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Librarian of Congress Posts DMCA Exemptions
MrNerdHair writes "The Librarian of Congress has posted a list of exemptions from the DMCA (also obtainable in PDF here.) Works falling in four 'classes' may be considered exempt from Section 1201 of the DMCA's prohibition against 'circumvention of a technological measure which effectively controls access to a work.' Among the list are blacklists of sites used in programs such as NetNanny and cracks to bypass dongles on abandonware. All in all, a very interesting read ..." Not just interesting: as Robin Gross writes, "Unfortunately, the ruling leaves the vast majority of consumers unable to access their own property, such as skipping commercials on DVDs, playing CDs in their PCs, and reading eBooks on PDA's without violating the DMCA." Update: 10/29 15:19 GMT by T : Take a look at Seth Finkelstein's site for an idea of how being pushy can sometimes be helpful; Finkelstein has loudly pushed for the importance of DMCA exemptions, including in Congressional testimony.
"The Librarian of Congress"?
She must be busy as hell!
The saddest thing about this whole DMCA fiasco is that there were enough people illegally distributing copyrighted works that the publishers saw fit to put these idiotic controls in.
Both sides are wrong, but it was the copyright infringers who were wrong first.
Now we are stuck with these controls and a completely braindead law that makes it a crime to exercise what was once accepted as 'inalienable rights'.
"circumvention of a technological measure which effectively controls access to a work."
If it can be circumvented, then it's not really that effective, now is it?
Really there should be a list of things that ARE covered by the DCMA so that companies can't blidning through the DCMA around everytime they feel threatended.
Beings aspergers AND pulling chicks... I enjoy the challenge!
meep
The US Librarian of Congress has created the following four narrow exemptions from the DMCA's general ban on circumvention for the next three-years:
1. Compilations consisting of lists of Internet locations blocked by commercially marketed filtering software applications that are intended to prevent access to domains, websites or portions of websites, but not including lists of Internet locations blocked by software applications that operate exclusively to protect against damage to a computer or computer network or lists of Internet locations blocked by software applications that operate exclusively to prevent receipt of email.
2. Computer programs protected by dongles that prevent access due to malfunction or damage and which are obsolete.
3. Computer programs and video games distributed in formats that have become obsolete and which require the original media or hardware as a condition of access.
4. Literary works distributed in ebook format when all existing ebook editions of the work (including digital text editions made available by authorized entities) contain access controls that prevent the enabling of the ebook's read-aloud function and that prevent the enabling of screen readers to render the text into a specialized format
Windows 95 is considered obsolete and unsupported by Microsoft, right? And doesn't that end many questions on MAME?
I can't wait for the next round of exceptions.
+&x
could be a he... heck, as the librarian of congress, i imagined Conan The Librarian!
"I'd say 'Have a good time,' but arson is still illegal.
If I buy a DVD of a movie, I want to be able to skip there damn promos. I don't want the disc or player telling me that I HAVE TO WATCH THEIR ADVERTISEMENTS.
It's asine. It would, according to the DVD spec, be possible for them to produce a movie which would not allow you to pause, fast forward, or rewind.
What if I want to get up and take a piss?
If I transfer that DVD to something like VHS, so that I can pause it to get up and take a piss, I AM A CRIMINAL. This has nothing to do with stopping piracy.
Windows 95 is considered obsolete and unsupported by Microsoft, right? And doesn't that end many questions on MAME?
This ruling merely creates exceptions to the DMCA, i.e. cracking the protection on a work, not distributing it. Therefore, as Windows 95 is a copyrighted work and you don't need to crack its protection to get it to work on a PC (its native format), this ruling does not affect Windows 95 in any way. And the only thing it changes for MAME is that it makes it legal to crack the protection on arcade boards to decrypt and emulate them. It's still illegal to trade abandonware ROMs/ISOs.
