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Ask Mike Godwin About Internet Law
Mike Godwin is probably best known to Slashdot readers for Godwin's Law, but that's one of the most minor reasons you should know him. In this blurb for his book, CYBER RIGHTS, he's (correctly) described as "one of the first lawyers to 'live and work in cyberspace.'" Naturally, Mike can't give specific legal advice, but he's certainly about as expert as they come about the development of law and legal hassles surrounding the Internet. We'll send him 10 of the highest-moderated questions, and publish his answers as soon as we get them back.
Is port scanning illegal? Spoofing e-mail addresses?
Do you ever feel that your more recent work has trouble climbing out of the shadow cast by Goodwin's Law? Is there any work you've done that you feel is of greater significance than Goodwin's Law which hasn't received sufficient attention you think it deserves?
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
I've heard from time to time (albeit prety sparsely) of companies threatening legal action for using their images on a website/forum/etc.
Is there any written law that backs it up, or is it just baseless threats?
Kids these days. They don't know the difference between classic, and just plain old.
Internet piracy, peer-to-peer, 'sharing mp3s'... is there any chance any of this can and will be legal? It just seems like so many geeks want it to be legal, but it requires a lawyer with a good understanding of technology to deliver the odds. So whats it gonna be? Slim to none?
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
I wonder if he is allready working on a theory on the 'cluster' 'Beowulf' and the underpants gnomes profit plan reoccuring on Slashdot. ;)
In your experience, have you found most lawsuits involving IP issues to be a waste of time/resources, or possessing merit?
Nothing but the finest in meaningless drivel
What do you think of the No Electronic Theft (NET) Act of 1997 and do you think it is fair to make not profit motive copyright infringement a criminal offense?
Don't you think that some of today's Internet laws are suspiciously reminiscent of the laws the Nazis used to have? What? What did I say? Why are you looking at me like that?
No weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men.-Ronald Reagan
It has become clear to me that we probably need new IP laws for an age where copying is so easy. The current set were drafted when widespread copying was difficult, and accepted that certain infringements would happen. We can now copy so much so easily, and prevent copying so easily, that I think we should look again at the law, and see whether some small rights should accrue to the user. What's your view on this?
Exercise your right not to vote. thinkoutside.org
Speaking of Mike Godwin, and Internet 'laws', I think /. editors will no doubt be comprable to Nazis when judging responses to send to Mike.
(Godwin's Law, for those needing a clue)
So, this discussion has therefore ceased all useful content. But that's not surprising, really, is it?
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
How long do you predict it will be before all rights to fair use are vanquished from the Internet?
Sedition is defined as speach which advocates the immedate and violent overthrow of the government in a fashion as to provide a clear and present danger, if my memory serves me correctly.
My question is, would an internet website fall into that catigory, as it does not have the same force as say, Hitler in the Haufbrauhause with like, 2,000 SA going to storm the Bavarian capital building. It does have a wider audience, but due to the decentralized nature I doubt that a website can provide a clear and present danger or immediate action at all. Am I wrong? Does the PATRIOT Act redefine it in such a way as to make it "terrorism?"
If so, how does this impact the manufacturers of copy protected audio and data CDs?
If a copy-protected audio or data CD goes faulty, is the manufacturer liable to provide a new copy free of charge? If so, in what time-frame?
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Is deep linking legal?
What about mirroring? Does the answer change if the site would require you to register before accessing it? Does the answer change if no copyright notice is placed on the page?
Often, I find my network and servers I use for my small business come under attack by script kiddies. Sometimes it's a DDoS attack, but more often than not, it's just getting hammered by one machine. When I contact the ISP involved, generally one of the large US ISPs, I am told that they will look into it. Nothing ever happens, however, and ISPs are generally unwilling to provide assistance in tracking down attacks. This means my complaint ends up in the circular file. The ISPs are protecting criminals because they don't want to lose business, and I have no way of making sure my complaint doesn't end up lost in this black hole. As an individual representing a small business, what recourse do I have in dealing with ISPs to make sure my complaints are heard and taken seriously?
The DMCA contains an obscure clause about interoperability, what does this mean? That is could I break encryption to allow DVD player to work, so long as I maintained the spirit of the encryption (not allowing copies)? Can I break the encryption on various games to allow them to run under Wine?
By the time your daughter grows up, do you think there will be any of our cherished freedoms on the Internet left, or will everything be wrapped in legalese and DRM? With the passage of laws from the DMCA to the PATRIOT act, I've been increasingly pessimistic about the US's ability to pass any sane legislation that interfaces with the Internet...
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
Mr. Godwin - Lots of /.ers follow the SCO case, followed the DeCSS, Napster, IP, CIPA, etc. What are some lesser known cases/laws that you forsee as having a large potential impact on 'cyberlaw' as we know it?
A freind of mine was preaching to the choir (me) about how inappropriate it is that the RIAA is calling mass copyright infringement "piracy", and how it is an inappropriately biased term given the evils of Blackbeard and the like. Since I agreed, but like my rants to be backed up by better facts, I did some research on piracy of the "Argh, me hearties" kind. To my surprise, it almost fits, if you grant that copyright is "property", Cyberspace is a "place outside the jurisdiction of any State", and that mass copyright infringement falls within "act of depredation". (See what the UN has to say about the Jolly Roger type stuff.)
Skimming the web for some history on this, it seems that the idea of the laws against piracy arose slowly to deal with the problem of crimes committed outside of any national jurisdiction. I was wondering if Mike has any thoughts on this parallel, and what it may imply about how cyberlaw may evolve.
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Who do you think you are Hitler? Going around with some Nazi law that supresses free speech whenever someone uses Hitler or Nazi in a conversation.
As x approaches total apathy I couldn't care less.
A print example is an author's refusal to allow translation of a book to a given language.
A more digital example is Lucas' refusal to release the original Star Wars movies on DVD.
It seems to me that the copyright system is designed to allow the copyright holder to receive compensation for his art, but that this system is being abused by not allowing publication in a given format.
This has obvious implications, also, in the world of digital music.
:wq
You, sir, are worse than the Nazis!
As a legal professional, how do you see the evolution of the laws surrounding the internet progressing? We have heard much talk of losing our online liberties - what do you think the real threats to a reasonable internet are?
If I may, I would like to ask you the same basic question I asked of Lawrence Lessig three years ago: what form do you think that copyright law (and licencing) should take on the Internet?
Do you like Japanese imports?
How far do you think that the internet will be responsible for creating a de-facto international legal system? Property rights, shared criminal databases, shared economic systems,... it seems that the influence of TCP/IP packets has no limits on our society. Will we one day see a world government to enforce international law? And lastly, will this be the US?
Ceci n'est pas une signature
Several years ago the company I work for was the target of a denial of service attack. We contacted the FBI and, after an hour of deliberation, in not so many words they said there really wasn't much they could do. Our ISP was actually much more helpful, both legally and technically, than the FBI. Basically, as I understood the situation, they won't lift a finger unless you can prove $5,000 in damage was caused. The damages were easy to account for, but even then it seemed like they had very little power. I know most internet crimes involve violation of FCC regulations, making them federal issues, but does the FBI have any more power now than they did 3 years ago on this particular issue? If so, is the Patriot Act the source of additional power?
Copyright law in individual countries is usually relatively clear. However, the interactions of the copyright laws of different jurisdictions are often a legal minefield.
What is the best general rule for dealing with 'odd' copyright lengths such as Crown copyright, 50 years from date of publication in general, in countries like the US which have not adopted the Berne Convention rule of shorter term?
It seems to me that most (if not all) spaming and advertising done on the Internet is simply polluting the lines of communication. Like any pollution, it reduces the stuff you want, by increasing the ratio of stuff you don't want, thereby making the whole environment unusable.
Is it possible that this view can be used in any legal way to go after Internet polluters?
for a +5 funny?
