Monday, March 01, 2004
There's another interesting piece from Mr Schwartz at the NTY, this time on a report suggesting the entertainment industry's approach to fighting piracy is bad for business and the economy.
Larry Lessig has welcomed the report. Jane Ginsburg, renowned copyright expert at Columbia University, has welcomed some of the recommendations though criticises it as making misleading statements about copyright law.
Larry Lessig has welcomed the report. Jane Ginsburg, renowned copyright expert at Columbia University, has welcomed some of the recommendations though criticises it as making misleading statements about copyright law.
The Bunner DVD DeCSS case has been decided by the California Appeal court having been referred back from the California Supreme Court last year. The Appeal Court overturned the injunction banning the posting of the code on the web, finding a first amendment violation; also that there was no evidence that CSS was a trade secret when Bunner posted the descrambler.
Tomorrow sees the biggest test of electronic voting machines when millions of voters will use them in ten states in the US. John Schwartz at the NYT gives a nice summary of the current situation.
Even voting on that scale fades a little compared to the proposed all electronic October election in India. Over half a billion people voting on more than a million machines supplied by just two companies. Scary.
Even voting on that scale fades a little compared to the proposed all electronic October election in India. Over half a billion people voting on more than a million machines supplied by just two companies. Scary.
The EU IPR enforcement directive is to get the fast track approval procedure according to the excellent EDRI-gram Newsletter - Number 2.4, 27 February 2004. Details on the problems with the directive can be found at the CODE campaign at IP Justice. Andreas Dietl, EDRI EU affairs director, says:
"The European Union's disputed Directive on the Enforcement of
Intellectual Property Rights is scheduled for a fast-track procedure that
may lead to it being adopted by the European Council in little more than
two weeks. At present, it is still under discussion in the Brussels
Parliament. The Rapporteur, French Conservative Janelly Fourtou, and the
Council both wish to pass this Directive in First Reading, before the
enlargement of the European Union. Trying to avoid delay by too much
discussion, they have each chosen the fastest procedure possible in their
respective institutions.
The final discussion about the report in the Parliament's Legal Affairs
Committee took place on Monday 23 February. The item was scheduled at the
very last minute, the Friday before, when most of the Members of
Parliament were already gone. With many MEPs still on their way to
Brussels on Monday, only 14 MEPs were present. The discussion only lasted
15 minutes after the Council and the Commission had ended their formal
introductions.
The longest speeches were given by Arlene McCarthy MEP (Social Democrat,
UK) and Malcolm Harbour MEP (Conservative, UK), who both claimed that this
Directive was not mainly about the Digital world, but about counterfeiting
of tangible goods. There is no proof for that in the text, however.
Technically, the debate was about the amendments that the Rapporteur had
laid down, together with McCarthy and with Toine Manders (Liberal,
Netherlands) and which reflect verbatim the Common Position of the
Council. This position had been fine-tuned, behind closed doors, in five
so-called trilogue meetings between the Parliament and the Council during
the previous weeks. The Legal Affairs Committee did not vote on the
amendments of Mrs. Fourtou: she chose to table them directly to the
Plenary.
MEPs may now lay down additional amendments until 4 March. The vote will
take place on 9 March in Strasbourg, preceded by a plenary debate the day
before. Already on 10 March, the outcome of the vote will be considered by
the Council's Committee of Permanent Representatives (COREPER). On 11
March, on the occasion of the meeting of the EU Competitiveness Council,
ministers may sign it off if it has been agreed by the Permanent
Representatives.
Though some of the concerns of civil society and internet providers have
been taken into account in the drafting of the Common Position, the text
remains problematic. The scope of the directive is extended to cover "any
infringement of intellectual property rights as provided for by Community
law and/or by the national law of the Member State concerned." At the same
time, the Commission's initial limitation to infringements which are
"committed for commercial purposes or cause significant harm to the right
holder" has been deleted.
The term "intellectual property rights" is not defined, creating the
possibility of a large range of abuses. Because the enforcement is not
limited to large-scale infringements, kids downloading songs from the
internet risk the same kind of treatment as large-scale counterfeiters of
trademark designer clothes.
EDRI-member organisation FIPR has prepared a set of amendments to deal
with the worst deficits in this Directive and is preparing, together with
a range of other organisations, a rally in Strasbourg to promote these
amendments and to encourage MEPs to vote against the Directive if some
minimum requirements are not fulfilled.
