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More on Virtual Child Pornography
An Anonymous Coward writes "As noted previously, the Supreme Court has ruled the "Virtual" child porn act unconstitutional. LawMeme has an analysis of the Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition Supreme Court decision that discusses the case's impact on copyright, DMCA, CBDTPA, and machinima as the future of pornography."
He quotes from the decision:
The normal method of deterring unlawful conduct is to impose an appropriate punishment on the person who engages in it ... The government may not prohibit speech because it increases the chance an unlawful act will be committed at some indefinite future time.
It seems like this applies just as much to discussing methods for circumventing copy protection on DVDs as it does to fair use issues. The government cannot prohibit you from talking about how to copy DVDs just because it may increase your chances of actually doing something illegal with copies of DVDs.
On another note, the idea that you cannot talk about security flaws in copy protection schemes has another very negative side effect. If I wanted to copy protect my content, by paying some company to use their patented technology, I want to be able to make an educated decision about whether their copy protection methods will be effective. If I am unable to find descriptions of potential problems with these methods, how will I decide if they are secure enough to be worth the money I will pay to licence them?
Certainly the established pirates will have ways of distributing this information to each other, so they will have easier access to the circumventation methods than me, a potential customer of the technology they are trying to circumvent.
Seems pretty silly to me. If I am going to buy something, I want to be able to find out if it actually works before I spend the cash. I certainly want to be able to find out that it absolutely will not work, if that is the case.
Why is Grand Theft Auto a much more serious crime than Reckless Driving?