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Censorship

42 ways to Distribute DeCSS 124

Fabien Penso writes "As you know lots of homepages has been shut down or had troubles because they were distributing DeCSS source code (2600.com, ...). This one explains you other ways to share it. Basic FTP, HTTP, but also NetBIOS, ssh, DNS, IRC, Corba (!), XDMCP, CVS, etc. All the examples are also running on the server so you can get a try while you read it." Mirror early, mirror often ;)
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42 ways to Distribute DeCSS

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  • Get your overburdened server listed on Slashdot! Have a fire extinguisher handy!

    ________________________________________
  • Hack the MPAA web site with a 'bot, programmed to send out the source code to everyone who browses the page, encrypt it with some lame encryption scheme, and when they remove it sue them for circumventing an access control method!
  • I say someone writes an Outlook virus that would have compressed copies of the DeCSS source code attached to the message. Like most other Outlook viruses that run without the user knowing, this one would as well, execept it put the DeCSS souce code on a area of the hard drive where the user would normally not look and rename it (say C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\SKUZIDRV.SYS).

    Now wouldn't it be a shame if we just happened to mention this idea over in the Phillipines and former Bulgaria?

  • by outlier ( 64928 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @08:49AM (#699336)
    I'm working on converting DeCSS into barcodes using Azalea QTools [azalea.com]. The barcode format that the CueCat uses. Only the CueCat can decode this particular variant of code 128.

    This would mean that in order to see something that allegedly violates the MPAA's DMCA protections, you'd have to allegedly violate DigitalConvergence's DMCA protection.

  • by mayonaise ( 29272 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @08:54AM (#699337)
    Just distribute DeCSS on DVD media?
    Oh, wait a minute....

    J
  • What would happen to me if I got tatooed with the DeCSS source code? Would they make me tatoo over it? Cut off the body Part I have it on? Sue me? Could they do anything?
  • by cthulhubob ( 161144 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @08:54AM (#699339) Homepage
    AFAIK, no judge in the United States or elsewhere has ruled that it is a crime to own or distribute DeCSS or css-auth.

    The only related ruling is the one by Judge Kaplan, which states that it is not allowed in the State of New York to post a hyperlink that targets a copy of the DeCSS source code. Period.

    This is not a wide ruling. It does not cover other methods of distribution. It does not cover distribution outside of New York. These things are not illegal, in New York or elsewhere.

    Go forth, ye huddled, ye unwashed masses, and buy a DVD today with the express purpose of watching it on a Linux box using DeCSS!
  • How about encoding it into a bar code readable with a CueCat?
  • "Forget about your silly whim, it doesn't fit the plan"

    2112?

  • by Vassily Overveight ( 211619 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @10:19AM (#699342)
    I wish some programmer at a big outfit like Microsoft or Adobe would embed DeCSS into an easter egg in some app that sells in the millions. Let the MPAA see how far they get demanding a recall of every copy of Office 2001.
  • Well, I found a way without NY Times registration... but I did use my slashdot registration=)

    http://www.mpaa.org/ http://www.mpaa.org/home.htm http://www.mpaa.org/about/ http://disney.go.com/park/homepage/today/flash/ind ex.html?clk=1004398 http://disney.go.com/legal/internet_safety.html http://www.go.com/WebDir/Family/Parent_Pages/Inter net_issues/Internet_content_filters http://www.go.com/WebDir/Technology http://www.go.com/WebDir/Technology/Technology_new s http://slashdot.org/ http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/10/17/142224 0&mode=nested http://members.iinet.net.au/~locust/decss.c
  • You missed it.

    The question that Frankie and Benji mouse were looking for was "How many ways are there to distribute the DeCSS source code."

    Hmmm. The universe seems to have suddenly ceased to exist, and has been replaced by something even more inexplicable.

    -Peter

  • Don't forget Paul Simon's 50 Ways to Leave your Lover. Slip out the back, Jack, and all that. There must be a DeCSS version of this...

