"Why did SDMI have the challenge in the first place? They were enthusiastic about the challenge, but when someone cracks their technologies, they get so upset and were even reluctant to admit that someone had. If they say "try to crack this" they should accept it if someone does crack it, and also accept the results of that. Furthermore, why were they challenging people to crack a watermarking technology that is currently being used???"
If they truly expected that it wouldn't be broken, that is outright stupidity. Also, their "hacksdmi" challenge would seemingly, IANAL, put them on shaky ground as to preventing a participant from publishing the results of their participation.
Obviously, some corporate drone got giddy with the idea that SDMI was somehow "hackerproof" and ceme out with this "challenge" because he couldn't resist trying to give the hackers "what for"...
This has happened before. Wasn't it a corporation that publically proclaimed the Titanic "unsinkable", only to be proven wrong on the first trip?
"First off, you'd better not act that way in a real court of law, because disrespect for a judge will get you thrown out on your ear.
Of course, you're 'tuFF Boy' here because you're on Slashdot. That's understandable. Do get a clue though, before you enter real life."
Of COURSE I'm not stupid enough to think I'd disrespect a judge in a courtroom. However, if a judge behaved towards me or my counsel like Kaplan did Garbus and 2600, I'd certainly use his actions as evidence against him, in overturning any judgement.
Just as it would be foolish for a defendant to behave like that in a court, it's just AS foolish for Kaplan to conduct himself the way he did. He certaly made it easier, NOT harder, to appeal his own judgement.
Also, you seem to imply that I'm inmature for expressing my contempt for a contemptible "judge"'s actions in a case. Can't you see what is WRONG with that attitude? NOTHING can be above ALL question ina free society!!!! NOTHING!!!
If we as citizens have an ABSOLUTE 1st Amendment right to political speech, which includes bashing or praising Presidents and Congressmen without government reprisal, why does that not ALSO include judges? How can it not? Aren't Federal Judges part of the government, and therefore, subservient to the Constitution?
"Corporations by their nature are amoral, mindless beasts..."
Amoral, yes (remember the Pinkerton's "Geek profiling" service they are offering to schools to single out geeks as "potentially dangerous"?), but not mindless. Corporations seek profit like a tiger seeks prey. A world where IP companies have "carte blanche" to charge whatever they want for media is obviously a major objective for them.
"they'll have more luck in China, where censorship is part of the very society... I feel sorry for the Chinese in that regard."
I feel sorry for the Chinese, or any people not living in an open society, though I hate their evil governments. What is scary, is that laws like the DMCA threaten to end all freedom in the USA, and turn us into a "Corporate State" where corporations own everything. This is the opposite extreme of "communism" where the government owns everything, though the end results would be the same.
Just as people were no freer under Hitler's fascist Germany than under Stalin's USSR, they'd be no better off in Jack Valenti's "SDMI Rebublic"
It's clear to me that the USA as a free country is collapsing. The twin pressures of a non-productive population viting themselves more and more "bread and circuses" out of the pockets of the workers, and corporations extering pressure on those same politicos (who humor them so as to FUND these "bread and circuses" re-election schemes) is causing us to lose our freedom.
We are noticeably less free today as we were in 1984, I shudder to think of what we will be like in 2084...
"Oh, and kids... 1350 Hz is not some whacky frequency that only bats can hear. It's somewhere around E above high C, which is a perfectly fine note, when you think about it. I mean, I play trumpet, I love listening to trumpet music. Cutting out 1350 Hz will effect everyone from Maynard Ferguson to Miles Davis (well maybe not Miles Davis.;-)"
"1349 Hz ought to be enough for anybody" -Jack Valenti
I get your point. You'd think that any "new" media that is intentionally inferior to the old would fail in the market. But, remember, we're dealing with CONSUMERS here... Windows `9x is clearly an inferior and more restrictive product when compared to OS/2, Linux, BeOS, or even the original DOS it's still based on, yet it still dominates the market because of superior marketing.
Maybe the IP cartels think they can get SDMI accepted in the same manner?
"If they were patented, how they work would be required to be fully described in detail and on public file in the patent office. By keeping the code s33cr3t, they get no protection but can hope that security through obscurity will keep the innards of their function safe. Obviously it doesn't."
And the DMCA seems to have the effect of assigning perpetual "patent" protection to such "trade secret" schemes as well. Which is clearly Unconstitutional.
I think you make some very excellent points! Well done.
"Between these poles I think that there is a rational middle ground. The type of rights enforcement technology the RIAA is insisting upon cannot work, as with DeCSS every player has to have the secret key."
Which is why any such scheme that has to rely on "security by obscurity" will fail. Any consumer-level product will end up being broken, simply because it CANNOT change to make it incompatible with any breaks.
Simply put, any replacement of the audio CD will fail if the consumer is forced to replace ALL of his players and/or media every few months to a year because of SDMI "improvements" in response to breaks. Audio and video media MUST be ubiquitous to succeed.
The ultimate piracy prevention is to charge reasonable prices for the product, which is something the RIAA and MPAA are completely unwilling to do. Which is why they are wasting MILLIONS of dollars on doomed protection schemes, for the sole purpose of the ability to FORCE the market to bear whatever price they choose to set, by preventing piracy.
The RIAA and MPAA are charging many MANY times the cost of their product for the product.
I do NOT endorse piracy, but I do recognize that it does serve a legitimate purpose in giving the IP companies incentive to keep the prices reasobable.
"The RIAA/SDMI released all watermarked music tracks, of which some contained watermarks currently in production, with a challenge to crack them. Obviously, they assumed that no one would be able to crack it"
All the more indication the RIAA/MPAA et all are on a suicide march. They have no clue about technology, but yet, have the power and influence to get law passed restricting the rights of US citizens to it...
There never was and never WILL be a copy protection scheme that will absolutely prevent someone who is determined to copy from copying it, so long as the copy protection MUST allow the thing to be read, run, viewed, or played.
Ultimately, they will be forced into suing their customers, which will be the end of it, any business that sues its customers because it's scheme or product can't suceed on it's own merits fails (Rambus).
