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Sklyarov Released On $50,000 Bail
Mike Schiraldi was the first to write about Dmitry Sklyarov's release from jail, even before it happened: "According to this live report from the courtroom, Dmitri will probably be out of jail real soon now. Of course, he still won't be allowed to leave Northern California, but it's a start ..." Soon after, inaneboy pointed out this Reuters story on yahoo which says that Sklyarov has been released, on 50,000 dollars bail, raised by his employer, ElcomSoft.
phalse phace wrote to say that the EFF has just posted an announcement as well as some background.
I guess I'll jump in here.
your attitude seems to me that the penalty for vandalism and assault ought to be death. Not only death but death without a jury, a trial, a lawyer, a sentence. No chance at appeals or the opportunity to call witnesses or defend yourself. In your eyes if a person commits vandalism then he or she ought to be summarily executed by any police officer who happens to be at the scene.
Unfortunately there are plenty of people like you in this world and that's why brutal opression exists all over the planet.
War is necrophilia.
If the above is factually correct, then the prosecution's only hope is to find relevant US law, precedent, or theories under which an ordinary employee of a corporation can be held to have criminal liability for the actions of the corporation.
Which is something which US corporate interests would not want to happen...
Hey, I was there from about 10:45 AM to noon. Where would I send pictures I took with my digital camera? I don't have any place to host the pictures from.
We do the right thing.... sooner or later.... heh.
Oh well, I guess I'm just an eternal cyncic. Still, I'm very glad this happened, and hopefully he'll be able to get on with his life ASAP. Props to his employer for raising the cash. Somehow I doubt Adobe would ever do the right thing and reimburse them. I must say this whole experience has left me with a very bad taste in my mouth regarding Adobe.... I'll make sure never to purchase any of their products, and reccomend the same to any of my employers/employees/anyone.
He's gonna have a lot of e-mail to catch up on. Wasn't he in jail for the whole SirCam bit?
BilldaCat
What is Think Geek going to do with all of those Free Dimitri shirts they just got in? Nobody is going to want them now....
If, as they claim, Adobe doesn't want him prosecuted any more, then why don't THEY pay the $50000 bail?
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
... for pointing something that should get hyped in every dealing that anyone sympathetic to Sklyarov's plight has with anyone else: that this was legal under Russian law.
Seriously, the fact that he's a Russian (read "commie") coder (read "hacker") can, and may, get played against him in the press to no end, so it's nice just to see those little words, "legal in Russia," that should humble the cretins who pushed this misguided law.
"Ah, for the freedoms of Mother Russia..." *sigh*
AHHHHHHH! I'm burning with goodness again!
- Reakk, Sluggy Freelance
he still won't be allowed to leave Northern California...
Which earnestly solicits the question "may he code???"
Just because its "doing your job" dosent make it legal. Hitmen do there job, and get put in jail for it. The question is not whether he broke the law, he did. The question is whether the law is unconstitutional and or unethical. The feds at this point cannot just be like "You know what, this law just isnt right. Let him go." Thats not their job. It will be a long process for him to ever be released.
my other penis is a vagina
Here are a couple new SF Chronicle articles of interest:
Probably only applicable to those of us in Silicon Valley, but is anyone else interested in taking him out for a beer and some decent food? Show him the parts of the US that don't suck....
there are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots
Yep. $50000 for bail is a well-deserved slap in the face of FBI. I wonder what's going on inside FBI now. The agents are not stupid, just following orders. I am sure they know as well as all of us that this law is bogus. Must suck to be them.
-- Another senseless waste of fine bytes.
California: Vast, beatiful scenery
Jail: 4x6 cell, concrete
California: Sunshine
Jail: Flourescent track lights, or perhaps a bare bulb. (Note: I don't speak from experience here, but from such great documentaries as "The Shawshank Redemption"", "Escape From Alcatraz", and "Sleepers")
California: I'm hungry, I haven't eaten in like 8 hours, this sucks.
Jail: This constantly being beaten by corrupt guards sucks.
California: Bikini (somewhat)clad women, everyone stares at hungrily.
Jail: You (*shudder*).
shaddup
Ummm, he is most certainly not free. He is just out on bond awaiting trial. He has no passport, and no freedom of movement (he can't leave California, and he most certainly can't go home to Russia).
Yes, this is an improvement of his general situation, but this is far from over. He still faces the possibility of hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines and years in prison.
For now, he just has a much bigger jail cell.
