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Sony DRM Installed Even When EULA Declined
HikingStick writes "News.com is reporting that the Texas attorney general is expanding the allegations against Sony. It seems the software would install even if users declined the EULA. From the article: 'The Texas attorney general said on Wednesday that he added a new claim to a lawsuit charging Sony BMG Music Entertainment with violating the state's laws on deceptive trade practices by hiding 'spyware' on its compact discs ... The new charges brought by Abbott contend that MediaMax software used by Sony BMG to thwart illegal copying of music on CDs violated state laws because it was downloaded even if users rejected a license agreement.'"
"Can I come into your house?"
"Nope."
"Ok."
Man turns around to find the stranger at the door has already moved his shit into his house. Does this not constitute tresspassing?
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
Let's look at the article:
'The Texas attorney general said on Wednesday that he added a new claim to a lawsuit charging Sony BMG Music Entertainment with violating the state's laws on deceptive trade practices by hiding 'spyware' on its compact discs
Oh, so the state was hurt, and they're the ones who have to go after Sony?
The way I see it, Sony breached a contract. This is easily resolved in court, and anyone who had their contract breached by Sony should go ahead and file an independent lawsuit (not a class action lawsuit). You can hire a local attorney and move forward.
Wait, it is costly to sue a big company? Might that be due to the laws created in your state? Might that be due to the lawyers in control of the operation of the law?
No matter how often you lose, you will continue to lose. The system isn't by the People for the People any more. We're living in a country where the system is so powerful, only the powerful have rights. Let's ignore the state's concerns in this situation -- they're only going to find themselves stronger. They're going to fight Sony with millions of taxpayer dollars, and if they win, the taxpayers won't see a cent, but a bunch of state lawyers and Sony lawyers will be wealthier.
Step back. Look at the problem. The problem is that contract law is too complicated, and you can't fight a contract violation in court without a contract lawyer who likely is part of an organization that wrote the law. Ignore Sony, ignore all terribly written contracts. We need to get to the source of the problem and fix it. Let us return to the days when the law was simple to read, and simple to enforce. Let us return to the days when we could walk up to a court clerk, file a grievance and sue the people who violated the contract, just them and us.
Who is with me in asking for an amendment limiting all laws to one topic, 200 words or less, and only can pass with a signature of the President and a signature of a random person with a 3rd grade education who agrees that even they understand the law?
What Sony did was bad, but if contract law was written clearly and concisely, we'd have ways to defend ourselves cheaply and efficiently. The law is a mockery of justice today, and there is ZERO way for any individual or small group to win in the long run.
FYI, for other anarchocapitalists out there, my solution is true moderated arbitration mechanisms in a free market, not the law or the courts.
...this is a bit ridiculous on its face. Sure the spyware is illegal in about a dozen different ways (depending on your state) but... this all hinges on whether or not we accept or decline a EULA? How does that make sense?
That kind of reasoning by implication gives EULAs legitimacy which THEY DO NOT HAVE.
Since when under common law do we have such outrageously elaborate and suprising binding legal agreements by parties without equal representation?
Since when can agreement be given by pressing a mouse button or removing shrinkwrap?
The EULA itself is an ugly audacious legal fiction... this is why they needed UCITA to attempt to legitimize them after the fact.
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Sure am glad I've only purchased indie cd's in the last few years! Apparently not only do the big companies cram crappy music down your ears, but they also cram crappy software into your computer.
For example, I was planning on buying a new widescreen tv and a psp, but because of the rootkit etc I decided against a Sony tv and i'm probably going to buy either a Nintendo DS or the GPX2.
I wonder, if Sony has lost any sales because of this. Just how much in cash it has cost them?
What I want to know - when is someone going to go after Sony for the infringment of the GPL! That is the greater offence in my mind!
"'The Texas attorney general said on Wednesday that he added a new claim to a lawsuit charging Sony BMG Music Entertainment with violating the state's laws on deceptive trade practices by hiding 'spyware' on its compact discs"
Anybody else making the connection between this DRM tactic and those of the PSP, where Sony has plans to continuously update the DRM of the PSP with every new game release whether you like it or not. I'm sensing a disturbing trend- actually, it's been going on for quite some time now -in Sony's insistance on reguulating the hardware you already own contrary to your wishes.
Thankfully, their foothold on the PC industry is far less pervasive than it is in the console industry.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
John McCormick makes some interesting observations at the following Tech Republic link:
h tml?tag=nl.e101
http://techrepublic.com.com/5100-1009_11-5991769.
Quoting from his article:
---- Begin Quote ---
"The latest Sony debacle shows once again that you can't be too paranoid. A month ago, I personally would have never given a second thought to playing a new brand-name music CD in an office computer--now I wouldn't even duplicate one for personal backup.
And isn't that interesting? Could it be that Sony planned this whole thing just to stop people from making backups of their favorite CDs by scaring them out of even putting CDs in their PCs?
Even those users who only made backups and ignored DRM threats will now be extremely cautious about putting any Sony CD in their PC. Could there be something even more sinister to this story than mere incompetence?"
--- End of Quote ---
Hmmmm....... sort of makes one think, eh?
This whole situation with DRM, RIAA, big record companies is really starting to bug me. I just happen to believe that if I pay good money for a CD, a vinyl record, or any piece of music, that I should be allowed to convert it and play it on whatever technology is available to me, as long as I don't give it away to everyone else in the world!
When my dad discovered he had the Sony DRM on his computer, he asked me to remove it. Knowing that using Sony's tool to do so would simply open more security holes (turning on automatic program installation in IE, for one), I decided to go through and remove it manually.
After uninstalling the services, deleting the hidden $sys$ files, and removing the related registry entries, my parents' computer refuses to boot. I get a very uninforative BSOD. If I go into Safe Mode, the boot process halts after loading mup.sys (thus telling me the problem is with the next driver, whatever that is), then gives me a BSOD. They have an HP Pavilion, which came with an on-disk recovery tool. Unfortunately, all that is is the Windows Recovery Console, like the one on the installation CD. The CD we do not own, because HP did not give us one. Yes, that's right - we paid for a Windows license, and received no form of installation utility whatsoever.
Before I could even GET to the Recovery Console, I had another problem to figure out. When I tried to boot it, I got the good ol' "NTLDR is compressed" error. I checked - it was not compressed.
To boot into the Recovery Console, I had to boot BartPE, copy the NTLDR file from the Windows partition to the recovery partition, and reboot.
I've done everything I can think of to fix this. I've reset the BIOS and CMOS, cleared the ESCD, disconnected every piece of hardware other than hard drive, processor, and memory, changed various settings in the BIOS... to no avail.
Now we had to pay $24 for HP to ship us a recovery CD so we can get the damn machine working again. Not only that, but everything I've read on the Web says that reinstalling XP does not fix this issue, and that it's hardware-related.
Before this problem showed up, I couldn't burn CDs at all. Before the DRM was installed, I had no trouble doing this. I'm beginning to wonder if the DRM altered my burner's firmware.
Here's a big fuck you to Sony, and a slightly smaller one to HP. You are completely inept.
I am scientifically inaccurate.