A History of the Digital Copyright Struggle

sconeu writes "The National Journal has an article detailing the battle between Hollywood and Silicon Valley. An interesting read, it discusses the tech industry's early miscues, and the efforts made to ensure that Hollywood isn't the only voice heard on the Hill."

Comments

Shameless plug

[Gulthek]

Check out the class thesis I did on the history of United States copyright. Pages 10+ are at least somewhat relevant.

At least some companies are on our side

[CLIT]

Though their motivations may not be so philanthropic, at least consumer electronics corporations are on the side of the people like you and I. After all, they know that consumers will not purchase crippled, copy-protected products. Hopefully, this will result in a somewhat more balanced result when laws are passed. Call me cynical, but I feel that the Hollywood lobby's advantage is quite large and the laws will likely get passed.

Re:At least some companies are on our side

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

Hah. Urban legend.

Truth: They aren't on our side, though they don't want that known yet. They're busy investigating how to best fuck us with DRM, so that they'll reap maximum profits.

You cynical? Hardly. Feel free to contact me for lessons though, you may have potential.

Copyright: if you dont like it don't buy it

[GoatPigSheep]

I don't understand the mentality of alot of people in regards to digital copyright. Personally, I see it as if you don't like digital copyright, don't buy products that use it. The people who make movies and such have the right to sell the product in any way they please, yet people for some reason feel they are 'entitled' to use it any way they want. I see it as if you don't like the copyright scheme's they use, don't buy the product. Obviously most people don't care about the copyright protection as there has been no decline in the purchase of movies, even though they are released on the DVD format which has alot of protection. If people continue to buy movies that use copyright protection scheme's then the companies will continue to use the scheme's.

Re:Copyright: if you dont like it don't buy it

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish people who made this "free market" appeal actually understood what they were talking about. A truly free market has more choices than "buy" or "don't buy." In a free market, I could also start my own business selling copies of movies. Oh, but that's illegal thanks to government-enforced monopolies called copyrights. Fair enough, "promote progress" and all that. Instead I'll manufacture my own playing devices that don't bother with silly use restrictions. May the one who gives the customer what he wants win. Oh wait, but that's what these new laws are designed to block, isn't it?

Show me this free market you speak of, 'cause I've never seen it.

yet people for some reason feel they are 'entitled' to use it any way they want.

The above quote says it all. If I buy something of course I am entitled to use it any way I want! What do you think ownership means? There are exceptions, obviously--I can't use a crowbar to break and enter--but those are just that, exceptions. They are set by the law, not by crowbar manufacturers. Things like the DMCA (unconstitutional) and EULAs (unenforceable) give manufactures the power of the legislative branch in crafting copyright law with no accountability, no checks and balances, and no recourse for ordinary citizens.

Re:Copyright: if you dont like it don't buy it

[Raul654]

Simple. Because in the past, you could wait and honestly expect a work (movies, books, et al) to become public domain in a resonable (1 1/2 -3 decade) timespan, and which point it would be available for next to free. With current copyright laws, I'll be pushing 100 by the time today's new works become public domain, assuming no more extensions. There's something seriously wrong with that.

Re:Copyright: if you dont like it don't buy it

[Waffle Iron]

The people who make movies and such have the right to sell the product in any way they please

This is true. Now, after they've sold me a copy, it's my property. The law says I can do whatever I please with my new property, except for one thing: I am not generally allowed to make new copies of the content encoded in my physical copy, other than copies allowed under the statute of "fair use".

yet people for some reason feel they are 'entitled' to use it any way they want

I should be, as long as I don't make copies of the content that aren't protected by fair use.

There is nothing wrong with companies trying to peddle information that is saddled with any kind of onerous encrpytion/copy protectsion/annoyances/whatever..

However, by the same token, there should be nothing wrong with me doing whatever I want with my property, including decrypting it, hacking it, burning it, or gluing it to my forehead. (As long as I don't make copies of the content on it that aren't protected by fair use.)

The problem is that the media industry has bought legislation that gives these technical tricks the force of law. That is a huge change in the nature of the copyright landscape, and it effectively eliminates many of the tair use rights people used to hold over their own bought-and-paid-for property.

It used to be, you bought a CD, and you owned it; the record company only owned a lein that prevented you from redistributing additional copies of the CD. Now, through technical measures backed by new laws, the record company removes most of your ownership rights in your CD and retains them for itself. You are effectively renting the CD and are only allowed to play it on record-company approved equipment.

Re:Copyright: if you dont like it don't buy it

[Shelled]

Digital copyright is being legislated, there won't be any alternative product to buy.

Re:Copyright: if you dont like it don't buy it

[reallocate]

Well said. In addition, the media corps have rather easily made pop music and commercial films the focal point of the discussion. Easy to do because those are the two mediums with which people interact the most. To the corporations' political advantage because it makes it easy to tag anyone interested in a legitimate defense of copyright, consumer rights, and the interests of authors and artists as, instead, supporting the right of kids to steal CD's and DVD's. No politician wants to wear that label.

There's much more at risk here than the ability to copy music and movies.

Funny stuff

[MxTxL]

With a cue from Walt Disney Chief Executive Michael Eisner, Senate Commerce panel staffers dimmed the lights for a packed February 28 hearing in the Russell Senate Office Building. A full house of lawmakers and lobbyists settled back to watch an ABC Nightline

How funny would it be if it came out that Eisner had downloaded the footage the night before off of LimeWire?

