FYI, it was announced today that Charles James, current head of AntiTrust division at DoJ, and who crafted the sell-out settlement, is resigning to become Cheveron's general counsel. Article is here.
As a product of Palo Alto public education, just thought I should point out that this school is not in Palo Alto. The itinerary says it is East Palo Alto and the map shows Menlo Park. It may seem nit-picky, but aside from name and geography, there is nothing similar about Palo Alto and EPA, they are in two different counties for crimminy sakes. EPA was the murder capitol of the country in terms or per capita murders not too long ago, and even gave out free life insurance to their students. Palo Alto on the other hand is a city where the houses average close to a million dollars and the pretention in the air is thick enough to bottle and sell.
This was a very interesting hearing, and by interesting, I mean distorted half-truths and the like. It was a full packed room, and the people around me could barely contain their scoffing of some of the dramatics.
Prior to the hearing, while waiting, I talked to an MPAA lobbyist (brand new to the game, he was complaining of having to stay up the prior night and bone up on the subject). When I said, half in jest, so you guys support this bill--he responded by saying it does not have all they would like, they really want to go after irc channels as well. I hope there is never a hearing on irc, with videod demos showing irc channel traffic (as there was showing a d/l of "save the best for last" off of KaZZa).
The two main contradictions I saw were this: 1)RIAA described how big the IP industry was, and how important it is to preserve it with these laws. However, she then bemoaned the fact that they are engaged in litigation with Verizon who is much bigger then them, in fact bigger then the whole RIAA member companies. Umm, so shouldn't we then focus on the ISPs, if according to her logic, we need to help the big industries? Also, she characterized the lawsuit as just a disagreement over a minor legal technicality (you know, the LAW is a minor technicality--the case revolves around RIAA demanding names of Verizon subscribers that they properly need subpeonas to obtain, but are not getting, it is to protect subscribers privacy). 2)Rosen also said that they need this bill to stop piracy b/c the DoJ is too busy with other matters to enforce the laws, and civil suits cost so much money, more than the recoverable damages. YET, she claims that they would be under bigger restrictions with the bill passed, b/c there are remedies for users that they can bring up in civil case (which I guess would not be expensive to do????) or the DoJ can enforce criminal sanctions (which they have a lot of time to do over a few missing files, or whatever--no one would say what they want to do with the powers granted by the bill). Just such distortions.
On the plus side, Boucher was great when he brought up the letters referring to the harry potter book report (again a stupid RIAA response: "our members would not do that." Boucher responded, "it was done by the copyright holder"--AOL/TW, which I believe is a member of RIAA). Also Zoe Lofgren pointed out the meaningless aspect of the remedies for innocent hacked users. I gained a new respect for her, and I am on the other side of the aisle.
I spoke to a friend of mine who manages a Tower Records and told him this is precisly what the industry should do if they want to counter p2p. It would give the public exaclty what they want at an effeective cost point that is beneifical to both sides. However, this cannot happen as it would cost the labels a lot (his words).
The labels work by dripping out a single at a time for a hit album until the whole album has "hit singles." This process can take around a year b/c they dont want two songs from the same album canibalizing each other. But that is the method they use to promote the albums. They can not just release singles at a time, but need to release whole albums and buying it in whole for a few tracks subsidizes those tracks.
This is not (as was pointed out to me) a new or novel concept. If you recall, during the early 90's there were kiosks in stores where you could do this, and the record companies did not find them to be profitable enough to continue.
Of course, I responed that this is a different time, and the stores/RIAA need to compete with p2p, and this is the best bet, but they will not contemplate that as a viable alternative--too bad, i still think it would be a better method, even if it changes the old biz model.
This is not true for two reasons: 1) the video was Osama's IP, it is not just an image and it was taken by him, not you. 2) failing that, I refer you to this article an another topic, but relevant here: Lawyers unconnected to the case say it's a blurry area. Jonathan Band, an intellectual property expert in the District, says technically, Gore's speech was comparable to a theatrical production. "If he's taping it, he's infringing and copying her public performance."
It seems like a strech, but technically, it can be done. You taking the video can violate IP, you having a video he took definitly could violate IP. Great system, eh?
I posted this in the midst of another thread, so re-post so it isn't burried deep:
This bill applies to every copyright holder. But therein lies some of the more farcical (and completely realistic) scenarios that can be envisioned.
Osama Bin Laden owns the copyright and IP to his own image. Do you have a video clip of him on your computer? Well he would be able to hack in and destroy the file if he had a reasonable belief that you were harvesting his files.
