The purpose of the Mythbusters' experiment was not to determine whether Archimedes was an idiot or not. In fact, it's practically common sense given a high school education that focusing enough reflected sunlight on the same location will burn something ("Augh! Fire indeed hot!"), and a parabolic reflector can potentially make that happen. The Mythbusters wanted to find out whether, using the technology of the day, the Greeks actually could torch Roman triremes using Archimedes's idea, and ultimately decided that it was a good idea before its time.
Now, I'm not saying they proved anything. The Mythbusters are generally far-less-than-scientific in their approach. But their argument that the approach was far more difficult and far less effective than just shooting things with flaming arrows was pretty convincing.
Actually, it is as I said. The definition you quote is in 1201(a)(3) starts with "As used in this subsection", meaning 1201(a). I referenced 1201(b), which has additional restrictions on the manufacture and trafficking of circumvention technology. In fact, 1201(b) has its own set of definitions, in 1201(b)(2), which makes no distinctions based on who holds the copyright on a work.
Actually, the DMCA outlaws the mere creation of a technology for circumventing a copy prevention system. You don't even have to use it to be in violation. See Section 1201(b).
TiVo has no need to be worried about software-based PVRs. It's got the entertainment industry behind it on that one. We talk on Slashdot from time to time about the broadcast flag and how it would essentially prevent software-based (and especially open-source) PVRs, but what gets a lot less notice is that the same restrictions already encumber digital cable TV. Digital cable TV boxes output an analog signal at a lower resolution than HD, but for the purposes of software-based PVRs, that's where it ends. The HD digital signal is also an output option from a digital cable TV box, either through DVI or Firewire, but that signal is restricted by the 5C DTCP content "protection" system, which prevents a signal from being transmitted unless the listening devices are compliant.
Someone could probably come up with a software solution to defeat 5C, but with the DMCA in place and without the DMCRA to defend our rights, doing so would be illegal. Essentially, it takes open-source PVRs, which are legal and worthwhile in the analog domain, and puts them in the category of tools for piracy when used in the digital domain. And what's more, the DTLA (which administers licensing of DTCP) will, just like the DVD-CCA, never ever ever grant a license for someone wanting to build an open-source PVR.
TiVo has nothing to worry about from software PVRs - they'll die off slowly as the shift to digital HD continues. Then the entertainment industry can finish TiVo off at its leisure.
Also, Upton, R-MI, is also known to be strongly in favor of the flag. On the other hand, Upton is only a subcommittee chair, while Barton, R-TX, is the chair of the entire Energy and Commerce Committee. According to the EFF post linked in the OP, Barton may be willing to trade the broadcast flag for certain concessions from the ??AA (why Barton feels he has to bargain with the ??AA is beyond me - the entertainment industry is not the end-all, be-all of campaign finance).
Note that the people who signed the letter are lost causes. It's still important to deluge them with phone calls, but don't expect them to change their minds. The only true recourse is to vote against them next year. What's more important is the opinions of the other members of the Energy and Commerce Committee; they couldn't be convinced to sign the letter right away, and that must mean they're either opposed or on the fence.
My prediction is that, as usual, MPAA members will look this gift-horse straight in the mouth, and force Comcast and other cable providers into a contract where they can only put movies on PPV and subsequently sell the DVDs if they sell the rental versions of the DVDs, i.e., the ones with tons of unskippable ads before the movie itself starts.
Indeed, Albrecht and McIntyre learned that the phone company BellSouth Corp. had applied for a patent on a system for scanning RFID tags in trash, and using the data to study the shopping patterns of individual consumers.
I seem to remember that, back in the day, a large portion of the information used in phone phreaking was gathered through dumpster diving for internal manuals at Ma Bell. I guess turnabout really is fair play.
The whole "inconsistent jury" thing seems like a non-argument to me. After all, can't someone charged under the statute waive their right to a jury trial, thus putting the decision in the hands of a judge?
