Slashdot Mirror
The DMCA Is Just The Beginning
dr. greenthumb writes: "With the Sklyarov-case still fresh in memory, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) wants to rally up against the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) in order to preserve privacy and freedom of speech. The FTAA is currently negotiating agreements with several countries in the Western hemisphere concerning, among other issues, intellectual property rights. According to the EEF, the FTAA organization is considering treaty language that mandates nations pass anti-circumvention provisions similar to the DMCA, except the FTAA treaty grants even greater control to publishers than the DMCA."
When you think about it, people are behind these corperations and they are screwing themseleves as well as us. I just don't understand why these people keep passing tougher and tougher laws. I suppose they must not obey them. This is all obvious I imagine, but it's a slow day. :)
If an organization calls itself ??AA, it's gonna take away you freedom... MPAA, RIAA, FTAA... makes you wonder what comes next :-)
Excellent reply to WIPO, Congress, FTAA, and anyone who wants to support the DMCA and its offspring.
BTW, lame first post
Civil disobedience, anyone? This kind of legislation is equivalent to the police smashing down your door because you pop open the TV set you bought labeled "Do not open, refer to authorized service center" on the back. If they're going to sell it to me, there is no one on this Earth that can say what I can and cannot do with it. Oh, I know, they're only "leasing" you the software bits. Uh-huh. I'm all for action. If it gets bad enough, I say we resort to busting crackers out of jail and straight-out open resistance. You can't step on people with laws like this forever.
I fear that these type of laws and treaties will become more common in the next few years. The "content industry" is struggling to reclaim the territory they slowly lost over the years. Napster made it painfully obvious to them that the whole industry has been asleep at the wheel.
Unfortunately, by blinding lashing out at the community we are just that much further from reaching a compromise between consumers and companies.
The DMCA is twisted! and wrong! Twisted and wrong!
Dang, this means moving to canada will not make me safe.
In fact, I might be stuck in another country that has no free speech, and no human rights, and a stricter DMCA.
First Seattle, then Quebec City. Boring. Protestors can't come up with any more interesting arguments.
Even older news: Most of the industrialized world's leaders signed treates in 1996 (!) to enforce copyright law and property law. The FTAA has little to do with these treaties that were signed yonks ago.
I wish the Jihad here would find a way to quash the myth that the open source movements are about taking property rights away. You are behaving exactly like they say you are and it isn't helping you any.
Use Evolution instead of Outlook? Bewa
The link should point to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is different that the Eisenhower Fellowships.
Cheers,
RP
It's times like this you just have to feel hopeless. We (meaning the good ol' US of A) have captured a Russian giving a speech showing that some 'industry quality' encryption was nothing more than a XOR with a constant byte, and passed laws that give harsher penalties to programmers than to some murderes! And the worst part is that nobody else seems to CARE!
(And watch as I am moderated to -1 for this comment)
:wq
Fascism is the only way to enforce IP laws. They must have control over what you see and what you download. In other words, the government is going to be spying on you big time, not a little bit like before. The FTAA is also a way for the have nations to economically dominate (i.e., enslave) the have-nots since most IP in the western world is owned by Europe and North America.
There is no stopping it. They are armed to the teeth and they own the mass media. We're all shit out of luck. Goodbye liberty! I will miss you.
Each new law seems to shave away another form of the consumer actually owning anything. What's next..building all our towns around the corporate castle so we can run inside if we're the target of a hostile takeover...
Every year we move closer and closer to a true corporate feudalism... Funny thing is, we're very willing to give them the power to do it if they throw a free toaster or the equivalent our way...
Can someone please unclick the "repeat button" on the history maker.... At the very least put it on shuffle!
The EFF is not opposed to the FTAA because they're trying to extend the DMCA. Instead is the JLA who have allied with MSFT in an attempt to subvert NASA into not using CDA so the RIAA falls because as we all know MSFT is trying to capture all 3 and 4 letter domains so they can patent all abbrivations of names. The is SWC signing out.
Ideas are unique in that I may freely share my ideas with you without diminishing my own knowledge. The digital age has made it so that many other media are also reproducible at neglible cost to the individual.
By constrast, Intellectual Property Law serves the legitimate purpose of attempting to guarantee that the originator of an idea or creative work can earn income based on his creation without competing with others who grasp what it is he has done. Unfortunately quite often digital technology circumvents this process my allowing people free access to music, art, books, software, etc. without ever compensating the inventor.
Ultimately fair use comes from the principal that people should be able to use portions of a work when doing so is not for financial gain and to do so does not cause a lost of income to the property rights holder. As long as people percieve that they are losing money, they are not going to be happy about technologies that allow for copying and sharing.
