Slashdot Mirror
Regulators Lose Piracy Battle
asok_g33k writes "The US broadcast regulators were told today by a court of appeal that it 'crossed the line' in trying to dictate how devices functioned. This was after the regulators tried to ban a device which allowed TV shows to be pirated.
This comes after studies revealing that massive amounts of TV shows are beign illegaly downloaded from the internet and the regulators want a way to stop these shows being pirated and copied."
what is this a competition ?
yesterday
This article appeared yesterday.
And the day before yesterday.
Tomorrow, I intend to hold an opinion, so if you could post it then too, that'd be great.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Can we expect each of them to repost this? It's important stuff though. We need to hear it again and again.
...richie - It is a good day to code.
And only just off the front page!
seriously, I am glad you can't give a "campaign donation" to federal circuit courts. And let me say, Internet Pirates around the world have one the thing to say: 0WN3D!
Mod Wisely.
As long as the stream can be recorded on at least a decent quality analog medium, broadcast tv or even dvds will be "reproducable"
I just think i had a flashback.. Or its just such a good story that every editor wants to post it..
5 46244&tid=129&tid=17 1 33250&tid=123&tid=129
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/02/23/1
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/02/22/2
Tried to mail the editors, but apparently they dont check their email
From TFA:
"Selling televisions is not what the FCC is in the business of."
Amazing they needed a three-judge panel to tell them that. It's obviously not over yet with the appeals court still yet to rule whether the consumer groups that brought the suit have standing, but it's a fantastic sign! Both for this decision as well as upcoming decisions on whether the government can force PC makers to implement DRM and "Trusted Computing" initiatives.
I'm a big tall mofo.
There is no way to stop
Sometimes, it is feasible to "invent" a DRM solution as if not all, but MOST users will obey it, and sometimes (in this case) it is not. What should be right or wrong, is a totally different question though.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
It's not the first time and it won't be the last time that retailers had to follow pirates into a distribution model.
Always going forward, 'cause we can't find reverse.
Hammers are being massivly abused to kill people. They need to be equipped with a fingerprint sensor and a homing beacon and a rubber head so they can't be abused! END THE MADNESS NOW!
Beep beep.
samzenpus changes his name to dupesTacosPosts here
When I tell an object to delete this, am I killing it or telling it to kill me?
...I barely watch any TV anymore since the internet. And when I do I would prefer it to be TIVOed, sans commercials. But can you take out the product placements?
I'm just becomming too used to getting my content without the advertising rape job they do on TV. Especially the offensive (when my son is watching) "erectile disfunction" (wink) commercials. And after all, everyone says if you don't like it simply don't watch.
Maybe if /. had a broadcast flag, it would be able to recognize stories which had been broadcast and avoid copying them?
Ok, a bit lame, but I'm having a hard time trying to come up with anything which wasn't posted the first two times...
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
Please see Broadcast Flag in Trouble for details.
How about a little truth: "Regulators tried to ban a device that would allow for personal copying, and went against a previous Supreme Court ruling (Sony vs Betamax)."
There once was a time when I respected Slashdot for it's common-sense + Left'ish wing viewpoints. Now it looks like nothing more then an elementary school whine-fest. Poor spelling, grammer and an uncanny nack for re-posting stuff other peoples' work.
"The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." ~Plato (427-347 BC)
Taco and company... I think we get it, thanks.
The economics of distribution have changed, and they're trying to maintain their income stream while looking for alternate means. What google has taught us is that advertising can support freely copy-able content if done right.
I paid $5.00 to see 1,000 dupes before everyone else. It seems the only added value subscribers have now-a-days is to be the first ones to be disappointed by another dupe.
The preceding message was based on actual events. Only the names, locations and events have been changed.
"The broadcast flag bears about as much relation to the FCC's mandate as dishwashers.
Where was this judge in the ri/mpaa's war on file sharing technology? Coulda used somebody with this kind of logic...
-
Poll disscussions are so much better...
Note: This sig contains nine S's, nine I's and five O's which... means absolutely nothing.
"massive amounts of TV shows are beign illegaly downloaded from the internet" .
Is this really illegal , I am not aware of any case in which someone has been prosecuted for downloading TV shows
IANAL , though wouldnt this classify as Potential copyright infringment, as it is yet to be tested in court.
Does anyone know if this is definantly illegal ?
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
"thats what real geeks would do, but i have yet to find any who have anything to do with slashdot"
/. but they are only allowed to read and talk
Plenty of geeks have a lot to do with
I have worse karma than M$.
I just don't see how this crosses the line. Granted I didn't read the stories, so go ahead and flame if I'm off base. But the FCC is tasked with providing technical direction to the broadcast community. If they all wanted this flag, and i think we will agree the broadcasters do, it's the slashdot crowd who does not, then why is the FCC out of line being the standards committee for what they all want?
The thing that really gets me is the stupid court stepping in at the last minute and changing plans. Manufacturers have to be planning, designing, implementing and producing for this broadcast flag sometimes years in advance. Then the court steps in, thinks everything is going to change instantly at their whim.
The alternative to the the way this happened is that some standards comittee, like whomever dictated the NTSC signal or PAL etc, would get the task, come up with the exact same solution, and then the FCC would be 'in-line' to enforce it.
This is not the win you think it is. It's just some stupid judge(s) trying to make a name for themselves.
slashdot troll = you make a compelling argument I do not like the implications of.
As I don't currently have mods, so can't moderate you as '-1 Troll', I'm presuming you meant grammar, knack and people's . And I'm sure I've seen this comment before.
