Slashdot Mirror
Other Tech the Senate Would Have Banned
An anonymous reader writes "A few weeks ago, Senators Patrick Leahy and Orrin Hatch introduced the 'Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act' (COICA) bill, which was discussed here on Slashdot. The main part of the bill would allow the Justice Department to shut down websites that it deems are 'dedicated to infringing activities,' without a trial (due process is so old fashioned). Of course, in reviewing the bill, it's important to note that pretty much every new technology in the entertainment industry over the last century was deemed 'dedicated to infringing activities,' so here's a list of all of the technologies COICA would have banned in the past, including Hollywood itself, radio, cable television, the photocopier, the iPod and more."
Don't worry they are now working on keeping us safe from video games.
I remember reading a story years ago about cookbook publishers being up in arms when the Xerox machine came out.
Their thinking was that the secretaries would be swapping recipes via photocopies and not buying cookbooks as a Good Citizen should.
.
Trolling is a art,
I wish I could have laws written to guaranty my profits, too.
How dare you have a better product/service than me!
Why should I listen to my customers? They have to buy it from me.
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
And certainly more useful than a "don't burn the flag" amendment:
Amendment ___ - Strike the clause "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"
Replace with "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for Two Decades to Authors and Inventors the revocable Privilege to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
They don't call him "Dick" for nothing.
We have 2 wars, 10-20% unemployment, poverty, bad health care system, etc. But let's deal with copyright infringement for the wealthy. Everything else can be fixed later.
In the end they are just senators it's not like they know anything about law work, oh wait Senator Patrick Leahy got his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center and Senator Orrin Hatch got his J.D. from the University of Pittsburgh Law School. Well they are both lawyers so I guess we shouldn't question them on this.
when law meets technology, law bends, not technology. sure, the law can do a lot of damage, but technological progress is inevitable. at the very worst, if an insane amount of effort went into keeping society stuck in the past, even if they were somehow practically enforceable, other societies would vault ahead of the usa
the obvious benefits of progress would be seen in the other country and become envy. the threat the technology posed would be seen as sham, and the benefits would be clear: those other societies would be more competitive. if the technological progress is the gun, for example, the other country would win more wars. if the technological progress is a free and unfettered internet, the other country would become more culturally dominant
support for the ridiculous laws would erode. laws can often times conflict with common sense, but not forever, and not glaringly so
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
In case anybody might have forgotten, Senator Hatch was a strong supporter of computer built-in self-destruct mechanisms that the music industry could have activated remotely on a whim: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/930731/posts
"Dedicated to infringing activities" sounds like it should be the motto of Congress. Bring it on.
Set your phasers on "funky"!
If anyone remembered the legal battles Diamond had to fight against the RIAA to keep the Rio PMP 300 in production, it is a miracle we have MP3 players at all.
After the RIAA vs. Diamond fight, every player out there had some form of DRM [1], at the minimum something to keep people from copying music from the device to the computer. Some players had a proprietary application. Others encrypted the music with a key only that player had when it was copied.
Eventually this was dropped. Creative put out versions of their software that allowed copying music from the player to a computer.
Of course, Apple hammered the final nail in this coffin. Even now, you can copy music from your iPod or iPhone to your computer, although it either takes a third party application in some cases.
Had the RIAA had their way, MP3 players likely would either never be around, or have been forced to have very Draconian DRM technology on them, probably like the early Network Walkmans Sony had where one had to check sounds in and out of a device (as opposed to copy), only three instances of a song could ever be copied, and there was no such thing as backups -- reinstall of a computer meant having to re-rip the complete music collection.
[1]: Anyone remember the SDMI initiative, essentially required DRM on any and all players.
Yet nerds are always heated up about privacy eroding technologies. Not to mention weapons. And drugs. And corruption in the financial industry.
A couple of years from now Senator Hatch will be history. He has been in there far too long, and is flaky on any number of issues such as this one. It is nearly a foregone conclusion that his party members in the state of Utah are going to dump him for somebody new when he is up for re-election in 2012, someone certainly more libertarian in character. Rep. Jason Chaffetz for example.
cable tv?? they where taking a free OTA feed and putting it on the cable line and for some people that was the way to ota as some people did not get a good ota signal and you where paying for the cable systems line and there antenna. Some people where able to get the same stuff for if they put up there own ota antenna at there own cost.
later came the non OTA pay stuff (some area had uhf scrambled tv before areas got cable)
also back then you where about to get C-BAND and get lots of free stuff but you had to pay alot for dish and other stuff.
How about banning Government Institutions that hamper the exchange of ideas, commerce, and other items leading to a healthy economy?
All electrically powered devices are meant to infringe copyright! Ban Electricity! But wait, electricity can also be used to execute infringers in the chair, oh what a conundrum...
Maybe they can use this to ban gawd-awful movie knock-offs...
Ibid.
I was actually in agreement with you. Cheers, mate!
I wouldn't mind if I could think of some way to steal back the Money the corporations stole from the taxpayers in the first place
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
when law meets technology, law bends, not technology. sure, the law can do a lot of damage, but technological progress is inevitable.