What's the legality of An Anti-DoS Tool That Returns Fire? It sounds pretty vigilante to me, but what sort of laws would be applicable to it?
Do you see any municipalities or counties taking advantage of the internet in terms of embracing the benefits of online court calendaring and legal notices? And, are there real prospects of that supplanting the print legal organs that have grown up around the "public notices" industry?
We all know it's possible, but I'm curious to know if anyone is doing it effectively and if there are judges who have a comfort level that allows them to accept a move from paper-based notification.
Amateurs discuss tactics. Professionals discuss logistics.
I'm finished with this thread
On the contary, if a site passes itself as an "eNewspaper" site, an eMag or whatever, and it publishes mistruths, then I would expect it to be sued as any pulp publication would be.
Are there any legal precedents or specific laws on this?
And if you thought that was boring you obviously havn't read my Journal ;-)
Can't I ask Mike Internet about Godwin Law?
You NAZIs!
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
and prevent copying so easily
what are you talking about? give me at least one example on how you would make it impossible for me to copy something.
everything can be ripped (eg. with dd command) everything can be put on the web for others to download.
better you would ask how the law should look like, when everyhitng is possible to copy.
#
#\ @ ? Colonize Mars
#
Damned Nazi.
Different countries/governments/political systems have different laws concerning freedom of expression, privacy, property rights, etc.
How can it be possible to create one set of rules that can apply to all nations with regards to Internet access?
"For every right, an equal responsibility..."
Whne is it legal for lawmakers or their staff to brewak into other computers from light aspects such as file/foledr sharing to somethign more extreme..
as you may know recently US congress ruled that a computer brekain by staff was somewhat legal due to circumstances following a file/foledr share missconfiguration..
Don't Tread on OpenSource
I have a question about the recent litigation by the RIAA against a handful of university students for running supposedly illegal P2P services. I'm a student at Rensselaer, so I'm more familiar with the service that was being run there, but as far as I figure it was the same deal at all the other universities as well. At RPI, the Phynd server searched all the computers that were sharing files on the network and indexed them so you could do a keyword search for files, similar to the way google works. From what I read of the case, the major point in the case was that the RIAA said that the service provided illegal access to copyrighted material because you could use the service to directly download material, via a hyperlink in the search results window; even though the service and the files were restricted only to students at Rensselaer. My question is how would their case have changed if all the service returned was just the address of the computer hosting the files? Thus after a person ran a search and decided on his own to manually type the address of the hosting computer to access it, would the owners of the phynd server have been held accountable since it would have been the miscosoft transfer protocols transfering the files. This seemed to be the big point in going after the students that it was their program that was directly facilitating the illegal downloads, and it seems like if the service merely indexed the files without providing direct access the case would have been significantly weakened.
What would he view as an appropiate timeline for requiring ISP's to automatically assign an email signing certificate to every user and digitally sign every email that user sends through their smtp service. Conversely, ISP's would be required to accept email with signing certificate from a trusted root authority.
By having this done at the ISP level, it relieves the burden from the average user and will not tie you into a given email client
I view these requirements less as a means of stopping spam than as the first step to establishing a trusted delivery mechanism. Once you establish digital signing you can then go the next step and provide encryption services at the ISP level. Of course this would require an secure dial-up/broadband conncetion to the ISP but that can be handled at the oeprating system level and be hidden from the user.
I make my face look like this and concerned words come out.
Two words: Trusted Computing
It won't be easily circumvented, and if it is, you can bet that it will be illegal. We need rights to stop this onslaught.
Exercise your right not to vote. thinkoutside.org
Q: Can You see any way the net can be regulated? I have read the other suggestions/queries here and quite frankly it seems that most people(american that is) just dont understand that the net is global. How can we make a set of rules that all users of the net is forced to follow? Do we really want to?
Do you see the DMCA as a law that can truly benefit the world as a whole, or just a tool of the big corporations (MPAA, I'm looking at you) or whatever?
I'm amazing. You aren't. SUCK IT
Do you think that software patents, like those talked in slashdot, are very hard to get rid of?
Especially to open-source developers?
What's an internet?
It's got something to do with canned pork products.
Sometimes I feel that eventually MS and IBM will come to legal blows (more than likely due to SCO being a puppet of MS) - Do you think that this will eventually happen, and if so, who do you feel will win based on a) legal prowess and b) technology patents.
Also, what's your take on the SCO brouhaha?
And do you think they will?
As a computer science student graduating college and hoping to head to law school, I wonder if you have any particular advice about wha training, if any, will help to prepare me for "cyber-law". Many schools seem to have programs focusing on this aspect of the law, but I've often thought that the generalist approach to a field yielded better results.
Are there any experiences you'd advise a young prospective attorney interested in this field to seek out?
More to the point, does changing the medium in which content is delivered constitute a derivative work and therefore require a seperate copyright license? E.G., ripping a muic track from a CD to play on a computer, copying a track from a vinyl album to a CD or audio cassette to play in a car, etc.
While I find spam as annoying as the next person, I'm more interested in the legal status of spyware. What are the rights of the individual when he visits a site? What rights to the individual's machine does the site have? Is permanently altering a user's browser a legal operation? What constitutes permission with regard to this type of manipulation?
"If you're flammable and have legs, you are never blocking a fire exit." - Mitch Hedberg
If not, why do you suppose they don't do it?
It's Christmas everyday with BitTorrent.
Do you think there could be any danger associated with Godwin' law due to the fact that it trivializes comparisons to Nazi's/Hitler? Is it possible that legitimate comparisons to Nazi Germany could be laughed off or trivialized due to your law?
I thought it was the inner lining of your swin trunks.
Is it legal to make and edit copies of commercial DVDs for personal use? What about loaning out the edited copies to friends?
Ha, ha! Nobody ever says Italy.
To place all the virtual lawyers at the bottom of?
It used to be hard to make intellectual property that was compelling enough to justify the enormous cost of distribution. Since the distribution costs and production costs forced each other up, there was a lot of sunk-cost to deal with before any customers even had the option of paying for the product. Now, distribution costs are so low that you can do as little or as much production as you want, and you can distribute it nearly for free if you use peer-to-peer distribution networks. Software like Apple's iLife suite lowers the ante on production costs to within reach of nearly any high school or college student, let alone professionals moonlighting as film or recording artists.
Maybe most of the product will not be that good, but there is still no reason to involve the massive and massive expense of a full-blown 1980s style music or film production. For example, people routinely pay for concert tickets (guaranteed delivery) of a performance--sight unseen. If too few tickets are sold, the show is cancelled, and the ticket holders are refunded. Why not sell download tickets for yet unfinished films and albums? Then the fan base can directly fund proven popular artists' productions.
I recognise that some artists and a lot of middlemen enjoy lots of residual income from past production work. Why is it so hard to recognise that this is not the only way to pay artists for their work, and there may be better ways if we think about it? The way I see it, copyrights only protect residual income, which pays artists and middlemen to NOT produce new material. Why do people think this is good?
--- Nothing clever here: move along now...
Why is it that there "have to be" laws specific to the internet? If a spammer sends an e-mail using forged headers, why doesn't the law go after him (or her) with good old-fashioned anti-fraud laws? Does the main failing of these kinds of old laws lie in ingorance that makes law enforcement unable or unwilling to enforce the laws without further clarification, or is something else going on here?
My question: do the ongoing legal machinations of various behemoth companies with regard to software patents really threaten the liberties that Free Software programmers around the World currently enjoy? Or, are we guilty of hyping this up?
Napster was shutdown through the legal system while Usenet, IRC and P2P networks continue to exist even though they can share the same type of files. What are the technical differences between a legal and illegal file sharing system?
... charismatic leader of the last century, which one would you pick?
How do you feel about people sharing your book?
