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Orrin Hatch to Lead Senate Panel on Copyright, Patents
PontifexPrimus writes "Senator Orrin Hatch, (in)famous for his idea of destroying the computers of copyright violators is to head a Senate 'panel, which will have jurisdiction over copyright, trademark and patent law, as well as treaties intended to protect American intellectual property overseas.' Looks like file sharing will finally be erased once and for all. Oh, and this looks like another field day for those who refuse to subsume patent, trademark and copyright law under the heading of 'IP law.'"
"Osama Bin Laden has been named the new head of the United States' Department of Homeland Security."
If anyone deserves the name "copyright terrorist", it's Orrin Hatch.
I'm a big tall mofo.
.."Oh shit"
I have been a user for about 10 years. This ends Feb 2014. The site's been ruined. I'm off. Dice, FU
Wow, this troll was old in 2003.
http://tinyurl.com/4vxlf
-josh
There's a conflict of interests at work here, senator is just scared that everyone will download his awesome music for free.
OK... I haven't bitten the trollbait in a while, so here goes. Copyright law has some major problems in its current form. Regardless of one's views on the morality of having copyrights at all (something I don't see contested here, anyway), one must realize that with things like the Mickey Mouse Preservation Acts, and the *AA redefining of "for hire," copyright law is broken. Does that mean that I am against having copyrights at all? Hell, no. I want them fixed so that they are once again useful to me. Of all the people I'd trust to fix copyright laws, Hatch comes in pretty close to dead last on my list. He has an incredibly blatent disregard for anything other than the *AA propaganda.
#define DRM chmod 000
I think the basic premise is being tired of being screwed over. Most slashdotters were probably born between the 1950s and 1980s, we've seen records replaced by tape, then tape with CD and perhaps now CD with DRM-download
We supposedly buy a licence to listen to music.. but then when a new format comes out, we're not allowed to "upgrade", you have to buy a whole new licence. If your media is damaged - tough. Buy a new licence.
We have had to sit and watch the recording industry take legal action to prevent importers from selling music in some countries at a lower retail price gained by buying it in another country... so they can continue to take massive profits in richer societies. This still happens - the EU is investigating iTunes Music Store pricing in the UK as its more expensive than in the euro-zone.
Do I pirate music? Yes. Do I know it's technically wrong? Yes. Am I sympathetic to an industry which has stolen from me and everyone else for years and now has the tables turned? No fucking way.
I will start buying music again when I can pay between 40 and 50 pence per track for a file without DRM. Until then, I'll steal.
I have been a user for about 10 years. This ends Feb 2014. The site's been ruined. I'm off. Dice, FU
It's tax time - time to run the annual check to see who is sharing their .tax files (and "Tax Return.pdf") with the world.
Good old P2P. You think it's cute that your kid saves a few bucks by downloading music for free. Instead, you set yourself up for identity theft by publishing your complete tax return on the Intarweb.
Gnucleus (or substitute BearShare, Kazaa, or the P2P program of your choice) shows handfuls of people sharing .tax files. But don't try to be a Good Samaritan and tell them! They may shoot the messenger if you let Dad know that Daughter has opened up the confidential files to the world!
It's like telling someone that their zipper's down, and they punch you because you peeked.
> Could someone tell me what the essential
> difference is between someone violating the
> license terms on a copyrighted work released
> under a GPL license, and someone violating the
> terms under which a CD is released by (for
> example) Sony?
The differenc:
GPL programs don't come with encumbered software that will secretly install itself on your machine to ensure that you keep the GPL, and will post your personal data to the owner of the SourceForge project page, plus any other material that it feels might be related to your breach of the GPL (including any other code that you write, so that the owner can make sure it wasn't derivative of his) and which is capable of shutting down your computer if it determines the GPL has been violated (with no responsibility for it to be *correct* in that determination).
GPL authors don't then, having written that encumbered software, demand legal protection that obliges users to run it on their machine.
GPL authors don't gleefully accept your contribution to a project, and then argue that any code you ever write for the rest of your life must be GPLed because the programming skills you learned while working on the GPL project can only result in code which matches that which is GPLed.
GPL authors don't buy up entire distribution channels, and make exclusive agreements with them, to ensure that you are *forced* to GPL any software you want to write if you ever want it to be noticed, and even then they can still veto anything they don't want published for any reason.
Potential flamebait, but I'm damned curious.
Why are you Americans putting up with this crap? Governments have been violently overthrown for less than what the current administration has done.
Common answer: "Because corporations have a stranglehold on our government. It doesn't really matter who gets elected."
Yes, but you still have some kind of pseudo-democracy.
Why do I not hear of any collective group being formed to help inform Joe Public and try and rally some support? Power in numbers! Don't stand for what is currently being dished out to you. It's insulting.
