One problem with your reasoning here. If the band isn't in bed with the RIAA there's a decent chance that they don't have the funds to run an expensive website with tons of bandwidth regardless of how popular they are. This makes it so they either have to cap the number of active connections downloading their music at a relatively low level or they have to make their users deal with God awful download speeds. Both of these interfere with their ability to effectively distribute their music.
Well, while you may be correct about why the ISPs can ban this activity, your solution is nothing short of pure stupidity. I've been hearing people use the "if you don't like it then leave" argument for too many years of my short life and it makes just as little sense today as it did for all those years. It reminds me of what the Catholic church did back in medieval times when they said that everyone had to live by their rules or leave the Catholic church. Of course, leaving the church or being excommunicated meant that you would likely starve to death and be shunned from society. Sure, this is a little less extreme, but it follows the same principle in that the average American is dependent on the Internet for their day-to-day life.
First of all, there is virtually no such thing as a residential class broadband Internet service provider that allows the use of servers on their network so there isn't an option to "find an ISP that allows server usage" in most areas of the USA.
Second of all, virtually every service in the USA that does allow server usage is business class and costs a minimum of $400 per month to maintain. Most home users do not have that kind of money.
Third, I pay $50 a month for broadband access to the Internet. I should be allowed to do whatever I want to with that bandwidth as long as it falls within the limits of the law. I'm not saying the ISP needs to give me all the bandwidth I want. If they can prove that my bandwidth usage is hurting their network in some way then they should be allowed to throttle it to a reasonable extent to keep their QoS for other customers intact.
In conclusion, because there are almost no residential ISPs and because all business class accounts are cost-prohibitive for the average home user, there is therefore no availability for a home user to switch services. Because of this, your solutions is flawed in that it is not plausible.
I suggest civil disobedience to deal with the problem. If we get enough of this company's user base to bitch, moan, complain, and threaten to cancel service, and just outright break ToS by using P2P services and servers then they will back down or they will go bankrupt from losing all their customers. Quite a few laws in this country have been changed partly because of civil disobedience. There's no reason we can't get an ISP to change their ToS if they're faced with losing a significant portion of their customer base.
Hmmm... let me see here. I bought 4 CDs in the last two months. All of them were Japanese CDs by Japanese artists (none from Sony thank God). Now, since the majority of time doing homework is spent in front of a computer running Linux, I can't listen to new CDs by Sony Media on my computer so that means I have one of three choices:
1. Buy a Windows license from the Empire and use Sony's software, cluttering up my hard drive and desktop even more.
2. Buy a Boombox, which is unecessary now because my computer has some kickass Klipsch Promedia 4.0 speakers attached.
3. Tell Sony to go fuck themselves, boycott them, and wait till someone either writes a crack or until they make a Linux player for their music.
I'm opting for #3. If I wrote Japanese well enough for purposes of reading, I'd write their president a letter personally stating that I will boycott all of their products from here on out. I love this nice Sony Trinitron monitor I'm using right now, but I can easily do with something else if this thing ever breaks. Until Sony lets up on the DRM crap I'm not buying another damn thing from them.
I'm not going to let some greedy corporation dictate my buying habits. If they want to sleep with Bill Gates, they can, but I hope they wake up with crabs because they certainly deserve it. If they want to sell more stereos and CD players then they better find a way to sell them to someone else, because Panasonic, AIWA, and JVC are just as good to me. I vote with my pocketbook as well as with a voting machine.
Where do you get this strange idea that all lawyers are in their occupations for the money? When I get my law degree and bar card I promise that I will do pro-bono work as often as I'm able to do so and still make a reasonable living. I personally think the law should be available to everyone, not just large corporate interests or individuals with deep pockets. I plan on serving as a public defender for at least a few years in the criminal justice system and maybe moving on from there into intellectual property law as one who defends those accused of violating laws regarding IP. I can also say that there are a large number of lawyers who do routinely take on pro-bono cases for the same reason, while others take on high-profile pro-bono cases to gain notoriety. The problem is, there are so many abuses of the system that if we were to take on every case that came to us, we would never sleep or eat, much less make a decent living. A very old, well-known text states, "Thou shalt not stand with the mighty against the weak." The problem is, that's what the USA as a country is doing now, it is standing with the large, mighty corporations against individuals that don't have the money to defend themselves. This should not be and I intend to fight against it as others like the EFF lawyers also fight it, but there's just too many frivolous lawsuits out there and no way we can take all of them on, so we do the best we can with what we have. In summary, don't think that just because Joe Blow's lawyer is fighting a case pro-bono that he is going to rush through it or not put his heart and soul into it. Granted, there are many lawyers that do think that way, but there are many that do not.
Yes, you are correct, this story is similar to the changelog story from awhile back. I already know I'm not going to become very popular here saying this, but since I'm not a karma whore I could care less. Alan Cox is a coward. The fact that this information is not posted publically is a pure act of cowardice. First of all, this information has nothing to do with the DMCA and would not even stand a chance of holding up in a court if charges were brought against Alan especially if he's tried by a jury of his peers. Second, if, by some weird ass twist of fate, it did stand in a jury trial it would certainly be thrown out either by the appeals court or the supreme court which could result in parts of the DMCA becoming invalidated and thus liberating us from at least part of its tyranny.