The only thing you can accurately describe as "Scotch" is a sticky tape made by 3M. And it's
When the MSs, the RIAAS, the MPAAs, the Disneys etc finally admit that there is no agressive tactic that will work. The world has moved on now. People have access to broadband to download tons of data, people have means of backing up loads of data (soon TBs we hear). P2P and similar stuff is rampant. People want to copy stuff from their TV. People don't want to be forced into shitty exploitative DRMed and constrictive nonsense. They want to transfer their music to CD, to play it in a range of devices, they want to make backups of their DVDs.
They are all fighting a loosing battle. Start listening to what people want instead of what they don't want.
Because we all know that many great TV shows are cancelled because of piracy.
Tv show Piracy is killing the industry! do you all want to have to pay monthly for your TV content???
remember someone in the UK watching an american TV show off a bittorrent is exactly like killing puppies!
Dont support puppy killers!
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I was about to say well at least they can spell, then I remembered...! ;-)
You're only jealous cos the little penguins are talking to me.
Lets create "Meta Slashdot", a site where we solicit news items. We'll have some real editors that actually weed out the dupes and check the facts. Then we submit the news to Slashdot where Cowboy Neal can rubberstamp it.
With some luck we can even bribe Slashdot's ISP to reroute their mail to us, to make sure all submissions are properly vetted. :)
So, what do you say folks? Instead of this endles bitching about how the Slashdot editors suck, let's get together and do something about it!
/greger
OK, so it's a dupe, give the guy a break, or maybe you'd like to do the work -- I am sure the salary for a /. editor is great!
Don't even think of whining about "amounts of TV shows" and saying it should be "numbers of TV shows".
Mandatory relevant comment: DRM is fatally flawed since we always need to be able to see/hear the output. The only way to really stop duplication of AV media is to put the check higher up the data stream, that is, a chip behind your eyeball.
of a previous story.
The qualitee definitely is degradeng as it is reproducd, ovr and ovr and oe..
gak!
Yesterday's article was spun towards the EFF side so this article spins more toward the "regulators" side. While they are regulators of broadcasts, the issue here is whether they are legitimate regulators of non-broadcast functions of devices. To call them regulators here gives them what I consider an undeserved legitimacy.
As far as TV piracy being a growing problem. It probably will continue to be a problem until someone important catches on that all they need to do is come up with a downloadable program package that contains some forms of advertising that people will view.
One possible downloadable tv program package would feature small corner ads or something. They need to make the ads useable but not so intrusive that people feel the need to try and hack them out of there.
Coding Blog
This time the news is from the bbc. That is not america this time. So in this article all non americans can discuss the consequences for europe. Because sometimes the laws in europe try to follow the laws in the other parts of the world. Just look at the DCMA and recent discussions of patent law.
By the way, why don't the editors read their own site?
Ohhh, boy, all the time I open slashdot.org these days I have strange deja vu feeling. It is glich of the Matrix or just a bad day for editors?
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
You know this was supposed to be a joke, right?
Or did you just see his UID and get penis envy? I did.
Sure, we had Broadcast Flag in Trouble and Court Says FCC Out-of-Bounds With Digital TV ...but you also missed Preparing for the Broadcast Flag?, where these this court ruling was already mentioned
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
I don't understand how downloading a television show with Commercials is any different than recording it on my Tivo. I can skip commercials there as well as I can if I download a show. That's all they are truely worried about. (duh) the bottome line.
What terrible language they use: "tried to ban a device which allowed TV shows to be pirated." They make it seem like the default state is one where the shows could not be pirated rather than using language that would indicate the state where a device would be implemented as being restricted.
Welcome to the land of the free...pay toll ahead...no photography...please open your bag...
Please note the corrections. (And damn the New York Times, et al: "Internet" should be capitalized.)
If I am going to consume something later does it mean that I have to buy it today?
Example: If I decide to watch a movie via the internet but then at a later date also decide to watch in on my all too expensive Cable channel have they really lost anything? Isn't it a matter of time shifting my consumption of a product?
I mean I am not concerned about breaking their old pricing model but I am concerned that I am not getting enough value from my subscription dollars.
Why don't we have a global turn off you TV Day?
Actually, I think it's just the return of the evil bit.
It was only rejected 7 times though ;)
Actually, the verbage in this reference is slanted the other way. The FCC wasn't requiring that hardware works a certain way, they were attempting to ban devices that could be used to pirate video. That's quite a spin wouldn't you say?
And people sharing TV shows on the net is somehow piracy... I wonder if it would be okay with them as long as they left the commercials in?
Yes - there was a recent study that concluded that TV shows are heavily traded on P2P networks (also concluded that Limey's jones for 24 episodes), but the regulation providing for this "Broadcast Flag" was passed in November of 2003. It just took some time ( and urgency of it's adoption ) for the EFF ( and other like-minded associations ) to mount a legal challenge. At least it doesn't look like I will need to stock up on flag-less components, at least for the time being - I am sure one of Hollywood's in-pocket Congressmen will be quick to try and push a bill through with the same provisions.
that's all i can say. the potential abortion of the broadcast flag. wow. simply wow. now i don't have to jump on that $180 HD tuner card, and i can grab one later on to record movies to my blu-ray drive. thank you jurisprudence!
There once was a time when I respected Slashdot for it's common-sense + Left'ish wing viewpoints. Now it looks like nothing more then an elementary school whine-fest.