  • Pi is infinitely long, the corresponding sequence must be in there somewhere.

    We don't have that much pi calculated. The amound of pi you need increases exponentially with the number of required matching numbers in your string. Anyway, reporting the position would take an awfull lot of space (perhaps the number would be impossible to represent in the physical world even). Nice idea, though.

  • I can't get the link to load to see if this is covered, but I had an idea which involved creating an DNS Encoding Algorithm where you can take a text file and convert it into a bunch of strings 67 characters in length, all characters valid for encoding. You then register these non-sense domain name and each one links to the next.

    I figured you could encode the C Version of deCSS into 300 strings 67 characters long. That's about $3,000. I was thinking of having a page where people could sponsor a domain, and at the end I'd register a bunch and release the algorithm. But then I thought it was a stupid idea and nobody would do it.

    Would the courts be able to shutdown those domains? It might bring the issue of hyperlinking closer to deCSS's legality.
  • whoops... I messed that up...

    http://www.mpaa.org/
    http://www.mpaa.org/home.htm
    http://www.mpaa.org/about/
    http://disney.go.com/park/homepage/today/flash/i ndex.html?clk=1004398
    http://disney.go.com/legal/internet_safety.html
    http://www.go.com/WebDir/Family/Parent_Pages/Int ernet_issues/Internet_content_filters
    http://www.go.com/WebDir/Technology
    http://www.go.com/WebDir/Technology/Technology_n ews
    http://slashdot.org/
    http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/10/17/1422 240&mode=nested
    http://members.iinet.net.au/~locust/decss.c
  • All of the services on that one server? Goodness, talk about a security issue!

    -------
    CAIMLAS

  • Is there any work being done in integrating it within (well, maybe as a plugin) in a Linux DVD player?

    You can pipe the output of DeCSS though XMovie if you have the horses. If you don't, OMS integrates the css-auth code into a DVD player architecture. It's still very much in development, and hardware decoder drivers are iffy (if they work at all) but worth checking out - I managed to get a DVD to run through software decoding not too long ago, and I hope the hardware decoder drivers are fixed soon.
    -------------
  • Didnt you forget to reset raw_datapoint to zero?
  • by discHead ( 3226 ) <3zcxrr602@sneakemail.com> on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @10:35AM (#699352) Homepage
    Bonus points if you apply the watermark to an unauthorized dance remix of "Master of Puppets."
  • Since when is going against a judge's ruling considered "childish behavior?" Have you ever heard about civil disobedience? There's a long tradition of people illegally resisting stupid, arbitrary and violent laws. I see no difference here.

    Besides, none of us here are mentioned in court papers, so we're not bound by the decision.

  • Thoreau was also willing to face the legal punishment for his actions. Are any of us posting this code ready to lose our shirts over DeCSS?
  • Real simple solution.
    Get DeCss [metastudios.com]
    Please add your own mirros as needed.
  • Some of us are... especially if our shirts are the ones with the DeCSS code printed on them!
    _______________
  • This is modded as funny, but as MPAA so put:

    "There is no practical difference between the 2600 Web site's posting of DeCSS, and hyperlinking to other Web pages from which DeCSS can be downloaded."

    Are 2600 using this in their defence, that mpaa is linked to decss?
  • uuencode the decss.mp3 song, cut-and-paste it to the headers of all the web-pages at /., and watch access speeds CRAWL! >:-) I'm not just evil, I'm EEEEEVIL. That's right kids, don't try that at home!
    -C
  • Let's distribute the DeCSS code through Pioneer-10-alike probes... P10 had some sort of informations storage onboard after all.