Hell. There's at least a couple of hundred thousand Americans who read slashdot every day. There's a start.
And I'm not talking about something which just called for a change in administration.. like moveon.org
I don't know how this guy does it, who he knows, or how he keeps managing to BS his way into all of these things. Every bill he has attempted to pass has been so infantile in tech knowledge, so utterly chilling, and yet he just manages to do it again and again. And he doesn't even bother to learn, he just twists the words until they meet his agenda. He is like some scary Dilbert boss of the entertainment world, carelessly waving his laser pointer in everyone's eye. But for as much as he screws up (in the tech view anyway) he just keeps rising to the top!
This man is just exhausting already, and I wonder if that it the point. To take all of us who battle this now and just wear us out until we give up. As the years march by, it will simply become a way of life. Isn't there a word for that?
America is changing, a lot and not for the best. At first I was mad at americans for letting their country and values drift like that, I was mad when I saw them use left to promote right, how many evil in this country are being perpetuated because of some holy or pseudo-moral reasons, I was mad at seeing them call who's good and who's evil on the planet when no country on earth come even close to them on bodycount.
But then I started to pity them cause I realized they just, as an average, don't have the right level of education and willpower to actually fight those abuse so all they can do is witness them and rant on them but they are forbid to act and actually just don't feel the need for it.
This is another step toward an accepted and democratized dictatorship, think of it, soon the US will be the only place on earth where people will elect their dictator... isn't democracy great!
There are lots of things in this country that deperately need fixing. The bottom line of the music and motion picture industries is not one of them. Both industries are doing booming business at a time when many people have given up looking for work. Senator Hatch might make better use of his time trying to find ways to keep jobs in the U.S.
At a time when the economy has been in an extended slump, it's not surprising that CD stores, especially small ones, are having hard times. All small retailors suffer during bad economic times. (And don't talk to me about recovery until the jobs being created aren't all at McDonald's.) The success of huge discount retailors like Walmart also plays a role in the decline of CD stores. It's hard to compete with a company that gets huge volume discounts. While we're at it, look at all the other new venues at which you can purchase CDs, including the Internet, bookstores, and even groceries.
In fact, when you look at how broad the retailing of CDs has become, it's hard to believe that piracy is really playing such a large role. More than one study has shown that he people that are most heavily involved in pirating music, are also the ones who buy the most music. So, go ahead *IAA, prosecute your best customers!
The reason I oppose the appointment of someone like Senator Hatch to head anything that has to do with copyright and patent law is that he has never shown any inclination to listen to anyone other than the billionaires who are trying to increase their profits. Hatch reacts with outrage at the actions of file sharers, but can't seem to see that the actions of the *IAA are just as bad. Fair Use is part of the law, too. Taking away our Fair Use rights arguably has a much larger impact on the public than any amount of file sharing does on the *IAA companies.
Fair Use doctrine says that I should be able to make copies of copywritten material for my own personal use. The *IAA want to make it impossible for me to do so, ostensibly to protect them from evil file sharers. Most people don't share files, but many of them want to make up CD compilations of their favorite songs. All media has a limited lifespan. I should be able to make backups so that if my CD gets left in the sun, I can still listen to the music that I've licensed. The *IAA wants to force me to buy a new copy anytime my copy is ruined. If the DRM nonsense goes the way it looks like it will go, I'd have to replace my entire music collection if I got a new computer or if my hard drive went bad. This isn't about protection against piracy. It's about forcing the consumer to repurchase the same product over and over again.
The big crooks here are the *IAA and the people behind them, not the file sharers. That doesn't make file sharing legal, right, or reasonable, but we do need to keep things in perspective.
-All that is gold does not glitter - Tolkien
www.ra
Good old ornery Orrin. Remember when he took money from Novell, Sun, Oracle and AOL to fight Microsoft in the late 90's. Back then, many in the OSS community cheered him on for his integrity and forthrightness in taking on Microsoft. I guess cheering him on can't buy as much "integrity" as cold hard cash and the use of a corporate jet for his campaign.
Is this sig nificant?
Could someone tell me what the essential difference is between someone violating the license terms on a copyrighted work released under a GPL license, and someone violating the terms under which a CD is released by (for example) Sony?
This is a complete red herring. What the industry is trying to stop with their heavy-handed digital right management and anti-reverse-engineering laws is not activity they are authorised to prevent, and it's not analogous to any activity the GPL prevents.
When I take a GPLed program and modify it and keep my modifications secret I'm not violating the GPL unless I distribute the binary to someone without gicing them the source. Copyright controls distribution, not use.