This is something that the world will have to confront. I don't think the answer is to shut down the development and use of technology. Clearly when people are using technologies for illegal financial advantages, they can be targetted with existing law. The question is what to do with all the small time players who only "steal" a few MP3s or a little software?
What I would like to see is a paradigm shift in how we think about digital information and creative works. A world where music, movies, software, etc. are entirely free and subsidized by the government could be a wonderful place to live. Of course with fewer or no economic incentives the produce these works, one might lose quality people who value the huge profits of today. Trnasitioning to such a world would be a hard sell and lengthy process. Perhaps if subscription services become the norm then we can progress until everyone pays a flat tax for "entertainment & software services".
It could happen...
It is time for protest in the streets..
A handful of people protesting for Dmitry managed
to get this into CNN. It is time for more of
the same.. I suggest Ben Franklin's Birthday
as a day of protest (not sure when it is, anyone know?), as he as a politician who understood
technology and its potential misuses (IP controls/patent bogosity..etc) and reminded us
to fight against it.
We also need a website (or a GNU political party
or something), that lists out in plain english
what these congress people are voting for and
who is giving them the bribe money to do so (and
link it from all over, so everyone knows what
they are up to, and will call them on it).
Corporate fascism is definately taking over, and
I am starting to be not proud to be an American
anymore.. we must take to the streets.. banners
& protest.. its a whole civil rights movement,
and it involves all of us to stop this
corporate techno fascism before it goes any
further...
This is 1984.. in real life...
It won't stop unless we get out there, and make
it stop...
[Re: Dmitry..sigh, the day that the US arrests
someone for thoughtcrime... I thought I'd never
see it in real life.. we should all stop being
so naive]
A true free trade agreement is one for liberalization allowing for the free flow of goods. Certainly IP should be covered, but not to this extent. DMCA is anti-liberalization and hampers the development of technological advances.
Given the importance of this issue, it seems having lobbying/communication is required in Latin American nations regarding this subject.
How can this issue be communicated to those in Latin America with potential interest/influence of local governments? Has someone forward this information to Miguel de Iczara? I understand he has connections to the current administration in Mexico. Perhaps there are technological associations in Latin America who may be communicated this issue and rallied?
Given the effect of the DMCA in the US, American citizens probably have little influence --- maybe those in Latin America can make a difference.
"There ought to be limits to freedom"
I wrote representative Bentsen (D) and senators Gramm (R) and Hutchison (R). Who did YOU write to? (all of you, not just the parent author)
More practically, I got a reply from Bentsen yesterday. While his wording was the "politically correct" middle of the road drivel the average politician spouts, it seemed a little on the intelligent side. I am slightly encouraged by this letter, though it is fairly certainly a stock letter, and I know he's aware of one constituent's view of the issue.
I'm still waiting to hear from my senators, but mainly just for confirmation. As they're republican, I expect less acceptable view on the issue (with them leaning toward big money interests), but at least they'll know MY opinion, and I'm responsible, in part, for their job security. You people (well, the americans in the audience) should try writing the people whose salaries you pay. It gives you a short-lived feeling of power at the very least, you may even get warm-fuzzies.
funny munging
And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:
And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
-Revelation 13:16-17 (KJV)
Not that many Slashdotters are the Bible reading type, but passages like these become scarier and scarier to me whenever I hear about these types of laws that put more control on the marketplaces being proposed world-wide. Seems like DMCA and similar laws being thrown about there could just be the beginning of total control over the consumers. Could we one day see laws that not only say HOW we can use our purchased goods, but also say WHO can purchase in the first place?
The idea is scary, even if one doesn't believe in such scriptures.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
There have already been large protests against the FTAA. In Quebec City, Canada a few months ago they had a huge protest. There is a growing global anti-corporate movement. In case you haven't noticed, there has been a series of large protests over the past few years throughout the world against corporatization/capitalism/neoliberalism. The next big protest is S30 (September 30) against the IMF/World Bank in D.C. Some websites you might be interested in:
. ht ml
http://www.stopftaa.org/
http://www.citizen.org/pctrade/gattwto/gatthome
http://www.indymedia.org/
http://www.zmag.org/ZNETTOPnoanimation.html
Kudos to the EFF for jumping on this and drawing negative publicity to it before it becomes as big a thorn in the collective side of the public as the DMCA. Of course, signed treaties are an order of magnitude harder to overcome than laws.
BUT...
Those who care have been fighting this sort of thing on an emergency basis. We have to shoot down ever single encroachment on our rights in response to those encroachments.
