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Senate Soliciting Comments on SSSCA
jayed_99 writes: "The US Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing today about the issues surrounding DRM and the SSSCA. They have a link on their front page that requests comments. Here's a bit of the relevant text: 'If you have comments on these issues that you wish to share with the Committee and with other stakeholders, please email usercomments@judiciary.senate.gov We ask that comments not be sent anonymously, so that if we need to edit comments for public display or request clarification, we are able to contact the author. In addition, for obvious reasons, we request that e-mail submissions themselves avoid copyright infringement, defamation, or other unlawful content.' (You people from Wisconsin, pay attention! Both of your Senators are on the committee)."
This should really be on the slashdot main page! Here are my comments.
To: senate.gov
I'm currently a PhD student at Carnegie Mellon University and a computer
science researcher. I'm writing to express my dismay that the Senate is
considering passing a law that would require DRM technologies to be built
into hardware and software systems.
Honestly, I cannot imagine doing computer research in a country where
computers and the software that runs them are built with tamper-proof
components to implement DRM. We often need access to the internals of the
computer, and we almost always work on consumer-level commodity hardware.
Forcing us to purchase special hardware would dramatically increase our
research costs and reduce the relevance of our research to real-world
systems.
Several of my hobbies involve creating content: music, typefaces, and
software that would likely to be subject to DRM. As a content developer,
I am worried that mandated DRM will inhibit my ability to freely
distribute content that I own the copyright for, by placing restrictions
on content formats or requiring certificates from an external authority.
As a consumer, of course I dislike the increasing insistence of copyright
holders to control the use of content that I "license" from them. I also
would resent having to pay for the extra hardware and development overhead
to include DRM in my electronic devices!
Copyright infringement will remain illegal whether or not DRM is legally
mandated. But in a world with mandatory DRM, we lose the ability to
exercise some rights we historically have enjoyed, such as fair use and
the first sale doctrine. We also face the very strong possibility that our
technology industries and research communities will be stifled. Mandated
DRM is a bad choice on all counts!
Sincerely,
Tom Murphy
The SSSCA is, on its face, unconstitutional, as well as being gross folly with regard to its impact on the economic development of the nation, and it is a mark of rank corruption within the Senate that such a bill should ever
have been proposed. It is the most dramatic case of my knowledge illustrating
the desperate need of campaign finance reform, pitting the interests of the
people of the United States against the undue influence of big-spending special interests within the Senate. I will support each of these points in turn:
Unconstitutionality:
The SSSCA, like the DMCA before it, suppresses the creative and political expression of the academic and engineering communities by prohibiting the
development and distribution of expressive symbolic speech which describes
the construction of devices which may be used to circumvent the devices mandated by the bill. Furthermore, it places an unfunded mandate on industry
and micromanages the operations of industry by those same provisions, a mandate in which the state has no evident, much less compelling, interest.
Therefore it constitutes an uncompensated confiscation without due process.
Economic folly:
The SSSCA would transform all general-purpose computing devices into the instruments of the will of a few foreign corporations, and create an enormous disincentive to the purchase of post-SSSCA devices. In this way, it would direct funds out of the US, to other nations, and simultaneously depress the
domestic market for general-purpose computing devices. Moreover, by reducing the prevalence of general-purpose computing devices, the SSSCA will prevent continuing technological innovation as well as suppressing all derivative markets.
Contrary to the public interest:
The beneficiaries of the SSSCA are primarily, although not exclusively, a small number of foreign corporations, while the technology and media consumers who would be constrained by the bill, if passed, are exclusively
U.S. citizens. Like the DMCA and the NET Act before it, the SSSCA is an incursion against the principle of Fair Use. This is closely related to the
evisceration of the public domain by the infamous DMCA and Sony Bono act before it, and demonstrates clearly that the interests of the Senators and Representatives who act as paid agents of foreign corporations are directly opposed to the interest of the public, whose 'domain' is being ravaged by slash-and-burn tactics.
While the very fact that such a vile and corrupt bill could be seriously entertained is a tremendously discouraging and disillusioning truth, I for one will not be discouraged to the point of withdrawal from the political process by such evils, but will instead act the more aggressively to remove from office by any means necessary those public servants who would suck the blood from our veins, and crush us with servitude to their foreign masters.