There is no such thing as "technological progress". As a technique becomes more effective in the setting that it is in, it inevitably becomes less effective in every other setting, which means that as the external circumstances change, which they inevitably do, the technique becomes defunct.
"The Legal System" is a perfect example. "The Financial System" is another. They're both collaborative technologies, and nothing more. They'll go by the wayside when the changing world renders them obsolete, but it will not be progress, just change.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
Let's not forget that Orrin Hatch makes a habit of trying to legislate against technology. This is the same douchebag that a few years ago proposed blowing up all computers that illegally downloaded music.
Hoist Number One and Number Six.
I would have cheered any decision that eliminated the possibility of cable TV companies taking OTA signals and charging for them as was done in the 1970s and 1980s. The concept of engaging munipalities in a "franchise contract" that enforced a monopoly position of the cable company is also a somewhat silly idea.
We are now in a situation because of this where after the digital TV conversion it is impossible to receive decent signals in many rural and semi-rural places in the US. Your only choices are satellite and the local cable monopoly. They have a pretty solid lock on Internet access as well.
I live in Utah. I have for most of my life. I have never...ever...voted for Orrin Hatch. The man is an idiot. It's gray haired straight part ticket republicans that are keeping him in office. No one under 40 wants him to be reelected yet it keeps happening. He doesn't represent my interests, or the interests of most of his constituency any more. He's bought and paid for by the RIAA/MPAA.
This space for rent...
the trial is the process by which they discover if the website 'dedicated to infringing activities' and not just the subject of whining or attack by commercial rivals.
blog.sam.liddicott.com
As long as there is transparency, and as long as the individuals get to choose whether their contributions get used for a particular purpose, that's fine. Groups should not have power in and of themselves, however. If I leave a PAC because they have drifted too far from their original purpose, I should have the right to take back my contribution. If I decide that my union is doing something stupid, I should be able to reduce their contribution by 1/200,000th. If I decide that the company I work for is making an inappropriate contribution with money that I helped create, I should be able to reduce that contribution to a degree commensurate with my contribution. See how hard that would be to handle, though? And because these groups cannot feasibly be made transparent, it is necessary to limit their ability to abuse their power.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
It's amazing, every second story on /. is about how the government is trying to take away more and more Liberties and Freedoms that are intrinsic to the people and even those that are granted by amendments in a more specific way and I argue that this is what is wrong with the governments but over and over people fight me on this here, completely missing the point that they are less Free with every bill that the government passes, they are staring right at it and cannot see it, I do not understand this, but I understand that if even on /. this is the general attitude, then in the rest of the population this has to be even more pronounced, so basically nothing will change, people want to be controlled and punished and ruled by tyrants. People have decided this is what they need, it's sad.
You can't handle the truth.
Nerds are always heated up about weapons? I must have missed the memo on that one. Now if you meant we're annoyed at how difficult it is to legally purchase a firearm in certain states then I would certainly agree...
I meant laws banning/controlling/regarding weapons.
Oh look, almost all of them are Democrats.
Don't you mean will? This is their second chance.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
one day we used swords, the next day we used guns
one day we rode horses, the next day we rode cars
one day we listened to radio, the next day we watched television
technological progress dude
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
laws can often times conflict with common sense, but not forever, and not glaringly so
Meanwhile the War on Drugs is 40 years old with no real end in sight.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
I asked this question in another thread a while back and got modded a troll, but what the hell, I'm a sucker for punishment and I'll ask it again.
What about voting?
Why does the conservative right in the USA pander to evangelicals who think stem cells are people, Fred Flintstone lived alongside T-Rex and that it's just coincidental that chimps and humans share DNA? Because those evangelicals VOTE and vote strongly in numbers... Does campaign financing count for a lot? Sure - But ultimately it comes down to voters, and your representatives pander to those people who go out and put an "X" in the box next to their name.
Why does the liberal left in the USA pander to environmentalists who think sea-kittens are people, nuclear power is evil, and that it's just coincidental that humans have canine teeth? Because those environmentalists VOTE and vote strongly in numbers... Oh wait, they don't really. They're fringe-wackos. That means either the liberal left really believes that bologna, or there's something to gain from ever-restrictive rules that use the enviro-movement as a cover. So they're either crazy or evil.
If a representative goes with something silly because a lot of people want it, that's actually normal operating procedure. If they go with something only a small number of people want, it should be carefully inspected, because it's there's probably grift involved.
As it turns out in a recent study the human brain can be used with the assistance of Vision, Touch, Auditory, Olfactory, and Taste organs to duplicate all manor of infringing copyrighted/patented technologies!
We should JUST BAN THE BRAIN!
O wait... congress has apparently already done that!
but I'll bet they can find it.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
The idiots in the Senate aren't any smarter than us, but they are full-time lawmakers and usually started out in law practice.
[AdamSavage] Well, there's your problem! [/AdamSavage]
Yep. And if they had been really good at it, they probably would still be practicing lawyers. Seriously, there aren't too many possible reasons for a body as solidly dominated by lawyers, as compared to other professions, to be so bad at producing good laws (ie. that can withstand judicial constitutional review).
Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
Ah, fair enough. I'll freely admit I get pretty fired up about lawmakers trying to ban them.