What our government has to decide is this:
Do we want to become a country where corporations have absolute control over IP, or a free country where there is a right to innovate?
Obviously, if the DMCA sticks, and all individual initiative is crushed, some other country without restrictive IP laws will one day take the lead in technological innovation.
"Your abuse of Judge Kaplan is unwarranted. I also disagree with his decision, but your suggestion that he is corrupt and ran a "show trial" is utterly unfounded. In particular, the contention that Kaplan couldn't be fair because a different lawyer at the law firm he left several years ago represented one party in a tangentially related matter is nothing more than conspiracy-mongering."
I don't see how "judge" Kaplan's conduct could be construed as anything but dishonorable. The mere fact that he excoriated Martin Garbus for a less direct link with the plantiffs than his OWN, when he did this knowing that he had a similar link to them, shows:
1. Stupidity (he didn't remember, very unlikely)
2. Corruption (he admonished Garbus for conduct certanly no less conflicting than his own just to do anything he could to make the defendants look bad).
3. Napoleonic Complex: I'm the "judge" and I'm ABOVE all question. (This goes against the founding principles of this country... there is NOTHING that is above all question in any free society)
4. There was nothing illegal or improper about his OR Garbus's past associations with MPAA member companies, but he excoriated Garbus solely to make him look bad.
I really dont' see any fifth possibility. If Kaplan's conflict of interest was of no consequence, then Martin Garbus's lesser conflict (having once worked at a firm that represented a company later bought by Time-Warner) was also of no consequence. Nonetheless, the alleged "judge" saw fit to go on record excoriating Garbus, and even threaten future disciplinary action.
It makes Kaplan look all the worse, in that he did this in response to a MPAA motion to remove Garbus, and that he completely dismissed a later defense motion to recuse himself for a very similar, but even more direct conflict of his own.
Had Kaplan recused himself, or NOT excoriated Garbus, then set down the ruling that he did, I'd have some respect for him, as he would have at least been consistent. Instead, he acted in a manner more consistent with a televangelist caught with a hooker than a judge. Indeed, his actions condemming Garbus were very reminicient of Jimmy Swaggart's condemnation of Jim Bakker, only to be soon after caught in his own sex scandal...
The impression I got (and the same impression the majority of/.'ers got) was that of a "show trial" by a "kangaroo court" where the verdict was in before there was any evidence presented. The fact that this is the feeling I have is solely the fault of Kaplan's own conduct. I feel that his conduct in this case leaves me with no reasonable way to give him the benefit of the doubt.
To sum it all up:
1. Kaplan excoriated Garbus for conduct lesser than, or no more equal to what he himself had done.
2. Kaplan repeatedly abused Garbus, made his contempt completely blatant. Not for one moment in the transcripts did Kaplan treat Garbus with anything approaching civility or respect, that was due him and his clients.
3. Kaplan refused to recuse himself when his own conflict of interest was exposed. Furthermore, it took him 90 pages to explain WHY he shouldn't recuse himself. It would seem to me that if it takes you 90 pages to explain why you shouldn't recuse yourself, then you SHOULD have recused yourself if you had any shread of honor or integrity.
4. Kaplan most narrowly interpreted the DMCA (while ignoring it's fair use clause that allows reverse engineering for interoperability, which making a Linux DVD player would seem to me to be covered by) but only the parts that favored the MPAA position. Kaplan furtermore ruled web links to DeCSS illegal, something not at ALL covered under the DMCA, and clearly something beyond the scope of his authority.
"If a watermark qualifies as an effective access control measure, then I would think that by that logic, any player that doesn't check for watermarks would be considered an access circumvention device and therefore illegal. Or would they be legal because they have a commercially significant purpose? This is confusing."
You may be right in saying that you COULD by narrow interpretation, claim that a player that ignores watermark would be a "circumvention" device.
Certainly, that's what the MPAA/RIAA et all would say. Probably the only thing that may keep that from flying is the sheer number of non-wartermark players there are out there. Ruling them all illegal would create a VERY public upheaval that even our sheep-like media would not be able to ignore.
My opinion on this is: The RIAA/MPAA will push and push SDMI to try to replace MP3 (a futile crusade, but they don't seem to get it). Once they get a lot of watermark sensitive players out there, to the point they are more common than the non-watermark players, THEN they might be able to pull off litigation on that point.
The kicker though, is that I just don't see SDMI or any other restrictive format replacing MP3 as the "defacto standard" audio format. Are some of them better than MP3? Sure, but not ONE of them is completely non-controlled like MP3 is. The next MP3 will be just as uncontrolled as MP3 or else it will fail.
Also, the RIAA labels have no interest in even seeing SDMI succeed. They don't want to sell music as digital audio files instead of physical media. They have the MOST vested interest in seeing to it that ANY such initiative fails. If recordings start becoming distributed by audio files via the Internet, instead of physical media, even IF it's SDMI, they lose control over the artists.
"The DMCA has so far only protected the rights of big business. The courts have a history of supporting free exchange of ideas. I have faith in our courts. I hope this is not misplaced."
I don't have much faith in the courts. Perhaps I'm pessimistic, but so-called "judge" Kaplan seems to be a typical example of the neo-Napoleonoic complex that most of our newer judges seem to have.
Also, keep in mind, that Judges come from lawyers. Lawyers come from lawfirms. The past 20 years has seen a geometric increase in litigation, most of it being done BY the corporations and the powerful. From that pool of lawyers come the next crop of judges. Today, I'd doubt it's possible to apppoint a Federal judge who hasn't done a lot of work for at least one of the aggressive IP cartels.
Judges are supposed to be different from lawyers. They are supposed to be impartial, ubiased, and rule on the LAW, not their personal biases. If "judge" Kaplan is indeed a typical example of the modern judge, then it's obvious that wishing for impartiality is, indeed, wishing for something that won't happen.
"Do we believe we can defeat any audio protection scheme? Certainly, the technical details of any scheme will become known publicly through reverse engineering. Using the techniques we have presented here, we believe no public watermark-based scheme intended to thwart copying will succeed."