Alan needs to turn over kernel development to someone with more balls than he has. I've thrown myself in front of the cannon several times in an attempt to get the DMCA overturned, but no one has fired it yet. I'm going to throw myself in front of it again by posting the secret text on my webserver located right here. Alan has no right to call himself a leader in any sense for as long as he refuses to do something to change what he knows is wrong. Any man who knowingly allows an unjust act to occur(the imprisonment of a fellow programmer), does nothing to change it, and hides in fear of it, has no right to call himself a man, much less a leader.
I hope you're reading this Alan because I know you read these articles on a regular basis and yes, I am attacking your values and principles. Perhaps it's time to reevaluate them because you sir, are a coward who will allow injustice to continue when you are one of the few people who has enough public acknowledgement to actually have the ability to make a difference, whereas I, a lowly network engineer with no fame or notoriety, am willing to put my personal freedom on the line to make that difference.
IMAX (Ionia Maximum Security Prison) is Michigan's highest security prison. It is located in Ionia Michigan and it's where they keep all the multiple murderers, the criminally insane, and several other types of violent offenders most of which are serving one or more life sentences.
Well if he got married before he went into prison he could have conjugal visits with his wife. Then he could have hetero sex. Minimum security prisons are more like county jails than IMAX type facilities. There really isn't a lot of raping that goes on in there... granted there are people who think that homo sex is better than none at all and they may get into that, but you don't get a lot of violent prisoners in minimum security facilities. Also, in minimum security federal prisons it isn't all spent in lockdown like it is in max security installations. Sure, it's not a nice place to be, no prison is, but there are worse places to be than a minimum security federal prison (Terre Haute anyone?).
Well, it depends... if he knowingly and maliciously makes a statement to any third party which he knows to be false then it could be considered slander. Libel is actually more serious in some states and could be used in place of slander because it is public and in print. David Turner at Findlaw.com defines slander like this:
Slander, or oral defamation, occurs when a statement is uttered to a third party which is false and malicious. Some statements are considered so offensive that malice is implied and need not be affirmatively shown. Statements in this category include imputing to another person a crime punishable by law, or making charges against another in reference to that person's trade, office or profession which are likely to injure that person in his or her business. The crime need not be a felony; it is sufficient that a person has been accused of being guilty of a misdemeanor. Statements in the categories discussed in this paragraph do not require proof of actual damages either, contrary to most civil claims for money damages. The reason for this rule is that damage to a claimant's reputation can be presumed when the statement is sufficiently offensive, and also because reputation damages are difficult to prove.
Whoa, hold on there... Now, there are laws in the United States that have to deal with libel and slander, and your post violates the law regarding slander because you are accusing him of committing criminal sexual conduct with a minor (child molestation). Accusing someone of a criminal charge falsely (even if in jest) is considered slander.
Now if you said that he's an asshole, a jerk, a moron, an idiot, an abuser of the court system, a loser, a stupid motherfucker, dumbass, etc. then you're ok (and you'd be right too) because you have a right to express that kind of opinion about someone as long as you aren't threatening any violence or other harm towards them. By the way, if the stupid dumbfuck reads this message and wants to sue me, send me an email at darkraven26@hotmail.com and I'll tell you where to send the paperwork. I work for a company that does technical service for several quite well known lawfirms (which is how I get a lot of the legal knowledge I have), quite a few of which would be more than willing to defend me and also countersue for whatever legal costs are incurred as a result of a frivolous lawsuit.
Yes, and what's more is that the FCC is mandating that all TVs made by 2006 be digital. I wonder if this move was made for the advancement or technology, or for the advancement of the media moguls' agendas. Gee, that shouldn't be a tough one to figure out. I don't record much off of TV anymore. The only thing I recorded this year was the Stanley Cup Finals (GO WINGS!), but I think people should be allowed to tape their favorite TV shows (even if they are soap operas::shudder::), and watch them at a later time. We pay enough for premium channels that we should be able to record movies off of HBO and watch them a couple times even though it's a good bet I'll buy the DVD by the end of the year. Forcing digital technology on people by 2006 will only serve to restrict the public's fair-use protections, and does nothing to further the advancement of technology. Let's face it. The MPAA and other media companies have bought most of the government already. They've bought the FCC, they've bought Congress, they've bought the court system. The only person they haven't bought is the President, but since he's Republican (and a rich one at that) they don't have to. He'll do whatever the corporations say anyways.
While intentionally not paying royalties is obviously fraudulent accounting. The traditional system of applying overhead to jobs also needs to be eliminated because they're charging artists for idle time that's not the artists' fault, but the fault of the Labels. Take recording for instance. If a recording studio applies overhead based on the estimated number of studio hours they think they'll incur throughout the year, the overhead cost will be more per studio hour than if the studio applied overhead based on capacity of recording hours available which is the way it should be done. Artists should only have to pay for the time, labor, and materials it takes to produce their own albums, not the studio's idle time because they can't get enough business. While this will result in underapplied overhead for the studio and an increase in cost of sales, that's not the artists' fault and it shouldn't be their problem. The Labels and the studios need to find a way to bring their actual recording hours closer to capacity to get their profit margin back rather than overcharging the artists for it which is, unfortunately, still legal in the USA. This is why an album can sell 250,000 copies and still leave an artist owing money, because they're sticking it to them by overapplying overhead.
