2600 Appeal Rejected 273
blankmange writes "Wired is reporting that 2600's appeal has been rejected by a federal appeals court. "The Second Circuit Court of Appeals said in a one-line ruling that it was not going to revisit an earlier decision in which 2600 was found to be unlawfully distributing a DVD-descrambling utility. In January 2000, eight movie studios sued the legendary hacker quarterly for posting the DeCSS.exe utility, which decodes DVDs and allows them to be viewed on a Linux computer." The magazine now has 90 days to file a Supreme Court appeal." The Appeals court did not have to take the case, and they didn't. 2600 can appeal to the Supreme Court, but they don't have to take the case either - it's looking more and more as though Kaplan's ruling will stand.
T-Shirts (Score:4, Informative)
Does anyone remember this.... (Score:3, Informative)
-Henry
My guess is the Supremes probably.... (Score:3, Informative)
In a sense, I'm not sure that if I were the EFF that I'd want this to be the case in front of the Supreme Court. Don't get me wrong, I've met Emmanuel Goldstein a couple of times and he's a great guy, but to the non-geek straight world he's a Bad Criminal Hacker, not a journalist. You generally would like to have a case with a more sympathetic client before taking it up to the Supreme Court, which is why the Princeton prof or the Russian programmer writing software for the blind would have been better for us. It's too bad for 2600 if it loses, but it's worse if it loses at the highest possible level and screws up a better chance down the road for the Supreme Court to see just how terrible this law can be. Contrary to popular belief, the Supreme Court doesn't reverse themselves all that often (and the most famous time they did-- Plessy v. Ferguson being overturned by Brown v. Board of Ed of Topeka, took 58 years).
(IAAL, but this is just a prediction. YMMV.)
HTML version of Kaplan ruling, Openlaw, OpenDVD (Score:3, Informative)
http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/DVD/NY/trial/op . tml [harvard.edu]
This is part of Harvard's Openlaw [harvard.edu] site, which has an excellent OpenDVD [harvard.edu] section
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org) [sethf.com]
Re:2600 cant get no respect (Score:3, Informative)
The DMCA Is the Toast of D.C. [wired.com]
NOTICE the older-than-time, uppercrust DC politicians who are close to retirement, and need to pad their pockets with as much industry money as possible ("we'll pass ANYTHING for a price!").
SEE the big copyright holders wining and dining the aforementioned old politicians. Booze 'em up, then get them on board when they're tipsy.
EXPERIENCE the complete lack of anyone who has any opposing viewpoints.
Now, just for the record, I DO approve of copyright laws. That said, there NEEDS to be a fair use policy that allows users/owners to space/timeshift their information. Move it from DVD to HD to portable player without any restrictions other than making illegal copies.
The length of copyright terms needs to come WAY down if the studios/publishers want the kinds of control they are asking for.
Sure, make it an iron-clad copyright to protect all content without any space/timeshifting rights if you want - but if you, as a studio, DO want these rights, your copyright term drops to an absolute MAXIMUM of 5 years, after which it's opened up wide for all to see/shift/transfer as people see fit..
EFF en banc appeal (Score:4, Informative)
And to whet your appetite, here is the introduction:
Re:winux? (Score:3, Informative)