Which makes the DMCA all the more abhorrent. It's NOT a copyright protection law, but a copy protection protection law.
Copy protection was proven an ineffective mechanism back in the 1980's, and it's just as ineffective now, if not more so, given the much greater number of computer professionals (that you may call "hackers") than there were then.
Given that the right to make a backup copy is an established RIGHT under the Constitutional derived principle of "fair use" would it not follow that any law preventing you from circumventing copy protection to excercise that right would be Unconstitutional?
Keep in mind, the Constitution places SEVERE limits on the scope and duration of patents and copyrights (though that has been violated many times by Congress and several presidents, most recently, Clinton. when copyrights were extended pretty much to infinity).
"It would be a shame if Princeton's legal dept tells the researchers to back down because they don't have a legal leg to stand on here."
The fact is, they DO have a legal leg to stand on here... The rights of "fair use" and "reverse engineering" were established by the courts over the years in many many, precedent setting cases (such as the Betamax case) as being from the Constitution. NO statutory law can "outrank" the Constitution, it's the higest law of the land, from which there is no option but to change it.
The DMCA has many MANY problems with the Constitution, and this threat towards these Princeton professors proves, it could have this little side effect of DESTROYING academia.
The unanimous voice vote "coup de etat" nature of the DMCA's passage is even more insidious. Congress, and Bill Clinton, in effect, conducted an illegal Constitutional Convention, in their roles in passing that law. The DMCA cannot be legal without a Constitutional Amendment.
Remember, there has yet been NO TEST of the Constitutionality of the DMCA. This didn't happen in the 2600 case, because it was presided over a conflicted judge (the so-called "judge" Kaplan) who did not hide for one second his contempt for both the defendants and their counsel.
And, he also had worked for a lawfirm that had DIRECTLY represented a plantiff before becoming a judge (Martin Garbus, lead attorney for 2600 and the EFF was EXCORIATED by Kaplan for previously working for a firm that had represented a company that was eventually BOUGHT by Time Warner.)
Kaplan refused to recuse himself, and ran a "show trial" with an illogical and indefensible verdict. But then, one only need have paid attention to the judge's behavior in the pre-trial to know that the verdict was a foregone conclusion. Kaplan ruled on the most narrow POSSIBLE interpretation of the DMCA, even ignoring the language in the DMCA itself which would seem to make reverse-engineering CSS for the purpose of creating a Linux DVD player perfectly legal.
"Hell, even if they didn't have a legal leg to stand on it would still be fun to watch SDMI go after several professors at Princeton. High visibility and bad publicity for SDMI. I'd pay to watch those court proceedings."
I would think that the MPAA/RIAA/SDMI cartels et all, would be very hesitant to go forward with such a case. 2600 was an easy target because it was VERY easy to spin them off as "anarchistic hackers". Princeton professors will be a lot harder to mount a slander campaign against. It's a sad indictment of the US legal system that not all defendants are equal before the eyes of the law.
What the IP cartel is doing right now is trying to win by intimidation, threat, and extortion what it probably can't win in a courtroom (as it's certain that all or at least MOST of the DMCA would be struck down or at the very least, limited by the courts). They are hoping that either the authors of the paper will back down, or else Princeton will back them down.
If I were the author of the paper, I'd be considering pulling an "Infineon" on the IP cartel: What they are doing right now (using threat, intimidation, and extortion) kinda smacks as illegal under the RICO laws doesn't it?
"You are assuming that there must be a way to keep the status-quo with regards to how musicians live and work, while providing a different method for them to receive compensation. That's not a fair way to look at things. There is no natural 'right' for musicians to exist; they exist because of the laws and desires of the society they are part of"
The whole public disinformation case the RIAA/MPAA et all have been making is a farcical JOKE. They evoke sympathy for the ARTISTS, which the RIAA does NOT represent, not even indirectly. The RIAA does not, has not, and never will pay artists.
What the RIAA is, is a collossal, (and illegal, IMO, as they would seem to be engaging in the type of collusion that is illegal in most other industries) cartel of the largest record labels.
They have only one mission: Preserve the 20th century business model that gives the record labels control of distribution, sales, and perpetual rights to over 90%+ of the music out there. Not to mention, the power this gives them over the artists that lets them rake in the VAST majority of the total revenue.
Their very EXISTANCE is threatened by the Internet and MP3. For the first time in history, there is a way for bands to publish worldwide at little expense, WITHOUT the need to sign their rights (and most of their profit) away to the 5-6 mega corp radio labels that make up the RIAA.
Napster, Gnutella, et all, are worse for the RIAA in that they provide a vast, unregulated, and popular method for non-RIAA artists to be noticed worldwide. Like a vast, "you say it we play it" on demand radio station.
Ultimately, a Napster-esque system will benefit the artists for that reason. Especially if a subscription model were employed that doled out micro-payments to the ARTISTS per download, which is what I would advocate.
IMO, the BEST way ISP's can protect themselves from being terminally harassed by various corpers trying to harass their customers over IP would be to NOT keep logs more than 12-24 hours MAXIMUM. This would keep logs long enough to be able to trace a cracker should a break in occur, but be short enough to both protect their customers AND themselves from harassment.
It would be very rare for the MPAA/RIAA et all to be able to get and serve any kind of "search warrant" for server logs in less than a 24-hour time frame.
Of course, in the case of the MPAA, they probably have "judge" Kaplan's cell phone number, not to mention a nice little rubber-stamp of his signature and thousands of "fill in the blanks" search warrants:)
"That said, this is exactly what the MPAA should be doing. Not attacking the enablers, but attacking the actual movie fans themselves."
You are correct. This is what I want to see them and the RIAA do. Why? Because this will ultimately lead to the demise of the DMCA. This is our ONLY shot to wake the masses.
Suing the customers is never a sound business model. Just ask Rambus. That's why the RIAA attacked Napster itself, instead of users, because the centralized nature of Napster allowed it. The only way to attack Gnutella IS to attack users.