The message our lawmakers are sending to hackers is clear; leave the copy protection alone and instead just beat the f*cking shit out of the copyright holder.
I hope Dimitry flees. There won't be any justice for him here.
...is that it doesn't clarify the real difference between the legality in Russia and the illegality in the States -- i.e. that the reason you're allowed to do this in Russia is to make backups for personal use.
Overall, I think it's a reasonable story, and not slanted. But the average reader (side-note: how much do we think this will be picked up by the mass-circulation papers?) will end up thinking that this is a symptom of the decline of the Russian ex-empire in that it's legal to pirate CDs there. The reality, of course, is the reverse: it's legal to make a fair-use backup for your own purposes, as opposed to out-and-out piracy, and that is what Sklyarov's software addresses.
I think the real fact of the matter is that what Sklyarov did in his own country was well within the confines of Russian legality. From his point of view, he most certainly did not break the law. The United States is setting a new precedent in legislation. Do internet laws have unlimited jurisdiction? If so, who decides what these universal laws will be? Apparently, the US is taking it upon themselves to baby-sit the entire world. Hypothetical situation time: Say, for instance, I'm the writer of a strongly capitalistic, widely circulated e-zine, and I publish an article denouncing the dictator of a communist country. I then decide to take a trip to said country. "Well, I'm sorry, but we don't have this 'freedom of speech' thing here. You're under arrest." For some reason that just doesn't seem right to me, but mayve that's just me.
- Don't get in fights with ugly people, they've got nothing to lose. -
Is this a precursor to the widely expected split of California into North and South? Where is the boundary between these (soon to be two) states that Dimitry cannot cross?
Props to him on his bold defense of international freedom of speech.
-Ben
I personally wouldn't consider this a slap in the face of the FBI, but perhaps a slap in the face of the DMCA. Clearly the US Atty. intends to prosecute, but I suspect that John Ashcroft not exactly enthusiastic to prosecute Sklyarov. If we keep up the political pressure on Ashcroft, we may indeed stop this prosecution altogether.
So, let's step up the pressure. Call John Ashcroft (the US Attourney General) at 202-353-1555 and let him know that you think Sklyarov's prosecution under DMCA is unjust.
Finding God in a Dog
Define Irony: Fleeing to Russia from the US for the sake of Freedom...
> His employer raised that money? That's great! Talk about dedication! More companies should back their employees in this manner.
> I can hardly believe this; are they hiring???
Why, you planning on getting arrested?
...The question is not whether he broke the law, he did...
Where have you been for the past forever? Dyema' broke no law, just as you're breaking no law by getting drunk off your ass in your own home, provided you're allowed to purchase alcohol in your area, even though there are countries where being intoxicated past a certain point is illegal. A 19 year old in France who buys a beer is breaking no law, and neither is the man or woman selling it to him. Sure, over here the legal drinking age is 21, and over here we have a DMCA also. But Dyema' didn't break the DMCA while he was over here. He did actions in russia, previous to his ever having come to the U.S., that had he done them here, would have been illegal. The speech he gave is protected in a specific exception clause in the DMCA, which allows unlimited discussion of cryptography, as long as its application is not sold to break specific copyrighted software.
However unethical the DMCA may be, Dyema' did not break it.
However unethical underage drinking laws may be, then my 19 year old friend Ja'nos did not break them when he was over here mixing drinks, even if he had drunk alcohol in Hungary at the age of 18 before he ever came here! (Which is the legal drinking age over there).
Dyema did not break Russian or U.S. laws while in Russia. Dyema did not break Russian or U.S. laws while in America. Therefore, he is not a good test case to establish a precedent against the DMCA, which is an unethical law. A good precedent would be someone who actually broke it.
Duh.
Where have you been?
Search Skylarov on the slashdot front page and read the +5 insightful comments on any one of the many resulting slashdot stories. We've established this thoroughly. How can you still think that Skylarov broke the DMCA?
I assume an underage person is allowed to mix drinks, because I know someone so employed.
Running away does not fix the issue(ie. a bad law was passed). I can't believe people even suggest this as a correct corse of action.
There are two common ways to change the laws in most places in the US and at the Federal level.
- Get the lawmakers to amend the law
- Have a high court over turn the law
I would rather have courts review the law, all the way up to the Supreme Court, than to have lawmakers muck around with this issue any more. If Sklyarov flees how can the issue be pushed? It is a risk that unfortunately only Sklyarov can face but if not him who and when? Letting this horribly bad law sit on the books any longer is as a bad an idea as telling Sklyarov to run for it.