The European Commission's initial proposal for a Directive
http://europa.eu.int/smartapi/cgi/sga_doc?smartapi!celexplus!prod!CELEXnumdoc&numdoc=32001L0029&lg=EN
Amendments proposed by FIPR and EDR
http://www.ffii.org.uk/ip_enforce/andreas2.html
Campaign Info
http://www.ipjustice.org/CODE/ "
EDRI-gram also reports on the EU plan to introduce biometric passports I mentioned here recently.
"The European Union's disputed Directive on the Enforcement of
Intellectual Property Rights is scheduled for a fast-track procedure that
may lead to it being adopted by the European Council in little more than
two weeks. At present, it is still under discussion in the Brussels
Parliament. The Rapporteur, French Conservative Janelly Fourtou, and the
Council both wish to pass this Directive in First Reading, before the
enlargement of the European Union. Trying to avoid delay by too much
discussion, they have each chosen the fastest procedure possible in their
respective institutions.
The final discussion about the report in the Parliament's Legal Affairs
Committee took place on Monday 23 February. The item was scheduled at the
very last minute, the Friday before, when most of the Members of
Parliament were already gone. With many MEPs still on their way to
Brussels on Monday, only 14 MEPs were present. The discussion only lasted
15 minutes after the Council and the Commission had ended their formal
introductions.
The longest speeches were given by Arlene McCarthy MEP (Social Democrat,
UK) and Malcolm Harbour MEP (Conservative, UK), who both claimed that this
Directive was not mainly about the Digital world, but about counterfeiting
of tangible goods. There is no proof for that in the text, however.
Technically, the debate was about the amendments that the Rapporteur had
laid down, together with McCarthy and with Toine Manders (Liberal,
Netherlands) and which reflect verbatim the Common Position of the
Council. This position had been fine-tuned, behind closed doors, in five
so-called trilogue meetings between the Parliament and the Council during
the previous weeks. The Legal Affairs Committee did not vote on the
amendments of Mrs. Fourtou: she chose to table them directly to the
Plenary.
MEPs may now lay down additional amendments until 4 March. The vote will
take place on 9 March in Strasbourg, preceded by a plenary debate the day
before. Already on 10 March, the outcome of the vote will be considered by
the Council's Committee of Permanent Representatives (COREPER). On 11
March, on the occasion of the meeting of the EU Competitiveness Council,
ministers may sign it off if it has been agreed by the Permanent
Representatives.
Though some of the concerns of civil society and internet providers have
been taken into account in the drafting of the Common Position, the text
remains problematic. The scope of the directive is extended to cover "any
infringement of intellectual property rights as provided for by Community
law and/or by the national law of the Member State concerned." At the same
time, the Commission's initial limitation to infringements which are
"committed for commercial purposes or cause significant harm to the right
holder" has been deleted.
The term "intellectual property rights" is not defined, creating the
possibility of a large range of abuses. Because the enforcement is not
limited to large-scale infringements, kids downloading songs from the
internet risk the same kind of treatment as large-scale counterfeiters of
trademark designer clothes.
EDRI-member organisation FIPR has prepared a set of amendments to deal
with the worst deficits in this Directive and is preparing, together with
a range of other organisations, a rally in Strasbourg to promote these
amendments and to encourage MEPs to vote against the Directive if some
minimum requirements are not fulfilled.
The European Commission's initial proposal for a Directive
http://europa.eu.int/smartapi/cgi/sga_doc?smartapi!celexplus!prod!CELEXnumdoc&numdoc=32001L0029&lg=EN
Amendments proposed by FIPR and EDR
http://www.ffii.org.uk/ip_enforce/andreas2.html
Campaign Info
http://www.ipjustice.org/CODE/ "
EDRI-gram also reports on the EU plan to introduce biometric passports I mentioned here recently.
I've done a fair bit of grumbling about the current state of the deployment of electronic voting machines but put it down to the cock-up rather than the conspiracy theory of life, since there has been no hard evidence of any electoral fraud (and lots of evidence of incompetence and cover up of that incompetence). Dr. Bob Fitrakis, senior editor of the Free Press, thinks there is a vast right wing conspiracy going on here.