"1. They aren't laws, they're rules. I can't explain the distinction well because IANAL"
I still do not see how that addresses the Constitutionality question...
Even IF it's covered in a statutory law, the Constitution does NOT specifically grant Congress the ability to make law in this area. Just because a LAW exists does not mean that it is a just, or LEGAL law, as the highest law is the Constitution, which is to statutory law what a city ordinance is to the state government's laws... Statutory law is outranked, so to speak, when it conflicts.
Amemnment's 9 and 10 grant the states and the people the powers that are NOT granted to the Feds in the rest of the Constitution, and DENY all such powers not SPECIFICALLY enumerated in the Constitution to the Federal government.
The only loophole, and it's been so exploited it's no longer funny, is the "Interstate and Foreign Commerce" clause.
I fail to see how the Federal Government can regulate a local business's office "safety" under the guise of "Interstate and Foreign commerce".
You want to know why our government is bad and getting worse? It's because it's been living above the rule of Constitutional Law since the 1930's, and been moving ever further from it yearly. If the Feds want a power that the Constitution does NOT give them, the LEGAL way to get it is to AMEND it. This was done in the 1920's when they wanted the income tax. But seemingly by 1940, and beyond, they no longer feel the need to do this to grab power...
Instead of doing the PROPER thing, which mandates exhaustive public debate, AND THE APPROVAL OF 2/3rds of the STATES, the Feds just grab whatever they want, whenever they want it. In the Clinton administration, this included land, natural resources, and the imposition of onerous regulations, without public debate. Not saying only Democrats do this, each President since FDR has done the same thing, each has left a Federal government more intrusive and powerful than he found it.
Which is why I believe some time in the future, the USA will evolve into an autocracy, to the point that enough get fed up and invoke another document that was passed into law, on July 4, 1776...
It begins, "When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."
"Just because it wasn't done in the halls of Congress and they were considered too dull for even C-SPAN to carry doesn't mean they were done behind closed doors."
But it DOES mean that it was not done in a CONSTITUTIONAL (meaning illegal) manner. Laws are supposed to be made by CONGRESS, not by the President or an unelected bureaucracy.
But then, laws are often passed by Congress without a debate... The DMCA was one of them. IMO, whenever you have something that is slipped in the cover of darkness into law (such as the ergonomic rules and of course, the DMCA) it's almost always BAD LAW.
If there is to be widespread regulation of business, it needs to be done in the open. The ergonomics rules would have cost US business billions of dollars for what may be no public benefit. And that cost will be paid by EVERYONE. People will lose jobs, and products will become more expensive.
All the more reason why there needs to be PUBLIC debate by our representatives before such rules would be enacted.
BTW, I scoff at most of these so-called "carpal tunnel" and RSI "injuries" with relation to computer equipment. I've been using computer keyboards for many hours a day since I was 8 years old. I'm now 28 and have NEVER had any problem, nor would it seem likely to me that I ever will.
You do realize, that if executive order was used in the manner Clinton did with the ergonomics rules, the president could, by fiat, outlaw MP3's, or give the BATF authority to "regulate" them.
"The people in charge of enforcing laws do not make them."
Of course they don't make them. But they do enforce them. And it's plain to anyone that the police tend to be more likely to enforce the laws that:
1. Realize revenue (ie: the high percentage of cops you see sitting by the road with a radar gun)
2. Get arrests with a low likelyhood of danger (drug arrests).
It is rare to see the police pursue a violent crime or the drug BOSSES with the same zeal that they do speeders and drug users. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that going after speeders and drug users probably represents over 90% of what the police DOES!
Raiding college dorms for MP3 users is an even more attractive job for the cops, as there is virtually NO risk.
"Yes, Clinton has NAFTA, the WTO, and Marc Rich to answer for. But do you honestly think the ergonomic rules, national monument designations, or arsenic rules were examples of Clinton bowing to the wishes of big business?"
No, the "ergonomics" rules (passed by no legislature, with no public debate, but IMPOSED in an autocratic fashion by executive "fiat") were put in place to appease the Trial Lawyers.
The US Trial Lawyers are the largest contributors to the Democratic Party. The more regulations, the more money THEY make.
How can you NOT call the plantiff's lawyer industry a BIG BUSINESS?
"If that were only the case. I know in many of the more backward (and they think they're more advanced) countries in Europe, the "paraphenalia" is illegal. A clean glass bong is illegal, even if it's obviously unused. Sad but true."
We have that law here in the USA now... The DMCA. The MPAA has already gotten a utility (DeCSS) declared so illegal that you can't even link to it. What does DeCSS do? It allows you to watch a DVD that you bought on the OS or player of your choice...
Just because DeCSS COULD be used to eliminate CSS encryption, it's "illegal paraphenalia".
"There are bootleg CD's sold in stores all the place right? That has to be costing the recording industry many times as much as lost revenue from MP3's. Is the case law and legal system in Taiwan such that making and selling pirate CD's is impossible to prosecute, but owning MP3's is easy?"
Even mom and pop store owners have more political clout than an unemployed student. I think some others are right, piracy is rampant in Taiwan, and the government went along with this to both appease the RIAA (making it look like they will crack down), but yet not do anything to anger their own business community.
So, they bust those not making money off piracy and let the ones that ARE scoot... Isn't that rather like how the USA treats the "drug war"?
"you could even edit the source of a mp3 player to allow that extension"
It's farasier to do it than that. Just add your fake extension to your MIME type for MP3 files. XMMS doesn't care about the filename, just that it's something it can read.
"So you would open fire on a bunch of federal agents with a signed search warrant. This would get you killed and the corporate press would report you as just another maniac with a gun, who shot at some brave guys doing their job. Legal gun ownership is great in theory, but remember who has all the power and control of the press."
I'm not advocating such violence. However, the government has shown an increasing willingness to violate the law, especially in these armed stormtrooper raids. Sooner or later, something is going to happen.
Slashdot Mirror
"Why did SDMI have the challenge in the first place? They were enthusiastic about the challenge, but when someone cracks their technologies, they get so upset and were even reluctant to admit that someone had. If they say "try to crack this" they should accept it if someone does crack it, and also accept the results of that. Furthermore, why were they challenging people to crack a watermarking technology that is currently being used???"
