than the circumvention, or facilitating the circumvention, of an effective technological protection measure
Although, developing an open source LiViD-style program without distributing a DeCSS-like tool (ie. for testing) is a fine line...
Just as good as trying to hit six different people in the dark with a gun.
You mean an air-pistol or a fake. No illegal gun dealer is going to give a schoolboy a gun, because the police will be down on them like a ton of bricks. Far safer and more lucrative to supply the crime gangs instead.
Or burglaries to the euphemistically-challenged. I don't need a gun to get people out of my house, I have fists, feet and a baseball bat. In the UK, it's very hard to get a gun, even illegally, so the chances of the drug addict who's trying to nick my video having anything more dangerous than a knife are pretty low.
I believe it's the ISPs proxy-cache they're after, not the 'Temporary Internet Files' folder on Joe Corks-on-Hat's computer.
Well done Little Johnny! It's just like you and your cronies to come up with another law against the IT community in Australia. Let's face it Australia is becoming, if not has become the laughing stock if the World when it comes to IT legislation. For example the ludicrous censorship laws brought in to win votes at the last election? Even the CSIRO advised him that it was totally unfeasable, yet he pressed ahead just to keep Aliston happy! He also totally screwed up with both datacasting and digital TV. All I can say though is that he will get a huge shock when it comes to the next election. The IT community in Australia has had a gutful of the amount of tripe put forward by this man and his party. ps. Johnny, don't legislate against something that you obviously have no idea of... End Rant/
That's what all the DeCSS t-shirts are for.
--
Dyolf Knip
It seems a bit murky, because in the context of the protocol this makes sense, but iirc under Australian law all content is copyright the author even if there's no copyright notice, unless there's an explicit notice attached to the content stating that it's in the public domain. Anyone more knowledgable care to step up and answer?
What does it take in Australia to declare yourself a corporation? :)
I believe the comments regarding caching are the result of a reporting arror. This is not in the legislation. If you read the article and replace the word cache with mirror then you will get the correct sense on the law.
This law does not ban caching. It bans mirroring without permision.
There is a significant amount of information at the EFF DMCA page.
Expect more WIPO member countries to generate their own laws to comply with this.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
In Australia, there are many places where you can buy a DVD player that has been modified to get around the stupid protection mechanisms.
DVDs have coding on them to stop them being played in the wrong region. DVDs from the US aren't meant to be able to be played on DVD players bought in Australia. Well, you can easily buy a modified player from the shop that ignores this restriction, as I did. It means that I've now got access to about 4 times as many DVD movies as I could get in Australia alone.
Also, there's this thing called "Macrovision" which is meant to stop you from recording DVD movies onto VHS. It stuffs up the signal coming out of the DVD player in such a way that most TVs are OK, but most VHS recorders aren't. Well, it also effects many legitimate uses of VHS players, as well as overhead projectors. Anyway, you can buy DVD players here with that removed too.
At least, you used to be able to. This new law has made it illegal to sell Macrovision disabled players in Australia. Shops have stopped selling them modified in this way. It sucks. Lucky I got in a few months ago to get mine.
We are still allowed to sell multi region DVD players though. Small mercy.
Should there be clause added to the GPL and other open licenses that prohibits jerks like movie studios from benefitting from the same process they try to destroy?
I suggested this to Richard Stallman last year. (Here's my proposal). However, he was against the proposal, as it stood.
At least the Australian law will be up for review in three years. With any luck, that will be exactly how long it will last.
"We didn't want to be perceived as being heavy-handed" LOL!
political_news.c: warning: comparison is always true due to limited range of data type
No they haven't. This is part of a totally fictional story sent around by US gun-nuts who are sad because one more country has become lost to their deadly cause.
For more information check here.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
I guess I just have to disagree. Look at why Iraq and Afghanistan are regarded as pariahs. The Iraqi army has forcefully invaded another country for the sole purpose of robbing it. Afghanistan executes people for wearing the wrong clothing.
As far as I can tell (firsthand observation and interviews in the case of Iraq, and secondhand information from devout Muslim Pakistanis I trust in the case of Afghanistan) these things are true. It's not like someone made these stories up because the Taliban wouldn't play ball on DVD piracy.