It's all circumstantial neptoism and invisible-hand stuff with allegations, though no direct proof, of possible electoral manipulation but nevertheless an interesting read. If all the connections referred to are cosher then they could, at least, raise the appearance of impropriety. I really don't believe the Diebold folk and other electronic voting machine suppliers to date are avoiding the voter verifiable paper trail for any deep conspiratorial reasons, though. (I hope they are not anyway, in a world were powerful vested interests of all political persuasions are always angling for that extra edge). It's just that if you happen to have good market penetration with a less-than-perfect product, the short term marketing response to that knowledge leaking out is to try and cover it up.
It's all circumstantial neptoism and invisible-hand stuff with allegations, though no direct proof, of possible electoral manipulation but nevertheless an interesting read. If all the connections referred to are cosher then they could, at least, raise the appearance of impropriety. I really don't believe the Diebold folk and other electronic voting machine suppliers to date are avoiding the voter verifiable paper trail for any deep conspiratorial reasons, though. (I hope they are not anyway, in a world were powerful vested interests of all political persuasions are always angling for that extra edge). It's just that if you happen to have good market penetration with a less-than-perfect product, the short term marketing response to that knowledge leaking out is to try and cover it up.
Friday, February 27, 2004
Ernest Miller likes most of the EFF solution to the P2P file sharing problem.
"A Significant Problem: Using Any Software Won't Cut It
Why? Free riders. If people are permitted to freely share files on existing P2P systems, there goes any chance you have of limiting free riding.
Under EFF's proposed system, say I go ahead and get a license. For $5/month I can fileshare with impunity, that is, I can upload songs all day long. The free riders in this system will be the people downloading the songs from me. How do you enforce against downloaders? You can't, at least without draconian technical and legal enforcement mechanisms which I am sure the EFF would rightfully oppose.
What will happen under EFF's system is that a significant number of people will sign up for the system, say 10-20% of the filesharing population (if you are lucky). At this point, you stop getting subscriptions, because the free riders can get all the music they want for free, without fear of legal sanction. Sure, you might have some foolish people who both download and upload, but not many and all you'll do is turn them into legitimate uploaders for a small fee/fine. Suddenly, your $3 Billion/year is only $600 Million or $300 Million. Additionally many fee-paying subscribers will feel like suckers for paying"
He has a solution though - compulsory licenses.
"Compulsory licenses avoid this problem by forcing everyone to pay, regardless. This comes at the expense of heavily involving government, which should be a last ditch solution."
"A Significant Problem: Using Any Software Won't Cut It
Why? Free riders. If people are permitted to freely share files on existing P2P systems, there goes any chance you have of limiting free riding.
Under EFF's proposed system, say I go ahead and get a license. For $5/month I can fileshare with impunity, that is, I can upload songs all day long. The free riders in this system will be the people downloading the songs from me. How do you enforce against downloaders? You can't, at least without draconian technical and legal enforcement mechanisms which I am sure the EFF would rightfully oppose.
What will happen under EFF's system is that a significant number of people will sign up for the system, say 10-20% of the filesharing population (if you are lucky). At this point, you stop getting subscriptions, because the free riders can get all the music they want for free, without fear of legal sanction. Sure, you might have some foolish people who both download and upload, but not many and all you'll do is turn them into legitimate uploaders for a small fee/fine. Suddenly, your $3 Billion/year is only $600 Million or $300 Million. Additionally many fee-paying subscribers will feel like suckers for paying"
He has a solution though - compulsory licenses.
"Compulsory licenses avoid this problem by forcing everyone to pay, regardless. This comes at the expense of heavily involving government, which should be a last ditch solution."
The UK government have published a discussion paper in response to the Newton Report which recommended that the Part 4 powers in the 2001 Anti-Terrorism Crime and Security Act, which allow indefinite detention of foreign terrorist suspects, should be replaced with new legislation. Lord Newton recommended new powers to apply to British as well as foreign nationals, to avoid having to opt out of a part of the European Convention on Human Rights. I doubt most people will be interested in purusing the full 123 pages but it would really be worthwhile for you to read the main principles and conclusions on pages 8 and 9 of the Newton report. The principles state that the report recognises that the individual has the right to liberty and privacy and that the authorities have a duty to take the necessary steps to protect society from terrorism. It explicitly recognises the need for special counter terrorism legislation but says it should be kept distinct from mainstream criminal law and limited to dealing with terrorism. And it implicitly criticises the David Blunkett approach of introducing emergency legislation supposedly to deal with terrorism but having the provisions so broadly drafted that they apply to petty crime. "The enactment of mainstream legislation using emergency procedures undermines the consensus for the use of such procedures in justifiable cases." Our Home Secretary won't have liked that. At the other end of the scale pure libertarians won't be overly enamoured with "the blanket ban on the use of intercepted communications as evidence in court should be lifted to make it possible to prosecute more terrorists (and other serious criminals) and the government should examine the scope for more intensive use of surveillance to prevent and disrupt terrorism."
