Perhaps version 3 will specify that redistribution can only be under 3.0 or later. I could modify your code and opt to distribute it under the new, strict GPL 3.0, which would not allow you to redistribute it under the old, lax GPL 2.0. I don't expect restrictive abuses, but they are possible.
Everywhere but the USA, prior art has to be public. If you allow trade secrets to be prior art, the patent office can't "do its homework", unless it somehow knows everyone's trade secrets.
Since to acquire a player, one must agree to the license (apparently it shows up before you can play anything, or it's in the box or something)), you can not legitimately obtain a copy of the player without having agreed to this license.
If it's in the box, you've already acquired the player.
I must admit, I've never read a license that comes with a DVD. However, if it is the standard license, it probably does have a clause to the effect that "Purchaser agrees to submit to jurisdiction in the Courts of California."...
If you don't make a contract, you're not bound by it, including the jurisdiction clause. If the MPAA can produce a copy of the licence signed by the authors of DeCSS, then the California courts will have to hear the case.
The article does not say the judge invalidated the licence. However, it does day that the case hinges upon the licence, and that Allon Levy (defense attorney, or counsel for the defence as we call it over here) claims it is invalid. The article also makes the very strong claim that one must accept the licence before downloading CSS.
Just to be clear, YAHOO was a good trademark because it was "arbitrary" (its in quotes because its a term of art). AMAZON is another example in the internet realm.
The name 'Amazon' is not arbitrary. The company deliberately stole the name of an existing bookseller to mislead customers. They successfully misled me, I might add. The cooperative formerly known as Amazon is now not allowed to use its former name. (They sued, but Amazon.com argued that the co-op was not in the business of bookseller, but the business of 'bookseller and lesbian'. All the members were cross-examined about their sex lives in open court until they ran out of money.)
Amazon.com went on to dupe me a second time, by passing itself off as WHSmith (the largest book seller in the UK, commonly known as WHS). Several months ago I wanted to take advantage of WHS's online shopping facility but on typing www.whsonline.co.uk (instead of www.whsmithonline.co.uk) I was directed to amazon.co.uk, and thought WHS had sold its web sales operation to the US corporation. whsonline.co.uk now seems to be under dispute (if you go there, try the link to the 'dispute pages' which contain some relevant opinions).
Don't forget, this is the company which recently retrospectively gutted its privacy policy. And had already flagrantly violated the policy by posting lists of books bought by individuals in the hope of drumming up advertising revenue. Not to mention that it openly admits that its 'one-click' patent has no merit, and uses it solely for anticompetitive purposes. The only good thing I can say about Amazon.com is that last time I looked it was making huge losses.
Given that sounds get from your ear to your brain through neurons, could you make a codec which encodes sound as a representation of which neurons would be fired as you perceive that sound?
With a very detailed knowledge of the human nervous system, you could write an encoder, but:
It might be very inefficient in time and/or memory,
the encoded sound could be much larger than the original, and
>Only drawback to this solution is that it will be too costly to implement..
It would not be costly to print out 3 slips stuck onto the back of the box, you sign and 1 copy each goes to the purchaser, the vendor and the manufacturer. The drawback for the manufacturer is that some customers will not agree to odious conditions, and other will break all kinds of conditions. The drawback for customers is that you can't buy a game as a present for someone else, or at all if you're too young.
Basically you can't have it both ways. Either you sell a product and enjoy your generous existing protections under copyright law, or you sell a service under complex terms of your choice. You can't sell a service as a product.
You can provide your copyrighted software under any terms you like. But if you give it to me under the GPL I can redistribute it without the readme restriction. Of course, that doesn't compel you or me to answer luser questions. READMEware sounds like great fun for trolls: they can stick hundreds of k of gross porn in the docs.
Re:EULAs and the UK Sale of Goods Act
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EULA In Games
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3. Is it "as described"?
Of course not. It's described as a game, not a licence to play a game.
Re:The reason for harsh EULAs
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EULA In Games
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>This leaves id software's legal department with little choice but to say, "No mods", but only enforce it in the case of truly evil mods.
Why not: 'you may not distribute any mod without Id's permission. Id may withdraw this permission at any time'? Or, even better, 'you may make and distribute mods which do not infringe the rules published at [URL]. These rules may be updated at any time.' Then no-one gets burned unless they choose to immolate themselves.
Re:I'm 16. Does EULA legally bind on me?
