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DMCA Worldwide: Canada, New Zealand, USA
cdlu writes: "Citing the need for up-to-date digital copyright laws, the Canadian government is starting hearings into our own version of the US's DMCA. Do you still wonder why people protest at the G-8 and other such summits?" Meanwhile, New Zealand is also planning to reform its copyright laws to include DMCA-like restrictions, and in the USA, Congress is planning to double the number of FBI agents and Federal attorneys devoted to pursuing copyright cases.
This idea is laughably broken - and anti-capitalist - what is next? Perhaps they will tax walking and give those taxes to Exxon, after all, it hurts oil companies when people don't drive.
Why should someone who uses CDRs for, say, duplicating software such as Linux, have to pay money into the coffers of the record industry?
Where is the competition that is supposed to drive capitalism when companies are being paid directly from government imposed tarrifs?
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It's not so bad, when you allow for the fact that the media up here will cheerfully crucify any politician who shows any weakness. Witness Stockwell Day.
Also, our ruling party, the Liberals (who are actually conservatives) doesn't have that big a majority in Parliament. If the four opposition parties ever get their act together, and if some Liberals vote against their party, the opposition could defeat the government's bill.
Theoretically.
But the Bloc will just argue over what the bill gives to Quebec, the Alliance will continue to commit suicide, the NDP will give very eloquent speeches but will end up making no difference at all, the Conservatives (who may or may not be conservatives, depending on whether their flipped heads or tails that morning) will do nothing, and John Nunziatta will whine.
And the bill will go through, and Teflon Jean will get away with everything.
Hey, kids! Let's play "guess which of the opposition parties the poster is a bitter member of!"
This is from the Amnesty International 2001 World Report, the section on the U.S.
~ Leilah
Now it has turned out that I'll be doing my post-doctorate studies in the US next year and the Sklyarov case got me thinking if I might be in trouble because of my DeCSS mirroring. After all the MPAA lawyers argued that I was in breach of DCMA.
... unlike most civilized countries we are very bad about letting foreign nationals see their consulates or government representatives (we have even executed people without ever granting them this right, which is supposedly guaranteed by the Geneva Convention). We may be wealthy, but in most respects we are very much a third world nation, one whose corrupt politicians now have it in for programmers and free speech proponents such as yourself.
Why on earth would you do something so foolish as to come to the United States, particularly after Dmitry Sklyarov has disappeared into our Gulag for violating the very same law?
Any ideas?
Yes. Go somewhere else to do your graduate work. Do not risk imprisonment in the United States
Unless you would like to become another martyr for the disappearing liberties of a fat and lazy people who couldn't be bothered to care for themselves, much less some foreigh "troublemaker," I would strongly suggest finding a less oppressive country in which to study and not take the risk.
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The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
They started in the mid 70's and was continuing to the early 90's and then got a bit better. There are however still abuses.
... now there is no tension, because the DMCA, by exploiting a semantic bug in the US Constitution, has guaranteed copyright enforcement through criminal law at the absolute expense of freedom of speech. Copyright is now paramount, and any freedom of speech you might have had comes in a distant second.)
I'm not relying on foreign media, those just made me discover the whole thing. There are lots of information from independent sources in the country if you just search good enough.
That is one of the beauties of the internet, and the primary motivation I suspect for the comming "War on Copyright Infringement." In an environment where ISPs are compelled under legal and financial threat to remove any offending material at the merest assertion that it might be infringing on someone's copyright, censorship by governments and corporate intersts will go from "impossible" (remember "the internet routes around censorship" soundbite of a few years ago?) to being trivial.