Do you feel that one should have to make their (human) name and street public information to receive a domain name? It is perfectly possible to keep such information private except to law enforcement under request. The debators on both sides seem to see it as an all or nothing situation: open to everybody or open to nobody.
For that matter, what are the legal barriers against having a single "recipient number" for all types of communication so that one can move and still keep the same number? Email, phone, paper mail, etc. can then be redirected to such a number, and internal lookup tables would supply physical locations or addresses for final delivery. But to senders or callers, it is just one stable number.
Table-ized A.I.
The problem is people who can't substantiate thier arguments, not Godwin's Law.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Do you think that the widespread use of the Internet and practical anonymity will force copyright back into its original, more reasonable form of limited restrictions on copying as business models adapt to the unenforcability of existing law? Or do you think it will force law the other way, to ever-more draconian measures that can't be enforced effectively without making examples of people?
Do you think a new form of Intellectual Property will arise that is based around creators' rights to control their work that goes beyond mere copying and into the realm of restrictions on use? Or have we already gotten to that point?
Are EULAs legal? If they aren't now, will they ever be?
What would you suggest people in countries do to avoid capitulating to the USA and adopting its twisted notion of copyright? It's not always practical to "just say no" to the USA.
Why is your book title "CYBER RIGHTS" YELLING? :-)
Damn, how many non cap words do I have to use to get past the lameness filter?
When I take a 'picture' (a screenshot of the
virtual world) in the MMORPG that I play
in who 'owns' the picture? Can I use it for
commercial purposes?
-- Programming with boost is like building a house with lego. It's a cool but I wouldn't want to live in it
How do international liscenses and copyrights apply to the Internet? Supposing a given song is liscensed in Japan and not the U.S., is it legal to acquire a copy of the song within the U.S.? What happens when the song finally is liscensed in the U.S.?
I have written some software and have decided to distribute it under the GNU General Public License. I then find out some established/incorporated company has modified the software without redistributing their modified version freely, that they are making a profit out of the modified undistributed version, or that they are redistributing the software without pointing out that what they are giving is not the original version of the software. What exactly are my rights? Is it worth taking the company to court, or is this too risky? To come to the point, is the GPL actually a licence which has some value in the courts of justice?
"Really, I'm not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect" -- Linus Torval
Quite often we hear a legislator (both in the US and Ireland, where I live) tell us about the next best legal scheme to handle the scourges of spam or child pornography. Nearly always their assumptions about how the internet works are so off-base that it's difficult to see where they are coming from. The most common failure in their thinking, of course, is the notion that the internet can be regulated like a utility (e.g. electricity, 'phone communications).
What do you think is the best means to educate legislators and their advisors on how the internet actually works?
Eibhear
What effects, positive or negative, do you think sites like the popular Groklaw have/will have on corporate technology litigation? Do lawyers pay any attention to the research and opinions of amateurs and the general public?
How do you plan on managing laws and constitutions that stretch beyond U.S territories.
If the Internet started with the U.S and expanded to some parts of Antarctica. U.S. rules are probably useless once it gets to the new continent.
Vice versa if someone in Antarctica created a P2P application and it became extremely popular in the U.S. U.S lawyers probably can never get a grip on it.
Isn't geography the greatest challenge out there for any lawyers. In fact it's so difficult to deal with it's rendering the law useless.
Dammti. I am a troll. I post thoughtful trolls but I am a troll one the less. Why does the crap I post that is meant as nothing but a troll get modded up and the stuff I actually believe (Downloading music is theft) and other things get modded into oblivion.
Arggg....
Plea is a noun.
To plead is a verb.
In the age of the internet, it seems that traditional law falls down in a alot of places. We are all familiar with the various IP issues with electronic media, but other issues are at the forefront as well, such as: jurisdiction, international transactions, taxation, morality, etc... For most of these items, the paradigm changes so much in the electronic world that current laws are next to impossible to reconcile.
Are most American and other legal systems so broken that they will never be able to adequately address cyberspace? Does the whole system need blown up and reconstructed, or maybe a new adjunct system built?
That police officer has repeatedly attempted to contact me (as a rule, I never volunteer any information to law enforcement), and has gone so far as to obtain some personal information about me. Turns-out that the ISP caved-in to his demands and provided some information about me, in clear violation of legal procedure and current privacy laws.
This is no different from a cracker obtaining passwords/access through social engineering.
Furthermore, the officer has repeatedly attempted to have me contact him tough threatening e-mail messages.
My question is: should there be stiff penalties towards law-enforcement officers who manage to illegally and without due process of law get information about ISP subscribers, especially if they are well outside their police department jurisdiction?
Trademark issues seem to become a common threat against Open Source projects. Since domain names and project names are often the same, this seems to be an issue for Cyber Law.
My article
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
Based on downloads of MythTV I would guestimate there are somewhere around 25,000 people who are screen-scaping copyrighted tv-listings information off of various web sites around the world. These web sites offer public access, and do not require you to view any sort of legal agreement - though I have heard there is a legal agreement on their websites somewhere...
My question is: Would it be legal to screen-scrape and use this copyrighted information for personal use if there were "terms of service" documents on the website that explicitly forbid this behaviour?
Before his arrest, I would have just ASSUMED selling bongs over the Internet was legal. What is the best way for an entrepreneur ( like an individual selling something on eBay ) to avoid tripping over any stupid and obscure laws?
Eat at Joe's.
Do you think that Godwins Law should be updated to include "Terrorists" as well as "Nazis" as a thread-terminating comparison?
Dan.
As we have repeatedly seen time and time again in recent events US laws made in the past are being used as the basis for litigation in this digital age. With the Internet growing global position, increasing access, and constantly evolving it may be time to recognize it as such. The Net as we know it, I feel, is a place outside our current reality. It exists in every aspect of our lives affect yet unaffected by our actions. Every user can become another being in the Digital Reality. A high school student can be a highly recognized computer guru, a middle aged women with correct skills can become a rich eccentric gentleman. Every aspect of the personality is transmutable in the Digital Reality. My question is thus, In this engimatic realm can we continue to rely on the laws based on a physical reality or is it time to view the 'Net' as a soveriegn world with laws that must be written?
Swim. Damnit where is the spell checker.
Is this a reasonable assertion? Has this been the case when new technology has appeared in the past?
If so, then most importantly: in your opinion, is this a "Good Thing"?Thanks, Rick.C
You were 80% angel, 10% demon. The rest was hard to explain. - Over The Rhine
"Math in a song is good."-Linford
"Piracy" is a perfectly appropriate word to use for copyright infringement. Not because the RIAA has adopted it as their term of choice (although that choice may well have been influenced by the other connotations of the word), but because it has been in use in exactly this context for hundreds of years.
Would you consider being retained for the Ask Slashdot section? Heaven knows that you'd be absolutely invaluable.
You zap the moderators with a wand of humor! The moderators resist!
right here
I mean - when IBM and Microsoft hired advertising agencies to spread the word about Linux and MSN respectively, weren't they fined for littering?
The IBM case The Microsoft Case and the Slashdot discussion about it
I think of spam as I do about drugs - if you go after the pushers, new ones will just pop up. Go after the suppliers, and they will wither away.
My question is - why doesn't anyone sue the people who purchaced the advertising?
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
Can you copyright the design of a web page?
I've heard varying responses to this one and would like some further input. Is it legal to sell items from MMORPG's like Everquest, Diablo 2 or Star Wars Galaxies to other players? If not, why has eBay not forbid these type of auctions since it is strictly against illegal material? Lastly, if this is illegal, would the auction sites selling these items be held responsible or the individual buyers/sellers of the items? Thanks.
It is becoming increasingly apparent that insecure machines on the internet are not just a problem for the owner. With Spam, DDOS, Worms and email viruses as very real issues, infected computers can affect everyone.