I'll go for that. I've been willing to throw myself in front of the cannon since the DMCA was first instituted. While the idea of spending time in prison really doesn't thrill me, the idea of living in a country which is more restrictive than China does even less for me. I'd rather go to jail defending the American right to fair-use and the freedom of information than cower in fear of the almighty RIAA, MPAA, and DOJ. As far as I'm concerned they can come get me with the handcuffs. Most of the music I download is Japanese even though my primary language is English. Japanese CDs are very expensive so I am very selective about the ones I buy, so I download select songs from artists I like and if I like the songs I buy the CD they came from. What's wrong with that? If I'm going to pay $25 for a CD that I can't listen to without buying it then I'm not going to buy it. By the way, if you think American companies have an inflated price tag for CDs, try Japan, where CDs routinely sell for 25-30 USD apiece.
I'd like to believe that there will be a swell of people rising up to fight the government and stand up for their rights in this matter, but I know that will not happen. It will not happen because the American nation has become complacent, lazy, and apathetic about the way their country is run. Joe Schmo down the street isn't going to care whether or not we have the right to trade songs because he doesn't do it not because he doesn't want to but because he's computer illiterate. John Q. Public in the next city doesn't like the law, but refuses to do anything about it because it's not serious enough to warrant letters to Congress or organized protest. It reminds me of something I once heard. "First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists, but I was neither, so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew so I did not speak out. And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me."
If people would just realize that there's a lot more than l337 kiddiez swapping the latest Britney Spears album on the line here. It's about the freedom of information, it's about fair-use, it's about the rights of the individuals outweighing those of the big businesses. If they would just realize this maybe they would be more willing to do something.
I don't know about any of you, but I have 5 workstations and one server on my home network and only one of the workstations and the server is used by me. How the hell is the DOJ going to figure out which one of us is illegally trading songs? I sure as hell don't want to be held liable for my brother's song swapping or my Dad's movie downloading, or whatever else anyone in this house downloads. I don't log my family's net activity nor will I do so. Since it is illegal to prosecute criminally on the basis of who owns the account what can they do to find out who on my network is actually doing the swapping? I think it's time they realize this isn't going to fix things at all. They're just going to crowd the prisons even more and when 1/3 of America's population is in prison maybe they'll discover that it was a pretty shitty law they wrote in the first place. On a side note I thought it was kind of funny how they simply crossed out that part about "for fiancial gain" from the act. Isn't that kind of taking away the original purpose of copyright law in the first place?
I'm seriously considering proxying my house's Internet connection through some Iranian, Cuban, Russian, or Korean server just to spite the losers at the DOJ. It's pretty bad when Cuba, Iran, Korea, and Russia have less restrictive laws regarding Internet use than the US does. China too I might add.
If I were in a school affected by this declaration I would simply disobey it and would encourage other students around me to do so. What would they do? Expell all of us? Bind and gag us to keep us from saying it. I don't care what anyone says, the pledge is an oath of patriotism. Despite the words "Under God" it's primary purpose is one of patriotism. Besides there's no law which says you HAVE to say the words "under God" If you don't believe in God just simply skip that part. Just like the swearing in oath for the military. You can omit the part of "So help me God" or even the word "swear" if you so choose. Besides, no one can force you by law to say the pledge. Are they going to arrest you for not saying it? Will you get sued for not saying it? No, and I'm getting sick of people saying that every religious reference must be construed as encouraging the establishment of religion. This is simply our government trying to bludgeon Christians into submission and it won't work with me. I for one will gladly say the pledge of allegiance in public if the occassion so calls for it, and I will encourage my children to say it even if it's ruled against. The more I see this happening the more I think the end times are upon us.
I definitely know what you mean about making the copies. I haven't had an original in my car ever since my brother got his CD changer and almost $350 in CDs ripped off when he got his car broken into. I think this is pure bullshit what the RIAA is pulling. They won't be satisfied till they have the whole world bowing at their feet. I can see it now. The three most powerful businesses in the world, the RIAA, the MPAA, and Microsoft running everything and making America a pure bureaucracy. I wonder if the seven heads of the beast could be seven really large companies. Another could be AOL Time Warner, and I can't think of who the other three might be. It's something to think about.
I think if this law gets passed I'm going to have to leave the US for another country. I'm sorry, but when our government starts becoming as restrictive as China's something is severely wrong here. In any case, I'm going to buy a new system NOW before any type of either law or Copy protection technologies go into effect and I will NOT buy another one until someone finds a way to crack whatever protection is out there. It's not a matter of if they will find it, it's a matter of when. People managed to modchip Playstations to play backup games and Japanese games, I'm sure we can figure out ohow to mod chip PCs in the future.
