Slashdot Mirror
Three Years Under the DMCA
willybur writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation just released a report (pdf) today detailing the last three years under the DMCA. It describes how the DMCA has been used to unfairly attempt to prosecute all of the various parties over the years, and gives yet another argument of why the DMCA needs to be struck down. It's worth a read." Slashdot has covered most of the incidents listed, but this is nice summary to hand someone who hasn't been following these issues.
Kero-chan ownz j00
Kero-chan: KEEEEKIIIIII GA DAAIIIISUUUUUKKKIIIIIII!!!!!!!
I'm glad I'm not living in the states.
yeah, my pdf reader pretends to download it but I get 9 blank pages. pls prnt thks.
*SRU
Pages 1--9 from Microsoft Word - DMCAxxx.doc
Page 1 2
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 1
v. 1.0 (May 3, 2002) for latest version, visit www. eff. org
Unintended Consequences: Three Years under the DMCA
1. Executive Summary
Since they were enacted in 1998, the "anti-circumvention" provisions of the Digital Millennium
Copyright Act (" DMCA"), codified in section 1201 of the Copyright Act, have not been used as Congress
envisioned. Congress meant to stop copyright pirates from defeating anti-piracy protections added to
copyrighted works, and to ban "black box" devices intended for that purpose. 1
In practice, the anti-circumvention provisions have been used to stifle a wide array of legitimate activities,
rather than to stop copyright piracy. As a result, the DMCA has developed into a serious threat to three
important public policy priorities:
Section 1201 Chills Free Expression and
Scientific Research.
Experience with section 1201 demonstrates that it is being used to stifle free speech and
scientific research. The lawsuit against 2600 magazine, threats against Princeton Professor
Edward Felten's team of researchers, and prosecution of Russian programmer Dmitry
Sklyarov have chilled the legitimate activities of journalists, publishers, scientists, students,
programmers, and members of the public.
Section 1201 Jeopardizes Fair Use.
By banning all acts of circumvention, and all technologies and tools that can be used for
circumvention, section 1201 grants to copyright owners the power to unilaterally
eliminate the public's fair use rights. Already, the music industry has begun deploying
"copy-protected CDs" that promise to curtail consumers' ability to make legitimate,
personal copies of music they have purchased.
Section 1201 Impedes Competition and
Innovation.
Rather than focusing on pirates, many copyright owners have chosen to use the
DMCA to hinder their legitimate competitors. For example, Sony has invoked section 1201
to protect their monopoly on Playstation
video game consoles, as well as their "regionalization" system limiting users in one
country from playing games legitimately purchased in another.
This document collects a number of reported cases where the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA
have been invoked not against pirates, but against consumers, scientists, and legitimate competitors. It
will be updated from time to time as additional cases come to light. The latest version can always be obtained
at www. eff. org.
2. DMCA Legislative Background
Congress enacted section 1201 in response to two pressures. First, Congress was responding to the
perceived need to implement obligations imposed on the U. S. by the 1996 World Intellectual Property Or-ganization
(WIPO) Copyright Treaty. Section 1201, however, went further than the WIPO treaty required. 2
The details of section 1201, then, were a response not just to U. S. treaty obligations, but also to the concerns
of copyright owners that their works would be widely pirated in the networked digital world. 3
Section 1201 contains two distinct prohibitions: a ban on acts of circumvention, as well as a ban on the
distribution of tools and technologies used for circumvention.
The first prohibition, set out in section 1201( a)( 1), prohibits the act of circumventing a technological
measure used by copyright owners to control access to their works (" access controls"). So, for example, this
provision makes it unlawful to defeat the encryption system used on DVD movies. This ban on acts of
circumvention applies even where the purpose for decrypting the movie would otherwise be legitimate. As
a result, if a Disney DVD prevents you from fast-forwarding through the commercials that preface the
feature presentation, efforts to circumvent this restriction would be unlawful.
Second, sections 1201( a)( 2) and 1201( b) outlaw the manufacture, sale, distribution or trafficking of tools and
technologies that make circumvention possible. These provisions ban not only technologies that defeat access
controls, but also technologies that defeat use restrictions imposed by copyright owners, such as copy 1
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Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 2
controls. These provisions prevent technology vendors from taking steps to defeat the "copy-protection" now
appearing on many music CDs, for example.
Section 1201 also includes a number of exceptions for certain limited classes of activities, including
security testing, reverse engineering of software, encryption research, and law enforcement. These
exceptions have been extensively criticized as being too narrow to be of real use to the constituencies who they
were intended to assist. 4
A violation of any of the "act" or "tools" prohibitions is subject to significant civil and, in some
circumstances, criminal penalties.
3. Free Expression and Scientific Research
Section 1201 is being used by a number of copyright owners to stifle free speech and legitimate scientific
research. The lawsuit against 2600 magazine, threats against Princeton Professor Edward Felten's team of
researchers, and prosecution of the Russian programmer Dmitry Sklyarov have imposed a chill on a
variety of legitimate activities.
For example, online service providers and bulletin board operators have begun to censor discussions of
copy-protection systems, programmers have removed computer security programs from their websites, and
students, scientists and security experts have stopped publishing details of their research on existing security
protocols. Foreign scientists are also increasingly uneasy about traveling to the United States out of fear
of possible DMCA liability, and certain technical conferences have begun to relocate overseas.
These developments will ultimately result in weakened security for all computer users (including,
ironically, for copyright owners counting on technical measures to protect their works), as security researchers
shy away from research that might run afoul of section 1201. 5
Professor Felten's Research Team Threatened
In September 2000, a multi-industry group known as the Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMI) issued a
public challenge encouraging skilled technologists to try to defeat certain watermarking technologies intended to
protect digital music. Princeton Professor Edward Felten and a team of researchers at Princeton, Rice, and
Xerox took up the challenge and succeeded in removing the watermarks.
When the team tried to present their results at an academic conference, however, SDMI representatives
threatened the researchers with liability under the DMCA. The threat letter was also delivered to the
researchers' employers, as well as the conference
organizers. After extensive discussions with counsel, the researchers grudgingly withdrew their paper from
the conference. The threat was ultimately withdrawn and a portion of the research published at a subsequent
conference, but only after the researchers filed a lawsuit in federal court.
After enduring this experience, at least one of the researchers involved has decided to forgo further
research efforts in this field.
Pamela Samuelson, "Anticircumvention Rules: Threat to Science," 293 SCIENCE 2028,
Sept. 14, 2001. http:// www. sciencemag. org/ cgi/ reprint/ 293
/5537/ 2028
Letter from Matthew Oppenheim, SDMI General Counsel, to Prof. Edward Felten,
April 9, 2001. http:// cryptome. org/ sdmi-attack. htm
Dmitry Sklyarov Arrested
Beginning in July 2001, Russian programmer Dmitry Sklyarov was jailed for several weeks and detained for
five months in the United States after speaking at the DEFCON conference in Las Vegas.
Prosecutors, prompted by software goliath Adobe Systems Inc., alleged that Sklyarov had worked on a
software program known as the Advanced e-Book Processor, which was distributed over the Internet by
his Russian employer, ElcomSoft Co. Ltd. The software allowed owners of Adobe electronic books
(" e-books") to convert them from Adobe's e-Book format into Adobe Portable Document Format (" pdf")
files, thereby removing restrictions embedded into the files by e-Book publishers.
Sklyarov was never accused of infringing any copyrighted e-Book, nor of assisting anyone else to
infringe copyrights. His alleged crime was working on a software tool with many legitimate uses, simply because
third parties he has never met might use the tool to copy an e-Book without the publisher's permission.
In December 2001, under an agreement with the Department of Justice, Sklyarov was allowed to return
home. The Department of Justice, however, is continuing to prosecute his employer, ElcomSoft,
under the criminal provisions of the DMCA.
Lawrence Lessig, "Jail Time in the Digital Age," N. Y. TIMES at A7, July 30, 2001.
http:// www. nytimes. com/ 2001/ 07/ 30/ opini on/ 30LESS. html
Jennifer 8 Lee, "U. S. Arrests Russian Cryptographer as Copyright Violator," N. Y.
TIMES at C8, July 18, 2001. 2
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Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 3
Scientists and Programmers Withhold Research
Following the legal threat against Professor Felten's research team and the arrest of Dmitry Sklyarov, a
number of prominent computer security experts have curtailed their legitimate research activities out of fear
of potential DMCA liability.
For example, prominent Dutch cryptographer and security systems analyst Neils Ferguson discovered a
major security flaw in an Intel video encryption system known as High Bandwidth Digital Content Protection
(HDCP). He declined to publish his results and removed all references on his website relating to flaws
in HDCP, on the grounds that he travels frequently to the U. S. and is fearful of "prosecution and/ or liability
under the U. S. DMCA law."
Neils Ferguson, "Censorship in Action: Why I Don't Publish My HDCP Results," Aug. 15,
2001. http:// www. macfergus. com/ niels/ dmca/ cia.
html
Neils Ferguson, Declaration in Felten & Ors v R. I. A. A. case, Aug. 13, 2001.
http:// www. eff. org/ IP/ DMCA/ Felten_ v_ RI AA/ 20010813_ ferguson_ decl. html
Lisa M. Bowman, "Researchers Weigh Publication, Prosecution," CNET NEWS,
Aug. 15, 2001. http:// news. cnet. com/ news/ 0-1005-200-
6886574. html
Following the arrest of Dmitry Sklyarov, Fred Cohen, a professor of digital forensics and respected
security consultant, removed his "Forensix" evidence-gathering software from his website, citing fear of
potential DMCA liability.
Another respected network security protection expert, Dug Song, also removed content from his
website for the same reason. Mr. Song is the author of several security papers, including a paper describing a
common vulnerability in many firewalls.
Robert Lemos, "Security Workers: Copyright Law Stifles," CNET NEWS, Sept. 6, 2001.
http:// news. com. com/ 2100-1001-272716. html
In mid-2001 an anonymous programmer discovered a vulnerability in Microsoft's proprietary e-Book digital
rights management code, but refused to publish the results, citing DMCA liability concerns.
Wade Roush, "Breaking Microsoft's e-Book Code," TECHNOLOGY REVIEW at 24,
November 2001. http:// www. technologyreview. com/ articles/ i
nnovation11101. asp
Foreign Scientists Avoid U. S.
Foreign scientists have expressed concerns about traveling to the U. S. following the arrest of Russian
programmer Dmitry Sklyarov. Some foreign scientists have advocated boycotting conferences held in the U. S.
and a number of conference bodies have decided to move their conferences to non-U. S. locations. Russia
has issued a travel warning to Russian programmers traveling to the U. S.
Highly respected British Linux programmer Alan Cox resigned from the USENIX committee of the
Advanced Computing Systems Association, the committee that organizes many of the U. S. computing
conferences, because of his concerns about traveling to the U. S. Cox has urged USENIX to hold its annual
conference offshore. The International Information Hiding Workshop Conference, the conference at which
Professor Felten's team intended to present its original paper, has chosen to hold all of its future conferences
outside of the U. S. following the SDMI threat to Professor Felten and his team.
Will Knight, "Computer Scientists boycott US over digital copyright law," NEW SCIENTIST,
July 23, 2001. http:// www. newscientist. com/ news/ news. jsp
?id= ns00001063
Alan Cox of Red Hat UK Ltd, declaration in Felten v. RIAA, Aug. 13, 2001.
http:// www. eff. org/ IP/ DMCA/ Felten_ v_ RI AA/ 20010813_ cox_ decl. html
Jennifer 8 Lee, "Travel Advisory for Russian Programmers," N. Y. TIMES at C4, Sept. 10,
2001. http:// www. nytimes. com/ 2001/ 09/ 10/ techn
ology/ 10WARN. html? searchpv= past7days
IEEE Wrestles with DMCA
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), which publishes 30 per cent of all computer
science journals worldwide, recently was drawn into the controversy surrounding science and the DMCA.
Apparently concerned about possible liability under Section 1201, the IEEE in November 2001 instituted a
policy requiring all authors to indemnify IEEE for any liabilities incurred should a submission result in legal
action under the DCMA.