Could it be possible for the owner of an infected machine to be held liable for the damage caused by their failure to secure it? Could an ISP be legally forced to disconnect such machines until they are clean?
How does jurisdiction and internet law work? For example, spammers in other countries, e-mailing into the US, how do the US courts and hosting country's courts work out this issue? On the other hand, if someone in the US were to post something on a web host based in a country with limited speech laws that angered the local political party, would that person have to worry about being summoned by a foreign court?
We seldom hear of gaining any online rights.
What would you consider the most important/effective gains that have been made recently in preserving and expanding online liberties? Can most progress be labeled as simply a defense against the further erosion of online rights?
I'm sure Hitler had a similar level of insight to yours. Oh wai--
So long, michael. Don't let the door hit you...
(A)
to transcribe text or images, or both, from paper into an electronic signal and to transmit that signal over a regular telephone line, or
(B)
to transcribe text or images (or both) from an electronic signal received over a regular telephone line onto paper.
My computer and attached scanner/printer clearly meet this definition and nowhere in this code are computers exempted.
Additionally paragraph b1C states that it is prohibited, "to use any telephone facsimile machine, computer, or other device to send an unsolicited advertisement to a telephone facsimile machine". As per the precise technical definition given in this code my PC meets the criteria as a telephone facsimile machine. Nowhere in this code does it specify that the unsolicited advertisement is only prohibited when sent in the form of a fax and the prohibition clearly states that it applies to unsolicited advertisements sent by telephone facsimile machine, computer, or other device. Why can't this law be applied to unsolicited email advertisements that I receive? It would seem that as long as my computer is connected to a "regular telephone line" that all criteria have been met.
Do you really believe that you have the power to declare legitimate analogies off limits, and your debating opponents automatically the loser? (see your eponymous "Law")
Do you also command traffic lights to change, and believe yourself decended from royalty?
;)
Do you think it's viable to use the American Home Recording act as a defense for sharing music over the Internet, if each party, e.g., burns the shared music onto "music" media (which has a tax paid to music artists). Is there anything a music-sharing individual can do to force the AHRA to apply?
(RIAA doesn't agree, but they label computers as non-music devices. This is no surprise of course)
Is is true that as long as I include "IANAL" in a /. post that any advice I offer is legally binding in court?
What tools or avenues of legal recourse does an individual have at his/her disposal to combat the myriad and plethora of otherwise frivilous lawsuits?
For example, IBM has a legal team very capable to defending IBM. SCO seems to think it's lawyers could take them on.
These are corporations, and while corporations have similar rights as citizens, what rights do I have as a US citizen on the Internet? Where can I go, who do I see? Are there lawyers or firms that represent me? I know the EFF can and will support and defend an obvious injustice in the system.
But what tools can I use to prevent having to even go that far in the first place?
I don't trade music, movies, scripts, books, or even look for them. I make my own. If I own the DVD, CD, book, or program, I create my own copies as backups (I know, I know). I have children who love to play Frisbee(tm) with my CD's(tm), DVD's(tm), and VHS(tm).
But considering the nature of IP law in the internet era am I ever going to be truly safe from infringing upon some law, obscure or otherwise, just by simply exercising Free Speech(tm)?
- Rivendahl
... there is nothing that has not already been thought
What current subject(s) do you see having the same probability & impact as invoking the original Godwin's Law in on-line discussions?
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.
It is obviously against copyright law for me to make available copies of a copyrighted work on a website. However I cannot point out a law which makes downloading from such a website illegal.
Can you?
Clicking a link may cause someone's webserver to produce a copy of a copyrighted work and distribute it to me, I agree, but have -I- just violated copyright law?
MORTAR COMBAT!
So, Mr. Godwin, when did you stop saluting Der Fuhrer?
I would contact the Free Software Foundation over this. It's their license; they should be able to give you an idea of how defensible it is. They might even be willing to take up the case if it is stark enough (i.e. an obvious violation that sets a good precedent).
Contact info at http://www.fsf.org/home.html#ContactInfo
Do you think that Compaq would have been able to do what they did with the PC clone in todays environment? What does that say about the future of research and development?
Free Mac Mini Yeah, it's
How would you compare the erosion of civil liberties and freedom of expression on the Internet with, say, the rise of Hitler in Nazi Germany?
[ducks]
My question is this: Has it been decided by any courts or legislation whether domain names are property, or merely a contractual service? Particularly as this pertains to bankruptcy law?
I'm interested in a domain name, but it seems to be in legal limbo and I'd be interested in understanding the principles involved.
Backround:
The company that holds the domain name filed for bankruptcy about 2 months after domain name was first requested. This was back in 1998. There is no evidence that the company ever used the domain name (e.g. internet archive, trademark registration, etc). The company was trying to restructure and then filed to liquidate back in 2000.
I looked up the court docket for the bankruptcy case but it looks like there have been no judicial or trustee actions for ~3 years.
However, the domain name, which appears to be in some sort of Registrar Lock and also a Legal Lock at Network Solutions, appears to be renewing at 1-year intervals somehow.
There are two other sub-questions that this scenario raises that I presume you don't have time to answer but I'll mention them in case someone else knows:
1) Does a bankruptcy trustee typically have the ability to renew contracts such as that for a domain name?
2) What sort of court papers would signal to a registrar that the entity registering the name has been bankrupt and the name should be removed from whatever legal lock and auto-renewal process is in place? (We've tried faxing stuff to their legal department but it seems to go into a black hole and we don't really know what should be sent.)
--LP
In light of cultural changes and scientific advances, there are on-going attempts to define or possibly re-define what life is, when it begins and when it ends. My question concerns how do the current legal standards for death apply to computer code and related copyright considerations.
A lot of software (projects on Sourceforge, for example) vary in their degrees of death and dying. Some could be considered "metabolically challenged" in that while they seem dead, they remain at room temperature. Could this meet the legal standard of "dead" or do the courts hold an alternate view? And what of those projects that give the appearance of being alive but, for whatever reason, don't work and have never really worked -- should these written off as dead because they exhibit involuntary movement only, but their existence is due entirely to some form of life-support? Is Internet Explorer, for example, not dead because security updates are still being released?
At the other end of the spectrum are those projects which have gone into permanent stasis. Would these "thermally challenged" a la the neurospension of Ted (Corpsicle) Williams programs be considered dead from a legal standpoint? And would any of this change with respect to the revival of the dead? Are there any legal precedents which could instruct in the case of something that was deemed to have Gone To Meet Its Maker but is suddenly no longer so? For example, if the parrot moves, do we declare it "reanimated" and the rights and benefits are thereto reinstated? Could the beneficiaries each be forced to pay $699 licensing fees to the now ex-descedent, or does the revived person have legal standing bring wrongful death suits against perceived enemies? And what of the Dying but Not Dead category? Does BSD need to litigate or appeal to a higher court to defend itself, or does it remain immune from all legal challenges and attacks until it is declared offically dead?
And where exactly does the Chewbacca defense fit into all of this?
Hi,
So we've all read the interview (or, more likely, the headline describing the interview) on groklaw with Mike Anderer, the SCO insider and then consultant, who said that over the next 10 years, Microsoft and possibly other enemies of open source software are going to attempt to shut down open source software. Since they don't have valid trade secret or copyright claims, software patents are going to be the weapon of choice, and we also all know about the very low quality of software patents in general, due to overworked patent examiners, poor-quality patent submissions that are intentionally ignorant of prior art in the area, and perhaps an unfamiliarity with the history of software on the part of the examiners.
Taken together, this sounds pretty bad for the open source community. The targets of such lawsuits will be the companies using Linux who have the deepest pockets, and if it seems likely there will be 25 legal attacks a year, the obvious business choice to minimize risk is to forget about GNU/Linux, and go with Windows. Alternatively, the developers themselves (and distributors) might be sued, and presumably they would fold immediately due to the lack of an ample supply of patent lawyers willing to work pro bono.