If they truly expected that it wouldn't be broken, that is outright stupidity. Also, their "hacksdmi" challenge would seemingly, IANAL, put them on shaky ground as to preventing a participant from publishing the results of their participation.
Obviously, some corporate drone got giddy with the idea that SDMI was somehow "hackerproof" and ceme out with this "challenge" because he couldn't resist trying to give the hackers "what for"...
This has happened before. Wasn't it a corporation that publically proclaimed the Titanic "unsinkable", only to be proven wrong on the first trip?
"First off, you'd better not act that way in a real court of law, because disrespect for a judge will get you thrown out on your ear.
Of course, you're 'tuFF Boy' here because you're on Slashdot. That's understandable. Do get a clue though, before you enter real life."
Of COURSE I'm not stupid enough to think I'd disrespect a judge in a courtroom. However, if a judge behaved towards me or my counsel like Kaplan did Garbus and 2600, I'd certainly use his actions as evidence against him, in overturning any judgement.
Just as it would be foolish for a defendant to behave like that in a court, it's just AS foolish for Kaplan to conduct himself the way he did. He certaly made it easier, NOT harder, to appeal his own judgement.
Also, you seem to imply that I'm inmature for expressing my contempt for a contemptible "judge"'s actions in a case. Can't you see what is WRONG with that attitude? NOTHING can be above ALL question ina free society!!!! NOTHING!!!
If we as citizens have an ABSOLUTE 1st Amendment right to political speech, which includes bashing or praising Presidents and Congressmen without government reprisal, why does that not ALSO include judges? How can it not? Aren't Federal Judges part of the government, and therefore, subservient to the Constitution?
"Corporations by their nature are amoral, mindless beasts..."
Amoral, yes (remember the Pinkerton's "Geek profiling" service they are offering to schools to single out geeks as "potentially dangerous"?), but not mindless. Corporations seek profit like a tiger seeks prey. A world where IP companies have "carte blanche" to charge whatever they want for media is obviously a major objective for them.
"they'll have more luck in China, where censorship is part of the very society... I feel sorry for the Chinese in that regard."
I feel sorry for the Chinese, or any people not living in an open society, though I hate their evil governments. What is scary, is that laws like the DMCA threaten to end all freedom in the USA, and turn us into a "Corporate State" where corporations own everything. This is the opposite extreme of "communism" where the government owns everything, though the end results would be the same.
Just as people were no freer under Hitler's fascist Germany than under Stalin's USSR, they'd be no better off in Jack Valenti's "SDMI Rebublic"
It's clear to me that the USA as a free country is collapsing. The twin pressures of a non-productive population viting themselves more and more "bread and circuses" out of the pockets of the workers, and corporations extering pressure on those same politicos (who humor them so as to FUND these "bread and circuses" re-election schemes) is causing us to lose our freedom.
We are noticeably less free today as we were in 1984, I shudder to think of what we will be like in 2084...
"Oh, and kids... 1350 Hz is not some whacky frequency that only bats can hear. It's somewhere around E above high C, which is a perfectly fine note, when you think about it. I mean, I play trumpet, I love listening to trumpet music. Cutting out 1350 Hz will effect everyone from Maynard Ferguson to Miles Davis (well maybe not Miles Davis. ;-)"
"1349 Hz ought to be enough for anybody" -Jack Valenti
I get your point. You'd think that any "new" media that is intentionally inferior to the old would fail in the market. But, remember, we're dealing with CONSUMERS here... Windows `9x is clearly an inferior and more restrictive product when compared to OS/2, Linux, BeOS, or even the original DOS it's still based on, yet it still dominates the market because of superior marketing.
Maybe the IP cartels think they can get SDMI accepted in the same manner?
"If they were patented, how they work would be required to be fully described in detail and on public file in the patent office. By keeping the code s33cr3t, they get no protection but can hope that security through obscurity will keep the innards of their function safe. Obviously it doesn't."
And the DMCA seems to have the effect of assigning perpetual "patent" protection to such "trade secret" schemes as well. Which is clearly Unconstitutional.
I think you make some very excellent points! Well done.
"Between these poles I think that there is a rational middle ground. The type of rights enforcement technology the RIAA is insisting upon cannot work, as with DeCSS every player has to have the secret key."
Which is why any such scheme that has to rely on "security by obscurity" will fail. Any consumer-level product will end up being broken, simply because it CANNOT change to make it incompatible with any breaks.
Simply put, any replacement of the audio CD will fail if the consumer is forced to replace ALL of his players and/or media every few months to a year because of SDMI "improvements" in response to breaks. Audio and video media MUST be ubiquitous to succeed.
The ultimate piracy prevention is to charge reasonable prices for the product, which is something the RIAA and MPAA are completely unwilling to do. Which is why they are wasting MILLIONS of dollars on doomed protection schemes, for the sole purpose of the ability to FORCE the market to bear whatever price they choose to set, by preventing piracy.
The RIAA and MPAA are charging many MANY times the cost of their product for the product.
I do NOT endorse piracy, but I do recognize that it does serve a legitimate purpose in giving the IP companies incentive to keep the prices reasobable.
"The RIAA/SDMI released all watermarked music tracks, of which some contained watermarks currently in production, with a challenge to crack them. Obviously, they assumed that no one would be able to crack it"
All the more indication the RIAA/MPAA et all are on a suicide march. They have no clue about technology, but yet, have the power and influence to get law passed restricting the rights of US citizens to it...
There never was and never WILL be a copy protection scheme that will absolutely prevent someone who is determined to copy from copying it, so long as the copy protection MUST allow the thing to be read, run, viewed, or played.
Ultimately, they will be forced into suing their customers, which will be the end of it, any business that sues its customers because it's scheme or product can't suceed on it's own merits fails (Rambus).
What our government has to decide is this:
Do we want to become a country where corporations have absolute control over IP, or a free country where there is a right to innovate?