Sincerely,
My Name,
My Address
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
First, I would like to thank the membersof the Committee for querying the
public for thier comments - it is not everyday when our government takes a
proactive role in listening to the American public at large.
I understand that digital media producers have a need to control the
rights of thier IP. I respect this right. Unfortunately, digital media
prevents a quandry in that it is perfectly duplicated an unlimited number
of times.
I feel that a basic technical issue must be understood: If the data can
be access for the purpose of using the media, it can also be copied. To
get around this problem, you can do a couple things. You can restrict the
access to device containing a digital key, and restrict what those devices
can do (as done in the case of DVDs). You can also legislate protection
around the media, making it a crime to access the data in a non-approved
manner (the DMCA). You could also charge a tarrif on the blank media,
providing a profit to the companies being short changed by piracy.
I feel the first solution, the technical solution, is the best. But I
strongly belive that forcing hardware and/or software to be certified by a
government or sudo-government agency is a bad idea. This will undoubtedly
stiffle innovation, and deal a death blow to Open Source solutions. I
believe it will drive technology development out of the US, and result in
a bootleg device industry. Digital key solutions, such as those
implemented in DVDs, are a good idea, but the companies producing them
must change thier mindset, and make the technology available to all users,
not just the users who have selected an certain platform or operating
system. This requires both a strong technical solution, and open
standards.
The legislative solution can be used to buttress the technical one, but
laws such as the DMCA are too broad. Such laws should punish people who
seek to pirate the digital information, but should protect at all costs
fair use and research. A purchaser of digital media or a digital device
has a right to use it however they see fit, as long as doing so does not
constitute a violation the copyright - the in the traditional sense.
Finally, taxing blank media for the good of the digital content producers
is a violation of the proper role of government. If digital contents
producers feel that the only way to remain profitable is to tax blank
media, they should increase thier prices and let the market settle it. To
use the government for this purpose is a travesty.
Thank you very much for this opportunity.
_sig_ is away
In my opinion the only reason we got the attention of Senate Judiciary Committee is because of the fax campaign started yesterday at http://www.digitalconsumer.org to tie up the fax machines at congressional offices and get consumer attention on this important issue. We got their attention - let's keep up the pressure. Spread the word! Spread the -. story, spread the Digital Consumer link!
I have deep concerns with the Security Systems Standards and Certification Act (SSSCA) which is being introduced by the Senate Commerce chairman Fritz Hollings (D-South Carolina). Hollings and Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), are co-sponsoring this bill which would require computer and device makers to install a government-approved anti-copying technology intended to thwart piracy of digital works. This may sound good on the surface, but it has two flaws.
First it places the reponsibility for policing copyright infrignment on the makers of computers, instead of the copyright holders as it should rightly be. This means we, the consumer must pay higher prices for systems which are less useful to us. This act would reduce our freedom to choose Operating Systems. Many of us purchase systems, myself included, to run Linux (an alternative to Microsofts Windows XP), but because this proposed anti-copying technology will be a closed standard, the companies which distribute Linux will not be able to duplicate it without breaking the Digital Millenium Copyright Act(DMCA). Further, Microsoft owns the patent on Digital Rights Managment(DRM) Operating Systems, the software part of this technology, so companies, such as Apple and RedHat, who are in direct compitetion, would have to license this patent from Microsoft. Microsoft has been found guilty of building an illegal monopoly, so the chances of them cooperating with competitors is non existent, even for the betterment of society. This also means these smaller companies will be put out of business, because Microsoft will have an unfair advantage.
Leslie L. Vadasz, Executive Vice President of Intel Corporation said,
"Any attempt to inject a regulatory process into the design of our products will irreparably damage the high tech industry, It will substantially retard innovation, investment in new technologies, and will reduce the usefulness of our products to consumers."
The second flaw is it will not work, the big time pirates have the money and the incentive to circumvent any technology put into place. It is also just as likely the technology will be reverse engineered by a lone programmer, as was the case with DvD copy protection.