All very topical this week in the light of the dropping of the prosecution of Katharine Gun and Claire Short's attempts to take revenge on Tony Blair with allegations of illicit spying on the UN.
All very topical this week in the light of the dropping of the prosecution of Katharine Gun and Claire Short's attempts to take revenge on Tony Blair with allegations of illicit spying on the UN.
According to the Independent, the general angst about electronic voting is spreading in Ireland.
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern is dismissive of concerns and determined that an auditable paper trail will not be built into the system.
"We are not going to go back to pushing pieces of paper around the place," he said, accusing a critic of wanting "to keep old ways, old things, the old nonsensical past".
I guess he means that "old nonsensical past" where the election system was transparent, had impeccable integrity, it was simple to vote (mark the ballot paper and stick it in the box) and had a clear audit trail so that any anomalies could be reviewed openly. But it was, of course, terrible that it might take a few days to get the final results.
The new system will provide instant results (yahoo! - I use the word in its original sense prior to the Internet age) and a windfall for voting machine manufacturers all for 40m Euros(£26m). But no transparency, no simplicity, no audit trail, no confidence, no integrity...
Governments get five years if they win the election. Is democracy not worth a few days to make sure the results of the election are accurate? In the words of Milton Friedman in the Eldred amicus brief, this one is a complete "no brainer" for me. This ubiquitous Boys-Own blind faith of computing ignoramuses, like certain decision makers, in the ability of computers to automatically and magically make things better, regardless of the overall objective or the suitability of the tools (computers) to the task or [critically] the way in which those tools are deployed, drives me nuts on a daily basis in my own day job. That it is happening in so important a context of the integrity of our democracies is worrying in the extreme. Mr Ahern should not knock paper. It is still the best available technology for voting (imho).
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern is dismissive of concerns and determined that an auditable paper trail will not be built into the system.
"We are not going to go back to pushing pieces of paper around the place," he said, accusing a critic of wanting "to keep old ways, old things, the old nonsensical past".
I guess he means that "old nonsensical past" where the election system was transparent, had impeccable integrity, it was simple to vote (mark the ballot paper and stick it in the box) and had a clear audit trail so that any anomalies could be reviewed openly. But it was, of course, terrible that it might take a few days to get the final results.
The new system will provide instant results (yahoo! - I use the word in its original sense prior to the Internet age) and a windfall for voting machine manufacturers all for 40m Euros(£26m). But no transparency, no simplicity, no audit trail, no confidence, no integrity...
Governments get five years if they win the election. Is democracy not worth a few days to make sure the results of the election are accurate? In the words of Milton Friedman in the Eldred amicus brief, this one is a complete "no brainer" for me. This ubiquitous Boys-Own blind faith of computing ignoramuses, like certain decision makers, in the ability of computers to automatically and magically make things better, regardless of the overall objective or the suitability of the tools (computers) to the task or [critically] the way in which those tools are deployed, drives me nuts on a daily basis in my own day job. That it is happening in so important a context of the integrity of our democracies is worrying in the extreme. Mr Ahern should not knock paper. It is still the best available technology for voting (imho).
Thursday, February 26, 2004
Greplaw have done an interview with Jessica Litman. Lovely quote about Jessica thinking of herself as an older sister to Harry and I hadn't previously come across her Breakfast with Batman paper.
The Association of Chief Police Officers in the UK have accused the Information Commissioner of putting children at risk for ordering the "destruction of valuable criminal intelligence."
"In one case, in July 2003, the commissioner demanded that South Yorkshire police delete from a woman's record a juvenile conviction for actual bodily harm dating from 1979...
In September 2003 a similar request was made of West Yorkshire police over a man who wanted juvenile convictions that carried a three-month custodial sentence to be "weeded out" of his record.
In a case with echoes of Huntley, the commissioner asked an unnamed police force to delete intelligence relating to allegations that a man sexually assaulted young males in 1991 and 1998."
