Slashdot Mirror
Boucher's DMCRA To Get A Hearing On May 12
Mr. Firewall writes "It's been a long road since Slashdot first carried the story that Rep.
Rick Boucher (D-Va.) was speaking out about the DMCA's trampling of fair-use rights. Well, his bill (HR 107) gets a hearing this Wednesday and the multi-billion-dollar music and movie industries have called out their Big Guns to stop it. This morning an urgent message from the Professional Photographers of America arrived in my inbox characterizing Boucher's bill as 'A bill that would make it impossible for photographers to protect their work' and other lies (apparently, the RIAA and MPAA have recruited the PPA into their Axis of Evil). The alert finishes by saying that 'a strong grassroots effort combined with [our] recent lobbying efforts should be enough to keep this harmful bill locked in the subcommittee ... until Congress adjourns.' Let's give these folks a little taste of the slashdot effect and do a little 'grassroots' contacting of congresscritters ourselves." Of course, you can decide only for yourself what your thoughts are on the bill.
Figures that Slashdot would talk about a piece of proposed legislation without linking to the actual text of the bill in question...
Here's The bill's test on the Thomas system. and here's the list of 15 representatives co-sponsoring the bill.
Read the bill for yourself, then you can think for yourself about what it's going to do if passed.
Your letters do seem to have an effect folks. It's stopping the damn Diebold voting machines. Maybe we can pull together on this one. It is election season you know!
"Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press"
I personally think that the Congressmen would not wish to consider themselves so wrong on this; however, if the DMCA has an expiration date on it (like some legislation), there might be a chance of letting it lapse. Also, I think it far more likely that things such as signal flags and other copy protection devices have more support on the Hill.
Taking a look at the PPA's of the PPA's release...
A bill that would make it impossible for photographers to protect their work in any digital format is set for a hearing in the House on Wednesday, May 12.
It'd be still possible for photographers to protect their work using DRM. They could apply DRM until the cows come home... it's just that people would legally be able to crack their DRM in a way that's presently illegal. Security-by-encryption will still be around, but having security-by-law to back it up when it fails would go away. Okay, that's FUD.
Known as H.R. 107, the Digital Media Consumer Rights Act would give hackers explicit permission to distribute software and hardware devices designed to defeat copyright protection technology.
That's exactly true. Software like DeCSS would no longer be illegal to distribute, and in fact would be specifically authorized by this law. The PPA seems to think this is a bad thing, but that's the only problem with this claim.
Other provisions of the bill would set a dangerous precedent by making copyright owners who use anti-copying technology on music discs subject to regulation and fines from the Federal Trade Commission unless they meet extensive labeling and regulatory requirements.
That's true as well, as a CD with any sort of DRM applied to it ceases to be a "Red Book" standard CD. This law would require labeling of such non-standard CDs, and that such labels not be removed until the end consumer gets the disc. There'd be fines from the FTC if such a CD is sold without being properly labeled. Again, The PPA seems to think this is a bad thing, but that's the only problem with this claim.
In short, this is a piece of legislation that undoes some of the most offensive provisions of the DMCA, which is exactly what the "groupthink" opinion of Slashdot has wanted all along...
"Let's give these folks a little taste of the slashdot effect and do a little 'grassroots' contacting of congresscritters ourselves." The problem with trying to slashdot congressmen is that writing your congressman takes a lot more effort than clicking a hyperlink. A lot fewer of us have that kind of motivation, unfortunately. Apathy, it's whats for dinner in America.
From the bill's text, if it is passed this sentance would be added to the Laws of the Land:
It shall not be a violation of this title to manufacture, distribute, or make noninfringing use of a hardware or software product capable of enabling significant noninfringing use of a copyrighted work.
It's the RIAA/MPAA's nightmare and the consumer's dream... the right to defeat DRM in order to make fair use of the resulting file.
here
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
Just used their system to send an email in favor of HR 107.
Suck my balls MPAA, RIAA, and now PPA!
A Fatal OE Exception has occurred, Sig will now reboot.
looks like your typical slashdot geek :p
http://www.house.gov/boucher/pics/boucherpic.jpg
Looks like he also aided the early growth of the internet:
http://www.house.gov/boucher/docs/tbio.htm
I work in a professional photo lab and I am angling to become a professional photographer myself. AFAIC, the PPA can go fuck themselves on this one.