Again Leslie L. Vadasz says,
" It is important for the Committee to understand that content, once captured in "unprotected" form, can never be put back in the "bottle" and protected against copying on the Internet. This is because this unprotected media looks no different to digital devices than a home movie that you would send to a relative or friend. There is no watermark, chip device, or screening system that will ever effectively put an end to this problem."
The only people this will effect are those people who wish to use their machines for "Fair Use" copying of content. Fair Use allows me to make backup copies of movies I have purchased, record TV programs and lend them to friends. It allows me to record music CD to another format, such as cassette tape, so I can listen to it in my car or MP3 so my wife can play the music on her portable MP3 player. All of these uses are fair and are by no means copyright infringment. If the SSSCA passes, I will be forced to purchase a seperate licence for each of my several desktop computers, my laptop, my wifes MP3 player, as well as my stereo and one each for my two cars. Additionally, punishment for these new crimes are very unreasonable, stealing a CD from a store is considered petty theft, yet downloading the same content from the internet in the post SSSCA will be a federal offense punishable by time in prison and/or a fine of up to $500,000. This hardly seems to be punishment which fits the crime.
To Senator Hollings, this may be about preventing copyright infrigment, but to me it is about preventing fair use. To me this is about taking away my freedom to play content I have legally purchased on devices I have legally purchased. The RIAA and the MPAA member companies have business models rooted in the 19th century and they are trying to apply those models to the 21st century, this of course is failing, instead of changing with the times, they want the Government to intervene and protect thier 19th century business model
To quote Robert Heinlein's very first story Life-Line:
"There has grown up in the minds of certain groups in this country the notion that because a man or corporation has made a profit out of the public for a number of years, the government and the courts are charged with the duty of guaranteeing such profit in the future, even in the face of changing circumstances and contrary to public interest. This strange doctrine is not supported by statute or common law. Neither individuals nor corporations have any right to come into court and ask that the clock of history be stopped, or turned back."
I hope you will oppose the SSSCA, it is bad for the Tech industry and it is bad for the consumer. At the very least, please do not let this bill pass without public debate, as did the DMCA, which was later used by the same organizations sponoring the SSSCA, to stifle Free Speech (Felton v. RIAA), Freedom of Press (MPAA v. 2600) and Fair Use(DOJ v. Dmitry Sklyarov). If I personally must make choice between Titanic being available on the internet or retaining my current rights under Fair Use and retaining the personal control over my computer, I will take the latter, every single time.
Thank you for your time
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development
While my comments were in no way the greatest (certainly not the best thing I have ever written), they do come from my heart and mind - this proposed legislation tears at me, and with the DMCA, makes me feel SO angry. Anyway, here is the email I sent:
To whom it may concern:
Let me state my case in as simple of terms as possible. I am a computer software developer. I feel that the SSSCA threatens - THREATENS - my
very job. The career I have put many long years into to develop. The very thing that keeps my family fed.
I don't have much of a recourse to fall back on should the SSSCA (coupled with the same kind of crap - YES CRAP! - that the DMCA is as well) go through and make software development a crime, or impossible - without stepping through a multitude of hoops.
You see, I learned how to program on a home computer - sitting with my dad beside me, typing in programs from books. I was 10 years old, and
having fun. I could see (and still do see) whole new worlds openning up before me. The computer was a magic machine, and I could be the sorcerer
commanding it.
That was a long time ago - almost 20 years now. Kids today don't know what they really have in front of them (today's machine was FANTASY when
I was in high school, never mind when I was 10) - but those that do will be prevented from learning on their own by the SSSCA. Why?
When compilers and debuggers, and a whole host of other tools, coupled with tight DRM controls embedded in the hardware - make it impossible,
not to mention a FEDERAL CRIME - to learn about the very machine these individuals supposedly own - it will be a travesty.
The computer is not a TV. Information is not a tangible object. Reread your Thomas Jefferson for his thoughts on such things.
I cannot stress just how ANGRY I am at the thought of such proposed legislation as the SSSCA, and the already passed legislation of the DMCA. Neither will do anything to "promote the arts and sciences" that copyright was supposed to do (note: I am not against copyright - but I am against the laws which extend copyright past the Constitutional mandate of the "reasonable period", as well as allowing immortal corporations to hold copyright, in effect making the "life" provision of copyright equal "FOREVER").
