Slashdot Mirror
The RIAA's Halloween Tricks
deus42 writes "BoingBoing has an interesting article about a joint RIAA/MPAA move started yesterday on Capitol Hill. From the article: 'Hollywood has fielded a shockingly ambitious piece of Analog Hole legislation while everyone was out partying in costume. Under a new proposed Analog Hole bill, it will be illegal to make anything capable of digitizing video unless it either has all its outputs approved by the Hollywood studios, or is closed-source, proprietary and tamper-resistant. The idea is to make it impossible to create an MPEG from a video signal unless Hollywood approves it.'"
The simple audacity of their intentions, or the idea that they think they will actually get away with it, or that it will even be plausible.
I know nothing
...people will find a way around it. They will NEVER make any media copy-proof. It has been cracked again and again and again. I am not worried.
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
Oh no, the big bad RIAA is being silly again, howsoever shall we watch our tv now? *plugs into a converter, pipes it through co-ax to his computer* Wow that was hard. They need to learn the wonderful world of old technology will never allow for this to happen. Sure it may not be digital, but there will alwyas be a way to convert to a lesser standard, because the entire USA won't upgrade their TVs in an instant.
You never realize how much manually made unmanaged "linked" lists suck, till you have src.link.link.link.link...
The people who are doing this illegally still don't care, but the *aa has managed to alienate yet more people.
"Hello 911? I just tried to toast some bread, and the toaster grew an arm and stabbed me in the face!"
Make lobbying illegal, punishable by hanging in front of the Capitol Building. Problem solved.
Coding with assembly is like playing with Legos. Coding an application in assembly is like building a car with Legos.
And thus did the American cultural hegemony over the rest of the world collapse, leading to a world where India and China exported their values through their music and films while the Hollywood studios argued about whether consumers should be allowed to keep a taped episode of Will and Grace for 24 hours or only 12...
the major advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies in which they occur - A.N. White
This whole piracy thing is so silly. It's wierder than "terrorist". Both terms depend on who they are working for. If they're working for the "competition"(so to speak), they're pirates and terrorists. If they're on "our" side, they're distributors and freedom fighters. Do you know who will be the first to go out of business when P2P really takes off? The pirates. The guys out there selling millions of bootlegs. Most pirates usually sell the top 40, RIAA stuff, so they also "controlled" who was distributed, but they are the most expendable. Hell, they're off the books, so who's gonna care? Most people understand that P2P will increase record sales and concert attendance manyfold. This isn't just about money. Control plays a bigger role here. Just like both sides use terrorists in a war, both sides use pirates to distribute their wares. It seems to be mutually parasitic. What I'm trying to say here is that piracy is a diversion, a smokescreen used by those who want to control distribution of information(text, audio, video). It's little different from those who use terrorism to create unjust laws.
(kind of offtopic)
I sure wish the ptroleum industry was as concerned about the leaks in their distribution system as the content industry is about theirs. (11230681)
Kills two birds with one stone. Copyright infringement becomes slightly harder, but more importantly, independent production of content comes to a stillstand. With no consumer hardware capable of filming and making arbitrary reproductions of the material, how will anyone make a movie? Yep, gotta have the pro hardware. $$$
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I honestly wonder what historians will think of this time period, say, one hundred years from now. Think of how we view the Western European Dark Ages, where education slowed to a halt, an organization managed to secure society and manipulate it at will, while those in the East jumped leaps and bounds ahead of them. Gosh, sounds vaguely familiar....
It has been cracked again and again and again
The media companies will (if they haven't already) make cracking a punishable offense. As it is they drag people through court that crack their schemes just to make an example of them regardless of what the local laws may/may not give them.
Better still, the corporations get to characterize them as the least desirable citizens in the court. It's just like the medical marijuana reformers vs the "war on drugs" institutions.
Blowing it off because it can be cracked just isn't the answer.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
Perhaps they are referring to old films and stuff that people have just started archiving with the advent of affordable telecine, etc. Or it could be that they are about to offically close the hole in digital using some ingenious new system and they want to remove the analog option completely first.
Soon, you won't be able to buy a new DVD or CD player, reciever, etc. that has analog inputs and outputs, since they won't be "certified". Another reason is that they (the big studios and publishing companies) really want to move over into video on demand style stuff as an industry and cut out the retailers and wholesalers and distributers who have acted as middlemen.