The notion that a juvenille conviction from 1979 (25 years ago) should be held against someone is a bit excessive. What about the juvenille conviction leading to a custodial sentence or someone with serious allegations stemming from 1998? It's difficult to say without more specifics of the individual cases. What's certain is that the police have a very difficult job but they do need to recognise that the Information Commissioner does too. Very often an organisation's interpretation of the Data Protection Act bears little relationship to the actual requirements of the act. There is a judgement call to be made on the merits of individual cases and the perception on where the dividing line should fall will vary depending on the values and objectives of the institution or the indivual. ACPO and the Information Commissioner, if the story is to be believed, have different perspectives on the boundaries.
"In one case, in July 2003, the commissioner demanded that South Yorkshire police delete from a woman's record a juvenile conviction for actual bodily harm dating from 1979...
In September 2003 a similar request was made of West Yorkshire police over a man who wanted juvenile convictions that carried a three-month custodial sentence to be "weeded out" of his record.
In a case with echoes of Huntley, the commissioner asked an unnamed police force to delete intelligence relating to allegations that a man sexually assaulted young males in 1991 and 1998."
The notion that a juvenille conviction from 1979 (25 years ago) should be held against someone is a bit excessive. What about the juvenille conviction leading to a custodial sentence or someone with serious allegations stemming from 1998? It's difficult to say without more specifics of the individual cases. What's certain is that the police have a very difficult job but they do need to recognise that the Information Commissioner does too. Very often an organisation's interpretation of the Data Protection Act bears little relationship to the actual requirements of the act. There is a judgement call to be made on the merits of individual cases and the perception on where the dividing line should fall will vary depending on the values and objectives of the institution or the indivual. ACPO and the Information Commissioner, if the story is to be believed, have different perspectives on the boundaries.
There's a nice quote from Jonathan Zittrain in a New York Times article on the "Grey Album" (a re-mix of some Beatles tracks with some recent rap music) dispute:
"As a matter of pure legal doctrine, the Grey Tuesday protest is breaking the law, end of story. But copyright law was written with a particular form of industry in mind. The flourishing of information technology gives amateurs and home-recording artists powerful tools to build and share interesting, transformative, and socially valuable art drawn from pieces of popular culture. There's no place to plug such an important cultural sea change into the current legal regime."
"As a matter of pure legal doctrine, the Grey Tuesday protest is breaking the law, end of story. But copyright law was written with a particular form of industry in mind. The flourishing of information technology gives amateurs and home-recording artists powerful tools to build and share interesting, transformative, and socially valuable art drawn from pieces of popular culture. There's no place to plug such an important cultural sea change into the current legal regime."
Statewatch Editor Tony Bunyan is none too pleased at the EU plans to introduce biometric passports.
"For EU citizens getting a passport is quite straightforward, you fill in the form, get your picture taken in a photo booth and simply post both to the passport office. This simple process is about to change: to get a passport you will have to present yourself to an "enrolment centre" where a special picture will be taken of you and then you will have to have your fingerprints taken. These will then be held on a European database with personal data."
The political decision to introduce compulsory biometric identifiers, first on visas and residence permits and then on passports, was taken at two Informal meetings of Justice and Home Affairs Ministers (in February 2002 and then in March 2003). The Commission argued for a so-called "coherent approach" for "all travel documents, including the passports of EU citizens". These decisions were not reported at the time. It was the European Councils (the meeting of EU prime ministers) at Thessaloniki in June 2003 and later in Brussels on 12 December 2003 who formally endorsed the proposal. A secondary reason for bringing in biometrics on EU passports, the Commission argues, is that the USA is demanding them on passports too.
The legal basis for the proposal is highly dubious, see: Commission’s EU biometric passport proposal exceeds the EC’s powers, Statewatch legal analysis concludes that: "no powers conferred upon the EC by the EC Treaty, taken separately or together, confer upon the EC the power to adopt the proposed Regulation"
The ignorance in the making of these decisions about biometric identity as a surrogate for security continues to be staggering and it would be laughable if it wasn't so serious. I could mutter 'security is a trade off ' and 'biometrics may be unique (mostly) but they're not secret' and 'identity is no gaurantee of security' and 'statistically the bigger the biometric database the bigger the error rate' and 'false positives' and 'false negatives' and 'information overload' and 'well resourced clever human intelligence' and ''security is only as strong as the weakest link', but there's not much chance of getting heard by the 'war on terrorism' gang. And the sad thing is that I don't even know that much about security but even I can see the sense of people who really do know about it like Bruce Schneier. What kind of a world our our children going to grow up into?