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EULA In Games
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>It is assumed that it would be an undue burden to require someone to be 18 to buy food in some extended manner other than a simple purchase...
Really? I would have assumed that it would be an undue burden to require anyone to buy food in some extended manner other than a simple purchase, not to require them not to. I've never had to sign a contract to buy food (except when paying by cheque, debit card, etc.), but then I don't live in America. So what kinds of licences do you buy food under? If they're anything like EULAs, we can expect:
I agree not to reverse-engineer the Colonel's secret herbs and spices...
I agree not to share this loaf with any third party...
In the event of poisoning or other consequential damages arising from the use of this pie, I agree that the manufacturer's liability shall be limited to the price paid for the product...
I agree not to display this vegetable in the context of advertising any other product or service...
I agree not to publish the result of any nutritional analysis without the manufacturer's written approval...
I agree not to test this sausage for the presence of microorganisms or toxins of any kind...
I agree to use this fruit only for culinary purposes and not unlicensed uses, which include but are not limited to sexual gratification...
This beer is leased, not sold...
Re:How About A User's EULA?
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EULA In Games
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I heard about a case somewhere in the USA (sorry, can't be more specific). A man bought something and had to leave his name and address (for the warranty or for a credit agreement or something). He insisted the store manager sign a piece of paper saying something like:
[company] agrees not to send any unsolicited advertising to [consumer]'s address. [company] acknowledges that receiving such material will cause damage to [customer] of not less than $100 per instance, and agrees to compensate him for all such damage. Signed on behalf of [company]:
The store went on to send him snail spam (delicious!). He demanded money, they refused, he sued and won. If only there were more annoying pigheaded litigious troublemakers like him (and fewer of the other kinds of annoying pigheaded litigious troublemakers), the world would be a better place.
To return to your case, I think (IANAL) a licence like yours would be enforceable if the user explicitly agreed to it before receiving your addresses. So you need to remove your addresses from the licence, and find a way to deliver it without revealing those addresses (perhaps an extra account created for the purpose which does not receive mail).
>Now that the box is in your hands, with no licensing agreement you own it.
So what? You owned it as soon as you bought it, unless you were in Virginia. Now you're stuck with a product you don't want, with no way to get your money back. You could sue them for breach of contract. They will point out that if you didn't agree to the EULA there is no contract, and if you did then, by the terms of the contract, there is no refund.
Re:RIP hurts everyone, encrypt now!
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New Crypto-OS
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>They cannot demand your key outside of the UK, but they CAN brute force your encrypted files since they are storing them for 7 years.
If a G7 government with a particularly large intelligence budget can brute-force your encrypted files in 7 years, your cryptography is weak. Too weak, if you intend your data to remain secret for 7 years.
Well, you can ask them. But if they were genuinely investigating a crime they probably wouldn't be asking for trade secrets. Either they suspect you of concealing evidence of fraud or this is yet another of the countless acts of industrial espionage perpetrated by intelligence agencies the world over. (About 0.5 probability of each, I'd guess, and if they are spies, don't expect them to tell you that.) Either way, it is an offence to 'tip off' the company under investigation.
This scenario was discussed before the law was passed. If you choose to hand over the key instead of going to jail, you will still be guilty of breaking the NDA. If this is a criminal investigation, there is a good chance of your perfidy being revealed in any ensuing trial. If this is a secret service operation, you can be confident they won't tell the victim... as long as you do everything they tell you from now on, even if it's not strictly legal.
Re:I have a question...
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>The undoubtable fact is that the RIP act will reduce the exploitation of children, fraud, pornography, and more general crimes.
I doubt it very much. It will help convict a few criminals, but it will open vast opportunities for others, especially when combined with the vast data-logging operations now proposed.
The reason child sex abuse has so often gone undetected for years is not because the only evidence of it was encrypted logs. The evidence was right there in the victims' memories, but the abusers were in positions of power, often connected to schools or social services, and they exploited this power to blackmail their victims. Blackmail becomes much easier when your contacts can intercept the victim's communications. If you don't find anything damning, you can easily forge something now you have the private key.
One of the main uses of cryptography is to prevent fraud. Now tens of thousands of officials can demand the keys your bank uses to keep your money safe (well, formerly safe). Do you think all of those people, and everyone working in or visiting their offices will be honest? And there's no law saying they must shred their printouts.