The editorial board of slashdot is degenerating Fast. Not that its ever been particularly good at checking articles and correcting grammar, but in recent weeks there has been a significant increase in pro-microsoft, and now pro-cartel postings. This may only be a symptom of a misguided notion that a free software/open source forum and newssite should somehow be "unbiased" and give the enemies of their movement equal time and equal legitimacy (much like the misguided notion that Jewish leaders should debate whether or not the holocaust happened with right-wing revisionists, something the US media has actually tried to engineer, despite the inherent destructive effect of legitimizing very fring and demonstrably nonsensical notions in order to create an appearance of "balance").
Whether this is a symptom of misguided "appearance of balance at any cost," a gradual sellout of slashdot to its advertisers (Microsoft does advertise here, and who knows how much of its bottom line is being threatened if it doesn't post stories along certain political/philosophical grounds), or a shift in slashdot's targetting (moving away from us free software/opensource geeks to a more staid, corporate, proprietary audience) is hard to know. But there has definitely been a change in the tone of the site, and as someone who has been reading slashdot for many years, I can say that it is not a good change.
Spinning the banning of technology that makes recording a TV program a la a VCR as a "piracy device" takes the cake, that's for sure.
What's next, spinning the banning of general purpose computers as an attempt at banning a "piracy device" since computers can (and have been) used to violate the copyright of proprietary software (most commonly MS Windows, alas), music, or even *gasp* TV programs that were broadcast for free on television anyway?
Whoever did that writeup and/or vetted it for slashdot (if slashdot's laxidasical editing can be described as "vetting", a real stretch I grant you) should be fired.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
But how is downloading television episodes illegal? They're on the tube for free, for heaven's sake! As long as the content is not for profit, I don't see where they have a leg to stand on.
Mercy was given to me by Christ...I must give the same to others.
I'm betting that TOMORROW's DUPE of this story will turn out different.
title: Court Rules in Favor of US broadcast regulators
"The US broadcast regulators were told today by a court of appeal that it 'HAD NOT crossed the line' in trying to dictate how devices functioned. The court specifically gave the broadcast regulators the right to enter into anyone's abode and confiscate whatever they felt like. The regulatosrs followed up on their victory by announcing a COURT-BACKED plan to implant RFID devices into each and every citizen. The regulators have retained the firm of Claria Networks (formerly Gator), the creators of the pervasive and wonderful package GAIN to assist in the implementation.
In other news, US broadcast regulators delegated to the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the right to conduct Random Strip Searches of whomever it feels like for no apparent reason."
that massive amounts of TV shows are beign illegaly downloaded
That's three errors in part of one sentence. He's lucky he doesn't work for me. I'd fire his ass in a New York minute.
Massive NUMBERS of shows
BEING, not beign
ILLEGALLY, not illegaly
I've seen better work from second graders. This site has gone straight to Hell. There's not ONE editor here who could make it in the real world.
Well, certainly don't start thinking about ways to co-op those technologies and make them work for you. No, don't do that! Try to regulate the technologies you don't like away, that way you don't have to think outside your comfortable little corporate box. You're obviously not donating enough to the US Chamber of Commerce. Get that check book out and solve this problem the old fashioned way: Go buy yourself some sympathetic legislators.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
it's a re-run.
A pirated rerun at that.
How do you "pirate" a TV show? Seems like the wrong term.
The real story is that there WAS NO RULING YET, damn it! The question that the judges can't even decide on is whether the suing parties are in position to sue, so it's still very, very likely that nothing will come out of this. Check your facts before posting, will you?
The law already provides penalties for making copies of copyrighted materials *and* distributing them, especially for commercial purposes. The law makes the act illegal. Technology to copy material is just a tool which in itself is innately good or bad. A DVD recorder can be used for perfectly legitimate uses such as recording a TV program for later viewing and archival for purely personal and private use, which should be well within consumer rights. Its not the technology that should be illegal, but the certian acts which infringe upon copyright, which is mass redistribution of the material.
I believe it is completely unacceptable to force manufacturers to restrict the features of the technology so the user cannot record or copy material. Recording and copying, and archiving of copyrighted material is not and should not be illegal for personal use. I believe an individual should have the right to copy, archive, store, and modify copyrighted material for their own personal, private use. This is a right consumers should have. Interfering with hardware by requiring its features be restricted so the user cannot do this violates the users legitimate rights.
read penny arcade, decent discussion on tv show downloading, versus dvd sales.
if you can tape it or time shift it, you can download it. stop fuckering about.
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
finally a judge that works for the people and has some common sense. I think the industry is flattering itself if it thinks there is even a tv show worth copying. tv just sucks - I don't even watch anymore - I get my news from local stations or the internet - I think I am going to go home and cancel my cable - don't even watch it anymore. these folks are nothing but greedy bastards and all they want is for to watch a show once and pay for it every time we want to watch it again. they don't want us to record anything.
Correction: I meant to say that the technology is not innately good or bad.
No battle has been lost yet! (Unfortunately) Some comments have been made but there has been no decision, even in the slightest. Indeed, they haven't even decided whether or not the suit can continue.
Geez, it's a repost, and it's not even correct!
This court is simply wrong. We live in a socialist country and it is the government's job to tell the people exactly how to behave. It's in your best interest to do as you are told. The government has every right to outlaw or order anything it wishes including forcing TVs to be made in a certain way. If you have any doubt about this just ask John Ramsey of Ramsey Electronics. It's terrorism to violate the laws so shut up, respect authority, support the government's positions, and do as you are told!
i do not know about you but i spell being like this "beign"
it is spelt wrong in the article
To Hell with the Queen of England!
So is being copied wrongly, over, and, over, again...
Can I be a Slashdot editor if I promise never to come back?
/. could use people who don't even fucking read the blog they're in charge of.