Which makes you wonder, did he actually have the rights to show the footage? Sure, Eisner OWNS abc, but i wonder if he went through the red tape to get something printed that said he had the rights.

Go Silicon Valley

[brendanoconnor]

The more I read about the entertainment industry trying to lobby its way into a stable business model the more I want it to fall on its face and never get up. For them to expect the computer industry to include DRM into all software to prevent piracy is insane. It is not the computer industry's nor the ISP's job to police copyright infringement. The software is made to do a certain thing, but that doesn't mean someone will find another use for it.

For example, the airplane was invented as a way to travel. As soon as the military saw this, they thought, we can drop bombs from this device. Now the plane is not just for travel, but also for war. I'm sure the Wright Brothers didn't expect the creation of Stealth Bombers now did they. The same applies for developers of CD/DVD burners. I'm sure the original plan for them was to provide a great way to back up large amounts of data. Then someone said, hey, we can put multimedia on this and get our car stero, home theater to play this also.

Through this whole mess I just hope that some silly law doesn't get pasted that requires software/hardware developers to add DRM to their products, because if it does happen, I know a whole bunch of people that will stick to the last latest and greatest hard/software that doesn't include DRM.

Re:Go Silicon Valley

[Golias]

For example, the airplane was invented as a way to travel. As soon as the military saw this, they thought, we can drop bombs from this device. Now the plane is not just for travel, but also for war. I'm sure the Wright Brothers didn't expect the creation of Stealth Bombers now did they. The same applies for developers of CD/DVD burners. I'm sure the original plan for them was to provide a great way to back up large amounts of data. Then someone said, hey, we can put multimedia on this and get our car stero, home theater to play this also.

Before the Wright Brothers' flight at Kittyhawk, armies were already using baloons for recon. I'm sure those working on the first planes were perfectly aware of the tactical advantages of powered flight. Not the specific applicaitons, but only a moron would have overlooked that something like that would end up being used as a war machine.

Likewise, the makers of the first DVD burners not only knew they would be used for multi-media, but that was the whole point. Otherwise, why spend so much effort complying with the standard of the read-only DVD, when you could just make some proprietary optical disk (like SyQuest and others used to do before DVD's came along)?

Still, there are hundreds of legal applications for a DVD burner. The ability to back up your valuable DVD collection, or transfer your LD's to DVD so you don't need to replace your old LD player when it breaks down, or myriad other uses. Look at how many of the new iMacs Apple sold to people specifically so they could edit their home videos with iMovie and burn them to DVD. DRM would kill the biggest innovation in personal movie-making since the home super-8 editing station (which came out decades ago).

Re:Go Silicon Valley

[Gorobei]

For example, the airplane was invented as a way to travel. As soon as the military saw this, they thought, we can drop bombs from this device.


No they didn't - it took the military the better part of 30 years to invent the concept of bombers.

They initially used planes as observation platforms (just like balloons and blimps, the other flying devices they had experience with.) Fighters came next, as the observation planes tried to do battle with one another. By the end of WWI, bombing from planes was still largely ineffective: artillery was much cheaper, could delivery much bigger payloads, and was well-integrated with infantry.

By 1935, the military had recognized the power of multiple engine bombers, and Europe had an early version of Mutually Assured Destruction (the belief that bombers could decimate each others' major cities and civilian populations.) WWII proved that this was a total misunderstanding of airpower: no country capitalulated due to bombing; civilian populations proved largely immune to bombing (air raid shelters, underground factories, dispersing people to the countryside.)

This isn't about stealing.

[Lonath]

It's about control and competition. They aren't scared of copying, they're scared of people making their own stuff and not paying the industry taxes to get it made and distributed. They are trying to hinder the progress of the arts by artificially restricting what gets made while keeping themselves as the "gatekeepers to culture". You might not believe this, but most artists would accept a modest lifestyle if they could make the art that they want without being controlled by others. Those kinds of people are the ones who make the really good stuff. The idea that those people would be able to make a living without being controlled scares the shit out of the copyright industry.

Also, besides hindering the progress of art, they will also hinder the progress of science since most scientific advancements of today depend heavily on the use of computers. If computers are taken away (which they will have to be in order to get this level of control), then the copyright industry will be using copyright to hinder the progress of the useful arts and sciences.

However, since the ONLY reason that copyright exists is to promote the progress of the useful arts and sciences,what they're doing is blatantly unconstitutional. It's just that they can't come out and say that they want to control culture and prevent people from cmpeting with them by creating their own art, since they would get destroyed in the backlash. Maybe someday their internal notes and memos will come out and people will realize that this is about control and doing blatantly unconstitutional things to make money, not about stealing.

So what does this mean? This means:

1. Stop talking about this in terms of piracy. If you believe this is about piracy and not about control of culture, then you're still a part of the problem since you believe the copyright industrys' lies.
   
2. Stop buying anything from the copyright industry forever. Fuck em. Giving money to the copyright industry is giving weapons to people who want to destroy freedom to help sustain their bankrupt "-ism". So, stop seeing, renting, buying movies and music. Forever, since that's how long they would want copyright to last if they got their way.
   

Re:This isn't about stealing.

[Anonymous Coward]

While I agree, this is about control, it IS also about copying. They see copies around and feel that every copy is a copy someone might have paid for. Their region is money. They hate the idea that they might have lost one single sale.

Look at the VCR and how the industry felt about that.

