SSSCA Hearing 779
larsoncc writes: "According to this article on CNET, a Senate Bill will likely force the issue of adding copy protection to hardware. They are giving the industry 12 to 18 months to come up with a voluntary solution to the "problem" of copies, and if not... Well, you just have to read the article. Insane." Wired also has a story. The IP list published two interesting documents: an account of the hearing by an attendee, and a letter from Intel published immediately after the hearing. Read the letter carefully - note that the disagreement between the tech industry and Hollywood is not over whether or not copy protection will be implemented into every electronic device, but only whether or not this should be written into law. If the SSSCA isn't passed, Intel (and others) get a lot of leverage over Hollywood. If it is, Intel's leverage disappears. But since both sides want to build copy protection into everything, they only differ over the process, we're in trouble either way.
But... (Score:1, Funny)
Oh, great (Score:2, Funny)
Re:But... (Score:2, Funny)
We must all be protected from ourselves.
So basically (Score:4, Funny)
Good news and bad news (Score:1, Funny)
The bad news? Freedom no longer "rings" in America. It's more of a "thud" type sound. Like a sack of potatoes hitting the ground, or a swat team boot impacting your front door.
New law (Score:5, Funny)
The MPAA applauded them move. "Now that digital movies weigh 300lbs casual piracy will be elimiated and we can safely distribute films without concern of terrorists." Blockbuster announed that all new members will receive a free pallet jack.
Chinese peasents who have been hoarding illegal CDR technology in their villages were gleefull. "Perhaps Lik-Sang will buy this @#$%% for paper to cdr converters for hackers". The I-Pod Mafia could not be reach for comment.
SD
Re:I will accept copy protection. (Score:0, Funny)
You are such an important customer to them, what with your stealing and all, that they will probably bend over backward for you.
Wow, lets make laws for everything! (Score:4, Funny)
Politicians: Well then, we'll just make a law that says you have to make something to prevent copying. That will solve the problem.
Later on...
NASA: We can't make a spaceship that travels faster than the speed of light, it's against the laws of physics!
Politicians: Well then, we'll just make a law that says you have to make a spaceship that travels faster than the speed of light. That will fix the laws of physics.
Re:There's alway a way to break copy protection (Score:2, Funny)
Congratulations, sir! You now have a very tight grip on the obvious! Now let's see you do it.
This is Slashdot, home of the "Evil company X is threatening to restrict our rights! Let's all get together to stop--OOOH! SHINEY!!!"
In Other News (Score:2, Funny)
"This is GREAT!!" said one student. "My final project was a digital audio player, it was due in next week and i was far behind. But now the government has declared it illegal, and my professor is forced to pass me wayhaaay!" he continued: "The only down side, is that the feds raided my home and found a 100-page report (my project) with detaild schematics. I now face upto 5 years in prision under both the DMCA _and_ the SSSCA!"
Hobbyists were outraged however, "I don't want to live in a country where if i go to radio-shack to buy some components, i can expect FBI agents waiting on my doorstep for an inspection when i get home."
But this law doesn't only affect engineers. Second-hand electronics dealers today announced that they were concerned about the consequences of the law. When passed, it could mean the entire stock, of some dealers would instantly become as illegal as 100Kg of cocaine. "Does that mean i can sell this old Apple IIe for its weight in coke?" asked one seller.
This seems so Dilbertian... (Score:4, Funny)
Marketing Weasels: "This online piracy is hurting sales. The solution is obvious: Make all computers unable to copy anything."
PHB: "Yup. That sounds right, take care of it Dilbert."
Dilbert: "That's impossible. All computers copy. It's part of their basic operation. You might as well tell me to design a perpetual motion machine."
PHB: "I don't understand what you're saying. Logically, anything I don't understand isn't important. You have 12 to 18 months to make all the computers in the world unable to copy. Oh, and the marketing weasels get to decide on the specs. Don't worry, they rarely change their minds more than twice a day."
Re:overseas.... (Score:3, Funny)
>
> It could get tough. We already have a "War on Drugs" and a "War on Terrorism". Soon, our law enforcement officials will be waging a "War on Turing-Complete Computing Apparatus".
>
> Columbian drug lords will set up chip fabs in the jungle. Chip runners will swallow condoms full of CPUs and crap them out once they get inside the USA. You'll see people selling unregulated CPUs on the street for $100/MHz.
And the gang violence we used to see between Crips and Bloods over cocaine distribution rights...
Y'know, the future of tech under SSSCA could be kinda fun. Shitty for the US tech industry, but hey, our kids can flip fuckin 'burgers. Meantime, us Slashdotters with our pimpin' case m0dz will 0wn tha str33tz!
I'm thinking that buying a computer, post-SSSCA, will be something like a cross between a William Gibson novel and the Japanese Akibahara markets.
~wavy lines~
"Yo! Tackhead! I gotz dat AMD Hammerz you wanted! The newest steppings! Come right off the muthafukkin' fab in Dresden, man, then shoved up some guy's ass, then shat out in a motherboard plant in Taiwan, with the assembled boards shipped to Colombia and smuggled into the States buried in bags of coke! Hah! Dumb muthafukkin' customs bitchez thought tha truck was just another tonne of cocaine for Eisner and Valenti to pay off Hollings with, y'see, so they let it in, but it was fuckin' CPUs, man, CPUs! Soon as we crossed tha border, we flushed the worthless cocaine down the fuckin' toilet and broke out the fluorinert for tha mad pimpin overclock!"
For want of a dictionary... (Score:1, Funny)
Does this explain your idiosyncratic spellings of "deem", "reeling", "plagiarize", "aggregate", "acknowledges", "inherently", "privileges"? You know, if you read books now and again, you'd recognize a correctly spelled English word when you saw one.