Serial Cables Illegal Due to DMCA?

Colin McMillen writes "I've recently had an interesting run-in with the DMCA... apparently, US Customs has rejected entry of a PC<->Sega Dreamcast serial cable into the US, supposedly due to copyright violations. This cable was to be used for Dreamcast programming for the Real-Time Systems class offered at my university. This seems to be a clear case of the DMCA abridging a perfectly valid educational use of a perfectly legal piece of hardware."

Comments

Publish the pinouts! :)

[Deagol]

Surely someone must already have this cable, who would be willing to post the pinouts in a public forum?

Never having seen a dreamcast, I bet it has a non-standard connector, so a nice pre-fab cable would be better. However, in light of this totally lame event... open pandora's box again.

You'd better not try and import floppy disks

[3141]

What difference is there between the function of a Dreamcast Coders' Cable and that of a floppy disk? Both can be used for transferring both legal and illegal material. It seems somewhat wrong that customs should assume that you're going to use something illegally, especially when the primary use is perfectly legal.

Re:You'd better not try and import floppy disks

[micromoog]

especially when the primary use is perfectly legal

That's just it - the actual primary use is (assumed to be) copyright violation. The stated purpose in the documentation of the cable is another thing; they're going by the percieved actual usage.

The assumption is that this legitimate educational purpose is in the extreme minority of cases.

If the "stated legal usage" were all that mattered, Napster would still be around.

Re:You'd better not try and import floppy disks

[donglekey]

I say who gives a shit about what something's ambiguous primary use is. The act is illegal not materials. If I want to use a bong to try and invent cold fusion I should have the right to.

How rediculous

[autopr0n]

btw, there's a k5 story about this for those who care.

This seems to be another UPS fuckup... According to the Customs dep, you're supposed to get 90 days to apeal these types of things, but UPS said there was "no way." that anything can be done.

Asside from that, I think I speak for everyone when I say I find this a little desturbing. I mean, I'm sure Lik Sang has a 'reputation'... but the things are just wires for god sake.

I worked at Sega...

[The Vulture]

...for John Byrd actually, up until February 2001, when Sega of Japan dropped the axe on the Sega of America Third-Party Developer Technical Support (DTS). I have contacted him about this article, and maybe he can say a few words (however, he does not work for Sega anymore, so I don't know what effect his words will have).

Truth be told, when we were at Sega, we were following the amateur programmers, and we knew that there was no way that we could stop them (not that the youthful hackers in us really wanted to). I don't know if this will help you any, but Sega of America actually ran a mailing list at one time for amateur VMU (Visual Memory Unit) programmers - this may be useful in establishing some credibility that Sega was encouraging development. Of course, then again, there was usually a difference between what SOA and SOJ wanted. :(

Although I do not know where the links are for making the cables, it is possible to do so (and I believe that somebody else pasted the link). The only catch is finding the Dreamcast serial port side. Rather than ordering from Hong Kong, you might want to see if you can find the Japanese ISDN cable, which is the real version of the cable you are looking for (I have one at home). I don't remember the part number, but I can look it up tonight. That and a null-modem adaptor, and you're in business.

Absolutely rediculous what is going on. I wonder when my homeland of Canada will begin to follow suit. :(

Disclaimer: I speak only for myself, and not Sega of America, Sega of Japan, John Byrd, or any other current or former Sega employee.

-- Joe

Re:One problem

[mccalli]

Unfortunately, they must err on the side of caution.

With the guiding principle of law being innocent until proven guilty, they must do no such thing.

Cheers,
Ian

Doesn't Matter. DMCA's not about patents

[sterno]

What does Sega having or not having a patent have to do with this? The DMCA is all about circumventing an access control measure to a copyrighted work, and doesn't really care about what Sega's patents are. If they want to go after the company manufacturing them for patent infringement, fine (assuming they have a patent), but that has nothing to do with this issue.

What we have happening here is that an item is being forbidden to enter the country because it MIGHT be usable for bypassing an access control to a copyrighted work. The DMCA makes no distinction about whether the item may have other leagl uses. Seems like a lawsuit is in order against the US customs department, and this has some really strong legal ground to stand on.

Or maybe not a Patented Connector? Japanese ISDN?

[Nonesuch]

On further reading, it appears that the connector itself may just be the Japanese standard ISDN plug, and not something Dreamcast-unique. You still need a special cable to do the conversion between TTL and RS-232 voltages.

This conversion is a very common issue with a lot of products, schematics and chips to handle the adjustment are all over the net.

Elbows writes:

Yes, but is changing the arrangments of the pins and shape of the connector on one end of normal serial cable "innovative" or "non-obvious"?
Somehow it doesn't seem that way to me...

Actually, yes- I have seen some truly innovative means of connecting serial interfaces, including some really ancient IBM technology that is truly bizarre- looks like some sort of electroshock torture device, but apparently works really well :-)

The USPTO has been pretty lax about this sort of thing, pretty much pay your money and get a 'rubber stamp' approval without any real review.

Re:Or maybe not a Patented Connector? Japanese ISD

[Sj0]

The DMCA isn't about patents in that way, it's about copyright. That guy can't have his serial cable because he could use it(not bloody likely) to circumvent the copyright protection on music CDs and (possibly, depending on interpetation), dreamcast disks.

That's the reason the DMCA is such a bad law. It bans anything (ANYTHING) which can be used to circumvent copy protection.

It's like banning(and making it illegal to sell or distribute, or information on how to create) butterknives because they could be plunged into a persons chest. Stupid. Immoral too.

Re:Broken record

[HalfFlat]

er, guns do hurt people. That and hunting are indeed their primary purposes.

Unsurprisingly there are fewer gun deaths per capita in those democracies where gun use is restricted.

Gun laws won't stop the sole loony with an illegally owned gun doing the rampage thing. But such loons aren't the ones responsible for the amazingly large number of people who get shot in the US every year.

However you may feel about gun control, comparing them to a device that may have application in unauthorized copying of software is ludicrous.