After an outcry from IEEE members, the organization ultimately revised its submission policies, removing
mention of the DMCA. According to Bill Hagen, manager of IEEE Intellectual Property Rights, "The
Digital Millennium Copyright Act has become a very sensitive subject among our authors. It's intended to
protect digital content, but its application in some 3
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Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 4
specific cases appears to have alienated large segments of the research community."
IEEE press release, "IEEE to Revise New Copyright Form to Address Author
Concerns," April 22, 2002. http:// www. ieee. org/ newsinfo/ dmca. html
Will Knight, "Controversial Copyright Clause Abandoned," NEW SCIENTIST, April 15, 2002.
http:// www. newscientist. com/ news/ news. jsp ?id= ns99992169
2600 Magazine Censored
The Universal City Studios v. Reimerdes case 6 illustrates the chilling effect that section 1201 has had on the
freedom of the press.
In that case, eight major motion picture companies brought a DMCA suit against 2600 magazine seeking to
block it from publishing the DeCSS software program, which defeats the encryption used on DVD movies.
2600 had made the program available on its web site in the course of ongoing coverage of the controversy
surrounding the DMCA. The magazine was not involved in the development of software, nor was it
accused of having used the software for any copyright infringement.
Notwithstanding the First Amendment's guarantee of a free press, the district court permanently barred
2600 from publishing, or even linking to, the DeCSS software code. In November 2001, the Second Circuit
Court of Appeals upheld the lower court decision.
In essence, the movie studios effectively obtained a "stop the presses" order banning the publication of
truthful information by a news publication concerning a matter of public concern-- an unprecedented
curtailment of well-established First Amendment prin-ciples.
Carl S. Kaplan, "Questioning Continues in Copyright Suit," N. Y. TIMES, May 4, 2001.
http:// www. nytimes. com/ 2001/ 05/ 04/ techn ology/ 04CYBERLAW. html
Simson Garfinkel, "The Net Effect: The DVD Rebellion," TECHNOLOGY REVIEW at
25, July/ Aug. 2001. http:// www. technologyreview. com/ articles/ g
arfinkel0701. asp
Xenia P. Kobylarz, "DVD Case Clash-- Free Speech Advocates Say Copyright Owners
Want to Lock Up Ideas; Encryption Code is Key," S. F. DAILY JOURNAL, May 1, 2001.
Microsoft Threatens Slashdot
In spring 2000, Microsoft invoked the DMCA against the Internet publication forum Slashdot,
demanding that forum moderators delete materials relating to Microsoft's proprietary implementation of
an open security standard known as Kerberos.
In the Slashdot forum, several individuals alleged that Microsoft had changed the open, non-proprietary
Kerberos specification in order to prevent non-Microsoft servers from interacting with Windows 2000.
Many speculated that this move was intended to force users to purchase Microsoft server software. Although
Microsoft responded to this criticism by publishing its Kerberos specification, it conditioned access to the
specification on agreement to a "click-wrap" license agreement that expressly forbade disclosure of the
specification without Microsoft's prior consent.
Slashdot posters responded by republishing the Microsoft specification. Microsoft then invoked the
DMCA, demanding that Slashdot remove the republished specifications.
In the words of Georgetown law professor Julie Cohen, "If Microsoft's interpretation of the DMCA's
ban on circumvention technologies is right, then it doesn't seem to matter much whether posting
unauthorized copies of the Microsoft Kerberos specification would be a fair use. A publisher can
prohibit fair-use commentary simply by implementing access and disclosure restrictions that bind the entire
public. Anyone who discloses the information, or even tells others how to get it, is a felon."
Julie Cohen, "Call it the Digital Millennium Censorship Act - Unfair Use," THE NEW
REPUBLIC, May 23, 2000. http:// www. thenewrepublic. com/ cyberspace
/cohen052300. html
AVSforum. com Censors TiVo Discussion
The specter of DMCA litigation has chilled speech on smaller web bulletin boards, as well. In June 2001,
for example, the administrator of AVSforum. com, a popular forum where TiVo digital video recorder
owners discuss TiVo features, censored all discussion about a software program that allegedly permitted TiVo
users to move video from their TiVos to their personal computers. In the words of the forum administrator,
"My fear with this is more or less I have no clue what is a protected system on the TiVo box under copyright
(or what-have-you) and what is not. Thus my fear for the site."
Lisa M. Bowman, "TiVo Forum Hushes Hacking Discussion," CNET NEWS, June 11,
2001. 4
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Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 5
http:// news. cnet. com/ news/ 0-1005-200-6249739. html
4. Fair Use Under Siege
"Fair use" is a crucial element in American copyright law-- the principle that the public is entitled, without
having to ask permission, to use copyrighted works so long as these uses do not unduly interfere with the
copyright owner's market for a work. Fair uses include personal, noncommercial uses, such as using a VCR to
record a television program for later viewing. Fair use also includes activities undertaken for purposes such as
criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship or research.
While stopping copyright infringement is an important policy objective, Section 1201 throws out the
baby of fair use with the bathwater of digital piracy. By employing technical protection measures to control
access to and use of copyrighted works, and using section 1201 litigation against anyone who tampers
with those measures, copyright owners can unilaterally eliminate fair use, re-writing the copyright bargain
developed by Congress and the courts over more than a century.
Copy-protected CDs
The introduction of "copy-protected" CDs into the marketplace illustrates the collision between fair use
and the DMCA. Record labels are aggressively incorporating "copy-protection" on new music
releases. Over 10 million copy-protected discs are already in circulation, according to Midbar Technology
Ltd, one of the vendors of copy-protection technology. Sony claims that it has released over 11 million copy-protected
discs worldwide. Universal Music Group has stated that all of its music CDs will incorporate copy-protection
by mid-2002.
Whatever the impact that these copy protection technologies may have on online infringement, they are
certain to interfere with the fair use expectations of consumers. For example, copy-protected discs will
disappoint the hundreds of thousands of consumers who have purchased MP3 players, despite the fact that
making an MP3 copy of a CD for personal use is a fair use. Making "mix CDs" or copies of CDs for the office
or car are other examples of fair uses that are potentially impaired by copy-protection technologies.
Companies that distribute tools to "repair" these dysfunctional CDs, restoring to consumers their fair
use privileges, run the risk of lawsuits under section 1201's ban on circumvention tools and technologies.
Rep. Rick Boucher, "Time to Rewrite the DMCA," CNET NEWS, Jan. 29, 2002.
http:// news. com. com/ 2010-1078-825335. html
Dan Gillmor, "Entertainment Industry's Copyright Fight Puts Consumers in Cross
Hairs," SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, Feb. 12, 2002.
http:// www. siliconvalley. com/ mld/ siliconvall ey/ 2658555. htm
Gwendolyn Mariano, "Copy-Protected CDs Slide Into Stores," CNET NEWS, Feb. 12,
2002. http:// news. com. com/ 2100-1023-
835841. html
Jon Iverson, "Every New CD to be Restricted?," STEREOPHILE, Oct. 1, 2001.
http:// www. stereophile. com/ shownews. cgi? 1 153
Jon Iverson, "A Universal CD Problem?," STEREOPHILE, Feb. 12, 2002.
http:// www. stereophile. com/ shownews. cgi? 1 261
Fair Use Tools Banned
We are entering an era where books, music and movies will increasingly be "copy-protected" and
otherwise restricted by technological means. Whether scholars, researchers, commentators and the public will
continue to be able to make legitimate fair uses of these works will depend upon the availability of tools to
bypass these digital locks.
The DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions, how-ever, prohibit the creation or distribution of these tools,
even if they are crucial to fair use. So, as copyright owners use technology to press into the 21st century,
the public will see more and more fair uses whittled away by digital locks allegedly intended to "prevent
piracy." Perhaps more importantly, no future fair uses will be developed-- after all, before the VCR, who
could have imagined that fair use "time-shifting" of television would become common-place for the
average consumer?
Copyright owners argue that these tools, in the hands of copyright infringers, can result in "Internet piracy."
But the traditional answer for piracy under copyright law has been to seek out and prosecute the infringers,
not to ban the tools that enable fair use. After all, photocopiers, VCRs, and CD-R burners can also be
misused, but no one would suggest that the public give them up simply because they might be used by others
to break the law. 5
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Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 6
DeCSS and DVD Copy Plus
Fair use tools have already been yanked off the market. In the Universal v. Reimerdes case, discussed
above, the court held that section 1201 bans DeCSS software. This software decrypts DVD movies, making
it possible to copy them to a PC. In another case, a company has filed a declaratory judgment action in San
Francisco after being threatened with DMCA liability by the MPAA for distributing DVD Copy Plus, which
enables DVD owners to make copies of DVD content.
There are lots of legitimate reasons to copy DVDs. Once the video is on the PC, for example, lots of fair
uses become possible-- film scholars can digitally analyze the film, travelers can load the movie into their
laptops, and parents can fast-forward through the commercials that open Disney films. Without the tools
necessary to copy DVDs, however, these fair uses become impossible.
Matthew Mirapaul, "They'll Always Have Paris (and the Web)," N. Y. TIMES at E2,
March 16, 2002.
Steven Bonisteel, "Firm Sues Movie Studios To Defend DVD-Copying Software,"
Newsbytes, April 23, 2002. http:// www. newsbytes. com/ news/ 02/ 17608
0. html
Advanced e-Book Processor and e-Books
The future of fair use for books is at issue in the criminal prosecution of Dmitry Sklyarov and
ElcomSoft. As discussed above, ElcomSoft produced and distributed a tool called the Advanced e-Book
Processor, which translates e-books from Adobe's e-Book format to Adobe's Portable Document Format
(" PDF"). This translation process removes the various restrictions (against copying, printing, text-to-speech
processing, etc.) that publishers can impose on e-Books. The program is designed to work only with
e-Books that have been lawfully purchased from sales outlets.
The Advanced e-Book Processor allows those who have legitimately purchased e-Books to make fair uses
of their e-Books, which would otherwise not be possible with the current Adobe e-Book format. For
instance, the program allows people to engage in the following activities, all of which are fair uses:
. read it on a laptop or computer other than the one on which the e-Book was first
downloaded;
. continue to access a work in the future, if the particular technological device for
which the e-Book was purchased becomes obsolete;
. print an e-Book on paper;
. read an e-Book on an alternative operating system such as Linux (Adobe's format
works only on Macs and Windows PCs);
. have a computer read an e-Book out loud using text-to-speech software, which is
particularly important for visually-impaired individuals.
EFF, Frequently Asked Questions re U. S. v. Sklyarov.
http:// www. eff. org/ IP/ DMCA/ US_ v_ Sklyar ov/ us_ v_ sklyarov_ faq. html
Time-shifting and Streaming Media
As more consumers receive audio and video content from "streaming" Internet media sources, they will
demand tools to preserve their settled fair use expectations, including the ability to "time-shift"
programming for later listening or viewing. As a result of the DMCA, however, the digital equivalents of
VCRs and cassette decks for streaming media may never arrive.
Start-up software company Streambox developed exactly such a product, known simply as the Streambox
VCR, designed to time-shift streaming media. When competitor RealNetworks discovered that Streambox
had developed a competing streaming media player, it invoked the DMCA and obtained an injunction against
the Streambox VCR product.
RealNetworks, Inc. v. Streambox, Inc., 2000 WL 127311 (W. D. Wash. Jan. 18, 2000).
The DMCA has also been invoked to threaten the developer of an open source, noncommercial software
application known as Streamripper that records MP3 audio streams for later listening.
Cease and desist letter from Kenneth Plevan on behalf of Live365. com to John Clegg,
developer of Streamripper, April 26, 2001. http:// streamripper. sourceforge. net/ dc. php
embed and Fonts
In January 2002, typeface vendor Agfa Monotype Corporation threatened a college student with DMCA
liability for creating "embed," a free, open source, noncommercial software program designed to
manipulate TrueType fonts.
