The Argument for Crackable Media

rubberbando writes "Wired is running a story about how the US Copyright Office is looking for input about a law that will allow some media to be legally cracked. This is aimed at certain uses such as cracking an ebook so that a blind person can use reading software with it and older software that requires a hardware dongle that no longer works." From the article: "The DMCA forbids cracking of copy-protected or encrypted digital media, with certain exceptions. When the law was passed, Congress mandated the register of copyrights revisit the anti-circumvention section every three years to make sure consumers have proper access to materials they purchased -- even if content creators have them locked down. If the copyright office finds instances where copy protection prevents fair use of the work, then those copy protections can be legally circumvented." We reported on the other side of the coin yesterday.

Comments

Re:Fair Use?

[Kjella]

Copyright law allows you to make a backup copy.

Please point us to the appropriate paragraph. For bonus points, find the exception in the copy protection paragraphs too. (If I encode my own CD to DRM'd WMA, I still don't have the right to break their encryption system. Copyright and copy protection systems have two different protections) You can find it here.

Here's the details

[Bob9113]

http://www.copyright.gov/fedreg/2005/70fr57526.htm l

SUMMARY:

The Copyright Office of the Library of Congress is preparing to conduct proceedings in accordance with section 1201(a)(1) of the Copyright Act, which was added by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and which provides that the Librarian of Congress may exempt certain classes of works from the prohibition against circumvention of technological measures that control access to copyrighted works. The purpose of this rulemaking proceeding is to determine whether there are particular classes of works as to which users are, or are likely to be, adversely affected in their ability to make noninfringing uses due to the prohibition on circumvention. This notice requests written comments from all interested parties, including representatives of copyright owners, educational institutions, libraries and archives, scholars, researchers and members of the public, in order to elicit evidence on whether noninfringing uses of certain classes of works are, or are likely to be, adversely affected by this prohibition on the circumvention of measures that control access to copyrighted works. DATES: Written comments are due by December 1, 2005. Reply comments are due by February 2, 2006.

Exemption is practically worthless.

[russotto]

Please note that while the copyright office can grant exemptions to allow the act of circumventing technical protection schemes, they cannot grant exemptions to allow the manufacture or trafficking in devices which can circumvent those measures. So even if your special pleadings get you an exemption, you can't legally make or purchase a device which can do the job.

Re:Fair Use?

[cpt kangarooski]

Slavery was accepted until the 1860s. Yet was plainly unconstitutional the entire time

No, it was plainly evil the entire time. It was constitutional, however. If you disagree, please point to the part of the antebellum Constitution (i.e. everything before the 13th Amendment) that prohibited it.

Privacy is not even a right mentioned in the BoR

It's in the penumbra.

But protection against unlawful search and seizure specifically protects property.

The seizure in question is of one's person and of evidence to be used against that person. It's not related to takings, which is why you don't need a warrant to condemn property, and you don't need to pay a fair price to put the smoking gun in an evidence locker.

Bizaare? Have you ever read history and noticed that the societies w/o property rights are usually the most restrictive in all the other ways? Soviet Russia for one. Feudal Societies for another. There is a correlation there.

No, not really. They also didn't have free speech, for example. Does that mean that free speech is the basis of property rights? Of course not. Those sorts of societies didn't care about their people at all; it had nothing to do with any specific right that was infringed upon.

You are confusing "cannot" with should not.

Nope. This is a pretty standard part of civil liberties jurisprudence. It has its origins in the clever ways that segregationists would employ to deny minorities their rights when the blatant ones were overturned. No one was fooled, and the clever methods got overturned too.

we don't have the complete command of ourselves?

No, we largely do. Not entirely: it's unconstitutional for you to sell yourself into slavery, for example. But these are liberty interests, not property interests. People aren't property; this is part of how their freedom is ensured.

copyright has been completely perverted anyway because the flip side has been ignored

And I agree, which is why I'd like to see copyright fixed, and why I spend time working on that.