    The another advantage of this solution it the fact, that outer space is not under any national jurisdiction. Lawsuits would be really hard for MPAA/companies to win ;-)

  • by hernick ( 63550 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @03:25PM (#699360)
    Just convince Linus Torvalds to include it in the kernel, and include kernel hooks for CSS decoding. Let it go unnoticed for a while and watch the RIAA try to have 5 revisions of the kernel suppressed from 500 mirrors and 2 million production machines.
  • Hey, I like it! Someone wanna modify mine thusly?
  • While no doubt people think it's "cool" to do this kind of thing, it is exactly the kind of thing that gives the "hacker community" a bad name, by going directly against a judge's ruling.
    Apparently this is no longer about making a statement (was it ever?), but merely about doing exactly what you want to do, no matter what others or the law think of it. Usually such behaviour is called "childish".
  • Ok I forgot I could have put a mirror before to put the news here :) So here it is: DeCSS Mirror on LinuxFR [linuxfr.org]
  • Engrave it in an inch-thick brass tablet with OCR-A font. Engrave it in granite in front of a public library. That way, the MPAA would have to get many gallons of acid (or take some other ludicrous measure) to erase all traces of DeCSS.

    I would tattoo DeCSS on my back, but there are two things stopping me:

    It would be a fourteen-day plus job (holy yeow!)

    I'm already planning to have the Quake3 logo tattooed on my back in all its anti-aliased glory.

  • Alright, i'm not the most versed on PGP, but wouldn't it be feasable to have a CGI (or some kind of script) run a different PGP encryption table every couple of minutes on a html code of the DeCSS code (i'm thinking along the lines of securID) If I'm totally off base, i apologize for wasting your time, you're free to refute me in the fullest
  • by Mr. Barky ( 152560 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @09:05AM (#699366)
    A long time ago (in internet time), in MacUser or MacWorld (I forget which) Andy Ihnatko came up with a game: Web That Smut. It goes as follow. Choose any starting page and follow the links until you find smut. The shortest path wins. (Well, actually, you start with a page and two of you face off and say "I can Web That Smut in x links" like the game Name That Tune - but we're playing the distrubuted version here.) Here, let's play Web That DeCSS - find the path that leads to DeCSS code starting from www.mpaa.org.

    Some notes: you're not allowed to type in anything! That is, you can't find a search engine and type in DeCSS. In my solution below, I need to go through the NY Times. Since I've registered with them, I don't have to type in anything, but if you haven't registered, it won't work. Maybe someone can find a solution that doesn't require registration?

    http://www.mpaa.org/
    http://www.mpaa.org/home.htm
    http://www.mpaa.org/tv/
    http://www.tvguidelines.org/default.htm
    http://www.tvguidelines.org/resource.htm
    http://www.nea.org/
    http://www.nea.org/news/press/
    http://www.edweek.org/clips/
    http://www.nytimes.com/2000/10/17/nyregion/17TEA C.html
    http://www.nytimes.com/pages-technology/index.ht ml
    http://www.nytimes.com/pages-technology/cybertim es/cyberlaw/
    http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/reference/li nkscyberlaw.html
    http://www.eff.org/
    http://www.eff.org/IP/Video/MPAA_DVD_cases/20000 808_ny_post_trial_brief.html
    http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/dvd/
    http://eon.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/DVD/DeCSS/
    http://www.zpok.demon.co.uk/decss/
  • by empesey ( 207806 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @08:15AM (#699367) Homepage
    If someone were bold enough, they could get a tattoo of the source code, perhaps in a color that's only visible under ultraviolet light.

    This would bring all kinds of interesting laws into effect. They can't issue cease and desist orders on someone's skin, nor could they reposses the code.
  • My only shirt problem is that I have to explain it to everyone. I went two places today - had to spend 5 minutes explaining it both times (I have the DVDCCA shirt today). The DeCSS shirt does not raise as many questions.

    People do laugh though when I tell them what the shirt is about.
    Vote Nader [votenader.org]
  • by theoddone33 ( 184581 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @09:13AM (#699369)
    What if the DeCSS source package (or a gzip) is split up into 10 or so diff or xdelta patches. Each patch is stored on a different server run by a different admin. Each page also links to the next patch in the sequence. That way, everyone would be able to get the code, but no one would ever distribute more than 1/5 of it.