According to the student: "I wrote embed in 1997, after discovering that all of my fonts disallowed
embedding in documents. Since my fonts are free, this was silly-- but I didn't want to take the time to...
change the flag, and then reset all of the extended font 6
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Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 7
properties with a separate program. What a bore! Instead, I wrote this program to convert all of my fonts
at once. The program is very simple; it just requires setting a few bits to zero. Indeed, I noticed that other
fonts that were licensed for unlimited distribution also disallowed embedding.... So, I put this program on the
web in hopes that it would help other font developers as well."
Attorneys for Agfa Monotype nevertheless have threatened the student author with DMCA liability for
distributing the program. According to Agfa, the fact that embed can be used to allow distribution of
protected fonts makes it contraband under Section 1201, notwithstanding the fact that the tool has many
legitimate uses in the hands of hobbyist font developers.
Tom Murphy, "embed: DMCA Threats." http:// www. andrew. cmu. edu/~ twm/ embed/
dmca. html
5. A threat to innovation and competition
The DMCA is being used to hinder the efforts of legitimate competitors to create interoperable products.
For example, Vivendi-Universal's Blizzard video game division invoked the DMCA in an effort to
intimidate the developers of a software product derived from legitimate reverse engineering. Sony has used the
DMCA to threaten hobbyists who created competing software for Sony's Aibo robot dog, as well as to sue
makers of software that permits the playing of Playstation games on PCs. In each of these cases, the
DMCA was used to deter a marketplace competitor, rather than to battle piracy.
Sony Sues Connectix and Bleem
Since the DMCA's enactment in 1998, Sony has used DMCA litigation to pressure competitors who created
software that would allow PC owners to play games intended for the Sony Playstation video game console.
In 1999, Sony sued Connectix Corporation, the manufacturer of the Virtual Game Station, an emulator
program which allowed Sony Playstation games to be played on Apple Macintosh computers. Sony also sued
Bleem, the leading vendor of Playstation emulator software for Windows PCs.
In both cases, the Sony competitors had created their products by engaging in legitimate reverse engineering,
which has been recognized as noninfringing fair use in a series of Ninth Circuit cases. Connectix, in fact,
ultimately won a Ninth Circuit ruling that its reverse engineering was indeed fair use. 7 Both Connectix and
Bleem, however, were unable to bear the high costs of litigation against Sony and ultimately were forced to
pull their products off the market. Whatever the merits
of Sony's position may have been under copyright, trademark, patent, or other legal theories, the
competitive efforts of Connectix and Bleem certainly were at a far remove from the "black box" piracy
devices that Congress meant to target with section 1201.
Pamela Samuelson, "Intellectual Property and the Digital Economy: Why the Anti-Circumvention
Regulations Need to be Revised," 14 BERKELEY TECHNOLOGY L. J.
519, 556 (1999) (discussing the Connectix case).
http:// www. sims. berkeley. edu/~ pam/ papers. html
Testimony of Jonathan Hangartner on behalf of Bleem, Library of Congress, Hearing on
DMCA, Stanford University, May 19, 2000, pp. 221-28.
http:// www. loc. gov/ copyright/ 1201/ hearing s/ 1201-519. pdf
Sony Threatens Aibo Hobbyist
Sony has also invoked the DMCA against a hobbyist who developed custom programs for Sony's Aibo
robotic "pet" dog. The hobbyist cracked the encryption surrounding the source code that manipulates the Aibo
to reverse engineer programs that allow owners to customize voice recognition by their Aibos. The
hobbyist revealed neither the decrypted source code nor the code he used to defeat the encryption, freely
distributed his custom programs, and made no profit. Nevertheless, Sony claimed that the act of circum-venting
the encryption surrounding the source code violated the DMCA and demanded that the hobbyist
remove his programs from his website.
Responding to public outcry, Sony ultimately permitted the hobbyist to repost some of his programs
(on the understanding that Sony will have the rights of commercial development in the programs). The
incident, however, illustrated Sony's willingness to invoke the DMCA in situations with no relationship to
"piracy."
David Labrador, "Teaching Robot Dogs New Tricks," SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, Feb. 12,
2002. http:// www. sciam. com/ explorations/ 2002/ 0
12102aibo/
Blizzard Pursues bnetd. org
Section 1201 has been brandished by Vivendi-Universal's Blizzard Entertainment video game division
in an attempt to intimidate a group of volunteer game enthusiasts who created open source server software
called "bnetd" that provides Internet gaming 7
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Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 8
enthusiasts with an alternative to the servers operated by Blizzard.
The bnetd software permits owners of Blizzard games to play multiplayer games against each other
over the Internet. Blizzard runs its own servers, known as "Battle. net," which it makes available free of charge
to allow its games to be played across the Internet. The group of volunteer programmers decided to create
bnetd to overcome difficulties that they had experienced in attempting to use Battle. net. The bnetd
software is freely distributed, open source, and non-commercial.
In February 2002, Blizzard invoked the DMCA in an effort to have bnetd pulled off the Internet. Blizzard
sent a "cease and desist" letter to the ISP that hosts the bnetd website, claiming that the bnetd software
violated section 1201.
Blizzard contends that the bnetd software has been used by some to permit networked play of pirated
Blizzard games. Whether or not that contention is true, the developers are not using the software for that
purpose, nor was the software designed for such a purpose. The software has numerous legitimate uses
for owners of Blizzard games. As a result, whatever else may be said about the bnetd software, it is plainly not a
"black box" piracy device.
Ultimately, Blizzard filed suit in St. Louis to bar distribution of bnetd. Tellingly, however, Blizzard
chose not to press a DMCA claim in the lawsuit, opting instead for traditional copyright and trademark claims.
(EFF is representing the bnetd developers.) Blizzard's willingness to use the DMCA in pre-litigation threats,
however, demonstrates its chilling potential in the hands of copyright owners intent on hindering
competitors, rather than stopping piracy.
David Becker, "Group Backs ISP in Online Gaming Dispute", CNET NEWS, March 12,
2002. http:// news. com. com/ 2100-1040-
858414. html
Legal correspondence on bnetd website. http:// www. bnetd. org/ case_ letters. php
Sony's Attack on Playstation "Mod Chips"
Apart from using the DMCA against vendors of personal computer emulators of Sony's Playstation,
Sony has sued a number of manufacturers of so-called "mod chips" for alleged circumvention under the
DMCA. In doing so, Sony has been able to enforce a system of geographical regional restrictions that raises
significant anticompetitive issues.
So-called "mod chips" are after-market accessories that modify Playstation consoles to permit games
legitimately purchased in one part of the world to be played on a games console from another geographical
region. Sony has sued mod chip manufacturers in the U. S., the U. K., and Australia. In the U. S., Sony sued
Gamemasters, Inc., distributor of the Game Enhancer peripheral device, which allowed U. S. Playtstation users
to play games purchased in Japan and other countries. Although there was no infringement of Sony's
copyright, the court granted an injunction under the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions, effectively
banning the use of a technology that would permit users to use legitimately-purchased non-infringing
games from other regions.
Recognizing the anti-competitive potential of the region playback control system, the Australian anti-trust
authority, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), has intervened in a
lawsuit that Sony is pursuing against an Australian mod chip manufacturer under the Australian equivalent of
the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions. The ACCC argues that Australian consumers should be
permitted to use personally imported games discs not otherwise available in Australia, or available only at a
significantly higher price.
Sony has argued that mod chips can also be used to enable the use of unauthorized copies of Playstation
games. But most Playstation mod chips are not "black box" devices suitable only for piracy. The potential
illegitimate uses must be weighed against legitimate uses, such as defeating Sony's region coding system to
play games purchased in other countries.
"Sony Playstation ruling sets far-reaching precedent," NEW SCIENTIST, Feb. 22, 2002
(http:// www. newscientist. com/ news/ news. js p? id= ns99991933).
Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc. v. Gamemasters, 87 F. Supp. 2d 976 (N. D. Cal.
1999).
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission Press Release, "ACCC Defends
the Rights of Playstation Owners," Feb. 8, 2002.
(http:// 203.6. 251.7/ accc. internet/ digest/ view _media. cfm? RecordID= 595).
6. Conclusion
Three years of experience with the "anti-circumvention" provisions of the DMCA demonstrate
that the statute reaches too far, chilling a wide variety of legitimate activities in ways Congress did not intend.
As an increasing number of copyright works are wrapped in technological protection measures, it is
likely that the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions will be applied in further unforeseen contexts, 8
8 Page 9
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 9
hindering the legitimate activities of innovators, researchers, the press, and the public at large.
1 For examples of Congress' stated purpose in enacting the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions, see 144 Cong. Rec.
H7093, H7094-5 (Aug. 4, 1998); Senate Judiciary Comm., S. Rep. 105-190 (1998) at 29; Judiciary Comm., H. Rep. 105-551 Pt 1 (1998) at 18; House Commerce Comm., H. Rep. 105-551 Pt 2 (1998) at 38.
2 See WIPO Copyright Treaties Implementation Act and Online Copyright Liability Limitation Act: Hearing on H. R. 2281 and H. R.
2280 before the House Subcomm. on Courts and Intellectual Prop., 105th Cong., 1st sess. (Sept. 16, 1997) at 62 (testimony of Asst. Sec. of Commerce and Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks Bruce A. Lehman admitting that section 1201
went beyond the requirements of the WIPO Copyright Treaty).
3 For a full description of the events leading up to the enactment of the DMCA, see Jessica Litman, DIGITAL COPYRIGHT
89-150 (2000).
4 See Pamela Samuelson, Intellectual Property and the Digital Economy: Why the Anti-Circumvention Regulations Need to be Revised,
14 BERKELEY TECHNOLOGY L. J. 519, 537-57 (1999) (http:// www. sims. berkeley. edu/~ pam/ papers. html)
5 See Professor Ross Anderson, Cambridge University, Declaration in Felten v. RIAA (Oct. 22, 2001), describing ways in
which the DCMA is suppressing research into security weaknesses in SDMI watermarking technology: (http:// www. eff. org/ IP/ DMCA/ Felten_ v_ RIAA/ 20011022_ anderson_ decl. pdf).
6 111 F. Supp. 2d. 294 (S. D. N. Y. 2000), aff'd 273 F. 3d 429 (2d Cir. 2001).
7 Sony Computer Entertainment, Inc. v. Connectix Corporation, 203 F. 3d 596 (9th Cir. 2000). 9
Either the techies don't have a lot of money, or people don't care enough to take this to the Supreme Court to get this stupid law ruled on. I don't have the moeny or the time, but someone has too.
Avoid The Rush, Hate OU Early!!!
"In the Universal v. Reimerdes case, discussed above, the court held that section 1201 bans DeCSS software. This software decrypts DVD movies, making it possible to copy them to a PC." (Italics Mine)
You've always been able to copy them. It's PLAYING them that's been the problem. If even the EFF can be confused on this point, what chance do we have to get Joe American to understand?
Nipok Nek
Why choose white shoes?
Ugh, they use PDF for it, too. This is too new for google--somebody got a HTML mirror? I'm not going to install Acrobat to read about how Adobe is abusing US laws to punish people who find holes in their lousy 'secure' formats
--
Benjamin Coates
p.s. to lawyers: this post is opinion and not fact.
Which, if anything, is an indicator on where things are going.
Welcome to the world of Max Headroom!
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
OMG. I had a lot of beer last night. I mean, a LOT of beer.
Then I had two cups of coffee just now.
Do I really need to tell you what happened next? Lets just say my toilet will never be the same.
