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pcHDTV Card Available, Legal for Now
corby writes "pcHDTV has announced that their new HD-3000 Hi Definition Television Card will be shipping tomorrow, November 8th. The card is supported under Linux, and captures NTSC and ATSC video streams. It also ignores the Broadcast Flag, which means that it will be illegal in the States starting July 1st, 2005, under a recent FCC Order. If you are interested in being able to make your own decisions about what you can do with broadcast HDTV content, this is your last, best, chance."
I am pretty sure you will be able to purchase an "illegal" card from Europe or Asia after the broadcast flag law steps in force. It's not like we live in pre-Internet days after all..
Besides, look at DVD players. There are plenty of players on the market, which ignore regional settings despite DMCA and other bullshit regulations.
Possibly a joke, but I'm guessing the law doesn't have any post facto clauses. Just the same as how cars before manufactured before 1967 don't need seatbelts.
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
I am far from a Bush apologist--I even voted against the man this past election. But I am under no illusion that the Democrats would be any less subservient to the government's corporate masters. Please give the partisan references a rest unless they hold water.
I too have felt the cold finger of injustice.
Just to clear this up a bit, because the article is misleading and I didn't see any posts clarifying this. It will not be illegal to own or possess these cards (HDTV receivers that ignore the broadcast flag). It will simply be illegal to sell them in the U.S.
I suggest people stock up on them. I don't even have an HDTV at this point, but I'm going to grab a card just so I'm covered...
Citing a huge majority that could override a veto and trying to imply that Clinton didn't want those laws is the sort of revisionist history that would make even Orwell blush.
- [The] noncommercial home use recording of material broadcast over the public airwaves [is] fair use of copyrighted works and [does] not constitute copyright infringement
- [The law] does not support [...] theory that supplying the "means" to accomplish an infringing activity and encouraging that activity through advertisement are sufficient to establish liability for copyright infringement
- The sale of copying equipment, like the sale of other articles of commerce, does not constitute contributory infringement if the product is widely used for legitimate, unobjectionable purposes, or, indeed, is merely capable of substantial noninfringing uses.
- [U]nauthorized home time-shifting of [television] programs is legitimate fair use
The last point is the key one here: EVEN IF the copyright holder does not authorize you to make a copy for your personal use, you are STILL legally entitled to do so.Copyright is NOT an absolute monopoly on the duplication of a published work -- no matter how they whine, the copyright cartels cannot deny you your LEGAL fair use rights.
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
First, you misread the case. There has never been a case that established that an entire species of use, such as time shifting, was inevitably fair use. Rather, each individual use claimed to be a fair use must be judged on its own circumstances. Time shifting by one person might be a fair use, but that doesn't mean that time shifting by another person is. Sony merely recognized that a substantial amount of the time shifting going on, or that _might_ go on, was fair.
Second, I don't recall any case that claims that people are entitled to fair uses. Only that it isn't infringement to make a fair use. Copyright holders are under no obligation to make it easy. This is because fair use is not a right. It is merely a defense to infringement actions.
Plus of course, it remains to be seen whether the broadcast flag falls under the copyright power at all, and is therefore subject to a fair use argument.
-- 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.
Your ideas are good, if a bit malformed.
Sony vs. Universal did exactly what you describe: they ruled that recording programs for the purpose of timeshifting was fair-use. Call this an "entire species" if you like, but that's what the decision said.
People are not entitled to fair use - you are correct. However, that in no way means that fair use is "merely" a defense: it is not. It is a gap in the applicability of copyright (and DMCA) law. In other words, a specific provision under which the resitrction does not apply. If you were looking for something that is "merely" a defense, you should look at patent law's "prior art" or something more along those lines. But "fair use" and "prior art" are different in their natures.
Lastly, the broadcast flag will not fall under anything *but* copyright law, or an extension thereof, like the DMCA.
You bring up one very good point thought that I rarely see here: even though its entirely LEGAL for you to make copies as a paying user of [digital cable, satellite TV, satellite radio, whatever], there is no law saying that the broadcasters cannot make it difficult or [relatively] impossible for you to do so. I think this is a legal loophole for providers that needs to be closed to protect consumer's rights. (As you pointed out, fair use is not a right, but I think it should be.) As it stands now, we are in a situation where we are legally allowed to copy something, but the providers are also legally allowed to take every measure to stop us from doing so, including outlawing devices that would permit such an action. Circumvention of those restriction on the device would then fall under a legal exclusion, but you have to ask yourself at some point if we're being honest with ourselves...you basically are legally allowing something and then making it so hard to accomplish that only a very small portion of the population can benefit from that legal provision. This is a sort of legislative dishonestly - you're saying one thing while allowing something completely different to actually occur. We need to decide what we really want and then put laws into place that [protect/prohibit] those actions.
If you read the Sony vs. Universal decision, there is a lot of commentary by the judge "schooling" people in copyright law, its true purpose, and how it needs to be revamped when new technologies emerge. We're approaching that time, and I'm not so sure I'm going to like the outcome.