    Think it would work?

  • I am looking for a music background for the movie. If you are an artist and can compose and record a song for the movie, I would be eternally grateful to you. Please avoid the StarWars theme, I'd get automatically sued for obvious reasons.

    And we wouldn't want to do anything that might get us sued, would we? ;)

    W
    -------------------

  • I was discussing this with a friend a few weeks ago. Way back when I used to have fun with code by making a define, putting some text in it, then having printf's all over the place that were never called but were there just to stick phrases and stuff in the executeable. So why not do this? Make one big ass define, stuff the source in it, then do something so the value will show up when you compile and look at the compiled file, and bingo!

    Granted, you would probably want to spread the source out over many files...

    Oh - another good place to put the source would be in MP3s using the new ID tag. Can't remember which one it is right now, but it is the one that Music Match uses. It will let you put lyrics, notes, and artist bios in there. Start stuffing DeCSS in there, distribute the songs via Napster or something, and shortly there will be copies all over the world.

    Vote Nader [votenader.org]
  • They can't issue cease and desist orders on someone's skin, nor could they reposses the code.

    Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, decss, senses, affections...
  • I made a tune [mp3s.com] that just tells you one good place to get th'source [cyberspace.cz] code - kind of a musical link [slashdot.org]. It's getting a bit old now. I'm amazed this is still an issue - but it is!

  • I want some pie too! Leave some for me you greedy bastards!

  • I agree and think it would be great if IBM or Red Hat patented Linux. If IBM patented Linux, it would finally have full support of a large corporation. This would be great since Linux would no longer rely on volunteers. Paid professionals would be able to enhance reliability and performance greatly.

    On the other hand, RH accounts for 86% of the Linux installations in the world and should be awarded squatters rights.

    Anyway you boil it down, Linux would greatly benefit from corporate control.
  • Not bad code - are you looking for a job? :-)
  • we could get the monkeys working on shakespeare to shift gears and start on this one ;-)

  • Like another poster pointed out, it's called "civil disobedience". Read some Thoreau. When the judge rules that you're not allowed to speak, will you remain silent?
    _______________
  • by Anonymous Coward
    I did that; I found where pi states the DeCSS code. Unfortunately, it doesn't have an EOF character at the end, so my compiler barfed as it tried to compile all the remaining digits.
  • > Is distributing a virus that does no damage and makes the MPAA look silly illegal?

    Can't be - on the second count at least. They've managed to make themselves look silly so many times before.

    So, they're either (a) breaking the law, or (b) making themselves look silly for fun, and you've got the all clear!

    -flec
  • Yes.. But what I'm trying to say is that just because pi is infinitely long doesn't mean it has every possible combination of digits. I didn't say anything about compression.
  • I do so wish there was a mod for 'utterly, utterly, wrong'.

    As far as tne InterNIC goes, the limit is 67 (that's 63+".com")
  • Funny..

    I was about to bitch that there was a sizeable chunk of easter-egg code, and then I realized something obvious:

    Office suites probably contain on the order of the mid to upper millions of lines of code, and another couple hundred of text may not make much of a difference (if they embed it far enough).

    Hmm.....
  • How long before the MPAA creates their own spider to sniff out hidden textual versions of DeCSS? I like the code hidden in a HTML comment. I have put the code into a META KEYWORD tag, but it seems to truncate. Is there a character limit for meta tags?

  • If you can figure out a way to engrave it onto a building that's

    A: Up
    B: Under constant surveilance
    C: A place the xPD can enter at ANY time
    D: In plain public view

    More power to you.

    However, they'd probably news blackout this story.

    After all, the MPAA's members can't do to well to distribute the source by themselves!
  • by Hairy_Potter ( 219096 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @07:33AM (#699386) Homepage
    They missed a few obvious ways to distribute DECss code.

