UK Government Confiscates Firefox CDs 540
Alsee writes "The idea that Free Software can be sold has some government officials perplexed. Times Online has the story. A UK Trading Standards officer contacted the Mozilla Foundation to report catching a business selling copies of Firefox. The organization confiscated the CDs with the intent to prosecute said business. When informed that such distribution was authorized, the officer first expressed disbelief that Free Software could be sold then said 'If Mozilla permit the sale of copied versions of its software, it makes it virtually impossible for us, from a practical point of view, to enforce UK anti-piracy legislation'."
Not the first time (Score:4, Interesting)
AIK
eBay also did/does this to some extent (Score:5, Interesting)
Hmm, might have something to do with this (Score:5, Interesting)
Looks like someone on high has been told to allocate resources to copyright infringment. You can see how the idea that people can sell things which are free would confuse PC Plod.
Here's hoping they get equally confused with the idea you can buy something, but not be able to do what you want with your property and in consequence arrest the chairman of EMI.
Hilarious... (Score:3, Interesting)
Also, see Gervase's blog entry [mozillazine.org], and it is also on digg [digg.com].
Re:Licenses (Score:4, Interesting)
What the ...? What kind of logic is he using?!! (Score:5, Interesting)
If Mozilla permit the sale of copied versions of its software, it makes it virtually impossible for us, from a practical point of view, to enforce UK anti-piracy legislation.
This is one of the most asinine things I've heard in a long time! Just because one piece of software says that it can be distributed even though it's free does not mean that suddenly anti-piracy legislation is unenforceable! In fact, anti-piracy legislation does not even come into play here because there was no piracy going on! Either that quote is being taken way out of context or they are actually trying to say that not being able to prosecute those who copy Firefox means that they won't be able to prosecute those who copy Windows, Photoshop, or other programs that clearly fall under anti-piracy legislation!
In fact, this kind of distribution and marketing has been going on since the Commodore 64 days! Free software would be distributed for about $2 per floppy disk at local computer meets to cover the cost of media and duplication. In fact, that's how a lot of PC shareware got distributed. I used to write some shareware apps that were free to distrubte, just not free to use. I sent disks all over the country to PC user groups with permission to copy and charge a nominal fee for their efforts. I was still getting registration fees a few years after I stopped supporting the software, so that method clearly worked and there was nothing illegal about it. But there certainly would have been laws broken if those user groups tried to do the same with Lotus 1-2-3 or dBase!
Please tell me that I've misunderstood something here!
Incredulous ignoramus ignores issue (Score:4, Interesting)
Isn't that something! Maybe you didn't get the memo, but this is how everything works now. Songs play on a radio, but people still buy CDs, because who wants to go recording all the songs. Books are given away for free online, but people pay for the bound version. Artists give tracks away on their website, but people still buy their CDs.
It's called making money off distribution and convenience of medium, rather than off the production of the intellectual property in question. In fact, considering that most software (proprietary or not) has a one-time "production" cost which exists independent of the number of copies distributed. this makes a bit of sense.
The reason we don't mind if people sell copies of Firefox is because the Firefox developers, if they care about the "marketplace" of their product at all (which many developers I'm sure do not), they care only about one thing: more people using the software. If that means Joe in Indiana who only has dial-up and won't download Firefox would rather pay someone $5 for a CD, so be it.
The question asked above shows the general "negative" attitude of the state of our anti-piracy laws. In particular, it seems unfathomable to "let" another company make money off something you give away for free. We're already giving the software away, so how is this in any way a "harm" to us, the developers of the software? We don't "lose" money when another company sells our free product; instead, we simply gain marketshare. Isn't that good enough reason to allow it? Or, put better, wouldn't it be downright silly to disallow it?
I wish more people would sell Firefox. Like, say, Linux machines loaded with Firefox, at Circuit City or Best Buy, for $200 less than the Windows counterparts. Then we'd really be losing money on the OEM deals, us open source developers! We'd have to call the FBI upon all those piraters.
This article is somehow refreshing. Dealing with open source software usually means you see how dark and restrictive the proprietary/commercial world has become.
I was waiting for this (Score:3, Interesting)
"I'm sorry, we granted permission implicitly to do that..."
It's a beautiful thing.
Now if I could get my luser friends to stop paying for warez by using Free Software, I'd be happy. Maybe I could make them pay for Free Software?
Re:What they mean to say is.... (Score:5, Interesting)
However, I think she doesn't know anything about free software (or software for that matter) and her assumption was actually that if you don't hold the copyright on a work and are copying it you must be breaking the law, so, actually, she seems to not to be able to comprehend the idea of a copyright license, full stop (i.e.: she thinks that copyright shouldn't allow you to pass on your exclusive right to copy to a third party).
