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Consumer Technology Bill of Rights?
thrilliams writes "The WSJ's Walt Mossberg has a story about DigitalConsumer.org, a new lobbying group that's pressing for a Consumer Technology Bill of Rights. It would aim to protect the right to time shift and space shift media, make backups, allow for platform independence and translation between formats. Given the current DCMA/SSSCA climate, even these basic rights seem ambitious, but check them out and do what you can to support this nascent effort." There's also an NYT article on the SSSCA debate, with an unintentionally humorous quote from the head of News Corporation (which owns 20th Century Fox): "without copyright protection we will change our business models".
Think about all the public alerts that have been passed around the net that still cause headaches for government agencies, like the "FCC banning religious programs due to Madilyn O'hare" or the infamous modem tax issue or the $2,500 area code 809 phone calls.
Someone with a lot of literary skills needs to come up with some sort of alert that claims that those bastard liberal media companies and those liberals in Congress (I said sensationalist) are trying to take a way your right to record your TV shows by mandating that all future electronic devices contain copy protections to allow people who make shows to disable your ability to record them without paying for them. Include refs to digitalconsumer.org too. Then put the ole "We need to stop this right away, send this to all of your friends" line, details about the bill, and urge people to contact their congressman.
Make this issue so poisoned that no elected official will get near it. Remember, the public are sheep and the reason corporations give so much money to candidates and the reason that is so influential is that people are elected by the strength of their campaign ads. But in the end, it's people who vote, not companies. So if enough people get up in arms about this, the elected (and elected-wannabees) will stand up and take notice.
From the story...
/. community seems to be, it is insignificant to the people pushing and passing the new laws. Everyone needs to know, everyone needs to complain. We are the ones who know, we are the ones who need to shout from the rooftops.
If you want to preserve both the music and movies we enjoy, and your rights to use them freely, there are several things you can do. First, stop stealing music online, and stop condoning the practice. Second, boycott copy-protected CDs. Third, start paying attention to the coming fight over copy-protection, and speak up for your rights as a consumer.
These are all well and good but the fact is, a vast majority of consumers aren't even aware of the problem or the proposed solutions working their way through Congress. They won't know a thing about this until the mad rush is on to purchase the last few non-DRM protected PC's.
So, I would add - Fourth, Tell everyone else about these three steps! Tell your parents, your siblings, your cow-orkers, the people in line next to you at the store, and so on. Put blurbs on your web pages and yak it up the other customers at the video/music stores.
As large as the
Bill of Rights, as found at http://www.digitalconsumer.org/bill.html
1. Users have the right to "time-shift" content that they have legally acquired.
This gives you the right to record video or audio for later viewing or listening. For example, you can use a VCR to record a TV show and play it back later.
2. Users have the right to "space-shift" content that they have legally acquired.
This gives you the right to use your content in different places (as long as each use is personal and non-commercial). For example, you can copy a CD to a portable music player so that you can listen to the songs while you're jogging.
3. Users have the right to make backup copies of their content.
This gives you the right to make archival copies to be used in the event that your original copies are destroyed.
4. Users have the right to use legally acquired content on the platform of their choice.
This gives you the right to listen to music on your Rio, to watch TV on your iMac, and to view DVDs on your Linux computer.
5. Users have the right to translate legally acquired content into comparable formats.
This gives you the right to modify content in order to make it more usable. For example, a blind person can modify an electronic book so that the content can be read out loud.
6. Users have the right to use technology in order to achieve the rights previously mentioned.
This last right guarantees your ability to exercise your other rights. Certain recent copyright laws have paradoxical loopholes that claim to grant certain rights but then criminalize all technologies that could allow you to exercise those rights. In contrast, this Bill of Rights states that no technological barriers can deprive you of your other fair use rights.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
That brought an angry retort from Andrew S. Grove, the chairman of Intel. "Is it the responsibility of the world at large to protect an industry whose business model is facing a strategic challenge?" he said in an interview. "Or is it up to the entertainment industry to adapt to a new technical reality and a new set of consumers who want to take advantage of it?"
It is nice to see a more "mainstream" opinon which echos the sentiments of slashdot posters. This really is the core of the issue: Media companies don't want to deal with the new dynamics as to what people (the "consumer") want to do with the content that they percieve they own (i.e. i bought it in the store, i can do whatever i want with it). I don't see how digital rights should be any different than rights in the analog world. Asides from preceieved quality issues, all the move to digital has done, is make it easier for people to do stuff that they had done previously, i.e. the new term "space shift".
In my younger days i "spaceshifted" a record or cd to a tape or MD to listen to in my walkman or in my parents car. How is this any different than when I download a copy of a cd i own to my mp3 player?
The question I have, is who has more lobbyists? The hardware or media industires? That will probably be the deciding factor.
Bring back the old version of slashdot.
Joe Kraus, founder of Excite and co-founder of DigitalConsumer.org, is scheduled to testify before Congress today - his testimony is online and is excellent.
I'm a 2000 man.