Now, thanks to the DMCA, if they really want to get you (rather than merely silencing your voice on the 'net) they can arrest you on criminal charges for copyright violations (for the first time in our nation's history! Prior to the DMCA one could only be sued for copyright infringement, never arrested. There has always been a tension between copyright and freedom of speech
What, you say you didn't violate anyone's copyright, you merely posted information emberrassing or irritating to [insert your favorite Government or Corporation here]? When the evidence is an electronicly stored file, planting it is trivial. Indeed, manufacturing whatever evidence the Feds want to manufacture, for whatever purposes, is trivial. How on earth can you prove that that Metallica MP3 wasn't on your hard drive until after the Feds shut down your anti-FBI site, for example? It comes down to your word against their's, and unfortunately, here in the United States, people are very strongly conditioned to believe the word of a well groomed FBI agent over that of a "radical" "hacker" (well groomed or otherwise). What do you think all those Hollywood action films have been indoctrinating us with all those years?
It is interesting your government ceased its wholesale theft in the early nineties. Wasn't that about the time the internet came into widespread use and information began flowing freely as never before? Perhaps merely a coincidence, but if so, an interesting one.
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The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
In 1995, the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada (SOCAN) had filed a proposed tariff (Tariff 22) whereby ISPs were asked to pay royalties for the communication of the musical works in SOCAN's repertoire over digital networks such as the Internet. In its decision of October, 1999, the Board asserted its jurisdiction to certify such a tariff. The decision is currently under review by the Federal Court of Appeal.
There is really nothing wrong with the idea of a a world government as long as it is not a fascist one. Fascism has had a long history. The current western world is a continuation of the fascist Roman empire which was a continuation of the fascist Babylonian empire. Only the seat of power has moved over the millenia.
Computers and the internet are the latest tools in the arsenal of the fascist. Record keeping has always been the true basis of their power to control the masses. Now that we have all been numbered (social security numbers, driver's license numbers, etc...) it a simple thing to spy on the citizens of supposedly free countries. By forcing ISPs to spy on everybody, the governments of the world are in fact instituting Big Brotherism as the de facto form of modern government. Why? Because we are all slaves and the slave masters need to have control over their slaves.
Printing press and phonograph invented
Copyright is invented, a controversial law from the beginning.
Publishers rise to control physical distribution, pay authors--though not always fairly. There is no alternative.. people need books / records, authors need some cash. This system works relatively well for awhile. Consumers bootleg copyrighted materials by exchanging physical media. Losses are minimal and individuals aren't worth prosecuting.
Copyright law changes at the whim of publishers, effectively eliminating the creation of public domain works by extending the length of copyright indefinitely. Artists and authors increasingly produce "works for hire," which are then owned by the publisher they work for.
Popularization of the Internet and new data compression algorithms render traditional means of disseminating information nearly obsolete overnight. Some artists and authors realize that they don't need publishers anymore. Publishers ignore the Internet, seeing little threat.
Consumers realize that they can obtain copyrighted works on the Internet instead of paying for getting them on traditional media. Publishers for the most part look the other way.
DMCA quietly slips through Congress, in the guise of protecting US businesses and complying with international copyright treaties.
Napster shows the world the power of P2P information exchange with each user contributing a small part of the whole. Publishers get worried, can't sue every user, fumble for recourse. Napster falls and DMCA is challenged in numerous cases, but wins out in the end because money is power and those behind DMCA have lots of it. Consumers watch the Napster case curiously, stop using it after it's clear the end is near.
Publishers finally realize that the future of distribution is online and design crude digital copy control technologies which are protected under the DMCA. Each successful attempt to defeat these measures is crushed legally but is given little attention by the media.
Consumers aren't as comfortable with the new intangible online media and would prefer to keep buying books and CD's. Sales stagnate. Consumers don't realize the implications of future technologies that they have not yet experienced and remain quiet.