When I rip a CD so I can play it on my computer or mp3 player I'm not violating the terms under which a CD is released by Sony. If I give someone a copy or keep the files after I sell the CD I am, but that's not what the indusry is trying to prevent... they're trying to prevent me from playing the music, not distributing it.
So the answer to your red herring is "none, and it's irrelevant".
By the way, I like your handle, "B.S.Artist".
I think you are missing the point here...
Neither side is right. But when the law becomes an ass, people will disrespect it. That's what it IS.
Law is not morality. Law is usually what the "haves" use against the "have nots." The "have nots" are not a bunch of hooligans, they really will respect reasonable limits and rational morality.
When the law makes sense again, people will be less inclined to disrespect it because it will be seen to serve a public good by having a reasonable purpose.
Copyrights should serve as a protection for natural persons. We natural persons do not currently have lifespans reaching over a hundred years. When we see limits like that being codified we know the beneficiary is a fictitious person - a corporate entity or estate.
We respect the creators of good and useful things; and we also expect wealthy heirs and hangers on and to get jobs and become useful to society and not to just live off of royalties because they paid off the right people in D.C.
The "average slashdotter" you have constructed is made of straw, and your attack on it is nonsensical.
Anyway, being opposed to Orrin Hatch is not the same as being opposed to copyright, and being in favor of limited copyright is not the same as being in favor of unlimited copyright. For all we know, mr. Hatch could very well be proposing new laws that make GPL-style use of copyright illegal (I'm sure some method can be found, and don't think Microsoft et al haven't thought of it).
Send his office some email detailing your concerns. Be respectful. Try to use facts. If enough of us did that, we might even have an impact.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
First of all, you're taking what was intended to be humorous far too seriously. But I'll bite.
Anyone that says that your computer (which is your property) should be destroyed because of his radical agenda (which is on the extreme side of copyright holders) is a terrorist.
You may use your computer solely for playing games and futzing around on the Internet but many people use their computer for their livelihood or to maintain their quality of life. Some people even use their computer to buy medicines at a price they can afford. Orrin Hatch declaring RIAA operatives as the judge, jury and executioner allowed to destroy anyone's computer they want makes him a terrorist in my book.
I'm a big tall mofo.
Looks like file sharing will finally be erased once and for all
In case people don't understand sarcasm on the net, he was being sarcastic.
I mean, let's say Hatch outlaws file sharing...even say outlawing Bittorrent and things of that nature...will that change anything? The ONLY way to totally 100% stop piracy and file sharing over the Internet is to totally turn off the Internet. That's right, turn the entire thing off.
And trust me, it's only a matter of time before some idiot gets up there and proposes that.
And they're too busy with putting 500,000 dollar fines on radio people that may say "fuck" and having hearings on Baseball. I mean, what the FUCK are these idiots doing up there in Washington? Baseball?!?! WHO THE FUCK CARES! Tax dollars at work folks.
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
Wow, about a dozen replies, and no one has given the correct answer.
what the essential difference is between someone violating the license terms on a copyrighted work released under a GPL license, and someone violating the terms under which a CD is released by (for example) Sony?
Sure, it is impossible to violate "the licence a CD is released under" because no such licence exists.
When you buy a CD you get no licence because you need no licence.
When you buy a book you get no licence because you need no licence.
Really that's what has so many people confused and why there is so much arguing over copyright issues. It's not much of a simplification to say that copyright really only restricts three things: (1) creating new copies, (2) distributing new copies, and (3) public performance. By law, those are the only three rights available for a copyright holder to licence. If he is not licencing you one or more of those three rights then he is not licencing you anything at all. Copyright does not restrict anything EXCEPT those three things. All other activities are UNRESTRICTED by copyright. You need no licence to to anything OTHER than those three things. If you want to read the law, it's right here. You'll see that law lists 6 things, I lumped together 1 and 2 under 'creating new copies', and I lumped 4 5 and 6 together as 'public performance'.
You do not need a licence to read a book, it is unrestricted.
You do not need a licence to play a song, it is unrestricted.
You do not need a licence to resell a book or CD at a used book store, it is unrestricted.
There is no such thing as a licence to read, no such thing as a licence to play music, no such thing as a licence to "use".
If you buy a book or CD you can do essentially anything you like with it for personal use in the privacy of your own home. It is not copyright infringment and you need no licence. The copyright holder sold you that copy and that copy is your property. You just can't start running off more copies and offering them to the public.
And the same it true of GPL'd software. Once you are given a copy you can do essentially anything you like with it for personal use in the privacy of your own home. You only need the GPL licence if you want to start passing out copies (or derivative copies). THAT is restricted by copyright.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
There are a lot of words that could be used to describe Senator Hatch, and though "terrorist" may not be incredibly accurate, it's not all that far off the mark.