He'll get his ass back to Russia. Once he figures out the legal costs and his potential for incarceration I think he'll realise that it's in his best interest to flee prosecution. Hell! it's in ElcomSoft's best interests if he flees. $50,000 might sound like a lot, but once you start to think in terms of billable hours its really isn't that much. The sooner he's back at work the better it will be for them. It may be in the DOJ's best interest too. If you consider that this isn't exactly a popular case for them. Come to think of it... isn't $50,000 bail for someone that is as much of a flight risk as Sklyarov a bit low? Granted, he won't be able to return to the US again....but would he really want to? If it were you would you want to?
The last time I checked, even though the west won ther cold war US law was NOT the Law of the Land in Russia.
There is the legal concept of "Fighting Words". This covers things like inciting to riot, or other illegal acts. The Supreme Court has issued many rulings on this. These are the rulings that allow Nazis to stroll through a jewish neighborhood, while under police protection. This area of law is part of free speech rights, and basically knocks down the idea that you can be arrested for incitement to an illegal act. IANAL. A search for the phrase will turn up many referances.
People can buy instruments of violence in the US. But tread on someone's imagined profits, and watch out. Even if you are just speaking, or selling.
There could be a tremendous constitutional legal issue tied up with this. I hope the DCMA gets nailed.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Thus allowing him to stay in the country, work to make enough money to eat and fuel the U.S legal system. (not necessarily in that order)
The difference between Canada and the USA is that in Canada healthcare is a right and gun ownership is a privilege.
Pictures now up here
Sklyarov was handcuffed and wearing a fetching orange T-shirt from the Santa Clara County Main Jail collection.
The proceeding itself was mostly dull and could just as easily have been done over the phone. No controversy or disagreement. The judge seemed to just want to get the whole thing over with as routinely as possible. The only additional information he asked for was some assurance that Dmitry's immigration status would not interfere with the trial proceedings. And while the papers are reporting that the U.S. attorney is still holding Sklyarov's passport, he did make clear that it would be handed over to the court at their discretion.
The next court appearance is scheduled for August 23, so Dmitry must be indicted within that time for the case to go forward.
After the hearing was over, nine tenths of the people left the room, and the whole proceeding only took about twenty minutes.
The REAL people responsible for this whole situation are the INDIVIDUALS WHO FILED THE COMPLAINT IN THE FIRST PLACE.
These people made a PERSONAL decision to prosecute Sklyarov, and it was their INDIVIDUAL decision to cry foul under the DMCA.
We have their names from the criminal complaint document, why hasn't anyone in the media contacted them?
The individuals responsible:
Kevin Nathanson - eBooks Group Product manager, complainant to the FBI.
Daryl Spano - Adobe "Anti-piracy" investigator, also complainant to the FBI.
Tom Diaz - Senior Engineering Manager for eBook
Daniel J O'Connell - FBI agent who filed the complaint.
The media needs to put the spotlight on these I N D I V I D U A L S who are personally responsible for Sklyarov's situation.
I asked myself the same question when I heard about it on the radio. The only answer I can come up with is that in both cases there are large and very well heeled corporations that are being "protected" from us dangerous little citizens.
I want to see the DMCA crushed and Dimitri get to go back home, but in every other /. article I've read, it makes mention of him SELLING the software at the convention. I agree that the law is bogus and should be declared unconstitutional, but what happened didn't just happen in Russia. The moment he sold the program in the US, if in fact that's what he did, he broke (a very broken and unjust) law. Sad, but true.
Lets not that little fact escape the discussion...
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
I just read the complaint.
Looks like he didn't break a thing.
While he was in the US, he did not (at least, not in the complaint) traffic his software (I'd think they'd have complained about it if he did). After reading that, it looks like the only person they'd have recourse against is RegisterNow, since they can't prosecute Skylarov for his actions while in Russia. Skylarov was just an easy target (and it shows how aggressively and improperly Adobe went after him)
-= rei =-
*Kid Rock runs for Senate* Democrats: We must run Kid Scissors.
Of course the gun lobby is better armed....
Book publishers say they need a tough law like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act or
they'll never be able to make money selling electronic books.
Gee. I wonder if I can get the U.S. Congress to pass a law that says I have to be able to make a profit, no matter what stupid business I decide to get into.