Actually, I originally went in as a computer science major, but after seeing the way the industry is turning for network engineers and techs I decided to change majors to accounting and go for my CPA to make a career change and become an accountant. I still love working on computers and I'll always be a geek, but I like the ideas and principles of accounting and truthfully I think there's a more secure future in it.
Well, you're right about one thing. I do think of Christianity as the only right way of living. And as to most Christians not exemplifying Christ's teachings. I may not be perfect, but I try, and I fail, continually, but I know that it's not my works that are saving me, cuz if it was, I'd be hellward bound. I do, however, believe that since this is America that you should be free to practice whatever religion you want as long as it doesn't prevent me from practicing mine. What I am saying is that Christians shouldn't take their kids to go see these movies. If you really read the books you'd know that they are full of *REAL* occult references that deal with witchcraft.
If you want to believe that then it's your choice. I'm not saying that people have to be Christian. I'm saying that I, as a Christian would not take my kids to see this movie, and that I would recommend other Christians do the same. If you think that it's all made up, then you had better be right.
I don't think it's all that funny actually, because if they bothered to brush up on their research they'd have found that there has been a large rise in children, especially teenagers becoming involved in the occult and in things like witchcraft. The Pagan Federation has had to appoint a youth officer to handle all these inquiries from children and teens who want to learn how to cast spells and learn witchcraft. And guess what, every time that a new Harry Potter book comes out they get a resurgance in the number of inquiries. What gets me most about Harry Potter is that the author uses real occult references instead of harmless made up stuff as was done in Bedknobs and Broomsticks and the Wizard of Oz, etc. So, yeah, if you want to teach your kid about witchcraft you ought to take him/her to see this movie, but I as a Christian would not take my child to see it if I had a child. As a side note, I am NOT even CLOSE to a right-wing extremist so don't even TRY to rope me into that category. There's lots of things the right wing extremists say that I am completely against.
Non-US citizens can find the full uncensored changelog at http://www.freeworld.net
For those of you who don't want to have to go through a click-thru agreement I have posted them on
http://www.burger-family.org/chglog-2_2_20.txt
and
http://www.geocities.com/vsavatar/chglog-2_2_20. tx t.
I'm doing this to spite the DMCA and if they come after me for it then so be it. I'm sure the EFF and other organizations and individuals will be willing to help me out with my legal fees if the feds come after me for it. Since I'm in the US, I may be putting my neck on the line for this, but there are some things worth risking imprisonment for. I'm young and single... I have a lot to lose, but if we can't even post information like this which we as a community have helped put together and support over time, then we have lost more than I can stand to lose.
Actually that is not the case, and by the way IANAL, but I am a first year law student. As the appellate court said they make no judgement as to whether or not there can be granted permanent injunctive relief nor on damages. They merely said the plantiff could not have a preliminary injunction. Besides, this case did not deal with the DMCA. It deals with the UTSA which is a totally separate and quite different law which had been around for longer than the DMCA. Publishing it is in fact a violation of the DMCA and the defendant could likely be enjoined under that law if the plantiff were to file for injunctive relief under that law unless the DMCA is held to be unconstitutional (which is still going through our courts and probably will be for another year or so). This does not make the other DeCSS cases go away because currently in MPAA vs. Emmanuel Goldstein relief is being sought under the DMCA.
As much as I'd like to, very few, if any people I know have any idea how to decrypt PGP messages. The problem with PGP is you have to have one side to encrypt it and the other side to decrypt it, and since a lot of my friends, family members, and clients are 100% computer illiterate, it does not lend itself to being a realistic solution. I think all messages should, by default, be encrypted by all SMTP servers before they leave the network and be decrypted by the receiving SMTP servers before delivery, by using one of RSA's lovely encryption mechanisms, but that's just me.
He's not only being over-zealous. He's being downright dumb. The chance of this actually being used against the developers is so small that it's almost unimaginable. He's just trying to piss off the US citizens who want to know what the vulnerabilities are so they'll get the law changed. We've been trying to change the law but Congress doesn't give a damn. If he's too much of a damn coward to take a chance and post known security flaws so that we can look for other ones which might be related then he needs to pass the torch to someone who won't be such a coward. Hell, he can email me with all those vulnerabilities and I'll post them publicly. I'll be your damn martyr if that's what you want because I'm not afraid. This is getting ridiculous. It's no longer open-source anymore. Now it's open-within-the-confines-of-the-law-source.
If I read the draft bill correctly, this would put an unfair burden on smaller hardware companies by forcing them to spend extra manpower and equipment to make their devices comply with government licensing standards... government licensing standards... that sounds like something China would do doesn't it? In any case, not only would it do that, but it virtually wipes out whatever remenants were left of fair use after the DMCA got passed. This is something which would discourage innovation and fair use and is therefore something that must be stopped at all cost. The whole concept of copyright has been totally changed into something which is overly broad and restricted and this very well could be the final blow. If this gets passed I'm leaving the US for some other country... maybe one of the Scandanavian countries. I won't live in a country that's as restricted as China.
