Slashdot Mirror
Secret Copyright Treaty Timeline Shows Global DMCA
An anonymous reader writes "Michael Geist, a leading critic
of the ACTA secret copyright treaty, has produced a new interactive timeline
that traces its development. The timeline includes links to
leaked documents, videos, and public interest group letters that should generate
increasing concern with a deal that could lead to a global
three-strikes and you're out policy."
If any organization needed an emailgate, this is one of them. We need to see who is manipulating and bribing who. Just like the open docs. fiasco.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
I get a very bad feeling about international DCMA. It is bad enough the US citizens bent over and allowed the DCMA to be delivered, but now?
Next thing, I'll be sitting in jail for trying to solve a Rubik's Cube by taking it apart.
The Kai's Semi-Updated Website Thingy
These global organizations, as well as global governance, are a far bigger threat to freedom and democracy than terrorism ever could be.
We need politicians who are running on a platform that will directly challenge this sort of behavior. We need politicians who will withdraw our nations from these organizations and treaties.
NAFTA and treaties with various third-world countries have destroyed the American manufacturing base. The American economy will not recover until those treaties are abandoned and manufacturing comes back to America. We need politicians who will make this so.
Secret talks to discuss, develop policy for and enact positive action to counter the erosion of our rights as we step into a new global digital age. Only, that's terrorism these days isn't it? Ok. Non-secret talks. Who's in? I'll buy beer.
The harder they push in this direction, the more people will realize there is another way
If this is going live, i can foresee open source apps and creative commons goods surge in popularity.
Aren't they shooting themselves in the long term ?
If one follows the link in TFA to Michael Geist's interactive timeline, there's an element that leads to a short video of a debate in the Canadian Houses of Parliament-- one member says ACTA is a tool of US corporate interests and will lock millions of users out of the net; the government minister who responds says anything in ACTA is "subservient to the acts of this Parliament". What he DOESN'T say, and what the member is not sharp enough to pick up in the swift give-and-take of debate, is that *once the treaty is in place*, there is NO more subservience to *anything* (short of something on the order of a US Constitutional Amendment". This is the point: the people and even those of their representatives who want to derail this blindsiding juggernaut *will be able to do nothing* once the treaty is signed, and *saying the treaty is subject to US or Canadian law* is a pure, cynical smokescreen. An ounce of prevention here can accomplish what no amount of cure can fix. ACTA negotiations must be transparent. If we don't fight for that the corporate interests will do an end run around our rights.
Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others.
Intellectual property is an invention of the rich countries to force the poor countries into an economic model that benefits them. Knowledge has always been power, and the developed countries of the world realize that by locking up their books and restricting the free trade of information and knowledge, they can effectively keep those countries enslaved -- producing real, material goods, in exchange for imaginary ones.
That, people, is the true objective of intellectual property. You people think they care about you making pirate copies of CDs and DVDs? How pathetically self-centered! The truth is much bigger than your hard drive contents.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
This isn't a jail policy, they can't imprison you on allegations yet.
Unfortunately they can kick you off the internet for a period of time by allegation alone. You know, that little novelty some of us run hobbies off of, or maybe send the occasional "electronic" letter to our hip friends in other cities through Prodigy.
Let's get real about this. Internet for many people is an integrated part of daily life, you wouldn't cut power or phones from people who allegedly do bad things with it without proving guilt first (or in the rare case preventing immediate harm to someone else). This isn't any different; sure I can survive just fine without internet or power (for a while), but the consequences to my life and livelihood would be apparent pretty quickly.
Worse yet, the authority for removing essential services has an established track record for casting really big nets. The American cousin of the CRIA uses big lawsuits to make up for inadequacies like a city-bound guy with a Hummer... We already have enough issues in this country with a self-governed federal police force, thank-you. Let's sort those bumps out before putting law in the hands of the private sector.
