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Obama DoJ Goes Against Film Companies
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "If one attempted to distill a single prevailing emotion or attitude about government on Slashdot, I think it is fairly arguable that the winner would be cynicism or skepticism. Well here's a story that could make us skeptical and/or cynical about our skepticism and/or cynicism. Chalk one up for those who like to point out that, occasionally, the system does work. You may recall that the US Supreme Court has been mulling over whether to grant the film industry's petition for certiorari seeking to overturn the important Cartoon Networks v. CSC Holdings decision from the US Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit. This was the case which held that Cablevision's allowing its customers to make copies of shows and store them on Cablevision's servers for later viewing did not constitute a direct copyright infringement by Cablevision, there being no 'copy' made since the files were in RAM and buffered for only a 'transitory' duration. The Supreme Court asked the Obama DoJ to submit an amicus curiae brief, giving its opinion on whether or not the film companies' petition for review should be granted. The government did indeed file such a brief, but the content of the brief (PDF) is probably not what the film companies were expecting. They probably thought they had this one in the bag, since some of the very lawyers who have been representing them have been appointed to the highest echelons of the Obama DoJ. Instead, however, the brief eloquently argued against the film companies' position, dismembering with surgical accuracy each and every argument the film companies had advanced."
He knows the opposition's position as well as his so he can counter it up front. If he can't put himself in the opposition's shoes and argue against them, then they're going to suck.
These guys argued the other side forever, they *should* know how to tear that apart now.
Can someone mod those lawyers up? +1 insightful.
paul reinheimer
I know it isn't likely, but I would love to see this evolve into a situation where I could time shift my MythTV recordings with other users over BitTorrent.
coffee | nose > keyboard
For every time the gov deals with external reality, there are 100s of instances of decisions and actions based on some ideology or political interest.
This is why big government inevitably produces a low economic growth rate, eventually leading to the collapse of the society.
The only limit to the growth of gov is that collapse of the economic-social-political system.
Now if they can only come around on Warrantless Wiretapping.
4096R/EF7BAFA6 79E1 DF98 D09D 898F 9A11 F6F0 DDDC 23FA EF7B AFA6
You think that this is anything other then tactical deception? Seriously. You're not nearly cynical enough. The Obama government, just like the Bush government, was all about control. It's a nice brief, but it doesn't change anything about the new thugs, just like the old thugs.
It's nice to see things happening the way they are meant to happen. While the DoJ employees are not elected by the people, they are appointed by people who are. They are, in theory, supposed to represent the will and needs of the people, not corporations or lobbyists with money. Hopefully this will open up the debate about rewriting copyright and property laws in the age of information and the internet.
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." --Mark Twain
"since some of the very lawyers who have been representing them have been appointed to the highest echelons of the Obama DoJ."
Sometimes people just need a reminder that there is no grouping of people with less principles than Lawyers. We made the assumption that, since RIAA lawyers were hired to the DOJ, that they would find in favor of the RIAA. But it seems that lawyers are almost always megaphones for who is signing their paycheck.
And in this situation, it worked out in our favor.
They probably thought they had this one in the bag, since some of the very lawyers who have been representing them have been appointed to the highest echelons of the Obama DoJ. Instead, however, the brief eloquently argued against the film companies' position, dismembering with surgical accuracy each and every argument the film companies had advanced."
Thus demonstrating again why you should never trust a lawyer. Unless you are still paying him, of course. (sorry nycLawyer)
Qxe4
...is right twice a day. Despite the common belief that the US government is way beyond screwed up, occasionally there is an outbreak of common sense. (Once you stop laughing about the words 'common sense' and 'government' in the same sentence, you can mod me up.)
Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
NewYorkCountryLawyer said:
Well here's a story that could make us skeptical and/or cynical about our skepticism and/or cynicism.
It's way too early on a Sunday morning and/or afternoon for me to ponder and/or grok the in and/or out of the and/or in that sentence.
Just add {In Space!} to anything.
So far, at least on the surface, Obama is mostly keeping his hands off the DoJ and letting them do their thing independently. Perhaps it is a misperception on my part. And Obama seems to be at least trying to be his own president. It seems pretty obvious that he has capitulated on quite a few important issues and hasn't had quite the smooth ride he might have expected, but I don't think Obama cares much about the whole copyright thing right now.