Signed as a citizen of a failing country and society,
cr0sh (and yes, I posted my real name/address for responsibilty taking of my comments).
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
is my anti-SSSCA letter. Here it is again. I'll send asap to the address provided - I sent this to Sen. Dianne Feinstein.
----
Dear Senators:
I am writing to urge you to oppose Senator Hollings' draft bill "SSSCA" which would mandate copy
protection in personal computers, MP3 players, and other devices, and criminalize the
distribution of devices that don't have this government-mandated control on their use. This
bill is an abomination - it is an affront to my liberty as a computer user and owner to control
the devices which I own, and the music and movies on which I have spent my hard-earned money.
When I buy a computer, I expect to have full control over it. I do not wish to have my rights
to listen to the music I HAVE BOUGHT on an iPod, on a mixed CD, or on the computer itself,
dictated by a recording industry that has shown nothing but contempt for its customers. I do
not wish to have my rights to watch DVDs I HAVE BOUGHT subject to capricious, anti-competitive,
blatantly in violation of antitrust behavior such as region coding. And I damn well will not
give up my rights to record television shows for later viewing and archiving - on a TiVo, a VCR,
or a computer itself.
For developers, it is much worse. This bill would effectively criminalize free software -
software such as Linux, which has made huge advances in PC and server productivity possible at
very low cost; Apache, the most popular web server; and many other useful and commonly available
tools. And it would be a huge prior restraint on developers' right to free speech.
Piracy is a problem. But is it as much a problem as is our freedom? Without the right to
control our PCs, the PC is as much as dead. All of the innovation of the past twenty years
might as well be reversed if this bill passes.
For me, and for millions of computer users like myself, this is a critical civil liberties issue
- one of basic personal freedom. A vote for this bill is a vote to take my freedom away. Don't
do it.
sulli
RTFJ.
Very simply, this issue is about whether you support the corporations or the consumers. Although some (most likely the beneficiaries of this logic) would argue that what benefits corporations also in turn benefits consumers, and vice versa, this is frequently untrue, and is definitely so in this issue.
As a consumer who enjoys technology and innovation, I know I will be hurt by the passage of this law, just as the DMCA was a great loss of my rights. Mandatory DRM will hurt my choice, and ability to do legal activities with media that I purchase or create.
Faced with SSSCA-mandated devices, I will purchase less and less, both devices and media, as will most tech-savvy people. The laws that the industry is lobbying for in their mad rush to protect slipping sales are desperate grabs at making their turf be government-mandated. They do this rather than cultivate talent, or work with consumers to create exciting reasons why piracy should not be done. I would argue that there is not a single industry initiative of any value to create digital music or movies available to consumers for low cost.
Please stop subsidizing the monopolies that control media by giving them more and more legal power over our lives and choices. This is not what government is supposed to be about. In looking at this issue, look at the issue as a good individual who makes a normal income, who values their freedom of choice. Whose prices for digital equipment would rise because of mandated protection. Whose prices for media would rise due to continuing reliance of the industry on copy protection rather than innovation for retaining market share. Do not approach it as a person of power, or one who is influenced by lobbying, or one who buys into the argument that all consumers are thiefs.
Thank you.
Please subscribe to see the more insightful version of th
This is important! yes I enjoyed the article about the fan, but this is far more important.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Dear Judiciary Senators:
Frankly, I'm astounded that a proposal this anti-democratic, anti-consumer, anti-freedom and anti-free speech has made it as far as it has. It's just completely bad top to bottom. The SSSCA seems to be nothing but a massive payoff to the entertainment industry.
Hollywood has already cried fire where's there's not even ember. Anyone else remember Jack Valenti's predictions that the VCR would doom Hollywood? That VCR's would be to Hollywood what the Boston strangler was to women? Today, they can't live with out it. Valenti's been so wrong about so many things for so long that I'm surprised anyone takes that senile old coot seriously anymore. Do some research and the next time he shows up before your committee to whine about modern technology, ask him why anyone should believe a word he says.
