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Judge Rules Against RealDVD
mattOzan writes "Judge Marilyn Hall Patel was unswayed by RealNetworks' defense of their product under the Fair Use Doctrine, as she declared RealDVD illegal and barred its distribution. As she said in her ruling, 'So while it may well be fair use for an individual consumer to store a backup copy of a personally owned DVD on that individual's computer, a federal law has nonetheless made it illegal to manufacture or traffic in a device or tool that permits a consumer to make such copies.' She also said RealNetworks was aware of the conflict between their agreement and their plans for the software: 'Real did not elect to return (or destroy, with appropriate certification) the CSS General Specifications after it received them, as Real had a right to do under the agreement... This behavior indicates that Real understood it to be bound by the CSS General Specifications as well as the other technical specifications received after execution of the CSS License Agreement.'"
While I hate RealNetworks and all it stands for, and will never forgive them for taking over online media with their crappy bloated players and codecs....I think I hate the movie industry just a little more. Especially Sony Pictures. I think the net effect (as usual) is that this sucks for consumers.
If it's legal to store backup copies of your discs, but you can't legally buy a tool to make them, it seems that the only way to exercise your fair use rights is to download backup copies from BitTorrent and similar services.
So it's perfectly legal for customers to make their own backup copies of media, just as long as it's impossible for them to do. God, I love modern IP law!
Well, I guess everyone could go get a programming degree and write their own copying software. Or we could just break the law (since the law at this point has turned almost 100% of the citizens of the world into lawbreakers already, in one form or another).
And before any of you jump in to point out that the DMCA is just a U.S. thing, you had better keep in mind that the DMCA is just the U.S. implementation of the WIPO COpyright Treaty, so these types of court cases are probably in the pipeline for your country soon too!
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
It's an affront to fair use. The courts however, have acted in the obviously correct manner. The DMCA is very clear, and leaves no wiggle room. It was designed very carefully to ensure it would prevent people from using any unauthorized software with DVDs.
Fortunately, this does not yet affect my ability to read DVDs under Linux.
It's nice to see laws that are encouraging innovation in the tech industry.
Oh. Wait...
Its sort of like a lot of drugs - its not illegal to take 'em, but its illegal to buy, sell, possess, or be under their influence. With DVDs, its legal to make a copy for backup, but its illegal to create a means of making that backup.
Putting the "anal" back into "analyst"...
Just use Handbrake. It's free, adds no DRM, and US law can't touch it because it's hosted outside the US.
I don't even know why people bother with the DMCA. It's US-only. Notice how all the fun cracking and releasing and such happens outside the US.
It only takes one person to rip the movie once. After that, copy protection is pointless.
While I hate RealNetworks and all it stands for, and will never forgive them for taking over online media with their crappy bloated players and codecs....I think I hate the movie industry just a little more. Especially Sony Pictures. I think the net effect (as usual) is that this sucks for consumers.
No, the net effect is that there is no possible way to exercise your right to a single backup of a DVD for your personal use. Despite the 2007 DVD Jukebox ruling, every DVD copying solution seems to be illegal. So what you do not realize when you're purchasing DVDs is that they are not only effectively DRM'd, they ignore your right to fair use.
I'm interested in watching RealNetwork's antitrust claims against the industry. I could think of some very basic arguments to be used in that case. Hell, I think someone should take up the case of fair use violations against them.
When I buy a DVD, I want to be able to create a backup that I use and store the DVD in safe keeping. If they don't want me to do this, distribute your films on a more robust media. This ruling is down right horrible for consumers.
My work here is dung.
Real did not elect to return (or destroy, with appropriate certification) the CSS General Specifications
maybe they used DVD Jon's version?
This is exactly why I purchased my own copy of AnyDVD HD with a lifetime license (does not expire). Slysoft update's the ripping program at least once every two weeks, so you know many bugs are being worked out with ripping DVDs and BD disks.
I would highly suggest purchasing this program before it becomes illegal to do so. If not by Slysoft, by some other company.
http://www.slysoft.com/en/anydvdhd.html
Life is not for the lazy.
FTA: 'So while it may well be fair use for an individual consumer to store a backup copy of a personally owned DVD on that individual's computer, a federal law has nonetheless made it illegal to manufacture or traffic in a device or tool that permits a consumer to make such copies.'
Yes, the law says you can make and keep a backup copy of your DVD. But since the law also says that making or delivering a tool to do that is illegal, what are consumers expected to do?* Not everyone can afford to hire Superman to come over for the evening to burn backup DVDs with his laser vision. (Not to mention, he gets bored and starts flipping bits for the hell of it.)
*BTW: consumers are expected to buy the same DVDs multiple times as they get scratched up, left on a windowsill to warp by your nephew or chewed up by your dog, That's what consumers are expected to do.