Obviously, if the DMCA sticks, and all individual initiative is crushed, some other country without restrictive IP laws will one day take the lead in technological innovation.
"Your abuse of Judge Kaplan is unwarranted. I also disagree with his decision, but your suggestion that he is corrupt and ran a "show trial" is utterly unfounded. In particular, the contention that Kaplan couldn't be fair because a different lawyer at the law firm he left several years ago represented one party in a tangentially related matter is nothing more than conspiracy-mongering."
/.'ers got) was that of a "show trial" by a "kangaroo court" where the verdict was in before there was any evidence presented. The fact that this is the feeling I have is solely the fault of Kaplan's own conduct. I feel that his conduct in this case leaves me with no reasonable way to give him the benefit of the doubt.
I don't see how "judge" Kaplan's conduct could be construed as anything but dishonorable. The mere fact that he excoriated Martin Garbus for a less direct link with the plantiffs than his OWN, when he did this knowing that he had a similar link to them, shows:
1. Stupidity (he didn't remember, very unlikely)
2. Corruption (he admonished Garbus for conduct certanly no less conflicting than his own just to do anything he could to make the defendants look bad).
3. Napoleonic Complex: I'm the "judge" and I'm ABOVE all question. (This goes against the founding principles of this country... there is NOTHING that is above all question in any free society)
4. There was nothing illegal or improper about his OR Garbus's past associations with MPAA member companies, but he excoriated Garbus solely to make him look bad.
I really dont' see any fifth possibility. If Kaplan's conflict of interest was of no consequence, then Martin Garbus's lesser conflict (having once worked at a firm that represented a company later bought by Time-Warner) was also of no consequence. Nonetheless, the alleged "judge" saw fit to go on record excoriating Garbus, and even threaten future disciplinary action.
It makes Kaplan look all the worse, in that he did this in response to a MPAA motion to remove Garbus, and that he completely dismissed a later defense motion to recuse himself for a very similar, but even more direct conflict of his own.
Had Kaplan recused himself, or NOT excoriated Garbus, then set down the ruling that he did, I'd have some respect for him, as he would have at least been consistent. Instead, he acted in a manner more consistent with a televangelist caught with a hooker than a judge. Indeed, his actions condemming Garbus were very reminicient of Jimmy Swaggart's condemnation of Jim Bakker, only to be soon after caught in his own sex scandal...
The impression I got (and the same impression the majority of
To sum it all up:
1. Kaplan excoriated Garbus for conduct lesser than, or no more equal to what he himself had done.
2. Kaplan repeatedly abused Garbus, made his contempt completely blatant. Not for one moment in the transcripts did Kaplan treat Garbus with anything approaching civility or respect, that was due him and his clients.
3. Kaplan refused to recuse himself when his own conflict of interest was exposed. Furthermore, it took him 90 pages to explain WHY he shouldn't recuse himself. It would seem to me that if it takes you 90 pages to explain why you shouldn't recuse yourself, then you SHOULD have recused yourself if you had any shread of honor or integrity.
4. Kaplan most narrowly interpreted the DMCA (while ignoring it's fair use clause that allows reverse engineering for interoperability, which making a Linux DVD player would seem to me to be covered by) but only the parts that favored the MPAA position. Kaplan furtermore ruled web links to DeCSS illegal, something not at ALL covered under the DMCA, and clearly something beyond the scope of his authority.
"If a watermark qualifies as an effective access control measure, then I would think that by that logic, any player that doesn't check for watermarks would be considered an access circumvention device and therefore illegal. Or would they be legal because they have a commercially significant purpose? This is confusing."
You may be right in saying that you COULD by narrow interpretation, claim that a player that ignores watermark would be a "circumvention" device.
Certainly, that's what the MPAA/RIAA et all would say. Probably the only thing that may keep that from flying is the sheer number of non-wartermark players there are out there. Ruling them all illegal would create a VERY public upheaval that even our sheep-like media would not be able to ignore.
My opinion on this is: The RIAA/MPAA will push and push SDMI to try to replace MP3 (a futile crusade, but they don't seem to get it). Once they get a lot of watermark sensitive players out there, to the point they are more common than the non-watermark players, THEN they might be able to pull off litigation on that point.
The kicker though, is that I just don't see SDMI or any other restrictive format replacing MP3 as the "defacto standard" audio format. Are some of them better than MP3? Sure, but not ONE of them is completely non-controlled like MP3 is. The next MP3 will be just as uncontrolled as MP3 or else it will fail.
Also, the RIAA labels have no interest in even seeing SDMI succeed. They don't want to sell music as digital audio files instead of physical media. They have the MOST vested interest in seeing to it that ANY such initiative fails. If recordings start becoming distributed by audio files via the Internet, instead of physical media, even IF it's SDMI, they lose control over the artists.
"The DMCA has so far only protected the rights of big business. The courts have a history of supporting free exchange of ideas. I have faith in our courts. I hope this is not misplaced."
I don't have much faith in the courts. Perhaps I'm pessimistic, but so-called "judge" Kaplan seems to be a typical example of the neo-Napoleonoic complex that most of our newer judges seem to have.
Also, keep in mind, that Judges come from lawyers. Lawyers come from lawfirms. The past 20 years has seen a geometric increase in litigation, most of it being done BY the corporations and the powerful. From that pool of lawyers come the next crop of judges. Today, I'd doubt it's possible to apppoint a Federal judge who hasn't done a lot of work for at least one of the aggressive IP cartels.
Judges are supposed to be different from lawyers. They are supposed to be impartial, ubiased, and rule on the LAW, not their personal biases. If "judge" Kaplan is indeed a typical example of the modern judge, then it's obvious that wishing for impartiality is, indeed, wishing for something that won't happen.
"Do we believe we can defeat any audio protection scheme? Certainly, the technical details of any scheme will become known publicly through reverse engineering. Using the techniques we have presented here, we believe no public watermark-based scheme intended to thwart copying will succeed."
Which makes the DMCA all the more abhorrent. It's NOT a copyright protection law, but a copy protection protection law.