Wait, doesn't the US government have his image, perhaps on an NSA computer? Well that can be legally hacked.
Clearly this seems far-fetched, but will be perfectly allowed in the plain language of the legislation. Why on earth would Congress want to pass a bill that will weaken cyber-security? This is the one of the best angles of attack, b/c no legislator wants to be perceived as weak on computer security.
As an added irony, I note that Lamar Smith, author of the cyber-crime bill that passed earlier this weak (with only one dissenting vote) is a co-sponsor of this bill. So if I understand correctly, he authors a bill to give lifetime imprisonment to hackers, but also allows copyright holders to hack....mmm hmm, that is the consistency I love from our reps!
Also note that in the definitions, p2p services that have a central server are exempted (carve out for AIM, nah couldn't be). However, the idea of a centralized server was taboo under the Napster case. So run a de-centralized server, be subject to this Berman Bill, run a centralized server, be subject to Napster (which would have been immune to this bill).
Incorrect...perhaps that is not the "stated" purpose of the bill but those exceptionse refer to economic loss of any person other than the file trader OR economic loss of more than $50.00 per impairment...other than economic loss involving computer files or data made available through a publically accessible peer-to-peer file trading network that contain works in which the owner has an exclusive right...
I believe I am reading this correctly as only preventing the removal of files that (a) someone other that the evil file trader, or (b) files that are not protected by copyright and would cause more than $50 per infringement. This is highly broad. And with the good faith exemptions written all over it, even these protections are pretty meaningless.
This bill applies to every copyright holder. But therein lies some of the more farcical (and completely realistic) scenarios that can be envisioned.
Osama Bin Laden owns the copyright and IP to his own image. Do you have a video clip of him on your computer? Well he would be able to hack in and destroy the file if he had a reasonable belief that you were harvesting his files.
Wait, doesn't the US government have his image, perhaps on an NSA computer? Well that can be legally hacked.
Clearly this seems far-fetched, but will be perfectly allowed in the plain language of the legislation. Why on earth would Congress want to pass a bill that will weaken cyber-security? This is the one of the best angles of attack, b/c no legislator wants to be perceived as weak on computer security.
As an added irony, I note that Lamar Smith, author of the cyber-crime bill that passed earlier this weak (with only one dissenting vote) is a co-sponsor of this bill. So if I understand correctly, he authors a bill to give lifetime imprisonment to hackers, but also allows copyright holders to hack....mmm hmm, that is the consistency I love from our reps!
Also note that in the definitions, p2p services that have a central server are exempted (carve out for AIM, nah couldn't be). However, the idea of a centralized server was taboo under the Napster case. So run a de-centralized server, be subject to this Berman Bill, run a centralized server, be subject to Napster (which would have been immune to this bill).
I found the whole event to actually be better than expected, with some notable exceptions.
1) Really, this is not the way to get the message out. Yelling is counter-productive and makes those who do it look bad. I was quite suprised that no one got kicked out, and did not enjoy having a security guard standing next to me because people in front of me could not control themselves! I understand the frustration--hearing inane comments from Valenti et. al. and not being able to respond--but you do yourselves no favors by interuppting and acting like children in a sandbox.
2) Valenti's comments were just plain stupid. Defending his stupid comments circa 1981 of the VCR being like the boston strangler by saying "a little demoguagery never hurt anyone." Man, I need to get that transcript, but here he admits that is what he did best (and should we be suprised, he was a Presidential speechwriter after all). This came on the heels of him saying that it is time to get the inflamed rhetoric out of the debate and the best line of, "well I am the public" (which was reported by the record company execs as well.
He said that VCR piracy was a problem (on the order or $3.5B) and that it could have been fixed originally, though he never wanted to stop the VCR, only have modest copyright royalties. He was quickly corrected by Bob Schwartz, General Counsel for Home Recording Rights Coalition, who said, "I recall the word 'injunction' being used in the lawsuit and the modest royalty of $25-50 per VCR tape. GREAT STUFF!!!
But Valenti did say they want to give the consumer what they want at a price they will pay. When Bond interjected, well it is clear they want P2P, Valenti replied, well I may want a skeleton key that opens every door--bizarre stuff.
3) Rob Ried of Listen.com ROCKED!! Go on, very good stuff. Aside from his unwavering conviction to talk about a safe harbor for all out of print work, that can be rebutted by a take down notice of the original artist (which is a good idea, but he spent too much time on it), he has a great model and presented it clearly. It was what I have always thought, there is a way to beat free, offer something compelling. Once you reach a certain age time == $$ and if I can get my music with little time and portable, I will take that and pay for it. If I do not have that luxery, I will use what is available. He made a great analagy to all the "designer" water out there (although this is a little false, because DC tap water really does suck--then again so does most current music, so maybe I am wrong here).