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One problem with your reasoning here. If the band isn't in bed with the RIAA there's a decent chance that they don't have the funds to run an expensive website with tons of bandwidth regardless of how popular they are. This makes it so they either have to cap the number of active connections downloading their music at a relatively low level or they have to make their users deal with God awful download speeds. Both of these interfere with their ability to effectively distribute their music.
Well, while you may be correct about why the ISPs can ban this activity, your solution is nothing short of pure stupidity. I've been hearing people use the "if you don't like it then leave" argument for too many years of my short life and it makes just as little sense today as it did for all those years. It reminds me of what the Catholic church did back in medieval times when they said that everyone had to live by their rules or leave the Catholic church. Of course, leaving the church or being excommunicated meant that you would likely starve to death and be shunned from society. Sure, this is a little less extreme, but it follows the same principle in that the average American is dependent on the Internet for their day-to-day life.
First of all, there is virtually no such thing as a residential class broadband Internet service provider that allows the use of servers on their network so there isn't an option to "find an ISP that allows server usage" in most areas of the USA.
Second of all, virtually every service in the USA that does allow server usage is business class and costs a minimum of $400 per month to maintain. Most home users do not have that kind of money.
Third, I pay $50 a month for broadband access to the Internet. I should be allowed to do whatever I want to with that bandwidth as long as it falls within the limits of the law. I'm not saying the ISP needs to give me all the bandwidth I want. If they can prove that my bandwidth usage is hurting their network in some way then they should be allowed to throttle it to a reasonable extent to keep their QoS for other customers intact.
In conclusion, because there are almost no residential ISPs and because all business class accounts are cost-prohibitive for the average home user, there is therefore no availability for a home user to switch services. Because of this, your solutions is flawed in that it is not plausible.
I suggest civil disobedience to deal with the problem. If we get enough of this company's user base to bitch, moan, complain, and threaten to cancel service, and just outright break ToS by using P2P services and servers then they will back down or they will go bankrupt from losing all their customers. Quite a few laws in this country have been changed partly because of civil disobedience. There's no reason we can't get an ISP to change their ToS if they're faced with losing a significant portion of their customer base.
Hmmm... let me see here. I bought 4 CDs in the last two months. All of them were Japanese CDs by Japanese artists (none from Sony thank God). Now, since the majority of time doing homework is spent in front of a computer running Linux, I can't listen to new CDs by Sony Media on my computer so that means I have one of three choices:
1. Buy a Windows license from the Empire and use Sony's software, cluttering up my hard drive and desktop even more.
2. Buy a Boombox, which is unecessary now because my computer has some kickass Klipsch Promedia 4.0 speakers attached.
3. Tell Sony to go fuck themselves, boycott them, and wait till someone either writes a crack or until they make a Linux player for their music.
I'm opting for #3. If I wrote Japanese well enough for purposes of reading, I'd write their president a letter personally stating that I will boycott all of their products from here on out. I love this nice Sony Trinitron monitor I'm using right now, but I can easily do with something else if this thing ever breaks. Until Sony lets up on the DRM crap I'm not buying another damn thing from them.
I'm not going to let some greedy corporation dictate my buying habits. If they want to sleep with Bill Gates, they can, but I hope they wake up with crabs because they certainly deserve it. If they want to sell more stereos and CD players then they better find a way to sell them to someone else, because Panasonic, AIWA, and JVC are just as good to me. I vote with my pocketbook as well as with a voting machine.
Where do you get this strange idea that all lawyers are in their occupations for the money? When I get my law degree and bar card I promise that I will do pro-bono work as often as I'm able to do so and still make a reasonable living. I personally think the law should be available to everyone, not just large corporate interests or individuals with deep pockets. I plan on serving as a public defender for at least a few years in the criminal justice system and maybe moving on from there into intellectual property law as one who defends those accused of violating laws regarding IP. I can also say that there are a large number of lawyers who do routinely take on pro-bono cases for the same reason, while others take on high-profile pro-bono cases to gain notoriety. The problem is, there are so many abuses of the system that if we were to take on every case that came to us, we would never sleep or eat, much less make a decent living. A very old, well-known text states, "Thou shalt not stand with the mighty against the weak." The problem is, that's what the USA as a country is doing now, it is standing with the large, mighty corporations against individuals that don't have the money to defend themselves. This should not be and I intend to fight against it as others like the EFF lawyers also fight it, but there's just too many frivolous lawsuits out there and no way we can take all of them on, so we do the best we can with what we have. In summary, don't think that just because Joe Blow's lawyer is fighting a case pro-bono that he is going to rush through it or not put his heart and soul into it. Granted, there are many lawyers that do think that way, but there are many that do not.
Yes, you are correct, this story is similar to the changelog story from awhile back. I already know I'm not going to become very popular here saying this, but since I'm not a karma whore I could care less. Alan Cox is a coward. The fact that this information is not posted publically is a pure act of cowardice. First of all, this information has nothing to do with the DMCA and would not even stand a chance of holding up in a court if charges were brought against Alan especially if he's tried by a jury of his peers. Second, if, by some weird ass twist of fate, it did stand in a jury trial it would certainly be thrown out either by the appeals court or the supreme court which could result in parts of the DMCA becoming invalidated and thus liberating us from at least part of its tyranny.