In spring 2000, Microsoft invoked the DMCA against the Internet publication forum Slashdot, demanding that forum moderators delete materials relating to Microsoft's proprietary implementation of an open security standard known as Kerberos. In the Slashdot forum, several individuals alleged that Microsoft had changed the open, non-proprietary Kerberos specification in order to prevent non- Microsoft servers from interacting with Windows 2000. Many speculated that this move was intended to force users to purchase Microsoft server software. Although Microsoft responded to this criticism by publishing its Kerberos specification, it conditioned access to the specification on agreement to a "click-wrap" license agreement that expressly forbade disclosure of the specification without Microsoft's prior consent. Slashdot posters responded by republishing the Microsoft specification. Microsoft then invoked the DMCA, demanding that Slashdot remove the republished specifications. In the words of Georgetown law professor Julie Cohen, "If Microsoft's interpretation of the DMCA's ban on circumvention technologies is right, then it doesn't seem to matter much whether posting unauthorized copies of the Microsoft Kerberos specification would be a fair use. A publisher can prohibit fair-use commentary simply by implementing access and disclosure restrictions that bind the entire public. Anyone who discloses the information, or even tells others how to get it, is a felon."
And who says Slashdotters are afraid to stand up against the big guys.
>
It is ironic that they released in a PDF format and note that Abode is using the DMCA to "hurt" people.
Opps?
To some degree the common man is more worried about employment, terrorism, war in the Middle East. When the press (which is largely owned by companies just happy as hell with the DMCA) tells the common man it's a bad thing, then he'll care. Don't see that happening, do you?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I never thought I would see klerck whoring karma... Isnt this page too narrow for you?
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 1 v.1.0 (May 3, 2002) for latest version, visit www.eff.org Unintended Consequences: Three Years under the DMCA 1. Executive Summary Since they were enacted in 1998, the "anticircumvention" provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA"), codified in section 1201 of the Copyright Act, have not been used as Congress envisioned. Congress meant to stop copyright pirates from defeating anti-piracy protections added to copyrighted works, and to ban "black box" devices intended for that purpose.1 In practice, the anti-circumvention provisions have been used to stifle a wide array of legitimate activities, rather than to stop copyright piracy. As a result, the DMCA has developed into a serious threat to three important public policy priorities: Section 1201 Chills Free Expression and Scientific Research. Experience with section 1201 demonstrates that it is being used to stifle free speech and scientific research. The lawsuit against 2600 magazine, threats against Princeton Professor Edward Felten's team of researchers, and prosecution of Russian programmer Dmitry Sklyarov have chilled the legitimate activities of journalists, publishers, scientists, students, programmers, and members of the public. Section 1201 Jeopardizes Fair Use. By banning all acts of circumvention, and all technologies and tools that can be used for circumvention, section 1201 grants to copyright owners the power to unilaterally eliminate the public's fair use rights. Already, the music industry has begun deploying "copy-protected CDs" that promise to curtail consumers' ability to make legitimate, personal copies of music they have purchased. Section 1201 Impedes Competition and Innovation. Rather than focusing on pirates, many copyright owners have chosen to use the DMCA to hinder their legitimate competitors. For example, Sony has invoked section 1201 to protect their monopoly on Playstation video game consoles, as well as their "regionalization" system limiting users in one country from playing games legitimately purchased in another. This document collects a number of reported cases where the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA have been invoked not against pirates, but against consumers, scientists, and legitimate competitors. It will be updated from time to time as additional cases come to light. The latest version can always be obtained at www.eff.org. 2. DMCA Legislative Background Congress enacted section 1201 in response to two pressures. First, Congress was responding to the perceived need to implement obligations imposed on the U.S. by the 1996 World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty. Section 1201, however, went further than the WIPO treaty required.2 The details of section 1201, then, were a response not just to U.S. treaty obligations, but also to the concerns of copyright owners that their works would be widely pirated in the networked digital world.3 Section 1201 contains two distinct prohibitions: a ban on acts of circumvention, as well as a ban on the distribution of tools and technologies used for circumvention. The first prohibition, set out in section 1201(a)(1), prohibits the act of circumventing a technological measure used by copyright owners to control access to their works ("access controls"). So, for example, this provision makes it unlawful to defeat the encryption system used on DVD movies. This ban on acts of circumvention applies even where the purpose for decrypting the movie would otherwise be legitimate. As a result, if a Disney DVD prevents you from fastforwarding through the commercials that preface the feature presentation, efforts to circumvent this restriction would be unlawful. Second, sections 1201(a)(2) and 1201(b) outlaw the manufacture, sale, distribution or trafficking of tools and technologies that make circumvention possible. These provisions ban not only technologies that defeat access controls, but also technologies that defeat use restrictions imposed by copyright owners, such as copy Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 2 controls. These provisions prevent technology vendors from taking steps to defeat the "copy-protection" now appearing on many music CDs, for example. Section 1201 also includes a number of exceptions for certain limited classes of activities, including security testing, reverse engineering of software, encryption research, and law enforcement. These exceptions have been extensively criticized as being too narrow to be of real use to the constituencies who they were intended to assist.4 A violation of any of the "act" or "tools" prohibitions is subject to significant civil and, in some circumstances, criminal penalties. 3. Free Expression and Scientific Research Section 1201 is being used by a number of copyright owners to stifle free speech and legitimate scientific research. The lawsuit against 2600 magazine, threats against Princeton Professor Edward Felten's team of researchers, and prosecution of the Russian programmer Dmitry Sklyarov have imposed a chill on a variety of legitimate activities. For example, online service providers and bulletin board operators have begun to censor discussions of copy-protection systems, programmers have removed computer security programs from their websites, and students, scientists and security experts have stopped publishing details of their research on existing security protocols. Foreign scientists are also increasingly uneasy about traveling to the United States out of fear of possible DMCA liability, and certain technical conferences have begun to relocate overseas. These developments will ultimately result in weakened security for all computer users (including, ironically, for copyright owners counting on technical measures to protect their works), as security researchers shy away from research that might run afoul of section 1201.5 Professor Felten's Research Team Threatened In September 2000, a multi-industry group known as the Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMI) issued a public challenge encouraging skilled technologists to try to defeat certain watermarking technologies intended to protect digital music. Princeton Professor Edward Felten and a team of researchers at Princeton, Rice, and Xerox took up the challenge and succeeded in removing the watermarks. When the team tried to present their results at an academic conference, however, SDMI representatives threatened the researchers with liability under the DMCA. The threat letter was also delivered to the researchers' employers, as well as the conference organizers. After extensive discussions with counsel, the researchers grudgingly withdrew their paper from the conference. The threat was ultimately withdrawn and a portion of the research published at a subsequent conference, but only after the researchers filed a lawsuit in federal court. After enduring this experience, at least one of the researchers involved has decided to forgo further research efforts in this field. Pamela Samuelson, "Anticircumvention Rules: Threat to Science," 293 SCIENCE 2028, Sept. 14, 2001. http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/reprint/293 /5537/20 28
Letter from Matthew Oppenheim, SDMI
General Counsel, to Prof. Edward Felten,
April 9, 2001.
http://cryptome.org/sdmi-attack.htm
Dmitry Sklyarov Arrested
Beginning in July 2001, Russian programmer Dmitry
Sklyarov was jailed for several weeks and detained for
five months in the United States after speaking at the
DEFCON conference in Las Vegas.
Prosecutors, prompted by software goliath Adobe
Systems Inc., alleged that Sklyarov had worked on a
software program known as the Advanced e-Book
Processor, which was distributed over the Internet by
his Russian employer, ElcomSoft Co. Ltd. The
software allowed owners of Adobe electronic books
("e-books") to convert them from Adobe's e-Book
format into Adobe Portable Document Format ("pdf")
files, thereby removing restrictions embedded into the
files by e-Book publishers.
Sklyarov was never accused of infringing any
copyrighted e-Book, nor of assisting anyone else to
infringe copyrights. His alleged crime was working on a
software tool with many legitimate uses, simply because
third parties he has never met might use the tool to
copy an e-Book without the publisher's permission.
In December 2001, under an agreement with the
Department of Justice, Sklyarov was allowed to return
home. The Department of Justice, however, is
continuing to prosecute his employer, ElcomSoft,
under the criminal provisions of the DMCA.
Lawrence Lessig, "Jail Time in the Digital
Age," N.Y. TIMES at A7, July 30, 2001.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/07/30/opini
on/30LESS.html
Jennifer 8 Lee, "U.S. Arrests Russian
Cryptographer as Copyright Violator," N.Y.
TIMES at C8, July 18, 2001.
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 3
Scientists and Programmers Withhold Research
Following the legal threat against Professor Felten's
research team and the arrest of Dmitry Sklyarov, a
number of prominent computer security experts have
curtailed their legitimate research activities out of fear
of potential DMCA liability.
For example, prominent Dutch cryptographer and
security systems analyst Neils Ferguson discovered a
major security flaw in an Intel video encryption system
known as High Bandwidth Digital Content Protection
(HDCP). He declined to publish his results and
removed all references on his website relating to flaws
in HDCP, on the grounds that he travels frequently to
the U.S. and is fearful of "prosecution and/or liability
under the U.S. DMCA law."
Neils Ferguson, "Censorship in Action: Why I
Don't Publish My HDCP Results," Aug. 15,
2001.
http://www.macfergus.com/niels/dmca/cia.
html
Neils Ferguson, Declaration in Felten & Ors v
R.I.A.A. case, Aug. 13, 2001.
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/Felten_v_RI
AA/20010813_ferguson_decl.html
Lisa M. Bowman, "Researchers Weigh
Publication, Prosecution," CNET NEWS,
Aug. 15, 2001.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-
6886574.html
Following the arrest of Dmitry Sklyarov, Fred
Cohen, a professor of digital forensics and respected
security consultant, removed his "Forensix" evidencegathering
software from his website, citing fear of
potential DMCA liability.
Another respected network security protection
expert, Dug Song, also removed content from his
website for the same reason. Mr. Song is the author of
several security papers, including a paper describing a
common vulnerability in many firewalls.
Robert Lemos, "Security Workers: Copyright
Law Stifles," CNET NEWS, Sept. 6, 2001.
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-
272716.html
In mid-2001 an anonymous programmer discovered
a vulnerability in Microsoft's proprietary e-Book digital
rights management code, but refused to publish the
results, citing DMCA liability concerns.
Wade Roush, "Breaking Microsoft's e-Book
Code," TECHNOLOGY REVIEW at 24,
November 2001.
http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/i
nnovation11101.asp
Foreign Scientists Avoid U.S.
Foreign scientists have expressed concerns about
traveling to the U.S. following the arrest of Russian
programmer Dmitry Sklyarov. Some foreign scientists
have advocated boycotting conferences held in the U.S.
and a number of conference bodies have decided to
move their conferences to non-U.S. locations. Russia
has issued a travel warning to Russian programmers
traveling to the U.S.
Highly respected British Linux programmer Alan
Cox resigned from the USENIX committee of the
Advanced Computing Systems Association, the
committee that organizes many of the U.S. computing
conferences, because of his concerns about traveling to
the U.S. Cox has urged USENIX to hold its annual
conference offshore. The International Information
Hiding Workshop Conference, the conference at which
Professor Felten's team intended to present its original
paper, has chosen to hold all of its future conferences
outside of the U.S. following the SDMI threat to
Professor Felten and his team.
Will Knight, "Computer Scientists boycott US
over digital copyright law," NEW SCIENTIST,
July 23, 2001.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp
?id=ns00001063
Alan Cox of Red Hat UK Ltd, declaration in
Felten v. RIAA, Aug. 13, 2001.
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/Felten_v_RI
AA/20010813_cox_decl.html
Jennifer 8 Lee, "Travel Advisory for Russian
Programmers," N.Y. TIMES at C4, Sept.10,
2001.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/10/techn
ology/10WARN.html?searchpv=past7days
IEEE Wrestles with DMCA
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
(IEEE), which publishes 30 per cent of all computer
science journals worldwide, recently was drawn into the
controversy surrounding science and the DMCA.
Apparently concerned about possible liability under
Section 1201, the IEEE in November 2001 instituted a
policy requiring all authors to indemnify IEEE for any
liabilities incurred should a submission result in legal
action under the DCMA.
After an outcry from IEEE members, the organization
ultimately revised its submission policies, removing
mention of the DMCA. According to Bill Hagen,
manager of IEEE Intellectual Property Rights, "The
Digital Millennium Copyright Act has become a very
sensitive subject among our authors. It's intended to
protect digital content, but its application in some
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 4
specific cases appears to have alienated large segments
of the research community."