    • A really, really long sig file.
    • Send a R/C truck to the moon, with a lot of diatamecous earth. It could write out the DECss source, and make it visible form earth.
    • Encode the DecSS code into redundant parts of your DNA.
    • Change your name to the DecSS code.
    • Shave your head and tattoo on your bare skull. Your hair grows back and your message is encoded.
    • Enbed it in a meme; Make Money Fast with DecSS, This is not a chain letter, it's DecSS, Neiman-Marcus Cookie and DecSS recipe.


    thank you very much
  • It's at my mp3 site [mp3.com], inspired by Joe Wecker's sung version.
  • by drwiii ( 434 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @07:34AM (#699388) Homepage
    Be sure to mirror DeCSSPlus as well! The old DeCSS code will not work on newer DVDs since they use hard-coded keys. DeCSSPlus will brute-force all the keys on the disc, and is immune to any further key-pulling antics. You may still need the old DeCSS to authenticate to and unlock the drive. Or so I've been told.. .. ..

    http://the.wiretapped.net/wt/forbidden-fruit/dvd/

  • by XORing the data with random bytes, and distributing among different servers, you basically not only acheive what you described, but also it is mathematically impossible to prove any of the servers were involved, only that they host random data.

    I happen to have written a program to do that ;)
    http://www.lammah.com/pad/ [lammah.com]

    --
  • Do you really think that customs people would have a problem with walking through the lower level of an International terminal with a shirt coated in code, illegible to them?

    No.

    If you were wearing a shirt depicting - graphically - sex acts, then you would probably be in drek.

    But code? Gimme a break.

    Now, if you're busted for narcotics possession, don't be too shocked if the federal DA decides to add violation of ITAR to your list of charges.
  • by AntiPasto ( 168263 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @07:32AM (#699391) Journal
    Anyone ever actually get into some trouble with this or the DES encryption shirts? And for that matter, anyone ever had any run-ins with pirated software with local law enforcement?

    On another note, I'd like to see this distributed carved into a pumpkin just in time for Autumn. God, the leaves looks beautiful ;)

    ----

  • Do it!

    Do it!

    Do it!

    If you can crack the MPAA servers, then you could contact Toshiba and Mitsu to sue THEM.

    While you're at it.. Crack dvdcca.org as well.

    And the oscar.com website for the Academy Awards.

    And anyone else who is a figurehead of the MP industry.

    -=note: acts not sanctioned by author. thy felonies are thine own, and it is thy seat in San Quentin.=-
  • Hmmmm.... there's an old blues song by Willie Dixon called "Twenty-nine ways" ("twenty-nine ways to get to my baby's door") where he lists the ways. Maybe someone with more musical talent than me could make this into a song ("Twenty-nine ways to get to my DeCSS")!
  • by lpontiac ( 173839 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @08:18AM (#699395)
    Should work fairly nicely, and I believe that ^= constitutes an access control device... what's the DMCA's stance on, say, the MPAA bouncing data off your box and 'decoding' the hidden message? (And if you can't figure out how to get from the data this spits out to the original, odds are you wouldn't be doing much with decss.c anyways :)

    /* necessary headers for your system */

    /* this should contain an array of char with the contents of decss.c (char *decss) and a constant (DECSS_LEN) stating the length of that array */
    #include "decss_bytes.h"

    #define ECHO_PORT 7

    int main() {
    int sockfd, clisock;
    struct sockaddr_in server, client;
    int addrlen;
    char buffer[1024];
    int bytes_recv;
    int i, rawdata_point = 0;

    if (( sockfd = socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0)) < 0)
    exit(-1);

    server.sin_family = AF_INET;
    server.sin_addr.s_addr = INADDR_ANY;
    server.sin_port = htons((u_short) ECHO_PORT);

    if (bind(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &server, sizeof(server)))
    exit(-1);

    listen(sockfd, 5);

    addrlen = sizeof(client);
    clisock = accept(sockfd, (struct sockaddr *) &client, &addrlen);

    do {
    memset(buffer, '\0', 1024);
    bytes_recv = recv(clisock, buffer, 1024, 0);
    if (bytes_recv < 1) {
    close(clifd);
    exit(0);
    }

    if (bytes_recv > 0) {
    for(i = 0; i < bytes_recv; i++)
    if(rawdata_point < DECSS_LEN)
    buffer[i] ^= decss[rawdata_point++];
    send(clisock, buffer, bytes_recv, 0);
    }