If you haven't already read The Right to Read, do it while you still have the right to do it. From what I witness it might change in the near future. Funny that we all were laughing at Richard when he wrote his "dystopian science fiction which will never happen outside of a paranoid mind guarded with a tinfoil hat" and at the same time we all kept allowing it to slowly happen. And who looks like a fool now? Not Richard but us. It certainly doesn't make me feel proud at all.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
Unfortunately no. Section 2 & 3 specifically state (emphesis mine):
2. Computer programs protected by dongles that prevent access due to malfunction or damage and which are obsolete.
3. Computer programs and video games distributed in formats that have become obsolete and which require the original media or hardware as a condition of access. A format shall be considered obsolete if the machine or system necessary to render perceptible a work stored in that format is no longer manufactured or is no longer reasonably available in the commercial marketplace.
So this says you are allowed to bypass and DRM or other copy protection necessary to access the software if it is no longer feasable to do it legally... BUT you must own the software in the first place to do this. Otherwise it could still be considered piracy.
Blockwars: multiplayer gaming... free!
"They do not preach that their god will rouse them, a little before the Nuts work loose." Kipling, 'The Sons of Martha'
We're not talking about the rights to the movie. We're talking about ownership of the EQUIPMENT and SOFTWARE to play it. If I want to go buy a DVD from Amazon.com or buy DRM-crippled music from the iTunes Music Store, then I'm free to do so. If I want to buy a DVD player from Fry's or an iPod from Apple, then I'm free to do so.
Suppose I wanted to *lease* a DVD player (like a car) - then the lessor can impose restriction whatever restrictions he wants on me modifying HIS property, and I don't think anyone would find this unreasonable.
However, if I want to modify my DVD player THAT I PAID FOR, FAIR AND SQURE, so I can skip commercials, then I should be free to do so. And if I want to write a program that can play the stuff on the DVD disc THAT I PAID FOR, then I should be free to do so.
We are not asking for NEW allowances. The old copyright law was fine. It's the DMCA that has to go.
Y'know, I want to agree with you, I really do, but I just can't bring myself to do it.
Copyright was not originally intended to provide a way to allow creators to restrict how their works are distributed - that was a deliberate side-effect of the actual purpose of copyright at the time, which was to promote further creation. In other words, "if you keep on writing books/painting pictures/whatever, you get to say what people can do with that - but only for a little while, because any creative work eventually should become the property of the people".
Now, before somebody starts foaming at the mouth about how that was then, this is now, and books, movies, music, etc. are big business and thus more control should be given to those who create them - I do agree with you, to a point. If I wrote a book and the next day had it spread around the world without my consent, I'd be pissed.
The problem is, we're reaching a point in history where, for the very first time, it costs virtually nothing to store, replicate and distribute creative works. In the old days, a book had to be laboriously handcopied, or re-typeset, or be run through a photocopier a page at a time. Now, any book on the planet fits into my USB keyring a thousandfold.
At this point in time, don't we want to rethink what the meaning of restrictions on copying are in a world where there is no physical basis for those restrictions?
Isn't the whole point of creation to enrich your life and the lives of those around you? (I exclude Britney Spears songs, "books" by anyone with the first name Danielle, and movies that feature the incumbent Governor of California from this.) Surely we can figure out a way that someone who creates something worthwhile can make a reasonable living doing so, without forbidding everybody else to pass such a creation to other people without restriction?
May someone please give me a non-obscene definition of the word 'dongles?'
The consumer owns the disc. The copyright holder, once it's sold, does not. Copyright doesn't grant ownership of the movie, it only grants exclusive right to copy. Have you not read any of the explainations posted on /. describing the difference between property and copyright? I'd go over it again, but no one ever seems to listen...
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Reading the article, it seems to me like the third exemption makes mod chips for video game consoles legal. It specifically states that it covers current (non-obsolete media) and allows for the circumvention of copy protection when a copy can be made, but not used, without circumventing copy protection. The same exemption also specifically mentions video games.