-Matt
--- Need web hosting?
technology tames the law
the law never tames technology
not for want of trying of course
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Lets face it. The "authorities" have now realised that the internet allows people to collaborate and learn openly whats really going on in the world, and how the puzzle fits togther. this to them is danderous. the cat is out of the bag, and now they are trying to gain control over it so they can manage the leaks as it were. Its crucial that the internet remain fully open !!!! Its thats simple. More groups that support open information should be targettting these groups hard. This is the type of thing that the authorities will try to slide in to legislation as part of trade agreements like they do with all the other things. Dont support treaty x, y and z - Sorry you cant trade with us. Its really insidious and smart tactic they use.
Normally I'm against captain-obvious troll-feeding, but this is one case where I think a response is merited.
ACTA awareness needs to reach as far as it possibly can. We are, quite literally, talking about the future of the world here: A global treaty that promises to have a profound effect upon the freedom of all of us is being negotiated in secret.
The maximum must be brought to light before the widest audience. If that means dupe stories, then I'm all for dupes.
Your mind is clear / The things that you fear / Will fade with how much you / Believe what you hear
digital sharecropping. nuff sed.
How interesting that you mention farming. The way copyright and patent law works now, it would be illegal for me to use irrigation and farming techniques any more modern than at least 1880 (150 years plus the life of the author). Think about that when people talk about the war on "piracy". It's not -- we're on the right side (by distributing this stuff for free and attacking their business model) but we're here for all the wrong reasons.
Hackers need to return to their roots: Deep down inside, we know that free access to technology is a liberating and empowering experience. We've become complacent -- certain that we'll crack whatever protection scheme they invent, and comfortable with the labeling of criminal and pirate. We think we're too hard to find, too decentralized, and it would be too expensive to take us out. That arrogance will kill this community and everything it stands for.
We need to give the disadvantaged access to the collective's knowledge. That's always been our purpose. It's the guiding principle behind open source -- and piracy and breaking copy protection is just the cheap way to avoid having to reinvent the wheel. But we have to... Because otherwise we'll have to wait through three generations of humanity growing up to have access to what we do today. We need the old school hacker mindset more now than ever before -- and we need to understand the golden age is at its end. We're about to go toe to toe with Goliath -- a worldwide cooperative of corporations, governments, and private interests with trillions of dollars at their disposal, secret treaties, courts, and increasing levels of control over the media.
This is not a conspiracy theory. This is not someone crying wolf. This is out there, it's real, and it's happening now -- and we are acting like The Pirate Bay and torrents are a blow against these faceless powers. We still have people like Richard Stallman and his precious GPL, and we argue over and over again about the merits of a change in language. Typical geeks -- we focus on the details and fail to see the big picture. There are over five billion people living in complete poverty, and intellectual property is one of the barriers keeping them there.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
I agree, problem is most of us here in the USA are already used to the oppressive laws against consumers so we already do our DMCA violations in secret.
I have to live as if the SS will come smashing down my door in search of contraband. All because I'm a wierdo that wants to have his own Video on demand system with a server full of my DVD's, HDDVD's and Blu Rays, ready to play in any room.
I'm evil, destroying all that is American by not being patriotic and switching discs and cluttering up my living room with cabinets full of discs (Destroying the economy by not buying furniture to hold them! OMG!)
Honestly I took the stand that I don't give a rats-ass what laws are passed and what they say. The laws are un-just so I not only ignore them, I am in contempt of them. I'll do what I want, if I have to design in a system to automatically destroy "evidence" when they storm the house, then so be it. It's the price I pay for living in a country where we gave up being by the people and for the people.
The USA is for the Corporations and by the Corporations....Anyone saying otherwise is either blind or watches Fox News too much.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
My view is, that the Internet by its very definition does not make it possible for such a treaty to be any more that a pipe dream.
We already have darknets, wich are way beyond the grasp of any legislation. They would have to literally shut down the internet, to even stop it for more than a month. After that everyone would just have a personal net with all the wlan nodes around, completely and literally routing around the net. Everyone who knows how to do it, will do it. And everybody else will ask those, to do it for them. Even if that becomes illegal, it will become like selling weed. (A war long lost.) But it won’t ever stop.
Because inside, everybody knows what is right and wrong. And that ACTA is not right. Even the hypocrites who say the opposite, secretly use Bittorrent.
Until there is nothing else left for them, than to give up.