4) A great argument from Intel to Valenti. "Looks like the only way we can clean up ponrongraphy and violence and drugs in the movies is through a government mandate." That's right, throw it in their face that our industry does not want to be mandated just like theirs doesn't.
5) Again, I reiterate, chose the messenger better. Flame me if you will, but 10 guys looking like the comic book salesman from the simpsons, disrupting a government meeting, does not help. You guys can bitch and moan about secret back room dealings (and I do too), but when you are given the opportunity to attend public meetings, do not show why they prefer to do things in private. It is embarrasing, counter-productive, and will likely lead to the reduction of these meetings (which I did think was highly productive in showing that differing industries come at it differently). Standing up and yelling, "the time for civility has now come to an end" (true quote) does no good!!!!
Rep Berman spoke at our washington caucus 2 weeks ago where he announced the p2p self help bill he is working on. One of the more interesting things he said was that he never was interested in IP, and didn't know much about it before coming to Congress, but considering that he represented Hollywood, he figured he should get on the IP subcommittee to "represent his district."
Incidently, PTO head, James Rogan (formerly a Congressman from Orang County) pretty much said the same thing motivated him to get into IP issues which heknew next to nothing about before coming to Congress.
it is the percent that the server is up. i.e. 99.99% is 4 nines of reliability and up 99.99% of the time (I am assuming that x 9 refers to total 9 in the the percentage, not just to the right of the %).
100% uptime is virtually impossible, so the holy grail is as close as possible--99.999%
I will say this, being at the conference yesterday where he announced the dropping of the bill. If you do not think that there will some massive safe harbor provision and a good faith clause, you are deluding yourself. Fortunatly this bill will never pass, much like when the RIAA tried to add something similar to the PATRIOT act (after being rebuffed trying to do it as a stand alone bill). This spells disaster though because it opens the debate so skewed on one side that the "happy middle ground" will in fact be far away from what we would want.
2 interesting things to note though: 1) This cannot be done with out amending DMCA Sec 2101 (I believe that is the correct section) on circumvention devices. This could be the chance to finally make that it something workable, or put the Sony doctrine into statute and not just common law (common law that is being eroded as the Napster decisions showed).
2) I thought the most interesting thing Berman said yesterday (aside from this bombshell) is that when he came to Congress, he had no interest in IP per se, however being as he was the Congressman from Hollywood (I believe those were his exact words), he had to chose something to help his constituency out, and this was a great issue area for that.
If you object to this legislation (as you all should), contact his subcommittee office, they deal with this issue (not his personal office) at (202)225-4695. Of course, it goes with out saying, be polite and respectful and state your opinion with out flaming. If you want your position to be taken seriously, then you have to treat it seriously. Being a former hill staffer, nothing gets a brush off more than someone spewing out angrily and irrationally, HOWEVER, contrary opinions, stated well are always well regarded.
BTW, at the Q&A part everyone came out against this and told there objections to Berman.
Last time I was in Canada and changing $ at the bank, I wanted to get some $50 bills. I was told specifically not too as many stores do not take the $50 anymore due to the high counterfitting of them.
Actually the "punishment" is not supposed to punish MS per se, but rather restore competition, terminate the monopoly, and terminate all fruits of that illegal monopoly.
Granted, doing this would be a punishment for MS, but the purpose is not a punative system but rather a corrective system. This is a civil, not criminal case.
I was just talking to a friend of mine who is the manage of a local big name record chain. He wants to get out NOW because his profit margins are so low these days. He blames it on p2p and says that record sales have gone down in the last few years (he has been managing franchises in different locations over the last 7 years or so). Granted, his location is smack dab in the middle of a big city university campus and his biggest customers are students (who have the time and resources to burn music, but $15+ is too much to buy music).
I told him, these companies need to adapt or die (taking a page from that article countering the deToqueville Institute FUD on OSS). I suggested either they need to offer a premium on the discs that you can't get through burning, lower the prices, or change their model to a kiosk stand where you pick and chose your music, and within a few minutes out comes a customized CD with nice linear notes, of what you want to hear, at a reasonable price.