It seems that
Why is it cool to post the same story 3 times in the same day, but a cook who grabs the crap from yesterday's garbage gets fired?
Most often heard from Slashdot editors wives, girlfriends, boyfriends or inflatable toys:
"This again?"
Seriously, take a moment from inspecting your own balls, and DO YOUR FUCKING JOB. Really.
Or go get fired from McFuckingClownBurger. This site is full of people who do more than you appear to do in the first 5 minutes of their 10 hour day. Is it too much to ask of the editors that they actually read, scan, or glance at the site enough to be called 'editors'?
A gas station toilet has a better story queue than you worthless bitches. Is it really TOO MUCH to READ SUMMARIES OF 12 stories? IS IT? If so, I suggest special ed tutoring. Perhaps you'll learn something from the fucking tards that can at least tell me if they've seen the goddamn puppy in the book before.
Why 'edit' this site at all if you're going to masturbate on donuts all day? Fuck, I can do that, and I don't even have a degree.
You know what really blows my teensy mind? That there was four hours between the time you posted your first story, and the time you posted the dupe from yesterday. What where you doing? Playing Minelayer? Eating samitches? Posting to Fark? Please tell me you do this for free, and that OSDN doesn't pay you to smell your fingers for hours on end.
Yeah, I amy be drunk, but I can still recognize a stupid dupe on the front page of the site I edit. Which is not this one. Which is probably why I'm not working there.
(Please note: I am not drunk this time)
Too bad this story didn't have a broadcast flag on it.
--
If Bush is against gay marriage, why does he keep talking about his mandate?
(Originally posted by teamhasnoi in Broadcast Flag in Trouble. Please don't sue me, teamhasnoi. It was a tribute. Yeah, that's it.)
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
I don't see how it can be called "piracy" when you are talking about broadcast media, which potentially can be received by anyone. As long as your TV licence is up to date, and your satellite subscription is also up to date {which it would have to be, otherwise you would not be able to get a picture}, then surely you have a right to watch the programmes being broadcast? And, as the saying goes, all means to the same end are equally valid.
..... but that's another story}. If he comes around to my house and watches my TV {on which I have paid the licence}, is he doing anything he shouldn't? What if he watches Sky {which he is definitely not paying for}?
There's half an argument about people who have not paid their TV licence watching programmes, but it doesn't hold up to scrutiny. Does not having a TV licence mean you are not allowed to watch TV in someone else's home, a bar, or an electronics store? Real-life example: One of my friends has no TV set. He doesn't pay any TV licence {and incidentally has great fun with the enforcement people when they come around
What if I lend him a DVD I made, of a broadcast programme, that he can watch using VLC on his PC, or on a portable DVD player with no broadcast receiver? As far as I can tell, my licence and my Sky subscription covered me making the recording in the first place; and if my friend would be allowed to watch it in my house, then why shouldn't he be allowed to watch it anywhere else?
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
this time, the title is different. What makes me really pissed off is when they publish a dupe with the same title and the same blurb.
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
"Regulators Lose Piracy Battle"
Its not a piracy battle, its about fair use.
"the regulators tried to ban a device which allowed TV shows to be pirated.
the regulators want a way to stop these shows being pirated and copied.
The whole point of the ruling is tht the courts have already decided looong ago that timeshifting is NOT piracy. The second phrase is meaningless - it is perfectly legal to record a show, it is not until you distribute it that any piracy has occured.
And they've got the cheek to complain that civil liberties groups are "muddying the waters" over copyrights...
I got nothin.
You have two hands and one brain, so always code twice as much as you think!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
'As long as the stream can be recorded on at least a decent quality analog medium, broadcast tv or even dvds will be "reproducable"'
Macrovision (old style, anyway) clips the analog sync pulses, preventing recording devices locking on to frames correctly; this was the system used to prevent copying of VHS hire tapes, and it worked reasonably well. Not all rights management is digital...
With HDTV/digital broadcasting it is possible to broadcast with Macrovision and prevent analog recordings. It isn't be done for analog free-to-air because reducing the amplitude of the sync pulse means TVs in fringe reception areas may not see enough signal to trigger sync, effectively reducing the transmitter's range (increasing a television transmitter's power is insanely expensive).
So I'm afraid that "as long as" may not be very long at all...
It seems to me that slashdot editors (or story submitters) go out of their way to word the stories in a way that their dupeness is not immediately obvious...
first psot1!!!1 leet.
what does roman polansky think about this?
The article refers to comments made by one of the judges in the case and NOT to a ruling. The court still has to determine if the complaintants have standing to bring this case, and if not, then the whole case gets thrown out.
From the article:
The 'anti piracy' efforts of any given media industry has been a losing battle since the battle began.
Pick a media, any media you want. Someone comes up with a way to prevent copying some kind of media. Someone else comes up with a way to defeat the copy protection. The copy protection never wins. It would be interesting to hear an account of when copy protection has definitively won.
Here's a point I haven't seen, though I've not read all 100-gabillion replies...
Broadcasters put up shows for people to watch. They pay for it through advertising revenue. Advertisers pay for air time based on how many people watch it. The more people are watching, the more they pay and the more the broadcaster makes. That's what ratings are for. So...
If you download and watch the show, you are not watching it on broadcast which means you aren't counted in the ratings. The ratings for the show go down, the advertisers pay less, the broadcasters pay less. (this assumes the ratings industry is accurate...)