Alan needs to turn over kernel development to someone with more balls than he has. I've thrown myself in front of the cannon several times in an attempt to get the DMCA overturned, but no one has fired it yet. I'm going to throw myself in front of it again by posting the secret text on my webserver located right here. Alan has no right to call himself a leader in any sense for as long as he refuses to do something to change what he knows is wrong. Any man who knowingly allows an unjust act to occur(the imprisonment of a fellow programmer), does nothing to change it, and hides in fear of it, has no right to call himself a man, much less a leader.
I hope you're reading this Alan because I know you read these articles on a regular basis and yes, I am attacking your values and principles. Perhaps it's time to reevaluate them because you sir, are a coward who will allow injustice to continue when you are one of the few people who has enough public acknowledgement to actually have the ability to make a difference, whereas I, a lowly network engineer with no fame or notoriety, am willing to put my personal freedom on the line to make that difference.
IMAX (Ionia Maximum Security Prison) is Michigan's highest security prison. It is located in Ionia Michigan and it's where they keep all the multiple murderers, the criminally insane, and several other types of violent offenders most of which are serving one or more life sentences.
Well if he got married before he went into prison he could have conjugal visits with his wife. Then he could have hetero sex. Minimum security prisons are more like county jails than IMAX type facilities. There really isn't a lot of raping that goes on in there... granted there are people who think that homo sex is better than none at all and they may get into that, but you don't get a lot of violent prisoners in minimum security facilities. Also, in minimum security federal prisons it isn't all spent in lockdown like it is in max security installations. Sure, it's not a nice place to be, no prison is, but there are worse places to be than a minimum security federal prison (Terre Haute anyone?).
Well, it depends... if he knowingly and maliciously makes a statement to any third party which he knows to be false then it could be considered slander. Libel is actually more serious in some states and could be used in place of slander because it is public and in print. David Turner at Findlaw.com defines slander like this:
Slander, or oral defamation, occurs when a statement is uttered to a third party which is false and malicious. Some statements are considered so offensive that malice is implied and need not be affirmatively shown. Statements in this category include imputing to another person a crime punishable by law, or making charges against another in reference to that person's trade, office or profession which are likely to injure that person in his or her business. The crime need not be a felony; it is sufficient that a person has been accused of being guilty of a misdemeanor. Statements in the categories discussed in this paragraph do not require proof of actual damages either, contrary to most civil claims for money damages. The reason for this rule is that damage to a claimant's reputation can be presumed when the statement is sufficiently offensive, and also because reputation damages are difficult to prove.
Whoa, hold on there... Now, there are laws in the United States that have to deal with libel and slander, and your post violates the law regarding slander because you are accusing him of committing criminal sexual conduct with a minor (child molestation). Accusing someone of a criminal charge falsely (even if in jest) is considered slander.
Now if you said that he's an asshole, a jerk, a moron, an idiot, an abuser of the court system, a loser, a stupid motherfucker, dumbass, etc. then you're ok (and you'd be right too) because you have a right to express that kind of opinion about someone as long as you aren't threatening any violence or other harm towards them. By the way, if the stupid dumbfuck reads this message and wants to sue me, send me an email at darkraven26@hotmail.com and I'll tell you where to send the paperwork. I work for a company that does technical service for several quite well known lawfirms (which is how I get a lot of the legal knowledge I have), quite a few of which would be more than willing to defend me and also countersue for whatever legal costs are incurred as a result of a frivolous lawsuit.
Yes, and what's more is that the FCC is mandating that all TVs made by 2006 be digital. I wonder if this move was made for the advancement or technology, or for the advancement of the media moguls' agendas. Gee, that shouldn't be a tough one to figure out. I don't record much off of TV anymore. The only thing I recorded this year was the Stanley Cup Finals (GO WINGS!), but I think people should be allowed to tape their favorite TV shows (even if they are soap operas ::shudder::), and watch them at a later time. We pay enough for premium channels that we should be able to record movies off of HBO and watch them a couple times even though it's a good bet I'll buy the DVD by the end of the year. Forcing digital technology on people by 2006 will only serve to restrict the public's fair-use protections, and does nothing to further the advancement of technology. Let's face it. The MPAA and other media companies have bought most of the government already. They've bought the FCC, they've bought Congress, they've bought the court system. The only person they haven't bought is the President, but since he's Republican (and a rich one at that) they don't have to. He'll do whatever the corporations say anyways.
While intentionally not paying royalties is obviously fraudulent accounting. The traditional system of applying overhead to jobs also needs to be eliminated because they're charging artists for idle time that's not the artists' fault, but the fault of the Labels. Take recording for instance. If a recording studio applies overhead based on the estimated number of studio hours they think they'll incur throughout the year, the overhead cost will be more per studio hour than if the studio applied overhead based on capacity of recording hours available which is the way it should be done. Artists should only have to pay for the time, labor, and materials it takes to produce their own albums, not the studio's idle time because they can't get enough business. While this will result in underapplied overhead for the studio and an increase in cost of sales, that's not the artists' fault and it shouldn't be their problem. The Labels and the studios need to find a way to bring their actual recording hours closer to capacity to get their profit margin back rather than overcharging the artists for it which is, unfortunately, still legal in the USA. This is why an album can sell 250,000 copies and still leave an artist owing money, because they're sticking it to them by overapplying overhead.