Instead, why don't we do the same thing that those trying to take away our freedoms are doing and start sponsoring treaties or laws that protect those freedoms. Seriously, the EFF is in prime position to start this kind of lobbying! Let's just get a few legal hotshots to start authoring 'sponsored' legislation like the RIAA, MPA, and BSA have done. Let's start contacting other governments and get them to start thinking about treaties that protect public domain and fair use.
The idea here is to fight fire with fire. Treaties can often 'trump' laws, but with the right treaty in place...
C'mon, if I'm gonna pay a membership fee to the EFF, I'd like to see some of it used for proactive work like this.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
These arguments won't have any impact on our Congress because for the most part, our elected officials lack the intellectual ability to comprehend them, and in any case, they can be considered employees of the content providers.
What's left? Figuring out how to make the anti-democratic behavior of the content providers unprofitable by whatever means necessary.
Economic boycott against targeted content providers would be a good start.
Tech Public Policy stuff
As time passes, it becomes more and more difficult to retain focus in addressing the Freedom of Speech and Privacy rights infringement of the DMCA, the WIPO treaties (which are an expansion of the Berne Convention Treaty) and now the potential for indevidual national legislation in each of the countries of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA). This newest development makes a consolidated stand against such over reaching legislation, substancially more difficult, and all but garentees the passage if DMCA-like legislation in countries other than the United States.
It looks like a strategy of divide and conquer will work for content providers in their quest to get this sort of legislation passed in countries throughout the world. The already fragmented opposition to this legislation stands to be further fragmented by the requirement that their efforts be divided accross (in the case of the FTAA) the countries of the Americas in order that there be no discrepency between countries' approaches to Intellectual Property.
I made this same argument with respect to the Open Source Community response to Craig Mundie and Microsoft with respect to the legitimacy of the GPL. There must be a focused response. The EFF has provided good leadership thus far, but in order to be an effective leader you must have followers. This is antithetical to the OSS mentality of independant developers (who seem to be the only ones focusing in this issue in any depth at the moment). This tendency, as evidenced by the response by some members of the community to the EFF request to discontinue protests in the Skylarov case durring negotiations with Adobe - where some members of the community basically told the EFF to stuff it and "You Can't Control Me". As a community, we need to realize that we need to follow leaders - not any leader, but those who have proven themselves - for our mutual benefit.
Additionally, I think it's worth spending a moment considering why the issues around the DMCA and similar legislation have recieved so little coverage in the popular media. I know it sounds paranoid, but since the deregulation of the communications industry, (we all know) conglomorates have been allowed to emerge which represent both the news media and content owners. I would not presume to make accusations that the popular news media has interests other than informing the public, but it's disappointing that we havnen't seen these issues addressed in the popular media. Their lack of coverage, leaves us with the responsibility of making others aware of Intellectual Property issues. IP is a complex subject, even explaining limited aspects of it in a comprehensive way is difficult, but we must begin focusing our efforts in this area as well.
--CTH
--Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
In the 19th century, small farmers and landless farmers were forced off their land and into the factories. Now, software patents and other IP nonsense is making it more and more difficult for independent programmers and small businesses. Since we can't afford enough lawyers to own the patents for the software we create, we will be left with less and less choices. And already we're working 10+ hours a day.
It's time we stood up for ourselves and starting looking out for our own interests. It's time we started fighting back where we have the most power -- in our workplaces. As individuals, we can't change much, but at all the Microsofts, Adobes, AOLs, and IBMs, there are thousands of programmers that keep these companies running, that create the "intellectual property" these corporations value so highly. If we join together, we can take back some of our power and turn things around.
Since /.'s new lameness filter is, well, lame, and won't let me just post this list of email addresses, I'll post a link instead.
Those of us in Canada should write concise, polite emails to these people, outlining your objections to the expansion of draconian copyright legislation to our country.
Make your voice heard, but do it in a civil way. Spam and mail bombs will not win people over to our side.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
The DMCA is soooo silly.
Of course, we have to fight it and the EFF is right. Also, folks like Aimster are proving that the DMCA can just as effectively be used to defend piracy. They assume that the "software publishers" will necesarily be large corporations. Thankfully, subversives can also publish software and manipulate the BS that is the DMCA.
Of course, folks like RMS might argue that this is so they can then pass new legislation to stop subversives from publishing software, as he describes in The Right to Read. This is why it's still totally necesary to fight these restrictions to our rights. Still. The DMCA is sooooo silly.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
Beware of the man that calls another a zealot.
-- Another senseless waste of fine bytes.