Their "control" obsession has been around for years, and no-one's managed to break it... sadly, with the masses - sheep, cattle, whatever - I don't see it happening now...

Maybe one day though...

*sigh*

Re:This isn't about stealing.

[abe ferlman]

They aren't scared of copying, they're scared of people making their own stuff and not paying the industry taxes to get it made and distributed.

I actually don't believe this. But it sells *very* well. You've nicely encapsulated a way to describe a problem with the current copyright system without being forced to defend "piracy" (I share your reservations about that terminology).

I think closer to the truth is that the copyright industries truly are worried about copying as well as losing control, and that they're worried about the former more than the latter because it's the more immediate threat.

Anyway, althoguh I quibble about the details, I think your story is the rhetorical "goodcop" that the struggle for information freedom needs.

Bryguy

Re:This isn't about stealing.

[Steve B]

They aren't scared of copying, they're scared of people making their own stuff and not paying the industry taxes to get it made and distributed.
I actually don't believe this.

Why ever not? It's the explanation that fits the evidence (the industry downplays the solution -- individual enforcement against individual violators -- that would attack illegal bootlegging without hurting independent producers and distributors, and insists upon measures -- e.g. Fritz-chipping -- that would require independent creators to buy an industry license so they can convert their product into a form accessible to the end user's computer).

Re:This isn't about stealing.

[SiliconEntity]

It's about control and competition. They aren't scared of copying, they're scared of people making their own stuff and not paying the industry taxes to get it made and distributed.

If that were true, then why would the motion picture studios in Hollywood be leading the charge? Big Hollywood productions face no serious competition from people being able to make and distribute their own movies. Low-budget, small scale productions are a completely different art form than the big studio pictures.

It seems more likely that Hollywood's concern is that if people can see movies for free, they won't pay to see movies. You don't need to look any deeper than that for an explanation of their actions.

Re:This isn't about stealing.

[decefett]

If you read the article you would have seen that the studios are leading the charge. The MPAA was a political force before the RIAA was.

You do have a point that Hollywood is concerned that people can see movies for free, this does not mean that they are not concerned that people can make and distribute their own movies.

Music is a lot closer to this, already you can record professional sounding music in a home studio where the entire equipment cost is significantly less than a major label artist will spend renting a studio.

For example, the Australian band Machine Gun Felatio's latest album was recored at home, Front End Loader's latest effort was self funded and recorded in small/cheap studios.

The two albums above have received high rotation on the national radio station Triple J. They both sound as good technically (heaps better musically) as any major label release I've heard lately.

Outlawing The Right to Read

[Anonymous Coward]

CBDTPA & other such future laws will outlaw information sharing. They will forbid the fundamental right to share. It is very important to understand this process.

(1) "The Right to Read" by Richard M. Stallman.

http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html

(The important thing about this story is that it was written before the DMCA was even proposed!)

(2) "What's Wrong With Copy Protection" by John Gilmore.

http://cryptome.org/jg-wwwcp.htm

(3) "Re-evaluating Copyright: The Public Must Prevail" by Richard M. Stallman.

http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/reevaluating-copyrig ht.html

What is copyright, and what is it meant to accomplish? How can we tell whether it is meeting its goals?

This was also written before the DMCA; Stallman argued that copyright law had _already_ gone too far.

(4) Sold Out, By James Boyle

http://www.wcl.american.edu/pub/faculty/boyle/sold _out.htm

Re:Outlawing The Right to Read

[ftobin]

Thank you for that link to John Gilmore's essay. It is certainly one of the most moving pieces I've read on the topic in a long time, and gives me a bit of hope, because 1) someone (Gilmore) wrote it and believes in it 2) you linked to it, and probably believe in it too. I've added it to the top of my list of suggested readings.

Business Model Hollywood/ Open Source =?.

[buswolley]

It seems to me, that open-source companies are like Hollywood, in that they both create CONTENT, and both are freely available on the net. . The opensource embraces this fact, with my applause. So, what kind of business model can be adopted by both, to make a modest and fair profit, but not create this digital gestapo?

Observations

[OverCode@work]

a) Many industry forces want to combat the rise in Internet copyright infringement through technological means.

b) These technological means would likely result in a considerable reduction in the flexibility of personal computers.

c) This "considerable reduction in flexibility" might preclude 100% open source operating systems, depending on the technology used. It stands to reason that open source and free software license compatibility is not the primary concern of the proponents of such legislation.

d) At the very least, this is likely to make it difficult to play movies and/or music with open source software, which will reduce the desirability of the software we've worked so hard to build.

e) This is unacceptable.

What are we going to do about it?

I can think of a few possibilities.

We could stop infringing copyrights, and convince the industry that the problem has been solved. Fat chance this'll happen.

We could implement a classic broad-based boycott, but history has shown that this only works until the next cool shiny DVD comes out.

We could convince our representatives to stop listening to the entertainment industry.

We could do nothing (or do things that amount to nothing, like sit around and gripe like I'm doing right now).

Something is going to happen, and it's probably going to suck unless we, a community of people who have a vested interest in preventing these things from happening, unite and implement an effective solution.

What'll it be?

-John

Re:Observations

[Milican]

We could do nothing (or do things that amount to nothing, like sit around and gripe like I'm doing right now).

Whats great though is that this is an election year in the US. I wish there was some sorta snappy campaign with t-shirts and bumper stickers that support industry freedom from Unconstitutional Hollywood DRM. Anyone making "Pro Tech Choice" style shirts, etc...?