Death looks every man in the face. All any man can do is look back and smile. - Marcus Aurelius
Actually, it was. It showed a fundamental understanding of the law and how it pertained to the ruling she made. She got it right. It sucks, and hard, but she got it 100% right.
The judge's ruling is bound by the current law. It doesn't matter if she thinks it's stupid or accurate, she's bound by it and gave the ruling that she was bound to.
Sent from your iPad.
Judges are not held accountable for their own bullshit. We just have to collectively hope they are fair, similar to dictators or kings. If they ruin lives, oh well.
If it's a "DMCA violation to distribute products that enable consumers to override copyright owner preferences against unauthorized copying", then does that mean that repositries that distribute libcss2 are breaking the law?
More of a buffering really.
Task Mangler
Of course, it doesn't help that RealDVD is more accessible to consumers, and takes the easy "wizard" approach of doing a single task well. libcss is not a special purpose ripping program, even if it enables that sort of functionality. RealDVD is.
$_ = "wftedskaebjgdpjgidbsmnjgcdwatb"; tr/a-z/oh, turtleneck Phrase Jar!/; print
You appear to be confusing the cost to produce the disk, and the cost to produce it's contents, and what you're in fact being asked to pay for.
Unless the DVD you buy is completely blank, it cost more then 5 cents to produce.
Since the ones writing the contracts were allowed to contribute to the campaigns of the justices who later rule on them.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/01/us/01judges.html
Stop buying movies that have anything to do with the MPAA. Stop going to movies at the theatres too...unless it's an independent film. While I'm ranting, stop buying anything musicwise associated with the RIAA. This site can help you find out who to boycott.
Furthermore, reject the purchase of any media (music, movies, games) that utilize DRM. Don't even check-out these materials from your local library--for those lucky enough to have a library that offers music, movies, and software. While you are at it, if you have cable, shut it off othewise you're still giving money to these quasi-criminals.
Don't even go to network television websites (or Hulu, etc.) to watch programs. They are getting ad revenue from advertisers everytime you go. This includes watching movie trailers anywhere that posts adverts. Yahoo! Movies comes to mind.
Stop downloading ringtones from (insert your favorite band here) as if they are associated with the RIAA, they're likely getting royalties.
Bottom line: vote with your damn wallet. I can't stress that enough. VOTE WITH YOUR WALLET. Support indepedent artists. Support independent film. Support your local public radio and television stations. Let's make the dinosaurs of big media the extinct creatures they should be.
However, the reach of the DMCA is vast and it does not allow courts the discretion to make this assessment and render a value judgment untethered from the language of the statute. In the words of Justice Cardozo, âoe[l]aws are not to be sacrificed by courts on the assumption that legislation is the play of whim and fancy.â People ex rel. Alpha Portland Cement Co. v. Knapp, 230 N.Y. 48, 62 (1920).The court is bound by the DMCA provisions at issue, even if it determines the extent to which innovative technologies realize their future potential.
Basically, she's saying that Congress wrote this law, and it's not unconstitutional, so she can't strike it down. If you want to change it, contact your legislator. Don't biatch at her.
Nice doublespeak there, Marilyn, but a right that you have no way to exercise does not exist.
But Fair Use isn't a right. Fair Use only exists because Congress codified exceptions in the 1976 Copyright Act to allow people to do certain things without them being a violation of copyright. Congress can revoke such fair use at any time they want since they created such exemptions in the first place.
This is a really strange reversal of the laws that govern Marijuana:
In many countries it's illegal to smoke marijuana, but legal to sell the tools to do so (Head Shops).
In America, it's legal to make copies of your DVDs, but illegal to sell tools to do so..
Kind of makes a mockery of the law, doesn't it?
If we wanted the laws to be followed to the letter, we would have coded up an Judge system in Lisp by now.
But, we don't want that. We want Judges to make judgments based on both the letter and the spirit of the law. (This applies in sentencing as well as judgments by the way.) We want Judges to be able to spot discrepancies, loopholes and injustices in our current laws and rule against them where it is right to do so.
If you tell me it's legal to rake my lawn, but you then say it's illegal for anyone to give me gardening tools, do you really think that your position is just and logical. It doesn't take a fool to see what is going on here. The law and the legal system are being strained to breaking point, and that's good for neither justice or respect for the rule of law.
Why should anyone respect and uphold a legal system that twists itself into contradictions and connives to deny people the very rights its says they are entitled to? How can anyone go into a courtroom, expecting justice, when they know that the court has no interest in that. When they know the court only cares about an ironclad, rigid and dogmatic interpretation of any rag of a law our legislature see fit to pass; Or worse, only cares about a political interpretation of the law and their rulings within society at large?
In such an environment, why should anyone petition the courts for justice instead of making their own? Our contemporary cinema hails a masked vigilante who goes about beating criminals in the dead of night. What does that say about our respect for the legal system? Judges need to stop being automatons that parse legalease, and start doing their jobs, i.e. delivering justice.