So.... here's the solution. Broadcasters package shows with the advertisements. Put the shows up for free download. Count how often its downloaded, apply a factor to determine how many people actually watch a downloaded show (like newspapers counting readers from borrowed copies) and include those numbers in the ratings. Ratings go up, advertising rates go up. all are happy. You'll still get a portion of the population that doesn't watch the ads, but I bet you'd discover that many people still would. Frankly, I wouldn't mind watching ads if I new it was part of the price for watching the show when I wanted... plus its nice to have the time to duck out to the kitchen or the can.
Or... even easier solution... Ratings industry is already in place, they simply have to make provision for counting those shows that are watched from download. simple.
The point is, it doesn't matter when a show is watched or on what media, just that the producers/broadcasters/advertisers know that its being watched and how often.
man, I feel like mold.
Since this is apparently a dupe, this seems like a good time to rant. I'm so fucking SICK of these regulators trying to push their "anti-privacy" measures on everyone. I'm glad that someone told the FCC that they overstepped their bounds. I think I have the right to record whatever the hell I want from the TV. I travel for work, and most of the time I can't watch the shows I like because they're not on an available local channel. So I either record the shows at home with my PVR, or I get them off a torrent site somewhere. I don't consider myself a pirate for wanting to watch the show I missed. Most of the time I still buy the DVD of a show I like (Buffy, SG1, etc), so where's the harm in getting to see the show NOW, and I'll buy it later at a better quality when and if the studio decides to release it to the public. I see no harm there. If these "regulators" are worried about piracy, then why not make a product for consumers that's worth a shit. If they put as much money and effort from their prosecution and lobbying into their product, they wouldn't have to worry. But it's the American way: "have someone else do it (protect our investment) because we're too lazy to do it ourselves or make it better".
Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion.
I don't mean to be insensitive in this, but here goes.
Since we can't seem to get rid of the piracy and theft memes with respect to copyright, I propose we consider adding the rape meme.
As in those price fixing, for example, the selling price of CDs, are raping the public. They are copyright rapists. That company is a convicted rapist. Along those lines.
As in those taking undue advantage of artists are rapists as well?
See if they like such pejorative terms when applied to them. They seem to like such terms when applied to those they consider to be their opponents.
all the best,
drew
btw - three tabs open in firefox right now. slashdot, freshmeat and dictionary.com and I just got a popunder add for wall street advisor.
FreeMusicPush If you want to see more Free Music made, listen to Free
It's not even a dupe. It's a troupe.
This is a fight that needs to be won. The broadcast flag essentially does an end run around the Betamax decision which, despite changes in technology and an increase in piracy, is still a sound legal precedent. I don't pirate broadcasts. The vast majority of viewers don't pirate broadcasts. They just want to record their weekly showing of and watch it when they get home from their crappy jobs. Or TiVo the PPV movie they just paid for in case they get called away. The Supreme Court has stated they have the right to do this. The broadcasters are now saying sure, you have the right, but we're going to prevent manufacturers from selling you the enabling technology.
So celebrate briefly, and then go make sure you're on the EFF mailing list and that you know who represents you in Congress.
"Ding dong, the flag is dead!
Which old flag?
The Broadcast Flag!
Ding dong the wicked flag is dead!
Wake up - sleepy head, rub your eyes, get out of bed
Wake up, the Broadcast Flag is dead!
She's gone where the goblins go,
Below - below - below. Yo-ho, let's open up and sing and ring the bells out
Ding dong the merry-oh, sing it high, sing it low
Let them know
The Broadcast Flag is dead!"
Who gets her broom?
Insert witty sig here.
The "COPY" button on the Xerox machine at the /. office is stuck. Staff are trying to sort out the news among all the duplicate "Broadcast Flag" stories flying out of the Xerox. Details after this report on the Broadcast Flag.
Eternity: will that be smoking, or non-smoking? I Corinthians 6:9-10
As opposed to considering it a dupe, You are in an elite group which gets the backups of the articles before anyone else.
How about someone posting a list of good alternates to /. every time there is a dupe? We can all add to the continually growing alt list, the virtual scimitar hanging over /. editors' necks (if they have any, har-dee-har-har). Ever read any Edgar Allen Poe?
What I resent is not so much the dupe as the wasted cycles if there is in fact an interesting thread - since nobody will read it except whoever comes later by accident.
You can read my post and followup story suggestions if /. could hire a real journalist.
On another note, I believe the Japanese police did arrest or force out of business (same thing here really) someone who was selling a linux box for consumers that could be plugged in to a broadband line so that it would forward Japanese tv shows to you when you were travelling to another country. They also arrested the writer of a file sharing app who showed a user (cop) how to upload the hash of a movie to the net. There's a real chance that a real decision would help the Japanese government rewrite their rules on IP which would be really helpful for the broadband industry here.
This question was settled over twenty years ago! Recording TV is not bloody piracy. The broadcasters are trotting out the same stupid arguments they made before the bench then, but this time the semantic war redefining basic terminology is making the fight unwinnable by the sane.
Copying TV is not piracy. Passing copies around is not piracy. I know, I know, HBO is pay per view. But guess what? We've been recording the shows on VCR's for years. Passing them out to friends without cable. AND NO ONE CARED. Because it's not piracy, ie SELLING the tapes, and two, it didn't hurt HBO, it only made it more popular and made more people want to subscribe. As for satellite TV and similar, they've already bought laws making recordings almost impossible anyway.
But broadcast TV is being shot through my body right now. The idea is to have as many people watch as possible. At least for the last 65 years or so. We've been recording for almost thirty years, we've beaten back the loons who tried to make it a felony, and now they're back and winning, for God's sake.