A law that nobody respects is usually an unjust or at least ill-considered law.
Care to back that number up? Why isn't it 10%, or 40%?
And anyway, very few people are talking about repealing copyright completely. Most anti-DMCA folks just want to roll back the relatively recent excesses of copyright law, not to scrap the entire concept (though there is of course a small minority who wants that.)
Yes, there will always be people copying movies, songs and software. It sucks, especially for small companies just trying to pay the bills (I feel less bad for monopolists and cartels, but that still doesn't make it okay to infringe their copyrights). The DMCA has been remarkably ineffective at preventing this. It has been remarkably effective at squelching free speech and killing off projects to promote interoperability. How long did the Linux platform suffer without proper DVD support no thanks to DMCA threat letters and legal extortion? I think we can safely say the vast majority of people just wanted DVD support to work and be Open Source, and aren't into ripping and pirating movies.
We don't need the DMCA. It fails to respect the balance between consumer rights and media producer rights, it is bad for Open Source and open technologies in general, and it disempowers us all.
There is no point at which the "Fair Use supporters" will agree to stop wholesale infringement.
/. posters even would support a SANE system of copyrights. Just not what we've got right now.
Well, this is woefully incorrect. Most wholesale infringement is simply not a fair use. HOWEVER, any use is capable of being a fair use; it all depends on the specific circumstances involved. So if you foreclose an entire class of use -- e.g. reproduction -- then you are necessarily trampling on fair uses. This is the problem with DRM. It is stupid, and it cannot allow fair uses through while barring infringing uses. Given that federal judges and justices have had arguments in various cases, there is no reason to believe that any stupid, mindless machine will ever be able to do a good job of this.
Of course, since you can get the bejeezus sued out of you for infringements, who gives a rat's ass? It's always an available remedy, and it's a much better one.
Nobody respects the law now. Why would any new legislation change anything?
Well, the law right now is completely unworthy of respect. No one respected prohibition. But there's considerably more respect for the laws pertaining to alcohol that we have now. It's not perfect, but then you should be smart enough to expect that there will always be a bit of illegal activity going on, and that even what we have after reforms might not be ideal either.
If copyright is repealed (for example) 30% of the economy vanishes overnight.
Followed by crazy-huge upsurges in the network, storage, and publishing industries, to whom the doors are wide open.
But most reformers aren't trying for a total repeal. I for one just want sensible copyright laws that more or less fit the contours of people's ordinary common sense anyhow (making it that less likely that people would even want to do something illegal). Shorter terms, strict formalities, more exemptions for ordinary people. It's a damn far cry from repeal.
The number of people who would lose jobs that depend on copyright, patent and trademarks is incredible.
Patents have their own problems of late, but really the patent system is very good. All it needs are some minor changes, chiefly in stricter examinations and easier burdens on challengers.
Same deal for trademarks, basically. Get rid of the recently introduced (and foolish) dilution laws, leaving things at infringement, and that's about all the reform that's needed. Again, a total overhaul is not necessary, and AFAIK not called for.
Copyright is the most fucked up of all of these, but I think you'll find that most
So stop exaggerating.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
sorry to be off-topic, but does anyone have any good links on how the American policial system works, who has what powers. These debates that involve congressmen and sub-committees are all very interesting, but for an outsider it can sometimes be difficult to understand.
What do research, pharmaceuticals and semiconductors have to do with copyrights? They use trade secrets and patents. Scrapping copyright would be a Bad Thing, but there's no need to outrageously state your case.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
And why the heck would copyright be repealed? What a ridiculous straw man. It's even in the U.S. constitution: "Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;". How about making copyright laws constitutional and enforcing that "limited times" aspect?
PPA believes that a strong grassroots effort combined with its recent lobbying efforts should be enough to keep this harmful bill locked in the subcommittee on Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection until Congress adjourns.