May the Maths Be with you!
So then the obvious solution is to take this to the people who do make the law- Congress. Write letters showing how blatantly contradictory the law is in this case. Ask them how it's possible to exercise fair use with a law preventing distribution of the tools allowing fair use, citing the RealDVD case. Ask for suggestions on how to legally time shift a DVD for watching on a netbook, or how to make a backup of a $30 DVD so you can still enjoy what you paid for when it gets dropped/scratched/eaten/rolled over by an office chair.
After a ruling like this, congress should be proactive and fix the law. But they won't. Why? 'cause they could give two shits about making things right. They're busy trying to make themselves look good. So they're going to be 100% focused on "fixing" health care.
Actually, it was. It showed a fundamental understanding of the law and how it pertained to the ruling she made. She got it right. It sucks, and hard, but she got it 100% right.
There has to be a different answer than this. There must be a part of the government whose job it is to make sure law is rational. That seems like the sort of thing for the judicial to do. If she is not at fault then the entire judicial system is. This is not a rational law, and a system which does not correct irrational laws is broken.
As to her culpability: Did she state in her opinion that the law is irrational and should be changed but cannot be because the system is broken? Did she identify any possible path for the irrational law to be changed? If not, she is complicit in the broken system and should be judged just as harshly as the system itself. When the gatekeepers of justice fail to seek justice in favor of blind obedience to the letter of an unjust law, they are failing in their sworn duty to the nation.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Yes - in America. That's part of why Fedora doesn't include it but Suse does - Fedora is quite American-centric, while Suse has always been quite German-centric. Just because using libcss2 in the US is illegal to make use of "fair use" rights doesn't mean that it's illegal in the rest of the world ;)
My computer can copy bits from a CD, making it a device or tool that permits me (a customer) to copy copyrighted stuff. Does that make my computer illegal as well (if I ever hauled it to America)?
The judge said it all. We are entitled to Fair Use but any attempt to exercise that right is illegal. There are two ways that this can change: Congress or the Supreme Court. I have little faith in either.
It's said that in a democracy people get the government they deserve. Until we start voting these issues, the lobbyists will own the law.
so...it's legal and acceptable to have copies, you just can't make them...
I find the ruling really missing the point. When you sell the dvd copying software, it allows a user to make a backup copy of their dvd, which they already own. The problem is when THAT copy is given or sold to someone else other then the owner.
I think they should effectively come up with a better way to watermark the copy of the dvds and send a bot to monitor torrents and such, then the watermark (of the original dvd) could then be used to track down the owner, and say if 20,000 copies showed up on the net or on the black market, you could easily know who was responsible.
However, it is easier for every one, including this useless judge, to just point the finger at the person allowing legit copying to not happen. Smoking pot is legal, selling pot is illegal, so the only way to ge your pot is through the gov.
Copying a dvd is legal, selling the dvd copying software is illegal, so does that mean owning the dvd copying software is also illegal or using it...I am interested in seeing how it pans out, and what sort of precedent this case sets!
If you outlaw copyright-protected-media backup software, only outlaws will have copyright-protected-media backup software.
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Your post is completely foolish.
You do not want judges who will overrule the law based on their own individual sense of justice--whatever that may be.
You want judges who predictably follow the law--so that the rest of us CAN ORDER OUR LIVES SO THAT WE WILL STAY OUT OF COURT!!!!!
If we can't predict what judges will do, we can't avoid litigation risk.
Litigation risk is a COST. An unnecessary, socially unproductive, cost that should be minimized as much as possible.
You may want unpredictability in the courtroom, but fortunately the intelligent people of the world do not.
And, as a bonus parting shot: Would you rather have judges rule your life (with unwritten rules) or have legislators write the rules? It's not a hard choice.
Get Smart!!
Uh, no, that is not correct.
CSS-protected DVDs have a title key which until the proper key is presented to the drive prevents you from copying protected sectors from the disc. So your dd command will fail when it gets to protected (aka scrambled) sectors.
Once you get the title key set correctly, the drive will then let you read all the sectors. The rest of the CSS protection involves encryption of those protected sectors. You could, in theory, put off that decryption operation until you went to play the material and just copy the encrypted sectors.
So you can copy without decryption but not unlocking access. Both are part of CSS protection and are therefore covered by DMCA. And the only way you get to find out how it works - legally - is through signing an agreement with the DVD Copy Control Authority, part of the DVD Forum. The big deal seems to be that Real violated their agreement with DVD CCA.
You're right; you can only do this on DVDs after the title key has been presented.
However, if I start to play the DVD and quit, I can then copy it. The copying software itself obviously is not decrypting/circumventing anything, so why is it covered under DMCA?
Can You Say Linux? I Knew That You Could.
What if the court had said in another case:
"We understand that the defendant has a right to speech, but as federal law has made the removal of 'speech restraint devices' illegal, the defendant will have to leave the muzzle on.