It sounds like the argument is consistent with the Betamax decision. This is essentially a VCR as a service rather than a product. I have no idea why it matters that storage is in RAM. There are systems that have stored data in RAM for years.
If one attempted to distill a single prevailing emotion or attitude about government on Slashdot, I think it is fairly arguable that the winner would be cynicism or skepticism.
Yeah right. Like we're expected to believe what you think about slashdot's opinion. You know, it's summaries like this that prove we can't expect much change either from the government OR slashdot...
PS: For the HUMOR impaired, the above was meant to be a skeptical, cynical comment. But THIS bit is actually sarcasm.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Just curious why you feel it's necessary to link the PDF in via a frame with some other stuff in the "sidebar" I could care less about.
Here's a direct link to the PDF:
http://beckermanlegal.com/Lawyer_Copyright_Internet_Law/cartoonnetwork_csc_090500AmicusCuriaeBriefOfUS.pdf
I was initially skeptical about the alleged, lauded virtue of Barrack Obama, but the more I see of his actions, the more I'm forced to concede that I was wrong, and that in this case, water genuinely has flowed uphill, to use that analogy.
Obama's level of integrity is genuinely intimidating, for the simple reason that an American President is, at this point in history, expected to be a thoroughly amoral and corrupt human being. That he isn't, is rightfully seen almost as a violation of physical law. Bush's degree of evil had almost become reassuring, purely because of its' level of routine familiarity. When he attempted to do something monstrous, it was entirely expected.
Even with Bush aside, it is also a paradox when considered in light of the dynamics of political power in general. Reading Machiavelli and virtually every other treatise on the subject, one is left with the overwhelming conclusion that the single greatest prerequisite of political power is amorality, to the extent that it can be said that an individual's degree of political power will be directly proportional to their level of amorality.
Given this, Dick Cheney is perhaps a more likely example of who we would ordinarily expect to hold the office of President, morally speaking, than Obama. Cheney is, according to virtually every depiction of him, a consciously, willingly, and indeed enthusiastically evil individual. He is, therefore, far more consistent, both from study of political theory in general, and observation of American political history in particular, with the type of individual who I would expect to hold the office of the Presidency.
It is said that within a democracy, a people get the leader they deserve. I'm not entirely sure what Americans have done recently to deserve a leader with Obama's comparitive level of decency, especially given that Bush was so far to the opposite, but even for us outside America, Obama's integrity is certainly very welcome.
It will be fascinating to observe just how far outside of the established, conventional rules Obama is permitted to go.
I find it interesting that our Supreme Court Nominee was not part of this ruling. In fact, the 2nd circuit is making a lot of important rulings - they also established legal precedent in the Google Adwords trademark violation case, and some stuff about trademarks and internet before that. But I don't see her opinion on -any- of them. Maybe we should appoint the judge whose opinion this is?
This is my sig.
But you'd be a fool not to play the scam like everybody else. The rational choice for a person was to treat their home like an ATM, after it was a "sure bet" and if they didn't, they would regret it. Even if they knew it was a scam, they figured if they got screwed everybody was screwed so why not play?
In other words, good regulation can keep a bunch of individuals who are making rational decisions from screwing up the entire system. Sometimes what is right for one person is harmful to the whole. The lending crisis is an example of that.
The Supreme Court was thinking about overturning an important and just ruling but decided to just maintain the status quo. Oooooh, I suddenly feel so optimistic.
We want cases like this to lose to set an example kind of like we want to implement Stalinist communism so that everyone will feel the pain of it and fight against it.
you are an idiot
I think it is fairly obvious what approach the Obama DoJ is going to take. In return for coming down hard on those that distribute pirated content (it is indeed a crime, if not one that deserves much punishment), the DoJ is going to make sure it is only going after actual pirates instead of consumers trying to use content they have already paid for.
While this is not an ideal situation (there are a LOT of things the DoJ could be doing other than chasing after torrent trackers), it's better the previous situation, where the xxAA gets whatever they ask for.
SirWired
I RTF Brief. It was a good read. There is one issue that was mentioned and claimed to be explored, but I don't understand the reasoning.
In the last paragraph of discussion B.3.A and in foot note 10, on page 19, they say that the customer is the only one that makes the copy through RS-DVR, with some help from the respondents (the cable company). In fact, through out the brief, it is emphasized that who makes the copy is very important, and in this case it is always the customer that does.