I'm voting this November, and I'm looking at tech standpoints of my congressman! If you support Disney you can kiss my arse!

JOhn

Re:Observations

[Steve B]

We could stop infringing copyrights, and convince the industry that the problem has been solved.

The industry's problem is not that some people infringe copyrights. The industry's problem is that technology has made it practical for artists to produce and distribute their works independently. Don't use language that supports their scam of suppressing the latter under the guise of suppressing the former.

DaveNET plan

[perfessor multigeek]

Check out scripting.com, where Dave Winer and his friends have figured out a good response to this. Don't sit around bitching, learn how to game the legislative process and get good people elected.
They've started backing the Libertarian candidate to replace one of the Congress critters backing this nonsense and now she's getting real media coverage and is given a chance to win.
We don't need to put up with these yahoos in DC. God knows they need us more than we need them, so let's get moving on replacing their bought and paid for asses.
I'm certainly doing my partto spread the word.
Rustin

Re:DaveNET plan

[swb]

If you think backing the libertarian candidate is the way to victory, you're lost.

I agree with the theoretical notion that if we all got involved we could elect better and even third party candidates, but the libertarian party isn't going to have enough appeal to most voters and will actually turn off many voters.

Re:DaveNET plan

[swb]

No, I just based it upon the number of third party campaigns I've seen totally tank and the overwhelming number of libertarian party campaigns that go nowhere.

As for facts specific to this particular situation, the last libertarian candidate got less than 9% of the vote. This leads me to believe that libertarian politics are weak and aren't really a big draw.

Even a recent News-Record column said that "success" for Grubb in this particular race would be 25% of the vote. This just demonstrates that she's a here-and-now, single-issue candidate who doesn't have any real backing or substance.

If you want you can cry now over her loss and move on and find something else to cry about later on, or you can keep investing false hope in a non-solution and be REALLY disappointed when she's back to temping at the mall.

Re:Make sure you include musical instruments

[Golias]

These laws are to make large corporations rich

I agree with most of your points, but as soon as you hit this typical rhetorical chime of railing against the big, rich corporations, I am compelled to remind you that most of the "wealth" of a big corporation is split up between thousands of middle-class investors, including whatever is left of your 401K after last year's crash. If you are like most people office drones, you might actually be a part-owner of Microsoft and not even know it.

History repeating itself

[GreyWolf3000]

Even the broadcast-flag technology failed to address an infinitely harder problem: how to stop people from using the Internet to spread movies from sources other than digital television. Disney used that limitation as an opportunity to reframe the debate.

I'm sure this point has been made before on some other similar article somewhere else, but I enjoy ranting and most posts do this too, so I'll speak my mind anyway :)

If one looks back in history 50 years, one will recall the 50's as a decade where Hollywood studios were in trouble, feared the television media for similar reasons as they fear the 'net today, and were reluctant to enter the new technology. The studios faced monopolistic charges (I'm recalling a John Lithgow PBS segment) and almost went bankrupt. They bit the bullet, embraced television, and Hollywood fared quite well.

Now, movie making and television have virtually merged thanks to Time Warner, Turner, etc (well for our purposes they have). They are not starving for cash these days, but they certainly are not embracing this new technology. They are rather attempting to control it and resist it, like in the 50's. What they must realize is that more people "pirating" means more people viewing their content. These then could be customers if the RIAA would embrace (I'm sick of that word too; homonyms?) the 'net, they could provide content from third party sites that they could control just like television. They would need some ad system which I am not going to try and pull out of my arse to gain the sites revenue, but I think it could work. Either that or a pay system, but because of who we're dealing with, it would have to be good.

My point (ah yes, there it is) is that if the big guns spent some of their budget for fighting the 'scourge' that is 'piracy,' they could at the very least have a better argument in court, if not a peaceable solution for everyone. All of you out there downloading m0vI3Z will have to give it up if anything but more rights being lost is to be acheived. They will win if you don't, and honest hackers and their rights will get screwed.

Re:History repeating itself

[puppet10]

The early history of Hollywood is even more interesting.

The first motion picture studios were in New York City, but they moved out to California to avoid paying licensing fees to Edison for his patents. They then avoided his lawsuits by going to
Mexico until the heat was off. (1)

Then in the late thirties antitrust lawsuits were attempted against the big eight leading to a consent decree between the studios and the justice dept. (we all know how effective those are ;>) promising to limit some monopolistic practices. The independants (at that time) used their name recognition (Charlie Chaplin, Walt Disney, Samuel Goldwyn, Mary Pickford, Orson Welles) to take their case to the people recruiting other well known names to promote their cause - Howard Hughes, Hal Roach, Leo McCarey, Sol Lesser, James Cagney, Bing Crosby, John Huston, Preston Sturges, Sam Spiegel, and Stanley Kramer.

In 1948 a supreme court decision against the big eight for conspiracy forced them to sell their theater holdings and stop certain monopolistic practices such as block booking (requiring a theater to buy all the films they needed in a single package, hmm sounds a little like bundling).

The studio system and its opposition which forced the dissolution then both faded away leading to the rise of new monopoly structure.

(2)

Re:Business Model Hollywood/ Open Source =?.

[Stonehand]

Why do you think one business model would work for both?

Open-source software companies, for instance, may /give away/ the software, but they'll (try to...) sell service contracts, better documentation, or proprietary software bundled in. A company like IBM can afford to fund some Linux devs, if they think that the investment will bring in more business through selling servers with an OS that their customers will want.

