The Ninth Amendment had been mentioned infrequently in decisions of
the Supreme Court4 until it became the subject of some exegesis by
several of the Justices in Griswold v. Connecticut. There a statute
prohibiting use of contraceptives was voided as an infringement of the
right of marital privacy. Justice Douglas, writing the opinion of the
Court, asserted that the ''specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights
have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help
give them life and substance.''
Thus, while privacy is nowhere
mentioned, it is one of the values served and protected by the First
Amendment, through its protection of associational rights, and by the
Third, the Fourth, and the Fifth Amendments as well. The Justice
recurred to the text of the Ninth Amendment, apparently to support the
thought that these penumbral rights are protected by one Amendment or
a complex of Amendments despite the absence of a specific
reference. Justice Goldberg, concurring, devoted several pages to the
Amendment.
Note the hard-core (pun unintended) sex sites are in fact
the ones most compliant with keep-minors-away requirements. That's
because they want paying customers.
Perversely, commercial pornographers would remain relatively
unaffected by the Act, since we learned that most of them already
use credit card or adult verification anyway.
Hmm, there might be a fifth amendent problem
here. The.com addresses are generally thought
to be most valuable. This might
be difficult,
aside from the free-speech issues, as
a 'taking' i.e.
private property be
taken for public use, without just compensation
The pedophile impulse seems to have very little
to do with with the images. That is, the images are generated from
the impulse, not vice-versa. People trying to ban suggestive images
(those not imvolving abuse of real children) have cause and effect reversed.
Howitt, D. Pornography and the paedophile: Is it criminogenic? British
Journal of Medical Psychology, 1995 68:15-27. Abstract: Presents case
studies of 11 fixated adult male pedophiles interviewed in a private
clinic for sex offenders about topics including their offending, their
psychosexual histories, pornography, fantasy, and sexual abuse in
childhood. Commercial pornography was rarely a significant aspect of
their use of erotica although some experience of such materials was
typical. Most common was "soft-core" heterosexually oriented
pornography. Explicit child pornography was uncommon. However,
Subjects also generated their own erotic materials from relatively
innocuous sources such as television advertisements, clothing catalogs
featuring children modeling underwear, and similar sources. In no case
did exposure to pornography precede offending-related behavior in
childhood.
There's been a few comments which ask, basically, why one can make filthy
pictures but not good clean code. The difference is in the reason for the law.
DeCSS and others are basically under property law. Whereas
this case was about general goverment prohibitions for personal harm.
One might just as well ask why it's
legal to swear, but one could conceivably get into trouble for
copyright infringement if the choice of swearing duplicated a comedy
routine.
.... but also "any visual depiction, including any photograph, film,
video, picture, or computer or computer-generated image or picture"
that "is, or appears to be, of a minor engaging in
sexually explicit conduct," 2256(8)(B), and any sexually explicit
image that is "advertised, promoted, presented,
described, or distributed in such a manner that
conveys the impression"
it depicts
"a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct," 2256(8)(D). Thus,
-2256(8)(B) bans a range of sexually explicit images, sometimes called
"virtual child pornography," that appear to depict minors but were
produced by means other than using real children
such as through the use of youthful-looking adults or computer-imaging
technology.
In the United States, we like to think of ourselves as the most free
country on the planet. But perhaps our freedom is not a virtuous trait
of our national character, as we would like to believe. Rather, maybe
it's simply an effect of having many decades where there was no
military threat which would prompt any type of office of "homeland security".
So the content industry should ruminate on this. Find some udder
solution. Maybe tipping.
Or a place where the grass is greener.
And especially no bullshit.
I have had motor neurone disease for practically all my adult
life. Yet it has not prevented me from having a very attractive
family, and being successful in my work. This is thanks to the help I
have received from Jane, my children, and a large number of other
people and organisations. I have been lucky, that my condition has
progressed more slowly than is often the case. But it shows that one
need not lose hope.
