but being web based there's a lot less chance of that happening. All the docs should be availiable for testing sample so QC should be easier too. Also, they can make smaller changes more often so breakage isn't as bad. Realize too, that the documents would probably be part of a database until you "printed" them to a file so they would auto-magically upgrade right along with the server.
Get RMS & Lessing to co-write a text with the help of the EFF & FSF. Be sure to include things like RMS "Future vision" article & Lessing's arguments to the supreme court. Then as a civic service release the book under a combination of Creative Commons and GPLD licences.. Be sure to assign the tradmark to the FSF. Then explain how copyright and trademark are working and why they made the license decisions they did right from the very first page!
The ultimate in subversion... after all, why should the public schools pay for books when they're willing to provide it for free!!
but nobody makes you buy an iPod to listen to music. on the other hand MS makes OEMS promise to sell ONLY MS if they want to sell computers at all. The same case is true for ANY music player... if you buy $500 from Real or $500 in WMA they won't work on an iPod either!!! Apple didn't invent the game of integrated music stores & players, they were last to the party and played the game by the rules other people had already set.. Apple won.. the other player lost. The only other real player in town is MS and they are trying just as hard to actively use their monopoly to lock down digital music.. but can't be cause Apple is beating them fair and square!!!! After all, MS forces OEMS to install their player on new computers, MS has a huge branding scheme with dozens of companies... and none can beat apple. Frankly, it's pretty funny.
They tried this with beenie babies and Magic cards too.. the general public [and most business leaders] fail to understand the difference between "selling a lot" of something and "abusing" your position to sell something.
The measure of Apple being a monopoly is this.... only Apple sells iPods or runs iTunes. they tried to partner with HP for a while, but HP backed out after only a year into the deal. If Apple was such a "monopoly" HP couldn't just walk away could they? Did Apple "tie" anything to their product to get HP to sell it? NO. Does Apple strong arm record lables to "only" be on iPod..or penalize labels for listing songs elsewhere? No. for a matter of fact, there's a lot of Sony music [to pick a very famous label] you can't get on iTunes... why? because they want to tie their music lables to their own media players... who's MORE monopolistic? Also, the majority of the other stores are WMA only.. again, is apple to blame because they made iPod cross platform when others don't do a good job of making their players work on macs?
to a certian extent I agree with the idea Apple should open their spec up... but... they more than likely are contractually bound to the RIAA [mopolistic collusion anybody] to only use their system for iPods. Also, they absolutley MUST be able to maintain the security of the DRM in order to stay in business. If it leaks out that it's too easy to break FairPlay, apple is probably in some form of trouble themselves.. so they just can't afford to share right now. Frankly, I'd like to see them play with Real just because Real makes an attempt at Linux software. An "offical" connection to a store for my iPod on Linux would be really cool as well as "offical" methods to play DRM'd stuff.
I always look at it like this. governement is a group of ALL the people. For capitalism to work economically everybody must be relitively equal in financial ability. So, one of Governments jobs is to "protect" private property... well if you have too much of it, then the govt may "relive" you of some property so they can afford to protect the rest. The libertarians always forget that there's a balance between your right to have property by taking thru "contracts" from other people and the right of the "mobs" so simply take it from you if they get too desperate!!
The govt has developed a practice of making the very rich "tread water" so that as they get "weighted" down with more money they have to let some go to the masses. That provides money for other people to attempt to be super rich too! Also, the govt has a vested interest in keeping the size of individual fortunes manageable.. after all, the govt should be top dog... nobody should have more money or resources than them... that's the problem we're having with multinationals right now.
but this is about UNWARRANTED search.. from the tone of things, the feds got direct access to the database to do their own searches... this is several steps past warranted searches... and with no accountability at all. They don't know WHAT the feds are looking up at this point! they may be looking for pizza, looking for drug delivery boys, or checking up on old girlfriends... the point of the lawsuit is that ATT opened the gates there is no accountabiltiy at all anymore!!