However, take a movie. What do you buy with a movie?

In a real (physical) theater, there are pretty much always snacks and drinks for sale, combined with a policy that says "don't bring your own", because that's where they hope to make their money. If, instead, you buy the equipment for a good home theater, you send your money to the supermarket (for the popcorn, drinks, et al) and to the appliance store (for the AV gear) -- but if you download the movie, then the content creator gets nada (since the studios generally aren't in the business of food or electronics... with the possible exception of Seagram, but I'm probably out of date on that one).

You're not going to buy tech support for a movie. "Hello? I just saw _Road to Perdition_, and I was interested in knowing whether you could help me repair a problem with my Thomson submachinegun."

A movie isn't necessarily going to induce /any/ other purchases. I don't know about you, but I have /never/ bought a book (written from the movie, not the other way around), article of clothing, toy, poster, soundtrack, or other movie merchandise product as far as I can remember, so no studio is making very much from me (basically, ticket price and however much it costs an advertiser to place a product in front of my eyeball). If I had broadband and used it to freely infringe on their movies, they'd be making only the product-placement money, which doesn't always make sense (e.g. a can of Coke seem out of place in a B5 movie).

My personal code

[Apreche]

I have a personal moral code, as I'm sure most people do. My code amounts to the fact that I will not do anything that hurts someone else or myself. If you aren't hurting anybody, then its not wrong to do.
Laws are neither good nor bad. Some apply to moral situations and some do not. For me, if a law is not enforced, it does not exist. For example if there is a stop sign in the middle of nowhere at night and there is no cop, then I can run the stop sign. As long as nobody is hurt. I broke the law, but I didn't hurt anyone and I didn't get hurt.

Here's where copyright gets in. I could care less what laws the government tries to pass. They can't enforce them on me. As we all do I'm sure, I have a rather large collection of mp3s. It's technically illegal, yes. But nobody is ever going to come and take me to jail for it. It's an unenforced law, so I refuse to obey it, since nobody is hurt.

As for unjust/unconstitutional laws I publicly disobey them on purpose, as we should all. The best way to fight an unconstitutional law is to break it. If you go to court, and the law is truly unconstitutional you can take your case up through the system until the power of judicial review is used to get the law off the books.
It is quite plain and obvious that new copyright laws are unconstitutional and unjust in many ways. And breaking these laws doesn't hurt anybody. Therefore I don't care what laws they make, I will not follow them. At the very worst I can become a martyr for the cause. (only I wont die).
I suggest we all stop moaning and groaning and repeating ourselves over and over again. When obviously innocent people start getting locked up then, and only then will there be a public outcry.
Remember we've taken advantage of every right the constitution gives us, except for the right of revolution. The fundamentals of our US government are sound and have lasted through time. We're going to have to have a revolution sometime, or technology will get ahead of the law and everything will fall apart.

Feel free to call me a nut.

Re:My personal code

[/dev/trash]

This is fine but please lock yourself in a room for life and interact wwith no one. This is the only way to gaurantee that you will never harm anyone by anything you do.

If they don't want to distribute it, then don't

[powerset]

I think this logic applies to Hollywood too. If they are uncomfortable distributing movies digitally, then don't do it! If they don't want to sell videos, don't! Just distribute to theaters. If they want to distribute in some super-secure format of their own design, go for it.

The whole problem is that they are seeking legislation to restrict the rights of the public and force technology industries to cripple their products and stop innovating. They think they have a problem, but rather than change their own businesses, they want another industry to solve it and have the whole country pay for the solution.

The whole copyright "problem" is a sham to strengthen the control the major players have and stifle competition and innovation.

Bill Gates

[dattaway]

Does anyone have that mp3 on Bill Gates during a radio interview where he was describing the sad state of copyright protections back in those days? From what I remember, he became a hero for backing the rights of software authors.

Back then, if you were an author, your only protection was protecting your software with keys and other nasty copy protections. No one liked it. Mr. Gates fought for legal protection, stating the software industry would thrive with laws.

Somewhere between then and now it turned ugly with people who disagree with their vision of revenue being called "pirates." It would come down to a person who makes a backup copy of their own software would be suspected of raping and pillaging thousands of software authors of thousands of dollars.

The entertainment industry appears to be a great amplifier of this intellectual property madness. They wish consumers and the technology they buy to be a conduit for their business plan. It appears the label "pirate" has appeared on the other side of the coin these days.

Re:Business Model Hollywood/ Open Source =?.

[LordFlower]

In a broader way i see some similarities. The opensource community are working on a business model that challenges traditional economic models. A model that embraces new technologies. Hollywood may have to do the same, (adapt or die) bring themselves into this emergent mode of economics.

They need a "control"

[NigelJohnstone]

"ABC Nightline segment on a 15-year-old named Benjamin who used his personal computer to go online and download the movie Men of Honor and an episode of Seinfeld, minus the ads"

Let me guess, they showed him start the download, then a smooth cut to hey presto here is the movie, cutting out the days or weeks between.

For a control, they should have had him download "men of Honor" and "Seinfeld" from a legitimate site he could buy it from.

Oh wait, despite the promise to do Video on Demand they never have. So there is NO "control" to compare this with and they have no idea if people would buy the product for a couple of $$ a download if they could get it legitimately from fast download servers.

All that shows is there is big demand, not that people wouldn't pay for downloads if they were available.