But, this paragraph and foot note strikes me. It says that it is possible that two parties at once both be the "who" and who makes a copy. Like "if one person selects the programs or documents to be copied, but hires someone else to push the buttons used to operate the relevant copying machine, it is possible that both could be held liable as direct infringes for any copyright violations that their conduct entails." The brief argues that this doesn't happen; the customer makes the selection and pushes the button.
Why is pushing the button important? If a customer makes a selection but no button is pushed, then nothing has happened. If a company pushes a button but no selection was made before then, then again nothing happens. The customer is always the one that makes the selection; pushing a button is the extension of that selection. Hmm, maybe it is important, actually.
But, in the case of RS-DVR, the company is pushing some buttons of several kinds. The customer can make a decision, then press a button on their remote. This button press is sent to the RS-DVR server at the company's location, and the server presses it's own internal buttons to set the recording time and channel, and then presses some more when the right time comes. If these internal server buttons were not pressed, then nothing would happen. To me, they look just as important to the process as the remote control.
Hmm, maybe the server's internal buttons usage are considered a service, while the remote control's buttons usage is not?
I think the only thing that's clear here is that I'm not familiar enough with this aspect of law to figure it out conclusively myself.
This way the ruling is limited to the Second Court of Appeals district only, and can be re-litigated in more friendly climes - like the Ninth Circuit Court, or Marshall, TX. If the Supreme Court agreed with the lower court then this ruling would hold throughout the country. Why else tell the Supreme Court that "This isn't important enough for you to bother with. Leave it to the other cable companies in the other areas of the country to work this all out."
After all, when have we seen the MPAA/RIAA litigation machine go away after only one defeat? Also, when have we seen them go in for the big one - besides Grokster, that is?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Ha ha!
Unless, of course, you're one of the "hurp copyright is always bad pirating is gud give me everything for freee!111111" mouthbreathers, in which case you can fuck right off.
Heh. Sounds like you're one of the "hurp everyone who disagrees with copyright is dumb la la la can't hear their arguments nope I bet they just want everything for free!111111" mouthbreathers.
Try actually reading some of the reasoned anti-copyright posts on here sometime. You might learn something.
No you're not the only one. In my screen on Firefox the type got larger (nice) but the comment headings are missing (not nice).
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Now my comment headings have returned.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Seems like Obama's blatantly retarded cabinet appointments weren't so retarded after all. Hopefully he knew that these people would go against the industry that they have been representing, and hopefully he didn't appoint them because he thought they would help to bring along the policies that the industry has been fighting for. I'm really interested to see what the Administration does in the future, though... hopefully they can make a trend out of this.
Good luck working for change within the system.
Education
Mobility of people educated on one state's dime to another state where labor is needed makes education an interstate matter. I believe the problem is called "brain drain".
intrastate agriculture
Is agriculture really intrastate? That is, is there a major fertilizer company based in each state that practices agriculture?
health care
Medications, devices, and skilled labor routinely cross state lines.
work regulations
For someone who lives on one side of a state line and works on the other, which state has authority to tax income?
I wish I had mod points. This weak minded PC world of moral relativism must be abolished. Copyright holders demand to be taken seriously and insist others listen to their arguments. I DONT NEED TO, your arguments are worthless because the position you already occupy is outrageous. The stated intent of the law was to promote innovation. Being able to profit from one work for a life time does not do that, it eliminates the need for innovation almost entirely.
Return to the bright bright line and we can have an intelligent discussion listen to each other and hash out the specifics, till then I am for damaging the strength of copyright law in any possible way, including making completely impossible to enforce on a technical level such that everyone is a violator and the entire concept becomes a sad joke. Chances are that we can't come back from that point, which does not bother people like me much so maybe you pro IP types aught to think about giving us some concessions because there are more of us and eventually we will defeat you; yes some of us are willing to whip others into what amounts to an unruly mod to do that.