I wasn't asked to vote for this, the only democratic element in the US is elections. Then you have your oligarchy-element (congress) and your monarch-element (president).
Fortunately, this isn't a goverment design problem as much as it is a soft-money, "government is the shadow cast by big business" type problem - which is true of all governments. We simply don't have enough protections or an acknowledged voice that let us seperate business from government.
You're right, the majority does rule but only in elections, err in theory. Almost forgot about Mr. Bush and company.
Opposition to the FTAA is hardly a new thing. Many will remember the recent Summit of the Americas in Quebec City, where the FTAA was a major issue. There, a throng of protesters, estimated between 25,000 and 35,000 in number clashed with 6,000 riot police over the agreement.
Trying to oppose something as big as the FTAA, however, can be less than a walk in the park. I was walking down a street in the Quebec City centre where a circle of demonstrators were sitting, making speeches and singing protest songs, just before they were hit by a volley of tear gas cannisters from riot police. Political repression ain't just an American phenomenon. America saw it in Seattle, but the rest of the free world is getting the benefit of the experience these days.
Just how serious expressing ones political opinion can get these days became obvious to me as I watched the rubber-coated bullets fire and the tear gas fly. A Canadian Member of Parliament, Svend Robinson, who attended the protest, was shot with a rubber bullet, himself.
For more info on where opposition to the FTAA began, see the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's report on police actions and main page on the summit.
As I've stated before, I believe the US has been becoming less free since 1933, when our first "king" came in to power (FDR) and single handedly removed all Constitutional restraint on the federal government. All in the name of "empowering government to do more FOR you".
ALL Constitutional restraint? So you're actually claiming no private citizen has won a court case against the US government on Constitutional grounds? That the protective powers of the Constitution aren't invoked every day?
so as to fund "bread and circuses" which both buys votes and keeps the majority cowed.
Then leave. The United States doesn't have anti-emigration laws, you're free to go.
See, now *that's* how you generate media coverage. Especially if there's a cigar involved.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Because of the censorship, they had to hide their messages, using creative images and fables. The people knew instinctively that these messages were important and they craved them.
Then Glasnost came about, and eventually the Iron Carpet came down. Suddenly the people were free. Starved of free speech, there was a short flurry of popular political activity, with large political meetings, marches and what not.
Then things settled down, and one day they woke up. All this new stuff they had been denied all these years was now available. What a disappointment it must have been to them to discover that although the political messages in the western press might be of a different color, most of the stuff was ads, tabloid reporting on celebrities, porn, worthless fiction, stupid game shows, and soap operas. We fought all these years to hear the message from the other side, and all they have to tell us is "Drink Coca Cola?"
If I was Russion, I'd drown myself in vodka, too.
And what has this to do with the DMCA? Just the fact that it will force U.S citizens to be vigilant (break the DMCA laws) in order to have their free speech. By being in opposition to the ruling regime (the megacorps), U.S citizens can enjoy the excitement of getting their free speech, in spite of the regime. Now it's worth something. Hard to come by free speech is valuable. Gratis free speech is worthless.
-- Another senseless waste of fine bytes.
The battle for control over the freedom of information and the right to use digital information with the same 'fair use' conventions as those of the analog versions is over. The corporations have already won, we havent even realised it yet.
We, slashdot readers, are the minority of people who actually care about such issues. The average person, the majority of the population, does not care and has been dumbed down by years of propaganda. Joe Blow doesnt have time to care about the rights he has for using and watching his DVD, he just wants to be able to see them. The corporations behind such digital control acts have done their work well. They have consistently portrayed all those opposing such works as pirates seeking to rip off honest companies. They have been working behind the scences, lobbying governments to put in place laws and structures restricting copyright. Indeed, earlier laws introduced by the USA, has merely 'softened up' the public for subsequent ones.
Any lobbying by the EFF or other freedom organisation will be portrayed in the media as the work of extremists and ignored as such. I have repeatedly written polite letters to members of parliment about important issues (I live in Australia, sigh) and I usually get a 'thank you for your interest' response.
Now, the EU is issuing a Directive to other Eurpoean states to pass laws similar to the DMCA, while not binding, you can bet that the states will be pressured to comply. With millions of consumers living under such laws, the rest of the world will a)be subject to the rule of those laws (Skarlov (sp?)case in point) b)be pressured by the companies to introduce similar laws.
Game Over!
So what we get is the dictatorship of the majority.
Look, it's not as though jubilant throngs are filling the streets, demanding anti-circumvention laws. What's going on here is that most people are either unaware or indifferent, and there is a power vacuum -- where there is no popular interest, vested interests have full sway. The solution to this is not griping about democracy, but rather taking action to make your opinion known, and to educate others.
