As mentioned in Wired, Sen. Feinstein (D-CA) is a
big supporter of DMCA along just about everyone
in DC other than
Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA). Apparently, she stated
that there was "no credible opposition" to the law.
I was very pleased to see that Barbara Simons and
Gene Spafford of the ACM Public Policy Office
have done their best to disabuse her
of this view (for whatever good it will do).
I like your letter, and I think it gets at a couple of things I've noticed:
Very little mainstream media coverage since the arrest
DMCA opponents much more vocal than DMCA proponents on this matter
No attempt to put any kind of spin on the arrest in order to legitimize it
Why do I find this so insidious? Well, certainly it's tempting to say that the mainstream media won't cover this story because of centralized corporate control that supports the DMCA. I don't know if that's really it. Maybe the story is just too esoteric to make exciting copy for the average person. Any thoughts?
But isn't it interesting that we aren't seeing a lot of editorials explaining in detail why a non-dangerous alleged offender of a disputed law *should* be held without bail? I mean, if someone can point me to an article that says "Yes, for the good of society, Sklyarov should be under lock and key and here's why." then I'd be very interested in reading it. But it took just a feather's touch of pressure to get Adobe to back down from that position. It's untenable under any reasonable standard of the legitimate use of force.
Finally, there's no PR campaign from the pro-DMCA, pro-arrest camp. Why? Well, because there's no way to *put* a positive spin on using excessive force against a relatively powerless individual to settle a corporate dispute. So in this case, the best spin, the best PR, is simply no publicity at all. The average American who has heard the story at all simply believes that a "Russian hacker" has been apprehended by the FBI. This vaguely suggests that there must have been some sort of national security threat. The supporters of DMCA would like it for things to stay this way.
Here's the sad truth of the matter: power doesn't need reason or persuasion to justify itself. That's why those in favor of Sklyarov's arrest have been eerily silent. Of course, we supposedly live in a democratic society, so power supposedly resides with the people.
Well, the people do have power if enough of them raise their voices. Right now we just have the tech community raising a voice. And that's a wonderful thing, and I guess for such a small community it holds a lot of clout (heh, imagine a general IT strike for even one day).
But this is an issue that politicians will take seriously if there's enough public response. As the subject line says, we just need to educate more people about the implications of something that sounds rather obscure. Well, it's worth a shot.
Slashdot Mirror
See http://www.acm.org/usacm/IP/dmca-feinstein-letter. html
They of course wrote an earlier letter to AAP specifically regarding Sklyarov's arrest and AAP's statement in favor of it.
--Paul
- Very little mainstream media coverage since the arrest
- DMCA opponents much more vocal than DMCA proponents on this matter
- No attempt to put any kind of spin on the arrest in order to legitimize it
Why do I find this so insidious? Well, certainly it's tempting to say that the mainstream media won't cover this story because of centralized corporate control that supports the DMCA. I don't know if that's really it. Maybe the story is just too esoteric to make exciting copy for the average person. Any thoughts?But isn't it interesting that we aren't seeing a lot of editorials explaining in detail why a non-dangerous alleged offender of a disputed law *should* be held without bail? I mean, if someone can point me to an article that says "Yes, for the good of society, Sklyarov should be under lock and key and here's why." then I'd be very interested in reading it. But it took just a feather's touch of pressure to get Adobe to back down from that position. It's untenable under any reasonable standard of the legitimate use of force.
Finally, there's no PR campaign from the pro-DMCA, pro-arrest camp. Why? Well, because there's no way to *put* a positive spin on using excessive force against a relatively powerless individual to settle a corporate dispute. So in this case, the best spin, the best PR, is simply no publicity at all. The average American who has heard the story at all simply believes that a "Russian hacker" has been apprehended by the FBI. This vaguely suggests that there must have been some sort of national security threat. The supporters of DMCA would like it for things to stay this way.
Here's the sad truth of the matter: power doesn't need reason or persuasion to justify itself. That's why those in favor of Sklyarov's arrest have been eerily silent. Of course, we supposedly live in a democratic society, so power supposedly resides with the people.
Well, the people do have power if enough of them raise their voices. Right now we just have the tech community raising a voice. And that's a wonderful thing, and I guess for such a small community it holds a lot of clout (heh, imagine a general IT strike for even one day).
But this is an issue that politicians will take seriously if there's enough public response. As the subject line says, we just need to educate more people about the implications of something that sounds rather obscure. Well, it's worth a shot.