The ultimate goal, of course, is to control all information, entertainment or otherwise, for monetary and political gain.
Cool! Amazing Toys.
Are they trying to make life insanely difficult for student and amateur video makers?
What I don't get is that there is TONS of "analog signal" that is not RIAA-owned, so how can they legislate on it?
Or perhaps they won't, but apparently they'll make it very difficult to use the required equipment. Make life difficult for students, and you're cutting off your source of income 20 years down the road..
Did they forget the fact that dvd's are infact already digitized. Or how about the fact that cable these days is digital. Not only that, last i checked werent they trying to make everything digital? Personally i think it would be better for them to just make a law saying its illegal to transmit information.
To me, this law seems like their poor attempt at stopping independent film makers(analog being cheaper to make than digital film), and to kill open source software.
All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing. Therefore there are three questions that must be asked:
1) Which senators and congressmen submitted this bill for consideration?
2) When are they up for reelection?
3) Where do I send a check to support their opponents?
Bitching and moaning about Hollywood trying to pull crap like this is all fine and good, but unless we PUNISH their accomplices in government, this kind of crap will just keep going and going.
So the next time these turkeys are up for election, start sending their opponents money. When you send them the money, make sure you include a little note explaining exactly WHY you're sending them money. While you're at it, send the turkey a note as well telling him that you've just sent his opponent money and why.
This isn't limited to just the people from the districts in question. I live in Arizona, but there is nothing to stop me from making a contribution to a candidate in another state. I can't take part in the official election, but I can sure as hell vote with my money. Imagine if one of the turkeys who tried to pull this crap got tens of thousands of letters from accross the country that all said the same thing: "I gave your opponent X dollars because you supported the Analog Hole bill" Meanwhile their opponents get tens of thousands of letters saying "I'm giving you X dollars because your opponent supported the Analog Hole bill, don't make the mistake he did."
Freedom is precious and fragile. It is also one of the few things in this world outside of family worth dying for. You can either fight for your freedom, or you can sit by idly and hope that things don't get any worse. Hope that someone else will pick up the tab for your liberty. Hope that the ever-present forces that seek to deny you your freedom will go away. Well guess what, they won't. If you're not fighting against them then you're actively helping them. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance and it is a price that we all must pay each and every day. If you're not fighting for your freedom then you've already forfeited it.
Lee
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
It isn't individuals in their bedrooms sharing albums and movies that scares the studios, it is individuals in their garages making albums and movies.
If people are free to create and distribute their own content, it does two things:
Of course, they also run the risk of small, independent producers creating content that is superior to their own. To use an analogy, the big media companies are in the same position now that the Big Three auto makers were in the early 70s. They've had a cooperative oligarchy for decades. Now there are smaller, cheaper,faster (and potentially better) competitors entering their market. Rather than compete in the new world of smaller cars and expensive gas (or, for the studios, independent content and cheap distribution), they react by lobbying for import restrictions and spreading FUD about unsafe foreign cars (or lobbying for content controls and spreading FUD about destroying the incentive to create).
They probably realize this, and they've seen what the failure to successfully lobby has done to the American car industry. Rather than choosing the alternative route and rapidly adapting to the new world, the lesson they've learned from the past is that they need to lobby more effectively.
All us /.ers have judiciously ridiculed all the DRM techniques introduced to date. Now corp america finally gets it...If you can convert it to one format, *they* can convert it to something else. The suits have finally realized they must control everything to control anything. Maybe after this fails they will realize they are no longer in control and make quality and price a differentiator instead of sitting and playing Monoply with all their friends.
> But the problem is not technical - the board would be illegal.
Ah, but that is the beauty of the situation. Since any attempt to outlaw the millions of boards already in the field would be a non-starter, they really can't try outlawing mere possession of an unlicensed encoder. Nope, they will go for their old standby and only try to outlaw importation and sales. And because of the nature of our form of government, Congress lacks the power to outlaw sales so they will go for their old standby and invoke the Commerce Clause, forbidding unFritzed boards to be sold in "Interstate Commerce". But neighbors selling to neighbors aren't engaged in Interstate Commerce and we are about to have a majority on the Supreme Court who can actually read. Interesting times ahead.
