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Censorship Your Rights Online

What Is The MPAA Up To Now? 36

Posted by michael from the nothing-good dept.
Phlux writes "I was one of the original group of people sent letters by the MPAA back in March to stop posting DeCSS on the Web. I immediately removed the code from my site at that time. I have now been sent another letter telling me to cease and desist from linking to any other sites on the matter (there is a link to 2600 on the page). The standard list of threats apply. The page, and the text of the letter, can be found here." I think these form letters are sent with little or no human supervision. Which ought to be illegal in and of itself.
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What is the MPAA up to now? More

What is the MPAA up to now?

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  • I wrote on the subject several weeks back, asking whether or not anyone had considered performing an anti MPAA prank on the widest possible scale, but little to no responses had been recieved, and even less action... The original idea follows:

    (1) Find a white pages phonebook for a relatively small town (ie: Population 5000-10,000), and the relevent zip codes for that area... If possible, pick a backwaters town which is lucky to have phone service, let alone net access...

    (2) Go to any of the dozens of free webhosting sites out there, and build a couple of hundred websites which simply contain the DeCSS code, and register said sites under the names and addresses found in the aforementioned phone books... Then submit these sites to every search engine available...

    (3) Watch the news... Within a few weeks, there'll be a report about a little podunk town's populace all recieving C&D letters from the MPAA, getting up in arms due to the fact that more than half don't even own PC's... With luck, some may even open up lawsuits of their own against the MPAA for whatever reasons...

    You see, the point of this whole prank is to put the DeCSS in the REAL public spotlight... You know that other than the sparse handful of newspaper reports (well buried in sections nobody ever really reads), there was virtually NO coverage of this whatsoever? That's why the public has to be drawn into this, because the public per se is largely ignorant of how their rights are being stripped away, and how the MPAA and other major media moguls view them (and us)...

    Lets face it folks, the biggest thing standing in the way of nerds and geeks has always been the same thing: The overwhelming lack of intelligence within the status quo... The public is made up of the same folks who voted in the idiots who pen CDA after CDA, they're the same folks that beat us up in school, they're the same folks that made fun of us for simply being interested in things they had no understanding of, the same ones who cut budgets for scientific development in liew of finding a way to build a bigger SUV, or a new football field... They MUST be made to learn, for they are our biggest threat, nay, the biggest threat to the world, as long as their ignorance remains poised to hobble any hopes of advancement of knowledge...

    Frankly, yeah, the world is headed to hell in a handbasket, but who would be better to hold that handbasket in it's descent? Us or them?

    Carl Sagan was a stoner, Carl Sagan was a nerd, and for all intents and purposes, Carl Sagan was the singular man who provided a reason to not fight a nuclear war, and thusly, the first man to truly rationalize disarmament...

    So why can't we do similar?

  • All facts in the letter need to be verified (is the site really infringing? Is it still up? Is this request valid under law / precedents?) If that can be done rapidly or by a paralegal, fine. But if the facts are wrong or invalid, hold the legal firm accountable, as well as the hiring firm. If they repeatedly have facts wrong, fine them and eventually yank their license to practice. If they want to do automated under this restrictions, they should feel free. Of course, it could be incredibly stupid (to err is human, to really foul things up requires a computer).
  • This I would have no problem with.
  • Great. So they can send e-mail to ask them to shut it down. I don't have a problem with that.

    How does it give them a right to mass produce those e-mails with no human intervention?

    If those letters are honored, it means a machine has more rights than a human. Is that your intent?

  • If I were you I'd report this to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. As anyone who keeps up with the news knows, they have some teeth, and if there's any suggestion of a cartel between movie producers and DVD manufacturers (using the CSS licence), I'm sure they'll want to investigate it. In particular, suggest that they might be using cases in other countries to muscle the open source community out of the DVD player business and artifically fixing the price of DVDs using the region coding system.

    Let us know how you do.

  • Slashdot is linking [chello.nl] to one of the sites. Hehehe.
  • hmm.. I think I heard somewhere that in New Zealand (and maybe other countries) ALL DVD players sold are zoneless by law. Anyone in New Zealand got the MPAA letter? That may give the MPAA even more troubles..

    //rdj
  • Accountability is a rare thing now. That's really all I want to see.