Like another replier said, this is more like the DMV office leaving an "empty desk" for law enforcement to use... Yeah, they know the guys a valid officer, yes, they know he catches lots of high-profile cases.. so they just set him up a desk so he can do his own searches...and they don't bother to ask for papers anymore. THEN the girlfriends start suing the DMV because they don't have any proof weather he was was legally allowed to make the searches or not.
at that point, the burden should be on ATT to prove they have some records of who was requesting searches and what for... especially if they allow direct access to a database of millions of customers! What's going to be interesting is how much discovery the judge will allow.. will they appoint some grand jury to look at the secret requests and match them up? That's really what this is about and a good judge should be VERY interested in some form of accountability for the executive branch.. The whole problem right now is that the Bush Administration isn't even complying with the laws for doing things in secret!!! Courts don't like it when really common data is called "secret" by anybody... that's the angle to go on here.
What about my slashdot replies? Is slashdot a mailing list, or are those considered "personal" emails??? Is every OSS project with a sourceforge.net address going to get blasted by this?
sure, why not, it's not like companies enforce laws they don't like here overseas.. think human rights, OSHA, minimum wage, working hours, right to unions, child labor, etc.. those things cause more damage in the world than a few pediphillies. Note too that MS and other companies want "IP" laws ENFORCED by the US where they're NOT legal yet.. after all, they want to take advantage of the cheap labor, but don't undercut us on the home! From a corperate point of view there's nothing wrong here.. they should be doing this [hosting content where it's legal] all along.
for starts, if you raid a terrorist target outside the USA we have the secret FISA court that will willingly sign the warrant for you... [and up to 72 hours AFTER you do the tap] They've only rejected a half-dozen in almost 20 years! The trouble is that the executive isn't even bothering to ask the secret court for permission anymore!!!
They are fighting ATT on consumer rights front.. that they gave the Feds private data nobody else could legally get and without any formal court paperwork. Like you said, it's a grey area that's not offically illegal because we can't prove it was going on... so how do you prove you're injured if it all happens with a few company execs and the feds in the computer room???
As far as the tail of your post, we are not at war...this is a policing action. the prez started one, but not with the congress approval before hand. Under the current precedent, the prez can pretty much start something somewhere and call us "at war" forever if he wants... that's got to stop. To put a counter conspericy out there, what if 9/11 was planned, or at least allowed to happen all along? The "patriot" act was way to convenient, big and thought-out for a last minute powers bill, what if it was planned to grab for the power all along.. there's a large segment of higher ups that think we should return to "cowboy" days where the "good guys" can just "get" the bad guys and go home proud of themselves and damn the conciquences.
And the whole problem with snooping is that our federal system is based on "injury" if you aren't "injured" adaquately they won't hear your case... Privacy is a really hard thing to measure, because they are collecting the information to use against somebody later. Once they single you out for somthing, they don't have to admit in court They ever spied on you if they bring up enough other evidence. There has to be SOME fight before they analyse the data an start creating laws that are targeted to the "symptoms" of crimes rather than the comming them... Think Minority Report here where they arrest you because your "patterns" are indicating you're about to commit a crime. That's where the Google case is so scary because lots of people "look" for bad stuff, but not everybody DOES bad things.
in My state of Michigan, you can petition to have the courts look at the laws immediately after it passes.. it can be denied before it's even a law. But in the federal system you have to be "injured".. usually meaning arrested, tried, convicted and serving time.. most of the time it's easier to "plead" out an get less than to fight the law... while they continue abusing it by keeping it from being "bad enough" for court. Look at the "enemy combatant" thing for a lesson in how to do this... keep the people out of "juristiction", out of court, away from lawyers, and make executive claims that you're just going to do it. We're rapidly nearing the point that the court needs guns to get the answers they need so they can presue cases rather than just wait for them to come into court on the excutive branch's whim.
This is the equivelant of the old scam of people dressing in utility company uniforms and vehicals in order to rob your house. Any time somebody pretends to be an agent of your business and isn't...especially to scam your customers, you have a serious problem and should fix it.