"For EU citizens getting a passport is quite straightforward, you fill in the form, get your picture taken in a photo booth and simply post both to the passport office. This simple process is about to change: to get a passport you will have to present yourself to an "enrolment centre" where a special picture will be taken of you and then you will have to have your fingerprints taken. These will then be held on a European database with personal data."
The political decision to introduce compulsory biometric identifiers, first on visas and residence permits and then on passports, was taken at two Informal meetings of Justice and Home Affairs Ministers (in February 2002 and then in March 2003). The Commission argued for a so-called "coherent approach" for "all travel documents, including the passports of EU citizens". These decisions were not reported at the time. It was the European Councils (the meeting of EU prime ministers) at Thessaloniki in June 2003 and later in Brussels on 12 December 2003 who formally endorsed the proposal. A secondary reason for bringing in biometrics on EU passports, the Commission argues, is that the USA is demanding them on passports too.
The legal basis for the proposal is highly dubious, see: Commission’s EU biometric passport proposal exceeds the EC’s powers, Statewatch legal analysis concludes that: "no powers conferred upon the EC by the EC Treaty, taken separately or together, confer upon the EC the power to adopt the proposed Regulation"
The ignorance in the making of these decisions about biometric identity as a surrogate for security continues to be staggering and it would be laughable if it wasn't so serious. I could mutter 'security is a trade off ' and 'biometrics may be unique (mostly) but they're not secret' and 'identity is no gaurantee of security' and 'statistically the bigger the biometric database the bigger the error rate' and 'false positives' and 'false negatives' and 'information overload' and 'well resourced clever human intelligence' and ''security is only as strong as the weakest link', but there's not much chance of getting heard by the 'war on terrorism' gang. And the sad thing is that I don't even know that much about security but even I can see the sense of people who really do know about it like Bruce Schneier. What kind of a world our our children going to grow up into?
Tuesday, February 24, 2004
321 Studios have lost their DMCA battle against the movie industry.
"Judge Susan Illston ruled Friday in San Francisco that software made by
Chesterfield, Mo.-based 321 Studios violates the 1998 Digital Millennium
Copyright Act, which prohibits the circumvention of anti-piracy measures such
as the Content Scramble System protecting movies on DVDs.
The judge ordered the company to cease making or distributing such software
within seven days of her order."
The company has said they will appeal.
"Judge Susan Illston ruled Friday in San Francisco that software made by
Chesterfield, Mo.-based 321 Studios violates the 1998 Digital Millennium
Copyright Act, which prohibits the circumvention of anti-piracy measures such
as the Content Scramble System protecting movies on DVDs.
The judge ordered the company to cease making or distributing such software
within seven days of her order."
The company has said they will appeal.
Monday, February 23, 2004
Michael Froomkin recalled some advice from his grandmother recently in reflecting on the Bush administration's response to the atrocities of 9/11 and Siva Vaidhyanathan's confession of self-censorship when going through airport security at Newark.
Friday, February 13, 2004
I learn from The Filter that there's a nice summary of the controversy surrounding the Diebold electronic voting machines and leaked internal memos at the Berkman Center. Section "5.0 The Implications" seems to be repeated twice. Possibly for emphasis? Probably in error. I'm sure the Berkmanites will correct it pretty quickly.
I was telling some friends over lunch on Wednesday that I had just heard a BBC radio report on the problems with trying to play copy protected CDs in certain Vokswagen CD players. It seems that Andrew Orlowski at the Register heard the same report and has written about it: Copy-crippled CDs launch in UK, baffling Auntie Beeb.
Orlowski reports the conversation very accurately. What I can't get is how a hardened consumer-advocate journalist lets by openings like those provided by the BPI spokesman. He tells her the CD standards have been around for a long time and then says the CD manufacturers have recently "enhanced CDs" with new features (i.e. copy protection). And the effect of these new features is that the CD produces silence when played i.e. doesn't work. It's a bit like Raleigh saying 'we decided to take the wheels off our bikes to reduce bicycle thefts and improve our service to customers; and don't blame us that the bikes are no good for cycling, the government should have adapted the road transport infrastructure to take account of our changes.'