Copy protection was proven an ineffective mechanism back in the 1980's, and it's just as ineffective now, if not more so, given the much greater number of computer professionals (that you may call "hackers") than there were then.
Given that the right to make a backup copy is an established RIGHT under the Constitutional derived principle of "fair use" would it not follow that any law preventing you from circumventing copy protection to excercise that right would be Unconstitutional?
Keep in mind, the Constitution places SEVERE limits on the scope and duration of patents and copyrights (though that has been violated many times by Congress and several presidents, most recently, Clinton. when copyrights were extended pretty much to infinity).
"It would be a shame if Princeton's legal dept tells the researchers to back down because they don't have a legal leg to stand on here."
The fact is, they DO have a legal leg to stand on here... The rights of "fair use" and "reverse engineering" were established by the courts over the years in many many, precedent setting cases (such as the Betamax case) as being from the Constitution. NO statutory law can "outrank" the Constitution, it's the higest law of the land, from which there is no option but to change it.
The DMCA has many MANY problems with the Constitution, and this threat towards these Princeton professors proves, it could have this little side effect of DESTROYING academia.
The unanimous voice vote "coup de etat" nature of the DMCA's passage is even more insidious. Congress, and Bill Clinton, in effect, conducted an illegal Constitutional Convention, in their roles in passing that law. The DMCA cannot be legal without a Constitutional Amendment.
Remember, there has yet been NO TEST of the Constitutionality of the DMCA. This didn't happen in the 2600 case, because it was presided over a conflicted judge (the so-called "judge" Kaplan) who did not hide for one second his contempt for both the defendants and their counsel.
And, he also had worked for a lawfirm that had DIRECTLY represented a plantiff before becoming a judge (Martin Garbus, lead attorney for 2600 and the EFF was EXCORIATED by Kaplan for previously working for a firm that had represented a company that was eventually BOUGHT by Time Warner.)
Kaplan refused to recuse himself, and ran a "show trial" with an illogical and indefensible verdict. But then, one only need have paid attention to the judge's behavior in the pre-trial to know that the verdict was a foregone conclusion. Kaplan ruled on the most narrow POSSIBLE interpretation of the DMCA, even ignoring the language in the DMCA itself which would seem to make reverse-engineering CSS for the purpose of creating a Linux DVD player perfectly legal.
"Hell, even if they didn't have a legal leg to stand on it would still be fun to watch SDMI go after several professors at Princeton. High visibility and bad publicity for SDMI. I'd pay to watch those court proceedings."
I would think that the MPAA/RIAA/SDMI cartels et all, would be very hesitant to go forward with such a case. 2600 was an easy target because it was VERY easy to spin them off as "anarchistic hackers". Princeton professors will be a lot harder to mount a slander campaign against. It's a sad indictment of the US legal system that not all defendants are equal before the eyes of the law.
What the IP cartel is doing right now is trying to win by intimidation, threat, and extortion what it probably can't win in a courtroom (as it's certain that all or at least MOST of the DMCA would be struck down or at the very least, limited by the courts). They are hoping that either the authors of the paper will back down, or else Princeton will back them down.
If I were the author of the paper, I'd be considering pulling an "Infineon" on the IP cartel: What they are doing right now (using threat, intimidation, and extortion) kinda smacks as illegal under the RICO laws doesn't it?
Mandrake 8.0 has:
./post.
Kernel 2.4.3
XFree86 4.03
Not 2.4.2 and 4.02 as is in the
"You are assuming that there must be a way to keep the status-quo with regards to how musicians live and work, while providing a different method for them to receive compensation. That's not a fair way to look at things. There is no natural 'right' for musicians to exist; they exist because of the laws and desires of the society they are part of"
The whole public disinformation case the RIAA/MPAA et all have been making is a farcical JOKE. They evoke sympathy for the ARTISTS, which the RIAA does NOT represent, not even indirectly. The RIAA does not, has not, and never will pay artists.
What the RIAA is, is a collossal, (and illegal, IMO, as they would seem to be engaging in the type of collusion that is illegal in most other industries) cartel of the largest record labels.
They have only one mission: Preserve the 20th century business model that gives the record labels control of distribution, sales, and perpetual rights to over 90%+ of the music out there. Not to mention, the power this gives them over the artists that lets them rake in the VAST majority of the total revenue.
Their very EXISTANCE is threatened by the Internet and MP3. For the first time in history, there is a way for bands to publish worldwide at little expense, WITHOUT the need to sign their rights (and most of their profit) away to the 5-6 mega corp radio labels that make up the RIAA.
Napster, Gnutella, et all, are worse for the RIAA in that they provide a vast, unregulated, and popular method for non-RIAA artists to be noticed worldwide. Like a vast, "you say it we play it" on demand radio station.
Ultimately, a Napster-esque system will benefit the artists for that reason. Especially if a subscription model were employed that doled out micro-payments to the ARTISTS per download, which is what I would advocate.
IMO, the BEST way ISP's can protect themselves from being terminally harassed by various corpers trying to harass their customers over IP would be to NOT keep logs more than 12-24 hours MAXIMUM. This would keep logs long enough to be able to trace a cracker should a break in occur, but be short enough to both protect their customers AND themselves from harassment.
:)
It would be very rare for the MPAA/RIAA et all to be able to get and serve any kind of "search warrant" for server logs in less than a 24-hour time frame.
Of course, in the case of the MPAA, they probably have "judge" Kaplan's cell phone number, not to mention a nice little rubber-stamp of his signature and thousands of "fill in the blanks" search warrants
"That said, this is exactly what the MPAA should be doing. Not attacking the enablers, but attacking the actual movie fans themselves."
You are correct. This is what I want to see them and the RIAA do. Why? Because this will ultimately lead to the demise of the DMCA. This is our ONLY shot to wake the masses.
Suing the customers is never a sound business model. Just ask Rambus. That's why the RIAA attacked Napster itself, instead of users, because the centralized nature of Napster allowed it. The only way to attack Gnutella IS to attack users.
"1. They aren't laws, they're rules. I can't explain the distinction well because IANAL"
I still do not see how that addresses the Constitutionality question...