    How the heck would you convince Congress (mostly lawyers) to pass something like this?
  • I heard that. I heard it from a Kiwi claiming that it isn't true.
  • I am surprised that I am not getting any letter. I have lots of information on my page about DeCSS and the 2600 case for people to hopefully understand what is going on. Thanks to my server, I know what kind of domains are viewing my sight and what they are looking at. I have some from the MPAA, Universal, and more that have checked my sight out. I totally agree with you. If there are people out there that talk about how they are going to kill someone and not get jail time for it, why should this be any worse?
  • Have Mattel ever actually won a legal case through legal means? (i.e. not settling out of court)
  • Who said anything about email??? It looks to me like the letter was postal mail.

    If those letters are honored, it means a machine has more rights than a human.

    What? I don't follow your meaning at all. What right will a machine have that a human will not?

  • I went back to read the judgement [uscourts.gov] on which the MPAA letter is predicated.

    Wouldn't you know. The wording of the judgement and the wording of the letter do not match at all well. Gosh. What a surprise.

    The Judgement prohibits "(c) knowingly linking any Internet web site operated by them to any other web site containing DeCSS, or knowingly maintaining any such link, for the purpose of disseminating DeCSS . [my emphasis].

    The implication is clear: a link to a DeCSS site for a purpose other than disseminating DeCSS (e.g. for the purpose of review of the whole issue, or of private study) is perfectly acceptable.

  • There is a law firm in California that does much of the litigation for Mattel. They brag that they never lost a case that went to trial.

    In my case, they avoid trial by taking a voluntary judgment. Mattel avoided a trial on their counterclaim by dropping the case.

    Ihad asked them for information regarding their succesful wins, but they did not provide it. Maybe a stockholder in Mattel(other than me) should ask. I wonder how many cases that Mattel brought and actually won (meaning got more $$ then legal costs in a judgment).

  • I'd heard the same thing. However, if you do a search of "DVD region code New Zealand" at google or the like, you'll find sites based in NZ that talk about region coding and how it affects them (since they don't get movies in theatres until after USians already have it on video.) So I think it's bunk.
  • I suggest you write a letter to your local member in Canberra. I wrote a email to my member about it, and he wrote a letter to the Attorney General on my behalf outlining my concerns that copyright is being used to create market monopolies. I was very impressed he took the time to write on my behalf.
    Also, check out on the federal govt website on the Digital Agenda Bill on Copyright, my feeling is that code such as decss should be ok in Australia since it can be used for fair dealings.
  • How does the description of the injunction in the MPAA letter compare with the actual wording of the injunction?

    -----------------------------------

  • Here too (Score:4)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 15, 2000 @10:28PM (#620871)
    We're getting these letters, almost word for word, down here in Australia.

    I imagine one day we'll be forced to remove the stuff from our web sites, but for now, decss is not illegal here in Australia, nor is it covered by any legal/court rulings. I have a dread feeling that one day I'll become a test case. I have no idea if I'll have the balls and stamina to go through with it. I hope so.

    My site has received two threatening letters, but fortunatly my ISP has a set of balls, and is not only ignoring them, but has started his own mirror too.

    I'm anonymous for a reason - I dun wanna provoke the fight before it's due :) I know the mpaa dudes are scouring the web...
  • Since when do machines have rights?

  • AINAL Comments: seven degrees of seperation (Score:3)

    by tagishsimon ( 175038 ) on Thursday November 16, 2000 @04:08AM (#620873) Homepage
    There seem to be a couple of issues, here, the second being more interesting than the first.

    1. You're site still has a fairly blatent (indirect) link to the code ... "I encourage you to click here for a list of mirrors". You'd be hard pressed to defend this. If, however, you provided a link to" sites which provide further commentary on the DeCSS/MPAA matter", then the link to the code would not be so blatent and you could, imho, argue fair comment.

    2. More interestingly, the form of words in the letter: "injunction against .. linking any Internet web site, either directly or through a series of links, to any other Internet web site containing DeCSS". is surely unenforcable. My site has a link to slashdot. Slashdot has a link to your site. Your site has a link to 2600. 2600 has links to mirrors of hte DeCSS code. So we're all implicated. Various UK Government sites link to my site. They're implicated. US Government sites link to UK government sites. MPAA probably links to US Government sites. They're implicated.

    The logic appears to me that we should all stop linking to other sites, on the off chance that there is a route through which someone can get the the DeCSS code. To comply with the injunction, we should, in effect, dismantle the internet.

    Further, we should not link to 2600 for any other reason than to highlight a DeCSS link; in other words, the injunction apparantly makes it impossible to link to 2600 for any reason.

    So, to repeat, I suggest there must be plenty of scope under your free speech amendment to argue that the injunction is not enforcable.