    } while (1);

    }

    DISCLAIMER: Untested code based on a random .c file I had lying around my system. No warranty. I waive any and all claim to the copyright on this work.
  • The latest issue of 2600 The Hacker Quarterly has the english language (ie non-code) version of DeCSS printed on page 53. They used similar methods for getting around the crypto export laws of the US - by publishing it in book format. In nice OCR friendly fonts, no less.
  • I and the rest of the crew of Emperor Linux [emperorlinux.com] sang the DeCSS source code at the Friday night Karaoke party at ALS. ;-)
  • by jmv ( 93421 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @08:20AM (#699398) Homepage
    OK, I think everybody how wanted a copy of it now has one. Now, where do we go from here? For now, DeCSS is totally useless as an application. Is there any work being done in integrating it within (well, maybe as a plugin) in a Linux DVD player? Otherwise, we really look like our purpous wasn't to make a Linux player after all. Of course, I may be wrong and there's already a DeCSS Linux DVD player, in which case, I'd like to know.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Now all we need is some DeCSS gangsta rap and the circle will be complete....

    Muahahaahahaaaaa

  • How about

    www.#include_DeCSS......com
    ------------------- -------------------
  • by dodobh ( 65811 )
    Is that a coincidence or something? Or is DeCSS a detailed answer to life, the universe and everything?
    Short answer: 42
    Long Answer: The DeCSS code.
  • It really doesn't matter if it's being distributed or not. What's important is that it be rolled into products. Your standard dists (Redhat etc) won't be able to include the products with their dists, but products need to be developed and those products need to be fairly widely used, or the MPAA will have won without having to put the genie entirely back in the bottle. While I'm sure they'd like decss to go away completely, all they really need to do is make it impossible to actually use it in anything.

    I admit I'm a bit behind on the news on this front. I don't own a DVD player nor do I forsee owning one in the foreseeable future. Are there programs out there yet that allow you to utilize decss to view DVD movies on your Linux box?

  • by rogerbo ( 74443 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @09:43AM (#699404)
    Search through the digits in pi until you find a sequence that corresponds to the decimal ascii code values of the decss code.

    Pi is infinitely long, the corresponding sequence must be in there somewhere.

    Then just quote Pi starting at blah blah big
    for decss.
  • Just because it is infintely long doesn't mean any possible combinations of digits is in there... Maybe there's some proof that that's the case for pi, but if you have 0.1101001000100001...etc., you aren't going to find 238437466445 in it. Even if you converted from binary you'd never find the DeCSS source in there.. you'd have to invent your own number/letter conversion format and that would defeat the whole purpose.
  • The universe seems to have suddenly ceased to exist, and has been replaced by something even more inexplicable.

    Hmm, I don't feel the urge for caffeine, and I've just read on the BBC [bbc.co.uk] that the RIAA are planning on implementing a distributed music system where the majority of proceeds go to the artist.

    Alex


  • That's not what he's saying, and it's not about compression.

    Say I have the string 'DeCSS'. I then need to look for the positions of the ascii values of those characters in pi.

    D = 68, e = 101, C = 67, S = 83, S = 83.