His responses were, they have tried offering better premiums, that has not worked; the price margin for the retailers is about $1 per new CD so he can't budge lower; and the companies don't want to offer a la carte music. They tried cd singles before and could not make a good margin on that, they tried kiosks before and took them away. Really it comes down to promotion, and they want to promote a whole unit where they can release singles at a time. He couldn't really argue against me when I said that before record companies had a monopoly on distribution, now with broadband, that monopoly on promotion and distribution is being altered.
His choice on whether to adapt or die is he wants to get out of the music reatail biz and open other franchises.
I still think kiosks in a mall would be a viable solution. It eliminates the retailers biggest cost and that is CDs go stale. If you can't sell them, you have physical property that cost money but is worthless, wheras electronic bits that cost per burn never go stale and don't take up shelf space.
or it could just be rolled into an omnibus approps or supplemental emergency, or the new supplemental terror bill (which is laden with pork) in conference. WireDog, you live in the DC area, so I am sure you know how a lot of stuff gets swept into those corners at the last minute under the cover of darkness in a 1000 page bill that no one except the staff that wrote it (and the lobbyists who request it) knows is in the bill. That said, i don't have any opinion of this specific bill.
Yes until such treaties such as the Hague convention are ratified where companies can be sued in any foriegn jurisdiction with out any sort of contacts. Or until Yahoo and the like start losing cases and can be held liable in France for actions that they filter out for french specific sites (yahoo.fr). The future of lowest common denominator is not too far off, and that should be alarming whether you are concerned about USA exporting the DMCA or Europeans exporting bans on all "racist and xenophobic" speech (as they are currently attempting to do in the Council of Europe), or this!
Perhaps MS has plans to do pop-ups themselves? I don't think they do now, I think it is just inline. Of course, I haven't seen a pop-up since i began using proxomitron, so what do I know.
Then again, knowing MS, I am suprised they don't kill pop-ups in general, but have a special web developer subscription fee to disable this server side.
This is correct, that in general the english definition of effective is not necc the same as the DMCA def of effective. No argument from me there. But, even looking beyond the plain meaning to the definition that you provide, my first paragraph is still acurate. It is not an effective control in terms of requiting the application of information...blah blah blah if it just requires a cheap pen to swipe a strip away. Anyways, thanks for bringing up the distinction, b/c it is important to bear in mind. It leads to sloppy argumentation not to make that distinction clear, and I appreciate you keeping me honest, though I did mean it would not be a violation of DMCA under any definition of effective control.
Nice to read your response though. I have been following this whole saga you are having with AFGA on Declan's list. Of course, I am sure your program has been dl in great numbers in the last week or two, and now I would guess that the amount of people that knew about the program prior to AFGA's stunts and post-publication is a factor of 100-1000 times. I would also guess that many people did not know this was possible to do with fonts until AFGA made an issue about it. Anyways, good luck with your fight.
For some humor on this subject, the DMCA/Sharpie one that is, look here.
I think the key here is also that the (B) "effectively controls access". By definition, a control that be circumvented by a.99 pen and no special skill is not much of an effective control.
As nice as it would be to use this to show the DMCA for the sham it truly is, this is not going to be the test case.
I would note that putting recording celine dion and putting her voice on a CD is a MUCH better effective control for protecting that work. I mean, I would never want to listen to that, much less put it on my HD or copy it...would you?
We have prepared on analysis of this bill andit is online here, much easier than reading through the 30 pages, a condensed outline version. We oppose the bill and sent a letter to Sen. Hollings yesterday saying so, we also cc: to all members of the Committee (inc. Sen. Lott). You can also read our press release from our front page here.
We do not want to see the Internet, and Internet commerce treated differently than non-internet commerce. We do not want discriminatory effects placed on the Internet, and wide ranging new regulations and sever legal penalties that will bankrupt many firms. If you conduct any business with a web site, you should oppose this bill!
The DoJ has absolutely nothing to do with this phase of the trial, in fact they oppose it. They have a seperate remedy proposal::cough:: sellout::cough:: that they are trying to get the judge to aprove. It is far weaker remedies than what the non-settling states are proposing, and most all credible commentators believe it will do absolutely nothing.
The one to have faith in is the non-settling state AGs who are still pursuing the case. The DoJ has determined they don't care, they got enough of MS $$ to satisfy their needs.
Ironically, the city where Jack Daniels is made, Lynchburg, TN, it is illegal to purchase alcohol, so you can't even purchase Jack there, it is a dry county.
OK maybe not a coincidence, but crazy nevertheless!
Slashdot Mirror
wondering why it took so long to see posts, and then realized, everyone must be on UUNET and can't race for f.p.