Do you see this as a strong risk to the open source movement, and what can we do about it?
While wardriving one day I happened to stumble onto an open wireless network for a lawyer, a doctor, and a securities trading firm in the same parking lot. All networks were open and C drives for many computers were shared. I connected to the networks for the doctor and checked my email. I connected to the lawyer's office and plundered around in their shared drives and copied a folder called Client Files onto my computer. And I connected to the securities firm and started up a packet monitor for an hour to capture and analyze their network traffic. This information reveled several bank account numbers, email usernames and passwords, and sensitive customer information.
All 3 networks had no encryption in place and no passwords were cracked to access any of the data.
How many, and which laws, have I broken?
The Code Ninja is swift with his tool, precise in his delivery, and deadly accurate in his execution.
There have been many precedents about fair usage of graphics, images, and the like. However, for places like online forums where users want Avatars (small 50x50 pixel images), I find the case law is unclear.
There are several cases that say that recognizable images (Spiderman, Anime, etc) are all NOT okay to use - but there are also some cases that say that depending on the size and the usage, it may be okay.
So, what is your opinion (not legal advice) about what would and would not be legal in terms of Avatars on forums, and also for graphics in general on the net.
GPL'd web-based tradewars themed space game
What do you see as the largest gaps and the largest overreaches in current criminal law with respect to computer technology.
Darthtuttle
Thought Architect
Both programmers and lawyers deal with logic as their bread and butter. But law relies on a vague language (English), an obscure syntax (18th century customs), and bases it's procedures and algorithms on an foundation that's very volatile, hard to track, and subject to forking with almost each ruling.
Computer professionals had to deal with trying to figure out reliable ways to deal with similar problems even when it wasn't in their power to change things. The waterfall development models of the sixites, and the trial-and-error bumbling of the hobbyists have developed some workable procedures (extreme programming, pragmatic programming, etc) that have made the computer world accessible and observable to all who want to participate.
I don't see the legal community even wanting to pursue such ideas. A senator introducing a bill into congress can offer all sorts of flowery comments to his "legal code", but it's the code that matters and affects people once codified into law. So much irrelevant crap gets worked into law each year on the state and federal level by being hidden in other work, it's depressing. When a court writes a verdict to set a legal precedent, all hell seems to break loose. It's like you have been told that the memory management routines in the standard C library are deprecated and you're left wondering whether that impacts your string library.
I know that English stinks as a language for expressing logic, but why can't lawyers depend on something English-like such as Lisp, Scheme, Prolog, or a special legal dialect that could be reduced to clear answers and effects. Lawmakers and judges could continue to write English comments with flowery and awe-inspiring prose, but their code would be clear what the result of this change would be. Imagine the Supreme Court running their rulings through regression tests before they are released so that they can fully understand the impact the changes will have. The results may still be ground-breaking but at least such tests would ensure that there are no unexpected results and loopholes created by a sloppy ruling.
Of course, this is an absurd idea. But it's even more absurd that the governed allow politicians, lawyers, and judges to play so fast and loose with the rules that govern their own lives. Is it a matter of power having corrupted those in charge? The legal community has all sorts of institutions to preserve their power ("passing the bar", etc).
Is it just that only recently have the techniques and ability to deal with such a huge system become available? I could be wrong, but wasn't it Blaise Pascal who dreamed of a time when courts could be run with the logic of algebra? Today we machines that can hold the volumous data from the legal world. Our understanding of logic and (more importantly) the consequences of making exceptions are much better understood. Artificial Intelligence tools do exactly this sort of logical "if this then this" sort of reasoning that humans are so bad at doing when we really don't want to come to the logical conclusion.
These days, the debate over gay marriage for example gives me the willies with overzealous lawmakers spreading diatribes about their legal changes to the definition of marriage. Of course CNN would never carry the actual patches, but if I could go to a website and see for myself different positions. Group A was arguing to simply remove definition of husband and wife as male and female. Group B was coding a subclass of marriage called gay_union. And Group C was making changes to define marriage as a couple capable of producing offspring. Regression tests may tell us more about their intents than their 30 second commercial spots. Group B's gay_union subclass might not hold up as constitutionally valid as marriage and would be subject to court challenge. Group C's fertility requirement might keep certain old or infertile heterosexual couples from getting married. While Group A's dropping the gender definition might make for some funny changes to a 1913 New York subway law th
Mike: why do you hang out on so many Nazi-oriented newsgroups?
There are very few Nazi references in places where decent people go.
But I am a Practical Logician, you are a lawyer. I hang out in Babylon 5 and comp.sys.... groups. Your fascination with the Nazis is perhaps an obvious professional affliction.
obviously as today's children grow up and begin to make policy we will have more tech savvy policy. But will the informality of the web ever infect the language of law. Is it impossible to make laws that are easily readable and that do not require an advanced degree just to be eligable to discuss the laws.
Do you foresee the "right to encrypt" surviving as an essential tool in the right to privacy? With recent expansions in domestic surveillance capabilities and requests by the DoJ to expand those powers even further, some are predicting that regulations regarding the use of encryption are inevitable (e.g. a return of the Clipper chip). Do you believe that the legitmate uses for encrypting personal data and communication will outweigh the possibility that criminals will also use encryption now that increased fear of terrorism has given that much more weight to the old "four horsemen" (terrorists, drug dealers, pedophiles, and money launderers)?
Why isnt the trend in cyber law to simply apply 'real world' law to cyberspace?
... it has legitimate uses, sucha as testing my own network, even testing someone else network may be fair use in some cases (if im checking to see if a peer has been hacked to determine if they are foe or just a hacked victim that needs a phone call to let them know).
I mean, if i buy a hammer i can use it to break windows or heads or babies backbones (humour noir), nevertheless it is not illegal to own, buy, invent, sell or use a hammer in any legal way.
Why is it that in the internet it has been so hard to grasp for lawyers, judges and (worst of the cesspool) lawmakers that software gadgets need not be different at all from hardware gadgets.
Compare hammer to a portscanner or an active hacking tool (an exploit)
I mean, just to finish the argument. People in the US can buy an m16 over the counter at wallmart for christ sakes....and lawmakers want to make a different set of law for cyberspace (DMCA for example)?
Why? Why is the current state of afairs not inconstitutional by US law?
NO SIG
This is why the corps with $$$ to lose are after the legal system. The only way they can hope to control it is to make legal punishment harsh. They will also need to make the same laws around the world because if it's illegal everywhere except BFE-kistan then the point is moot.
This is also why there have been attempts to "close the analog loophole" as they say. So you can't even aim your camcorder at your HDTV and copy it that way.
Finally, this will not go away IMHO until enough people get "mad as hell" and decide they're not gonna take it anymore. Which brings me to the questions I'd like to ask Mr. Godwin:
Sometimes, overrated is exactly the correct moderation. Is a comment like the grandparent here redundant? Flamebait? Not really. But it's certainly useless and there's no reason for it to have a positive score. The goal of moderation is to get the comments people want to read higher and the ones they don't lower, not to play guess-the-right-category with the mod system. Sometimes a comment doesn't fit into one of those categories, and under/overrated is the catch-all.
And they could fix the metamod problem if moderating with over or underrated would save the score at the time.
What suggestions would you have for someone who has recently graduated from law school and is very interested in cyberlaw? What steps could such a person take to "break-in" to this area of the law?
I'm halfway through Len Deighton's "Blitzkrieg" in which he explains Hitler's rise to power and how it was used. I was going to attempt to write a humourous response to the parent, stating that Hitler took away many of the rights of his own citizens, wrongly imprisioned and tried citizens of other countries, manipulated England and France into supporting his attacking other countries when I realized that the parent wasn't all that fallacious.