I don't see how the RIP Act will reduce the amount of pornography, nor why that would be a good thing. If you want to get rid of pronography, ban top-shelf magazines, and employ more police officers to tackle the rise in rape, indecent assault, etc.
Organised crime will be the biggest beneficiary. Gangsters have always maintained their impunity through blackmail - like spymasters, they know almost everyone has a guilty secret, and if not you can manufacture one. Soon they will be able to incriminate even the trickiest targets. That tax inspector will be only too willing to give you a judge's private key if you keep quiet about his sex life.
Read the Sealand website. Sealand is located in international waters.
No, even their own web site puts it within the 12 mile limit. But Sealand don't recognise that so it doesn't count. Duh!
You are deliberately trying to mislead. Sealand recognises Britain's territorial waters. Sealand was located in international waters before it was settled, and thereafter has been located in Sealand's territorial waters. Parts of the Republic of Ireland are within 12 miles of the UK's coastline, but that does not make them part of the UK. (If they were, the UK could extend down the coastline of Ireland 12 miles per day, until it had assimilated every spot within 12 miles of the coast. And Sealand could do the same to Great Britain.)
Sealand has either been a sovereign nation since its declaration of independence (as the lawyers think), or it never has. The retrospective extension of both countries' maritime claims has not altered the situation.
A paedophile is someone who wants to have sex with children (more than with adults, let's say). A pederast is someone who has sex with children, perhaps because they are a paedophile, or because they can't get an adult partner, or because they've been ordered to rape every female in the village. Most paedophiles are not pederasts.
I agree that "Having sex with someone who is too young to know what is happening is quite clearly rape". But it is a huge and ludicrous jump to say that all children are "far too immature to understand what is going on". When I was almost 18 I was not far too immature, or even slightly too immature, to understand what sex was. I had known what sexual intercourse was for at least ten years, and had had a pretty detailed understanding for at least four years.
I would imagine, not having any evidence either way, that children suffer more psychological harm from being raped than adults do. I can also see some possible reasons for forbidding children under a certain age to have sex - they do not have as good an appreciation of issues like STDs and pregnancy as the typical adult. But deliberately confusing the two issues is silly and dangerous.
It would have to be far-red (close to the longest frequencies we can see already). Longer millimetre waves would be much more informative, because warm objects like mammals emit them, and they pass through substances like masonry while being blocked by metal. Unfortunately, if you had mm-sensitive cones, your own emissions would blind you to anything else.
I believe glass blocks far-red, as well as ultraviolet.
The latest common ancestor of all bony vertebrates must have had at least 4 photosensitive pigments. Most vertebrates have 4 pigments sensitive to bright light. Most mammals have 2, but primates have 3 (plus a rod pigment for dim light).
It should also be noted that many humans carry more than one copy of the middle wavelength-sensitive cone opsin. As this is grist for the evolution of color vision mill, we're literally ripe for the addition of a fourth cone class. (This probably won't happen, though, because people with a fourth cone class will be constantly trying to readjust the color on television sets. As a result of that such people will be highly selected against in bars the world over:-)
This means that engineering tetrachromatism would be easier than expected.
>The weirdest one was an undersea critter equipped with a rotating polarising filter and a sweeping rainbow colour filter over each eye.
That was a mantis shrimp (can't remember the formal name). They're also notable for their weaponry - very fast mantislike spearing or bashing appendages.
Slashdot Mirror
Perhaps version 3 will specify that redistribution can only be under 3.0 or later. I could modify your code and opt to distribute it under the new, strict GPL 3.0, which would not allow you to redistribute it under the old, lax GPL 2.0. I don't expect restrictive abuses, but they are possible.
According to Johansen, DeCSS was a clean room reimplementation. The MPAA seems to be claiming that it's reverse engineering. I know whom I believe.
The main reason for clean-room techniques is to avoid infringing copyright, not patents or trade secrets.
Everywhere but the USA, prior art has to be public. If you allow trade secrets to be prior art, the patent office can't "do its homework", unless it somehow knows everyone's trade secrets.
The article does not say the judge invalidated the licence. However, it does day that the case hinges upon the licence, and that Allon Levy (defense attorney, or counsel for the defence as we call it over here) claims it is invalid. The article also makes the very strong claim that one must accept the licence before downloading CSS.
The name 'Amazon' is not arbitrary. The company deliberately stole the name of an existing bookseller to mislead customers. They successfully misled me, I might add. The cooperative formerly known as Amazon is now not allowed to use its former name. (They sued, but Amazon.com argued that the co-op was not in the business of bookseller, but the business of 'bookseller and lesbian'. All the members were cross-examined about their sex lives in open court until they ran out of money.)