FYI, it was announced today that Charles James, current head of AntiTrust division at DoJ, and who crafted the sell-out settlement, is resigning to become Cheveron's general counsel. Article is here.
As a product of Palo Alto public education, just thought I should point out that this school is not in Palo Alto. The itinerary says it is East Palo Alto and the map shows Menlo Park. It may seem nit-picky, but aside from name and geography, there is nothing similar about Palo Alto and EPA, they are in two different counties for crimminy sakes. EPA was the murder capitol of the country in terms or per capita murders not too long ago, and even gave out free life insurance to their students. Palo Alto on the other hand is a city where the houses average close to a million dollars and the pretention in the air is thick enough to bottle and sell.
This was a very interesting hearing, and by interesting, I mean distorted half-truths and the like. It was a full packed room, and the people around me could barely contain their scoffing of some of the dramatics.
Prior to the hearing, while waiting, I talked to an MPAA lobbyist (brand new to the game, he was complaining of having to stay up the prior night and bone up on the subject). When I said, half in jest, so you guys support this bill--he responded by saying it does not have all they would like, they really want to go after irc channels as well. I hope there is never a hearing on irc, with videod demos showing irc channel traffic (as there was showing a d/l of "save the best for last" off of KaZZa).
The two main contradictions I saw were this:
1)RIAA described how big the IP industry was, and how important it is to preserve it with these laws. However, she then bemoaned the fact that they are engaged in litigation with Verizon who is much bigger then them, in fact bigger then the whole RIAA member companies. Umm, so shouldn't we then focus on the ISPs, if according to her logic, we need to help the big industries? Also, she characterized the lawsuit as just a disagreement over a minor legal technicality (you know, the LAW is a minor technicality--the case revolves around RIAA demanding names of Verizon subscribers that they properly need subpeonas to obtain, but are not getting, it is to protect subscribers privacy).
2)Rosen also said that they need this bill to stop piracy b/c the DoJ is too busy with other matters to enforce the laws, and civil suits cost so much money, more than the recoverable damages. YET, she claims that they would be under bigger restrictions with the bill passed, b/c there are remedies for users that they can bring up in civil case (which I guess would not be expensive to do????) or the DoJ can enforce criminal sanctions (which they have a lot of time to do over a few missing files, or whatever--no one would say what they want to do with the powers granted by the bill). Just such distortions.
On the plus side, Boucher was great when he brought up the letters referring to the harry potter book report (again a stupid RIAA response: "our members would not do that." Boucher responded, "it was done by the copyright holder"--AOL/TW, which I believe is a member of RIAA). Also Zoe Lofgren pointed out the meaningless aspect of the remedies for innocent hacked users. I gained a new respect for her, and I am on the other side of the aisle.
I spoke to a friend of mine who manages a Tower Records and told him this is precisly what the industry should do if they want to counter p2p. It would give the public exaclty what they want at an effeective cost point that is beneifical to both sides. However, this cannot happen as it would cost the labels a lot (his words).
The labels work by dripping out a single at a time for a hit album until the whole album has "hit singles." This process can take around a year b/c they dont want two songs from the same album canibalizing each other. But that is the method they use to promote the albums. They can not just release singles at a time, but need to release whole albums and buying it in whole for a few tracks subsidizes those tracks.
This is not (as was pointed out to me) a new or novel concept. If you recall, during the early 90's there were kiosks in stores where you could do this, and the record companies did not find them to be profitable enough to continue.
Of course, I responed that this is a different time, and the stores/RIAA need to compete with p2p, and this is the best bet, but they will not contemplate that as a viable alternative--too bad, i still think it would be a better method, even if it changes the old biz model.
This is not true for two reasons:
1) the video was Osama's IP, it is not just an image and it was taken by him, not you.
2) failing that, I refer you to this article an another topic, but relevant here:
Lawyers unconnected to the case say it's a blurry area. Jonathan Band, an intellectual property expert in the District, says technically, Gore's speech was comparable to a theatrical production. "If he's taping it, he's infringing and copying her public performance."
It seems like a strech, but technically, it can be done. You taking the video can violate IP, you having a video he took definitly could violate IP. Great system, eh?
I posted this in the midst of another thread, so re-post so it isn't burried deep:
This bill applies to every copyright holder. But therein lies some of the more farcical (and completely realistic) scenarios that can be envisioned.
Osama Bin Laden owns the copyright and IP to his own image. Do you have a video clip of him on your computer? Well he would be able to hack in and destroy the file if he had a reasonable belief that you were harvesting his files.
