I continue to take some comfort in the fact that this is not the first time unconstitutional laws have been passed in this country. Remember the Alien and Sedition Acts? They were passed in a climate of fear very similar to the one we are now in vis a vis terrorists. Only then the terrorists were French, rather than Islamic. Somehow, the country got through that and those laws were repealed (and they were not even declared unconstitutional, because that was before the principle of judicial review of laws passed by Congress was established).
I think there is hope that the current passel of unconstitutional laws will not stand the test of time, either, particularly if people like us keep the pressure on and keep shining lights into the dark corners of government in this country.
Not working at the same time, though. I think I do have
my facts straight. But if you disagree, please tell me how I can log in from another machine (remote desktop) while someone else is working at the console, without spending $$ on
XP server, I'll be grateful. I haven't figured out how to do that yet. As far as I can tell, only one login at a time can be active.
I can do that with a Mac, though, without buying the server version of OS X.
Not only that, but, unless you pay $$ to
get the server version of XP, only one user
can be logged in at a time. I can log into a Mac
as many times as I need to. So on top of everything
else M$ lies about "Multi-User." It does just mean you
can have more than one user account, it means they
can all be logged in at once.
Y'know, if they go that far with the protection schemes (passing the additional costs on to the customer, of course), I suspect the current slump in computer sales is a walk in the part compared with what will happen then.
Really, who will buy this stuff? It's notions like this that (almost) make me certain that the current crop of dumb laws, and Palladium itself (in the current form) will never actually see the light of day.
I had a lawyer tell me once that "the law is what you boldly proclaim and cautiously defend."
You are seeing a perfect example of that. In spite of what your country's law might actually say (e.g. you cannot sign away your right to sue, etc.) companies routinely try to make you do so. Think of it as legal intimidation of the uninformed.
You probably should go see a lawyer to have her explain what is or is not legal about the contract. You'll feel better knowing what your actual rights are and can probably sign it without feeling you're giving away any right you shouldn't. That, at least, has been my experience.
I'm wondering, though, if these products fail: Maybe, just maybe, that will be the wake-up call to both the general "consumer" and the tech biz that following RIAA and MPAA ain't such a good idea. Could it be that a spectacular failure will give *AA such a black eye that no one will pay any attention to them? Anyway, we can hope!
This whole thing is reminiscent of the "copy protection wars" of the 1980's. Software makers tried ever more sophisticated means of copy protecting disks, and every one of the methods was broken. Eventually the industry just simply gave up on the idea of copy protecting floppy disks.
Now it looks like the whole batlle is going to be repeated with CD's and DVD's. Guess who's going to lose that battle?
It's kind of like Columnist Dan Gillmor (San Jose Mercury News) wrote a while back: Microsoft will eventually find, when crunch time comes, that it has lots of allies, but no friends.
Is RIAA already doing this? The Berman law has not passed yet, AFAIK. So if they are already doing this, they are breaking the law and should be prosecuted, not just shut out. And if not, aren't we overreacting a bit?
You should move to California. It's illegal here to smoke inside any building. There are exceptions, of course, but the vast majority of public buildings are smoke free.
Marge: You know, the courts might not work any more, but as long as everybody is videotaping everyone else, justice will be done.
This is the pithiest way to say this I have seen! What a great quote!
David Brin has a book out, _The Transparent Society_, that is an in-depth discussion of the issues of privacy and surveillance in modern society. The book expands on Marge's point and speaks to all the issues so far brought up in this discussion, and quite a few you haven't thought of yet.
Among other things, some salient points I gleaned from the book are:
The cameras are coming, there's no stopping them. They will be in the hands of the Government (at every level), but also in the hands of private citizens. They are getting smaller (therefore easier to hide) and more capable all the time.
This is not necessarily a bad thing, as Marge notes in the quote. This can have the effect of protecting us from each other, as well as from police abuses. Think of Rodney King. Think of the young black teen who was slammed into a car hood by police, and was captured on camera. Think of the young girl who was assaulted (on camera) by police during a protest on the Golden Gate Bridge, and who turned out to be 12 years old. Enough of these incidents being publicized will of necessity force authorities to moderate their behavior.
Surveillance by the Gov't (in any form) is not that terrible if citizens have the right of oversight into what is captured on these cameras. Fortunately, we do have that right through court orders and subpoenas.