With this case, we recognize that both the First Amendment to the
United States Constitution and Article II, Section 10 of the Colorado
Constitution protect an individual's fundamental right to purchase
books anonymously, free from governmental interference. Law
enforcement officials implicate this right when they seek judicial
approval of a search warrant authorizing seizure of customer purchase
records from an innocent, third-party bookseller. This case requires
us to decide what test should be applied to balance the constitutional
rights of individuals and bookstores against the duty of law
enforcement officials to investigate crime.
When you buy a book, you don't expect to have a law enforcement agent searching through the store's records at some later date to see
what books you have purchased. Such an action offends America's sense of privacy. It smacks of a police state.
The aforementioned site either
hosts or distributes software which
illegally modifies
and/or alters Blizzard Entertainment copyrighted software
or or bypasses
anti-circumvention technology, thereby infringing upon Blizzard Entertainment
copyrights.
That is. Blizzard technically claimed in their letter that Bnetd
violated EITHER traditional copyright OR new anti-circumvention, but didn't
actually say which one it was.
People are still complaining that Gator is getting installed on their
computers with little advanced
warning and in many instances, people do not
know that Gator is being installed until the next
time they turn on their computer. The user should
always have the option to click on a download link
but instead Gator partner sites use the automatic
ActiveX download/installation program.
Arguing DeCSS as a fourth amendment case is like arguing against cryptography
restrictions as a second amendment case (i.e., if crypto is a munition,
we have the right to bear arms, so the right to use cryptography). It's
something which sounds cool in a web-posting. But the courts aren't
Slashdot posters, and they will take that argument down to
(-1, Troll) as fast as an editor with infinite
moderation points (which, in this case, they are).
The courts reason that they're protecting the property rights of the
copyright owners, and only the speech aspect even gave them pause.
Read
the decision:
(emphasis added)
In considering the scope of First Amendment protection for a
decryption program like DeCSS, we must recognize that the essential
purpose of encryption code is to prevent unauthorized access. Owners
of all property rights are entitled to prohibit access to their
property by unauthorized persons. Homeowners can install locks on the
doors of their houses. Custodians of valuables can place them in
safes. Stores can attach to products security devices that will
activate alarms if the products are taken away without purchase. These
and similar security devices can be circumvented. Burglars can use
skeleton keys to open door locks. Thieves can obtain the combinations
to safes. Product security devices can be neutralized.
...
At first glance, one might think that Congress has as much authority
to regulate the distribution of computer code to decrypt DVD movies as
it has to regulate distribution of skeleton keys, combinations to
safes, or devices to neutralize store product security
devices. However, despite the evident legitimacy of protection against
unauthorized access to DVD movies, just like any other property,
regulation of decryption code like DeCSS is challenged in this case
because DeCSS differs from a skeleton key in one important
respect: it not only is capable of performing the function
of unlocking the encrypted DVD movie, it also is a form of
communication, albeit written in a language not understood by
the general public.
High sounding language, but the intent of such escape clauses is to
allow Congress to normalize laws to reflect changes in the rest of the
world.
Don't mix up the issues of retroactivity (extending copyrights
on already-existing works), and limited times (length of the
copyright). Retroactivity isn't slam-dunk un-Constitutional.
I don't like it any more than you do, but we have to deal with what the
Appeals Court has ruled. In fact, they would use your "normalize laws"
argument directly against you to justify the time extensions!
(again, emphasis added)
Judge Sentelle concludes otherwise only because he sees a categorical
distinction between extending the term of a subsisting copyright and
extending that of a prospective copyright. This distinction is not to
be found in the Constitution itself, however. The dissent identifies
nothing in text or in history that suggests that a term of years for a
copyright is not a "limited Time" if it may later be extended for
another "limited Time." Instead, the dissent suggests that the
Congress -- or rather, many successive Congresses -- might in effect
confer a perpetual copyright by stringing together an unlimited number
of "limited Times," although that clearly is not the situation before
us. The temporal thrust of the CTEA is a good deal more modest: The
Act matches United States copyrights to the terms of copyrights
granted by the European Union, see Council Directive 93/98, art. 7,
1993 O.J. (L 290) 9; in an era of multinational publishers and
instantaneous electronic transmission, harmonization in this regard
has obvious practical benefits for the exploitation of copyrights.