That's a sign of trouble right there. The PPA's goal is to see Congress lock this bill in committee. That's a legislative tactic to defeat a bill by having the comittee that's been assigned the bill simply never submit a report, which denies the full House any chance to debate or vote on the bill unless there is no objection to the House substituting a favorable report to make up for the comittee's inaction. Death-by-inaction is a way to get rid of a bill you don't like without having to actually make a "nay" vote that goes on the record.
However, this May 12 hearing is not something people supporting that outcome want to see. It's even very possible that the vote to favorably recommend the bill to the full House may come out of this session...
Alot of times, when a system goes to hell, peoples first instinct is to try and 'force it' to work. After all, it took so much to set up - it would be such a waste. But I think things are different here. The system is stacked against us, and the right to copy openly available information freely exists inspite of government coercion, not because of it.
The freedom restrictions caused by copying monopolies are far more effectively addressed by defiance, encryption, and p2p.
The court did give CRIA a legal-wedgie, but that was mainly because they were remote-controlled dummies of the RIAA. When they are finally ready to play by Canadian rules, I wouldn't expect the rematch to be as one-sided.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Prefixed by "If copyright is repealed (for example) 30% of the economy vanishes overnight". What does this bill have to do with patent and trademarks?
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
The only thing that might pertain to photographers is the section about fair use:
Not coincidentally, this is my favorite part of the bill.
68.3% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
Notes:
If you're not sure what to write, you can start with my letter to my congresscritter.
If the bill link above stops working (Thomas doesn't seem to like direct-linking bills), just go to Thomas and enter bill number HR107.
Let's face it: they know a lot of things, but some of them are lucky if they can get Microsoft Word to start up. A sufficient amount, especially the ones without much seniority or facing tough election campaigns, are going to go with what big-money associations such as the RIAA and MPAA say because they a: don't see why it's worth it to fight such powerful lobbying groups and b: are only being provided information by one side.
So the long-term solution might be two-fold: a little lobbying of our own, in terms of presenting our side of the argument and why it's worth the blood and sweat programmers pour into it; and some basic coursework in Internet 101.
OK, I know it's bad form to repy to my own post. But every time defiance is sugested as a solution - someone else relpies and says something like "... self centered childish teens that would rather steal than ask mommy for the money to buy a cd ... ", I swear, it's true, or they say something like "... with civil disobedience you have a duty to accept whatever punishment the system dishes out ...(or youre just greedy coward - is often on)"
....
So let me just address it now. First off, in the information age it is no longer a copyright issue, it is a free speech issue, because there is no technology that naturally distinguish between free speech content and copyright content. Second, did Harriet Tubman deserve to be punished for forming the underground railroad, should she have gracefully accepted whatever punishment that came to her, should society have gracefully accepted her almost certain death penalty if she were caught because she knew it was against the law and did it anyhow? Just think about it
progress will speed up
Progress will stop. No company will be able to justify the R&D expense.
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
... middlemen. If CR (and patenting of intangibles)_ were to "vanish",or be re-severely restricted- primarily the middlemen's jobs would be in jeopardy,because that is where the bulk of the cash, or wealth, gets skimmed off --> to. The thinkers and doers would still work, because they want to, because they can,and because they have the motivation,because they are humans and not lazy, they want to be productive, and this "the industry" would evolve to a new model with more producing,much less skimming, and the wealth staying more where it belongs, with the thinkers and doers, who mostly realise they profit immensely from collaboration, but not with the middlemen. That's something that is basic, you "get it" or you don't, just generally speaking.
We had in man's history the fasted growth and most advances following the most free sharing of information and when technology making knowledge transfer virtually instantenous and pervasive.
Back when knowledge was locked up in some monks chambers and in a few closed guilds, we stayed mostly stagnant, productive change was painfully slow, and the bulk of the people alive lived in total misery and in helpless exploitation. You can't have it both ways. Some seek a return to the old ways by insisting on more and more to keep knowledge "all theirs", even though they get great benefit from millions of others work and knowledge-they tend to forget that all the time.
It's just historical data, and it's true facts. More knowledge shared, and the cheaper and faster, the better off things get.
Over all it would improve the over all wealth structure of society as a whole, not undermine it. short term, yes, some chaos, but medium and long term, nope, it would make it much better. It would force (they would be more free to do so actually) more and more people to become thinkers and doers in actual effect.