Wait, doesn't the US government have his image, perhaps on an NSA computer? Well that can be legally hacked.
Clearly this seems far-fetched, but will be perfectly allowed in the plain language of the legislation. Why on earth would Congress want to pass a bill that will weaken cyber-security? This is the one of the best angles of attack, b/c no legislator wants to be perceived as weak on computer security.
As an added irony, I note that Lamar Smith, author of the cyber-crime bill that passed earlier this weak (with only one dissenting vote) is a co-sponsor of this bill. So if I understand correctly, he authors a bill to give lifetime imprisonment to hackers, but also allows copyright holders to hack....mmm hmm, that is the consistency I love from our reps!
Also note that in the definitions, p2p services that have a central server are exempted (carve out for AIM, nah couldn't be). However, the idea of a centralized server was taboo under the Napster case. So run a de-centralized server, be subject to this Berman Bill, run a centralized server, be subject to Napster (which would have been immune to this bill).
Incorrect...perhaps that is not the "stated" purpose of the bill but those exceptionse refer to economic loss of any person other than the file trader OR economic loss of more than $50.00 per impairment...other than economic loss involving computer files or data made available through a publically accessible peer-to-peer file trading network that contain works in which the owner has an exclusive right...
I believe I am reading this correctly as only preventing the removal of files that (a) someone other that the evil file trader, or (b) files that are not protected by copyright and would cause more than $50 per infringement. This is highly broad. And with the good faith exemptions written all over it, even these protections are pretty meaningless.
This bill applies to every copyright holder. But therein lies some of the more farcical (and completely realistic) scenarios that can be envisioned.
Osama Bin Laden owns the copyright and IP to his own image. Do you have a video clip of him on your computer? Well he would be able to hack in and destroy the file if he had a reasonable belief that you were harvesting his files.
Wait, doesn't the US government have his image, perhaps on an NSA computer? Well that can be legally hacked.
Clearly this seems far-fetched, but will be perfectly allowed in the plain language of the legislation. Why on earth would Congress want to pass a bill that will weaken cyber-security? This is the one of the best angles of attack, b/c no legislator wants to be perceived as weak on computer security.
As an added irony, I note that Lamar Smith, author of the cyber-crime bill that passed earlier this weak (with only one dissenting vote) is a co-sponsor of this bill. So if I understand correctly, he authors a bill to give lifetime imprisonment to hackers, but also allows copyright holders to hack....mmm hmm, that is the consistency I love from our reps!
Also note that in the definitions, p2p services that have a central server are exempted (carve out for AIM, nah couldn't be). However, the idea of a centralized server was taboo under the Napster case. So run a de-centralized server, be subject to this Berman Bill, run a centralized server, be subject to Napster (which would have been immune to this bill).
I found the whole event to actually be better than expected, with some notable exceptions.
1) Really, this is not the way to get the message out. Yelling is counter-productive and makes those who do it look bad. I was quite suprised that no one got kicked out, and did not enjoy having a security guard standing next to me because people in front of me could not control themselves! I understand the frustration--hearing inane comments from Valenti et. al. and not being able to respond--but you do yourselves no favors by interuppting and acting like children in a sandbox.
2) Valenti's comments were just plain stupid. Defending his stupid comments circa 1981 of the VCR being like the boston strangler by saying "a little demoguagery never hurt anyone." Man, I need to get that transcript, but here he admits that is what he did best (and should we be suprised, he was a Presidential speechwriter after all). This came on the heels of him saying that it is time to get the inflamed rhetoric out of the debate and the best line of, "well I am the public" (which was reported by the record company execs as well.
He said that VCR piracy was a problem (on the order or $3.5B) and that it could have been fixed originally, though he never wanted to stop the VCR, only have modest copyright royalties. He was quickly corrected by Bob Schwartz, General Counsel for Home Recording Rights Coalition, who said, "I recall the word 'injunction' being used in the lawsuit and the modest royalty of $25-50 per VCR tape. GREAT STUFF!!!
But Valenti did say they want to give the consumer what they want at a price they will pay. When Bond interjected, well it is clear they want P2P, Valenti replied, well I may want a skeleton key that opens every door--bizarre stuff.
