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Felten Will Present SDMI Research At USENIX
iamblades writes: "Edward Felten is scheduled to present his research papers on SDMI on Wednesday at the annual USENIX security conference. Apparently the RIAA backed off their harrassment, which makes sense, as SDMI is almost completely dead already." And a Semi-Anonymous Coward writes: "Despite the RIAA's attempts to silence the Princeton Professor and his students, USENIX will broadcast the SDMI Crack Live via the web. The broadcast will be available for the world here along with a discussion concerning your Freedom."
But seriously, who would put up $million for no profit? Even if they get that million back, they still won't make anything with it, like they could have been doing had they invested it in something else. People with $million to throw around tend not to make poor investments, which is how they gained that money.
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"Karma can only be portioned out by the cosmos." - Homer Simpson [1F10]
Skylarov's product was advertized as a product to backup ebooks for personal use. In fact, it appears not just to be a front, as the company took steps, such as setting a high price to discourage people who just want to pirate, knowing that it would reduce sales. While the DMCA says its illegal to circumvent a copy protection method, it also says the consumer has a right to make backups (a contradiction in terms if the company who provides the envryption method leaves no method for backups). So, its not really that simple
-= rei =-
*Kid Rock runs for Senate* Democrats: We must run Kid Scissors.
While I am happy that Felton managed to get his paper published despite being threatened with the legal equivalent of a *huge* can of whoop-ass (it's actually supposed to be "arse" but that's America for you), I am concerned about the implications that this will have for future research. If people have to hire a lawyer in order for their research to be safely published, then it's likely to seriously restrict the amount and quality of future research. The RIAA may have in fact won after all, if this whole fiasco makes people think twice about publishing material (such as the cracking of SDMI or Adobe's eBook copy protection system) that may go against corporate interests. At any rate, the war for user's rights continues.
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When the pin is pulled, Mr. Grenade is no longer our friend.
I suspect that the RIAA was set-up on this. Since Felton not only is a boy-scout, but looks like one too, and Princeton can't be called a pirates cove, they can't use the pirate/hacker label to villify Felton. The MPAA had done this with the 2600 case.
Fight Spammers!
True, but they're on far thinner ice than natives, and have less resources to fight with. There are more than a few people within the system who'll quietly fail to keep up equal protection for non-citizens, especially when they feel that the non-citizen "doesn't deserve" the equal protection rights for whatever reason.
see, they need votes, that's you, to get elected to positions of power.
they get those votes, again that's you, by running radio/tv spots, printing flyers, ordering yard signs etc, so that you know what a great american they are and how they are fer/agin' whatever you are fer or agin'.
they get the money for all this paraphernalia from campaign contributions, such as the $20K checks sent by $$$$$Corp.
once they have been elected, they are well-disposed to act favorably towards $$$$$Corp., being very careful to throw the occasional social bones of GettingToughOnCrime or some other fluff bill that won't, you can be sure, conflict with the interests of $$$$$Corp.
when this cycle is firmly established, the votes, again that's you, become abstract demographic cattle to be manipulated by propaganda generated with more of $$$$$Corp's money; the elected officials then began to operate more like employees of $$$$$Corp. than public servants.
Hollywood, Television, has become the dream machine. We need to take that back; each of us is a Dream Machine
Who'd pay $20 million to ride on a Russian rocket? There's certainly no profit in that.
Yes, the actual criminal charge against Dmitri is for selling the software.
However, if the crime was "selling" this software why didn't they arrest the sales and marketing guys of Elcomsoft or people from the US company that collects their registration fees (regnow.com)? They arrested the author of the program, who merely had an incidental role in selling the software. There were many people in the US that day who were involved in "selling" or "traffiking" the software, but they chose to only arrest the programmer.
That's too bad. It was better when the RIAA didn't know how to pick its battles -- they would've lost serious points if this had gone to court.
Is Felten planning a suit for harassment?
First, the RIAA used "us" (I am using that term loosely, as I am not a programmer) to crack SDMI, and will use the work done by "us" to come up with a more secure encryption scheme.
Second, they *were* successful in delaying the release of the SDMI crack long enough where it is no longer relevant.
The only "good thing"(tm) that really happened was we were able to embarrass the RIAA a bit. Mind you, they are embarrassing themselves on a constant basis, and laughing all the way to the bank.
This is not a victory. Far from it.....
Feed the need: Digitaladdiction.net
Ok, I was thinking about this the other nite a bit.
Why hasn't someone started a Non-profit record label. Could that work ? Or what about a "minimum profit" record label ?
I mean, if the end users, and the artists, and everyone is getting screwed over.. there seems like there's not only an ethical reason to do so, but a good solid _market_ to get into... if you reverse the business and set it up such that the artist owns all the rights to everything, and the record company is just that - someone that makes records (and does other things like putting up money for recording studio time perhaps) then it seems like everyone involved could come out ahead.
Honestly, if a CD can be mass produced for $1, and its costing $16, and the artists aren't getting any, there has to be room for someone to cut away a _lot_ of fat in that operation.. enough to give the artists enough to make them consider switching.
Yeah, record companies take a risk when they sign someone and they spend 1m in studio time and the album flops.. but its hard to get signed to record labels now... its not like they price things as an insurance measure as opposed to a profit motive..
Someone that knows a lot more about this stuff than me should think it through. Maybe initially its only feasiable to do small-volume recordings... i.e. CDR's as opposed to pressed cds ? or maybe simultanous low bit-rate mp3/ogg distribution with all releases. Maybe just a "musical venture capital" front end for mp3.com or something.
In any case, i dont konw the economics of the music business, just what i've read. It seems like there's an incredible opportuniy for someone who loves music and has plenty of money to back it, to try and make a reasonable record label that deals with artists in a reasonable fashion. I know musicians can be crummy people, especailly with agents, lawyers, and money issues, but there doesn't seem to be the need for awful contracts and outright company ownership of artists works.
My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily represent those of my employer.
(I still don't agree with Dmitry's imprisonment, but you can help "The Cause" by trying to hide from the facts, and you can do a great deal of damage from it.)
Its not actually "owing allegence". This is a common public misconception.
People in congress work *hard*. They have virtually no free time, incredible amounts of stress, incredibly boring/tiring work on many things, and emotionally straining issues on others. They usually end up with severe health problems. Every action they do is watched and criticized. They have to give up a tremendous amount usually just to make it into office (my uncle had to sell his retirement home, to go live in a tiny apartment in DC). Then, he had to leave after one term because of stress-induced health problems.
With that said, the only reason a person would *ever* get involved in national politics is because they want to make a difference. The people in congress actually do believe in what they're doing. They feel the nation really needs them to fight for it, they want to make a difference.
The problem is, while things like the ability to raise money and get votes and having a strong motivation are requirements for getting in office, intelligence and common sense aren't. You'll find a very wide range of intellects there. Far too many aren't that bright. Then, who do they spend time with? Lobbyists. Who are lobbyists? Professional manipulators.
I think you can take it from there, what happens.
-= rei =-
*Kid Rock runs for Senate* Democrats: We must run Kid Scissors.
This guy is such an interesting person. Did other people also notice he was a key element in the DOJ vs Microsoft case? You know, this guy may be, in his own inconspicuous style, one of the best things happening to us as of late. Let's not lose trace of him.
-- B.
This sig does in fact not have the property it claims not to have.