I highly doubt it would be possible to successfully demonize, say, the Bahamas if they choose to create a competitive position for themselves by allowing freedom of communications. The worst they have to fear is exclusion from the low-duties club, which won't matter if they're the only ones selling what they're selling.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
Nothing is wrong with this, I'll just have to BLOCK the .au domain so my copy of squid doesn't illegaly cache copyrighted material.
We should warn all of our ISP about how they can avoid illegal operation by blocking the Aussie domain!
And we should find out who we should notify in the Aussie gov to let them know the meassures that we are going to have to take to respect their new law.
My web site specificaly allows local cacheing as a fair use; Mainly because I thought only the US Gov could pass something this stupid; Who would have the the Aussie's would have beat us to it!
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Mark Twain commented on USA's government as being "The Best Government Money Can Buy". Looks like he applies Down Under as well.
Tomorrow is Open.
The DMCA is spreading, south. =( Now that Australia has a DMCA of it's own, I'm hoping New Zealand (where I live) doesn't follow. But considering the recent law proposals here (e-mail snooping, vodafone tapping) I wouldn't be surprised. I'd like to read the actual law to see just how it's worded. But I expect it to be very broad in most of it's definitions. I can't believe they're not exempting caching.
I've just been skimming through a document on the website www.aph.gov.au which has a huge archive of all the goings on of the Australian parliament (I'm Australian, by the way). This document was interesting: http://search.aph.gov.au/search/ParlInfo.ASP?actio n=view&item=1&resultsID=OV8t2
It's a memorandum explaining every ammendment to the copyright act, all the viewpoints of all the stakeholders that had been gathered through the committee and hearing process, etc. What I gathered from reading this was:
a) They were trying to take the 1968 copyright act and simply remove all the technology-specific terms and make them technology-neutral (eg. take out 'wireless telegraphy', etc.). They were also doing their best to make all the laws and exemptions that were already in place for print media and wireless broadcast apply in exactly the same way to digital media. For example, it's OK to copy a portion of a copyrighted paper work without authorisation as long as you don't exceed 10% of the number of pages or one chapter (whichever comes first, I think). They changed the 10% reference to the number of words in the case of an electronic document, but said if a document existed in both print and electronic formats, only one of these requirements had to be satisfied. Similar attempts at uniformity are made all over the place. They also redefined what it means to copy things (eg. converting software from one form to another is still copying), what it means to authorise copying, etc.
b) Secondly, they wanted to make sure that there was the right amount of access to information over the internet, to actually satisfy concerned libraries and academic bodies. There are all kinds of ways they did this. It's a very long document.
c) Thirdly, they wanted to make sure that there were exemptions to the law that were appropriate to the online environment. This is where they made temporary caching exempt! If they hadn't, it would be illegal under the more general form of the old copyright law! They had to make the distinction between temporary caching and unauthorised copying, and what Slashdot has reported on is the way they made that distinction. I think it might be a bit harsh, but ISPs were strongly involved in this process.
d) Lastly, to satisfy the WIPO treaty, they had to address the circumvention of copy protection issue. They tried to do it so that devices with purposes *other* than just breaking copyright protection (eg. computers and VCRs) are exempt. My feeling from reading this is that only stand-alone devices are illegal, not, say, DVD players that can bypass region encoding. I don't know, though.
I don't know if the memorandum contains everything the way it was finally passed, but if you go to the website and search for 'copyright' you get a huge number of documents on the subject of these ammendments dating back around 10 years. I don't think this was passed secretly - all this information has been there for a long time. Also, I think it was bipartisan, I don't think the present opposition would have done anything differently. However, I couldn't find the hansard report of who voted and how.
The Australian law isn't quite as bad as the DMCA. For example:
While making and importing decoding devices will be banned, their personal use will not.