3) Rob Ried of Listen.com ROCKED!! Go on, very good stuff. Aside from his unwavering conviction to talk about a safe harbor for all out of print work, that can be rebutted by a take down notice of the original artist (which is a good idea, but he spent too much time on it), he has a great model and presented it clearly. It was what I have always thought, there is a way to beat free, offer something compelling. Once you reach a certain age time == $$ and if I can get my music with little time and portable, I will take that and pay for it. If I do not have that luxery, I will use what is available. He made a great analagy to all the "designer" water out there (although this is a little false, because DC tap water really does suck--then again so does most current music, so maybe I am wrong here).
4) A great argument from Intel to Valenti. "Looks like the only way we can clean up ponrongraphy and violence and drugs in the movies is through a government mandate." That's right, throw it in their face that our industry does not want to be mandated just like theirs doesn't.
5) Again, I reiterate, chose the messenger better. Flame me if you will, but 10 guys looking like the comic book salesman from the simpsons, disrupting a government meeting, does not help. You guys can bitch and moan about secret back room dealings (and I do too), but when you are given the opportunity to attend public meetings, do not show why they prefer to do things in private. It is embarrasing, counter-productive, and will likely lead to the reduction of these meetings (which I did think was highly productive in showing that differing industries come at it differently). Standing up and yelling, "the time for civility has now come to an end" (true quote) does no good!!!!
Rep Berman spoke at our washington caucus 2 weeks ago where he announced the p2p self help bill he is working on. One of the more interesting things he said was that he never was interested in IP, and didn't know much about it before coming to Congress, but considering that he represented Hollywood, he figured he should get on the IP subcommittee to "represent his district."
Incidently, PTO head, James Rogan (formerly a Congressman from Orang County) pretty much said the same thing motivated him to get into IP issues which heknew next to nothing about before coming to Congress.
it is the percent that the server is up. i.e. 99.99% is 4 nines of reliability and up 99.99% of the time (I am assuming that x 9 refers to total 9 in the the percentage, not just to the right of the %).
100% uptime is virtually impossible, so the holy grail is as close as possible--99.999%
I will say this, being at the conference yesterday where he announced the dropping of the bill. If you do not think that there will some massive safe harbor provision and a good faith clause, you are deluding yourself. Fortunatly this bill will never pass, much like when the RIAA tried to add something similar to the PATRIOT act (after being rebuffed trying to do it as a stand alone bill). This spells disaster though because it opens the debate so skewed on one side that the "happy middle ground" will in fact be far away from what we would want.
2 interesting things to note though:
1) This cannot be done with out amending DMCA Sec 2101 (I believe that is the correct section) on circumvention devices. This could be the chance to finally make that it something workable, or put the Sony doctrine into statute and not just common law (common law that is being eroded as the Napster decisions showed).
2) I thought the most interesting thing Berman said yesterday (aside from this bombshell) is that when he came to Congress, he had no interest in IP per se, however being as he was the Congressman from Hollywood (I believe those were his exact words), he had to chose something to help his constituency out, and this was a great issue area for that.
If you object to this legislation (as you all should), contact his subcommittee office, they deal with this issue (not his personal office) at (202)225-4695. Of course, it goes with out saying, be polite and respectful and state your opinion with out flaming. If you want your position to be taken seriously, then you have to treat it seriously. Being a former hill staffer, nothing gets a brush off more than someone spewing out angrily and irrationally, HOWEVER, contrary opinions, stated well are always well regarded.
BTW, at the Q&A part everyone came out against this and told there objections to Berman.
Last time I was in Canada and changing $ at the bank, I wanted to get some $50 bills. I was told specifically not too as many stores do not take the $50 anymore due to the high counterfitting of them.
Actually the "punishment" is not supposed to punish MS per se, but rather restore competition, terminate the monopoly, and terminate all fruits of that illegal monopoly.
Granted, doing this would be a punishment for MS, but the purpose is not a punative system but rather a corrective system. This is a civil, not criminal case.
I was just talking to a friend of mine who is the manage of a local big name record chain. He wants to get out NOW because his profit margins are so low these days. He blames it on p2p and says that record sales have gone down in the last few years (he has been managing franchises in different locations over the last 7 years or so). Granted, his location is smack dab in the middle of a big city university campus and his biggest customers are students (who have the time and resources to burn music, but $15+ is too much to buy music).
I told him, these companies need to adapt or die (taking a page from that article countering the deToqueville Institute FUD on OSS). I suggested either they need to offer a premium on the discs that you can't get through burning, lower the prices, or change their model to a kiosk stand where you pick and chose your music, and within a few minutes out comes a customized CD with nice linear notes, of what you want to hear, at a reasonable price.
