UCITA By the Back Door 174
InfoWorld's Gripelog airs a subject that should interest this community — involved as we were with efforts against UCITA back in the day. One main aim of the derailed UCITA initiative was to give software manufacturers and content owners a degree of control over users' computers. Gripelog's Ed Foster informs us that UCITA is sneaking back in, under the cover of an anti-spyware bill, S. 1625, now making its way through the US Senate. One clause in this draft bill would legalize what the BSA calls "electronic self help" — i.e., the ability for commercial entities to cripple or disable software or networks on your computer if they believe you are violating their property rights.
UCITA isn't dead (Score:3, Informative)
Contact your Senators! (Score:3, Informative)
Please contact your senators!
Re:Contact your Senators! (Score:4, Informative)
If any of you have recognizable credentials in the field, please try to contact your senator or congressperson and offer your assistance in these matters. I've received a very grateful response from my senator for this offer, and I've been called by his office before with questions about issues.
Here's a chance to have more than your "fair share" of influence in certain matters.
Take advantage of it.
Self-Help & Much To-Do About Nothing. (Score:5, Informative)
For quite enlightened reasons (and the more cynical would say selfish ones too), courts tend not to favor resolutions that encourage self-help. Courts are not going to interpret the phrase "detection or prevention of the unauthorized use of software fraudulent or other illegal activities" to allow for deprivations of or interference with the enjoyment of personal property without due process. This law can't be interpreted in any manner to set up a due process satisfying procedure, so it's pretty much unconstitutional if interpreted to allow remote disabling or (suspected) pirated property.
Assuming that the above language even means to imply the "software fraudulent" is a meaningful term, given that it appears nowhere else in the US Code, and there's no definitions section for the bill. The sentence makes a lot more sense if "...software for fraudulent..." was their intended language.
In that context, it seems less like a backdoor attempt to insert remote disabling into law and more like a phrase in line with preventing malware. UCITA was dangerous because it allowed people to contract away their protection against this sort of thing, which is less constitutionally suspect than just writing into law at large.
I encourage BSA members "losing" money (Score:4, Informative)
I encourage the use of BSA-profit-depriving alternatives such as:
* Linux rather than Windows
* The OpenOffice.org and OxygenOffice suites rather than Microsoft Office
* Thunderbird or Evolution+Lightning rather than Outlook
* Moon Secure rather than the buggy, resource-hogging Symantec antivirus
* Scalix, Zimbra, or even good old Postfix rather than Exchange
* Mozilla Firefox rather than the insecure MSIE
* Spybot S&D rather than commercial (OK this one is freeware not F/OSS but proprietary/free as in beer is great when the payware solutions suck!)
* ASSP rather than Symantec's crappy spam filter - which after an automatic update deleted every single email attachment in my Exchange Info Store years ago, which prompted my moving almost everything at the office back to Linux. ASSP blocks more spam, incurs fewer false positives, plus it's FREE/OSS! I implement ASSP for clients running both Windows and Linux mail servers.
That isn't to say I am opposed to buying software, nor is open source software a solution for everyone. I pay for my Linux distributions, I buy Crossover Office and Zend Studio, and I just bought a Windows game. There is an intern at one of my clients wanting to get everyone on open source across the board, and was asking me why I didn't do it. I pointed him to the fact that QCAD is 2D-only, PythonCAD is weak, other CAD solutions on Linux are immature, incomplete, incompatible (no LISP), or in planning stages, plus there would be HUGE training issues. Also, they NEED M$ office for some of the programs they need to run, and several engineering programs they use "might" run under wine, but there is no way the execs would approve of the training cost. We're planning a Linux server for them for some time sheet/project billing software, but there is no realistic way they can dump Windows. As it is, I have OOo.org, Firefox, PDF Creator (no more "pirating" Distiller), 7 Zip (no more "pirating" Winzip!), Filezilla (No more "pirating" WS_FTP), and various other F/OSS and freeware programs deployed there. When I pointed that all out he saw the reality of it: F/OSS is not the BFH that works for every solution, but when it can be used, it should be.
In the architecture industry there are few alternatives to AutoCAD or DesignCAD, both of which require Windows.
Also, for syncing up PDAs, smartphones, etc. nothing beats Windows and Exchange+Outlook.
There isn't a good affordable alternative to Quickbooks - and none that I know of that run on Linux.
You're a gamer? CVS Cedega, Cedega, and Crossover Games may play a lot of games, but not all. Like Microsoft Live games? Linux is probably not the best solution for you.
I recommend F/OSS solutions whenever possible, because it's best for the client, it's best for the F/OSS community (exposure), and it helps keep the market forces (read: Microsoft) keep their prices in check.
Re:See Sony v. Universal (Score:3, Informative)
While there are rulings saying time shifting is not illegal, those rulings do not place vendors under a requirement to ensure you have the ability to carry out actions granted under fair use rights - basically, fair use rights are not something the vendor has a requirement to protect and allow use of, they are only (theoretical) protection from legal actions in certain circumstances.