Slashdot Mirror
Senate Hearing Webcast Today On DMCA Subpoena Powers
An anonymous reader sends this clipping from the Senate Commerce committee website about today's hearing into "consumer privacy implications of the use of subpoena powers by copyright holders to obtain the identities of Internet subscribers allegedly infringing on their copyrights. Members also will examine whether the government can mandate content protection technologies without limiting consumers' legal uses of digital media products. Senator Brownback will preside. Tentative witness list will be available at a later time."
Here's a link to both the schedule and the webcast itself; it starts at 10:00 a.m., EST.
This is about whether CORPORATIONS can issue subpoenas. That was NEVER intended by our Government's framers. The governement represents, or at least, ought to represent, the will of the people. The RIAA represents the desire of rich greedy people to get more money by knifing artists and the people.
Quite simply, this enforcement campaign would never happen without the DMCA, because people don't consider copyright infringement to be a serious crime. Before the DMCA, enforcement of copyright law was generally in touch with the public's perception. There was no public outcry, so the police only cracked down on huge cracker rings.
The DMCA is the hijacking of the will of the American people for corporate profit. The RIAA wants to use our "basic human rights" to bleed us dry. It already has laid claim to powers reserved for our government, while declaring itself immune to the protections of the constitution, especially against unreasonable search and seizure. So please, the last thing I want to hear some ignorant troll bitching about is how we're depriving the RIAA of its rights.
But there is another kind of evil that we must fear most... and that is the indifference of good men.
The hearing is being held by the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Technology. The chairman of the committee is Norm Coleman, the freshman senator from Minnesota... He has been fairly outspoken against the recent tactics of the RIAA...
--Kobayashi--
Where have you been!?!?!?!?!? Congress has "deliberately, knowingly, and unabashedly sacrificed their Constitutional responsibility to protect the rights of the people" so many times and for so many years that if violation of thier oath of office, there is enough public record to convict just about every current or former senator or representatiive still living! I agree with you that they shouldn't be protecting the rights of corporations - but they do because it is corporations that pay to get them elected. The only way we currently have to stpo it is to make enough noice that the idiots in office worry about some other moron with backing from different corporations getting elected next time. Then they back off.
The heights of genius are only measurable by the depths of stupidity
Well, I watched part of this, and I'd have to say that the Congresswoman with the short dark hair and the red shirt (didn't catch her name, or what state she was from, assuming California since she said that content industries are a major player in her state) is the Stupidest Person Alive. She was blasting William Barr (Verizon) for including in a Verizon brochure something along the lines of, "There are music downloading services that you can pay for, and also free ones, but the free ones have ads," because as we all know, "free" automatically means "illegally downloaded from Kazaa." Hey, Ms. Stupidest Person Alive, ever heard of mp3.com? Or iuma.com? Or hundreds of other free and legal sites like them? How about "downloading legal music from Kazaa"? She quipped that Mr. Barr should have warned subscribers about lawsuits resulting from using said (legal) services, and not ads.
Interestingly enough, I am a subscriber of Verizon, and I remember receiving in the (snail) mail a brochure explaining how to download free music online. It was obviously geared toward people who had never touched a computer before, because it said, "Click Start. Click Programs. Click Internet Explorer. In the address bar, type "www.mp3.com" etc etc." And it did tell subscibers to go to mp3.com. It never mentioned Kazaa or any other P2P software specifically, and I can't believe that Verizon ever would, because judging by the way the brochure was written, I'd say Verizon doesn't think it's users are capable of installing software.
Reprise the theme song and roll the credits!