The funny thing is, Microsoft is powerful enough to re-open the analog "hole" for HD, if it turned out to be valuable enough to them. All they have to do is threaten to switch to Blu-Ray, and Toshiba and NEC will adjust the standard for them to avoid losing all those sales of HD-DVD drives. That's even over the objections of the media companies, because with the customer base of the Xbox 360, the media companies would be shooting themselves in the collective foot by refusing to produce content for it, analog hole or not. Even Sony Pictures will release content on both formats until one of the formats wins.
In fact, that last bit - the media companies want to make money, and they will make money regardless of DRM - is why I can't understand why the software and electronics companies haven't been more assertive so far. They definitely have the upper hand.
It's the same strategy the media industry tried (and is still trying) for broadcast TV. High def is just candy for the consumer to get them to buy into the new technology - but the true purpose of the new technology is to encumber us all with oppressive DRM so that the media industry can disable our fast-forward buttons.
If it had worked with DVDs, then HD DVDs would be even further off than they are now, but DeCSS with a ripped player key (and later, simply brute-forcing CSS) forced their hand.
Sometimes I'll do a Google search for something, and find a document that's closely related, but there's no link on that document to a page on the same site that lists other similar documents (like, for example, I get Chapter 2 in a Google search and want to get to Chapter 1). So what I'll do is delete the "chapter2.html" from the end and hope I get an index.html or a plain directory listing.
Are we saying that I'm now violating computer criminal statutes (or would be, if I lived in the UK) when I do that?
What if the downloader is already an HBO subscriber, and just happened to miss the episode? HBO loses zero income to such downloaders, so you can't paint everyone with the same brush in this case.
Politics.slashdot.org: an address that changes all the rules.
Re:Stop giving them money
on
RIAA Sues a Child
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Actually, the law explicitly grants us the right to resell the music we buy. In fact, the law (upon a cursory reading) doesn't appear to discount electronic copies of music (such as music downloaded from iTMS), and the law also states that we are entitled to resell said music, which means that someone might actually have a legal case to force Apple to open up some mechanism for us to resell the music we buy from them.
I thought the point of the guardian ad litem in the original case was that the RIAA was suing the mother, the mother claimed she didn't do it but her daughter admitted to it, and the RIAA then amended the suit to include the daughter. Since the mother had a conflict of interest in acting as the girl's guardian, a guardian ad litem could be appointed. But the RIAA dismissed the suit against the mother, and so now there is no conflict of interest. Does that mean that there is no longer a conflict of interest, and hence, no need for a guardian ad litem?
What's more, watermarking as a deterrent/detection method for piracy is supported by the EFF. This won't be particularly useful for DVDs (as there's no way to link watermark with purchaser), but it could be very useful for DRM-free Internet distribution.
Wouldn't it be great to form a company that, amid chaos preventing peering agreements, purchases bandwidth from backbone participants and resells that bandwidth to other participants and smaller-tier ISPs? Better yet, the company wouldn't need to actually create any bandwidth, or for that matter, provide any hardware at peering points - it could just use existing hardware owned by other companies. And even better, find ways to exploit the system so that money is made by doing nothing at all even though the books indicate that network conditions are being improved.
Just make sure to have my charter flight ready to leave for sunnier climes without extradition agreements, just in case.
Slashdot Mirror
My Commodore 64 has a 700kHz processor in it
Unless you're underclocking, your C-64's 6510 runs at about 1 MHz.
Everything's "dishonest" when you're on the hunt for lies. Why can't you take the apology at face value?
Oh, wait, I forgot. They're Fox News, this is Slashdot, and there's karma at stake.
The purpose of the Mythbusters' experiment was not to determine whether Archimedes was an idiot or not. In fact, it's practically common sense given a high school education that focusing enough reflected sunlight on the same location will burn something ("Augh! Fire indeed hot!"), and a parabolic reflector can potentially make that happen. The Mythbusters wanted to find out whether, using the technology of the day, the Greeks actually could torch Roman triremes using Archimedes's idea, and ultimately decided that it was a good idea before its time.