Also, I could see possibly some help for DeCSS-specifically the section of I believe the first exemption relating to the restriction of fair use.
Rule 4 seems to say that if you can't get a copy of an ebook that a screen reader can read (basically plain text or html) then you're allowed to make a program to get said plain text. It doesn't specify that you are blind to be able to use this exception... Doesn't this allow you to do basically anything you would want with your ebook, just phrased in a way no one can argue with it?
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups.
I see this as a ploy to respond to those who have been screaming to get this horrible law overthrown for several years. To the casual person who doesn't know what a horrible piece of legislation the DMCA is, this could look like some kind of compromise possibly giving the law more credibility. If the LOC projects the impression that they want to work with opponents of the law and make it "better" while avoiding further legal action, maybe they hope that will give the law a better reputation with the public. In reality it is a realization that the DMCA's days are numbered and a pathetic attempt to appease the courts to keep it in place.
-You may license this sig for only $6.99.
It is 3Q 2030.
You're arguing with your wife again. It seems she's missed her spending quota again this quarter. A proud patriot, you have no problem spending 85% and sometimes 90% of your income on consumer goods, yet she can't manage to spend even close to the 75% required by law. It's that foreign mentality, you suppose--that's what happens when you are educated overseas and without the benefit of a corporate sponsor. You have to remind her that if the Internal Consumer's Service (ICS) catches her, she'll be doing time in Philip Morris(TM) Prison like her uncle.
Oh well, hopefully a night at the town's AOL-Time-Warner-Clear-Channel-Blockbuster(TM) Authorized Media Distribution Center will smooth things over with her. That reminds you--you need to have your eye- and ear-implants inspected for this quarter again, otherwise you won't even be allowed in tonight.
You haven't attended church services for a while. Although your wife is a devout follower of God's Customers(TM) and shops in the Church Store at LEAST five tiems a quarter, you're not yet convinced that converting from Consumers For Jesus(TM) was that sound an investment.
Your son Rick has just graduated from the local McDonalds(TM) High School. You want him to go to Pepsi(TM) University like his sister, but he wants to go to Coke(TM) College. Not that it matters--the permits you get at either school are the same. Although he really wanted to attend Stanford(TM), his corporate sponsors rejected that proposal, based on what it might do to his credit rating.
Your youngest daughter just graduated Pepsi(TM) U. It was expensive, but she is all set now, having received a Creative Thought Permit and a Entrepreneurship License. On top of that she's accepted a job at Fortune 10 corporation. Of course almost everyone works for a Fortune 10 nowadays, there being only thirty-some corporations left. It's too bad she had to sign all those NDA's though--you'd really like to be allowed to know where she would be living and how to get in touch with her. Ahh well, it's the price you pay for our corporate security.
Your older daughter, after twenty quarters of employment, was finally permitted to tell you that she is working in middle-management at AT&T. Of course, every job in the United Corporations of America is middle-management. The cheaper--skilled--labor is all outsourced to Those Other Countries, whatever they are called. In ten more quarters, assuming her credit rating remains good and she has attained Shareholder status, she'll be allowed to talk face-to-face (no encrypted channel) with us again!
Apparently, her five year old daughter has been grounded again, this time for racking up a $6000 fine--singing "Happy Birthday(TM)" at a party without a Media Distribution License. She really needs to be taught a lesson--that as a patriotic Consumer of the UCA, she needs to respect the rights of Shareholders and property owners. What a dangerous thoughts she has! She thinks she should be allowed to say whatever she pleases, no matter what it does to someone else's portfolio! No one can get it through to her that terrorist ideas like that will land her in one of those "special" schools--and she'd be subjected to a lower quarterly limit on all her credit cards.
Fax from your wife--she'll be late tonight. Corporate HQ has re-instated fourteen-hour work days until the end of this quarter. It's too bad she's not allowed to quit her job--you could get her a pretty sweet management position any time in your department at Microsoft.