Scariest part?

[Mekanix]

It's a battle between Hollywood and the tech-industry... who is missing from this picture? The consumers... the people... It isn't untill the end of the article consumersgroups are mentioned... and rightly so... they hardly play a role...

Isn't it scary to live in a nation, where the voice of the voting people are ignored?

When did democracy die?

Re:Scariest part?

[LordFlower]

Democracy in America never existed. America's capitalistic democracy is just another form of Feudalism, where the majority of the wealth, freedom, and voice, will pass from the privelidged to their children. so let us dream of the future and not on the fallacies of the past.

Re:Scariest part?

[thales]

" Democracy in America never existed. America's capitalistic democracy is just another form of Feudalism, where the majority of the wealth, freedom, and voice, will pass from the privelidged to their children. so let us dream of the future and not on the fallacies of the past."

ROFLMAO
Feudalism is a system where wealth and power are based on a limited comodity, land. Capitalism is a system where new wealth is created. If you bothered to look at the differences instead of parroting stale old leftist slogans you would find that Capitalism replaced Feudalism with a dynamic system where the "Wealthy" are an ever changing group. If your premise was true the wealthiest people in America would have names like Washington and Adams. Instead you find a constant pattern where the Wealthiest people are those who created thier own wealth, and most often rose out of the lower classes.

Why the need to protect broadcasts?

[Greger47]

I don't get the obsession with protecting broadcasts.

Since they are transmitting to anyone with an antenna on their roof (while hoping that you will watch thier commercials), whats the big deal if teenager X records the latest episode of Buffy and shares it on the internet?

The only thing I can see is a lessening of the value of next day re-runs (with new commercials) since whoever missed it the first time it was broadcast can now get it of the internet at thier own leisure instead. And I don't think those constant re-runs of M.A.S.H are at danger, only the most hardcore Allan Alda fans will downlaod that.

I can see why HBO wants to protect their primetime movies, since they are a subscription based service. But according to the article, copy protection for cable has already been solved by that C5 group.

No, this is all about what the broadcasters have dreamed of since the invention of the VCR, regaining total control over the average Joe's television watching habits and killing those pesky Tivo devices that threat to kill their revenue model.

Also the point about noone ordering broadband because there's no high definition movies to download is just bull. The reason noone gets broadband today is because of bad service, crippled bandwith, download caps and monthly fees bordering to extortion.

Besides, downloading a DVD using a 2 mbit/s connection takes atleast 6 hours. Wow! Select a movie at breakfast, watch it for dinner. I don't think HBO needs to worry about competition from broadband anytime soon.

And in the side-scene we have the movie studios smiling with glee waiting for the broadcast industry to fix thier broken DVD standard with laws and regulations.

Screw both industries

[Alex Belits]

They either are against us, or are ready to sell our rights as a piece of some bargain. Consumer advocates, free/open software developers and civil rights groups must do everything to affect the outcome of this because it's their interests that are at stake. Both Intel and Disney can kiss our asses and have Enron-style bankruptcy for all I care.

Why not buy the Content Industry?

[phulshof]

I believe that some technology company (was it MS?) already made a threat to Valenti to buy the MPAA companies. If you look at the wealth in the electronics/IT sector, they could probably do it. If Hollywood continues their attacks in Congress, the tech sector might just follow up on their threat...

Btw: has anyone ever thought about DRM? It's a weird system isn't it? A system designed to keep itself safe from its owner...

Re:Why not buy the Content Industry?

[squiggleslash]

Good idea. We could get, say, Sony to buy Columbia, and maybe AOL could buy Time Warner. Then we'd live in a utopia where content providers make money from hardware sales and...

...I'll get my coat.

Re:Make sure you include musical instruments

[reallocate]

It's rather nice to hear from an actual musician. His fear -- that no one will buy his music if they can get it free -- seems reasonable to me. After all, almost everyone here constantly and stridently asserts their right to copy digital recordings of his music.

>> Those working on open source, like myself and many others, clearly rely on the goodwill and kindness of the community.

How, then, are you paying your bills? Canvassing the neighborhood for donations? Why would you expect to receive the community's continuing goodwill? (By community I mean a real, physical place, not the imaginary "community" of disparate people with sharedd interests.)

I think it is demeaning to people who create software to expect them to work for nothing. Likewise, it is demeaning to musicians to expect them to work for nothing.

>> These laws are to make large corporations rich...

No question that the media corporatins have successfully molded copyright law into a tool to bludgeon both the consumer and the artist. Historically, though, copyright law is intended to protect artists and consumers from predatory businesses. In simple terms, no copyright, no protection of reproducible art, no art to buy apart from live performances. Most importantly, the ability of people who write books to protect their interests would disappear. Don't throw the baby out with the bath water.

for a book length treatment

[danny]

I recommend Jessica Litman's Digital Copyright .

Danny.

Re:It's not a conspiracy at all

[Lonath]

You act as if the RIAA and MPAA are out to control exactly what we see and hear. In reality, its just people working for an industry hoping to make money.

The thing is with computers the only way they can continue to make lots of money is to control what we see and hear. I am not arguing that the control is their end purpose. Their end purpose is making as much money as possible. It's just that the only way to do that is to control everything. So, they are out to get me because they want to make money. I think we're in agreement about the money. I just have a different opinion about what kinds of strategies they want to use.

If you lived in an age where machines made it so that you could only protect copyright or freedom strongly, but not both. Which would you choose to protect strongly?