I'll go for that. I've been willing to throw myself in front of the cannon since the DMCA was first instituted. While the idea of spending time in prison really doesn't thrill me, the idea of living in a country which is more restrictive than China does even less for me. I'd rather go to jail defending the American right to fair-use and the freedom of information than cower in fear of the almighty RIAA, MPAA, and DOJ. As far as I'm concerned they can come get me with the handcuffs. Most of the music I download is Japanese even though my primary language is English. Japanese CDs are very expensive so I am very selective about the ones I buy, so I download select songs from artists I like and if I like the songs I buy the CD they came from. What's wrong with that? If I'm going to pay $25 for a CD that I can't listen to without buying it then I'm not going to buy it. By the way, if you think American companies have an inflated price tag for CDs, try Japan, where CDs routinely sell for 25-30 USD apiece.
I'd like to believe that there will be a swell of people rising up to fight the government and stand up for their rights in this matter, but I know that will not happen. It will not happen because the American nation has become complacent, lazy, and apathetic about the way their country is run. Joe Schmo down the street isn't going to care whether or not we have the right to trade songs because he doesn't do it not because he doesn't want to but because he's computer illiterate. John Q. Public in the next city doesn't like the law, but refuses to do anything about it because it's not serious enough to warrant letters to Congress or organized protest. It reminds me of something I once heard. "First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists, but I was neither, so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew so I did not speak out. And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me."
If people would just realize that there's a lot more than l337 kiddiez swapping the latest Britney Spears album on the line here. It's about the freedom of information, it's about fair-use, it's about the rights of the individuals outweighing those of the big businesses. If they would just realize this maybe they would be more willing to do something.
I don't know about any of you, but I have 5 workstations and one server on my home network and only one of the workstations and the server is used by me. How the hell is the DOJ going to figure out which one of us is illegally trading songs? I sure as hell don't want to be held liable for my brother's song swapping or my Dad's movie downloading, or whatever else anyone in this house downloads. I don't log my family's net activity nor will I do so. Since it is illegal to prosecute criminally on the basis of who owns the account what can they do to find out who on my network is actually doing the swapping? I think it's time they realize this isn't going to fix things at all. They're just going to crowd the prisons even more and when 1/3 of America's population is in prison maybe they'll discover that it was a pretty shitty law they wrote in the first place. On a side note I thought it was kind of funny how they simply crossed out that part about "for fiancial gain" from the act. Isn't that kind of taking away the original purpose of copyright law in the first place?
I'm seriously considering proxying my house's Internet connection through some Iranian, Cuban, Russian, or Korean server just to spite the losers at the DOJ. It's pretty bad when Cuba, Iran, Korea, and Russia have less restrictive laws regarding Internet use than the US does. China too I might add.
If I were in a school affected by this declaration I would simply disobey it and would encourage other students around me to do so. What would they do? Expell all of us? Bind and gag us to keep us from saying it. I don't care what anyone says, the pledge is an oath of patriotism. Despite the words "Under God" it's primary purpose is one of patriotism. Besides there's no law which says you HAVE to say the words "under God" If you don't believe in God just simply skip that part. Just like the swearing in oath for the military. You can omit the part of "So help me God" or even the word "swear" if you so choose. Besides, no one can force you by law to say the pledge. Are they going to arrest you for not saying it? Will you get sued for not saying it? No, and I'm getting sick of people saying that every religious reference must be construed as encouraging the establishment of religion. This is simply our government trying to bludgeon Christians into submission and it won't work with me. I for one will gladly say the pledge of allegiance in public if the occassion so calls for it, and I will encourage my children to say it even if it's ruled against. The more I see this happening the more I think the end times are upon us.
I definitely know what you mean about making the copies. I haven't had an original in my car ever since my brother got his CD changer and almost $350 in CDs ripped off when he got his car broken into. I think this is pure bullshit what the RIAA is pulling. They won't be satisfied till they have the whole world bowing at their feet. I can see it now. The three most powerful businesses in the world, the RIAA, the MPAA, and Microsoft running everything and making America a pure bureaucracy. I wonder if the seven heads of the beast could be seven really large companies. Another could be AOL Time Warner, and I can't think of who the other three might be. It's something to think about.
I think if this law gets passed I'm going to have to leave the US for another country. I'm sorry, but when our government starts becoming as restrictive as China's something is severely wrong here. In any case, I'm going to buy a new system NOW before any type of either law or Copy protection technologies go into effect and I will NOT buy another one until someone finds a way to crack whatever protection is out there. It's not a matter of if they will find it, it's a matter of when. People managed to modchip Playstations to play backup games and Japanese games, I'm sure we can figure out ohow to mod chip PCs in the future.