Now, I'm not saying they proved anything. The Mythbusters are generally far-less-than-scientific in their approach. But their argument that the approach was far more difficult and far less effective than just shooting things with flaming arrows was pretty convincing.
Actually, it is as I said. The definition you quote is in 1201(a)(3) starts with "As used in this subsection", meaning 1201(a). I referenced 1201(b), which has additional restrictions on the manufacture and trafficking of circumvention technology. In fact, 1201(b) has its own set of definitions, in 1201(b)(2), which makes no distinctions based on who holds the copyright on a work.
Some more information on where the ex- came from (and where else he's an ex-) might be enlightening.
Actually, the DMCA outlaws the mere creation of a technology for circumventing a copy prevention system. You don't even have to use it to be in violation. See Section 1201(b).
(Apologies in my previous post if there was any confusion caused by my using 5C and DTCP interchangeably.)
TiVo has no need to be worried about software-based PVRs. It's got the entertainment industry behind it on that one. We talk on Slashdot from time to time about the broadcast flag and how it would essentially prevent software-based (and especially open-source) PVRs, but what gets a lot less notice is that the same restrictions already encumber digital cable TV. Digital cable TV boxes output an analog signal at a lower resolution than HD, but for the purposes of software-based PVRs, that's where it ends. The HD digital signal is also an output option from a digital cable TV box, either through DVI or Firewire, but that signal is restricted by the 5C DTCP content "protection" system, which prevents a signal from being transmitted unless the listening devices are compliant.
Someone could probably come up with a software solution to defeat 5C, but with the DMCA in place and without the DMCRA to defend our rights, doing so would be illegal. Essentially, it takes open-source PVRs, which are legal and worthwhile in the analog domain, and puts them in the category of tools for piracy when used in the digital domain. And what's more, the DTLA (which administers licensing of DTCP) will, just like the DVD-CCA, never ever ever grant a license for someone wanting to build an open-source PVR.
TiVo has nothing to worry about from software PVRs - they'll die off slowly as the shift to digital HD continues. Then the entertainment industry can finish TiVo off at its leisure.
Here are the 20 signatories of the letter:
Shadegg R-AZ
Bono R-CA
Radanovich R-CA
Whitfield R-KY
Rush D-IL
Shimkus R-IL
Wynn D-MD
Pickering R-MS
Terry R-NE
Ferguson R-NJ
Pallone D-NJ
Bass R-NH
Engel D-NY
Fossella R-NY
Towns D-NY
Sullivan R-OK
Doyle D-PA
Blackburn R-TN
Gordon D-TN
Gonzalez D-TX
Also, Upton, R-MI, is also known to be strongly in favor of the flag. On the other hand, Upton is only a subcommittee chair, while Barton, R-TX, is the chair of the entire Energy and Commerce Committee. According to the EFF post linked in the OP, Barton may be willing to trade the broadcast flag for certain concessions from the ??AA (why Barton feels he has to bargain with the ??AA is beyond me - the entertainment industry is not the end-all, be-all of campaign finance).
Note that the people who signed the letter are lost causes. It's still important to deluge them with phone calls, but don't expect them to change their minds. The only true recourse is to vote against them next year. What's more important is the opinions of the other members of the Energy and Commerce Committee; they couldn't be convinced to sign the letter right away, and that must mean they're either opposed or on the fence.
My prediction is that, as usual, MPAA members will look this gift-horse straight in the mouth, and force Comcast and other cable providers into a contract where they can only put movies on PPV and subsequently sell the DVDs if they sell the rental versions of the DVDs, i.e., the ones with tons of unskippable ads before the movie itself starts.
Indeed, Albrecht and McIntyre learned that the phone company BellSouth Corp. had applied for a patent on a system for scanning RFID tags in trash, and using the data to study the shopping patterns of individual consumers.