We live in scary times,
myke
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
I'm currently doing my undergrad in computer science, but I would like to go into law. Can you talk about some fields in law that relate to computers? Also, can you name some schools that have good programs in these fields?
espo
i.e., Where do you feel the rights and freedoms of individuals are best protected and/or recognized in law?
i.e.2., Is the USA still the "land of the free", or should that title be bestowed upon Canada, the EU, or foo?
perl -e 'print $i=pack(c5, (41*2), sqrt(7056), (unpack(c,H)-2), oct(115), 10)'
Could you give us your point of view about the status of binary-only kernel modules from the standpoint of the GPL?
In a nutshell, I'm interested in the status of LinkSys's released code for their wrt54g and similar routers -- regular slashdotters may recall that they released the source code, under pressure from the FSF, last year. However, their modified Linux code is distributed with both binary-only files (in the form of compiled Broadcom wireless drivers) and a great deal of source code which claims to be unpublished, proprietary, and prohibited from redistribution.
Ideally I'd like your take on the LinkSys situation specifically, but I'd settle for some discusion of how binary-only kernel drivers and the GPL coexist. There's some excellent background on this topic in this LWN article from last October.
Mike:
As privacy advocates, what can we do to impress the importance of privacy without coming off as tinfoil-hatted whack jobs?
An example was a presentation I prepared for co-workers a while back regarding grocery store "loyalty" cards. In it, even after detailing the California case of a store that in a slip and fall case in their store, tried to introduce the customer's purchases, tracked via a card, saying he may have been drunk at the time because of frequent alcohol purchases. Afterwards, I was hit with several questions about being paranoid. I used the standard "this is why we have envelopes and blinds instead of postcards and open windows" argument, and while most seemed to understand, some were obviously unimpressed. What can we do to convince people of the need for privacy without being over the top?
The truth about Scientology, Xenu, and you: Operation Clambake
In 1981, computer programs were nonstatutory subject matter for patents. The US Supreme Court reiterated this in Diamond v. Dieher, but clarified that when you use software somewhere in a process, "the process as a whole does not thereby become unpatentable subject matter."
Today, with no change of law, we see software patents all over the place? What happened? I don't think it can just be re-wording of patents to make them sound like part of a system. The Diehr opinion had a whole section (IV) for the express purpose of heading such things off. "To hold otherwise would allow a competent draftsman to evade the recognized limitations on the type of subject matter eligible for patent protection."
So where did all these software patents come from?
At least this one got modded up, it's the best question I've seen here so far. Let's hope it gets answered...
one of the first lawyers to 'live and work in cyberspace.'"
What's the commute like? I'm looking to rent somewhere bigger but don't want to speed more than 30 minutes on the Information Highway during rush-hour.
It seems there area lot of people wardriving and gathering up all this information regarding AP's, WEP status, etc...
The gamut of usage ranges from:
* Simply listing to AP broadcasts
* others connect to and use unsecured AP's as "public" AP's to read email, get directions, etc...
* others use the access to perform dastardly acts of damage and mayhem on individuals and corporations.
* even worse, some send spam from the hijacked AP's.
Ethics issues not withstanding, what are the legal implications for those who access and unsecured AP without explicit permission from the owner and yet do this with no intended "harm" on the hosting party or any other party for that matter.
18 USC 1030 seems to be the hinge point for the debate. A counterpoint is the unlicensed nature of the 2.4GHz range and what consitutes acceptable use/recpetion of transmissions in the WiFi band.
What about the wardriver, it might not be "illegal" today, but should it be? could it be? What legal/ethical implications does publicizing which AP's are unsecured and which are not hold?
http://www.wigle.net
Perhaps even a broader view of the legal implications on the hosting party are warranted (regardless if they area aware of their"hosting" status or not).
While I know the Nazi post was pertinent to the conversation, since the current American administration has orchestrated the passage of many questionable laws, I can't help but laugh.
I have always wondered why, when considering new spam legislation, they do not target the ultimate benefactor of SPAM. SPAM in my mind, is nothing but an advertisement for a product or service. For SPAM to be effective (which it must be, seeing how prolific it continues to be) money must exchange hand and contact information must be provided in some manner. Why not just follow the money, see where it lands and prosecute?
Before the flame, let me acknowledge the opportunity to target legitimate business by sending spam on behalf of a company without their knowledge to put the business in legal peril.
Don't go after the dealer, go after the supplier.
My ignorance is self-evident.
I'm sick of people comparing our life and times with those under the Nazi Regime. The iherrent implication with all of theses stupid claims is that because there is a small simularity with something that the Nazis did, that the Government will end up Killing 6+ Million of us.
Seriously, this is Freakin' slashdot. Aren't we supposed to be somewhat intelligent? Basically all of the arguments can be boiled down to the following exagerations. They are obviously exagerations, but they expose the logicall fallacies used in the real stupid commments that are always made.
The Nazi's taxed their citizens and then Killed them, therefore our governemnt, because it had taxes, is going to Kill us. The Nazi's digested food that gave them the energy to Kill millions of people, Our governement officals also digest food!!!
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
The way I see it, copyrights only protect residual income, which pays artists and middlemen to NOT produce new material. Why do people think this is good?
Residuals are good for musicians because under the current system, they make NOTHING up front on their hit songs, because the recording company ties up all the artist's profit in the ridiculous contracts (for example, they will loan the artist money to pay for roadies, which the artist must then pay back, sometimes with INTEREST, at the end of the tour, using money from ticket sales). Residuals and royalties are the only way they see any money from their work.
That said, I think the real issue is the middle-men you mentioned. Artists (like myself) are very much aware that the major labels have nothing to offer anymore, and that the future, somehow, lies online. I want to know how we could revise the copyright laws to continue to protect artists, but at the same time allow for Internet users to have widespread access to music (thereby increasing their popularity and hopefully their bank account).
And if anyone was really getting paid NOT to create new music, why isn't Britney on that system? Does someone need more of my tax money to make that happen? I'll donate!
The House Between - Original Sci-Fi Series
I work for a company with 2000+ employees. Management and legal both seem to be out of touch on the SCO issue.
As far as I can tell, they haven't bothered to do any in-depth research, and they won't trust anyone here to do it for them, on the assumption that their own employees have biases they cannot see past.
How can I help them overcome their fear? What might I say that they will relate to?
How does Mike Godwin feel about his compeitition such as Senor Leonard J. Crabs from http://somethingawful.com/crabs ? I hear Leonard is packin heat.
http://sflip.com
If a thread exists where the topic is Nazis and/or Nazism, does your law automatically get invoked or is it held fast against itself?
MOD the Parent up. This is a really interesting question, because:
i) If a site hosts something which it then has to take down for say libel, is google able to be libelled too?
ii) Could google sue you as a result?
iii) Can we sue google for copyrught infringement if it contains some of our own, copyrighted, photos?
etc etc.
You get the gist.
Legally, you could be prevented from copying something if you live in the US - all the publisher needs to do is put some sort of crappy encryption, and DMCA prevents you from unencrypting it.
Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
Do you believe networks similar to Freenet will be considered illegal? Without going through the entire tech details, just assume the following properties:
1) Each peer reserves some space on their HDD
2) The peer has no knowledge or control of the contents, which are all encrypted.
3) It's impossible (for the legal question) to
a) Determine who inserted information into the network
b) Determine who requested information from the network
c) Determine who provided information on the network
The only reasonable thing you can prove, is that one peer was the last proxy - it routed the information to you. It does not know the contents, and it only did so on your node's request.
Do you think such a network, should it grow popular, would be outlawed? And if so, how?