IEEE press release, "IEEE to Revise New
Copyright Form to Address Author
Concerns," April 22, 2002.
http://www.ieee.org/newsinfo/dmca.html
Will Knight, "Controversial Copyright Clause
Abandoned," NEW SCIENTIST, April 15, 2002.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp
?id=ns99992169
2600 Magazine Censored
The Universal City Studios v. Reimerdes case6 illustrates
the chilling effect that section 1201 has had on the
freedom of the press.
In that case, eight major motion picture companies
brought a DMCA suit against 2600 magazine seeking to
block it from publishing the DeCSS software program,
which defeats the encryption used on DVD movies.
2600 had made the program available on its web site in
the course of ongoing coverage of the controversy
surrounding the DMCA. The magazine was not
involved in the development of software, nor was it
accused of having used the software for any copyright
infringement.
Notwithstanding the First Amendment's guarantee
of a free press, the district court permanently barred
2600 from publishing, or even linking to, the DeCSS
software code. In November 2001, the Second Circuit
Court of Appeals upheld the lower court decision.
In essence, the movie studios effectively obtained a
"stop the presses" order banning the publication of
truthful information by a news publication concerning
a matter of public concern--an unprecedented
curtailment of well-established First Amendment principles.
Carl S. Kaplan, "Questioning Continues in
Copyright Suit," N.Y. TIMES, May 4, 2001.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/04/techn
ology/04CYBERLAW.html
Simson Garfinkel, "The Net Effect: The
DVD Rebellion," TECHNOLOGY REVIEW at
25, July/Aug. 2001.
http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/g
arfinkel0701.asp
Xenia P. Kobylarz, "DVD Case Clash--Free
Speech Advocates Say Copyright Owners
Want to Lock Up Ideas; Encryption Code is
Key," S.F. DAILY JOURNAL, May 1, 2001.
Microsoft Threatens Slashdot
In spring 2000, Microsoft invoked the DMCA
against the Internet publication forum Slashdot,
demanding that forum moderators delete materials
relating to Microsoft's proprietary implementation of
an open security standard known as Kerberos.
In the Slashdot forum, several individuals alleged
that Microsoft had changed the open, non-proprietary
Kerberos specification in order to prevent non-
Microsoft servers from interacting with Windows 2000.
Many speculated that this move was intended to force
users to purchase Microsoft server software. Although
Microsoft responded to this criticism by publishing its
Kerberos specification, it conditioned access to the
specification on agreement to a "click-wrap" license
agreement that expressly forbade disclosure of the
specification without Microsoft's prior consent.
Slashdot posters responded by republishing the
Microsoft specification. Microsoft then invoked the
DMCA, demanding that Slashdot remove the
republished specifications.
In the words of Georgetown law professor Julie
Cohen, "If Microsoft's interpretation of the DMCA's
ban on circumvention technologies is right, then it
doesn't seem to matter much whether posting
unauthorized copies of the Microsoft Kerberos
specification would be a fair use. A publisher can
prohibit fair-use commentary simply by implementing
access and disclosure restrictions that bind the entire
public. Anyone who discloses the information, or even
tells others how to get it, is a felon."
Julie Cohen, "Call it the Digital Millennium
Censorship Act - Unfair Use," THE NEW
REPUBLIC, May 23, 2000.
http://www.thenewrepublic.com/cyberspace /cohen052 300.html
AVSforum.com Censors TiVo Discussion
The specter of DMCA litigation has chilled speech
on smaller web bulletin boards, as well. In June 2001,
for example, the administrator of AVSforum.com, a
popular forum where TiVo digital video recorder
owners discuss TiVo features, censored all discussion
about a software program that allegedly permitted TiVo
users to move video from their TiVos to their personal
computers. In the words of the forum administrator,
"My fear with this is more or less I have no clue what is
a protected system on the TiVo box under copyright
(or what-have-you) and what is not. Thus my fear for
the site."
Lisa M. Bowman, "TiVo Forum Hushes
Hacking Discussion," CNET NEWS, June 11,
2001.
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 5
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-
6249739.html
4. Fair Use Under Siege
"Fair use" is a crucial element in American copyright
law--the principle that the public is entitled, without
having to ask permission, to use copyrighted works so
long as these uses do not unduly interfere with the
copyright owner's market for a work. Fair uses include
personal, noncommercial uses, such as using a VCR to
record a television program for later viewing. Fair use
also includes activities undertaken for purposes such as
criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching,
scholarship or research.
While stopping copyright infringement is an
important policy objective, Section 1201 throws out the
baby of fair use with the bathwater of digital piracy. By
employing technical protection measures to control
access to and use of copyrighted works, and using
section 1201 litigation against anyone who tampers
with those measures, copyright owners can unilaterally
eliminate fair use, re-writing the copyright bargain
developed by Congress and the courts over more than
a century.
Copy-protected CDs
The introduction of "copy-protected" CDs into the
marketplace illustrates the collision between fair use
and the DMCA. Record labels are aggressively
incorporating "copy-protection" on new music
releases. Over 10 million copy-protected discs are
already in circulation, according to Midbar Technology
Ltd, one of the vendors of copy-protection technology.
Sony claims that it has released over 11 million copyprotected
discs worldwide. Universal Music Group has
stated that all of its music CDs will incorporate copyprotection
by mid-2002.
Whatever the impact that these copy protection
technologies may have on online infringement, they are
certain to interfere with the fair use expectations of
consumers. For example, copy-protected discs will
disappoint the hundreds of thousands of consumers
who have purchased MP3 players, despite the fact that
making an MP3 copy of a CD for personal use is a fair
use. Making "mix CDs" or copies of CDs for the office
or car are other examples of fair uses that are
potentially impaired by copy-protection technologies.
Companies that distribute tools to "repair" these
dysfunctional CDs, restoring to consumers their fair
use privileges, run the risk of lawsuits under section
1201's ban on circumvention tools and technologies.
Rep. Rick Boucher, "Time to Rewrite the
DMCA," CNET NEWS, Jan. 29, 2002.
http://news.com.com/2010-1078-
825335.html
Dan Gillmor, "Entertainment Industry's
Copyright Fight Puts Consumers in Cross
Hairs," SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, Feb. 12,
2002.
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvall
ey/2658555.htm
Gwendolyn Mariano, "Copy-Protected CDs
Slide Into Stores," CNET NEWS, Feb. 12,
2002.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-
835841.html
Jon Iverson, "Every New CD to be
Restricted?," STEREOPHILE, Oct. 1, 2001.
http://www.stereophile.com/shownews.cgi?1
153
Jon Iverson, "A Universal CD Problem?,"
STEREOPHILE, Feb. 12, 2002.
http://www.stereophile.com/shownews.cgi?1
261
Fair Use Tools Banned
We are entering an era where books, music and
movies will increasingly be "copy-protected" and
otherwise restricted by technological means. Whether
scholars, researchers, commentators and the public will
continue to be able to make legitimate fair uses of these
works will depend upon the availability of tools to
bypass these digital locks.
The DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions, however,
prohibit the creation or distribution of these tools,
even if they are crucial to fair use. So, as copyright
owners use technology to press into the 21st century,
the public will see more and more fair uses whittled
away by digital locks allegedly intended to "prevent
piracy." Perhaps more importantly, no future fair uses
will be developed--after all, before the VCR, who
could have imagined that fair use "time-shifting" of
television would become common-place for the
average consumer?
Copyright owners argue that these tools, in the hands
of copyright infringers, can result in "Internet piracy."
But the traditional answer for piracy under copyright
law has been to seek out and prosecute the infringers,
not to ban the tools that enable fair use. After all,
photocopiers, VCRs, and CD-R burners can also be
misused, but no one would suggest that the public give
them up simply because they might be used by others
to break the law.
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 6
DeCSS and DVD Copy Plus
Fair use tools have already been yanked off the
market. In the Universal v. Reimerdes case, discussed
above, the court held that section 1201 bans DeCSS
software. This software decrypts DVD movies, making
it possible to copy them to a PC. In another case, a
company has filed a declaratory judgment action in San
Francisco after being threatened with DMCA liability
by the MPAA for distributing DVD Copy Plus, which
enables DVD owners to make copies of DVD content.
There are lots of legitimate reasons to copy DVDs.
Once the video is on the PC, for example, lots of fair
uses become possible--film scholars can digitally
analyze the film, travelers can load the movie into their
laptops, and parents can fast-forward through the
commercials that open Disney films. Without the tools
necessary to copy DVDs, however, these fair uses
become impossible.
Matthew Mirapaul, "They'll Always Have
Paris (and the Web)," N.Y. TIMES at E2,
March 16, 2002.
Steven Bonisteel, "Firm Sues Movie Studios
To Defend DVD-Copying Software,"
Newsbytes, April 23, 2002.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/17608
0.html
Advanced e-Book Processor and e-Books
The future of fair use for books is at issue in the
criminal prosecution of Dmitry Sklyarov and
ElcomSoft. As discussed above, ElcomSoft produced
and distributed a tool called the Advanced e-Book
Processor, which translates e-books from Adobe's
e-Book format to Adobe's Portable Document Format
("PDF"). This translation process removes the various
restrictions (against copying, printing, text-to-speech
processing, etc.) that publishers can impose on
e-Books. The program is designed to work only with
e-Books that have been lawfully purchased from sales
outlets.
The Advanced e-Book Processor allows those who
have legitimately purchased e-Books to make fair uses
of their e-Books, which would otherwise not be
possible with the current Adobe e-Book format. For
instance, the program allows people to engage in the
following activities, all of which are fair uses:
read it on a laptop or computer other than
the one on which the e-Book was first
downloaded;
continue to access a work in the future, if
the particular technological device for
which the e-Book was purchased becomes
obsolete;
print an e-Book on paper;
read an e-Book on an alternative operating
system such as Linux (Adobe's format
works only on Macs and Windows PCs);
have a computer read an e-Book out loud
using text-to-speech software, which is
particularly important for visually-impaired
individuals.
EFF, Frequently Asked Questions re U.S. v.
Sklyarov.
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/US_v_Sklyar
ov/us_v_sklyarov_faq.html
Time-shifting and Streaming Media
As more consumers receive audio and video content
from "streaming" Internet media sources, they will
demand tools to preserve their settled fair use
expectations, including the ability to "time-shift"
programming for later listening or viewing. As a result
of the DMCA, however, the digital equivalents of
VCRs and cassette decks for streaming media may
never arrive.
Start-up software company Streambox developed
exactly such a product, known simply as the Streambox
VCR, designed to time-shift streaming media. When
competitor RealNetworks discovered that Streambox
had developed a competing streaming media player, it
invoked the DMCA and obtained an injunction against
the Streambox VCR product.
RealNetworks, Inc. v. Streambox, Inc., 2000 WL
127311 (W.D. Wash. Jan. 18, 2000).
The DMCA has also been invoked to threaten the
developer of an open source, noncommercial software
application known as Streamripper that records MP3
audio streams for later listening.
Cease and desist letter from Kenneth Plevan
on behalf of Live365.com to John Clegg,
developer of Streamripper, April 26, 2001.
http://streamripper.sourceforge.net/dc.php
embed and Fonts
In January 2002, typeface vendor Agfa Monotype
Corporation threatened a college student with DMCA
liability for creating "embed," a free, open source,
noncommercial software program designed to
manipulate TrueType fonts.
According to the student: "I wrote embed in 1997,
after discovering that all of my fonts disallowed
embedding in documents. Since my fonts are free, this
was silly--but I didn't want to take the time to...
change the flag, and then reset all of the extended font
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 7
properties with a separate program. What a bore!
Instead, I wrote this program to convert all of my fonts
at once. The program is very simple; it just requires
setting a few bits to zero. Indeed, I noticed that other
fonts that were licensed for unlimited distribution also
disallowed embedding.... So, I put this program on the
web in hopes that it would help other font developers
as well."