To contact your Representative and Senator. Go to http://www.digitalconsumer.org/fax.html and fill out your name, e-mail address, and Zip code. Then they'll fax a pre-made letter (which you can alter if you'd like) to your two Senators and your Representative (based on your Zip code). Very important since many people are concerned about this stuff, but balk when it's time to actually write and send a letter.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Wow. Mr. Chernin has just admitted that his network could be used for piracy! I guess we need to cripple his network to make it impossible for newscasters to read technical information.
__
Do ya feel happy-go-lucky, punk?
I know that the congressional staffers don't pay too much attention to boilerplate messages, so I rewrote mine to say the following, posted here as just another perspective:
I'm upset that the Fair Use rights of citizens and consumers of copyrighted information are under steady and increasing attack by profit-maximizing and liberty-minimizing corporations.
It'd be nice if some representatives such as yourself stood up for the average Joe's 'pursuit of happiness'.
Specifically, I would appreciate if Congress would grant the right for consumers to 'time-shift' and 'space-shift' our use of legitimately purchased (or licensed) copyrighted materials for personal use. I would like to add my voice to DigitalConsumer.org in calling for a "consumer technology bill of rights" in an attempt to preserve our Fair Use rights. I'm sure you've read their boilerplate, I won't repeat it.
I have a bunch of old cassette tapes. And I have a bunch of CDs. And I listen to a lot of my music and audio on the computer nowdays. And over time my cassettes (and even CDs) degrade for reasons of physics and cheap electronics.
As a software developer who respects intellectual property rights, I have never used Napster (or similar services) to download music I have not purchased. But I dang well *would* like the clear legal right to download MP3s of casettes I purchased 15 years ago, or CDs in my collection, so I don't have to go through the hassle of upgrading my tape deck and connecting it to my computer to try to move songs around. (To be fair to record companies, I would not demand the right to download CD-quality copies of my old cassettes, but CD-quality copies of CDs or low-medium-grade MP3 copies of casettes should be 'fair'.)
I've slowed and stopped purchasing much additional music until the industry comes up with a consumer-friendly way for me to purchase it; something which allows me to recognize a song on the radio, say "hey, I like that song and would like it in my permanent collection" and allows me to download it and play it for the rest of my life, like a book on my shelf.
The record industry wants me to purchase a 'license' to listen to the song when I am online, being tracked, or wants me to purchase a copy on some physical piece of media that they will obsolesce in 15 years.
I don't mind if they attempt to convince the public to do that, but I resent that they are enhancing their ability through highly suspect oligopolistic practices, through high-paid lawyers in the courts, through high-paid lobbiests trying to convince you, my representative.
Copyright was designed by our founders not as a license to print money (although that is a nice side effect when a work is popular). Copyright should be an incentive to create new, great works.
Wouldn't the world be a better place if they focused their massive resources on identifying new, good music? And not on trying to reduce the public's Fair Use rights in an attempt to create pseudo-mandatory upgrades for consumers who just want to listen to the Beatles songs of their youth, 20, 40, and 60 years later without paying copyright holders at every step along the way?
I focus on the music industry because that is closest to my heart, but there are very similar issues with movies, the electronic books of tomorrow, and other media products.
Thank you very much for your attention to this important matter.
--LP (no, I signed it with my real name and address in hopes they'd pay more attention)
"I believe if you say to these people, `You get us a system by Dec. 31 or we'll do it for you,' you'll be surprised at how innovative they'll become," Mr. Eisner told the lawmakers at last month's hearing.
Let's turn that around, and pretend I'm Intel for a moment:
"I believe if you say to the RIAA, `You find a new business model by Dec. 31 or we'll do it for you,' you'll be surprised at how quickly they'll adapt to current technology," Intel told the lawmakers at next month's hearing.
There, see how easy that was??
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
This is from the company that brought us a boxing match between Tonya Harding and Paula Jones, Temptation Island, Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire, The Chamber, and loads of other worthless trash, while at the same time doing a poor job of promoting Futurama and Family Guy (and a poor job in general with The Tick). Since when is changing this business model a bad thing? The public is already a loser, it can't get much worse.
Other nice quotes:
"I believe if you say to these people, `You get us a system by Dec. 31 or we'll do it for you,' you'll be surprised at how innovative they'll become," Mr. Eisner told the lawmakers at last month's hearing.
Oh yeah, this really makes Eisner look like the good guy...
Senator Ernest F. Hollings, Democrat of South Carolina and chairman of the Commerce Committee, says that without technological safeguards Hollywood may never offer the kind of high-quality programming for digital television and broadband Internet services that would generate consumer interest and, in turn, economic growth.
Real "high-quality programming" comes from intelligent and creative writing, good acting, and management that lets these things happen - until that happens, it won't matter how many lines the video image has if they are all lines of crap.
"Unfortunately in many cases, fear is paralyzing Hollywood's ability to seize what I believe is an incredible opportunity," said Steven P. Jobs, chief executive of Apple Computer. "We at Apple believe most people want to be honest, and if offered reasonable choices, most people will choose to buy their content."
You know things are bad when Steve Jobs is the least insane person in the room...