Amazon.com went on to dupe me a second time, by passing itself off as WHSmith (the largest book seller in the UK, commonly known as WHS). Several months ago I wanted to take advantage of WHS's online shopping facility but on typing www.whsonline.co.uk (instead of www.whsmithonline.co.uk) I was directed to amazon.co.uk, and thought WHS had sold its web sales operation to the US corporation. whsonline.co.uk now seems to be under dispute (if you go there, try the link to the 'dispute pages' which contain some relevant opinions).
Don't forget, this is the company which recently retrospectively gutted its privacy policy. And had already flagrantly violated the policy by posting lists of books bought by individuals in the hope of drumming up advertising revenue. Not to mention that it openly admits that its 'one-click' patent has no merit, and uses it solely for anticompetitive purposes. The only good thing I can say about Amazon.com is that last time I looked it was making huge losses.
Mmmm. That felt cathartic.
>Isn't there a law against harassing suits? If not, there should be...
I think we should harass suits more often.
>Only drawback to this solution is that it will be too costly to implement..
It would not be costly to print out 3 slips stuck onto the back of the box, you sign and 1 copy each goes to the purchaser, the vendor and the manufacturer. The drawback for the manufacturer is that some customers will not agree to odious conditions, and other will break all kinds of conditions. The drawback for customers is that you can't buy a game as a present for someone else, or at all if you're too young.
Basically you can't have it both ways. Either you sell a product and enjoy your generous existing protections under copyright law, or you sell a service under complex terms of your choice. You can't sell a service as a product.
You can provide your copyrighted software under any terms you like. But if you give it to me under the GPL I can redistribute it without the readme restriction. Of course, that doesn't compel you or me to answer luser questions. READMEware sounds like great fun for trolls: they can stick hundreds of k of gross porn in the docs.
3. Is it "as described"?
Of course not. It's described as a game, not a licence to play a game.
>This leaves id software's legal department with little choice but to say, "No mods", but only enforce it in the case of truly evil mods.
Why not: 'you may not distribute any mod without Id's permission. Id may withdraw this permission at any time'? Or, even better, 'you may make and distribute mods which do not infringe the rules published at [URL]. These rules may be updated at any time.' Then no-one gets burned unless they choose to immolate themselves.
>It is assumed that it would be an undue burden to require someone to be 18 to buy food in some extended manner other than a simple purchase...
Really? I would have assumed that it would be an undue burden to require anyone to buy food in some extended manner other than a simple purchase, not to require them not to. I've never had to sign a contract to buy food (except when paying by cheque, debit card, etc.), but then I don't live in America. So what kinds of licences do you buy food under? If they're anything like EULAs, we can expect:
I agree not to reverse-engineer the Colonel's secret herbs and spices...
I agree not to share this loaf with any third party...
In the event of poisoning or other consequential damages arising from the use of this pie, I agree that the manufacturer's liability shall be limited to the price paid for the product...
I agree not to display this vegetable in the context of advertising any other product or service...
I agree not to publish the result of any nutritional analysis without the manufacturer's written approval...
I agree not to test this sausage for the presence of microorganisms or toxins of any kind...
I agree to use this fruit only for culinary purposes and not unlicensed uses, which include but are not limited to sexual gratification...
This beer is leased, not sold...
The store went on to send him snail spam (delicious!). He demanded money, they refused, he sued and won. If only there were more annoying pigheaded litigious troublemakers like him (and fewer of the other kinds of annoying pigheaded litigious troublemakers), the world would be a better place.
To return to your case, I think (IANAL) a licence like yours would be enforceable if the user explicitly agreed to it before receiving your addresses. So you need to remove your addresses from the licence, and find a way to deliver it without revealing those addresses (perhaps an extra account created for the purpose which does not receive mail).
>Now that the box is in your hands, with no licensing agreement you own it.
So what? You owned it as soon as you bought it, unless you were in Virginia. Now you're stuck with a product you don't want, with no way to get your money back. You could sue them for breach of contract. They will point out that if you didn't agree to the EULA there is no contract, and if you did then, by the terms of the contract, there is no refund.
>They cannot demand your key outside of the UK, but they CAN brute force your encrypted files since they are storing them for 7 years.