That is rubbish. America gained its industrial might by IGNORING british patents which were causing british industry to stagnate. History has proven you wrong time and again - patents exist to protect existing companies against new innovators. New innovators would do better if patents didn't exist - patents are used by existing players in a market to bar new players from market entry by erecting barriers via cross-licensing agreements.
That is why the american empire is pushing so hard for patents to be enforced in the developing world - it is trying to protect itself against third-world innovators, just as the british empire did in its time.
Expect india, china and brazil to band together to ignore american patents and copyrights as soon as they have assembled enough nukes.
That's the rub -- the last court ruling on (I believe) the Sonny Bono copyright extension act type thingie essentially said that even life + XX years is "limited". Running with that logic, any copyright term that is not infinity must therefore be "limited". Wheee.
An interesting analysis of the DMCRA argues that the DMRCA strengthens the DMCA -- but in a good way.
Aire Libre
Who is going to publish worthless information?
Everybody, basically. Not everyone has broadband. Not everyone has, or knows how to use a computer. Not everybody wants to read, listen to music, or watch videos on a computer.
The printing press was invented in about 1454. The first copyright law didn't appear until 1710. Historically, publishers have hated copyrights, which were passed despite them.
The trick is, you have to be more responsive. Whenever something comes out that there is a demand for, you print 'em up fast and get as much of the initial market as possible, before it's a commodity. Witness paperback copies of the Starr Report that were in stores within days of its release. Then, the other half is to print somewhat smaller runs of works that are commodities, but which are priced accordingly. I can walk into about any bookstore and buy copies of Shakespeare, Dickens, Twain, Melville, and so forth. Their works have been in the public domain for ages, if not forever, but continue to be mildly steady sellers.
The fact that there are pirates that SELL copies of the things they've pirated should attest to the fact that there's always a buyer for damn near anything, even when you can get it from anywhere. Just because something is universally available doesn't mean you automatically have one already.
Would they stop wholesale flagrant infringement?
Probably. If for no other reason than that the wholesale flagrant activities going on right now would probably be legalized. The repeal of Prohibition sure as hell stopped people from drinking illegally. Didn't stop drinking itself, though.
I think that at this point, any reasonable copyright reform is going to require that any otherwise infringing acts which are not for commercial gain, which are performed by natural persons, is not infringing.
Which is probably your largest bit of flagrant infringement right there. At least, it certainly is in terms of people involved, and so fewer people would be acting lawlessly, anyhow.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
This hearing is before the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection Committee which is a subcommitte of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. It is the 27 members of this specific subcommittee that need to hear from us as they will make the decision on what to do this Wednesday.
This is a list of the subcommittee members.
E-mail each of these 27 members, especially if one of the members happens to be your representative. They hold the power right now. Later we'll worry about other votes and other members. For now, write these 27 reps! Here's a sample letter:
Dear Subcommittee member,
I am writing to ask you to support H.R. 107 this Wednesday and favorably recommend that it move on from your subcommittee. This bill is identical to one which Representatives Boucher and Doolittle introduced during the last Congressional session, so the time that this bill move forward has come.
H.R. 107, the Digital Media Consumer's Rights Act (DMCRA), restores consumers' fair use rights by amending the DMCA to allow circumvention of copy protection for non-infringing uses of digital copyrighted material. The DMCRA also specifies that it is not a violation of Section 1201 of the DMCA to manufacture, distribute, or make non-infringing use of a hardware or software product that enables significant non-infringing use of a copyrighted work, as in making back-up copies of legally purchased DVDs or other digital media.
Several provisions of The Digital Millenium Copyright Act have harmed law-abiding citizens of this country for too long. The DMCRA is a sensible change to the law that is necessary for consumers to enjoy their rights of fair use.
The content industry that opposes this bill has cried wolf before. They opposed the VCR, likening it to the Boston Strangler. We know now that technological advances are good for both consumers and industry, and that an industry scared of change should not be allowed to impede progress or consumer's rights.
I believe that if you are truly thinking of the interests of your constituents, then you will support the DMCRA. I urge you to take a stand for the public this Wednesday.
Thank You.