In other words, if you can get your hands on a device, you are allowed to use it
The full text of the modifications to the copyright bill can be found here and contain some interesting definitions which make the whole DeCSS thing quite different in Australia:
circumvention device means a device (including a computer program) having only a limited commercially significant purpose or use, or no such purpose or use, other than the circumvention, or facilitating the circumvention, of an effective technological protection measure
Under that definition, the DeCSS code itself is definitely illegal, but any Linux DVD player is fine because it definitely has a purpose other than simple decryption of the video data. Basically while this bill is still an impediment to the free trade of ideas, I think there is enough restraint in it to make some worthwhile things come out. Hopefully this means that while decss.c might be outlawed, css-auth.c is quite ok.
Fear: When you see B8 00 4C CD 21 and know what it means
The new legislation is the Copyright Ammendment (Digital Agenda) Act 2000, available on AUSTLII
Technical reproductions made in the process of communication are exempt from the prohibition on copying digital works (ss. 43 and 111A). This is meant to protect ISPs and Carriers (which the Uni and Colleges are - probably). Whether copyright is breached will probably be determined as a question of degree; eg;
- Napster providing cacheing facilities allowing massive mp3 copyright infringement is bad.
- Cacheing purely to facilitate communication (eg. Universities) is OK.
Note that this is a question of degree and interpretation. Some (such as the views cited in the article) would argue that any cacheing is not purely to facilitate communication and is therefore in breach. I personally think (and hope) that the laws will be enforced more intelligently than that, only prohibiting copying restricting copyright users' rights.
Universities are worried that these new rights will allow copyright holders to charge per view, as opposed to the University downloading information once (and paying once) and then distributing it to students. They argue that this is like what University libraries do.
Anyway, I've gotten off the track. I think that cacheing that is purely for saving download costs (such as cacheing the hotmail.com frontpage) will be fine. Possible future pay-per-view lexus/nexus web-type things could cause problems.
The prohibition on circumvention (read hacking) devices has the exceptions of (amongst other things);
- making programs interoperable (s. 47D)
- correcting errors (s. 47E); and
- security testing (s.47F)
Which could make it sort of ok - although is decss (allowing DVD copying) security testing?
This, once again, is a question of degree and interpretation ...
---
---
soni bo da
Sign up for 50 free hours. Surf as much as you can to sites containing objectionable material. Have AOL Australia chasing it's tail trying to remove all the sites from their cache. It may not change anything, but what the hell, baiting the MPAA, RIAA and AOL all at the same time would be somewhat satisfying.
For what its worth the Bill was before the Parliament for nearly a year.
It was certainly discussed in legal publishing circles (which are heavily effected as the government is messing around as a copyright holder of legislation)
However the so called "house of review" the Senate seemed to push it though without even looking at it. meaning no-one had objected strongly as it usually only takes one senator to refer a bill to committee (unless the government can get majority support of a guillotine which is rare)
The Bill and its explanatory material are here
You gotta be patient while the page loads.
'There is a Light that never goes out.'
The EU's doing the same thing. See my page about the new EU copyright law.
We all keep talking about how we'll just move offending stuff to physically offshore locations. Have Napster set up shop in Japan, have DeCSS available for download from Canada.
And there's the old truism that "you can't regulate the internet, it's global". The problem is that when every country in the world has passed the DMCA there's nowhere left to go....
The Second Reading Speech (which has legal bearing on the spirit of the law) is here
'There is a Light that never goes out.'
I spoke with a bloke who attended a briefing by the solicitors for the AVCC (Australian Vice Chancellor's Council - the AVCC control AARNET, the internet 'backbone' across the universities here).
/. can be bothered to complain to the authorities here.
/. can prove the front page was placed there deliberately.
The solicitors have advised a 'wait and see' approach, and this seems an even-handed way to go about things.
The keyword is 'deliberate'. www.slashdot.org is probably one of the most popular pages at Monash university and is always in the cache.
But if anyone were to *deliberately* place www.slashdot.org in the cache, they might have some explaining to do, if:
o Anybody at
o Anybody can actually figure out what's in the cache from the US (from anywhere outside Monash, actually).
o
Socceroo
Does anyone know of a link to the text of this bill? The article is quite vague (standard mainstream media quality). I'd love to read (or at least skim) the real thing to see what it really means.