Actually, I originally went in as a computer science major, but after seeing the way the industry is turning for network engineers and techs I decided to change majors to accounting and go for my CPA to make a career change and become an accountant. I still love working on computers and I'll always be a geek, but I like the ideas and principles of accounting and truthfully I think there's a more secure future in it.
Well, you're right about one thing. I do think of Christianity as the only right way of living. And as to most Christians not exemplifying Christ's teachings. I may not be perfect, but I try, and I fail, continually, but I know that it's not my works that are saving me, cuz if it was, I'd be hellward bound. I do, however, believe that since this is America that you should be free to practice whatever religion you want as long as it doesn't prevent me from practicing mine. What I am saying is that Christians shouldn't take their kids to go see these movies. If you really read the books you'd know that they are full of *REAL* occult references that deal with witchcraft.
If you want to believe that then it's your choice. I'm not saying that people have to be Christian. I'm saying that I, as a Christian would not take my kids to see this movie, and that I would recommend other Christians do the same. If you think that it's all made up, then you had better be right.
I don't think it's all that funny actually, because if they bothered to brush up on their research they'd have found that there has been a large rise in children, especially teenagers becoming involved in the occult and in things like witchcraft. The Pagan Federation has had to appoint a youth officer to handle all these inquiries from children and teens who want to learn how to cast spells and learn witchcraft. And guess what, every time that a new Harry Potter book comes out they get a resurgance in the number of inquiries. What gets me most about Harry Potter is that the author uses real occult references instead of harmless made up stuff as was done in Bedknobs and Broomsticks and the Wizard of Oz, etc. So, yeah, if you want to teach your kid about witchcraft you ought to take him/her to see this movie, but I as a Christian would not take my child to see it if I had a child. As a side note, I am NOT even CLOSE to a right-wing extremist so don't even TRY to rope me into that category. There's lots of things the right wing extremists say that I am completely against.
Non-US citizens can find the full uncensored changelog at http://www.freeworld.net
. tx t.
For those of you who don't want to have to go through a click-thru agreement I have posted them on
http://www.burger-family.org/chglog-2_2_20.txt
and
http://www.geocities.com/vsavatar/chglog-2_2_20
I'm doing this to spite the DMCA and if they come after me for it then so be it. I'm sure the EFF and other organizations and individuals will be willing to help me out with my legal fees if the feds come after me for it. Since I'm in the US, I may be putting my neck on the line for this, but there are some things worth risking imprisonment for. I'm young and single... I have a lot to lose, but if we can't even post information like this which we as a community have helped put together and support over time, then we have lost more than I can stand to lose.
Actually that is not the case, and by the way IANAL, but I am a first year law student. As the appellate court said they make no judgement as to whether or not there can be granted permanent injunctive relief nor on damages. They merely said the plantiff could not have a preliminary injunction. Besides, this case did not deal with the DMCA. It deals with the UTSA which is a totally separate and quite different law which had been around for longer than the DMCA. Publishing it is in fact a violation of the DMCA and the defendant could likely be enjoined under that law if the plantiff were to file for injunctive relief under that law unless the DMCA is held to be unconstitutional (which is still going through our courts and probably will be for another year or so). This does not make the other DeCSS cases go away because currently in MPAA vs. Emmanuel Goldstein relief is being sought under the DMCA.
As much as I'd like to, very few, if any people I know have any idea how to decrypt PGP messages. The problem with PGP is you have to have one side to encrypt it and the other side to decrypt it, and since a lot of my friends, family members, and clients are 100% computer illiterate, it does not lend itself to being a realistic solution. I think all messages should, by default, be encrypted by all SMTP servers before they leave the network and be decrypted by the receiving SMTP servers before delivery, by using one of RSA's lovely encryption mechanisms, but that's just me.
He's not only being over-zealous. He's being downright dumb. The chance of this actually being used against the developers is so small that it's almost unimaginable. He's just trying to piss off the US citizens who want to know what the vulnerabilities are so they'll get the law changed. We've been trying to change the law but Congress doesn't give a damn. If he's too much of a damn coward to take a chance and post known security flaws so that we can look for other ones which might be related then he needs to pass the torch to someone who won't be such a coward. Hell, he can email me with all those vulnerabilities and I'll post them publicly. I'll be your damn martyr if that's what you want because I'm not afraid. This is getting ridiculous. It's no longer open-source anymore. Now it's open-within-the-confines-of-the-law-source.
If I read the draft bill correctly, this would put an unfair burden on smaller hardware companies by forcing them to spend extra manpower and equipment to make their devices comply with government licensing standards... government licensing standards... that sounds like something China would do doesn't it? In any case, not only would it do that, but it virtually wipes out whatever remenants were left of fair use after the DMCA got passed. This is something which would discourage innovation and fair use and is therefore something that must be stopped at all cost. The whole concept of copyright has been totally changed into something which is overly broad and restricted and this very well could be the final blow. If this gets passed I'm leaving the US for some other country... maybe one of the Scandanavian countries. I won't live in a country that's as restricted as China.