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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."
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
"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
How about a little truth: "Regulators tried to ban a device that would allow for personal copying
Well, this is true, but doesn't mean the other statement was false. It would have allowed pirating. In addition to legimate copying.
and went against a previous Supreme Court ruling (Sony vs Betamax).
The ruling was simply that the video recorder didn't break exisitng copyright laws. Not that it is illegal for a law to ban it.
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
Here in Australia they stick watermarks on every program now. Even funnier - if you're watching widescreen you can see the regular 4:3 station logo, then another one to the right of it, then another watermark with an HDTV logo. Then they stick flashing banners across the bottom telling you about this really great program coming up.
You know, watching a decent movie on free to air in this country it's like viewing the Mona Lisa on a web site. I don't bother any more, I just pick up boxed sets of old UK TV shows off ebay. Faves so far - 7 years of Minder and 54 episodes of The Professionals
Hal Spacejock: Science Fiction with Nuts
"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.
In the Middle Ages, a fellow named Gutenberg developed a new tech that had the church in an uproar. Know why? Indulgences. What is an Indulgence? Well, it is a piece of paper that is a "Get out of jail free" card for sin.
"Present this to St Peter and you will be without sin. uh that will be 3 farthings please", said the village priest.
Scribes composed it (they had scribal sweat-shops in the monasteries for this), a priest would "bless" it, then a poor peasant would pay a life's savings for it to insure paradise in his afterlife.
Along came Gutenberg's press and scribes were layed off right and left. Indulgences could be printed at a fraction of their earlier cost. For a while the Church made out like bandits. But then...Someone ELSE used a press to print them and suddenly Europe was flooded with Pirate indulgences... The Church declared unauthorized presses to be sinful and heavy penalties were imposed. Eventually Presses were everywhere and the Church lost control of a lucrative, and dishonorable scam. As you see, nothing new under the sun...
- Minutus cantorum, minutus balorum, minutus carborata descendum pantorum.