His responses were, they have tried offering better premiums, that has not worked; the price margin for the retailers is about $1 per new CD so he can't budge lower; and the companies don't want to offer a la carte music. They tried cd singles before and could not make a good margin on that, they tried kiosks before and took them away. Really it comes down to promotion, and they want to promote a whole unit where they can release singles at a time. He couldn't really argue against me when I said that before record companies had a monopoly on distribution, now with broadband, that monopoly on promotion and distribution is being altered.
His choice on whether to adapt or die is he wants to get out of the music reatail biz and open other franchises.
I still think kiosks in a mall would be a viable solution. It eliminates the retailers biggest cost and that is CDs go stale. If you can't sell them, you have physical property that cost money but is worthless, wheras electronic bits that cost per burn never go stale and don't take up shelf space.
or it could just be rolled into an omnibus approps or supplemental emergency, or the new supplemental terror bill (which is laden with pork) in conference. WireDog, you live in the DC area, so I am sure you know how a lot of stuff gets swept into those corners at the last minute under the cover of darkness in a 1000 page bill that no one except the staff that wrote it (and the lobbyists who request it) knows is in the bill. That said, i don't have any opinion of this specific bill.
Deleware also has no corporation taxes. That is why many businesses are incorporated there.
Yes until such treaties such as the Hague convention are ratified where companies can be sued in any foriegn jurisdiction with out any sort of contacts. Or until Yahoo and the like start losing cases and can be held liable in France for actions that they filter out for french specific sites (yahoo.fr). The future of lowest common denominator is not too far off, and that should be alarming whether you are concerned about USA exporting the DMCA or Europeans exporting bans on all "racist and xenophobic" speech (as they are currently attempting to do in the Council of Europe), or this!
Perhaps MS has plans to do pop-ups themselves? I don't think they do now, I think it is just inline. Of course, I haven't seen a pop-up since i began using proxomitron, so what do I know.
Then again, knowing MS, I am suprised they don't kill pop-ups in general, but have a special web developer subscription fee to disable this server side.
This is correct, that in general the english definition of effective is not necc the same as the DMCA def of effective. No argument from me there. But, even looking beyond the plain meaning to the definition that you provide, my first paragraph is still acurate. It is not an effective control in terms of requiting the application of information...blah blah blah if it just requires a cheap pen to swipe a strip away. Anyways, thanks for bringing up the distinction, b/c it is important to bear in mind. It leads to sloppy argumentation not to make that distinction clear, and I appreciate you keeping me honest, though I did mean it would not be a violation of DMCA under any definition of effective control.
Nice to read your response though. I have been following this whole saga you are having with AFGA on Declan's list. Of course, I am sure your program has been dl in great numbers in the last week or two, and now I would guess that the amount of people that knew about the program prior to AFGA's stunts and post-publication is a factor of 100-1000 times. I would also guess that many people did not know this was possible to do with fonts until AFGA made an issue about it. Anyways, good luck with your fight.
For some humor on this subject, the DMCA/Sharpie one that is, look here.
I think the key here is also that the (B) "effectively controls access". By definition, a control that be circumvented by a .99 pen and no special skill is not much of an effective control.
As nice as it would be to use this to show the DMCA for the sham it truly is, this is not going to be the test case.
I would note that putting recording celine dion and putting her voice on a CD is a MUCH better effective control for protecting that work. I mean, I would never want to listen to that, much less put it on my HD or copy it...would you?
We have prepared on analysis of this bill andit is online here, much easier than reading through the 30 pages, a condensed outline version. We oppose the bill and sent a letter to Sen. Hollings yesterday saying so, we also cc: to all members of the Committee (inc. Sen. Lott). You can also read our press release from our front page here.
We do not want to see the Internet, and Internet commerce treated differently than non-internet commerce. We do not want discriminatory effects placed on the Internet, and wide ranging new regulations and sever legal penalties that will bankrupt many firms. If you conduct any business with a web site, you should oppose this bill!
The DoJ has absolutely nothing to do with this phase of the trial, in fact they oppose it. They have a seperate remedy proposal ::cough:: sellout ::cough:: that they are trying to get the judge to aprove. It is far weaker remedies than what the non-settling states are proposing, and most all credible commentators believe it will do absolutely nothing.
The one to have faith in is the non-settling state AGs who are still pursuing the case. The DoJ has determined they don't care, they got enough of MS $$ to satisfy their needs.
Ironically, the city where Jack Daniels is made, Lynchburg, TN, it is illegal to purchase alcohol, so you can't even purchase Jack there, it is a dry county.
OK maybe not a coincidence, but crazy nevertheless!