Orignal post by Accord MT.
You mean like,
So, if they make an ebook available for $5 without read-aloud, but make a special edition available for $200,000, this exemption does not apply.
In fact, the exemption says nothing of the availability of a read-aloud edition. If a publisher were to create one single edition and sell the only license to his nephew, then it will no longer be the case that "all" existing ebook editions have read-aloud disabled and you would not be able to circumvent the access controls. Even though no read-aloud version is available to you, one does exist so you are SOL.
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
So I can't watch DVD's in my Mandrake box? Or in my Xbox Media Center (should I decide to build one)
Oh my! What should I do about all these awful copies of DeCSS all over the Internet?
Um, so sorry, but no one is going to tell me what I can or can not do with property that I posess. It's mine, I paid for it, I traded CASH for property. I buy property, I don't license it. Licenses are invalid and un-enforceable anyway, just ask SCO. I'll take any and everything apart I own and study it and tell people about it as I see fit.
I always have and I always will.
When I was 5 years old a kid game me a 9 transistor pocket radio circa 1966 that was broken. I fixed it by taking other radios apart and seeing how they were put together.
This DMCA is bullshit designed to keep the elite few at the top in total control.
It stiffles innovation and creativity.
A hell of a lot of inventions were the spawn of someone trying to improve upon an existing design. You stop people from doing that and you are killing progress.
DMCA is a draconian and oppressive tool that keeps the rich, rich and the dumb, dumb.
It's all about the almighty dollar. Greed makes the world go around..
Buy a book. See any license agreement on it? No, such has been tried and explicitly rejected by law. You buy the book, you own the book and its content. You license nothing at all. You are merely restricted from making illegal (as opposed to unauthorized. Think about it) copies.
You may use the content in any manner you like. Cut it up and rearrange all words if you wish. Read it anywhere, under any circumstances. This is your right. Because you own it. You do not license the content.
Hey, same thing for videotape. How about that! Nifty, huh?
Analog. Its yours. For keeps.
Fancy that.
KFG
If they want to clam we don't own it, they why do they say "OWN IT NOW ON DVD" in most, if not all, of their ads?
That's just the thing. Unlike, say, the Bill of Rights, copyright for both the public and the holder, is a very narrow grant of power implicitly to further 'science and the useful arts.' I'm completely on your side, in so far as I believe in corollary rights, such as a right to one's culture, and a 'right' in a Hohfeldian sense in that copyright is a bargain and generates rights that are not being honored, but a substantive constitutional negative liberty right it is not.
In fact, by framing it in terms of 'inalienable rights,' you're actually helping the other side, because the key point of disinformation coming out of the MPAA and RIAA lobbying groups is always phrasing their assertion of power as being morally right insofar as it's against 'theft of intellectual property.' This terminology taken from physical property is vitally important, because that you can't be deprived of physical property is an inalienable right under the constitution.
So the MPAA and RIAA are basically reframing copyright in such a way that they can reasonably demand stronger control over the things they publish, such as we've seen in the debate about (and subsequent S. Court decision in favor of, in essence,) perpetual terms, as well as the great expansion of copyright's scope (Girl Scouts singing campfire songs anyone?). Although they wouldn't publicly phrase it that way, that is the necessary and logical conclusion of their use of physical property issue-framing. By asserting that you have inalienable rights, you're supporting, however inadvertantly, a stronger constitutional test that is, right now, the strongest threat to the public's stake in copyright.
it's about controling distribution. Take Nintendo for instance. They fight tooth and nail to keep import games out of Europe so they can keep prices high there. Ditto for japan and American DVDs (although why anyone would want the crap we spew is beyond me). DRM has less to do with keeping you from sharing music files and more to do with keeping you locked in to whatever system of distribution content providers please. Soon they'll have the holy grail of distribution methods: home audio-video juke boxes and pay-per-use.
