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30 Days of DRM
Posted by
Zonk
on Sun Aug 27, 2006 05:52 PM
from the i-prefer-30-days-of-thunder dept.
from the i-prefer-30-days-of-thunder dept.
sonofollson writes "Michael Geist, a Canadian law professor, in the middle of a 30 Days of DRM project,
which is targeting the planned introduction of the DMCA in
Canada. Each day, the project identifies an exception or
limitation that is needed to address the danger of anti-circumvention
legislation. Issues covered so far include interoperability,
privacy,
region
coding, and reverse
engineering. The project is also supporting a wiki version for
broader participation."
Related Stories
[+]
News: iTunes v6 FairPlay DRM Cracked 421 comments
luaine writes with an Engadget article claiming the cracking of iTunes v6 FairPlay DRM. From the article: "[A] new app called QTFairUse6 looks like it can now be used (with some amount of difficulty) to dump iTunes version 6.0.4 - 6.0.5 files of their chastely protection." At present this is a Windows-only tool for those who are "not afraid to get [their] hands dirty with a little python." Engadget does not provide a link to QTFairUse6, and neither will we. We've run several DRM stories recently, but it's been 19 months since Cracking iTunes' DRM with JHymn.
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Cool movie (Score:5, Funny)
Great idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe if we'd had something like this before the DMCA, we could have made it a little less restrictive. (No way in hell the **AAs would have let it die)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
OK, if DRM and the equivalent of the DMCA is introduced in Canada, effectively eliminating their equivalent of Fair Use, will the levies on blank media be repealed?
Re:Great idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Wretched idea (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Great idea (Score:5, Informative)
This is wrong. There are levies on blank CDs, because they are commonly used to record music, whether they are "CD-audio" or not.
See the current rates here. [cpcc.ca]
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
That store is doing one of two things. They're not paying the levy or the
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The only difference between the discs is a simple flag specifying the type. It is allegedly illegal to sell an audio CD recorder (non-computer peripheral) here that allows recording onto a non-taxed disc.
If it
Re:Great idea (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Great idea (Score:4, Informative)
In order to avoid paying this levy, you have to be an eligible organization (e.g. businesses who legitimately don't use it for ripping CDs, churches, NGOs, etc.). You then have to pay a $60/year ($15/year for non-commercial) registration fee with the CPCC, and you can only buy levy-free CDs from CPCC-certified manufacturers and distributors (NOT retailers).
So essentially, either you pay the levy to the CPCC, or you pay the CPCC other money so that you don't pay them the levy. Either way, you're paying more, and they're getting your money, all because they preemptively convict you of stealing music.
(Organizations for the perceptually disabled can get a rebate on their levy from the CPCC.)
Source: www.cpcc.ca [www.cpcc.ca]
- RG>
Parent
Re:Great idea (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Great idea (Score:4, Informative)
Lastly, if the manufacture of these discs ever ceases, I am stuck with a play-only unit in my stereo rack. Nice, eh?
Sure hope somebody reverse engineers these and starts manufacturing them independently one of these days. I'd actually pay *more* for a product if a portion of its cost supported anti-DRM organizations.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/sc_mrksv/cipo/cp/copy_g
Re:Great idea (Score:5, Informative)
Wikipedia has a nice discussion [wikipedia.org] of the differences between fair use and fair dealing.
I could have said "Canada has no equivalent of Fair Use. Our Fair Dealing is quite different.", but the private copying levy has nothing to do with fair dealing.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Though I'm not sure how much of this is FUD. The Conservative government is in a very precarious position. The wrong move and the victory they let the Liberals screw up so badly for is gone.
Turning everyone into criminals isn't going to benefit them during the next election when they go for a majority government.
Which I've reminded my MP of in the last 2 letters.
the most important (Score:2, Insightful)
DRM doesn't expire, so the media never makes it to the public domain
by design of course
Re:the most important (Score:5, Insightful)
I have a bridge to sell you.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Re:the most important (Score:5, Insightful)
Beyond that, one would have to trust to the fairness and common sense of the courts, not always the best bet.
Also, it would be best if such a case went to conclusion and set a precedent (hopefully of "Death to DRM"), rather than being dismissed to be tried another day, possibly with disastrous results.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
DRMed societies will stagnate due to the luck of innovation, restrictions on the exchange and development of ideas, etc. In time, 'North America' will be 'liberated' by a more advanced nation, and while some of our children will lose their lives, we will all be arguably better for it under our technologically superior masters.
