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Diebold Rejected in Copyright Takedown Attempt

Posted by michael on from the worm-turns dept.

JimMarch(equalccw) writes "Our favorite crooked voting company Diebold has lost a MAJOR copyright case (click for ruling here or description here). Short form: Diebold's internal documents (key excerpts here and here and here) and code were floated all over the 'net last year, showing all kinds of horror. Diebold filed cease'n'desist notices under the DMCA (such as mine linked here); a court has now ruled that Diebold wrongfully abused the DMCA by issuing these takedown notices about materials that they knew were not covered by their copyright."

10 of 172 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Sweet by 91degrees · · Score: 5, Informative

    Erm... This isn't a chink in the DMCA. It's an exception written into the law to prevent abuse of the the legislation.

    Unusually for a DMCA story, this part of the law is being used in exactly the way it was intended.

  2. Re:WTH? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    It's true.
    In the late 1800's the Supreme Court ruled that corporations have the same protections as people under the Bill of Rights.

    Yet if I purposely do something I know will kill someone, I go to prison. If a company sells a product that is known to be dangerous (cigarettes, the Corvair) it's just fines.

  3. NPR reported on this... by flashbang · · Score: 2, Informative

    NPR reported about Diebold a few times. It's getting some coverage, but I agree, not enough.

    --
    My sig left me for a younger user id.
  4. Get Even? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    I've read a few of the comments from fellow
    slashdoters, 'slap on the wrist when they violate dmca...' 'pain and anguish, after i got a letter from diebold'....

    Look, just go to your local court and file a suit
    against them.

    Its fairly easy, you don't need to pay no stinking Esquire.
    ---badges

  5. Re:Double negative? by wes33 · · Score: 2, Informative

    no, it means that they abused the dmca and it was wrong to do that ... but you knew that already didn't you? There is a place for grammar pedants, but I'm not sure it's /.

  6. No penalty of perjury by Guanix · · Score: 4, Informative

    This issue was covered in a Slashdot interview with a DoJ lawyer a while ago. DMCA does not require the statements about infringement in notices to be made under penalty of perjury. Only the statement that the issuer is a representative of the copyright holder is made under penalty of perjury.

  7. Actually, they do know by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    CNN:
    http://money.cnn.com/2004/08/30/technology/e lectio n_diebold/
    http://www.cnn.com/2004/LAW/09/28/rama sastry.votin gmachines/

    MSNBC:
    http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5937115/

    IMHO this issue has gotten decent (but not perfect) coverage in the mainstream media. Having said that, they do not go much into the technical details, but look at their audience. While I agree that it is crappy that thinks like the Kobe trial get more coverage, to say that the 'Mainstream media still doesn't know' is inaccurate.

  8. Re:That's subtly hilarious. by csimpkin · · Score: 2, Informative

    I think that the code in the curly braces would be done depending on what the value of GW_BUSH represents. In C/C++ an assignment is essentially a function call that returns the new value of the variable being assigned to. That is handy for things like multiple assignments in a single statement (ie a = b = c).

  9. Re:WTH? by dillon_rinker · · Score: 2, Informative

    The missing phrase is "to the seller." If a product is known TO THE SELLER to be dangerous, but not to the buyer, then the seller is culpable.

    Recall the McDonald's hot coffee lawsuit. McDonald's was selling a product that THEY knew would cause 2nd and 3rd degree burns, and they knew that people would put it in their lap, and they knew that some people would spill it. BUYERS, on the other hand, thought they were buying a product that was hot and would cause discomfort or 1st degree burns at worst.

    Who, then, is at fault in a situation like this? Clearly, in the McDonald's coffee lawsuit, the buyer was partially at fault; she spilled something on her that she knew might burn, HOWEVER, she didn't realize the extent or severity of the burns. McDonald's, by not clearly warning of the magnitude of the risk, was also partially at fault. A jury of ordinary Americans determined that McDonald's held most of the blame.

  10. Actually... by temojen · · Score: 2, Informative
    The only hack this would require is getting an old dot-matrix printer to talk to a modern server and only print out one line at a time.

    All you have to do is plug it in, assuming you're using some variant or UNIX/BSD/Linux.

    The real hack with your system would be making it not possible to figure out how someone voted by corellating the vote log and the elector log (who voted already).

    The problem with touchscreen voting is that the voter has no way of knowing the vote they entered is the vote that was recorded.

    If your state has trouble figuring out how to run a free and fair election, Elections Canada can help.