Civil Disobedience and DeCSS

The DVD trial has been underway in New York City since last Monday, testing the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and it's expected to run through Wednesday or Thursday this week. It's not looking good for the forces of light. See below for more reading material than you could possibly take in.

The EFF has put out a series of Updates covering the case day-by-day as it progresses. The most recent one or two aren't on the website yet, but should be soon.

2600 is keeping a complete archive of case-related documents, including transcripts. The transcripts are serious time-killers - it takes a long time to read 7 hours of testimony. But if you've got some time on your hands, they make good reading. Nothing beats first-generation source materials.

The New York Times has a nice summary in their Cyber Law section. Concentrates on the surprise testimony of Jon Johansen on Thursday, but touches on other issues as well.

The people at Harvard's Openlaw project have been scrutinizing the trial as it unfolds. They've collected a bunch of links to press coverage of the trial, and it's frankly pretty interesting to see the substantial differences between publications - almost as if they were watching different trials, one about the freedom to view DVD's as you choose, and a completely different trial about pirates, freebooters, and buccaneers. Their DVD-discuss mailing list often has insightful commentary.

So now that you've had a chance to read up on the trial, let's cut to the chase: the defendants are going to lose. (Note that the decision in the case may not come for a few weeks yet.) No doubt Monday-morning quarterbacks are already primed for action, and the MPAA's PR people have already prepared their after-action press releases calling 2600 a bunch of pirates, thieves, and baby-stealers. Some people will claim it was due to Judge Kaplan's evident bias (which has now degenerated into the lawyerly equivalent of a flame-war between the defense lead attorney Martin Garbus and the Judge); some will point out that any judge could have interpreted the statute as rigidly as Kaplan, with or without bias. Regardless of who wins, the case will be appealed, so this matter will be finally settled in the Court of Appeals or perhaps even the Supreme Court.

In the meantime, I'm going to take the liberty of reposting an email from John Perry Barlow. I don't think he'll mind.

Dave,

Thanks for the LA Times link. I like best the delicious irony of the following:

"This is a very profound moment historically," Time Warner President Richard Parsons says. "This isn't just about a bunch of kids stealing music. It's about an assault on everything that constitutes the cultural expression of our society. If we fail to protect and preserve our intellectual property system, the culture will atrophy. And corporations won't be the only ones hurt. Artists will have no incentive to create. Worst-case scenario: The country will end up in a sort of cultural Dark Ages."

A profound moment, indeed. Indeed, it is an assault on everything that has stifled the cultural expression of our society. It's an assault on the system that stole every dime The Chambers Brothers ever made while grotesquely enriching Brittany Spears.

There is certainly the potential for a cultural Dark Age here, by which I don't simply mean what would follow the death of Time-Warner. Rather, I refer to the very real possibility that Time-Warner and the rest of its loathsome kind will die with most of the expressive genius of the 20th Century buried with them, embedded in their corpses by their last success: using copyright to prevent the digitization and, hence, perpetuation of all that creation.

Only massive civil disobedience will prevent this ugly future. Speaking as someone who has created a lot of "intellectual property," I can assure you that my primary incentive was the possibility that what passed through my heart would be heard. I want it to be available to my great grandchildren. But they will never hear it unless it's stored in some other medium than the material objects the record industry manufactured, all of which will be as mute as stones by then.

Of course, I wanted to be paid for it, and I was. Just as Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, and countless others were paid, despite the absence of copyright protection.

The only people who are likely to lose the lesser incentive of wealth will be the likes of Richard Parsons. His loss will be our gain. Unless, of course, he wins.