This is a powerful indication that the CTEA is a "necessary
and proper" measure to meet contemporary circumstances rather than a
step on the way to making copy rights perpetual; the force of that
evidence is hardly diminished because, as the dissent correctly
points out, the EU is not bound by the Copyright Clause of our
Constitutionn. As for the dissent's objection that extending a
subsisting copyright does nothing to "promote Progress," we think that
implies a rather crabbed view of progress: Preserving access to works
that would otherwise disappear -- not enter the public domain but
disappear -- "promotes Progress" as surely as does stimulating the
creation of new works.
I think the best argument they have going for them is that extending
the copyright of already created works cannot possibly meet the
constitutional requirement that copyright law "promote the progress of
science and useful arts".
I'm not a lawyer. But, careful, that argument has actually lost (by 2-1) in the
Appeals Decision (emphasis added)
Such guidance as the Supreme Court has given further confirms us in
this view of the matter. The Court has made plain that the same Clause
permits the Congress to amplify the terms of an existing patent. As
early as 1843 it established that the status of a particular invention
and its protections must depend on the law as it stood at the
emanation of the patent, together with such changes as have been since
made; for though they may be retrospective in their operation, that is
not a sound objection to their validity; the powers of Congress to
legislate upon the subject of patents is plenary by the terms of the
Constitution, and as there are no restraints on its exercise, there
can be no limitation of their right to modify them at their pleasure,
so that they do not take away the rights of property in existing
patents.
McClurg v. Kingsland, 42 U.S. 202, 206.
Within the realm of copyright, the Court has to the present era been
similarly deferential to the judgment of the Congress. "As the text of
the Constitution makes plain, it is Congress that has been assigned
the task of defining the scope of the limited monopoly that should be
granted to authors or to inventors in order to give the appropriate
public access to their work product;" that "task involves a difficult
balance between [competing interests]" as reflected in the frequent
modifications of the relevant statutes....
This chart is a visual representation of amici's understanding of the
decline of the growth of public domain as a result of repeated
copyright term extensions.
Slashdot Mirror
Findlaw - Rights Retained by the People
(emphasis added)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
From the District Court CDA decision
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Real reference:
http://www.netspeed.com.au/ttguy/refs2.htm
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
From the song Smut , by Tom Lehrer
Very apropos.Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
There's been a few comments which ask, basically, why one can make filthy pictures but not good clean code. The difference is in the reason for the law. DeCSS and others are basically under property law. Whereas this case was about general goverment prohibitions for personal harm.
One might just as well ask why it's legal to swear, but one could conceivably get into trouble for copyright infringement if the choice of swearing duplicated a comedy routine.
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer.
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
From the decision (emphasis added)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Are we learning to stop worrying and love the Surveillance State?
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nyt / 0020411/tc_nyt/seeking_profits__internet_companies _alter_privacy_policy
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
We refuse to be COWED
So the content industry should ruminate on this. Find some udder solution. Maybe tipping. Or a place where the grass is greener. And especially no bullshit.
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
ObHawkings: Here's a picture of the scene(scroll down - Hawkings, actor-Einstein, actor-Newton, though no Data)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
http://www.riaa.com/PR_Story.cfm?id=505
The RIAA's News section is definitely worth a look, in a know-your-enemy sense.
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Spam laws
Especially
Summary of US State spam laws
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
http://www.cobar.org/CFwebFiles/Content/dspOpinion . fm?OpinionID=560
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
http://w3.trib.com/FACT/1st.lev.tatteredcoverrec.
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
The Blizard letter states (emphasis added)
That is. Blizzard technically claimed in their letter that Bnetd violated EITHER traditional copyright OR new anti-circumvention, but didn't actually say which one it was.Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
The courts reason that they're protecting the property rights of the copyright owners, and only the speech aspect even gave them pause. Read the decision:
(emphasis added)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
(emphasis added)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
The Growth Rate of the Public Domain
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
It is extremely cross-platform compatible
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)