Attorneys for Agfa Monotype nevertheless have
threatened the student author with DMCA liability for
distributing the program. According to Agfa, the fact
that embed can be used to allow distribution of
protected fonts makes it contraband under Section
1201, notwithstanding the fact that the tool has many
legitimate uses in the hands of hobbyist font
developers.
Tom Murphy, "embed: DMCA Threats."
http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/~twm/embed/
dmca.html
5. A threat to innovation and competition
The DMCA is being used to hinder the efforts of
legitimate competitors to create interoperable products.
For example, Vivendi-Universal's Blizzard video
game division invoked the DMCA in an effort to
intimidate the developers of a software product derived
from legitimate reverse engineering. Sony has used the
DMCA to threaten hobbyists who created competing
software for Sony's Aibo robot dog, as well as to sue
makers of software that permits the playing of
Playstation games on PCs. In each of these cases, the
DMCA was used to deter a marketplace competitor,
rather than to battle piracy.
Sony Sues Connectix and Bleem
Since the DMCA's enactment in 1998, Sony has used
DMCA litigation to pressure competitors who created
software that would allow PC owners to play games
intended for the Sony Playstation video game console.
In 1999, Sony sued Connectix Corporation, the
manufacturer of the Virtual Game Station, an emulator
program which allowed Sony Playstation games to be
played on Apple Macintosh computers. Sony also sued
Bleem, the leading vendor of Playstation emulator
software for Windows PCs.
In both cases, the Sony competitors had created their
products by engaging in legitimate reverse engineering,
which has been recognized as noninfringing fair use in
a series of Ninth Circuit cases. Connectix, in fact,
ultimately won a Ninth Circuit ruling that its reverse
engineering was indeed fair use.7 Both Connectix and
Bleem, however, were unable to bear the high costs of
litigation against Sony and ultimately were forced to
pull their products off the market. Whatever the merits
of Sony's position may have been under copyright,
trademark, patent, or other legal theories, the
competitive efforts of Connectix and Bleem certainly
were at a far remove from the "black box" piracy
devices that Congress meant to target with section
1201.
Pamela Samuelson, "Intellectual Property and
the Digital Economy: Why the Anti-
Circumvention Regulations Need to be
Revised," 14 BERKELEY TECHNOLOGY L.J.
519, 556 (1999) (discussing the Connectix
case).
http://www.sims.berkeley.edu/~pam/papers.
html
Testimony of Jonathan Hangartner on behalf
of Bleem, Library of Congress, Hearing on
DMCA, Stanford University, May 19, 2000,
pp. 221-28.
http://www.loc.gov/copyright/1201/hearing
s/1201-519.pdf
Sony Threatens Aibo Hobbyist
Sony has also invoked the DMCA against a hobbyist
who developed custom programs for Sony's Aibo
robotic "pet" dog. The hobbyist cracked the encryption
surrounding the source code that manipulates the Aibo
to reverse engineer programs that allow owners to
customize voice recognition by their Aibos. The
hobbyist revealed neither the decrypted source code
nor the code he used to defeat the encryption, freely
distributed his custom programs, and made no profit.
Nevertheless, Sony claimed that the act of circumventing
the encryption surrounding the source code
violated the DMCA and demanded that the hobbyist
remove his programs from his website.
Responding to public outcry, Sony ultimately
permitted the hobbyist to repost some of his programs
(on the understanding that Sony will have the rights of
commercial development in the programs). The
incident, however, illustrated Sony's willingness to
invoke the DMCA in situations with no relationship to
"piracy."
David Labrador, "Teaching Robot Dogs New
Tricks," SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, Feb. 12,
2002.
http://www.sciam.com/explorations/2002/0
12102aibo/
Blizzard Pursues bnetd.org
Section 1201 has been brandished by Vivendi-
Universal's Blizzard Entertainment video game division
in an attempt to intimidate a group of volunteer game
enthusiasts who created open source server software
called "bnetd" that provides Internet gaming
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 8
enthusiasts with an alternative to the servers operated
by Blizzard.
The bnetd software permits owners of Blizzard
games to play multiplayer games against each other
over the Internet. Blizzard runs its own servers, known
as "Battle.net," which it makes available free of charge
to allow its games to be played across the Internet. The
group of volunteer programmers decided to create
bnetd to overcome difficulties that they had
experienced in attempting to use Battle.net. The bnetd
software is freely distributed, open source, and noncommercial.
In February 2002, Blizzard invoked the DMCA in an
effort to have bnetd pulled off the Internet. Blizzard
sent a "cease and desist" letter to the ISP that hosts the
bnetd website, claiming that the bnetd software
violated section 1201.
Blizzard contends that the bnetd software has been
used by some to permit networked play of pirated
Blizzard games. Whether or not that contention is true,
the developers are not using the software for that
purpose, nor was the software designed for such a
purpose. The software has numerous legitimate uses
for owners of Blizzard games. As a result, whatever else
may be said about the bnetd software, it is plainly not a
"black box" piracy device.
Ultimately, Blizzard filed suit in St. Louis to bar
distribution of bnetd. Tellingly, however, Blizzard
chose not to press a DMCA claim in the lawsuit, opting
instead for traditional copyright and trademark claims.
(EFF is representing the bnetd developers.) Blizzard's
willingness to use the DMCA in pre-litigation threats,
however, demonstrates its chilling potential in the
hands of copyright owners intent on hindering
competitors, rather than stopping piracy.
David Becker, "Group Backs ISP in Online
Gaming Dispute", CNET NEWS, March 12,
2002.
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-
858414.html
Legal correspondence on bnetd website.
http://www.bnetd.org/case_letters.php
Sony's Attack on Playstation "Mod Chips"
Apart from using the DMCA against vendors of
personal computer emulators of Sony's Playstation,
Sony has sued a number of manufacturers of so-called
"mod chips" for alleged circumvention under the
DMCA. In doing so, Sony has been able to enforce a
system of geographical regional restrictions that raises
significant anticompetitive issues.
So-called "mod chips" are after-market accessories
that modify Playstation consoles to permit games
legitimately purchased in one part of the world to be
played on a games console from another geographical
region. Sony has sued mod chip manufacturers in the
U.S., the U.K., and Australia. In the U.S., Sony sued
Gamemasters, Inc., distributor of the Game Enhancer
peripheral device, which allowed U.S. Playtstation users
to play games purchased in Japan and other countries.
Although there was no infringement of Sony's
copyright, the court granted an injunction under the
DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions, effectively
banning the use of a technology that would permit
users to use legitimately-purchased non-infringing
games from other regions.
Recognizing the anti-competitive potential of the
region playback control system, the Australian antitrust
authority, the Australian Competition and
Consumer Commission (ACCC), has intervened in a
lawsuit that Sony is pursuing against an Australian mod
chip manufacturer under the Australian equivalent of
the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions. The
ACCC argues that Australian consumers should be
permitted to use personally imported games discs not
otherwise available in Australia, or available only at a
significantly higher price.
Sony has argued that mod chips can also be used to
enable the use of unauthorized copies of Playstation
games. But most Playstation mod chips are not "black
box" devices suitable only for piracy. The potential
illegitimate uses must be weighed against legitimate
uses, such as defeating Sony's region coding system to
play games purchased in other countries.
"Sony Playstation ruling sets far-reaching
precedent," NEW SCIENTIST, Feb. 22, 2002
(http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.js
p?id=ns99991933).
Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc. v.
Gamemasters, 87 F.Supp.2d 976 (N.D. Cal.
1999).
Australian Competition and Consumer
Commission Press Release, "ACCC Defends
the Rights of Playstation Owners," Feb. 8,
2002.
(http://203.6.251.7/accc.internet/digest/view
_media.cfm?RecordID=595).
6. Conclusion
Three years of experience with the "anticircumvention"
provisions of the DMCA demonstrate
that the statute reaches too far, chilling a wide variety
of legitimate activities in ways Congress did not intend.
As an increasing number of copyright works are
wrapped in technological protection measures, it is
likely that the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions
will be applied in further unforeseen contexts,
Unintended Consequences: Three Years Under the DMCA 9
hindering the legitimate activities of innovators,
researchers, the press, and the public at large.
1 For examples of Congress' stated purpose in enacting the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions, see 144 Cong. Rec.
H7093, H7094-5 (Aug. 4, 1998); Senate Judiciary Comm., S. Rep. 105-190 (1998) at 29; Judiciary Comm., H. Rep. 105-
551 Pt 1 (1998) at 18; House Commerce Comm., H. Rep. 105-551 Pt 2 (1998) at 38.
2 See WIPO Copyright Treaties Implementation Act and Online Copyright Liability Limitation Act: Hearing on H.R. 2281 and H.R.
2280 before the House Subcomm. on Courts and Intellectual Prop., 105th Cong., 1st sess. (Sept. 16, 1997) at 62 (testimony of
Asst. Sec. of Commerce and Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks Bruce A. Lehman admitting that section 1201
went beyond the requirements of the WIPO Copyright Treaty).
3 For a full description of the events leading up to the enactment of the DMCA, see Jessica Litman, DIGITAL COPYRIGHT
89-150 (2000).
4 See Pamela Samuelson, Intellectual Property and the Digital Economy: Why the Anti-Circumvention Regulations Need to be Revised,
14 BERKELEY TECHNOLOGY L.J. 519, 537-57 (1999) (http://www.sims.berkeley.edu/~pam/papers.html)
5 See Professor Ross Anderson, Cambridge University, Declaration in Felten v. RIAA (Oct. 22, 2001), describing ways in
which the DCMA is suppressing research into security weaknesses in SDMI watermarking technology:
(http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/Felten_v_RIAA/20011022 _anderson_decl.pdf).
6 111 F. Supp. 2d. 294 (S.D.N.Y. 2000), aff'd 273 F.3d 429 (2d Cir. 2001).
7 Sony Computer Entertainment, Inc. v. Connectix Corporation, 203 F.3d 596 (9th Cir. 2000).
>
Since they censored a discussion about movie decryption in a legitimate magazine (2600), couldn't they censor the discussion about the discussion about movie decryption?
Hell, here slashdot is having a discussion about a discussion about a discussion about movie decryption. It may be legitimate, but someone is bound to pull a 1201 on everyone here.
Teenagers with died hair with HUGE EYES fighting monsters.
Yep thats anime. it sucks!
and yes, many of these are available for win32. I'm sure they've been ported to other platforms, too...
Klerck! I fucking hate you so much! You're a fucking ass-ripping, pagewidening, communist, anti-semite coprophage sodomist! I don't understand why Taco hasn't bitchslapped you already so that whoring for karma wouldn't help you a bit!
I read the paper, and here's my conclusion:
This is evidently aimed at law scholars. It is NOT a good piece for informing Joe Public about the DMCA -- even I could develop doubts from this (not to mention that my eyes kept glazing over) and I'm already familiar with the issues. Furthermore, due to the way the info is presented, someone new to the issues could well assume that this paper is a history of CRIMINAL ACTIVITIES by evil people out to overthrow the rights of copyright holders. IOW, it could have exactly the opposite of the desired effect.
I read it hoping to find something I could use to convince a client, who is in love with the DMCA, of how evil it really is, but this paper would, if anything, strengthen his position: He loves the DMCA because it's letting him sue his old publishers for unauthorized online use of his old old articles, so he hopes to make a lot of money by applying the various fines. Because of how it's written, the paper gives the *impression* that fighting the DMCA is all about encouraging "theft" from copyright holders. Not exactly good for convincing DMCA supporters of the error of their ways!
What's needed is a plain-English interpretation describing the legitimate activities which were crimilized under the DMCA (with the existing legal examples likewise described in plain English), in terms that make Joe Public think "Omighod, that could happen to me!!" THAT would be much more informative and convincing to the average person who doesn't follow the legal incidents and issues on a daily basis.
[BTW, it's not only PDF, it's a newish PDF format that causes errors on older versions of Acrobat; worse, it's formatted for publication in a print rag, so is difficult to read on a computer screen, even tho I have a 19" monitor. What would have been wrong with ordinary HTML for online viewers?]
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Why hasn't the parent post been moderated up already? It's insightful and interesting as hell!