Like Digital Freedoms? Then donate to EFF before they're gone.
bill that would make it impossible for photographers to protect their work in any digital format is set for a hearing in the House on Wednesday, May 12. In response, Professional Photographers of America has been making the rounds on Capitol Hill to rally opposition to the legislation.
Key emotional words (some of which are outright lies as well) are impossible and rally. Not too bad so far, though starting off with a lie in the first paragraph is a bad sign.
Known as H.R. 107, the Digital Media Consumer Rights Act would give hackers explicit permission to distribute software and hardware devices designed to defeat copyright protection technology. Other provisions of the bill would set a dangerous precedent by making copyright owners who use anti-copying technology on music discs subject to regulation and fines from the Federal Trade Commission unless they meet extensive labeling and regulatory requirements.
Many of us will disagree with the use of hackers here, but explicit has dirty connotations, even if it's not a dirty word. We all know what the general public thinks hacker defines, anyway. My favorite is the "dangerous precedent" -- a slippery-slope argument
PPA believes that a strong grassroots effort combined with its recent lobbying efforts should be enough to keep this harmful bill locked in the subcommittee on Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection until Congress adjourns. To that end, we encourage all members to contact their Representative and urge them to oppose H.R. 107 the Digital Media Consumer Rights Act.
Just a plea here, nothing too exciting.
Of course, the comments with the post of the article are just as bad but you all must be used to reading that point of view by now.
Error 404 - Sig Not Found
Just as a possible example:
//their name//,
//your state// ties, such as //companies with a presence in your state//. I too, as a private citizen, support this bill.
//your name//
Congress(wo)man
On Wednesday, May 12, 2004, there will be a congressional hearing to consider HR 107, the Digital Media Consumers' Rights Act (DMCRA). The DMCRA has been endorsed by many large corporations, including those with
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998, illegalized acts that are necessary for scientific research and fair use of technology products. The DMCRA works to loosen some of these restrictions. Specifically, it informs consumers of when an audio CD does not conform to industry standards and therefore might not be able to function in their player. Furthermore, it invites scientific research by allowing products to be reversed-engineered, only so long as such use is does not infringe upon the copyright.
I encourage you to consider this bill as a first step towards reinstating the rights of citizens to be informed of the limitations of the products they buy and to use those products in whatever non-infringing ways that they see fit.
Thank you for your time,
Most pro photographers try to own anything they shoot. This is a broken business model. If they shoot people, they have to get a model release to sell the photos. When was the last time your wedding photographer did this? (Oops) They do not have the right to sell the likeness of the people in the photos without a model release. On the other hand, photographers should simply do weddings and such as a work for hire and not own the copyright. When I hire a photographer, I bring my own contract to that effect. My works for hire buys the copyright. Many photographers won't go along. Some want sky high prices to discourage the contract. If we can't settle, then I take bids. Do expect to pay more for the service, but get the copyright in writing. Hire it for albums and web. Offer to buy a fixed number of prints to support the studio. With the current copyright issue, taking a families photo album, scanning the photos including school and sports photos, and showing them as a slide show at a wedding is a copyright violation. It's also common. Quick, can you find your friends 3rd grade school photographer to get permission to use the school photo in her wedding slide show? The business model is very broken and needs to change to adjust to the reality of how photos are shown nowdays. It shouldn't be a crime to show kid growing up photos including school and sports photos. Changing the law simply makes what is now being done legal. Is there anyone out there that put together a slide show for a wedding and actualy found and paid the school photographer to produce a slide show? (I'm guilty as anybody on this one. How do you find them?) Do you simply leave out school and sports photos? Is making a slide show not a copy but just another way of presenting the photos? If you are a school photographer and are at a family wedding, do you say anything regarding the inclusion of school photos in a slide show?
The law is broken and needs to change.
Non-works for hire such as nature photos should still be pieces of art and protected as a piece of art such as a painting, movie, or song. My wedding for hire photos should be mine, not the photographers.
The truth shall set you free!
Not a bad idea, but there are a few simple rules to make your vote actually count...
First, read the f'ing bill. It's here
Use the telephone. You'll probably never get through to your congressman, but getting through to staff is actually more important. Call the office in DC (http://www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.html) and ask to speak to the STAFF MEMBER who's tracking HR 107. If no one's following it, ask for the staff member who handles IP, technology, or computer issues.