The technology community (i.e. us) shares a lot of blame for the DMCA's passage. Discussion of technology issues in legislatures, courts, and media is confused and uninformed. And here we are, the people with the information that would inform this debate, and what do we do? Do we work to spread the word? Do we lobby our representatives? Do we provide simple, clear, explanations of the issues to the public? Do we work to communicate with non-technology people of all kinds, on their own terms, finding ways of educating and informing instead of simply looking down on their ignorance?
Well, the EFF does some of this. Yay for them!
But most of us just sit on our asses and tap away little flames about political philosophy for other members of our little geek ghetto to read. Great.
This is not a tyranny of the majority; it's a tyranny of those who are capable of taking effective action over those who aren't. And whose fault is that?
It took the communists and capitalists to crush fascism in WW2. What is so bad about working with anarchists and socialists and whoever else wants to come along for the ride? If the result is a more free and just society I am willing to work with people who do not share my political philsophy. If anything it is BETTER to work with people of different philosphies, it leads to good debate and developes new ideas.
I mean, dude, were you smoking crack during your entire educational career? If anything, his interventionist policies and the nature of the structures he put in place would label him as more of a socialist. A "king"? Hardly. Just extremely popular, enough to win four consecutive elections. Last I checked, kings aren't elected.
;-)
50% of your income? That's a suspiciously round number. Round numbers are usually that way because they came out of someone's ass.
Typical libertarian/conservative bleating about the bad old government peeking into their lives and siphoning money from their pockets. Wake up and smell the representative democracy! The US government is astonishingly open and non-intrusive compared even to other Western democracies (c.f. surveillance in the UK, police powers in the UK such as not having the right to remain silent, encryption laws in France, etc.). WRT taxes, would you like to personally pay for your own mirror of the public goods and services you use, if it would mean paying no taxes? Have fun affording an army/navy/air force to protect you, or police and firemen and EMTs to save you, or several teachers for your kids, or a set of roads for you to drive on, or regulatory people to check the quality of the water you drink, the food you eat, or the meds you take. You get a lot for what you pay, if you'd bother to enumerate it rather than whinge about the cost. I'm proud to pay my taxes, because it means I am contributing to the welfare of my fellow citizens as well as my own via supporting society as a whole.
Now, of course our society is far from perfect, and we have PLENTY of really, really fucking retarded laws. But I blame the corps for that, and all the other special interests that have warped our democratic processes with ca$h. The only way to fix these imbalances is to get involved with the system, or as was said (by whom I forget, politico from the early 20th iirc) "The only cure for the ills of democracy is more democracy."
Yeah, I know this is only tangently related to the main topic, but I couldn't bear to see tripe like that get modded up without a response. Mod me down, mod me up, I care not because a) it's only karma, and b) I've got way more than enough karma to not worry about it
News for Geeks in Austin, TX
In the beginning Freedom first arose amongst the Greeks, but she was not fully fledged and was young and naive. She eventually left the minds of Humankind until she gently entered the minds of some Knights in 1215, who then put the seeds of Democracy into written Law at Runnymede. However, she was not content with this and yearned for a place and a time when Humankind would be of Free thought and Will.
Eventually, some bright scientific minds working in a large English colony on an Eastern Coast of a large land mass started to think up great and wonderful ideals, likes of which She had only ever dreamed of! Events took their stride and a land based upon the greatest of human Ideals became a reality: Thus the United States of America came into existence:
With it she bought these values unto the Land:
Freedom
Justice
And the Free Pursuit of Happiness
She thought her job was done and so went off to Europe, where her work was even more hard. But after almost two hundred years she thought her job was done. Little did She know, for one so Old, that her job is never done. A new threat emerged after the great battle of the years 1939-1945 and the Cold War years of 1945-1991. Little did she know that what was made to protect the small person in his pursuit of Happiness would turn into something so perverted that it would threaten his very rightful right to Happiness and reward. And it came through a system She thought would suit the Freedom of the individual from exploitation; The Law. The DMCA as it became known, was bought forth by a Monopoly of studio's to help keep them in their lofty position, free to carve up the World into regions to maximise profit.
She is always an eternal optimist and has to rely on others to know the Rules of Tyranny:
"Find out just what the people will submit to and you have found out the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them; and these will continue until they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.
- Frederick Douglass, civil rights activist, Aug. 4, 1857
Any power that can be abused will be abused.
- Tyranny Law #1
Abuse always expands to fill the limits of resistance to it.