Here's a point I haven't seen examined yet. IANAL, but I don't see how Dmitry can be charged with violating DMCA anti-circumvention (DMCA-AC hereinafter). Here's why:
Premise: As I understand DMCA-AC, what's forbidden is 'creation and trafficking' in anticircumvention tools, with geographic scope limited to the US.
Analysis: While Dmitry created (or created a lot of) Advanced eBook Processor (AEBPR), he created it in Russia, not the US; and he has not personally 'trafficked' in it within the US - there is no DMCA cause of action against Dmitry. It was Elcomsoft that sold AEBR in the US, which -is- actionable under DMCA-AC. Despite employment by Elcomsoft, Dmitry the person is distinct from Elcomsoft the corporation and not criminally liable for the deeds of Elcomsoft.
Conclusion: For the prosecution to be successful, the US Attorney must show either:
a) that Dmitry individually has 'trafficked' in AEBPR, separately from Elcomsoft's sales of AEBR in the US, or
b) that Dmitry as an employee of Elcomsoft has criminal liability for Elcomsoft's actions in 'trafficking' in AEBR.
I don't see how either a) or b) can be proven, as there are no signs that Dmitry has personally distributed AEBR in the US, and no signs that Dmitry is an owner or officer of Elcomsoft -- just an ordinary employee. (If I were Dmitry's boss, or an Elcomsoft owner, I wouldn't be hanging around the US, though.)
If the above is factually correct, then the prosecution's only hope is to find relevant US law, precedent, or theories under which an ordinary employee of a corporation can be held to have criminal liability for the actions of the corporation. More specifically, the precedent or theory would have to pertain to the situation in which both the corporation and the employee are foreign nationals.
If there is no such law, precedent, or theory, the case ultimately fails, and therefore the US Attorney would likely decline to indict.
If the DOJ is looking for a way to make this case go away, either to avoid embarrassment or to avoid taking to trial a case with the potential to nullify DMCA-AC, this would do it for them.
In any event, there may not be any DMCA-AC test case here -- the charge may be flawed, and if so it should not have been brought in the first place, and will be dismissed.
Actual lawyers please comment?
I almost didn't go to this hearing. I thought to myself, "What's the point? The deck is stacked against me, the media will spin its own story regardless of the facts or what the EFF has to say, and we'll all be ignored, anyway." At the last minute, I decided that I had to go. I didn't want to, I had to. Though mine may be the proverbial voice in the wilderness, as an ethical software engineer of almost 25 years, I couldn't let this transgression against everything I hold dear go unanswered.
I dressed up in uncharacteristically formal attire, in the event I was asked for an on-camera interview, and drove to downtown San Jose, arriving at about 09:45, and walked to the "Snake" at the end of Caesar de Chavez Park. There were about two dozen people there, most of them carrying hand-made pickets, including a former colleague, who coincidentally also happens to be a Russian named Dmitriy. Also milling through the group were a few media representatives (I saw units from KGO, KPIX, and TechTV).
I didn't see any obvious representatives from the EFF there (though I was asked several times if I myself was a representative). Things seemed a shade disorganized to me. The march toward the Federal building one block away was supposed to start at 10:00. By 10:10, no one was moving, so I walked down myself to make sure I got a seat in the courtroom for the bail hearing which was to take place at 11:00.
I arrived at the Federal courthouse, and made my way through the security gauntlet. (You remember that scene in The Matrix where Keanu Reeves shows up in the lobby with all those neatly-dressed security guards? It was a lot like that. Seven Marshalls stood nearby as they X-rayed my mini-MagLite three times.) Finally convinced I was harmless, I went up to the fourth floor to Judge Infante's courtroom and waited to enter.
There, I met some more reporters from TechTV and the LA Times. Again, I was asked if I was from the EFF.
"No, I'm a software engineer," I said.
"Oh, an actual real person!", said one of the reporters. I got asked why I was there, and tried to explain my concerns. I don't know how well I succeeded.
While waiting, the rest of the protest group arrived at the front of the Federal building. We could see them from the windows of the waiting area. Not too long after, the corridor began to fill up with spectators awaiting admittance to the courtroom.
I managed to buttonhole the LA Times reporter, and tried again to explain the issues as I saw them. I related this case to the DVD CCA debacle, which the EFF is still fighting on both coasts. I felt I was actually beginning to help him understand, when our conversation was cut short when the courtroom doors opened and we were allowed in.
After inquiring with the Marshall what the rules were (laptops okay, cellphones bad), I pulled out my laptop and started making a few notes. While sitting there, I picked up a fragment of a conversation between the Marshall and a spectator who walked in.