The court system is stacked with extremely business friendly judges now, thanks to twenty five years of pro-free market Presidents, and there's no way of stopping them, especially since the regulators Bush appointed were lobbyists for the very industries they now regulate. It's a looting party for corporations. The legal precedents and semantic nastiness will be with us for the rest of our lives. Technology is being roped and tied by greedy gamers of the system, so it may not save us in the end. There won't be a place in the world you can manufacture tech not approved of by the powers in the U.S. God, they're raiding in Russia! The advance of corporate government is relentless, and largely ignored by the very people it locks into its worldview.
TV? Recording? PIRACY? Why not just call it rape or murder? The penalties would be less severe.
Checking Google news, I see another 100 or so news sites that covered this.
Are we going to see a Slashdot story a day for the next 100 days on this, or what?
I don't know about others here, but I pay my cable bill every month, which in my view authorizes me to watch those TV shows. Frankly, the idea that downloading a show rather than taping it is immoral and illegal is insulting.
It's been a long time.
They can try to ban whatever they like, I still won't be buying any TV service. Ads + braindead shows... no thanks.
"Moderators lose duplicity Battle"
From the oh-no-not-again dept.
Dupernova writes: "The slash dot editors were told today by a bunch of users that it 'missed the start' in trying to dictate how duplicates were banned. This was after the moderators tried (unsuccessfully) to ban a duplicate submission which was allowed to get published. This comes after studies revealing that massive amounts of dupes are being immorally uploaded from the internet and the moderators want a way to stop these dupes being posted and accepted."
(2^2^2^2 bytes in body)
Free-market my ass. These people are FASCISTS. When the corporations can control the government and get any asinine law that increases their profits passed, that is NOT A FREE MARKET, just as a wolf in sheep's clothing is NOT A SHEEP.
Regulators Lose Consumer Battle
"The FCC was established by the Communications Act of 1934 and is charged with regulating interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite and cable." Quoted from the FCC web site. The broadcast flag battle isn't about piracy anymore than the lawsuits against P2P filesharing systems are about piracy. Piracy is the excuse given to make these battles seem legitimate. Piracy, in all its forms, is already illegal and we have fine laws and law enforcement to battle piracy. The issue with the broadcast flag and P2P networks is control of consumer access to technology. The RIAA and MPAA want to prevent access to technologies that they don't like. If my daughter wants to watch her favorite show 4 times this month why should it be piracy for me to make a recording of that show for her? If I want to listen to 4 songs from one album and 3 songs from another one, why should it be piracy for me to rip those songs to CD/MP3 and listen to them in my car (bike, on a hike, etc)? The only reason is that the RIAA/MPAA wants to force us to buy multiple copies of everything we own. They are moving towards DRM that will tie a purchased recording to a single device and force us to buy it again to play it on another device. Ultimately, they want us to accept a pay-per-use model for literally everything they produce. This is their "holy grail" and they are eagerly pursuing that goal in the courts, in trade groups and in standard committees. The RIAA and MPAA should use existing laws to combat actual piracy and leave consumers alone in their own homes.
EFF lawyer Wendy Seltzer
"The broadcast flag bears about as much relation to the FCC's mandate as dishwashers."
first it was washing machines, now its dishwashers.....
I believe anything on television should be fair game to copy and share. If you were afraid of distribution, you shouldn't have distributed it.
"copyright infringement" 1.610.000 pages
"copyright infringement" -piracy 1.480.000 pages
"copyright infringement case" 15.900
"copyright infringement case" -piracy 12.300
Exactly, that's what I am talking about.
I believe that it's common that people that want to talk about "copyright infringement" like to always say the word "piracy" because it aggravates the issue.
What I mean is that the word "piracy" attached to copyright infringement is used as a tool to make it look worse that it already is.
"Piracy", even in the copyright sense, means ripping of someone else, to say the least, and "copyright infringement" only means that at the worse.
The problem is that "piracy" is also used to describe DVD-ripping, and I don't understand how that can be described by a word used to describe for example airplane hijackers. Maybe that's the idea, you can make laws against copyright infringement, to stop "terrorists" that perform "piracy".
It's precisely because of this behaviour and the extremely annoying frequency of advertising that I don't bother with broadcast TV anymore. I download everything I want from one of the many torrent sites available for the particular shows I watch.
If the TV people would simply play the shows in a manner that didn't annoy the hell out of me, I'd watch the old fashioned way. This "problem" is of their own making.
What I mean is, I don't have to pay the government in order to receive broadcast television.
Analog television is no longer patented. Digital television is heavily patented, and patents are a government subsidy to inventors under Const. I.8.8. In addition, digital television incorporates technology designed to make copyright in broadcasted audiovisual works easier to enforce, and copyright is also a government subsidy under Const. I.8.8, in this case to authors. American TV owners pay a lot of taxes to watch TV:
Unless you're making some kind of post-modern, ironic comment that I don't follow.
I guess you could call it pomo.
I get the slashdotters do not understand the distinction, but the reporters should be more clear about it.
"...sell people what they want; don't sue them into wanting what you have"
A totally stupid misrepresentation of the situation, worthy of Darl himself. Nobody has ever been sucessfully sued for NOT having **AA material*, nobody has ever been sued for NOT wanting to see a film or NOT wanting to buy a CD.
They ARE selling what people want, it's just that some people aren't prepared to pay. These are the people the **AAs are trying to sue; like any other business, they're going after dead-beats.
File sharing might be given a bit of respect, if only it's supporters didn't keep spouting absurd bullshit like the parent. You make yourselves sound like a bunch of petulant, spoiled brats who think the world owes you a free lunch. "Campaign donations" from the **AAs probably do less damage to your cause than your own idiotic statements. If there's ever a senate committee into file sharing and the pages of slashdot are presented, P2P will be gone faster than you can say "NO CARRIER".