    So, you would find the position of the first occurence of '68' in pi. the first value of the encoded string would then become the position of '68'. etc, etc.
    --
  • Here's a fun way to distribute DeCSS: 1) Take a drivable mower. 2) Find a friendly uncle (or something) with a very large field of grass. 3) Mow the DeCSS source code into the grass so that is visible from the air. If you're really nuts (and your uncle has a *very* large field), you might be able to pick it up on satellite images. Will the MPAA then sue NASA?
  • The problem is all inside your head she said to me
    The answer is easy if you take it logically
    I'd like to help you in your struggle to be free
    There must be 50 ways to get your source code

    She said it's really not my habit to intrude
    Further more I hope my meaning won't be lost or mis-construed
    But I'll repeat myself, at the risk of seeming rude
    There must be 50 ways to get your source code

    50 ways to get your source code

    Just slip out the back (Orifice), Jack
    Make a new .plan, Stan
    You don't need to be coy, Roy
    Just set your source free
    Or you hop on the PCI bus, Gus
    You don't need to discuss (NNTP) much
    Just drop off the PGP key, Lee
    And set your source free

    The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196

  • by knuth ( 6137 )

    It should be possible to put it in a MIDI file. If necessary, break into several files.

  • Of all possible methods, I think finger is the most appropriate.

    finger riaa@localhost

    Just Couldn't resist...
  • Make that...

    finger mpaa@localhost

    or better yet

    finger mpaa@mpaa.com
  • Actually, I think we also could use a hard rock/heavy metal version too. But I definately think the hoedown was cool too.

    "If this song violates the DMCA, the stick your middle finger at the MPAA." - The Computer Code Hoedown

    ------------------------------------------------ ----
  • I was just thinking:
    unless one of the newish laws that seem to prevent thinking infringing thoughts prevents this, wouldn't it be perfectly legal to distribute

    1. A file containing every ascii character in standard or randomized order

    and

    2. a list of numbers like 45,61,70,210,70 that corresponded to the DeCSS source character in file 1.

    I can see how this could conceivably be illegal, but if you picked complex interpolations using large enough datasets, say from SETI raw data, it should be possible to interpolate the DeCSS source from perfectly legitimate starting points.

    Of course, there's also the fantasy of finding the DeCSS source in ASCII char valuess occurring somewhere in a legitimate data source. Is simply providing the start & endpoints in a file of collected data illegal as well?
  • Hey, cool. Let us know when you have it done. I've been trying to think of a way to use my cuecat. ;-).
  • For your information:

    For you non-hams, EME (earth-moon-earth) or 'moonbounce' is the transmission of a very high wattage signal from a land station, bouncing it off the moon, and getting it on a sensitive reciever.

    Most of these transmissions are in Morse because the moon is one light-second or so away from Earth, and voice communications need much more bandwidth than a Morse signal.

    Besides, constant 2 second delays suck.
  • Shouldn't someone sue the MPAA for providing a link that points to a link that... points to DeCSS? ;)


    Refrag
  • Morse could be used just fine. Special characters have prosigns, or run-together letter combos, to represent them. Examples:
    • open parenthesis "(" is KN (-.--.)
    • close parenthesis ")" is KK (-.--.-)
    • double quotes """ is AF or RR (.-..-.)
    There is a PDF at http://www.arrl.org/notes/1832/ch30.pdf which has the full lists of the ASCII codes, Baudot codes, and International Morse Code or CW.
  • Nah, it's more like a cap than a rotation. Once raw_datapoint >= DECSS_LEN then the data isn't altered between being received and being echoed back, so the result on 'decoding' should be a stream of zero bytes.

  • I swear someone mentioned something about it, though....


    --
  • by n3rd ( 111397 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @07:41AM (#699421)
    Since I've seen to many Outlook viruses out there in the past year or two, how about this time we create one that actually does something productive rather than wreak havok?

    I say someone writes an Outlook virus that would have compressed copies of the DeCSS source code attached to the message. Like most other Outlook viruses that run without the user knowing, this one would as well, execept it put the DeCSS souce code on a area of the hard drive where the user would normally not look and rename it (say C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\SKUZIDRV.SYS).

    Later, if need be, the file could be retreived through another e-mail to the same person (assuming they keep the same computer) if we find the number of copies out there dwindling. Again, another Outlook virus that would create a new message, attach the file and send it to a specified address.