For example, it doesn't go into any detail regarding what constitutes "digitally protected material" - does this cover only materials already protected by strong crypto (not much legislation required) or anything that someone chooses to protect by any means (DMCA-style - protect your copyrighted work with ROT-13 and make un-ROT-13 illegal)? Or is there a legal definition of "protected" which says how the protection must work?
From the article:
How does anyone define what is "deliberate"? If I set up an HTTP proxy in order to minimize traffic on an outgoing line, am I potentially in violation of Australian law? I may have deliberately set up the proxy server, but after that, I do not control what goes through it.
And what about the fact that my HTTP proxy can't even decode the material? Does this act represent an attempt to regulate the copying of the digitally-protected materials (like caching the encoded data, or copying a DVD bit-for-bit) or just the decoded, unprotected materials (distributing de-CSSed DVD content)?
Or perhaps Australian legislators don't realise the importance of caching to the health of the Internet... If every client had to talk directly to the originating server for every request, the Internet would have brought to its knees years ago under the load. Caching, mirroring, and other techniques based on making local copies of data are what keep the network running (Slashdot effect aside)
(I'm glad to see that they're not planning on making computers illegal :)
If there are any Aussies reading who are familiar with this legislation, I'd be very interested in hearing more (especially how it got this far without anyone hearing about it (for anyone, read me.))
Living better through chemicals
So basically the government is trying to censor or copyright everything digital in the hope that nothing will be legal on the internet soon. Then what....??
What really sux about the whole copyright issue in Australia is how corporations are exempt from copyright (at least in some areas). Take for example pirated music CDs. It is totally illegal for a regular person to copy a CD and sell it to someone else even at a cheap price - BUT it is legal for companies to import pirated CDs from indonesia and sell them at a high profit margin. If companies are allowed to pirate stuff, and even make a profit off it, then all citizens should be given that same right!
Saying your OS is the best because more people use it is like saying MacDonalds make the best food
Maybe this is just me, but with the open source world getting it's butt kicked more and more by DMCA's and UCITA, I'm feeling more and more that people who crack down open source reverse-engineering have no business using free software. Should there be clause added to the GPL and other open licenses that prohibits jerks like movie studios from benefitting from the same process they try to destroy? Should we tolerate movie studios getting their movies cheaply rendered with Beowulf and cheaply and securely promoted on the net with Apache and Linux when the very same people who create that software cannot legally watch those very same movies? Any opinions?
This is another brilliant example of corrupt law-makers not understanding how the world works combined with some old-fashioned short-sightedness.
Good laws should spring up to enforce social conventions and give them legitimacy. For example, if a society can agree that it entering people's houses and taking stuff is wrong, then the laws should reflect that. If we lived in a society which stressed the unimportance of having personal space or possessions, the law would probably reflect that. I admit Im probably being a little philosophical here, but consider the alternatives.
Laws should not (in my obviously not consulted opinion) be created to shape society, especially in ways that are non-intuitive to the average person, and benefit only a small minority. By this, I mean that the vast majority of people out there dont really consider it stealing to trade files and music with one another. That such copying is immoral has been propagandized by the software (remember MSFT circa early 1980s?) and entertainment industries for many many years. When this propaganda failed to sway the behaviour and sentiment of the public, they resorted to pushing through unfair laws to force us to obey.
I, for one, think that people, even in government, are mostly fair and intelligent. Companies will change or companies will fade. Once pocketbooks are hit, eyes will open.
When the Internet was first created, it was intended to be used to exchange the ideas and work of universitys and promote a better intellectual solidarity. Now it's intitial purpose has been thwarted, and it's subject to the whims of the commercial world. Governments pandying to the big companies propogate this, leaving the true enthusiasts/intellectuals behind. With the internet, we have an opportunity to do something that is unprecedented. We have freedom of speech, freedom to exchange and express ideas. We have anonymity, free from racial and social predjudices, where people can only judge us by what we say and think, not where we come from and how we look. Why must we abandon this to shallow commercialism. Thats what we have TV for, right?