It's a really good and thoughtful book, and I recommend you all check it out.
This brought to my mind another SF author, Carl Sagan. In his 1985 novel, _Contact_, one of the characters, Hadden, had invented a device called Adnix, which automatically muted TV ads. There ensued both a legal battle and an arms race, and Hadden won both, but was branded un-American by the Ad Counsel.
It appears Sagan was remarkably prescient, and I hope that he's right about the outcomes of both the legal fight and the arms race!
"If as a result of pvrs, nobody watches commercials anymore and the bottom falls out of the broadcasting industry, what do you propose to do with the countless people who were employed by said industry and now are jobless with mouths to feed? Do you really want to see the broadcasting industry go into the shitter? Having your freedoms is one thing, but destroying somebody's livelihood is another."
I dunno, but (content-wise), it seems they are already there!
Re:The Law Goes Further Than That: It is Yours
on
Shrinkwrapped Books
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
It'd be interesting to see what Omnicare's response would be if a large number of recipients of this book would donate it to their local library. If that ended up in court, what a delicious case, no?
We do have a secret weapon that I think could be effective at educating even "joe sixpack" about the evils of DMCA and other proposed laws. I've thought all round this, and I
see lots of upside, and no downside.
Consider how fast an emailed joke gets from one end of the country to the other, just by being passed along friend to friend.
Why can't we all send a clear concise email message to all our friends, explaining just why people should know about DMCA and care about fair use. Urge them to send it along to all *their* friends. I'm sure you are all aware how such messages take on a life of their own. If a small number of us do this, I suspect that most people that have email accounts would see at least one of them within a week.
Now, many will no doubt ignore it, but a lot of people won't. Many who didn't know much about DMCA would at least start to recognize the issue in the newspapers and other media. Some people might be moved to write their Congresscritters about what's going on. This would be no bad thing, for in spite of what Declan says, Congresscritters *DO* pay attention to what their constituents think. If enough of us tell them how mad and frightened we are of the direction things are heading, they will be forced to consider our concerns.
If you want an example of this, consider the Aircraft Owners and Pilot's Association, of which I'm a member. AOPA has just over a half a million members, which doesn't seem like much compared to the 280 million in the country. Yet regularly, when issues of concern to pilots are in consideration in Congress, AOPA's letter writing campaigns do affect the votes of members of Congress.
All the money Disney hands to Berman and others won't matter a fig if Berman ever gets it in his head that he could lose the next election. It wouldn't take many of his constituents writing him to get that message to penetrate.
What should a message like this say? Something along these lines: "Do you know that rights you now take for granted could be taken away by law?" Then a simple explanation of what DMCA is, and how it has already led to one person being jailed for simply giving an academic talk, while other researchers have cancelled talks rather than risk jail. Then: "well, why should we care about a bunch of professors and scientists, anyway?" Because they were simply exercising their free-speech and fair use rights. Then go on to explain that fair use means that it's OK to rip CD's and make MP3 tracks to play on your computer (providing you bought the CD, of course). Fair use means that you can sell a CD or a book after you buy it and are done with it. Fair use means you can go to a library or music store and listen to a CD to see if you like it before you buy it. And all of these fair use rights are in jeopardy because of DMCA and other proposed laws.
If done right, I think this kind of grassroots campaign can be very effective. Can someone see why it wouldn't at least help? I can't think of any reason myself. It won't solve everything, but it would be a step in the right direction.
Slashdot Mirror
I think Socrates said it like this: Democracy is two wolves and a lamb discussing what's for dinner.
I think there is hope that the current passel of unconstitutional laws will not stand the test of time, either, particularly if people like us keep the pressure on and keep shining lights into the dark corners of government in this country.
I can do that with a Mac, though, without buying the server version of OS X.
Not only that, but, unless you pay $$ to get the server version of XP, only one user can be logged in at a time. I can log into a Mac as many times as I need to. So on top of everything else M$ lies about "Multi-User." It does just mean you can have more than one user account, it means they can all be logged in at once.
Really, who will buy this stuff? It's notions like this that (almost) make me certain that the current crop of dumb laws, and Palladium itself (in the current form) will never actually see the light of day.
"Obscurity is a much worse problem (for an artist or author) than piracy."
You are seeing a perfect example of that. In spite of what your country's law might actually say (e.g. you cannot sign away your right to sue, etc.) companies routinely try to make you do so. Think of it as legal intimidation of the uninformed.
