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Verizon Lawyer Explains Telecoms' DMCA Position

CheapBrew writes: "Sarah Deutsch, a vice president and associate general counsel at Verizon, is interviewed by Declan McCullagh on CNet's News.com. She argues against the DCMA, anti-P2P bill, and the broadcast flag, and notes that Verizon is teaming with other telecoms and groups like the EFF to fight the 300 pound gorilla."

6 of 213 comments (clear)

  1. 2600 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    I thought 2600 magazine was sued by verizon because they registered verizonreallysucks.com

  2. DMCA DMCA DMCA by qslack · · Score: 3, Informative

    It's "DMCA." Not "DCMA."

    It looks like it was fixed in the title but not in the body text. I expect that /. editors will fix it shortly, but I must assume that a lot of Slashdotters don't know what its correct name is. I'll repeat it.

    It's the DMCA. Digital Millenium Copyright Act. Not DCMA!

  3. Let's not kid ourselves... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Verizon is "standing up for the little guy" because there are thousands on thousands of little guys that give them a lot of revenue.

    If DMCA service provider liability is found to apply to people running their own servers through an ISP- Verizon and other ISPs will lose a lot of customers as they shift around. Users won't necessarily *want* to shift around, but they will have to move ISPs as they get their accounts terminated under the DMCA for distributing the latest music or movies through their p2p app of choice.

    Verizon has a pure profit motive here, nothing more. Of course the profit motive in this instance is in our favor....so it feels a bit different than most.

  4. Have you not realized yet? by KarmaBitch · · Score: 1, Informative

    At the same time, we have an equally legitimate concern that they comply with the proper legal process

    We oppose the Berman bill. It's very troubling in that it essentially permits one particular segment of the U.S. industry to engage in vigilantism on the Internet

    For example, even assuming that Verizon was able to provide digital television over the Internet, would we be allowed to do so without a technology that has been blessed by three (movie) studios?

    We find ourselves with shared interests in making sure that fair use is preserved

    Not everyone with an Inc. or Coporation after there name is bad....
    Can you here me now?

  5. Verizon? by psicE · · Score: 4, Informative

    I used to have Verizon for my phone line, them being the incumbent in Massachusetts. I've never seen a worse company! I call up their customer service, wait half an hour, get somebody who doesn't know anything they're talking about; rarely could I accomplish anything constructive. Phone lines having a problem? Just have to wait it out, until the problems pass.

    At the time, Continental Cablevision was my incumbent cable company. As cable doesn't require many support calls, I can't comment about them.

    Suddenly, Continental Cablevision, which engaged in a merger a couple of years before, merged with US West's cable operations to form MediaOne. And they started offering MediaOne Express, one of the first broadband connections around, with unprecedented T1 downstream speeds. I went over to the nearest MediaOne center in Beverly, tried the service out, loved it, and ordered it the next day. Often, I end up having to call MediaOne tech support; they're much more responsive than Verizon.

    So now, MediaOne starts offering digital phone service. And better yet, they offer a combo package; digital cable (400 channels), broadband, and digital phone service with all optional features included on the first line (and a second bare line), for $100 a month, no more. This is an incredible deal. I call up, order this package, and three days later, I don't have any services from Verizon. Every time I call up MediaOne for tech support, it's *amazing* how fast they respond.

    So now I hear that Verizon's standing up "for the consumer", and that AT&T Broadband (which bought MediaOne) is pushing in the other direction. Whoop-de-doo. AT&T Broadband provides me a damn good quality service. Verizon doesn't. Until Verizon improves their quality, I'm going with the company that gives me a good service. After all, in the end, all either one cares about is their bottom line.

  6. Copyright reform and self correcting alternatives by neibwe · · Score: 3, Informative

    You'll have to put in some default caps too...

    The (profit last year)/(total previous profit) * scaler.

    If one applied for a SW copyright (before working on a projcet) and then brought it out on the last year. It would skew the ratio to some huge value.

    Here's an interesting proposal on copyright time allocation. And some nice counterpounts from writers and others that need to live off copyrights.

    I'm wondering if some sort of copyright/patent power limitation should imitate progressive taxation, where you'd pay higher premiums if you own more copyrights/patents. Companies would tend to split up their copyright ownership (to reduce fees) while at the same time they would then be exposed to more anti-trust laws (because their satellite [copyright-holder] companies would have "intra-company" cooperative behavior subject to anti-trust laws.)