A power struggle is an awful hard fight to win, once one side has excepted anarchy as satisfactory outcome, and a large enough group of people start to fell that would be preferable to your continued control; that is whats happening slowing in the world of IP. "Information wants to be free," is catching on.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
I have no need to hide behind the AC mask. Whoever spreads this trash are pretty desperate. OF COURSE some blacks voted for Obama, just because he's black. It's no different than all the white people who voted against him just because he's black. I happen to be non-black. I'm a veteran, for that and some other reasons, I really WANTED to vote for McCain. So - why didn't I? Well - McCain was far more likely to get my SONS killed than Obama. McCain wouldn't have exactly followed in Bush's steps, but he would have followed closely enough that it wouldn't have made a tremendous difference. Do I really CARE that our president is a funny looking nappy headed non-white? Not much. I voted for him because he understands more about world culture than McCain ever did, or will. The man has lived in places that McCain just flew over in a fighter jet. Tremendously different perspective. The black guy can relate to the world, whereas McCain used the world as a background on which to acquire targets. McCain may not be a pure neocon, but he does believe in much of the agenda of the New American Century. It is McCain's mission to spread corporate control around the world, supposedly for the benefit of Americans, but really for the benefit of those wealthiest 2% of Americans who already have more money than they can ever spend.
With one son in the Army, and one son in the Navy, I really feared for their lives with Bush in control. Obama may or may not commit to some action which puts their lives in peril - but I'm fairly confident that the purpose of that action WILL NOT BE to enrich our wealthiest 2%. That is exactly what Iraq accomplished, with the neocons in charge.
While you bitch and belly ache about the "nigger" in the White House, I breathe a sigh of relief. My own funny looking kids (sans the nappy heads) are far more likely to live long enough to give me some grandchildren to play with.
Bottom line? Fuck off, you cretinous redneck!!
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
When Obama was elected, one of the things that was most apparent was his understanding of technology and related issues. When he appointed the ??AA lawyers to the DOJ, there was a large outcry from people who believed he was being influenced by his party's traditional media kowtowing.
The specific lawyers who represented the RIAA and MPAA, and are now in the DOJ, are recused for two years from working on any of these types of matters. So they are not supposed to have had anything whatsoever to do with this brief. And from all appearances they did not
I'm wondering if the ??AA lawyer appointments weren't designed to "take them out of the game". If so, it's a brilliant move, IMHO. :)
... you cretinous redneck!!
This word apparently means something different to you than it does to me. Not easy to find digital sources for this, but, from a GlobalSecurity.org article:
That's from the Battle of Blair Mountain, where those "rednecks" fought thugs--and some died--for the right to unionize.
Not saying I'm going to write a curse-laden response to you, but... heads up.
I might be considered a redneck by geography/accent (grew up in Louisiana and Texas), but I completely support everything you said. Good job.
Cretinous was the only insult in that comment.
General use of the word in the United States refers to unsophisticate, uneducated, unruly, generally racist backwoods people, possibly inbred for generations. There are so many connotations, I couldn't possibly do the term justice.
The wiki has a decent rundown. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redneck From it's earliest use in reference to Americans, it was derogatory.
For more info, just google Southern American redneck You'll find tons of redneck humor among the results.
Doesn't excuse the blind vitriol, though. I can make a list of nasty and ignorant phrases that, if directed toward another person here, would have people recoiling in horror, or lashing out in rage (typically phrases that many AC posts consist of--no offense). But "redneck," when used in an equally hateful way, is okay--and that's not really right.
I'm not posting demanding an apology, or such. I'm just wanting to share that these groups may find such usage of the word a little offensive, or pointlessly hateful.
The change has to come from the people themselves. The problem is that the people are just as bought off as anyone. Nevertheless, that is where it needs to start.
There are probably dozens and dozens of programs in our interest. Regulations, social programs, health care, education mandates, etc. The problem is that as they accumulate, we lose the freedom of action to make decisions on the things we disagree on, even on some things we really, really want to oppose, but they are not quite as important as the #1 issue. That means the voter is stuck. You could have one party for every district in America, or even completely independent representatives and you have the same problem.
In a republic, we already rely on the ability and honesty of our representatives. The problem is that the more they become responsible for, the more people have an interest in buying those representatives, directly or indirectly.
The problem with the government is not that "socialism" is evil, its that the government is a monopoly just like Ma Bell and Microsoft. The biggest difference between a corporation and the government is that we get a free vote. But I have some stock too and we all know how much that matters. In fact, I probably have a bigger voting share in some Fortune 500 companies than I do in the US government.