You probably should go see a lawyer to have her explain what is or is not legal about the contract. You'll feel better knowing what your actual rights are and can probably sign it without feeling you're giving away any right you shouldn't. That, at least, has been my experience.
I'm wondering, though, if these products fail: Maybe, just maybe, that will be the wake-up call to both the general "consumer" and the tech biz that following RIAA and MPAA ain't such a good idea. Could it be that a spectacular failure will give *AA such a black eye that no one will pay any attention to them? Anyway, we can hope!
Now it looks like the whole batlle is going to be repeated with CD's and DVD's. Guess who's going to lose that battle?
It's kind of like Columnist Dan Gillmor (San Jose Mercury News) wrote a while back: Microsoft will eventually find, when crunch time comes, that it has lots of allies, but no friends.
Is RIAA already doing this? The Berman law has not passed yet, AFAIK. So if they are already doing this, they are breaking the law and should be prosecuted, not just shut out. And if not, aren't we overreacting a bit?
There are compensations for the high taxes here!
This is the pithiest way to say this I have seen! What a great quote!
David Brin has a book out, _The Transparent Society_, that is an in-depth discussion of the issues of privacy and surveillance in modern society. The book expands on Marge's point and speaks to all the issues so far brought up in this discussion, and quite a few you haven't thought of yet.
Among other things, some salient points I gleaned from the book are:
The cameras are coming, there's no stopping them. They will be in the hands of the Government (at every level), but also in the hands of private citizens. They are getting smaller (therefore easier to hide) and more capable all the time.
This is not necessarily a bad thing, as Marge notes in the quote. This can have the effect of protecting us from each other, as well as from police abuses. Think of Rodney King. Think of the young black teen who was slammed into a car hood by police, and was captured on camera. Think of the young girl who was assaulted (on camera) by police during a protest on the Golden Gate Bridge, and who turned out to be 12 years old. Enough of these incidents being publicized will of necessity force authorities to moderate their behavior.
Surveillance by the Gov't (in any form) is not that terrible if citizens have the right of oversight into what is captured on these cameras. Fortunately, we do have that right through court orders and subpoenas.
It's a really good and thoughtful book, and I recommend you all check it out.
It appears Sagan was remarkably prescient, and I hope that he's right about the outcomes of both the legal fight and the arms race!
I dunno, but (content-wise), it seems they are already there!
It'd be interesting to see what Omnicare's response would be if a large number of recipients of this book would donate it to their local library. If that ended up in court, what a delicious case, no?
Now, many will no doubt ignore it, but a lot of people won't. Many who didn't know much about DMCA would at least start to recognize the issue in the newspapers and other media. Some people might be moved to write their Congresscritters about what's going on. This would be no bad thing, for in spite of what Declan says, Congresscritters *DO* pay attention to what their constituents think. If enough of us tell them how mad and frightened we are of the direction things are heading, they will be forced to consider our concerns.
If you want an example of this, consider the Aircraft Owners and Pilot's Association, of which I'm a member. AOPA has just over a half a million members, which doesn't seem like much compared to the 280 million in the country. Yet regularly, when issues of concern to pilots are in consideration in Congress, AOPA's letter writing campaigns do affect the votes of members of Congress. All the money Disney hands to Berman and others won't matter a fig if Berman ever gets it in his head that he could lose the next election. It wouldn't take many of his constituents writing him to get that message to penetrate.
What should a message like this say? Something along these lines: "Do you know that rights you now take for granted could be taken away by law?" Then a simple explanation of what DMCA is, and how it has already led to one person being jailed for simply giving an academic talk, while other researchers have cancelled talks rather than risk jail. Then: "well, why should we care about a bunch of professors and scientists, anyway?" Because they were simply exercising their free-speech and fair use rights. Then go on to explain that fair use means that it's OK to rip CD's and make MP3 tracks to play on your computer (providing you bought the CD, of course). Fair use means that you can sell a CD or a book after you buy it and are done with it. Fair use means you can go to a library or music store and listen to a CD to see if you like it before you buy it. And all of these fair use rights are in jeopardy because of DMCA and other proposed laws.
If done right, I think this kind of grassroots campaign can be very effective. Can someone see why it wouldn't at least help? I can't think of any reason myself. It won't solve everything, but it would be a step in the right direction.