That can't happen without legally enforced DRM. Not because of illegal sharing, but because without that DRM, none of this crap would fly in the free market (divx anyone?). Americans are stupid about a lot of things (politics, environment, energy use) but not about our TVs.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
(3)... A format shall be considered obsolete if the machine or system necessary to render perceptible a work stored in that format is no longer manufactured or is no longer reasonably available in the commercial marketplace.
As eBay has many Atari 2600, Colecovision, Intellivision, etc. systems listed, is anything really *not available*?
Similarly, is a program that was introduced on 5 1/4" floppies, and then taken off the market, considered a "format no longer manufactured"?
Ok, so if you have a DVD that consists entirely of material that is in the public domain, it is legal for you to use DeCSS to access that material, yes? Am I reading this incorrectly?: "the prohibition on circumvention will not be applicable." So how can it be illegal to post DeCSS to a website, if the code can be used for legitimate purposes? The premise of the MPAA's case against 2600 was that DeCSS violated the DMCA by providing an illegal circumvention technique. But if this circumvention is only illegal when misused by the end-user, isn't DeCSS more akin to the FastTrack network -- or, for that matter, to VCRs, MP3 players, Xerox machines, etc.
In other words, if there are instances in which the prohibition on circumventing CSS is not applicable, then telling someone else how to circumvent CSS should not be illegal, yes? What am I not getting here?
Michael
"No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality;..."
but not including ... lists of Internet locations blocked by software applications that operate exclusively to prevent receipt of email.
If I suspect some commercial entities blacklist software has blacklisted my domain, I can't reverse engineer the list to confirm that without running afoul of the DMCA.
I hope there's a case that allows a First Amendment challenge to that one real soon. That looks like a very dangerous exclusion.
When I read 'Librarian', I go a mental picture of an orangutan sitting at a desk , eating bananas and going 'Ook?'
main(i){putchar(177663314>>6*(i-1)&63|!!(i<5)<<6)&&main(++i);}
Um, so sorry, but no one is going to tell me what I can or can not do with property that I posess. It's mine, I paid for it, I traded CASH for property. I buy property, I don't license it. Licenses are invalid and un-enforceable anyway, just ask SCO. I'll take any and everything apart I own and study it and tell people about it as I see fit.
Just what, exactly, gives you the right to do anything you want with no regard for anyone else? Just because you bought a physical object doesn't mean you can do anything you want with it, from a moral or legal point of view.
Stop having such an egocentric view of the world. Make it a point to look at every other person you pass tomorrow and realize that they've got the same rights you do, and therefore, you've all got limited rights for the good of all.
Gr@ve_Rose
!ekoj on si aixelsyD
...just don't buy it. I mean seriously, can I get a witness from someone, anyone here?
If you can't handle the fact that you're not legally allowd to fiddle with a DVD to get around commericials that have been inserted in there, why are you buying DVDs? Yes, it's stupid, and it should be fought hard, but why are you people buying DVDs in the meantime?
I don't buy music on CDs because I don't care for the copy protection regime, and I'd rather not have some idiot corporate lawyer looking for a test case try to eat my life. It's easier, and they can't legally touch me for not buying stuff. I couldn't care less if anyone calls me unpatriotic. Whooptie doo. I can call them the reincarnation of Adolph Hitler, but just because it's personally insulting doesn't make it true, or worth more than the lungfull of air it took to spew it. I truly do not understand why people allow themselves to be railroaded into things, if they hate those things so much.
Just don't buy DVDs or CDs. Watch ones your simple minded sheep friends have at their house. Stops you from watching the idiot box all day, at worst. There is stuff that is released in a format that conforms to your wishes. Find it, use it, and patronize the people who produce it, and punish the big guys by, horror of horrors, NOT SPENDING YOUR MONEY ON THEIR STUFF.
So, I guess that will make MAME, et al, very happy. From the way I read this section, things like Sega Genesis or TRS-80 games are not protected?
--Malachi
http://www.google.com/profiles/malachid