Jesus Christ

[for(;;);]

(If the following post seems like an overreaction, keep in mind that messages to anti-abortion web sites began with statements like this and elevated to hit lists that murderers actually followed.)

Sweet fucking Jesus! This is incredibly stupid, counter-productive, and dangerous. Things wrong with your post:

1) Terrorism inevitably results in strong conservatism on the part of the terrorized. Killing members of the media cartel (without the backing of a full-out revolution) would horrify the public and lend gravitas to whatever the media execs say. ("We should outlaw piracy -- it's a gateway for murder.")

2) If anyone who (rightfully) hated the media execs actually killed anyone, they'd become a greater tyranny than the media execs themselves.

Your rights are being trampled on. Affect political change by lobbying your elected officials. If that doesn't work, elect new representatives. If that doesn't work, start a revolution to get a true democracy in power. Media execs should be prevented from stomping on free speech by law; the problem is with the laws, not that Jack Valenti draws breath.

I'm sure you meant this as a joke, but good god! This is how these things get out of hand.

DRM exists, but Hollywood isn't biting

[smiff]

Also the point about noone ordering broadband because there's no high definition movies to download is just bull.

Real Networks, Microsoft, and Apple have provided video players with built-in Digital Rights Management for years, but Hollywood doesn't seem to have any interest in providing movies in those formats. As of July 29 this year, Hollywood has donated over $25 million to congresscritters. It would cost less than that to develop their own DRM protected software to download and play encrypted DVD images. If Hollywood won't sell movies on the internet protected with current DRM schemes, they have no plans to ever release movies on the internet.

Re:It's not a conspiracy at all

[fishbowl]

In the 1800's, before recording and broadcast media,
it was actually far more likely for a musician to
find work than today.

Ballet and theatre companies did not use recordings,
they used orchestras. Dance halls and nightclubs
did not have jukeboxes and DJ's, they had bands.

Even playing music on a street corner, which will
most likely get you arrested today, was perfectly legal.

To the remaining points, the audio production industry does
create artificial barriers to entry into markets, but copyright control
does not have that much to do with it.

So Preposterously Wrong...

[reallocate]

>> You do not have a right to make money off your art.

Geez, that's so preposterously wrong that it is hard to imagine how you came to that conclusion.

People who make something -- music, movies, or whatever -- have every right to try to sell their creations, for any price, to anyone. Your only right in the matter is to not buy.

Re:So Preposterously Wrong...

[Golias]

I could have worded that better. (Two moderators understood what I meant, and modded me up, two didn't and called it a troll.)

What I meant was that making enough money to live on with nothing but your art is not an absolute right. If somebody is willing to buy it, great. If not, you are not being repressed, you are just unsuccessful.

A letter to Congress

[captaineo]

I recently faxed the following letter to my Congressional representatives. Feel free to quote it in your own correspondence, with proper attribution of course. (apologies for the formatting; this is copied from LaTeX source)

I am proud to be both your constituent and the owner of a small but
successful digital video studio. I have become very alarmed by recent
changes to U.S. copyright law, and the direction in which it seems to
be heading. The tremendous powers the law has granted to copyright
owners, particularly large film and music studios, are having a
deleterious effect on independent producers (such as myself) as well
as consumers of these media.

Under the pretense of combating music and film piracy, the major
U.S. recording companies and film studios have recently obtained legal
powers that extend far beyond the reasonable, limited monopoly
conferred by traditional copyright law. For example, the 1998 Digital
Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) outlawed the creation of tools that
circumvent the copy-prevention systems now present in commercial VHS
tapes, newer audio CDs, DVDs, and other digital media. This provision
has hardly diminished the operations of music and film
pirates. Instead, the primary effect of the DMCA's anti-circumvention
provision has been to trample on ``fair use'' rights --- legal
allowances to duplicate copyrighted material for personal or
educational use. It is illegal to produce a device that circumvents
the copy-prevention system on VHS tapes or DVD discs, even if the
intended use is simply creating a personal back-up copy, excerpting
for academic purposes, or converting the media into an alternative
format (e.g. close-captioning for a hearing-impaired audience).

More significantly, small, independent producers are excluded from the
DMCA's protection, since most copy-prevention systems are only
available to the largest media studios (either due to high costs or
exclusive licensing arrangements). As an independent studio, we have
not seen any benefit from the DMCA. In fact, on several occasions we
have been forced to abandon projects because copy-prevention systems
barred us from duplicating materials, rights to which we had
properly and legally obtained!

I have learned of upcoming copyright initiatives that would further
worsen the situation. The Security Systems Standards and Certification
Act (SSSCA), introduced by Sen. Ernest Hollings at the behest of the
Disney Company and other large studios, would outlaw all digital audio
and video equipment that does not contain an integrated, tamper-proof
copy-prevention system. This measure would make life extremely
difficult for independent digital studios like my own, which have
thrived on the availability of cheap, flexible digital equipment for
editing (and thus necessarily duplicating) audio and video. Large
media companies will escape through an exception in the law for
``professional'' recording devices --- which will likely be priced
beyond the budget of a small studio. This is already the present
situation with VHS players: cheap ``consumer'' players by law must
incorporate the Macrovision copy-prevention system, while expensive
``professional'' players are excepted!