Mad as hell,

Barlow

Civil Disobedience: Time for a Revival

Yes, it's time for civil disobedience to undergo a revival. I say go for it. Break the rules. Break the law. Pick your side and fight. Civil disobedience is about choosing to violate the law because sometimes being criminal is the right thing to do. Are you worried about a record, a news story, your picture in the paper, what your in-laws will think? Don't. We're all criminals waiting to be caught. Being arrested isn't a sin. It's not an automatic black mark. Being arrested can be more powerful than voting. The law is the law until it isn't the law any more. Don't sigh and submit. You don't have to. Don't accept what you've been handed. Fight it. Rebel. Then write letters about it, post fliers, mail pamphlets. Hammer on the doors with battering rams, with your fists, with your head. Prove them wrong. Upset the apple cart, overturn the outhouse, barricade the bridges. Get some guts, some spine, some gumption, some chutzpah. You are privileged to burn the flag on the courthouse steps, to march without a permit, to chain yourself to the trees, to stand in front of the tank, to haul salt from the beaches to the people. You are entitled to tell everyone exactly what you're thinking. Civil disobedience means small battles standing proxy for large wars. By God, don't just stand there.

Start a Fair Use Law

One of the things we can do to fight off this law suit it too slashdot Congress to pass a bill assuring Fair Use. The MPAA is on a media blitz and confussing people about the basics of information, culture and copyright. What we need is to get Congress to pass a NEW LAW which guarantees Fair Use over the provisions of any other Copyright Law. We can wait for the Supreme Court to uphold Fair Use, but we can also demand from Congross these protections as well, and then undermine the Court Case entirely.

Orin Hatch is already upset with the degree the DMCA underminded Fair Use. We can HELP him fix his mistake. www.NYFAIRUSE.org is one organization which is trying to do just this.

Declan was never a friend of DeCSS

Declan McCullagh (the site which hosts the photo implying ill-behavior on Goldstein's part) has never been a friend of DeCSS or open source DVD. That he enjoys a rapport with slashdot is IMHO one reason to seriously question the ethics of those who run this forum.

While this doesn't necessarilly exhonorate Golstein, I would suggest we all consider the source and be appropriately wary of assuming the truth is being told (or shown) here.

I suggest anyone who is interested check out the archives of the LiViD mailing list. I found Declan's behavior to be shockingly reprehensible, unprofessional and downright destructive, and truly regretted that I had previously defended him on the very same list.

Declan is in my opinion responsible in no small part for what has happened with DeCSS (and is directly responsible for the original author of css-auth quitting the project as an act of self-defense). He is the main reason I don't read wired, and a contributing cause to my reading slashdot less and less.

Re:DeCSS was handled all wrong

> And Rosa Parks was arrested fo breaking the law.

Which is still remembered today and is used as the canonical example of an American fighting for her rights.

> The only actions which worked ... were the legal ones (bus boycotts, sit-ins, etc).

The bus boycott would not have happened if Rosa had not been arrested. She brought attention and focus to the struggle.

Incidentally, sit-ins are illegal. Something about trespassing.

Also remember that there are two ways to change a law: get the legislature to change it or have a judge overturn it. In the case of DeCSS, the legislature was already bought and paid for and isn't about to change its mind.

The only alternative is for judicial review, but courts don't hear theoritical cases. The only way to get a law like the DMCA heard by a court is to break it.

Re:The status of DeCSS in EU?

IIRC, under EU law reverse engineering is indeed legal, for the purposes of interoperability.
"Then it comes to be,
that the soothing light at the end of your tunnel,
is just a frieght train coming your way..... "

This is only the beginning

The Napster trial, the 2600 trial -- these are only the beginning of the debates to determine who "owns" a piece of work. The DMCA gives the large content aggregators a whole new arsenal to choose from when attacking things they determine to be a threat.

The next round of this debate? Digital Television! While the FCC is telling us that we'll be enjoying this wonderful new technology by 2006 - don't count on it. The MPAA and others are fighting like mad to control the delivery, and playback of digital content that will become HDTV (or DTV). You think they are going to transmit a digital signal and let you receive and record a perfect copy on to box or hard disk? Ha! Not likely...