Democrat delenda est
Why, of course they are. Unless they are in an MPAA sanctioned film-school, using expensive *AA sanctioned recording technology. Because we can't possibly allow an independant film-maker to make a movie which does better than a highly expensive Hollywood flop. Witness, Saw II and Zorro from this weekend.
Do you have any idea of how much money they would lose if just anyone could release a better movie than they can?
And home movies are right out. You could be at home watching little Billy win the track meet again, instead of generating revenue for them or their advertisers. What are you, a communist?
Same way they've done this all along -- "we don't care what you're doing with it, someone could, in theory rob from us. Therefore nobody gets access to the technology". Sheesh, it would be like arming terrorists or something. They basically try to cut off any arguments about legitimate contexts in which you would so this -- it's clearly a smokescreen to actually Pirate The Day After Tomorrow.
Student film-makers are too pesky. You could get someone new Like Michael Moore who points out the wickedness of the studio system. All future film-makers will be genetically engineered to give us a steady stream of gruel which has been approved by the *AA's.
Face it, in the Draconian future the *AAs envison, any technology capable of recording/transmitting either video or audio is just too dangerous to be in the hands of consumers and needs to be outlawed and controlled. I mean, we don't sell assault weapons to children, do we?
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Don't forget that Americans can only make stuff illegal in the USA. The rest of the world couldn't give a flying fuck what's illegal there. Do I care about the DMCA? No, because I don't live in the USA.
If this kind of legislation continues to go through, the USA will end up back in the tehcnological stone age as emerging economies such as India and China overtake. Don't forget that these economies still make stuff for the west too. Does your Toyoya have all the dashboard icons in Japanese? Of course not.
There are a groing number of bands rejecting the copy protection that the labels are applying to their CDs. I'm sure the film industry will follow soon. How long before the next Hollywood blockbuster is produced by a non-USA company because they know the USA film industry's anti-consumer practices will actually harm the films success.
My only fear living here in Europe is that our brain-dead politicians will follow suit with the USAs practices. There's still a lot of work to do to make sure we don't.
Like tinyurl, but one letter less! http://qurl.co.uk/
Seeing bad movies only encourages them. Watch responsibly
Tech firms didn't pay much attention to the DMCA when it was fielded.
.they thought it was obscenely extreme at the time, but assumed the congress people would "do the right thing".
CEA and other tech reps from that time speak about it now with great regret..
You, sir, are living in a dream world if you think this bill will fail if not strongly opposed.
The last one gave these "A holes" almost complete regulatory control over software and consumer electronic developers.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
This is a move to try and stop the "home brew tv" industry. Personal cams were fine when they shot crappy quality, but now that truly creative people can have a setup that can pull off anything the big boys can do for under 10 grand...they are shitting their pants...now that vic-xasts on places like itunes ate taking off with out them as the middle man, they are shitting their pants...in general this is a final move, proving cowardis, and shame of their content, knowing that now they can be upstaged by kids in a garage with a powermac and a HDV Cam so they are looking for revinew by threatening the companies that make the stuff.
You're right to be confused. The music and movie industry, as far as I can tell, actually believe they have the god-given right to be the *only* producers of 'culture' -- our songs, our legends and myths, they want to own it all. In their ideal world, you wouldn't even dream of creating anything yourself. That's why it's up to individuals to keep creating culture and letting it out as copyleft, public domain, GPL, whatever.. just anything other than the frameworks they have constructed to lock our culture up.
ERROR 144 - REBOOT ?
But the problem is not technical - the board would be illegal.
Assuming this bit of nonsense were to get anywhere (which it won't), I think you could still sell kits without any problem. It's a bit like with homebrew -- it's illegal for a shop to sell alcohol to a minor but there's nothing wrong with a shop selling to a minor barley malt, hops, yeast, corn sugar, fermenting bins, airlocks, bottles, caps, capper, and a whole range of books on the fine art of zymology.
Similarly, it would be illegal to sell a device that captures an analog video signal to a digital format, but it would not be illegal to sell breadboards, DSPs, coaxial/component jacks, solder, etc.