- Tyranny Law #2
If people don't resist the abuses to others, they will have no one to resist the abuses to themselves, and tyranny will prevail.
- Tyranny Law #3"
Are we to enter a new Dark Age?
These are Churchill's words during the Battle of Britain:
"if we can stand up to him [Hitler] all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age..."
This new Dark Age maybe thus:
" if we can stand up to them [DMCA et al] all the World may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age..."
Protracted and extended by Ignorance of the populace, they will work their lives, but something will be missing. Real Freedom, of expression and of Thought. These were now being patented and protected through Software patents, how long till they patented expressions and thoughts? Or is this already so?
Yet there is a Glimmer of hope, a hope small but visible. In small houses and apartments around the Western around people, men and women are worrying and thinking of things to do. Knowledge is there to be shared, to help Humankind ascend the mountain of Higher Being.
StarTux
Kind of like ms passport with future nano-technology Without a monthly feee to microsoft you can not go shopping can not use the atm, etc. And to use passport you need to sign a draconian EULA claiming Bill Gates lord.
hehe
Anyway here is what the phrase in the book of Revelation 13 means. " ..he that had the mark, or the name of the best, or the number of his name." .(slightly offtopic)
The number of his name refered to in the passage is 666. In ancient times numerology was huge and the early christians/Jews used the number 6 meaning man, and the number 7 meaning hevenly or godly. 7 was used alot for things like Jesus, god, and the holy spirit. 777 is the trinity in other words. 666 = man, man, man, meaning a false trinity. Their will be Satan as god, the anti-christ as his son, and an evil spirit to brainwash his followers. I don't think this is hollywood so don't worry but hollywood does represents greed, pride, selfshiness, sex, voilence, lust any sin representing man, etc. What is really scary is the part on the mark which may apply soon. The hand and head are great heatsources of power to provide nano-technology so expect embed nano-chips to be inside. Under the dmca and now this new upcoming trade law, the anti-christ can prosecute those who disable them or find out how they work in order to buy food. A sig of the end times is when society will become greedy and worship their creations (technology), and their achievements and I love this qoute "..there has never been a time like this.." being applied to the time when the anti-christ comes. Now can you name any other time where the world had great wealth, technology, communications, medicine, pride, etc ? Hmmm Anyway back to bashing the DMCA....
http://saveie6.com/
Welcome to doublethink America, where because liberty has a price of eternal vigilance, it can no longer be regarded as free.
Exigo spamos et dona ferentes
At least a garage band can burn a CD if they want to. How hard is it for a unlicensed movie house to burn a DVD that will play in the average player? With all the "Copy Protection" crap they're trying to jam down our throats, I'm sure it's just a matter of time before a garage band finds it similarly difficult to make a CD. And the RIAA's been going after anyone with an MP3 on their web page, whether it's actually infringing on a copyright or not. So your garage band could get its web page shut down for posting their MP3s on the web, because their ISP will shit itself and shut them down immediately as soon as they get that E-Mail from the RIAA lawyers. I've heard of several instances of this happening thus far; I'm surprised civil rights suits havn't been filed against the RIAA and the offending ISP...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You're preaching to the choir here. The thing to recognize is this argument won't be won by geeks. It'll be won by lawyers, lobyists and political action committees. Such is the state of politics in this country today.
You suggest that there are no avenues left, well I maintain that the constifutional argument is still winable in the United States, but what of other countries here such strictly defined rights language doesn't exist (not to say those rights don't exist, but just that they don't make up the basis for government in other countries, nessecerily)? This is a big problem. In the United States over-reaching laws can be enacted because we are confident in the carved-in-stone nature of the rights afforded to us in the constitution will counter-balance and eventually win out over any ill advised legislation. In other countries this protection may exist is a somewhat weaker form, or not at all. This is extremely disturbing not because those rights may not be so vigorously protected, but because those countries look to the United States for models of legislation and will probably (in this case anyway) follow closely in the footsteps of the US legislation, which without having been fully constitutionally tested - when introduced to countries without such vigorously enforced rights language - creates the risk of becoming a trap door (read: function). A step from which we may not be able to recover. At that stage, the DMCA may be ruled unconstitutional in the US, but in these other countries, there will be lesser or no grounds to repeal the laws enacted under the WIPO and FTAA treaties.