"Hey, aren't you on the wrong floor?" asked the Marshall.
"Yeah, but this looked really interesting," said the gentleman.
I didn't get his name, but it turned out that he's a bankruptcy lawyer who was also a computer programmer back in 1963. He saw the hearing listed on the court calendar, and stopped by to watch. We chatted a bit about recording devices and court stenography methods.
At 10:55, Dmitry entered the courtroom with another man, Juan Valencia Rowa (sp?), who was under indictment for a drug and parole violation. Both were handcuffed, dressed in freeway-cone-orange scrubs. By the time court was in session at 11:00 sharp, the spectators' gallery was filled.
Judge Infante banged court into session. It was immediately apparent that this man worked strictly by the book. He was formal and precise, almost to the point of stuffiness. The first case called was Dmitry's. Counsels for the defense and prosecution introduced themselves, and Judge Infante read the summary of the government's criminal charges aloud to Dmitry. Standing next to Dmitry was a Russian translator (identity unknown).
Infante then asked for motions from counsels concerning bail. The government prosecutor stated that they considered Sklyarov a flight risk, since he is a Russian national and has nothing tying him to this area. Nevertheless, a deal had apparently been worked out whereby the government was willing to allow him go free, provided the following conditions were met:
Defense counsel, in support of this, presented character references from Dmitry's professors in Russia, as well as a letter from the Russian Consul. The Judge accepted this arrangement on its face, and ordered exactly those conditions be imposed on Dmitry for his release.
The Judge expressed a concern that the US Department of Immigration might present complications. Dmitry is here on a travel visa. When that visa expires, Dmitry could theoretically be arrested again for violating immigration laws. Judge Infante inquired if Immigration was okay with Dmitry's extended stay. Defense counsel replied that arrangements were not yet finalized, but were underway.
Defense counsel then announced that a custodian for Dmitry was available immediately. Sergei Osokine of Cupertino then stepped forward and introduced himself to the court. Judge Infante informed Osokine that he was vouching for Sklyarov's promise to appear, that he was to inform the court immediately if he became aware of Sklyarov's flight or intent to fly, and could himself become liable for the bail sum should Sklyarov disappear. Osokine indicated he understood and agreed to all this.
Defense counsel then announced that the bail sum was also available immediately, in cash, paid by his employer. Dmitry was then uncuffed, and brought to the center of the courtroom to sign the papers indicating the conditions of his release. The date was also set for the preliminary hearing: 09:00, 23 August 2001. Having forgotten to do so earlier, the Judge then informed Dmitry of the maximum penalty for his alleged crime: $500,000.00 and five years in prison. Once everything was signed, Judge Infante ordered Dmitry's release upon payment of bail to the court clerk, and moved on to the next case. The spectators' gallery emptied almost immediately. The entire process took about twenty minutes.
Outside, an actual representative of the EFF :-) stood before a camera claiming victory in this round of the dispute. Defense counsel, in a different interview, also said he was pleased with Dmitry's release, but that there was still a long way to go before a final resolution.
I stood around with Dan Kaminsky and helped answer questions from a reporter from Reuters wire service. Dan and I can get a bit animated about these issues, and I fear we ranted a bit. Hopefully the reporter wasn't put off by it.
What I did find off-putting were the chants that suddenly broke out from the picketers (who had moved to the other side of the courthouse). "What do we want? Free Dmitry! When do we want it? Now! Hey-hey, ho-ho, DMCA's got to go," etc. I know I have absolutely no practical experience in social agitation for political change, so please accept it as my woefully uneducated personal opinion that I see this sort of thing as infantile. It is not effective or witty, it is lame. It makes you look like brainless, uncreative drones on television, and people will tune you right out. Please think of something different.
After the Reuters reporter left, we answered a few more questions from the reporter from WiReD News, then I left for an appointment at 13:00. On the way to my car, I bumped into Brad Templeton, president of the EFF, who hinted that you may expect to see some new fundraising events in the not-too-distant future.
Why do I give a damn about this? When I first touched a computer at age 12, I saw it as the ultimate tool of creative expression. Theoretically, there was nothing you couldn't do with these machines, no idea that could not be expressed in a myriad of ways. In that instant, I immediately knew that this was what I would be doing for the rest of my life. Not everyone gets the chance to spend their life doing what they love, and I value very highly my good fortune of my vocation also being my dearest hobby.