Nevertheless, this is just a proposal from an industry lobbyist -- the kind of thing that happens all the time in Washington. It isn't a bill, and if by some miracle it becomes a bill, it will never make it out of committee. Remember, electronics manufacturers also have some pretty powerful lobbyists, and there's no way that they will let Hollywood dictate design and engineering decisions.
We don't HAVE to buy drugs
Untrue. Many people rely on medications of one sort or another to keep them alive and narcotic addicts generally have a physical dependancy on the products.
Bottom line is it's all about FREEDOM. Most things you and I do every day we don't HAVE to do, does that make them any less important to our quality of life? Thing is about this article, it goes beyond the idea of piracy. If Hollywood controls what people can see is, that not a violation of our basic rights. Shouldn't the average citizen have just as much right to create and distribute content as Hollywood does? The whole purpose behind this proposition is to control the content by controlling the hardware. I don't want to give our government or any particular special interest group that kind of control over our society.
Find coupons in Greeley
America Spells Bullshit, B.U.L.L. S.H.I.T.
come on
ANY deivce that turns analog video into a digital signal. That includes the Pinacle and Hauppage video input deives, as in the ones poeple use to take THEIR home movies and make them into files on their computer. Just because Hollywood movies can be done the same, doesn't mean every device should be illegal. Christ Sakes. Just because a car is mechanically capable of going past the speed limit, does it mean we make its manufacture illegal? MPAA, leave video capture devices alone. It's not the creation of pirated materials thats the problem its the distrobution. Just because you make it hard to copy, means fewer people are going to figure it out, that doesn't effect the real problem, because now those few people are using networks to spread the "contraband." So now, its still to everyone it just propigated a different way!
**This is something the MPAA needs to leave well enough alone, home video capture devices. OMG!**
$%^Does anyone have a Online Petition started yet? Post the link!^%$
Amen and Amen! People think that defending freedom is a task that's outsourced to the military and cops and maybe the intelligence services. In fact, it's the duty of every human being who wants to be able to say what they want, go where they want, believe what they want, and become what they want.
But let's bring it down to the level of the every day. Good candidates for office are out there. They're constantly hurting for money, but even more than that, expert help. If you can give either, it is your duty to do so. Many Slashdotters will think nothing of spending $5/day on coffee. Multiply that by a five day work week and you're spending $1,250/yr. on coffee. For that price, you can give a real shot in the arm to the fine aspiring public servant of your choice. A city council race in NYC, for example, typically has a budget of $20K. Forego your daily cup of joe and you can single-handedly account for 5% of a great candidate's warchest. And suddenly you'll have someone representing you who will keep your streets patched, your neighborhood regularly patrolled and cleaned, and larger, abstract things like affordable housing defended. And if you can take the Board of Elections data, crunch it into a list of likely voters, and help your candidate allocate his/her resources efficiently, then you've saved them the $25K it costs to procure the leading commercial software solution.
In short, the power to create change/improvement in the political scene is eminently in your hands. And like all things, the better the candidates you help elect to local office, the finer the pool of choices you have when fighting for higher state and federal offices. After all, there are always outliers who go from zero to Congress in one try, but mostly it works like a farm team system.
Think about it, consider, and act. If you don't, the schmuck who lives down the street who's out to screw you and everyone else certainly will, and you will be very, very unhappy with the result.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
So, what are you doing about it? Are you a thinking, educated, informed, and motivated human being? If you are, you can make an enormous difference.
I kept bitching on sites like Slashdot for years and ultimately found it uniquely unsatisfying. Nothing changed. So 18 months ago I started a grassroots political organization in New York. 8 months ago there was a reform package put before the state legislature that had the audacity to require legislators to actually be present to vote, and many, many other good things. One of our state assemblypeople in NYC came out four-square against the reforms. So I gathered four people from our organization, went out on a Saturday and handed out 300 flyers in 2.5 hours in front of 2 supermarkets in the woman's district. Our 300 flyers generated roughly 80 phone calls to the lawmaker in question. Her chief of staff left a message on our machine the next day calling us all kinds of unholy names. But in the end she did a 180 and voted for the reforms.