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Ussually if you bother to read the 'terms of agreement' when you install said net games, there is a clause that says you may not sell items outside of the game enviornment; however, most MMORPGs while having legal grounds to file suit, do not because it means that in order for this transaction to take place both buyer and seller have to have accounts on thier game, which ussually means money in thier pocket. Also they know that some people would rather pay money to get stuff then to work for it themselves, and if they can't buy thier way to good stuff, then they won't play, which means no money in thier pocket. Finally, if word got out that a MMORPG was legally prosecuting it's players, people would be less likely to play thier game, thus even more money out of thier pockets.
/.-,
As for Ebay, I don't know thier specific terms of use reguarding this, but I would think that signing up for a sellers account would entail accountability that they would not sell any illegal materials. If ebay is allerted that this type of item selling is illegal and that allowing the item to stay on auction would get them sued then the item would be removed and similar items would be taken down as well, then accountability would shift to the person who established the auction. However, as I said, the companies behind these games probably know that these violations of thier terms of use are occuring, but as long as there is no major disturbances to thier game environment due to these minor violations then they will turn a blind eye to it as long as it means more money in thier pockets.
The above post should not be taken literally, figuratively, or any other way. Why are you even reading it?
/.-,
Say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism...at least it's an ethos!
related to software and user rights?
Some examples:
I install a program that claims to do 'X', but it actually does 'X' and or 'Y'.
I chose to remove a program from my system, yet parts of it remain.
Installation of one program depends on or triggers the installation of another one. The terms and conditions for the secondary, but required, software are not acceptable though the terms and conditions on the primary software are. Should I be able to return the package to its point of origin even though it has been opened?
In case the above is not really clear, my real question lies here:
When the Founders put America together they had some reasonable expectations as to how a free, fair and open society should run. Given this expectation, they were able to provide a framework to guide and foster development that benefit everyone. (This is a little out of balance today, but overall the idea is sound.)
Fast forward to today. Most people have reasonable expectations as to how their software should work for them, but are growing increasingly frustrated with increasingly aggressive software being produced and sold without a solid framework to maintain order.
If you take digital devices out of the discussion, for a moment, our current balance of law and freedom mostly works. People have the means to understand what they can and cannot do. There are reasonable protections for those that need them as well.
Instead of hashing out every issue in the courts, where the general public will end up at a clear disadvantage, shouldn't we be working hard to define and frame core issues and build from there?
I'm thinking of a cyber citizens bill of rights, where the right expectations can be set. Given those expectations, wouldn't our existing body of law largely handle most of the issues at hand today?
( Wishing to slow the great cyber land-grab long enough to see just what we really are losing.)
Blogging because I can...
I first got on the internet about... oh, I'd estimate about 8-10 years or so ago, AOL 2.5; I've had this aol email address every since, though I rarely check it any more due to the fact that when I do I generally have 50+ emails wanting me to refinance my morgage, visit thier porn site, or make my penis longer.
I've sent so many notices to remove me from thier list, but it never works because it's never from the same email and they re-write/misspell and other such tricks to intentually deceive filters. Is there any legal way for me to stop this harrassment that doesn't involve wasting countless hours of my time tracking down the orignators of these lists and how they got my email ?
Also what is the legal status of 'Chain letters' asking you to 'forward this message to 10 or more losers or Y2k may break into your house and eat you'. I'm pretty sure they are mostly a tool for spammers to collect email adresses to spam, but are they illegal and if so what can be done legally to the people that start said chain letter?
/.-,
The above post should not be taken literally, figuratively, or any other way. Why are you even reading it?
/.-,
In that instance, you are copying the work, no matter what medium it is in, and therefore, absent fair use arguments, you are infringing the copyright.
I've noticed a lot of use of the term "Liberal" lately to pigeonhole just about anyone who is to the left of the far right, including moderates, centrists, and, of course, leftists. Do you think the media and "conservative" personalities have turned this monniker into a meme, and if so, what do you think it may do to the causes of anyone but the far right?
man rtfm
Copyright Law "Should" be about balance, not who deserves more protection of their rights. Your hypothetical question implies that:
a) a balance cannot be struck between content creators and consumers (this could be reasonably construed as an issue of compromise)
and
b) a mutually exclusive prioritization of rights in this scenario is needed (this could be reasonably construed as an issue of equality)
I disagree with both points. If we give up on the idea of pursuing compromise and equality, where will we be?
.
uR iGn0ranc3, Their Power
Just a syntax point. The DMCA does not prevent me from copying something, it makes it illegal to so. It's an important distinction. The law makes it illegal for to drive above the speed limit but does not prevent me from doing it. I just take the risk if I do.
there are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots
But if you know something I don't as to why this is the case, I'd love to know about it.
Of the various advocacy orgs out there, which are most deserving of our hard-earned cash, and how do their various missions differ?
With some companies deciding that litigation and threats are possible business models and the growing number of software patents how do you see this affecting software development?
How can the EFF and 'open source' organisations help abate the problems of open source developers who cannot afford patent searches on every element of their interface and methods?
Tony Williams
With various governments at various levels across the world starting to enact anti-spam laws do you think that this will have any effect?
How do you think laws (and perhaps international conventions) could be best used to fight this problem?
Tony Williams
You'll be dissapointed to know that with regards to your question regarding jurisdiction, the United States Supreme Court has determined that:
if a crime is committed in jurisdiction A and the alleged offender then is arrested in jurisdiction B, by an officer from jurisdiction A, with no assistance or authorization from Jurisdiction B, this is perfectly legal.
However, if the arrest is made on the basis of illegally obtained evidence, that is basis for a case being dismissed.
I sure hope you are right about the penalties, though. That's just plain wrong. I hope you get the advice and/or help you need/deserve.
joke -- (joek) n.
1. Something said or done to evoke laughter or amusement, especially an amusing story with a punch line.
2. A mischievous trick; a prank.
3. Your penis.
Is there any viable defense for the average citizen against the privacy-killing, intrusive technological programs being put into place by our government for apparently "good reasons " (antiterrorism and security, ecomonics, government administrative convenience), when these are implemented so ignorantly or so sloppily that they actually cause more damage than good ? It seems people are permitted to make all kinds of "innocent mistakes" at our expense when the apparent intent is a positive one (evoting, surveillance, eschelon, jet blue, Northwest, Axciom, M.A.T.R.I.X.), and it seems we have no defense against the consequential intrusions on our rights and privacy.
Will there be any accountability for negligent technology deployment or will we continue to see only unfair unilateral protectionist activities (RIAA, John Doe suits, cybercrime acts, anti-theft acts, database protection acts, etc etc etc).
As more and more IP laws become more like trade secrets laws how can libraries continue to provide free public access?
Why are there no Internet lending libraries? A internet sight that lowns it's digital property to one person at a time. You could receive a digital library card (Public key?) and check out the Matalica song you want to hear. After playing it would be checked back in.
If the librarie owned more then one licensed copy, more then one person could check out the same sound, movie, book, audio book, and so on.
Many IP objects are no longer sold they are licensed for the users use. This use right is not transferable. How to libraries get around this?
There are 10 type of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
I've been trying to read the actual text of laws and bills, both in my local city, as well as in the Library of Congress. The Library of Congress Search engine, at thomas.loc.gov, is horrible to use - not only is the searching difficult to use, but you can't link to a law or bill. Do you think there would be value in creating some sort of "legal wikipedia"? If so, what are some good resources to get started? Who could help an intrepid developer get such a thing kicked off?
What are your views on how to deal with International crime using DDoS attacks against US businesses for extortion?
How could it be made simpler from a legal perspective to track, capture and convict such people, remembering that they're not party to US law?
Andrew
Andrew van der Stock
What most people (even tech-nerds!) seem to forget is that the Net is not a static system. The reason why the Net has been so difficult to regulate in the past is because of the way it is built.
Therefore, as was put by Lawrence Lessig in his book Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace because the Net is a completely artificial environment, the only thing you have to do is to change the environment. Then, hey presto, you can regulate that which was previously impossible to regulate (Palladium, anyone?