Prediction
Publishers attempt to phase in online media sales. Some consumers bite, but are quickly frustrated by the inability to read an e-book or listen to music on multiple computers they own. HDTV arrives with its own copy protections. VCR's recording functions stop working. Copy protected audio disks don't work in consumers older players or in car players. Works are distributed in both old and new formats while consumers are encouraged to buy new (and better) hardware that supports the new formats. [This process would likely take at least 10-20 years given the installed base of CD players, saturation of the home computer market, and lack of inexpensive, eye-friendly electronic books]
Just when the publishers think they have won the war over content, a movement similar to Open Source is established that sweeps the world and begins a modern cultural renaissance. Publishers disappear. The public domain expands rapidly. Artists and authors are fairly reimbursed by using alternative business models and handling distribution themselves. (eg. give away music, sell concert tickets) The world is a better place.
Wishful thinking? People said the same thing about Open Source 5 years ago and IT hasn't even fully taken off yet.
So while it is important we get our comments in, it looks like the government already sees the real problems with the DMCA. So let's fire up our word processors and clinch the deal, shall we?
It really sucks that this would be the case. Let's just hope that the poster-boy US citizen who gets nailed by a forgin version of the DMCA is appealing enough that the press will run the story as front-page news.
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In spite of the suggestions and all the tests that I have made, I have not cavato a spider from the hole.
But the worst the DVD Forum can do, according to the article, is bar the Chinese companies from using the DVD name or logo on their product!
Fine with me. Big whoop. I'll buy a "DVD compatible" player or a "binary video disc player" anyday. Yeah! Then maybe we can get some firewire outputs on 'em too. DVD could be so much better if it wasn't so closed, proprietary, s3cr33t, and litigous at any 3rd party innovations.
This is like the start of the PC clones all over again. And we all know the clones won out in the end and made PCs into deeply discounted commodoties.
People like Jack Valenti have demonstrated they have no understanding of current technology, that they are inefficient and stupid (see his alt2600 deposition - it would be laugable if it weren't so sad). I mean this is a guy who needs more cars and houses at his disposal than whole towns in order to live "comfortably" and he is a small fry compared to others. In other industries (like coal mining, steel production) this state of affairs leads either to the end of whole industries (with mass layoffs) or to a huge reduction in output. But the backers of DMCA want to change the legal system to support their entirely unnecessary industry (Courtney Love's description of which is not flattering) and seem to believe their companies deserve to be protected. They are using their influence to achieve these ends.
I suppose it isn't surprising though - I mean in the US the oil industry names tankers after members of cabinet (a cabinet that is rabidly pro-oil and with zero support for alternative energies) and the government proposes changes to tax laws that will likely save just Bush and his cabinet over a billion dollars. Wealth and power is what it's all about. The wealthy need their power to feel safe about all the money they have and are naturally more greedy (since they have more stuff) - I don't blame them. It's when their greed results in anti-democratic law-making that impedes innovation that it needs to be pointed out and resisted.
Much as we may hate the idea, copyright is a part of the way the world currently works. Take a look at the bottom of this page, notice the "The Rest(c) 1997-2001"? The existing laws were written before they had any idea of what computers would one day be capable of. Updating them to include [to the same degree of fairness] digital forms only makes sense. Otherwise you are left with unequal protection, depending on the media.
The problem with the DMCA is that it was slipped in by the copyright holders and is way too heavily in their favour (including ignoring various other constitutional concepts). The DMCA isn't bad for simply being an extension of copyright law - it is bad for being a biased extension.
All Canada is doing at the moment is starting hearings about their own version. The idea of hearings is that they give everyone the chance to speak up and prevent the kind of abuses that are in the DMCA. So, instead of complaining that it's happening - it will almost certainly happen whether you like the idea or not - start making your opinions heard; block the copyright holders from simply writing their own law; ensure fair use remains a concept; and produce a sensible version Americans can point their simple minded government towards as a good example.
I can just envision a scenario where countries all over the world, under pressure from the U.S., enact DMCA-like laws only to have the U.S. DMCA law overturned by the Supreme Court. Then the U.S. can point to the DMCA-like laws in those other countries as being examples of how those countries don't respect free speech like the U.S. does...