Point? I did it, and you can too. Easily. So do. Go out and do.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Doesn't it occur to them that the only people this will stop are the people who already don't pirate music and movies because it's illegal?
www.linuxpenguin.net
Don't try to figure out which is more guilty. They're both just as horrible. Remember, there is very little real difference between Democrats and Republicans today. Indeed, they both share the same interests, and those are not the interests of the majority of American citizens. Thus you get crap like this, which serves the interests of a very, very small handful of people, at the expense of basically everyone else.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
"The more you tighten your grip, the more [control] slips through your fingers." -- Princess Leia
Quite seriously, that's what I think will end up happening. The law must get so tough and so bloated, that someone will challenge the Constitutionality of it, and all of the laws will be struck down. If it gets really bad and people are pissed off enough, Constitutional Amendments can be made, but that'd be really really really pissed off to the nth degree, as n approaches infinity. Based on what these greedy bastards are capable of, that may just happen. Content is content. An idea becomes public when it leaves one's mind. The only "intellectual property" I claim to own is the functioning brain inside of my head. I have the right to do with it what I want, and no one can coerce me or compel me to do with it what I need. Sadly, this property is being stolen, while public property is being plundered. Artists are screwed by big cartels; the real intellectual property is raped while pseudo-property is given rights, so that an elite can benefit and profit. Sounds like an oligarchy to me. As a result, talent isn't valued, consumerism is rampant, and "American culture" is a contradiction.
You know, I'm agitated much too easily nowadays. This bit is really getting my blood pressure up, so, you know what? I'm going to be brief, before I suffer that long awaited anneurism I've been anticipating and die.
This law, in a nutshell, applies to any device that can convert analog video into digital video. This is the video version of the Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA), with some added goodies. Any analog to digital conversion device - or vice versa, apparently - produced after the law goes into effect will have to be approved under Hollywood's standards by the USPTO. Among these standards are mandated DRM, as well as a nifty little requirement stating that the device must be proprietary and completely closed, thereby making it substantially more difficult to modify. Content converted from an analog format to a digital format will be encased in DRM, and any unprotected output, digital or otherwise, will be constricted heavily. (In other words, ugly as sin.) It mandates highly invasive and restrictive DRM, plain and simple, and everything therein that applies will become law.
This is about more than piracy, people. This is about killing technology, just like how the AHRA killed DAT. If you're a content producer or marketer, and you control this kind of technology, you control who can compete with you. They're on a technological tirade, and any device which could possibly be used to erode away at their market share will be eliminated. Only approved commercial institutions will have access to unrestricted 'professional' devices. (A device, under this law, becomes 'professional' once it's widely available.) Just as the AHRA stopped DAT dead in its tracks, this is a new control mechanism for DV. While it seems to only apply to devices that could theoretically pirate analog content in a digital format or vice versa, will this affect those who wish to record and publish their own videos? Almost certainly. They wouldn't field a bill like this unless there wasn't an anticompetitive kicker in there for them.
If these rapaciously greedy, bottom feeding, subhumanly mentally deficient piles of animated scum manage to get this law passed, it'll mean big trouble, not only for consumers, but producers as well. There is absolutely no sense in it whatsoever. None. Zero, zip, zilch, nada. As an aspiring innovator, this is the kind of garbage that causes my hair to stand on end. This is the kind of law that, upon reading it, causes me to enter a state of mind wherein my number one priority is to beat the living shit out of the nearest handy inanimate object of similar size and composition to a human body, so I don't track down these sneering assholes and wail on them instead. Cheesy as it is, The Rock said it best: "Know your role, and shut your mouth." The AA's need to take that statement to heart, sit down, and shut the fuck up.
What's next? Outlawing any 'improfessional' application of P2P protocols while forcing anyone who owns a streaming radio or video site on the internet to file comprehensive broadcasting reports with the FCC to ensure they're not playing copyrighted content? Or maybe a law that makes it illegal to distribute multimedia via a wireless connection, along with mandated DRM baked into every WiFi card! The possibilities are just endless with these people. Given their track record, I'd highly advise putting anything past them.
Of the modded comments, I am surprised that I saw no mention of this!
Does nobody see that this bill is not INTENDED to pass? It is intended to be too extreme to pass, so they'll tone it down to what they really want, which is just the basic broadcast flag, and it won't seem as extreme as it really is.