Nete, the DMCA Slashdot incident, Microsoft Asks Slashdot To Remove Readers' Posts, was exactly one of the DMCA incidents in mind as a factor when I made my Slashdot article code proposal in order to get some support for publishing anti-censorware code. Too bad nothing came of it (I don't say Slashdot had to help me out, I'm just pointing out the connections). But the DMCA chilling effect on me for anticensorware work is very real, and well-ground in DMCA court cases. `
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Forgive my ignorance on the matter, but does the DCMA only have jurisdiction in the United States? I ask because in the article it mentions foreign researchers being weary of visiting the US following the arrest of Dmitry Sklyarov. So if it is only applicable in the US how does it affect those of us in Australia and other countries?
aus.music.scrapbook
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While the USA sits alone thinking it's doing better than ever, the rest of the world is taking the unilateralist USA and its false "free market" vision less seriously by the hour. The last decade has shown Denmark, Austria, Holland and now France growing huge support for national socialist parties as the only cause loud enough to halt the relentless privatisation and destruction of the government's duty to support its people. Even recent local elections in the UK have shown an average 20% vote for the British National Party on councils where it stood.
Once the "national" aspect of national socialism is tempered in favour of the "socialism" aspect, these parties will gain widespread acclaim and a serious chance of power.
There are some serious safety issues regarding anal sex that you need to be aware of at all times. First and foremost, whatever touches the anus shouldn't be touching anything else. Never never never take the penis out of the anus and put it into the vagina. That can lead to serious infections and other complications. After any kind of anal play, you should immediately change condoms and wash the relevant body parts thoroughly.
Of course, STDs are also a major concern with anal sex. This isn't just limited to AIDS; herpes, genital warts, syphilis, gonorrhea, etc. can all be transmitted through anal sex. You simply shouldn't be having anal sex without a condom; it's not worth the risk to either partner.
Tip #2: Lube, lube, lube
One of the most important thing to remember when thinking about anal sex is that, unlike the vagina, the anus isn't self-lubricating: you gotta bring your own grease. And, the more lube you use, the better. It will make the initial penetration much more easy and less painful for the woman and make the whole experience, for both of you, much more pleasant.
All kinds of lube are used for anal sex, from spit to Vaseline to high-tech silicone-based lubes. We'd strongly recommend spending a little money to get a high quality water-based lubricant; remember, an oil-based lubricant like Vaseline will degrade the latex in a condom, destroying its usefulness. We'd recommend products like AstroGlide or KY Jelly, available in any drug store. Note, though a condom may be "lubricated", they typically don't offer as much lube as we'd recommend for anal sex.
There are some specialty lubes designed for anal sex that include an anesthetic to numb the woman's sensation and make anal sex less painful. We'd advise against these products. The simple fact is, pain is a way of your body telling you that something's wrong. If you're in pain during anal sex, you need to focus on solving the root problems, not anesthetizing yourself so it's easier to endure.
Tip #3: Start Small
Simply put, a penis is an awful big to be the first thing you stick up someone's butt. Better to start with something smaller and work your way up. Fingers are an excellent beginning point. Use one finger, then two, to initiate your partner into the mysteries of anal penetration. Try it while performing oral sex for an extra thrill. Be sure not to forget the lube, and you might also want to wear latex gloves.
As your partner gets used to your fingers, you might graduate to a butt plug or a small dildo. Dildos are available in all shapes and sizes. Go shopping together to get one she thinks she can handle. Remember, though, don't put the dildo into the vagina after putting it into the anus. The safest way is to put a condom on the dildo before using it, and to wash it thoroughly immediately after.
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/legal/20020503_dmc a_consequences.html
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
With all these examples of how the DMCA have been used to stiffle competition, kill free speech, hinder research and bury fair use I'm wondering if the DMCA ever have been used in legitimate cases; ie. cases that actually involved piracy/copyrightinfringement?
Hey hey, CmdrTaco here. I have a story in the high school section about my first time, which was with my little brother's hottie friend a couple of months ago.
Anyway, as with most of us guys, masturbation has always been a big part of my life. Ever since I can remember, I've been choking the chicken on a daily basis. Starting puberty at 11, I've masturbated at least once a day ever since. If I miss a day, then I more than make up for it the next time. So, masturbating at least 7 times a week for the past 6 years or so, (I'm now 17), that adds up to a fair amount of cum ejaculated from my ball sac!
One of my favourite things to do while wanking is to stick phallic shaped objects up my ass. These have included my fingers, dildoes, cucumbers and anything basically resembling a cock!
Laying spread-eagled on my bed one day, slowly stroking my uncut 6.5" dick, I massaged my hairless balls between my fingers, moaning loudly. I reached under my bed, feeling for my newly purchased friend, Mr. Cucumber...
Finding the vegetable, I grabbed the lube and slowly lubed it up, spreading some on my expectant asshole. Thinking of what lay ahead, I slid a finger up my puckered boy hole. Then two. After adding a third, I thought it was enough so I set about getting the cucumber ready again.
Rubbing my lubed up swollen knob sent shivers of delight down my back. Doing that was gonna make me cum if I didn't stop! My balls lobbed from side to side with the sudden pick up of pace with which I was beating my meat. I picked up the cucumber and placed the rounded end against my hole, feeling myself opening up for the glorious pleasure maker. Slipping it in sent huge ripples of delight through me. I slowly slid the vegetable in and out, all the time jerking off. After a few minutes of furious beating and fucking, I was very close to cumming.
"Knock, knock...," was all I heard before my best friend Hemos barged in with an armful of school books.
"Whoa! What the hell?" was his shocked response to my little bit of exhibitionism, before bursting into a fit of laughter.
With my gorgeous best friend watching, a cucumber lodged up my ass and my frantically jacking off, it only took me about ten seconds more to burst forth with my sticky white juice. A huge glob flew at Hemos and landed at his feet, before I threw my legs in the air, with the rest of my cum landing on my chest and face.
With Hemos's raucous laughter still in my ears, I slowly pulled my cock, easing the last remaining drops of cum out, putting my fingers to my lips.
"Man, that's fuckin' sick, eating your own cum," he said, grinning.
"Yeah, well, I like the taste," I smiled, "and don't deny you don't do it!" I said, before wiping my finger over each drop of cum on my body and taking it to my hungry mouth.
Hemos continued laughing and started walking out.
"Meet you out front in 5," he said, "give you some time to clean up."
He strolled out, still shaking his head and laughing.
I was very satisfied. Although I have no doubts that Hemos was totally straight, it didn't hurt to fantasise about my tanned and gorgeous friend. His face and body are a recurring image in my masturbatory fantasies.
Its not that techies don't have money or care to take it to the Supreme Court. Whenever the media companies get close to a court being able to make a decision to rule on the law, they back off. They do this so that the law doesn't get overturned, not because they don't want to go to court. This way, the law is still on the books and perhapps they scared some people into submission.
FFS, just go to Adobe's freely available conversion site and convert it to HTML if you don't like it.
And the parent was modded up to (+5, Insightful)? Perhaps (-1, Flamebait) would have been more appropriate.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
However, that would be a misreading or our opponents actions and motivations.
The DMCA is a deliberate, intentional, malicious, act by our government on the behalf of an industry group which seeks to improperly control the actions of the public at large and to unjustly profit at the expense of that public. The act does not need fixing it needs to be repealed - and an investigation into possible bribery of the public officials who foisted it upon us needs to be launched. This is the only way in which pernicious laws of this type can be prevented in the future.
The rule "Never attribute to malice that which may be explained by stupidity" does not apply here; the DMCA is not an act of stupidity but one of deliberate malice. Everyone in the world needs to learn the skill of being able to spot the difference between a malicious action and a stupid one
Make a program and include some simple kind of copy-protection (ie ROT13 or bit-flip).
Have another person break the protection. Sue him - take turns appealing it all the way to the Supreme Court.
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
I'm sure that everyone notices the subtle irony of releasing this report using a proprietary format from a company that has abused the DMCA.
*sigh*
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
Okay guys - you're complaining about "no-one" having the time or money to get this to the Supremes. Well - the best bet is going to be the EFF.
Case in point - The judge in the Sonic Blue case has just ordered the company to spy on me! The judge wants to come into my house without issuing a proper search warrant and determine my use of the Replay 4000 I own. The company has to record what shows I watch and whether I time-shift, and whether I skip commercials (of course I do ;-) This information
will be slightly santized, i.e. my name won't be attached to
the data (yet..) That is suppose to make this invasion of privacy
better.
Now - I happen to have sent a check or two the EFF's way. They're already aware of the situation. Time will tell whether this nonsense stands. At least someone is trying to fight this BS. Why don't you help them in the fight??? Give them a few bucks to support their diverse efforts!!!!
This is the ONLY way we're going to get the DMCA and the up-coming Hollings bill defeated!
Have you compiled your kernel today??
on average, a human at three years has reached the following developmental milestones.
Physical Development
* jumps, gallops, tiptoes, runs smoothly
* can walk backwards a long distance
* may stumble and fall frequently
* rides a "trike"
* pours from a pitcher or milk carton using both hands
* undresses self, but needs help with dressing buttons and unbuttons large buttons
* uses crayons with somewhat more control
most primary teeth have erupted
Emotional Development
* is more relaxed and flexible than "terrible twos"
* still cries and hits at times
* quickly alternates between shyness and exuberance
* may show fear of unfamiliar objects or activities
* may want to be a "baby" at times
* begins to talk about dreams
Social Development
* is keenly interested in family activities
* idolizes parents
* seeks approval from adults
* tests limits constantly
* often prefers to play alone
* may have an imaginary playmate
* shares and takes turns occasionally
* quarrels with other children
Mental Development
* develops more stable concept of self
* speaks about 1,000 words
* speaks in 3 to 4 word sentences
* grasps some grammatical principles
* delights in hearing stories over and over again
* loves learning short rhymes and songs
* may match or identify primary colors
* enjoys imaginative and imitative play
* can assume some very simple responsibilities
* puts toys away with adult help
* has attention span of no more than a few minutes
* can choose between alternatives
the dmca has reached a milestone of its own. while no formal terminology accurately describes this phenomenon, i've coined a term of my own.
Public Outrage Due to Bitch-Ass Legislation Development
* promotes corporate rule, content control, price-fixing, monopolization and censorship.
* 'protects the rights' of large companies who own 'artists' work, most of which is mainstream, bland, unsatisfying shite.
* provides no real protection for struggling musicians, software developers, or other content-creaters because they can't afford to enforce the law
* makes the baby jesus cry, deploying salty, shimmering pools of christ-tears beneath his eyes.
"Life is great; without it, you'd be dead." -Harmony Korine
What's needed is a plain-English interpretation describing the legitimate activities which were crimilized under the DMCA (with the existing legal examples likewise described in plain English), in terms that make Joe Public think "Omighod, that could happen to me!!"
Here are a couple papers I wrote a while back (when the CBDTPA was still called SSSCA):
The Politics of Copy Protection Technology
DMCA in Plain English
You might also find this paper helpful: What's Wrong With Copy Protection by John Gilmore.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Either the techies don't have a lot of money
This is the main problem. It is also the reason why DMCA threats tend to be more successful in getting the complainants what they want than less successful; the mere thought of being sued and removed of what little money they usually have is enough to intimidate most people into compliance, regardless of the nature of the law that is being used against them.
Avoid The Rush, Hate OU Early!!!
Nice, very nice. I'm an OSU student.
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
Whether you consider it right or wrong, it remains true that the past year of US politics has been very little about treaty and discussion and very much about central government mandate -- whether in foreign policy or in implementation of new domestic law.
Canada is cold.
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
Great point, definitely deserving of a (+5 Insightful). But, are you sure that all of the DMCA's consequences are intentional? We've been under the general impression that those responsible for it's passage (RIAA, MPAA, etc) have not a whit of technical knowledge, despite all of their PH.Ds and MBAs. I've sure all of us have met supposedly well-educated individuals without even a basic grasp of any technical issues. Remember when the MPAA tried to outlaw the VCR, and then it became one of their biggest moneymakers? That wasn't that long ago, and those dumb fsckheads are still the ones in charge.