The point is that none of the laws created would have prevented 9/11 from happening. The terrorists complied with nearly every law that has been made after the fact. You can't make killing lots of people MORE illegal. If they knew we were checking for metal, they'd just use non-metalic implements, broken bottles, violin string to strangle, etc. Ultimately, people have to stick up for themselves! That's the true lesson of 9/11. 3 of the flights sat by and let people armed with boxcutters? blow them all up while waiting for the govenment to save them. One plane was contacted [by illegal use of cell phones mind you] by people that told them planes were being crashed. so they did something. They may not have saved themselves, but they saved what could have been the Congress, White House or thousands of other people. That's what the writers of the Constitution intended to happen.. and now we're punishing the PEOPLE for the PEOPLE's success when the govt failed!
Except that's EXACTLY what the neo-cons want to do. For instance, they can't pass a law to drug test everybody, but they can pass a law that any company that wants Federal business has to test their employees. They are useing EXACTLY the argument you suggested and the courts have whole-heartedly accepted that argument. Sad thing is, the civil rights movement was built on using that tool. It wasn't enough to call all men "equal" the courts kept ruling the Feds couldn't enforce the states from passing distrinimation laws. Fast forward to today and the idea of federal contract has fingers into everything. Airlines have to follow FAA directives. if the directive says make security guidelines like this, then they have to do that.. but the guidelines the airline itself makes are "secret" for security so they can't tell you.. and of course the "directive" is a "private" communication between the FAA and the airline heads so that's "secret" too. Make everybody beholden to a corporation and you can sidestep the constitution all you want!
This is about your right to be anonomous in a crowd of people, not your right to not be identified. This is systamatic identification of EVERYBODY in a given place.. it's the right of the people [all of us] to generally be anonomous. NOTHING, NO precedent in history ever gives the government the right to identify all the people moving about... but that's exactly what they're trying to do here. Imagine if they put a booth on the highways at the state line and asked "papers please"... the outrage would be huge. but they get away with it because you have a "privellage" to ride an airplane. The goal is make everything a "privillage" then everybody has to comply.
you miss the mechanics here... somebody at Homeland Security tells the FAA to tighten up security. The FAA sends letters to the heads of the airlines to tighten up security "like this". The airlines security theam make internal "private" rules to comply with the FAA's request. The minimum wage monkey is basicly just that, a monkey to process people and collect the information.
in most states the wording is "identify yourself" to the officer's liking... what's been changed is the idea that they can "hold" you until they are satisfied. It's not a mandatory ID rule, but of "open season" on anybody without an ID on their person.
You miss the point of terrorism entirely... "fighting" terrorism is negotiating with terrorists! Which in turn is encouraging them to commit more acts to keep being noticed. Consider a herd of antalope in Africa, they are free to galloup around. Sure predators get some, and some step asside to fight, but the herd moves on doing what it does. Imagine how stupid an silly it would look if the antelope were forming "groups" to run out and trample the lions.. it's absurd! We are so far above them [the terrorists] we shouldn't be reacting like this. They got a "lucky shot" in and we've invaded two countries, and sacerficed our civil rights, started tourtuting innocent citzens of other countries, and are continuing to look for more ways to "protect" ourselves. We need a real "mission" like building a base on the moon or sending men to mars.. the reason is to give people something to look UP to and strive for rather than looking down on all the others that might be trying to unseat us.
I like the idea of repealing popular election of senators. Orginally it was considered to be "undemocratic" to have senators be appointed by states... but the thing is now senators are not responsible in any way to the states they represent. They are accountable to NOBODY else who is actually elected in the states. Think of the changes that would happen if state's goveners could directly "fire" senators for being stupid or not representing the state properly. What started out as an idea to "increase" democracy actually undermines it!
not really, Maybe he wanted to remove the images from his computer before his wife found them. Maybe he was being "responsible" and keeping the images away from his own kids. What if this "burning" was a normal backup? It just said he put them on a CD... not what for. What if you have porn [even legal] images on your home network server, what about porn on backup tapes?