Thankfully the SSSCA was withdrawn, but mandatory copy-prevention
equipment appears in several other upcoming proposals. One such
measure is the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act
(CBDTPA), also to be introduced by Sen. Hollings. The Act's
supporters, all major media companies, claim that having
copy-prevention hardware in all digital TV equipment is necessary for
the widespread adoption of digital TV. I see no reason for this. Many
other media, like analog TV, radio, and the audio CD, have thrived
despite the absence of copy-prevention systems. My own studio has no
qualms about digital distribution channels that do not mandate
copy-prevention. One effect of mandatory copy-prevention equipment is
clear though: it will completely lock out independent artists and
studios who do not have the ability to encode their work with the
proper copy-prevention signals. I strongly suspect that this is
the true effect the established industry intends to create with the
CBDTPA.

In light of these facts, I urge you to take the following actions:

Oppose the further expansion of copyright powers. Pre-DMCA
copyright law was already strong enough to encourage the creation of
vast numbers of film, music, and literary works.

Do not support mandatory copy-prevention or ``content
protection'' systems, as embodied in such measures as the CBDTPA and
SSSCA. Media pirates will inevitably find ways around these
systems. Mandatory copy-prevention will only have the effect of
strengthening the established media monopolies at the expense of
independent studios, artists, and consumers.

Support the efforts of legislators such as Rep. Rick Boucher
(D-VA), who is working to scale back the Draconian provisions of the
DMCA and write ``fair use'' into law as a guaranteed right.

Support H.R. 5285 - the Internet Radio Fairness Act - which will
lower the unreasonably high music royalty rates imposed on independent
internet music broadcasters.

I can think of no better way to erode America's world leadership in
film, music, and digital media than to destroy the abilities of
creative artists to produce works, and of consumers to enjoy
them. Expanding the control of existing large media companies may lead
to higher short-term profits for them, but will surely cause severe
long-term hardship for all of us.

Re:Digital Rights Management

[symbolic]

If the tenuous nature of making a living off your music bothers you, maybe you should get a day job. I'm sorry, but at no point in human history did the majority of musicians make a good living at it.

And at no point in history have artists had endure so much self-serving THEFT of their work.

If you want me to pay $20 for your CD, make damned sure you sell it in a format that I can easilly back up on my HD, and take full advantage of Fair Use whenever I want. Otherwise you won't ever sell one to me, no matter what your SAT score was.

An artist will sell it in whatever format he/she sees fit. If it doesn't work for you, don't buy it. End of transaction.

You do not have a right to make money off your art. Most artists don't.

Turn this around...where does your right to acquire my art come from, and under what terms do these rights exist?

Are They Suing Phillips?

[Master of Transhuman]

No. Why? Because Phillips is a $60 billion (last time I looked which was years ago) giant bigger than the entire lame entertainment industry.

They can manufacture dual-tray CD players with CD recorders built in, obviously for the purpose of copying a CD (albeit they would claim it's for creating "best of" CD's - yeah, right...) - and nobody dares sue them. Because if they stopped making CD players, the music labels would have no way to sell their product. And if DVDs and VCRs don't get made, movie studios won't get 40-60% of a movie's revenue coming from video rentals.

The movie studios and music labels need to be told to shut up and sit down by the people making their profits possible - the artists and the tech companies.

Without tech, there is no art - and that goes back to whoever mixed the first paints on the cave floor...

Disagreeing with Lessig

[renard]

"The evidence is that this is an increasing battle, not one that is going to be resolved in the short term," says Lawrence Lessig.... "This is a struggle to the death."

No! In fact, death is only a threat if the Content Cabals get their way. In that case, they will in all likelihood kill off (severely reduce) both Tech Sector profits and their own. On the other hand, if by some miracle they give up and grant their customers fair use rights to digital content, they will (contrarily) end up making more money than ever before.

Demonstrating this point is as easy as looking back at the last few distribution revolutions. VCRs? We've already got Valenti's famous serial-killer quote, but thank goodness he didn't get his way - video rentals have been big business for the studios ever since the Supreme Court ruled the VCR legit.

Going back further: Were audio cassettes the bane that the music industry feared, way back in the age of disco when Home taping was killing music? I didn't think so.

And prior even to that: Think television, think radio, think... the printing press. Did publishers make more money before, or after, Gutenberg?

Returning to the present age, is it even clear that Napster, that glorious window onto the world of music as a whole, undivided and beautiful and ever-surprising - was it indeed a bad thing, or was it perhaps free-marketing the music itself? And at the same time, oh look, those copy-protected CDs don't seem to be selling so good.

What I'm getting at here is that discussions of this issue often degenerate rapidly into an us-vs-them mentality. Which in a way makes sense, since the --AA's are a bunch of raving lunatics, who want to lock people up for sharing music after first DOS'ing their computers. But looked at from a different perspective, they're just lost sheep in need of some direction - a little guidance from those of us who actually live with, embrace, and explore the technological frontiers.

In other words, people paint the conflict as win-lose. But it's not: it's a choice we have, as a society: win-win, or lose-lose.

-Renard

Re:Digital Rights Management

[Golias]

An artist will sell it in whatever format he/she sees fit. If it doesn't work for you, don't buy it. End of transaction.

That was my whole point. If it doesn't work for me, I won't buy it. Keep that in mind when chosing your protection schemes.

In other words, if you want to sell me your CD, you are probably going to have to learn to live with the fact that warez dudez are going to collect unauthorized copies of your album on their shared drives, because there's no way you can prevent that without also preventing my fair use of the content you are selling to me, which I, as a buyer, will not accept.