Even IF it's covered in a statutory law, the Constitution does NOT specifically grant Congress the ability to make law in this area. Just because a LAW exists does not mean that it is a just, or LEGAL law, as the highest law is the Constitution, which is to statutory law what a city ordinance is to the state government's laws... Statutory law is outranked, so to speak, when it conflicts.
Amemnment's 9 and 10 grant the states and the people the powers that are NOT granted to the Feds in the rest of the Constitution, and DENY all such powers not SPECIFICALLY enumerated in the Constitution to the Federal government.
The only loophole, and it's been so exploited it's no longer funny, is the "Interstate and Foreign Commerce" clause.
I fail to see how the Federal Government can regulate a local business's office "safety" under the guise of "Interstate and Foreign commerce".
You want to know why our government is bad and getting worse? It's because it's been living above the rule of Constitutional Law since the 1930's, and been moving ever further from it yearly. If the Feds want a power that the Constitution does NOT give them, the LEGAL way to get it is to AMEND it. This was done in the 1920's when they wanted the income tax. But seemingly by 1940, and beyond, they no longer feel the need to do this to grab power...
Instead of doing the PROPER thing, which mandates exhaustive public debate, AND THE APPROVAL OF 2/3rds of the STATES, the Feds just grab whatever they want, whenever they want it. In the Clinton administration, this included land, natural resources, and the imposition of onerous regulations, without public debate. Not saying only Democrats do this, each President since FDR has done the same thing, each has left a Federal government more intrusive and powerful than he found it.
Which is why I believe some time in the future, the USA will evolve into an autocracy, to the point that enough get fed up and invoke another document that was passed into law, on July 4, 1776...
It begins, "When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."
"Just because it wasn't done in the halls of Congress and they were considered too dull for even C-SPAN to carry doesn't mean they were done behind closed doors."
But it DOES mean that it was not done in a CONSTITUTIONAL (meaning illegal) manner. Laws are supposed to be made by CONGRESS, not by the President or an unelected bureaucracy.
But then, laws are often passed by Congress without a debate... The DMCA was one of them. IMO, whenever you have something that is slipped in the cover of darkness into law (such as the ergonomic rules and of course, the DMCA) it's almost always BAD LAW.
If there is to be widespread regulation of business, it needs to be done in the open. The ergonomics rules would have cost US business billions of dollars for what may be no public benefit. And that cost will be paid by EVERYONE. People will lose jobs, and products will become more expensive.
All the more reason why there needs to be PUBLIC debate by our representatives before such rules would be enacted.
BTW, I scoff at most of these so-called "carpal tunnel" and RSI "injuries" with relation to computer equipment. I've been using computer keyboards for many hours a day since I was 8 years old. I'm now 28 and have NEVER had any problem, nor would it seem likely to me that I ever will.
You do realize, that if executive order was used in the manner Clinton did with the ergonomics rules, the president could, by fiat, outlaw MP3's, or give the BATF authority to "regulate" them.
"The people in charge of enforcing laws do not make them."
Of course they don't make them. But they do enforce them. And it's plain to anyone that the police tend to be more likely to enforce the laws that:
1. Realize revenue (ie: the high percentage of cops you see sitting by the road with a radar gun)
2. Get arrests with a low likelyhood of danger (drug arrests).
It is rare to see the police pursue a violent crime or the drug BOSSES with the same zeal that they do speeders and drug users. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that going after speeders and drug users probably represents over 90% of what the police DOES!
Raiding college dorms for MP3 users is an even more attractive job for the cops, as there is virtually NO risk.
After all, a MP3 never killed anyone, did it?
"Yes, Clinton has NAFTA, the WTO, and Marc Rich to answer for. But do you honestly think the ergonomic rules, national monument designations, or arsenic rules were examples of Clinton bowing to the wishes of big business?"
No, the "ergonomics" rules (passed by no legislature, with no public debate, but IMPOSED in an autocratic fashion by executive "fiat") were put in place to appease the Trial Lawyers.
The US Trial Lawyers are the largest contributors to the Democratic Party. The more regulations, the more money THEY make.
How can you NOT call the plantiff's lawyer industry a BIG BUSINESS?
"If that were only the case. I know in many of the more backward (and they think they're more advanced) countries in Europe, the "paraphenalia" is illegal. A clean glass bong is illegal, even if it's obviously unused. Sad but true."
We have that law here in the USA now... The DMCA. The MPAA has already gotten a utility (DeCSS) declared so illegal that you can't even link to it. What does DeCSS do? It allows you to watch a DVD that you bought on the OS or player of your choice...
Just because DeCSS COULD be used to eliminate CSS encryption, it's "illegal paraphenalia".
"There are bootleg CD's sold in stores all the place right? That has to be costing the recording industry many times as much as lost revenue from MP3's. Is the case law and legal system in Taiwan such that making and selling pirate CD's is impossible to prosecute, but owning MP3's is easy?"
Even mom and pop store owners have more political clout than an unemployed student. I think some others are right, piracy is rampant in Taiwan, and the government went along with this to both appease the RIAA (making it look like they will crack down), but yet not do anything to anger their own business community.
So, they bust those not making money off piracy and let the ones that ARE scoot... Isn't that rather like how the USA treats the "drug war"?
"you could even edit the source of a mp3 player to allow that extension"
It's farasier to do it than that. Just add your fake extension to your MIME type for MP3 files. XMMS doesn't care about the filename, just that it's something it can read.
"So you would open fire on a bunch of federal agents with a signed search warrant. This would get you killed and the corporate press would report you as just another maniac with a gun, who shot at some brave guys doing their job. Legal gun ownership is great in theory, but remember who has all the power and control of the press."
I'm not advocating such violence. However, the government has shown an increasing willingness to violate the law, especially in these armed stormtrooper raids. Sooner or later, something is going to happen.
"You make it sound as if this took place in the USA. However, it didn't."
./ stories. I dont' know WHAT the law is in Taiwan.
I was more commentin on the rash of college dorm raids in the USA that have been