How different is it really? You downloaded the movie or music to view it, just like the kiddie porn guy did... you are downloading it for the entertainment that the media provides. If you burn a copy of it the same legal gymnastics could apply that you're "producing" a movie to pirate... remember, like another person said, there's no "fair use" law... "fair use" is a legal concept, but not a written part of law.. it's just the idea in court cases that certian actions are so basic they can't be illegal... The copyright law means that copying is copying... hence we have to have "licenses" to run software because it's "coppied" onto the hard disk and "coppied" into computer memory to run. That argument is alredy make and lost.
so what about "faces of death"... or hell, the nightly "smart bomb" footage on CNN. How about the "rodney king" hate crime filmed by onlookers? If you posess the images of the hate crime are you in th same group as the white pointy hat klan? If you posess a Koran are you a terrorist? There's a clear line between being a "watcher" and a do'er. The guy probably got the porn for free off Bittorrent anyway, so he didn't "support" the actual creator. The bigger question is this: Where does it stop? If CNN shows pictures of raped and tourtured Iraqi prisoners are all the people that view the nightly news guilty?? How about TiVo users.. Under the same rules can the Human Rights Court come after anybody they want now?
Ultimately, it's just information. It's a very dispicable information, but information about an event is NOT the same as causing the event yourself. Never forget, these cops, judges and procecutors want to be "thought police", they are tired of arresting "criminals" after the fact and would love to arrest "potential" criminals instead... to make their jobs easier. After all, if you're 16 and make dirty doodles of your girlfriend, in their book you're "deviant" and should be dealt with. We all know people that have dirty thoughts commit crimes, so if we have "proof" of the dirty thought we should presue it.
What several posters have pointed out... the anti-DRM clause covers the souce, not the media files protected. In other words. You CAN use a GPL program for DRM... but... You MUST release the source under the same conditions as the player... [i.e. you can't require extra restrictions on the source of a public program like NDAs] Also, you cannot encrypt the source.. or if you encrypt it [in means of a private user contract] you must include the key to the souce code.
A misconception so far is that you CAN'T use it for DRM... you can. [obviously, otherwise you couldn't encrypt passwords, use SSL or many other things we do everyday.. those are all "DRM" too] People must have the real source [but not necessaraly the keys to the files] and if they use it to figure out the key for your DRM'd files you can't sue them for "breaking the lock."
This puts DRM in the same class as SSL or RSA... the source is open, your're more than welcome to TRY to break it if you can.... But just like intruding on a private SSL connnection would be illegal so would distributing the files after you unlock them. essentially it's not that big of a deal.
Actually, like another poster said, there is no "common law" right to invention or copyright... It's the inate right of every human to absorb and recreate what they see and hear. The constitution takes away that right for the "common good"... if it wasn't written into it, the Feds couldn't ever create copyright!! It's a funny sort of thing happening lately where the real rights of men that can never be defined are being userped because they're not expressely allowed. We're becoming a nation of fiat law versus common law.. where it's not legal UNLESS there's a law for it... or at least there should be.. that's a scary thought.
but this could give more insight into what the muscles would have to look like to power the size frame.. draw better pictures or learn more abou how they lived. you can get close looking at other animals, but more info is always better.
The "REAL" reason this is newsworthy right now is that Will Wright has been putting serious inquery into just this thing for his next game Spore. One of the hooks of that game is defining general geometry of a creature an letting the computer figure out what it's supposed to do rather than an animator trying to guess every animation...
Slashdot Mirror
but being web based there's a lot less chance of that happening. All the docs should be availiable for testing sample so QC should be easier too. Also, they can make smaller changes more often so breakage isn't as bad. Realize too, that the documents would probably be part of a database until you "printed" them to a file so they would auto-magically upgrade right along with the server.