History is full of examples: 16th century Spain stagnating after expelling freethinkers and Jews, middle age Arabs imposing a religious DR
Re: (Score:2)
Two methods:
Re: (Score:2)
(see: http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/20020503_dmca_conseque n ces.html [eff.org] for more info).
The DMCA was and is a bad law. It is vaguely worded and exceptions in it are few. A violation of the DMCA is a felony in its own and shouldn't be taken lightly.
B.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Uh huh - and what happens when your media player *only* accepts DRMd media? where will you be then?
The way things are going, this will happen - especially as more companies become both vendors of hardware *and* media...
If I am the copyright owner (Score:3, Interesting)
If I am the owner of copyright in a work, why don't I have the authority to apply true and correct copyright management information to the work? Or are you basing this on yerricde's hypothesis that it is impossible to create an original musical work [slashdot.org]?
Re:If I am the copyright owner (Score:5, Interesting)
Imagine an ipod in the future. The ipod doesn't play mp3s anymore - it *only* plays Apple's DRMd music. I'm a musician, and record my band playing music, but I can't put it on my ipod directly - I have to implement DRM on the music for the ipod to play it.
This could happen.
"If I am the owner of copyright in a work, why don't I have the authority to apply true and correct copyright management information to the work?"
I don't know exactly what you mean by this, but I think you're looking at it the wrong way around. If I pay you to experience your creation, by what right to you seek to regulate the way I experience it? Will you try and tell me what colour shoes I may wear, for example?
Note that there are two issues here. The first is artist renumeration. This is important, because without it people will be less inclined to produce art. The second is control, and it has nothing to do with renumeration for the artist. Instead it's about power for the distributers of the art - power over both the artist and those who wish to experience their art.
Remember that copyright is not a 'right' per se - it's a TEMPORARY incentive given by the government to help people to profit from their creations, thereby encouraging creation for the benefit of humanity.
Parent
Re:If I am the copyright owner (Score:4, Interesting)
I challenge this concept. Nowhere has it been proved. In fact, there are several studies that show that those things that are pirated also enjoy a higher profit margin. To say that all media content will dry up if copyright didn't exist flies in the face of logic as well as human nature. The only one that benefits from copyright is the distributors.
I'll go one step further....
I say to fix the copyright problem, disallow the transfer of copyright except to the public domain. All rights to a work belong to the originator of that work. Then what the **AA is touting (namely that artists suffer when copyright is violated) would be true. Make it so that the only place an artist can relinquish copyright to is the public domain which is the purpose of copyright to begin with.
This is just my take on it. Reality differs dramatically.
B.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Doesn't matter. The law is very clear. In the United States, it is a violation of the DMCA to circumvent DRM of any kind. Cracking DRM is a criminal act by the clear letter of the law. U.S. websites have had injunctions upheld against them simply for telling others where to go to find information about circumventing DRM. So, your guesses as to what would happen if someone w
Re:the most important (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Seriously, what's copyright up to now
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Do some research about all the irreplacable old movies, etc. that are deteriorating into nothingness while sitting in un-climate-controlled warehouses becasue they're "too expensive" to save, and prepare to be surprised!
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Although you are being sarcastic you are also telling the truth. Jack Valenti the head of the MPAA, has stated, "The constitutional definition of "limited time" to me means the end of the universe minus 30 seconds". He has also stated that if people want to back up their copies, they can damned well buy the backup. Another gem from him is his belief
Region coding? About reducing sales (Score:5, Insightful)
How about the idea that region coding is all about reducing sales and increasing unauthorized duplication of DVDs? I run into so many DVDs that are not sold in any form for my region, and will never be sold for my region. That leaves me the options (a) not buying it at all, or (b) buying it and cracking it or perhaps getting a more usable pre-cracked version (barring the ability to get a DVD player that does all regions).
DVD players: collect all 6 (Score:4, Funny)
(c) DVD players: collect all 6 while supplies last!
Parent
De-regionalize your DVD player (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
This is great, but.... (Score:2)
How does one get the general public to care? From what I've seen, most computer users are short-sighted, datawise. "This DVD/Song/Program works right now, so it'll work forever, right?" How do we get everyone else to read this?