There's no more powerful statement to make than "I'm your constituent, and if this passes it's a problem for me", except for...
"This is so important that it will impact how I'm going to vote in November." But you damn well better believe it if you say it, because that's the easiest lie to detect. (Hey, if your guy's from the wrong party, but does the right thing here, why aren't you voting for him?)
Stay on message. Resist the urge to talk about Iraq, or software patents, or anything else. The point is for the staff member to say, "I got 50 calls today abut HR 107, they're mostly from people in the district, and they all said it's important that the bill gets through". Hard to believe, but if a party whip isn't demanding a position, this generally determines how somebody's gonna vote.
And don't take a lot of time. In the first three minutes, you've made your case or not. In any case, your call has already been recorded as for or against, and is going to be in tomorrow's daily brief. Once you state your case, all you can do is fuck up, unless the staff member starts asking you questions.
Follow up with a fax. It should go to the DC office, the closest district office, the sponsor (Boucher), and if you're feeling creative, all of the bill's cosponsors -- there's actually bi-partisan support. (Available from the bill link above.) Staff tally these things, and it goes into the decision matrix.
BTW, if anybody's from Rhode Island, Patrick Kennedy was a co-sponsor, but withdrew his support.
Don't bother with email. These guys get slashdotted every day (imagine a half million people knowing your email address), so the sad fact is that nobody on the hill reads email.
Follow up, part II: a personal note to the staff member. It may not help this time, but a note card saying "Thanks for taking the time to talk with me today" goes a long, long way the next time you need to talk to your representative. Tip O'Neil got to be Speaker that way, and you can make the case that George H.W. Bush got to be president that way. The legislative process is all about relationships.
Finally, Stay polite. The staff member (or the congressman) may be a pinhead, but if you get belligerent, he might vote the other way because you're seen as an asshole. Bite your tounge, especially if they're stupid.
Note: If your Congressman's a Congresswoman, use your favorite word processor to adjust the genders referenced above. Reread, lather, rinse, repeat.
Bah, why the crappy flash intro page?
... This has no bearing on a "DRM virus" but it shows that a judge might still entertain such an arguement, though I seem to remember that the DMCA has some manner of exemption that might cover such things... maybe.
Give them something more useful to look at, like the contact page. You can tell them why this is unreasonable.
Now then, they're probably right that it would prevent them from being able to protect their works--DRM does not and has not ever worked (and hopefully will never work, since DRM working would imply that all general-purpose devices have been disabled or destroyed...)
Of course, where we disagree is whether this is a Bad Thing [TM]. Obviously, the substantial non-infringing uses (not to mention the crippling effects of DRM schemes when secure, and their futility when insecure) legitimizes the need to be able to crack DRM schemes without fearing that you might have to go to prison because you stripped out the "don't copy" bit.
I could only wish that a judge would rule, with a perverse sense of irony, that the word "effective" when discussing copyright protection devices meant that the device had to actually work (e.g. be un-circumventable), but alas, I don't think that judges are allowed to do that.
In the mean time, why don't they stick to suing people from actual copyright infringement, instead of "protecting" their works with stupidly restrictive schemes?
I mean, I'm just waiting for a "DRM Virus" which makes use of some DRM scheme or another to prevent anti-virus people from reversing or deactivating it. And lest you think I'm kidding that a provision like this could be used by the virus writer, read McClelland v. McGrath, 31 F. Supp. 616 (N.D. Ill. 1998). Even though it might be "the very definition of chutzpah," a kidnapper sued a police officer for unauthorized monitoring of his cell phone. He may not have been able to supress the evidence against him and get off of the kidnapping charge, but there were still civil penalties under 18 USC 2518(10)(a)
Should I /. him?
I've found that my posts don't format quite right w/o a sig.
"Progress will stop. No company will be able to justify the R&D expense."
No, both of these statements are wrong, because they are oversimplified. First off I am assuming that you are both talking about what would happen if both patents and copyrights were gone.