*Yes, I know about Prof. Usher and the dead granny: both cases were dropped, neither were sued. Since when has any bureaucracy ever been 100% accurate?
Massive, massive TROLL. I mean, What the Fuck?
can some explain the idea of theft of a non-cable television show? we all know the VCR debacle from the 80s, so why is downloading shows off the internet different? isn't it essential a new means of time shifting a show?
i can record a show on my VCR/PVR, and rewatch it as many times as i want, but if i download it, it's a crime?
MooseGuy529 said: ... If I take this copy [the electromagnetic wave], take it out of the air, put it on magnetic tape (or a hard drive) and then later show it again, how is this invalidating a copyright? Personally I don't think broadcasters (cable is a different story) have a leg to stand on.
Well this one is pretty clear WRT copyright law. See, the broadcaster has rights to copy the programme (via sending it out on "the air"). You don't own the rights to copy it. The exception for your viewing is the 'transitory' nature of the copy. When you put that EM wave you took out of the air and put it on tape (harddrive, etc) you are reproducing (fixing the work to a tangible medium). This is a right you don't have. That's why programmes have 'fine print' at the end of the credits that say things like "Copyright [Someone]. All rights reserved".
Why? http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#106
[Over the air broadcasters] are dropping flyers from the sky, and complaining if you put one in your pocket to read it later.
This point doesn't back up your argument, which is one of reproduction (red herring). Time-shifting is an established fair use. If you started copying the flyer and giving it to other people you'd be liable. Depending on the consequences of that action (fraud, large damages from, say, reproducing a flyer with a price typo), maybe worse.
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
Michael, can you handle this?
samzenpus can you handle this?
I don't think they can handle this!
I don't think you ready for this posting
I don't think you ready for this posting
I don't think you ready for this...
'Cause my bodytext too dupalicious for ya babe.
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
This is connected to the story of the UK being the top worldwide downloader/copier of American TV shows. When will they [big media] learn? They turned us into the ravenous consumers that we are, now they 're once again fumbling how to control us.
Sell Us Something.
If we want a product, and no one wants to sell it to us, we WILL FIND A WAY to get it ourselves. Our thirst is great, and we must feed often.
TV viewing, and movie viewing, is now WORLDWIDE. They try to control it with region encoding, delayed rebroadcasts, etc, but what exactly are they controlling? They're telling a bunch of consumers waving money around to hold on, wait, be patient. We don't want your money.. yet.
But we are too strong for their chains. We know more about their products than they do, we do not live with regional constraints anymore. Our families are spread across the globe, there are no secrets from us. We want to see Battlestar Galactica NOW, the same time our brother sees it in the U.S., before he spoils the ending for us.
If media isn't ready with a full packaging and marketing campaign for a global release, fine. Sell us a digital version online. A full season DVD with extras will sell for $35, so sell a basic episode online for $5, and end piracy forever.
Sell Us Something. Else we will continue to run amok.
If there were a way to buy these shows legally, they could make a mint. If Apple does to TV shows what they did for music everyone would win. A buck a show? There is little replay value, but getting it when you want without commericals might be worth a buck.
Much easier solution that trying to control what happens on the internet.
I agree with the premise that the FCC should not regulate matters that involve copyright, particularly technical attempts to violate established case law (the aforementioned Sony case).
. html
OTOH, amateur radio operators are not allowed to listen to the cell phone part of the radio spectrum. See http://wireless.fcc.gov/ or (watered down) http://ftp.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/interception
Stop talking out of your hat.
-a licensed ham operator
"I don't understand how downloading a television show with Commercials is any different than recording it on my Tivo."
The difference is that without the demographic information that comes from the Neilsen (or similar) system, distributors have no feedback regarding the audience's size and composition, so advertisers have no idea whether a particular program will apeal to their target audience (and remember, STTNG cost about $2,000,000 per episode, you'd need some pretty hefty sponsorship to pay for that in the absence of syndication and export sales).
For example, say "Edgy Comedy" gets 1000 download hits a day from the official distributor's website, while "Banal Melodrama" gets 10,000. This would suggest that "Banal Melodrama" is the more popular, so the distributor concentrates on that (because the advertising is worth more). But "Edgy Comedy" is really so popular that 100,000 people download off BitTorrent every day, because the distributor's site is awkward (or slow, inconvenient, asks for registration, only allows limited connections, whatever). Sure, the distributor is stupid for having a bad site (or not using better technology), but in the end their numbers still show "Banal Melodrama" is ten times more popular than "Edgy Comedy"...guess which one is first against the wall when the revenue slumps?
You are perfectly right that the bottom line is all they're worried about. Which is why, with their income threatened, they are producing cheap, awful reality TV and carbon-cop-y shows (CSI Miami/New York/Oxnard, Law & Order, etcetera). Personally, I prefer a secure over-cahsed industry that's willing to make rash investments to the bland, conservative, panicky productions we have currently. Battlestar Galactica excluded, but even that's a tried and tested idea.
What do they mean by "pirated".
The shows had been broadcast unencrypted through the air, through my body and anyone with a $50 TV could watch/record them?
Whoever wrote this was on crack. So once again let us repeat the lesson for the hard of thinking:
Piracy involves the theft of physical items and is usually performed on the high seas by a gang of scurvy swabs, toting cutlasses, pieces of eight and featuring an array of shoulder sitting parrots.
Copyright infringement involves making an unauthorised duplicate of something without the copyright holders consent but without depriving the original holder of the work of their copy.
The two are completely differnet ideas and if you're in any doubt I suggest you consult a) a dictionary and b) a lawyer.