We need a better way of dealing with important items in the public sphere by not necessarily shrinking services, but splitting them up for better accountability. The best situation I can think of is breaking up the government like any trust, some being privatized, but most of it forming separate public units that also derive their authority directly from the people, instead of from a law made by the central government. And what's more, it has to stop being simple geography, it has to relate to things that we can elect experts to operate, instead of generalist lawyer types.
Wow, Thanks,
I didn't realize it was that long ago. This guy is something like 92 years old now, that's amazing.
I was thinking, if someone was 67 and retiring today, and they started with the DOJ right out of school at age 22 or so, they could have been hired in 1964 and served with Johnson.
Erm...you just said what I just said only more ranty.
Except for the "not Obama" part. Obama definitely plays a part, whether you and he realize it or not. (Though how could you not? I mean, he's in the Political Party...)
Your brain is not a computer.
"Network-based technologies for copying and replaying television programming raise potentially significant questions, but this case does not provide a suitable occasion for this Court to address them. The Second Circuit is the first appellate court to consider the copyright implications of network-based analogues to VCRs and settop DVRs, and its decision does not conflict with any decision of this Court or another court of appeals. The partiesâ(TM) stipulations, moreover, have removed two critical issuesâ"contributory infringement and fair useâ" from this case. That artificial truncation of the possible grounds for decision would make this case an unsuitable vehicle for clarifying the proper application of copyright principles to technologies like the one at issue here."
It sounds as though they are expecting this case to essentially repeat for an arbitrary future combination IP holder and cable company, without the peculiar waivers of contributory infringement claims and fair-use counterclaims, and are simply waiting for that no-holds-barred case to be settled by a lower court. The extreme quibbling over (to quote the brief) âoewhoâ would âoemakeâ the copies that would be stored does not inspire my confidence, as all this decides is whether the alleged infringement should be considered as direct or contributory. The cynic in me says that a pro-RIAA author would rather the latter be the ultimate test case since the bar for arguing secondary/contributory infringement is much lower. (You stored arbitrary data which included the pointer to a pointer to data that a 3rd-party chose to infringe? You're a contributory infringer!)
Caveat Emptor is not a business model.
Do I really CARE that our president is a funny looking nappy headed non-white?
I found parts of your post such as this to be extremely objectionable. Seriously, this sort of thing is agony to read.
Please don't capitalise part of a sentence like that. Emphasis like that doesn't help everyone hear your tone, it just makes those of us who don't hear your tone wince. Think about caps as shouting. Would you really SAY something like that, shouting out one word in the middle of everything?
Try using italics. It WILL NOT BE as annoying.
"Try using italics. It WILL NOT BE as annoying."
I make no apologies for my writing style. It is ironic that you use the same "technique" to make your own point.
The lack of apologies out of the way, you might consider some possibilities. Some of us have vision problems. Some of us have learning problems. Some of us are doing exactly what we were taught during the course of our lives. Some of us aren't really used to slashdot. I could go on. No need, though.
If you find my use of capitalization so objectionable, just add me to the ignore list. I am a loud man, and I really DO stress my points in conversation LOUDLY. There are no italics in the spoken language. Since I was taught to write like I talk, that's what I do.
Would you care to address the content of my post, or just the method of delivery? Do you agree or disagree with my thoughts? That, I care about. Obviously, I don't care very much about proper punctuation, capitalization, etc. I'm not a very retentive person. ;-)
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Lawyers have their trolls too. It seems that the RIAA/MPAA have many of them working their bridges, but only the judges get to mod them "-1 Misconduct", and you need to be a Jack Thompson to get modded "-5 disbarred" :-)
Feel free to vote for the non-Black candidates and against the Black candidates if you are not African-American. You need not defend your actions in any way. Voting on the basis of skin is quite acceptable by the standards of today's moral values.
Guess I'll vote for the nigger next time, too. I dunno, man. I haven't known many black people in my life, nor wetbacks, camel-jockeys or whatever. Some folks in my situation distrust such people. Fear of the unkown, I guess. Me, I think I understand my fellow white man pretty well, and I know what kind of treacherous assholery we can get up to. Maybe those weird darkies are different by nature. I'll take the unknown evil over the known.
Actually, I'd wager _more_ than half of the population fall below the mean intelligence level. Intelligence certainly appears to be skewed to the right after all.