First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
A lot of us live in "Democracies." Maybe some of us who don't suck should run for office. And maybe some others could help them out. I don't thing voting for change is enough in this day of age. We need people who are different that we can vote for first. Any takers?
Yeah, because perpetual copyright wasn't enough for these greedy fucktards.
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
The truth is that the developing world would benefit from greater IP protection, as IP currently has functionally **no** protection in most of it.
The developing world would benefit more from spending all of their money developing infrastructure instead of licensing and importing it in exchange for their natural and human resources. Their economy is not like ours: The multiplication effect is such that for every dollar they invest in infrastructure, the return on investment would be three, even as much as five times. The multiplication effect is lower in developed countries because we are operating close to or at the production possibilities curve. Although it seems like only pennies on the dollar to license these technologies, for them it represents a major investment rather than part of the aggregate cost.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Our economic system is predicated on perpetual growth -- and business interests have talked about IP as the new "gold" for decades. It is not an evil conspiracy, but rather, politicians and business leaders believe that they need to enact these laws for our system to continue to grow. It's not just the RIAA and MPAA, it's also the big phama and agricultural firms.
Personally, I think it is bullocks dreamed up by people who never created art in their entire lives. Nobody is going to pay for "IP" when they need food on the table. Furthermore, these laws will be used to silence the critics of political interests.
It is precisely the free exchange of ideas that creates intellectual wealth, which is why these laws are fundamentally counter-productive in their goals.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
So how does a bill get introduced that is not readable by the public?
Insert it in the middle of a 2000 page "economic stimulus package" or "health care reform act" or "climate change cap-and-trade bill" that "must be passed as soon as possible, don't bother reading it, we'll fix it later (except we never do because we need to fixate on the next (invented) crisis)".
What! Me cynical?
You weren't expexted to email your CV then. Mostly because many people didn't have internet (and only businesses had broadband).
Rather like "My grandad didn't need a car to live" well now "everyone" has a car, you can do fuck all if you haven't got one...
The USA is for the Corporations and by the Corporations....Anyone saying otherwise is either blind or watches Fox News too much.
I object! Blind people have a physical handicap, not a mental handicap, and should not be lumped together with Fox News viewers!
My view is, that the Internet by its very definition does not make it possible for such a treaty to be any more that a pipe dream.
First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.
So, basically what you're saying is, is that you're at the "ignoring" stage of the whole process?
How quickly we do forget -- Dimitri Skylarov was arrested for enabling the sort of fair use activities described. Note also that "Sklyarov was being arrested for something that was perfectly legal in his jurisdiction" (Russia at the time having no anti-circumvention laws).
I see the ACTA as an attempt by the Global Powers to make the "decryption loophole" disappear - after all, if it's illegal to make circumvention tools anywhere, the Sklyarov arrest was a perfect execution of justice.
Do you like Japanese imports?
Not that I am against Freenet, but how is it going to protect you against a "three accusations and your ISP cuts you off" law? In this respect, Freenet will probably screw you. After all, say one freesite hosts 3 images of Mickey Mouse, then all the movie studio "representative" has to do is access them through your node, and you will be cut off.
But this "three strikes" law is worse. As we have seen with the DMCA, you just need 3 assholes to want to censor you to cut you off. The question is will you be allowed to hook up with another ISP? ...assuming you have more than one broadband ISP in your area.
What we really need is an adaptive network / communication system independent of the internet. Methods which would allow you to exchange, say a hard (or flash) drive with a friend, and they just connect the drive to their computer. All the data on the drive is sorted through and things which are desirable to your friend are copied to his computer. I'm not just talking about audio and video files, but also stories, books, pictures, even Usenet messages.
This doesn't have to be hollywood stuff either. If you look in the right places, there are plenty of people who like to create things in their spare time. There are probably programs to do much of this already, but I'm sure they still need some work so the average computer user can run them.
A similar protocol could be used for intermittent wifi connections too. For example, all the people on the same bus could have their computers in a sort of exchange / sleep mode instead of fully asleep. Their computers would exchange as much info as possible during the bus ride.
Using these methods, I think one could exchange as much info as on a broadband connection to the internet, without some of the hassle. Though it would have its own hassles, it may be worth it.