Of course, whatever the reasoning, I'm sure they're peeing their pants with joy about the full implications of the new law they bought.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
The DMCA is one of the biggest land grabs ever given to special interests by Congress. The thought that Congress was able to so twist our processes allowing them to take away free speech rights guarenteed by the Bill of Rights truly sickens me. And the proscecutors and courts have proven to be no better! They've swooped in like vultures over a carcass (the carcass is people's rights by the way), making a mockery of the Constitution and Bill of Rights. The DMCA is simply an awful law...and the 'man' knows it. Why do you think that he quickly drops cases AFTER using it to do harm? Because he knows that this law would be struck down in court if it was ever challenged....easier to bust and run after ruining another person and/or company. Personally, I think that it's well about time that Congress was able to be punished for making obvious bad laws for their cronies in business with deep pockets. Our forefathers must be truly turning over in their graves at the blockheads occupying Congress today....
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer.
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
you will no longer be able to find an ad-blocking proxy server to use, they will be illegal black box circumention devices designed to alter the display of a copyrighted work.
you will not be able to legally alter the way an application you own interacts with things other than the way the manufacturer intended. Wanna change the user-agent your browser reports??? Want to block the ability of a program you own from phoning home and tracking you? Even Quake 3 does this if you don't block it.
Reverse engineering will also include using a sniffer to look at the network traffic that is leaving your machine and deciding what you do and do not want to allow to go out to the internet.
blocking cookies will be illegal.
anonymous proxies, remailers, news posters or any technology that grants the user relative or absolute anonynmity will be illegal, they allow the widespread and fast and unaccountable distribution of illegal information such as what the latest bug in a copyrighted work is that the manufacturer doesn't want you to know about (circumventing the DMCA).
freenet will be illegal.
Encryption will be for criminals.
Freedom and copyright/IP are mutually exclusive concepts as pure ideals. There is a sliding scale with freedom on one side and copyright/Intellectual Property on the other. Pragmatically we'd be foolish to think of having absolute freedom, the scale is sliding strongly towards complete copyright/IP & enforcement and there is tremendous power pushing it in that direction. Who's to stop them? A few geeks who can see what's going on. Unfortunately I think the geeks get caught up in these issues applying only to the Internet, or only to technology issues. These same issues apply to nearly everything with the world today and all tie together.
Think about it, figure it out and educate as many as you can and get as polically active as you can be.
Technology has started a new revolution just as the printing press did when invented. Centralized control of information was shattered then. Now it's being shattered again. There is going to be quite a struggle and the powerstructures are facing the biggest threats ever. They are counting on ignorance of the masses to win. I'm afraid they will and that terrible things will result.
DO SOMETHING.
Revolutions are never about freedom or justice. They're about who's going to be top dog. -- Kilgore Trout
Redhat IS Linux!!!!!
What US are you living in that the government plays no role in the economy? Businesses are regulated all the time by the government, child labor laws, minimum wage, polution restrictions, taxes (cigarette tax anyone?), anti-trust laws, trade tarrifs, import / export restrictions all of these are govenment interventions in the economy. A truly free market has no government involvment at all, the problem with a truly free economy is that it often under produces items which the bennifit society as a whole, but no the individual business (i.e. Highways, Military defence, public education etc) all of which are important to the economy, but which would be underproduced without government interference. Therefore we really have a mixed economy, not that that is a truly bad thing, but the more control the government exerts, the more they will restrict the economy. I can't speak for other countries, but I really don't see the US being a greatly superior country in terms of an economic standpoint than most other advanced countries.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
I actualy submitted to Ask Slashdot an idea revolving arround forming an interest group (kind of like an ACLU for Slashdotters). The basic idea was if we have a group of people willing to take these things to court and they get the money from people on slashdot donating, we might actualy get something out of this. We might be able to fight the DMCA. But the story got rejected. Any ways, that's the only real way I see of getting this done. We need our own group of lobyists.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Why does the above qualify as flamebait? As a US citizen, I have no objection to the above post. The person makes some valid points and I don't find it rude or offensive in any way.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
(apologies to Illiad)
(Sung to the tune of YMCA)
Net geeks
there's no need to feel guilt
I said, net geeks
for the software you built
I said, net geeks
cause you'r not in the wrong
there's no need to feel unhappy
Net geeks
you can burn a CD
I said, net geeks
with your fave MP3s
you can play them
in your home or your car
many ways to take them real far!
It's fun to violate the D M C A!
It's fun to violate the D M C A-AY!
you have everything
you need to enjoy
your music with your toys!
It's fun to violate the D M C A!
It's fun to violate the D M C A-ay!
you can archive your tunes!
you can share over cable!
you can annoy the record labels!
--j0shua
You can download xpdf . In fact, it may already be on
your (linux) system.
it's a nice simple open-source replacement
for acroread.
Because the laws already on the books were sufficient to cover any and all cases of copyright infringement, digital or otherwise, I would maintain that, by definition, there is (and can be) no such thing as a legitimate case of invoking the DMCA.
Money makes the world go round ... or lawyers on the tables pound ...
DVD Copyright Case Grinds Through Courts
Don't take it amiss that your story got rejected. As I mentioned earlier, I couldn't even get support for my Slashdot article code proposal for publishing anti-censorware code (repeat, I don't say Slashdot had to help me out, I'm just pointing out the connections to the issue). This is a very hard and risky area.Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
I have no Adobe software on my machine. In fact, the only non-free/non-open-source software on my machine is a few games. I clicked the link, and the document opened up. Adobe may have originated the format, but that doesn't mean squat at this point. Find something more relevent to troll about.
Postscript is an Adobe-originated format too -- yet Richard M. Stallman's own Emacs system uses postscript for printing. As does pretty much everything else found on a typical Linux system which prints. Is that ironic? Or just...a fact?
That's funny.
I agree wholeheartedly with everything else you said though.
I read the EFF document. To me, it seemed like an effective explanation of the evils of the DCMA. Honestly, though, the "DMCA is evil" case seems more strongly made by the "science and innovation are being stifled" angle. One may argue in circles about who owns or may use a movie, but since when are science, the progression of knowledge, etc., either private property or less important than the means in which they are used? Since when has a better firewall or less vulnerable web browser been a bad thing? Anyway, what is past is prologue. As I was reading, I came across some unfortunate news. I knew about the embed case, etc. I had hoped Blizzard hadn't wielded the Great Mace of DCMA, but it appears my hopes were in vain. So...which companies haven't done this sort of thing? Will we have to choose between the best games in a genre and opposition to the DCMA?
G. M. Manath
Go not to the Elves for counsel, for they will say both 'Yes' and 'No.'
Quit calling us USians, you dumbfuck. Would you like to be called an UKian or an UKman (pronounced Uck'man)? It sounds stupid doesn't it? So quit calling Americans USians, shithead. Oh, excuse me... Shitehead. Fucking arsehole.
National socialism? You mean like the Nationalsozialist party in Germany? I'm all for that. Allthough I am a little surprised that the French would be.
What everyone should know about Seth F, the net kook.
They made that PDF on Windows with MS word, a user called 'intern' created it, is that just a little bit ironic comming from the EFF?
Has been there any legitimate[1] use of DMCA?
[1] For "as intended by legislators" definition of "legitimate".
Just wandering...
Of course I have a "legal right" to play
a DVD that I purchased wherever I want to.
I ALSO have the right to (1) sell it to
someone else (2) break it into little pieces,
(3) use it as a window decoration. (3) ANYTHING
I WANT TO, EXCEPT FOR COPYING IT.
Got that? We are NOT talking about "fair use"
here, just MY use. Different topic.
DMCA wants to REMOVE my rights to (and I am not
talking "fair use" here) do WHATEVER THE F*
I want with the material. For myself.
Personally, I buy books -- not to read them,
oh no, I put them under a microscope to look
at the intricate patterns in the paper. That's
MY right fer f*sakes. Of course, that is
COMPLETELY illegal in the US of A now, when
we are talking about DVDs.
Keep your RIGHTS clear, ok?
Ratboy.
Just another "Cubible(sic) Joe" 2 17 3061
Leaving aside the bad grammar... 1. Never before in history has there BEEN a superpower like the U.S. 2. It is certainly easy to lampoon the U.S. - it is also easy to lampoon any sovereign state. There are idiots everywhere. In the U.S., however, the idiots are more likely to find themselves the victim of public derision. 3. Not sure what this "false free market" business is - there are no details given. In my experience, people who believe in "Socialism" over "Capitalism" understand neither. Briefly - Capitalism is putting ones money where ones beliefs lie. Socialism is trusting the government to put your money where its beliefs lie. This includes decisions about what sectors of society should be under governmental mandate. I should point out that even in a recession, the U.S. is still a net importer - we prop up more than our share of the world economy in good and bad times. This means we are BETTER AT ECONOMIC POLICY in absolute terms than most of the rest of the world, so our economy grows quickly enough that we can drag even socialist nations along for the ride. 4. Denmark, Austria, Holland and France may do as they please - I am curious about this "duty to support its people" concept. The U.S. constitution has no such provision - here, we simply freed people up to work as they saw fit. Oddly, Americans seem to like the whole "work for a living" idea better than going on the dole. In the U.S., people who refuse to work are scorned - and IMHO righfully. Welfare payments, needle-exchanges, national pensions are not fundamental rights - they are elements of a social contract that Americans don't want, because such provisions are too expensive. Sure, U.S. health care system is "bad" when you're trying to pay for it (present company included) - but we also have the best hospitals in the world and don't have to spend as much of our GNP to keep them good. 5. Unilateralist: those who can, do. Too bad other nations are so against unilateralism that they allow themselves to be paralyzed. Witness the U.N. in Kosovo, Rwanda, etc. Gee, the communitarian, consensus-building really did the job there! 6. (and final) The U.S. is FAR from perfect, but the suggestion that we are even at the bottom end of the curve when it comes to running our nation and participating constructively in world affairs is unsupportable.
In A.D. 2002, War was beginning.
Kernel Hacker: What happen?
User: Somebody set us up the CBDTPA
Programmer: We get signal
Kernel Hacker: What!
Programmer: Main Screen turn on
Kernel Hacker: It's You!
E.I.S.N.E.R.: How are you gentlemen?
E.I.S.N.E.R.: All your computer are belong to us.
E.I.S.N.E.R.: You are on the way to pay per compute
Kernel Hacker: What you say?!?!
E.I.S.N.E.R.: You have no chance to hack make your time
E.I.S.N.E.R.: HA HA HA HA....
Kernel Hacker: Take off every DVD
Kernel Hacker: You know what you doing
Kernel Hacker: Remove DVD
Kernel Hacker: For great justice
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
At first I thought you meant democratic socialism, but with Le Pen's recent success and Austria's right-wing turn, I think you really did mean national socialism. That's really frightening. Despite the name, the national socialists (Nazi is an abbreviation of National Socialist) were very much in bed with the big time industrialists of the day, and considered diametrically opposed to the (still strongly authoritarian) communist party.
Sig: What REALLY Happened to the Censorware Project
Sig: What REALLY Happened to the Censorware Project
Sig: What REALLY Happened to the Censorware Project
Spare me! What exactly do you think the Five Supremes, the same folks who picked our President Select, would do with a challenge to the DMCA? What if they give it their blessing? What would we be able to do about the DMCA then?
I would rather not move the DMCA into the court system. I suggest we look for some other way to reverse it. One way I can think of for a large, but moneyless, group of people to overturn a law is to find some way to make that law unenforceable. Does anyone remember the 55 MPH National Speed Limit? I think that 55 MPH speed limit is an example of a law that went away largely because it became unenforceable. I know many places where so many people were breaking the 55 MPH speed limit that the police literally could do nothing. If the police actually wanted to give speeding tickets to everyone driving over the 55 limit, they would have been forced to completely baracade the roads and stop (and ticket) every driver there.
An analog gray hair frantically clinging to the trailing edge of technology.