    Hey, maybe I should patent this! Remote File Storage and Retrevial Using Microsoft Outlook.
  • Here's my version...we need to get together and have Judge Kaplan, the brilliant judge that ruled against the DeCSS, removed from his post as a civil servant & ruler of right and wrong. It seems that he and his cronies have gotten into the business of playing GOD... Sounds like a battle cry to me, "Release the hounds!"
  • Given the fact that code is speech - it is, this is clearly established in law and also common sense, any decision to restrict DeCSS is clearly unconstitutional. If an idiot judge in NY decides that the 1st Ammendment no longer applies, that's his perogative, but I hardly see any reason why this should affect anyone.

    Furthermore, courts are unique among govt branches - their decisions have to be accepted by a lot of people to mean anything. By making a decision that was clearly unconstitutional, idiotic, and uneforceable, Judge Kaplan is doing the whole judicial branch a disservice. Courts only matter if people listen to them and they can only make decisions that people will probably choose to listen to, the second they start making absurd decisions they have no power. This is why the Supreme Court didn't order instaneous integration in Brown v. Board of Education - it knew that decision would be ignored in the South, and if the Court made a decision and got ignored once, it would never matter what the court ruled again. Kaplan actually did make a ruling that he knew 1) would be met with general contempt and 2) was absolutely uneforceable.
  • Also, encoded in morse code (or just 8n1 ascii) through successive miscapitalizations. DECss = 0/short, DecSS = 1/long. Pauses could be encoded as DECSS or D/CSS (for word and sentence pauses, respectively) Personally, I prefer ascii, just so that we can be ensured precise rendition of special characters. It's spelled DeCSS!
  • That is the funniest thing ever!!!
  • With all of these protocols mentioned for distributing DeCSS, FTP, HTTP, TCP/IP, CORBA, NetBEUI, etc., it's strange that they forgot one of the oldest and time tested methods: SneakerNET.

    --
  • by sdo1 ( 213835 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @07:48AM (#699428) Journal
    I'd hide it in SDMI compliant watermarking.
  • by haaz ( 3346 ) on Tuesday October 17, 2000 @08:31AM (#699430) Homepage
    At the recent Atlanta Linux Showcase, I attended the benefit dinner for the EFF, the Electronic Frontier Foundation. It had been about eight years since I'd paid much attention to the EFF, but man, if there's ever a time that they should be supported, this is it.

    DeCSS is just one of the things they're fighting for (or against). For more info, go to the EFF's web site [eff.org]. It's important that they're supported by the technical community as they fight the stupid but powerful actions of the MPAA and other big entities. I, personally, will be renewing my membership after a far-too-long lapse.

    Haaz: Co-founder, LinuxPPC Inc., making Linux for PowerPC since 1996.

  • we would pass around lists of games that came out on the Commie 64, and pay some kid $50 for 100 disks worth of pir8d wAreZ... cracked by THG, iCE, etc...

    never underestimate the distributed power of the SneakerNET!


    tagline

  • Heh, until today, I never knew I was assisting in distributing DeCSS. And all this time I thought I was just hacking quake :/.

    BTW, with 0.2.99beta3 of quakeforge [quakeforge.net], you can use gzip to compress the file and shorten downloads (not that decss.c is big in the first place). (0.2.99beta2 quakeforge qw clients and servers can transparently handle gziped files (even with the .gz extension) and in 0.2.99beta3 they have a reliable way of communicating this ability to each other).

    member of the QuakeForge developement team

    Bill - aka taniwha
    --

  • Or put it on a file that'll never get found because you encrypt it using CSS.

    Then write an applet or better yet some JavaScript to decrypt it and display it on a page.

    Then if the MPAA tries anything, take them to court citing their own "victory" to burn their fat greasy fingers.

    Hey, I got a web site :-)

    Look for it soon as I get some free time. (Or I'll host it for anybody who writes it for me.)

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