As to the notion that "The CD em player that he's got in his car is not actually, eh supposed initially to play audio CDs." Oh you mean that road was not meant for cycling my wheel-free-enhanced bike on? Even the BPI spokesman thinks "Now that might sound a bit strange" and the journalist still doesn't pounce.
You just could not make this stuff up.
All I can suggest to irritated, music loving, Volkswagen owners is to try to ensure not to have too many passengers when trying to play copy protected CDs. You might find yourself getting sued by the John Cage estate for infringing (public performance) their copyright in silence. Incidentally the real settlement figure was not the six figure sum the BBC report here but it was substantial and somewhere between four and six figures.
Orlowski reports the conversation very accurately. What I can't get is how a hardened consumer-advocate journalist lets by openings like those provided by the BPI spokesman. He tells her the CD standards have been around for a long time and then says the CD manufacturers have recently "enhanced CDs" with new features (i.e. copy protection). And the effect of these new features is that the CD produces silence when played i.e. doesn't work. It's a bit like Raleigh saying 'we decided to take the wheels off our bikes to reduce bicycle thefts and improve our service to customers; and don't blame us that the bikes are no good for cycling, the government should have adapted the road transport infrastructure to take account of our changes.'
As to the notion that "The CD em player that he's got in his car is not actually, eh supposed initially to play audio CDs." Oh you mean that road was not meant for cycling my wheel-free-enhanced bike on? Even the BPI spokesman thinks "Now that might sound a bit strange" and the journalist still doesn't pounce.
You just could not make this stuff up.
All I can suggest to irritated, music loving, Volkswagen owners is to try to ensure not to have too many passengers when trying to play copy protected CDs. You might find yourself getting sued by the John Cage estate for infringing (public performance) their copyright in silence. Incidentally the real settlement figure was not the six figure sum the BBC report here but it was substantial and somewhere between four and six figures.
Thursday, February 12, 2004
The EFF have posted a recording of the oral arguments in the MGM v Grokster appeal hearing. MGM's lawyer took a bit of a battering from the judges. I don't know whether that gives any indicator as to the ultimate decision in the case but isn't it fantastic to able to get direct access to this kind of material.
The NYT have a profile of Bram Cohen who created BitTorrent, the file sharing software that speeds up the downloading process for large files (such as digital films) and has the movie industry so worried.
"Under older file-sharing systems like Napster and Kazaa, only a small subset of
users actually share files with the world. Most users simply download, or leech, in cyberspace parlance.
BitTorrent, however, uses what could be called a Golden Rule principle: the faster you upload, the faster you are allowed to download. BitTorrent cuts up files into many little pieces, and as soon as a user has a piece, they immediately start uploading that piece to other users. So almost all of the people who are sharing a given file are simultaneously uploading and downloading pieces of the same file (unless their downloading is complete).
The practical implication is that the BitTorrent system makes it easy to distribute very large files to large numbers of people while placing minimal bandwidth requirements on the original "seeder." That is because everyone who wants the file is sharing with one another, rather than downloading from a central source. A separate file-sharing network known as eDonkey uses a similar system."
Copyfighters are grappling with the implications of the Appeals Court decision earlier in the week on DMCA [alleged] copyright infringement notice and takedown procedures for ISPs. The case was Ellison v. Robertson et al.
"Under older file-sharing systems like Napster and Kazaa, only a small subset of
users actually share files with the world. Most users simply download, or leech, in cyberspace parlance.
BitTorrent, however, uses what could be called a Golden Rule principle: the faster you upload, the faster you are allowed to download. BitTorrent cuts up files into many little pieces, and as soon as a user has a piece, they immediately start uploading that piece to other users. So almost all of the people who are sharing a given file are simultaneously uploading and downloading pieces of the same file (unless their downloading is complete).
The practical implication is that the BitTorrent system makes it easy to distribute very large files to large numbers of people while placing minimal bandwidth requirements on the original "seeder." That is because everyone who wants the file is sharing with one another, rather than downloading from a central source. A separate file-sharing network known as eDonkey uses a similar system."
Copyfighters are grappling with the implications of the Appeals Court decision earlier in the week on DMCA [alleged] copyright infringement notice and takedown procedures for ISPs. The case was Ellison v. Robertson et al.
Wednesday, February 11, 2004
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