The ultimate in subversion... after all, why should the public schools pay for books when they're willing to provide it for free!!
but nobody makes you buy an iPod to listen to music. on the other hand MS makes OEMS promise to sell ONLY MS if they want to sell computers at all. The same case is true for ANY music player... if you buy $500 from Real or $500 in WMA they won't work on an iPod either!!! Apple didn't invent the game of integrated music stores & players, they were last to the party and played the game by the rules other people had already set.. Apple won.. the other player lost. The only other real player in town is MS and they are trying just as hard to actively use their monopoly to lock down digital music.. but can't be cause Apple is beating them fair and square!!!! After all, MS forces OEMS to install their player on new computers, MS has a huge branding scheme with dozens of companies... and none can beat apple. Frankly, it's pretty funny.
The measure of Apple being a monopoly is this.... only Apple sells iPods or runs iTunes. they tried to partner with HP for a while, but HP backed out after only a year into the deal. If Apple was such a "monopoly" HP couldn't just walk away could they? Did Apple "tie" anything to their product to get HP to sell it? NO. Does Apple strong arm record lables to "only" be on iPod..or penalize labels for listing songs elsewhere? No. for a matter of fact, there's a lot of Sony music [to pick a very famous label] you can't get on iTunes... why? because they want to tie their music lables to their own media players... who's MORE monopolistic? Also, the majority of the other stores are WMA only.. again, is apple to blame because they made iPod cross platform when others don't do a good job of making their players work on macs?
to a certian extent I agree with the idea Apple should open their spec up... but... they more than likely are contractually bound to the RIAA [mopolistic collusion anybody] to only use their system for iPods. Also, they absolutley MUST be able to maintain the security of the DRM in order to stay in business. If it leaks out that it's too easy to break FairPlay, apple is probably in some form of trouble themselves.. so they just can't afford to share right now. Frankly, I'd like to see them play with Real just because Real makes an attempt at Linux software. An "offical" connection to a store for my iPod on Linux would be really cool as well as "offical" methods to play DRM'd stuff.
The govt has developed a practice of making the very rich "tread water" so that as they get "weighted" down with more money they have to let some go to the masses. That provides money for other people to attempt to be super rich too! Also, the govt has a vested interest in keeping the size of individual fortunes manageable.. after all, the govt should be top dog... nobody should have more money or resources than them... that's the problem we're having with multinationals right now.
but this is about UNWARRANTED search.. from the tone of things, the feds got direct access to the database to do their own searches... this is several steps past warranted searches... and with no accountability at all. They don't know WHAT the feds are looking up at this point! they may be looking for pizza, looking for drug delivery boys, or checking up on old girlfriends... the point of the lawsuit is that ATT opened the gates there is no accountabiltiy at all anymore!!
at that point, the burden should be on ATT to prove they have some records of who was requesting searches and what for... especially if they allow direct access to a database of millions of customers! What's going to be interesting is how much discovery the judge will allow.. will they appoint some grand jury to look at the secret requests and match them up? That's really what this is about and a good judge should be VERY interested in some form of accountability for the executive branch.. The whole problem right now is that the Bush Administration isn't even complying with the laws for doing things in secret!!! Courts don't like it when really common data is called "secret" by anybody... that's the angle to go on here.
What about my slashdot replies? Is slashdot a mailing list, or are those considered "personal" emails??? Is every OSS project with a sourceforge.net address going to get blasted by this?
sure, why not, it's not like companies enforce laws they don't like here overseas.. think human rights, OSHA, minimum wage, working hours, right to unions, child labor, etc.. those things cause more damage in the world than a few pediphillies. Note too that MS and other companies want "IP" laws ENFORCED by the US where they're NOT legal yet.. after all, they want to take advantage of the cheap labor, but don't undercut us on the home! From a corperate point of view there's nothing wrong here.. they should be doing this [hosting content where it's legal] all along.