CAPTCHA: signify. How appropriate.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:This is great, but.... (Score:5, Informative)
Michael Geist writes a weekly column [thestar.com] on law and technology for the Toronto Star, Canada's largest newspaper. The Star is a significant venue because its middle brow (not tabloid, but not the New York Times), and always has a populist favour.
He is also frequently called on as a commentor on CBC radio (the public broadcaster, which by law can be heard by Canadians anywhere in the country). CBC radio recieves no ads and no coporate sponsorship (unlike PBS), so is generaly balanced on controversial issues.
In Canada at least, someone like Geist has a greater chance of reaching Jaques Six-Pack than he might have elsewhere.
Parent
Reverse Engineering ... (Score:3, Interesting)
Different standards exist for reverse engineering. For example, reverse engineering a binary is illegal, while reverse engineering a protocol (for compatibility purposes) isn't.
But the real question to ask is, a .doc a binary file or a protocol ?
(and then there are EULAsGreat, more angrying up of my blood. (Score:5, Interesting)
In a way it feels like he's discussing ways to make a noose more comfortable and less abrasive to the victims throat.
The thing is, whenever DRM is discussed I cannot help by attempt to prognosticate into the deep mysterious future. Imagine a future (not too distant perhaps) in which we have direct brain interfaces of some sort. How would it be to have certain thoughts blocked? How would it be to not be able to think something?
Thoughtcrime - in other words. Oh, it's disgusting to me.
After all, DRM is basically a way of locking-down information. But information is so close to just thought. It's one step away from a pure idea.
When I hear DRM I think "Idea Stopping" - and being an idealist as I am, this is deeply disturbing to me.
DMCAs are so prehistoric to me - they seem to hail from the time in the past when the distribution of information required printing presses and tape-duplication facilities. When information distribution liked physical mediums for distribution.
In those ancient times of the 20th century only the wealthy could afford these behemoth machines. There was no way a consumer could copy a novel and send it to 20 or 100 of their closest friends.
Of course nowadays I can find the entire works and easily distribute them without all that mucking about with the physical constraints that plagued the old.
DRM and DMCAs seem analogous to a cart and buggy and wagon industry forcing automobile owners to not drive faster than the horse-drawn carriages because of their "right" to the road.
It is old-world philosophy being artificially forced into the modern mindset.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Cold Mexico just doesn't get it (Score:2, Interesting)
This DRM experiment is useless (Score:5, Insightful)
You cannot close the "analog hole" because we are purely analog-sensory beings. We cannot reliably have digital information put into our brain and decoded into a usable form without reliable biological-neurological wiring. With that simple logic, until neural wetware becomes commonplace (scary world that'll be,) the DMCA is absolute bullshit. I can simply circumvent your protection by going to a friend's house to watch a movie they bought but I never paid for. I can store that entire movie in "memory" (if I'm capable of that type of photo-auralgenic storage like other 'geniuses.') and tell others what the whole movie is about, which may/may not discourage them to see the movie, thus resulting in a loss of profit for the movie, or even after-movie DVD/VCR sales. Kiss your "unauthorized" use clause good-bye. We can hurt the **AA cause thru that means alone, and I'll bet with the current shit crop of movies coming out (Like Talladega Nights, compared to The Descent,) the sales are going to drop even further. I can simply watch a movie, tell everyone what it's all about, and they'll decide for themselves whether or not the movie is worth watching, in their opinion. And speaking technically, I didn't pay for it, so by going to a friend's house to watch a movie they paid for, I'm getting a public performance (because they explicitly state with a sign on their property "This is not private property, whatever happens here is public and sent to the police,") without paying for the rights to view the money. Now what are you going to do, RI/MPAA? Sue me for visiting a friend who happens to be showing a movie they paid for? You've tried twice already, let's go for a third strike so we can wipe you out legally.
I apologize in advance for potential double-ranting (restating the same rant twice in the same post,) but I felt the need to drive this into people's heads. Even if the general Slashdot crowd knows about this stuff, there are many others that join every day, and are rather ignorant, as I once was before I got some extra education from more knowledgable people on Slashdot. We need to keep this type of information flow happening, in my opinion. Let's keep it up so less knowledgable people have more plain-english definitions for the layman to understand, guys.
Last election (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
They had a few download links for a day or so as well. I do know the program works. I wonder how long it will be until Microsoft fixes it? More importantly, can they make it stop working without making people install an update?