For example, IPv6 with geographical pin-pointing built into it could easily make us subject only to national laws again. (Or at least the people who don't know about anonymous proxies.)
Now, the US still has a lot of power over the Net and perhaps it would be possible for the US to enforce its wishes on other nations by using it's power over the Net's architecture, but it may become more difficult, the wider the Net spreads out. It may also fracture the apparent unity of the Net, and result in many "small" Nets run by different countries or groups of countries. All with their own architecture, and therefore, all with different ways of regulating it.
As for me, I don't think it would be a good idea, but my yes, it is unfortunately possible to regulate the Net. 1984, here we come...
Can you suggest some action an average, concerned citizen can take to help affect positive changes in the USA's IP laws?
Aaron Maxwell - redsymbol.net
If I implement a mod chip on an XBox, and an open source bios that (of course) is not based on reverse engineered MS code, could I sell one legally? Microsoft has been pushing me all over hell-and-creation without giving me a real answer to this.
Better yet, where should the line be drawn between digital self defense and vigilatism? In real life you are justified in using force in order to protect yourself and your property from criminals. What types of counter-measures would/should be legal in cyberspace? Reverse DoS? Exploiting a security weakness in order to gain access and reformatting the drive?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
By the way, I used to know Mike Godwin pretty well. Very thought provoking chap. We were both living in Austin in those years, from a couple of years before he studied law until a couple of years afterwards. I don't want to reveal all his personal secrets, except that I'll say he was the big dull man of the Dull Man's Club (but there was an interesting woman's auxilliary). Even if my question doesn't make the cut, feel free to include my regards from Kawasaki...
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
Somewhere between self representation and the legal profession profitable monopolies, such as case law copyrights, were established.
Lawyers often say they can not discuss specific legal issues in public. Disbarred lawyers are distressingly rare. Corporations write legislation. "Ignorance of the law is no excuse" ignores the burden of complexity that encourages politically biased judges to insist upon paid representation.
Do citizens have any viable form of redress?
The core of the question - If I have paid for content on a particlar format (VHS), shouldn't I have the opportunity to transfer it to any other format (digital video) of my choice. Does the ruling on this differ if I live in the UK or the US?
It seems the DMCA was written without thought on the impact on consumer fair use rights (section 1201 in particular). New legislation, such as the DMCRA and BALANCE Acts, is in the works to correct/amend the DMCA to return fair use rights to the consumer.
While the U.S. government may not have expected the DMCA to be interpretted in this fashion, do you think this lack of foresight will continue in future legislation or will more thought go into the possible implications of proposed law?
Say you're tracking a piece of stolen equipment. You have a suspect. You find the equipment for sale on eBay, and he's the seller account.
From an evidence standpoint, what does it take to confirm his identity links to the account? Is eBay obligated to provide that information? Is that information admissiable in court, and is is considered substantial proof?
As of the time stamp shown on this post, questions for Mr. Godwin have been selected and will be emailed to him within the next hour. Questions posted after this will not be considered.
I'd like to thank everyone who submitted questions. If yours didn't "make the cut" this time, we'll have plenty of future interviews for you.
Don't forget: You can suggest interview candidates by emailing robin at roblimo.com. Please make sure you include current contact information for the person you'd like to see interviewed.
- Robin 'Roblimo' Miller
Suppose I'm running a website that collects personal information. As a responsible citizen I have a duty to cooperate with law enforcement, especially with serious offences. [Let's leave aside for the moment the question of what governments consider as "serious"].
How can I verify which requests for access are in fact ones that I am obliged to obey? Do I have to retain a whole legal department to decide whether I have to accede to requests from Little Rock, Arkansas on the one hand or of Moscow, Russia on the other?
Is there, in any jurisdiction you are aware of, some concept of "single-sourcing" of law enforcement demands so that it is easy for the person on the receiving end to determine what requests ought, and what requests ought not, to be granted?
Once upon a time we knew what terrorism meant, and we accepted anti-terrorism laws on that basis. Now we hear of people being prosecuted for hoax 911 calls under anti-terrorism legislation because they "jeopardize the integrity of the emergency services". Does this sort of prosecution get thrown out by the judges, or will "feature creep" end up defining every socially undesirable act as terrorism? If the latter, how do we protect ourselves? As a cryptographer, I'd like to know!
Child abuse suffers the same inflation. If you don't search your 15-year-old son's bedroom for dirty magazines every day, you are "permitting him to have access to sexually explicit material", which gets you prosecuted, put on the sex offenders' register, etc. But then, the same will happen to him when he kisses his 15-year-old girlfriend...
From the Bill of Rights: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press"
Since my personal computer and my printer form my own private press, can Congress legally make any law abridging my freedom to use my press? [DRM, fair use, etc.]
"...does changing the medium in which content is delivered constitute a derivative work?"
Answer: no. This would constitute a copy because the content does not change. Understand the difference between content and media: the media is subject to patent (in the case of CD, or not at all in the case of print), while the content is covered by copyright. The content is not the media. What you describe is technically called "transcribing", and does nothing to diminish the original copyright ownership (there is ample legal precedent to demonstrate this).
In order to be a derivative work, there must be substantial changes to the content (the concepts), and the media is not taken into account (a song is a song whether it is written as a score, played live or recorded).
For example, MC Hammer's "Can't Touch This" can be seen as a derivative work, because although it is based on a riff from Rick James' "Superfreak", the lyrics and arrangement are substantially different (This is the defining point of "derivative work").
If merely changing the format was considered sufficient to merit "derivative" status, then all MC Hammer would have had to do was transfer the original "Superfreak" to CD (since it was released on vinyl). As it happened, Hammer was successfully sued by James because the differences between the two songs were not substantial enough: that is, because the derivative work was too derivative, partial writing credit (& royalties) were due to the original author.
BTW, you have absolutely no right to make copies of anything you do not own the copyright to, except where "fair use" exemptions apply. Note that fair use primarily applies to academic work, or backup purposes (the exact circumstances are actually proscribed in copyright law, and are far more limited than most people think). File sharing, technically, is distribution since it allows anyone (not just the original licencee) to make copies. This is why the **AAs want it stopped.
Note, I am not expressing an opinion for or against P2P. I am merely pointing out the fallacy involved in the question in the parent post, and the current interpretation and implementation of the existing laws. If you don't like what I've said, find the evidence that proves me wrong and post it, but don't just rant at me: I don't make the laws.
" Has there been any challenge to a copyright holder's ability to deny publication in a given format"
No. The copyright owner owns the rights to approve (or not) copying in any form. Thats what copyright means. The exception is where exclusive distribution deals are used to prevent an author from releasing work; these have been challenged, but that is contract law, not copyright.
"A more digital example is Lucas' refusal to release the original Star Wars movies on DVD."
George Lucas sees the revised version as an improvement on the original, and more consistent with the subsequent films. In the eyes of the law, the rights of the artist are more important than your need for nostalgia, so unless the copyright is transferred to another owner who agrees with you, the original version will never apppear on DVD.
"this system is being abused by not allowing publication in a given format"
A copyright owner is under no legal obligation to release a work in any form at any time for the duration of copyright (yeah, yeah, Disney, Hollings, blah, blah). A copyright owner does have the right to insist that their work is distributed only in the form intended. Think Radiohead not signing to iTMS: they chose maintaining the integrity of their work as an album over increased unit sales. Agree with it or not, its their music, so its rightly their decision. Same thing applies to George Lucas: when you make an epic space opera, you can distribute it any way you like.
The word "digital" makes no difference to copyright: just because it is easier to copy/re-encode, it doesn't automatically become legal, nor does it become mandatory.
Should the U.S. Constitution be amended to add a specific privacy protection, one that takes into account the myriad ways personal data can be traded/sold etc.?