I seem to remember that, back in the day, a large portion of the information used in phone phreaking was gathered through dumpster diving for internal manuals at Ma Bell. I guess turnabout really is fair play.
The whole "inconsistent jury" thing seems like a non-argument to me. After all, can't someone charged under the statute waive their right to a jury trial, thus putting the decision in the hands of a judge?
The funny thing is, Microsoft is powerful enough to re-open the analog "hole" for HD, if it turned out to be valuable enough to them. All they have to do is threaten to switch to Blu-Ray, and Toshiba and NEC will adjust the standard for them to avoid losing all those sales of HD-DVD drives. That's even over the objections of the media companies, because with the customer base of the Xbox 360, the media companies would be shooting themselves in the collective foot by refusing to produce content for it, analog hole or not. Even Sony Pictures will release content on both formats until one of the formats wins.
In fact, that last bit - the media companies want to make money, and they will make money regardless of DRM - is why I can't understand why the software and electronics companies haven't been more assertive so far. They definitely have the upper hand.
It's the same strategy the media industry tried (and is still trying) for broadcast TV. High def is just candy for the consumer to get them to buy into the new technology - but the true purpose of the new technology is to encumber us all with oppressive DRM so that the media industry can disable our fast-forward buttons.
If it had worked with DVDs, then HD DVDs would be even further off than they are now, but DeCSS with a ripped player key (and later, simply brute-forcing CSS) forced their hand.
Sometimes I'll do a Google search for something, and find a document that's closely related, but there's no link on that document to a page on the same site that lists other similar documents (like, for example, I get Chapter 2 in a Google search and want to get to Chapter 1). So what I'll do is delete the "chapter2.html" from the end and hope I get an index.html or a plain directory listing.
Are we saying that I'm now violating computer criminal statutes (or would be, if I lived in the UK) when I do that?
Those Swedes know how to put in almost everything you need.
What if the downloader is already an HBO subscriber, and just happened to miss the episode? HBO loses zero income to such downloaders, so you can't paint everyone with the same brush in this case.
Or, as Wesley Snipes might say:
Politics.slashdot.org: an address that changes all the rules.
Actually, the law explicitly grants us the right to resell the music we buy. In fact, the law (upon a cursory reading) doesn't appear to discount electronic copies of music (such as music downloaded from iTMS), and the law also states that we are entitled to resell said music, which means that someone might actually have a legal case to force Apple to open up some mechanism for us to resell the music we buy from them.
I thought the point of the guardian ad litem in the original case was that the RIAA was suing the mother, the mother claimed she didn't do it but her daughter admitted to it, and the RIAA then amended the suit to include the daughter. Since the mother had a conflict of interest in acting as the girl's guardian, a guardian ad litem could be appointed. But the RIAA dismissed the suit against the mother, and so now there is no conflict of interest. Does that mean that there is no longer a conflict of interest, and hence, no need for a guardian ad litem?
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Gator- Python.html
What's more, watermarking as a deterrent/detection method for piracy is supported by the EFF. This won't be particularly useful for DVDs (as there's no way to link watermark with purchaser), but it could be very useful for DRM-free Internet distribution.
You forgot about the part where Bob makes you watch twenty minutes of ads before he puts out.
Wouldn't it be great to form a company that, amid chaos preventing peering agreements, purchases bandwidth from backbone participants and resells that bandwidth to other participants and smaller-tier ISPs? Better yet, the company wouldn't need to actually create any bandwidth, or for that matter, provide any hardware at peering points - it could just use existing hardware owned by other companies. And even better, find ways to exploit the system so that money is made by doing nothing at all even though the books indicate that network conditions are being improved.
Just make sure to have my charter flight ready to leave for sunnier climes without extradition agreements, just in case.
Unfortunately for Nintendo, the GBA Micro is still a thousand times the size of the iPod Nano.
Watch for Sony to release the PSP Femto sometime next year. Just make sure you watch really really close.