If a G7 government with a particularly large intelligence budget can brute-force your encrypted files in 7 years, your cryptography is weak. Too weak, if you intend your data to remain secret for 7 years.
Well, you can ask them. But if they were genuinely investigating a crime they probably wouldn't be asking for trade secrets. Either they suspect you of concealing evidence of fraud or this is yet another of the countless acts of industrial espionage perpetrated by intelligence agencies the world over. (About 0.5 probability of each, I'd guess, and if they are spies, don't expect them to tell you that.) Either way, it is an offence to 'tip off' the company under investigation.
... as long as you do everything they tell you from now on, even if it's not strictly legal.
This scenario was discussed before the law was passed. If you choose to hand over the key instead of going to jail, you will still be guilty of breaking the NDA. If this is a criminal investigation, there is a good chance of your perfidy being revealed in any ensuing trial. If this is a secret service operation, you can be confident they won't tell the victim
>The undoubtable fact is that the RIP act will reduce the exploitation of children, fraud, pornography, and more general crimes.
I doubt it very much. It will help convict a few criminals, but it will open vast opportunities for others, especially when combined with the vast data-logging operations now proposed.
The reason child sex abuse has so often gone undetected for years is not because the only evidence of it was encrypted logs. The evidence was right there in the victims' memories, but the abusers were in positions of power, often connected to schools or social services, and they exploited this power to blackmail their victims. Blackmail becomes much easier when your contacts can intercept the victim's communications. If you don't find anything damning, you can easily forge something now you have the private key.
One of the main uses of cryptography is to prevent fraud. Now tens of thousands of officials can demand the keys your bank uses to keep your money safe (well, formerly safe). Do you think all of those people, and everyone working in or visiting their offices will be honest? And there's no law saying they must shred their printouts.
I don't see how the RIP Act will reduce the amount of pornography, nor why that would be a good thing. If you want to get rid of pronography, ban top-shelf magazines, and employ more police officers to tackle the rise in rape, indecent assault, etc.
Organised crime will be the biggest beneficiary. Gangsters have always maintained their impunity through blackmail - like spymasters, they know almost everyone has a guilty secret, and if not you can manufacture one. Soon they will be able to incriminate even the trickiest targets. That tax inspector will be only too willing to give you a judge's private key if you keep quiet about his sex life.
Sealand has either been a sovereign nation since its declaration of independence (as the lawyers think), or it never has. The retrospective extension of both countries' maritime claims has not altered the situation.
Of course not. If he ordered a 'hit' in rhyming couplets would that make him any less murderous?
However, I suspect it would be perfectly legal to describe in detail the encryption scheme, and perhaps to describe an algorithm for decryting it.
You are confusing p(a)edophiles with pederasts.
A paedophile is someone who wants to have sex with children (more than with adults, let's say). A pederast is someone who has sex with children, perhaps because they are a paedophile, or because they can't get an adult partner, or because they've been ordered to rape every female in the village. Most paedophiles are not pederasts.
I agree that "Having sex with someone who is too young to know what is happening is quite clearly rape". But it is a huge and ludicrous jump to say that all children are "far too immature to understand what is going on". When I was almost 18 I was not far too immature, or even slightly too immature, to understand what sex was. I had known what sexual intercourse was for at least ten years, and had had a pretty detailed understanding for at least four years.
I would imagine, not having any evidence either way, that children suffer more psychological harm from being raped than adults do. I can also see some possible reasons for forbidding children under a certain age to have sex - they do not have as good an appreciation of issues like STDs and pregnancy as the typical adult. But deliberately confusing the two issues is silly and dangerous.
Octave? Surely it would be more appropriate to use a chromatic scale?
It would have to be far-red (close to the longest frequencies we can see already). Longer millimetre waves would be much more informative, because warm objects like mammals emit them, and they pass through substances like masonry while being blocked by metal. Unfortunately, if you had mm-sensitive cones, your own emissions would blind you to anything else.
I believe glass blocks far-red, as well as ultraviolet.
Mickey Rowe, an expert on the evolution of colour vision, wrote this post to his dinosaur mailing list and this talk.origins post on the subject. The latter includes this interesting observation:
This means that engineering tetrachromatism would be easier than expected.>The weirdest one was an undersea critter equipped with a rotating polarising filter and a sweeping rainbow colour filter over each eye.
That was a mantis shrimp (can't remember the formal name). They're also notable for their weaponry - very fast mantislike spearing or bashing appendages.