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Thursday November 16, 2000 @07:31AM (#620874)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I have a feeling that they simply did a search, or sent out a spider, looking for phrases like DeCSS and 2600. I would suggest renaming the DeCSS page, or having it redirect to something with a title that is a little less threatening. Perhaps say something like "Go here [2600.com] to help support free speach, and play movies on your computer."

    I also think that they are trying to bully people around. They won the first legal battle, but they know the war isn't over.

    Just MHO on the issue.

  • I'd make sure I wasn't doing anything "wrong" because you can't win a battle wit the MPAA... then optinally, I'd wipe my ass with the letter, and then file about 5 lawsuits against them to show you mean business.

    Evil empires like this can exist (MPAA, Rambus, Scientology) because us non-letigious mamals are afraid to play the same game they are playing. IMHO to fight effectivley one must become even more depraved then your oponent, otherwise your always on the defensive ...

    3rd of all, and this is just advice, whats wrong with hurting a few MPAA members? People like to think they can wrong people in court (believe me, the MPAA knows its wrong) and no harm will come to them. Once someone decides to bridge the gap between legal harm done to you, and harm dome to them, there are consequnces to the MPAA's actions -- think about it right now -- theres no consequence at all for them for making your life difficult. All the worry they cause you with the letter, the lawyers fees, -- is just another days work for them ... they go home, fuck their wives and sleep well at night.

  • If these letters (e-mail or otherwise) are produced by a machine (on its "own", without a human or a lawyer validating results), ordering a human to shut down something and the human complies, isn't that machine eliminating the free speech right of that person?

    The argument above was that both the web site and the letter were instances of free speech. If the automated cease and desist is honored, that gives the machine more right to speech than the human (the machine's pervailed, the human's was squelched).

  • Bully attempt. (Score:3)

    by www.sorehands.com ( 142825 ) on Thursday November 16, 2000 @08:14AM (#620878) Homepage
    This is another example of a large company bully tactic.

    Many large corporations use their size and wealth to bully the small guys (individuals and small companies) with the threat of large legal expenses.

    Why do you think that Skala and Jansson [islandnet.com] caved in to Mattel? I did not cave in [mattelabuse.com] to Mattel, but I can understand why they did.

    If enough people stand up to bullies, they may stop being bullies.

  • My site has a link to slashdot. Slashdot has a link to your site. Your site has a link to 2600. 2600 has links to mirrors of hte DeCSS code
    2600 has a list [2600.com] of mirror sites. They are not allowed to link to sites with DeCSS.
  • People have the right to use machines in order to exercise their freedom of speech.
  • If these letters (e-mail or otherwise) are produced by a machine (on its "own", without a human or a lawyer validating results), ordering a human to shut down something and the human complies, isn't that machine eliminating the free speech right of that person?

    Show me where I ever suggested that the human ought to comply with the C&D letter.

    The argument above was that both the web site and the letter were instances of free speech. If the automated cease and desist is honored, that gives the machine more right to speech than the human (the machine's pervailed, the human's was squelched).

    Please re-read my earlier comments. I never suggested that the recipient of the C&D letter ought to comply. Only that the sending of the C&D letter was free speech.

    If I tell you to give me $10,000, that is free speech. It does not mean you have to give me $10,000. What is so hard to understand about that???

  • Since the issue seems to have been made large in the courts over 2600's actual hypertext, but they have apparently been permitted to continue posting the addresses...

    Just change your 2600 link to the text http://www.2600.com instead of an active link. It's lame, but so is the court system.

    ---
    "The Constitution...is not a suicide pact."
  • If you say "Give me $10,000", I view that as free speech.

    If you say "Give me $10,000 or I beat you up/sic my lawyers on you" that is a threat, not protected under free speech.
  • They have every right to mail you any crap they want--my mailbox is always stuffed with junk.

    Precisely my point.

  • So what is a lawyer who is legitimately considering a lawsuit supposed to do, if C&D letters are outlawed as threats? Just file the suit without any attempt to resolve the dispute out of court?

  • Interesting book.. (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I haven't seen this mentioned before on slashdot, or in comments, so:

    Check out The Cluetrain Manifesto. [cluetrain.com]

    If anyone from the MPAA (or another likeminded organization) is seeing this, please.. read this book. Or, at least, the first chapter; it's online, and readable for free.

  • If a lawyer is involved AND WRITES THE LETTER, fine.

    A machine coming up with the letter is nothing more than a threat.

  • What if his paralegal writes it, and he just signs it? Should that be legal? If he signs it without reading it? If he glances at it for 5 seconds? 15 seconds? 1 minute? Where do you draw the line?

    Keep in mind that I'm concerned here with what should be legal--I agree that this is not moral.

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