Sonicblue Wins Stay of Spying Order

ebonkyre writes "According to this article, federal Judge Florence-Marie Cooper has stayed the order which would require SONICBlue to begin recording users viewing habits and reporting them to the MPAA, et al. It has been stayed until June 3rd, at which time the court is to review SB's motion to throw out the order entirely." EPIC has filed a brief supporting Sonicblue's position. EPIC's argument (starting on page 5 of the PDF) neatly summarizes why this order should never have been given.

Comments

Good Analogies

[geoffsmith]

SONICBlue's legal doc makes some good analogies:

In a personal injury lawsuit, it is relevant to kknow whether a plaintiff who claimed to be wheelchair-bound in fact left his chair; yet, one would be hardpressed to find a discovery ruling in which a judge ordered a plaintiff to place an electronic sensor in his chair seat. In a defamation lawsuit, it would be helpful to know if in fact the defamatory comment had a wide circulation among plaintiff's neighbors; yet, it is unfathomable to think that a court would order a microphone to be place in the local pub.

The point I think they are trying to make is that the only reason this seems even slightly reasonable (and the above examples do not) is because it affects so many people that it becomes a statistic, and the way in which those people's privacy is violated is complicated enough that it is easy to gloss over the fact that it is a severe intrusion into the living rooms of SONICBlue's customers!

This ruling is sickening, and I think it seriously hints at some money changing hands between the plaintiff's and the powers that be. This ruling unquestionably violates the rights of SONICBlue and its customers, and it is without legal precedent.

Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon

Re:Poor argument.

[chriso11]

Wrong Answer.
Here is a clue. Actually, the plantiffs wanted to collect the information with unique identifcation for every user. So, don't listen to the media companies, as they lie like a cheap linoleum floor.

Pointer to SonicBlue references

[Seth Finkelstein]

Just a quick pointer:

There's a good index of various references at

http://cs-www.bu.edu/~dm/pubs/replaytv.html

Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)

Re:Pointer to SonicBlue references

[Anonymous Coward]

Another sonicblue ref: BBB report. It is very difficult to get an unsatisfactory rating with the BBB - a rating usually reserved for questionable businesses (read: scam).

Re:Bah!

[ftobin]

The following quote best exemplifies Disney's stance. The Future of Ideas, by Lawrence Lessig:

In the early 1970's, RCA was experimenting with a new technology for distributing film on magnetic tape--what we would come to call video. Researchers were keen not only to find a technology that could reproduce firm with high fidelity, they were also keen to find a way to control the use of the technology. Their aim was a technology that could control the use of firm distributed on video, so that the owner of the firm might maximize its return from the distribution.

The technology eventually chosen was relatively simple. A video would play once, and when finished, the firm would lock into place. If a renter of the video wanted to play the video again, he or shee would have to return the video to the store and have the tape unlocked. In this way, the owner of the firm could assure that it was being compensated for every use of the copyrighted material.

RCA presented this technology to the Disney Corporation in the early 1970's. In a room with just five of the senior executives from Disney, a young RCA executive, Pat Feely, demonstrated RCA's device. The executives were horrified. They would "never,", Feely reports their waying, permit their content to be distributed in this form. For the content, however clever the self-locking tape player was, was still insufficiently controlled. "How could they know,", a Disney executive asked Feely, "how many people are going to be sitting there watching" a film? "What's to stop someone else coming in and watching it for free?".

If that doesn't make you shudder, I don't know what will.

Companies are now greater than the Government

[Neolithic]

II. Arguements
B. The Television Studios Seek Greater Invasion Into Personal Lives Than The Federal Government Has In The War On Terrorism.

The television studios are seeking, and have obtained from Judge Eick, a mandatory surveillance system even greater that what United States law enforcement, battling international terrorism, has obtained, or considers appropriate.

If anyone doesn't believe that laws are being bought they are deluding themselves. Those wishing to preserve outdated revenue streams in the future and punishing all citizens of the United States, including those who might commit a "crime" in the future, are granted more freedoms and greater powers than those that are responding to an act of immense destruction and horrible violence that actually happened in the past.

Suppose I were presented with a choice, where upon completion would result in the preservation of my family. If the two options were to have a plane fly into a building, killing thousands of people, or to watch a movie without commercials I would be inclined choose the former. I would be much more likely to get away with it.