Ditto for the RIAA. At the height of Napster's popularity, record sales were soaring. They were raking in money hand over fist. After the RIAA killed Napster and dispersed it to other services, sales utterly collapsed. Now, it's probably a stretch to say that no Napster=no sales, but obviously, the reverse, and the RIAA's primary claim, that Napster was hurting record sales, is not true in the least.
In any case, the SSSCA is just another way for corporations to completely screw over consumers. If they can't adapt to the times, then *they* need to change their business models. The government shouldn't be stepping in to prop up outdated ways of conducting business.
Ignore Hollywood's campaign contributions, ignore their spin, and ignore their whining. Support the *people* of this country for a change.
Sincerely,
I deeply appreciate the fact that the Judiciary Committee is soliciting comments about this subject via email. Thank you.
I think that the core question before us is: "should there be federally mandated controls for the protection of content creators' intellectual property rights?" There are dozens, if not hundreds, of tangenital issues surrounding this one question, and I think that we, proponents, opponents, lawmakers and citizens, need to focus our comments and rhetoric on this one point.
I do not believe that the Unites States Congress should require any form of digital rights management (DRM) that applies to every manufacturer of computers or other electronic devices -- and, through them, to every consumer and legitimate user of digital media.
One of the main reasons I believe this is that, according to the testimony of Mr. Richard Parsons of AOL Time Warner, at any given time less than 0.31% of the United States population is engaged in the illegal distribution of copyrighted works. Requiring every manufacturer of computers and electronic devices to incorporate some form of DRM will cost money. And that cost will be unjustly passed on the 99.69% of us who are not making illegal use of copyrighted material. (I would like to point out that 0.31% is the maximal value given by a proponent of federally mandated DRM. This figure also fails to consider what percentage of these people have enough bandwidth to engage in significant abuse. I realize that, in theory, "significant abuse" should not be a consideration but we need to be pragmatic).
Requiring the 99%+ legitimate users of digital media to pay so that major content creators can attempt to protect their intellectual property from the miniscule fraction of the population that uses it illegally is ridiculous.
Finally, I would like to point out that correlation is not causation. For the proponents of mandated DRM to claim that the rise of peer-to-peer networking is the cause of the content creation industry's reduction in revenue over the past year is absurd. Considering the economy since the dot-com bust, I would be surprised if the industry had increased revenues.
Thank you for your time.
This isn't what I want, but if we have to have DRM, perhaps someone will at least put the folowing in:
Another issue that must not be ignored is media life. I personally make a copy of all CDs that I own, and then use the copy, storing the original in a safe place. This is legal under fair use, but digital rights management would prevent me from making these copies. I started this practice because I scratch one of my favorite CDs enough that it was no longer useable. When I went to look for another one I discovered it was out of print and I could not get another copy. If I cannot make a copy to protect myself from my mistakes, than the law must protect me. That is anyone who produces a protected work must, for the duration of the copyright provide, for the cost of only the media and postage only, a replacement copy of any work that is damaged. I have already paid the artist, the mixing fees, and other overhead, so they must not charge full price for replacement copies. While I recognise that this is new requirement that previously has not existed, it is only fair that if I lose my right to copies that I not lose one major reason for copies.
Seems to me they have it covered.
United States Patent #6,330,670
Digital rights management operating system
Abstract
A digital rights management operating system protects rights-managed data, such as downloaded content, from access by untrusted programs while the data is loaded into memory or on a page file as a result of the execution of a trusted application that accesses the memory. To protect the rights-managed data resident in memory, the digital rights management operating system refuses to load an untrusted program into memory while the trusted application is executing or removes the data from memory before loading the untrusted program. If the untrusted program executes at the operating system level, such as a debugger, the digital rights management operating system renounces a trusted identity created for it by the computer processor when the computer was booted. To protect the rights-managed data on the page file, the digital rights management operating system prohibits raw access to the page file, or erases the data from the page file before allowing such access. Alternatively, the digital rights management operating system can encrypt the rights-managed data prior to writing it to the page file. The digital rights management operating system also limits the functions the user can perform on the rights-managed data and the trusted application, and can provide a trusted clock used in place of the standard computer clock.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development