One of the reasons I've gotten nice jobs in the Valley is because I'm fairly good at what I do. Apart from my enthusiasm, one of the primary ways I got so good was by taking apart things other people did, seeing how they worked, and using those discoveries to build new ideas. I even described my discoveries to others, in the hopes they would get new ideas, too.
In other words, I built much of my professional career doing exactly what Dmitry Sklyarov did.
When the Judge read the charges to Dmitry -- "trafficking in a device to circumvent a technological measure that protects a copyright" -- I nearly became nauseous. There is not so much separating me from Dmitry. I have often thought about -- and perhas will one day -- writing a display hack that takes whatever DVD is in your drive, wraps the movie imagery on to an OpenGL sphere, and bounces it around the screen ("Boing 2001", if you will). To do that, I would have to use the DeCSS code fragment published by Jon Johansen. And doing so would make me a "criminal," a threat to the State and public safety, just like Dmitry.
In a brief flash, I saw myself up there, humiliated, in a hostile place where no one knows me, no one understands what I do -- nor do they care -- answering terrifyingly punitive criminal charges for doing nothing more than what I have loved doing all my life.
I am Dmitry Sklyarov. What the hell am I supposed to do now?
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
If the police never enforce laws they think are bad, then what is the point of having a legislature; we could just have the police make up the laws.
The police SHOULD enforce even laws they think are stupid*; that is the only way the stupid laws can be corrected. Otherwise the public and congress never get any feedback that the law isn't working right. So they just go on and make more bad laws; which the police would then edit as they see fit, etc., etc. and so forth. Eventually almost everything would be illegal and the police would just arrest people they didn't like.
I realize that the police and DAs are human, and they are going to learn from The Courts which cases have enough merit to likely get a conviction and which ones aren't worth their time. I understand that they will have to make those kind of decisions at some level. But I'd rather the police err on the side of being automatons than have them err on the side of being "street judges". Let the real judges and the jurors be the ones to decide which laws are unconstitutional. Let the Governors and the President decide who should get pardons. Let the public get enraged and call their congressmen when bad or stupid laws cause good people to be arrested. That is the way the process is designed to work; that is where the checks and balances are; those are the people who should be making those decisions. That way bad laws get refined into good ones.
Don't get mad at the FBI for doing their job when they do it right; they have been dropping the ball enough lately that you have plenty of incidents where agents did their job poorly that you can get mad about instead.
*In the town I grew up in, it was illegal for women to wear pants. Of course they did; and didn't get arrested. The law was part of some old "blue laws" that everyone (including the police) thought were archaic. Ideally I'd like to see some city councilwoman arrested for wearing pants; then the law would get changed and the case would almost certainly be thrown out or she'd get a pardon or some such. As long as the laws are ignored they will stay on the books. And every kid who reads about them in school and laughs has their respect for other laws diminished. Worse, every time a policeman knows about such laws and chooses to ignore them, he (and really the rest of society as well) get conditioned to the idea that the police get to choose what laws they want to enforce.
>> She just didn't get it and even said that Disney should get perpetual copyright protection.
r andchildren. However, if Shakespeare's works were still covered under death plus 315 year copyrights, surely a media conglomerate would be collecting the royalties now, not the putatively deserving 10th generation heirs.
My favorite example of the absurdity of perpetual copyright is the song "Happy Birthday to You", composed by Kentucky schoolteacher Mildred Hill in 1859. Her sister Patty wrote lyrics and first published it as "Good Morning to All" in "Song Stories of the Kindergarten" in 1893. Mildred died penniless in 1916.
In 1924, Robert H. Coleman republished the song without permission, adding a second "Happy Birthday to You" verse. The surviving Hill sisters sued and the song was finally copyrighted in 1935.
Of course, the sisters aren't collecting royalties any longer. The copyright is now owned by AOL/Time Warner, and still garnerting about $2 million in royalties each year as of about 5 years ago (which is why television programs usually resort to "For He's A Jolly Good Fellow" instead). If Disney continues to get copyright extension bills passed every 20 years, the copyright on this simple 19th century folksong will never expire.
The Constitution originally intended "to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries". But death plus 95 years? To what end, encouraging Mildred Hill to compose more songs?
>> I knew that she had totally lost it when I suggested that the heirs of William Shakespear might complain and demand royalties for plays written by the great bard. She thought it was a good idea and was trying to decide how we should go about paying those royalties...
Good job getting your mother to think about the logistics of awarding Shakespeare's great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-g