So my note to the author of this article is "put your fucking brain in gear before you start fucking writing you clueless fucking moron".
Thankyou.
Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !
Now IANAL, but I have to wonder if the timeshifting part of the fair use laws would be a legally useful argument for the downloading of TV shows, if they have already been shown on free-to-air TV. Technically, you would have to have not watched the show when it was aired, I suppose...
Anyone (with more legal knowledge than myself) got any thoughts on the feasibility of this argument?
...and finally realise that television sucks. Then maybe you can get up off your flabby ass and go outside...maybe take a walk or something. Go hiking...hiking is good. Breath the air, see the sights. You know, that kind of thing. I haven't watched any television in almost two years. Not only am I better for it, physically, but I'm a shitload happier!!
That doesn't give them the right to ban variable resistors.
I know, I know, HBO is pay per view. But guess what? ....Copying TV is not piracy. Passing copies around is not piracy. I know, I know, HBO is pay per view. But guess what? We've been recording the shows on VCR's for years. Passing them out to friends without cable. AND NO ONE CARED. Because it's not piracy, ie SELLING the tapes, and two, it didn't hurt HBO, it only made it more popular and made more people want to subscribe.
First, HBO isn't pay per view it's a subscription network. Playboy for example offers subscription or pay per view but near as I'm aware this is not an option for HBO.
Second, when you give someone a home brewed disk and they ask where you got it, do you say HBO or some P2P network?
Pay networks and VCRs were a match made in heaven. You the subscriber got a cheap way to start a movie colleciton and the networks got more subscribers for people who wanted access to cheap movies. But pay networks have a right to be concerned. In the 80s and 90s when people asked you where you got the tape you gave them you could say HBO. In fact some pay networks advertised a time to set your VCRs (2:00am IIRC). So if you wanted to be cool and get a cheep movie collection of your own you got HBO. But in this decade you don't need a pay network to get content, you can get it via P2P.
Now rather than fight the public, I would think it would be wise of HBO and other networks to offer on demand downloads of content. Not only that but sell licensed cases and DVD fly leaves and add an element of legitimacy to the home brewed disc or printable coverart for those of us who can print on discs. Let's face it, sharpy marked discs look cheap.
I'm a strong advocate of copyright holders making money by offering downloads but selling cover art, bumper stickers, and posters. Consumers support and advertise at the same time and get a golden feeling they are supporting someone... and Weyerhaeuser.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
a version of the TV programs without the nasty added on cruft imposed by the feds
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
This is what... the 5th time this story has been posted now? GET A LIFE YOUR MORON EDITORS
Man, typical bad BBC reportage, and everyone here seems to have bought it hook, line, and sinker.
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
It's OK to record things as they give you cancer, but it's naughty if you download them after the fact.
You got me there -- whoops
Public domain flyers (pre-1914 flyers), sure. Parody flyers? I guess. An exception for parody denotes some kind of alteration of the work. So yeah, I could make parodies of TV shows and distribute them (dubbing over the soundtracks with something humorous, ironic, satirical), and then when I got sued I would at least have a defense. I could have sworn I was talking about copies though, and not derivative works. Double check me.
None of these fair-use arguments are relevant to the point I was addressing: redistribution of EM transmission. Going way back, this whole thread is addressing the ancestor: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=140452&cid=11
But how is downloading television episodes illegal? They're on the tube for free, for heaven's sake! As long as the content is not for profit, I don't see where they have a leg to stand on.
It doesn't matter if they were on the tube for free, it's very clear that uploading TV is infringing. I think it's pretty clear that downloading is infringing too (again cf. Napster). There may be some convoluted time/format-shift defense for downloading a recording of a broadcast (maybe if the broadcast was intact, it wasn't an NFL broadcast because they disclaim all of that, if it was complete with commercials and thus there is no argument of derivation), but I know of no precedent.
P.s. I don't know if the sports broadcast over-the-air-disclaimer has ever been tested in court either. IANAL. Pardon any typos.
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
As Alsee points out later I was imprecise in my original response. As you describe it, of course it's legal, that's what a TiVo, EyeTV, and countless other DVRs and VCRs do. There is no debate over whether or not it's allowed (excepted from infringement) to tape something off the air.
What I was basically addressing was your comment, "Personally I don't think broadcasters (cable is a different story) have a leg to stand on," in light of the parent that asks: "But how is downloading television episodes illegal? They're on the tube for free, for heaven's sake! As long as the content is not for profit, I don't see where they have a leg to stand on."
I was trying to explain why they have a leg to stand on.
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
DMCA next time i will use the full text.
....
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998
but maybe i was talking about the
Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA)
Does anyone know if this ruling could lead to the abolishment of DRM on CDs? After all, it's basically the same thing - a company regulating how a work is reproduced, rather than just how it is broadcasted. Come to think of it, isn't downloading music a way that a work is reproduced, rather than broadcasted?
I'm not a lawyer, but hey, this struck me as intriguing...
I am scientifically inaccurate.
that you just linked to the same story twice?
I am scientifically inaccurate.
To quote my own post. I also believe the FCC overstepped their bounds when they only allow licensed amateur radio operators to own receivers that can receive the cell phone spectrum.
I never said anything about the reception of such signals. I said OWNERSHIP OF THE EQUIPMENT. The link you provided also backs up that it is LEGAL to receive any over the air signal. The link you provided dealt with the "divulgence" or "benefit" from those of communications. When they did say reception of cell phone signals are illegal, they were referring to local and state laws. NOT FCC REGULATION. -- also a licensed ham operator, since I was 15 year old.