It is as if she thinks it is the duty of everyone to keep their works a secret and not publish them (otherwise the masses might learn stuff). I wonder when she'll find out about the public domain: an evil conspiracy by the government to allow information to be copied by anyone without anyone having the right to restrict this immoral act. No one tell her about these evil things called libraries...
Although, being in a nortoriously corrupt UK TS dept., I'm not surprised that she is scared of the idea of freedom of information and thinks freedom of expression is immoral somehow.
Who filed a complaint about the business? (Score:2, Interesting)
There is more to this story. I wonder if we'll ever find out.
Re:It's even better than that (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm mostly in agreement with what you say, but I'd just like to clarify that there is a huge difference between licenses like BSD, GPL, etc. (free and open source software licenses) and the typical commercial EULA: the GPL need not be agreed to in order to use the software. At worst, you don't abide by the GPL and are bound by the copyright law of your land. If you do abide by the terms of the GPL, then you are granted permission to do things (probably) forbidden by copyright law such as copying and redistribution. The EULA on the other hand, attempts to force you (legally dubiously) to agree to it as a precondition to using the software. It attempts to impose restrictions over and above those imposed by copyright law. Like you, I find this practice heinous. A pack of lawyers vs. the average Joe who has already bought and paid for the software does not seem a fair negotiation.
Two questions: When copyright expires on a piece of software, am I still bound by the EULA (assume for a moment that the EULA is a valid contract)? I suppose I could read the EULA to search for an expiration... And second, is there any commercially available proprietary software that does not include a EULA (other than the default copyright restrictions)? I think I would buy it just on principle.
Re:This doesn't count as stupid? (Score:3, Interesting)
No different with the RIAA, really. They want to presume that any distribution of digital music (except by their own members, of course) is illegal, and hence they attempt to shut down distribution channels for all large binary files. They're as much afraid of future competition from public-domain (e.g., creative commons) and permissively-licensed music as they are of actual copyright infringement.
But, I digress...
Re:Licenses are NOT the problem... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:It's even better than that (Score:3, Interesting)
Your statutory rights under the "fair dealing" or "fair use" provision of copyright law include the right to make a copy of a computer program in the memory of a computer as a necessary step in using the program, and the right to conduct reverse engineering for private study or research {which includes morbid curiosity}. You may be bound to secrecy in what you discover. Reverse engineering for the purpose of developing compatible or interoperable software {which implies that you are going to disclose results} is also permitted as a "reasonable force" measure if the vendor is unwilling to supply you with requested documentation. If you have to break encryption as part of your efforts, it is a defence that the encrypted information was meant for you.
When copyright expires and the software enters the Public Domain, you will not need a licence to do anything which was formerly forbidden by copyright law; the Law of the Land will give you the necessary permission.
As for proprietary software which does not come with an EULA, I don't know of any. The nearest thing might be DJB's "licence free" software, see here [cr.yp.to] for more info.
Re:Not the first time (Score:4, Interesting)
I was convicted of encouraging minors to participate in making the roadsides clean of litter. Appearing soon in a federal court near you.
AIK
Yes, it does... (Score:3, Interesting)
Let's say I'm selling Firefox CD's and the cops arrest me, take my computer, take my CD's, publicize information that I'm a thief, yada yada yada. Now the Mozilla foundation rings up and says "hey, that's totally okay with us".. Suddenly not only am I vindicated, but I've got one hell of a good counter-lawsuit against the city.
It's a huge pain in the ass to verify that what somebody was doing was, in fact, illegal before actually arresting them for it. This is something that cops, very generally, don't do. They leave that to lawyers and prosecutors and such.
So in order to prevent wrongful arrest lawsuits against the city, lawyers and prosecutors tend to dumb the law down so that your average cops can understand it. They don't really need to know every single detail, just enough to tell them when to arrest somebody or not.
If you find somebody blatently selling burned CD's, how do you know if they're doing something legal or something illegal? If you have to actually look at the software they are selling and then contact the makers of that software (or find their statements online) before actually shutting the guy down, then yeah, that's a huge pain in the ass. You can't go by the license files the guy himself is giving you (he could be lying), and you can't go by what some random webpage says (it could also be a lie). You need a confirmed truth from the copyright holders mouth before they even take action in the first place.
This basically means that they'll have to know common open source packages, whether selling them is okay, etc, etc. It means a much more difficult training program, it means a much more complex set of guidelines to follow in determining whether or not they should take action against somebody. They have to distill all this information down into what are the possible crimes that can be committed so that the people actually enforcing can understand these things. And yeah, that's a huge pain in the ass.
Oh, and BTW, it's a GOOD thing that it's a huge pain in the ass, because it means that most of these bullshit IP laws will end up going unenforced. That's always nice.