They are fighting ATT on consumer rights front.. that they gave the Feds private data nobody else could legally get and without any formal court paperwork. Like you said, it's a grey area that's not offically illegal because we can't prove it was going on... so how do you prove you're injured if it all happens with a few company execs and the feds in the computer room???
As far as the tail of your post, we are not at war...this is a policing action. the prez started one, but not with the congress approval before hand. Under the current precedent, the prez can pretty much start something somewhere and call us "at war" forever if he wants... that's got to stop. To put a counter conspericy out there, what if 9/11 was planned, or at least allowed to happen all along? The "patriot" act was way to convenient, big and thought-out for a last minute powers bill, what if it was planned to grab for the power all along.. there's a large segment of higher ups that think we should return to "cowboy" days where the "good guys" can just "get" the bad guys and go home proud of themselves and damn the conciquences.
in My state of Michigan, you can petition to have the courts look at the laws immediately after it passes.. it can be denied before it's even a law. But in the federal system you have to be "injured".. usually meaning arrested, tried, convicted and serving time.. most of the time it's easier to "plead" out an get less than to fight the law... while they continue abusing it by keeping it from being "bad enough" for court. Look at the "enemy combatant" thing for a lesson in how to do this... keep the people out of "juristiction", out of court, away from lawyers, and make executive claims that you're just going to do it. We're rapidly nearing the point that the court needs guns to get the answers they need so they can presue cases rather than just wait for them to come into court on the excutive branch's whim.
This is the equivelant of the old scam of people dressing in utility company uniforms and vehicals in order to rob your house. Any time somebody pretends to be an agent of your business and isn't ...especially to scam your customers, you have a serious problem and should fix it.
The point is that none of the laws created would have prevented 9/11 from happening. The terrorists complied with nearly every law that has been made after the fact. You can't make killing lots of people MORE illegal. If they knew we were checking for metal, they'd just use non-metalic implements, broken bottles, violin string to strangle, etc. Ultimately, people have to stick up for themselves! That's the true lesson of 9/11. 3 of the flights sat by and let people armed with boxcutters? blow them all up while waiting for the govenment to save them. One plane was contacted [by illegal use of cell phones mind you] by people that told them planes were being crashed. so they did something. They may not have saved themselves, but they saved what could have been the Congress, White House or thousands of other people. That's what the writers of the Constitution intended to happen.. and now we're punishing the PEOPLE for the PEOPLE's success when the govt failed!
Except that's EXACTLY what the neo-cons want to do. For instance, they can't pass a law to drug test everybody, but they can pass a law that any company that wants Federal business has to test their employees. They are useing EXACTLY the argument you suggested and the courts have whole-heartedly accepted that argument. Sad thing is, the civil rights movement was built on using that tool. It wasn't enough to call all men "equal" the courts kept ruling the Feds couldn't enforce the states from passing distrinimation laws. Fast forward to today and the idea of federal contract has fingers into everything. Airlines have to follow FAA directives. if the directive says make security guidelines like this, then they have to do that.. but the guidelines the airline itself makes are "secret" for security so they can't tell you.. and of course the "directive" is a "private" communication between the FAA and the airline heads so that's "secret" too. Make everybody beholden to a corporation and you can sidestep the constitution all you want!
This is about your right to be anonomous in a crowd of people, not your right to not be identified. This is systamatic identification of EVERYBODY in a given place.. it's the right of the people [all of us] to generally be anonomous. NOTHING, NO precedent in history ever gives the government the right to identify all the people moving about... but that's exactly what they're trying to do here. Imagine if they put a booth on the highways at the state line and asked "papers please"... the outrage would be huge. but they get away with it because you have a "privellage" to ride an airplane. The goal is make everything a "privillage" then everybody has to comply.
you miss the mechanics here... somebody at Homeland Security tells the FAA to tighten up security. The FAA sends letters to the heads of the airlines to tighten up security "like this". The airlines security theam make internal "private" rules to comply with the FAA's request. The minimum wage monkey is basicly just that, a monkey to process people and collect the information.
in most states the wording is "identify yourself" to the officer's liking... what's been changed is the idea that they can "hold" you until they are satisfied. It's not a mandatory ID rule, but of "open season" on anybody without an ID on their person.