Progress would not stop. there would still be some bennifit to R&D. Even if it is gaurenteed that your competitors will copy your researsh fast enough to deny you any market advantage, both of you would still bennifit from, say, 50% cheaper CPU's, as the overall market would expand 'cause more people and applications can afford them. However the bennifit of R&D in this case is a lot less than it would be with patents, as you lose advantages over competitors. So here progress would slow, not speed up.
For other things progress would speed up, if for no other reason than that you could fire all your lawyers and hire 3x more engineers for the same price, and save a few forests (less paperwork) in the bargin.
The real result here would be that progress would be different. I think given our current technological situation that progress would net a fair gain, but some areas would slow drastically.
Laws are horrible moral guides, moral guides make even worse laws.
Um, Kalak, as a teacher I hope you have done some research on Bowling for Columbine and show it in the right context in the classroom. I personally find the movie distasteful as it is primarily concocted of lies. Read here a little about it or do some research yourself: www.hardylaw.net/Truth_About_Bowling.html
There is no point at which the "Fair Use supporters" will agree to stop wholesale infringement.
I'm a fair use supporter. In 2000 I deleted the 30 gigs of MP3s I had downloaded via Napster, because I could not come up with an ethical justification for having them. I currently have zero infringing material. I also have over 15 gigs of digital music ripped from the more than 200 CDs that I own. Fair use gives me the right to store my CDs in digital format, which increases my ability to enjoy the product I purchased. Since my willingness to pay for a product is directly proportional to my ability to derive enjoyment from that product, this is a good thing.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
I doubt if the bill said
"This gives the RIAA the power to ass rape anyone they see fit"
Of course it does. Who the hell do you think wrote it?
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
I agree. I voted for Boucher twice and I don't even live in Virginia!
I wish there were more like him... at least on this issue.
Would be better if someone wrote a 'virus' that looked through people's harddrives for DRM-protected music and then stripped the DRM from them silently. That way, when people start getting subpoenas for DMCA violations, they can just say they had a virus, but removed it later. I don't think it would stand to reason that people should find some way to put the DRM back in place on the files that lost it, hm?
First off, their contracts with performers read like an indentured slave agreement -- an artist's copyright is transferred to the marketing firm; she loses the rights attached. Look closely at any music media, the songs will have author recognition, but the copyright is usually attached to the recording company. Why do you think the Beatles created APPLE? That's why an artist can't easily change recording companies and bring their past recordings with them.
These contracts should also be required to define how long the recording company can hold these exclusive rights to market a song and reap almost 100% of the profits from it.
We already have such a mechanism to determine that...Depletion allowances, as is used in the oil industry (I'm not advocating the oil barons, only pointing out the depletion allowance methodology as a fair way of setting time frames for exclusive rights to skim profit off an artist's copyrighted works).This would force recording companies to determine at the inception of the contract just how long they will have this exclusive right, then it reverts 100% back to the artist, who can then do as she pleases with it...market it herself, sell it to another recording company, or make it public domain, or GPL.
FPOThis isn't entirely true. Most of the House and about 50% of the Senate use programs like "WriteRep" as part of their homepage.
WriteRep requires you to put in your zipcode before writing your Congressman, thereby allowing the Member to know you are a constituent.
If you would like to write to a Member of Congress who is not your Representative, write a paper letter, but also understand how little effect it may have on them.
A sig?!? I don't think so.....
Take 5 minutes to go to the house of representatives and write your rep about your feelings on this topic (only if you hate the DMCA, that is).
I am a resident of Virginia 9th. I am satisfied that my dealings with Boucher indicate that representative democracy does work. The simple lines defining Fair Use at the end of the DMCRA legislation will have powerful effect on stopping the RIAA's attempts to lock down culture.
A VP of NASCAR has been brought in from out-of-state to run against Boucher, with appropriate funding. Nothing would make copylock industires happier than to defeat Boucher. After 20 years, his seniority and incumbent status is crucial on the Judiciary, Commerce, Internet, and Satelllite House committees. And you should take a look at his letters to Michael Powell on the Broadcast Flag.
We will be hosting fundraisers immediately. Hopefuilly, we can re-schedule San Francisco meet 'n greets with Lessig and the folks at EFF.
Please take a look at http://www.boucherforcongress.com Donate if you will!