The Digital Transmission Content Protection Method (DTCP) currently being debated will morph into some new standard controlled by the MPAA and others to control what you can see, and how you can see it. Check out some of these links:

Fourth digital-TV interface spec tossed into fray [eet.com]

US digital TV strategy "in disarray" [pira.co.uk]

Digital interface debate resurfaces at Western show [eet.com]

FCC sets deadline on DTV interface issues [eetimes.com]

Cultural development?

I'm completely thrown back that president of Time Warner, an AOL sellout, a completely capiltalist media company would make the following comment:

"This isn't just about a bunch of kids stealing music. It's about an assault on everything that constitutes the cultural expression of our society. If we fail to protect and preserve our intellectual property system , the culture will atrophy. And corporations won't be the only ones hurt. Artists will have no incentive to create. Worst-case scenario: The country will end up in a sort of cultural Dark Ages."

First he assumes that capitalism is required for cultural development. Second he states and boldly so that we must protect our "intellectual property system" when most people know full well that in it's current state it is flawed at best. The IP laws on the books currently reflect a society where products were largely tangable. In todays society these products are not so. Music, Software, etc. Lastly I'm shocked that he would seem to make the statement that "we control your culture" - we meaning all media companies. The truth of the matter is that popular music, news, etc. are hardly a basis to grow our culture on. They are capitalist sell out rip offs of something that is truly creative.

Now my rant to these companies; For those who purchase music regardless of the medium we should have the right to do with it as we *damn* well please. I sure as hell know what happens to a CD, or an LP if I play it over and over -- it fucking gets scratched, warped, or otherwise. That is why I transfer files to mp3 format - guess what I use napster also! And I buy more music than anyone I know. As for movies the media companies must think that they control every possible media solution avaliable because if I happen to run Linux or BSD, or QNX -- anything BUT MacOS or Windows and I want to use a DVD disk you come down hard. To me this seems completely retroactive of what the consumer needs.

My end statement would be that you, the media companies out there & the "artist organizations such as MPAA and RIAA - you disgust me with your arrogant misunderstanding of the very people who you market to. I would love to see all of you replaced.

Stephen King has the right idea

I think Stephen King [go.com] has maybe figured the right formula for "free" (as in speech) content. Release a part of the work for free, no strings attached, but promise further installments if readers pay voluntarily. The work becomes free for all after the payments are met, and the artist still gets paid. Tying payment directly to the promise of more from the artist is a lot more direct than the nebulous claims of "if we can't make money then the artists can't work and our culture will die" claims that the movie studios and recording companies make. In a way its like the patronage system, where someone contracts a work form an artist for a significant sum, but the work is made for all to enjoy (and the patron gets some recognition for their name getting attached to the credits). The trick will be to get it so it's relatively painless for many people to pay small amounts, and the incentive is made obvious, but not naggingly repetitive to the point of PBS beg-a-thons. I really hope King's effort succeeds, and becomes a model for more ventures like this.

Re:Money buys justice

Didn't americans learn anything from the OJ Simpson case? If you have enough money, you can buy any court decision you want. Right and Wrong haven't applied in decades. The MPAA has tons of money to spend to defend their monopoly, and the lack of morals and scruples to do so. This case will be lost because the judge is well in the pockets of MPAA. The only hope is to bring this obvious fact out in the appeals court, and get the ruling overturned.

I'm sick of hearing this "argument." Money didn't buy justice in the OJ trial. The LA DA spent millions upon millions of dollars trying to convict somebody, and then they made the bonehead move of putting a cop on the stand who had a record of being questionable and he happened to get caught in a lie. It was gross incompetence that got OJ off and nothing more. If you want to start a serious discussion about money and the courts then the real question to ask about OJ is how much more money did they spend trying to convict him than most people and why was that? For me personally, it would have been much more acceptable to let the bastard skate had LA county not spent $19million trying to convict him.

Don't believe me, then how come the tobacco companies got busted for $150billion?! They are the one group that has unlimited money and they lost their case.

Big money and big companies don't always win. They will in this case in part because 2600 tried to d