You miss the point of terrorism entirely... "fighting" terrorism is negotiating with terrorists! Which in turn is encouraging them to commit more acts to keep being noticed. Consider a herd of antalope in Africa, they are free to galloup around. Sure predators get some, and some step asside to fight, but the herd moves on doing what it does. Imagine how stupid an silly it would look if the antelope were forming "groups" to run out and trample the lions.. it's absurd! We are so far above them [the terrorists] we shouldn't be reacting like this. They got a "lucky shot" in and we've invaded two countries, and sacerficed our civil rights, started tourtuting innocent citzens of other countries, and are continuing to look for more ways to "protect" ourselves. We need a real "mission" like building a base on the moon or sending men to mars.. the reason is to give people something to look UP to and strive for rather than looking down on all the others that might be trying to unseat us.
I like the idea of repealing popular election of senators. Orginally it was considered to be "undemocratic" to have senators be appointed by states... but the thing is now senators are not responsible in any way to the states they represent. They are accountable to NOBODY else who is actually elected in the states. Think of the changes that would happen if state's goveners could directly "fire" senators for being stupid or not representing the state properly. What started out as an idea to "increase" democracy actually undermines it!
not really, Maybe he wanted to remove the images from his computer before his wife found them. Maybe he was being "responsible" and keeping the images away from his own kids. What if this "burning" was a normal backup? It just said he put them on a CD... not what for. What if you have porn [even legal] images on your home network server, what about porn on backup tapes?
How different is it really? You downloaded the movie or music to view it, just like the kiddie porn guy did... you are downloading it for the entertainment that the media provides. If you burn a copy of it the same legal gymnastics could apply that you're "producing" a movie to pirate... remember, like another person said, there's no "fair use" law... "fair use" is a legal concept, but not a written part of law.. it's just the idea in court cases that certian actions are so basic they can't be illegal... The copyright law means that copying is copying... hence we have to have "licenses" to run software because it's "coppied" onto the hard disk and "coppied" into computer memory to run. That argument is alredy make and lost.
Ultimately, it's just information. It's a very dispicable information, but information about an event is NOT the same as causing the event yourself. Never forget, these cops, judges and procecutors want to be "thought police", they are tired of arresting "criminals" after the fact and would love to arrest "potential" criminals instead... to make their jobs easier. After all, if you're 16 and make dirty doodles of your girlfriend, in their book you're "deviant" and should be dealt with. We all know people that have dirty thoughts commit crimes, so if we have "proof" of the dirty thought we should presue it.
A misconception so far is that you CAN'T use it for DRM... you can. [obviously, otherwise you couldn't encrypt passwords, use SSL or many other things we do everyday.. those are all "DRM" too] People must have the real source [but not necessaraly the keys to the files] and if they use it to figure out the key for your DRM'd files you can't sue them for "breaking the lock."
This puts DRM in the same class as SSL or RSA... the source is open, your're more than welcome to TRY to break it if you can.... But just like intruding on a private SSL connnection would be illegal so would distributing the files after you unlock them. essentially it's not that big of a deal.
Actually, like another poster said, there is no "common law" right to invention or copyright... It's the inate right of every human to absorb and recreate what they see and hear. The constitution takes away that right for the "common good" ... if it wasn't written into it, the Feds couldn't ever create copyright!! It's a funny sort of thing happening lately where the real rights of men that can never be defined are being userped because they're not expressely allowed. We're becoming a nation of fiat law versus common law.. where it's not legal UNLESS there's a law for it... or at least there should be .. that's a scary thought.
The "REAL" reason this is newsworthy right now is that Will Wright has been putting serious inquery into just this thing for his next game Spore. One of the hooks of that game is defining general geometry of a creature an letting the computer figure out what it's supposed to do rather than an animator trying to guess every animation...