Maybe so. Dick Morris argues that this is exactly how he's neutralized Hillary Clinton:
http://thehill.com/dick-morris/the-incredible-shrinking-clintons-2009-05-26.html
Space game using normal deck of cards: http://BattleCards.org
one of these days you will get your head out of your ass
It's getting a little late for that.
and find out that those who rule us aren't alien beings
I already knew that.
but human beings
I already knew that.
just like you.
Not exactly.
it will probably coincide roughly around the time you realize that you yourself are not some vanguard of moral precision,
Damn you. Are you trying to break my bubble? My parents probably thought they were training me for Messiah.
nor whatever other heroes you have right now that you somehow view as morally perfect
The only morally perfect heroes I had are deceased. They were few in number. I am not in their league.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
which I can only assume is a completely unveiled attack on people who wear turbans
Actually in America it's a reference to blacks. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Imus#Rutgers_women.27s_basketball_controversy/
Well, of course they never win, if you decide that you shouldn't vote for them because they never win.
Vote for them anyway.
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
So whats up with your low budget movie? last update 2006?
Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
I should have been more specific. You make it sound like I wouldn't be OK with returning to 18 years. I'd be fine with five! But I'm not fine with people just taking whatever they feel like.
"You can either have software quality or you can have pointer arithmetic, but you cannot have both at the same time."
It is the neolibs that post those stupid posts and you just eat it up because it fits so perfectly with what the media have told you a conservative is.
Those posts are solely designed to taint the character of the people that do not support their ideology.
It is so blatant that I cannot believe so many slashdotters fall for it.
These posts do not contain any kind of conservative message, just racial hatred. (And to anticipate the response - racial hatred is not conservatism.)
True enough. Nevertheless, the Republican Party has a long history of playing on such fear and ignorance in order to grab votes. Indeed, and to their credit, during most of the early '90's, they did so with enviable mastery. Unfortunately, one can employ that "those rednecks don't speak for us..." dodge for only so long before a sufficient segment of the public calls bullshit on such hypocrisy and hands the offenders their asses in a couple of consecutive elections. Fortunately, (or unfortunately, for Republicans) the Republican leadership (such as it is right now) has failed utterly to realize this and continues to play to the same fearful and ignorant (redneck) portion of their "base".
BTW, apologies up front to those who choose to wear the "redneck" label for reasons other than an unfortunate failure of the educational system.
Honestly, if these "redneck conservatives" are passionate enough to sit by their computers all day and post this garbage, why would they post anonymously? Do you really think someone filled with this much hatred would be afraid of someone seeing their made up username?
Of course! On /., a white sheet isn't very effective, but the AC moniker will do when you're too afraid to show your face while you make an ass of yourself.
Given that they would have been just as in favor of McCain over Hillary, I think we can safely say it was on policy grounds.
Uhh, isn't that where we're at right about now?
Requiem for the American Dream
idn't MDY lose on a decision recently regarding this? They were found to be infringing copyright because the game was loaded into RAM, which was considered a "copy" of the game, and MDY's wowglider program was modifying it (or something like that). So isn't this this opposite?
IANAL
As I understood the ruling: The issue revolved around MDY acting in contravention of Blizzard's TOS for the way the Application is loaded into memory.
Blizzards sanctioned mechanism for launching the WoW main executable is via a 'bootloader' that performs monitoring of the user's computer. This bootloader launches as a 'faceless application,' and then examines the execution environment of the user's operating system for signs of other running tasks known by Blizzard to provide services that violate TOS.
If no such applications were found to be running, then the bootloader launches the WoW client application, and remains resident. The bootloader continues to monitor the WoW client and the user's computer for activity in violation of TOS and to provide error reporting services should the client executable fail.
MDY sought to bypass this bootloader, by supplanting it with their own work-alike. This work alike would copy the WoW client software into random access memory, thus creating a copy in memory, using a method not authorized by TOS.
MDY's software was indeed fixing a copy of the WoW client into memory in contravention of Blizzard's licensing terms with the end user, which expressly forbid the use of unauthorized methods to load the client's binary image into the computer's random access memory.
MDY it was argued, created a situation where the end-user was unknowingly induced into violating Copyright by fixing a copy of the WoW software into the computer memory in a manner that was inconsistent with the terms of the Copyright License.
MDY was not accused of violating copyright. MDY was accused of Tortuous Interference on two different counts in providing their customers with the software that they sold.
You're right, and for the record, I don't consider it appropriate that you got modded down to -1.