As for what we can do, well, as I said, this battle will be fought and won by lawyers and lobyists, not by us. For that reason, we need to turn it over to lawyers and lobyists (however distasteful that may initially sound) and follow their recommendations with respect to our responses to developments in these issues. With respect to supporting your local LUGs, this is admirable, but your money would be beter spent supporting organizations such as the EFF. I've commented before on their unfortunately poor fund-raising mechanism. While it's admirable that they spent most of their time fighting our battles in the arenas not open to all of us (court rooms, state capitals, and Washington), it is to their detrement that they don't spend more time and effort fund-raising. I maintain they could learn a thing or two from the NRA in that regard, but in the meantime, we need to support the EFF and others who have stepped up to the plate to fight our battles for us.
--CTH
--Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
Comments, to be received by the FTAA organization by August 20, should be submitted to:
Gloria Blue, Executive Secretary, Trade Policy Staff Committee
Attn: FTAA Draft Text Release
Office of the U.S. Trade Representative
1724 F. St., NW, Fifth Floor
Washington DC 20508 USA
Non-US writers should also send a copy to their own country's intellectual property government officials; list available at:
http://www.sice.oas.org/int_prop/ip_dir.asp
Sample Letter:
This is just an example. It will be most effective if you send something similar but in your own words.
Dear Ms. Blue, Trade Policy Staff Committee, and Negotiating Group on Intellectual Property Rights:
I write to express my grave concern regarding the draft FTAA treaty's extreme intellectual property provisions.
These measures, based on the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) give far too much power to publishers, at the expense of indivdiuals' rights. The DMCA itself is already under legal challenge in the US, has gravely chilled scientists' and computer security researchers' freedom of expression around the world for fear of being prosecuted in the US, and resulted in the arrest of a Russian programmer. The FTAA provisions, which serve no one but American corporate copyright interests, are even more over-reaching than those of the DMCA.
These provisions would require signatory nations to pass new DMCA-style laws that ban, with few or no exceptions, software and other tools that allow copy prevention technologies to be bypassed. This would violate the U.S. Constitution's guarantee of freedom of speech under the First Amendment, and similar guarantees in other national constitutions and laws and in the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, since such tools are necessary to exercise lawful uses, including fair use, reverse engineering, computer security research and many others.
I urge you to remove these controversial and anti-freedom provisions from the FTAA treaty language. The DMCA is already an international debacle. Its flaws - and worse - should not be exported and forced on other countries.
Sincerely,
[Your full name]
[Your address]
Non-US writers should mention their own country's constitution and/or laws protecting freedom of expression, of coruse.
Copies may also be sent by e-mail to some key people in the FTAA process:
kalvarez@ustr.gov (Kira Alvarez - Intellectual Property)
walter_bastian@ita.doc.gov (Walter Bastian - E-Commerce)
Non-US contacts available at:
http://www.ftaa-alca.org/contacts/contpts.asp\
No excuses! If you've got time to sit around responding to slashdot posts all day you've got time to write a letter defending your freedom.
It Is the Nature of Information to Transgress Artificial Boundaries
hrm.
The problem is that even if the DCMA gets overturned in the US as being unconstutional or just plain stupid, now you have to overturn it in all of these other countries that have been forced to pass it.
Likely, they will be unwilling to look like complete marionettes, and thus resist repealing the law immediately, arguing that they actually passed it because they thought it was a good idea, not because the US forced them to.
DON'T FEEL POWERLESS. Look at the hundreds here who care enough to say a word or two in protest here. Go to the link. Copy the address and sample letter. Spend fifteen minutes of your day, just fifteen minutes, adding your personal touch to the letter. Print it, stamp it, spend it. If you can't spare 20 minutes of your time saying this isn't right, then yes, our situation is hopeless. (I'm not assuming this is the case with you, Gnome, but so many let feelings of powerlessness stop them from taking action that could make a difference).
Copy the link. E-mail it to your friends. Keep the word going. If we don't draw a line in the sand no one will.
It Is the Nature of Information to Transgress Artificial Boundaries
Canada has about 10% of the population of the US. Still, you say, that means we should have 90 MRI machines, and 78 open-heart surgery centres to bring us up to US "standards". Guess what?
Canadians actually have ACCESS to these resources! If I live in the US, it doesn't matter if there are 100 MRI machines in my city, because unless I am quite wealthy or have medical insurance I most likely can't afford the procedure! And if I do have insurance, HMO's have a history of denying "non-essential" diagnostic procedures or demanding the procedure be done at a certain location anyway.
In Canada, MRI, or open-heart surgery, or a liver transplant, or arthroscopic knee surgery is FREE! Yes, folks, "free as in beer"! NO CHARGE TO YOU SIR, YOU'RE A CANADIAN! The question Americans should be asking is: if 50% of their healthcare is paid for by the government (ie. their taxes), WHY DO SO MANY PEOPLE NOT HAVE ACCESS? Think about that one for a while.
Freedom: "I won't!"
Mexican copyright law was approved in 1996 has very specific entries like:
"
104. The copyright holder of a computing program has the right to authorize or forbid...
V. Decompile, reverse engineering a computer program, or disassembly."
112. Its forbiden to import, fabricate, distribute and use devices or services destinated to circumvent technical protections of computer programs, electromagnetic spectrum transmissions, telecommunication networks and programs of electronic devices as stated in the previous article" (Previous article is about 'Electronic programs that contain visual, sound, 3D or animation elements')
"
Thats sounds pretty much like DMCA. It seems that most media companies experimented first South of the border before lobbyig US Congress.
I just found out about this now. EFF says the deadline is the 20th, and tomorrow is, what the 21st?
How am I to get a letter on this important issue to DC in the time required?
/., this is stuff that matters, get it to us in a timely fashion so we can act on it!
IANAL, nor do I play one on /., but, if memory serves correct, treaty's supercede the constitution. Nor am I a lawyer, but I don't see how a treaty (ratified by a majority of one house of Congress) could supercede the Constitution (amendments to which take 2/3 of Congress and 3/4 of the states). However, when judges get to balancing various Constitutional requirements, they are likely to be persuaded to tilt towards whichever interpretation agrees with international treaties. And so, corporate special interests like to get onto the groups negotiating these treaties. I do know of at least one case where the US's "negotiators" essentially rammed something down Europeans' throats, then came back with the signed treaty saying something like, "We might not like this regulation much, but those Euros insisted on it."
what do they want to limit the distribution of? the very 'entertainment' that consolidates their power base. useful triage here: separate out the regulations that end up strangling the interests of the regulators (remember the soviet union's demise?) from the regulations that would actually prevent the arising of independent, alternative, subversive media. do anything to prevent the latter regulations, and as for the first, let them stew in their own juices....
meanwhile, concentrate on creating the music, video, literature that's truly outside and free (tho not necessarily beyond renumeration). all we have to do for the rest of the culture is what free software is already doing to its cyber core: while it rots from without, replace it piece-by-piece with a solid and economically-undeniable alternative from within the live center of things, which is the creative ability of individuals.
some day soon maggie will wake up to discover she doesn't own the farm anymore.
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
You mean tv?...hmmm wait,that's brainwashingly leftist...newspapers? The same(especially the CBC...govt owned and controlled)..regular radio..same...
I'll assume for the moment that you just forgot to take your medication or something. There are plenty of right wing tv shows/channels, newspapers, radio stations/programs, magazines, etc. You're just as guilty as the other guy. He claims a right wing propaganda machine and you claim a left wing propaganda machine. In reality there's not a whole lot of difference between the two except for their views on certain issues that they probably shouldn't be involved in anyway. In the end though, money is what got us the DMCA. There was almost zero publicity for it before or after it passed. This was not something the public demanded or even knew about. It was demanded and paid for by the industries that depend on control of IP. This was well worth it for them as it gives them an unprecedented amount of control over the information they sell to people.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Hehe. It's always a source of wonder for me to realize how brainwashed and ignorant good American patriots can be.
Patriots of each and every country on the planet are "brainwashed and ignorant" else they would not be putting their national "identity" above common sense, the common man, and the common good. And the French share one striking characteristic with their American cousins: an overdeveloped sense of national identity.
FYI, this whole hysteria about encryption laws in France is only due to the fact that France was 8 or 10 months late compared to the US in liberalizing its encryption rules.
Uh, no (but thank you for playing). Until the French anti-encryption laws were repealed it was illegal for anyone to use any encryption of any kind within the borders of France unless one first gave a copy of their secret key to the French government. This was far more intrustive than the anti-encryption legislation of the United States, which never said anything about domestic use of encryption (in other words, Americans were and are free to use encryption as strong as they like), but rather restricted the export of encryption technologies to other countries (like, say, France). These export restrictions were unbelievably stupid and foolish (nearly all of the encryption expertise and business went overseas as a result, and even years later the American encryption industry still hasn't recovered from that debacle), but they in no way came even remotely close to being as big brotherish as the encryption restriction in France were against their people.
The USA has a number of problems which Europe does not, the DMCA being a glaring example. But Europe also has some serious drawbacks the United States doesn't (yet) have, including some of those mentioned in the previous post. It would behoove us all to recognize the weaknesses of both ourselves and others in protecting our liberties, as you can bet that those who wish to oppress us are certainly borrowing techniques and mechanisms from their neighbors overseas and seeking to apply them at home.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy