US Won't Drop Charges Against Sklyarov - More Protests Planned 408
Oolon was the first to write in with news that the EFF has concluded their meeting with the US Attorney's Office, to no good result. Recent DMCA/Sklyarov news: Rep. Rick Boucher is supportive of reforming the DMCA but not very optimistic about getting it done soon. egerlach sent links for protests planned this Monday: Boston, Minnesota, San Francisco. Phil Zimmerman will be speaking about Sklyarov and other subjects this Tuesday. There's more information at the Free Sklyarov site as well.
Hit the US in the pocketbook and they'll listen... (Score:2)
Good luck Dmitry!
Already been done (Score:2)
Re:Free Skylarov (Score:2)
If you're going to misspell things then you will get many more people at the demonstrations if the signs all read Free Smirnof
Re:He's guilty (Score:3)
-- American Jurisprudence, Second Edition, Volume 16, Section 177
Although I'm sure explaining this to the people trying to arrest you might be difficult.
"You see, the law you're trying to arrest me for breaking in not constitutional, therefore I am not bound to obey it. So you see... oww! Hey! that hurts! OWW!"
-- Zack
public outcry? (Score:3)
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Re:He's guilty (Score:2)
As for Dmitry, his case may not be the best to get the law declared unconstitutional. The Felton case is stronger and doesn't involve imprisonment. The DOJ/FBI can always drop the charges. There is no law specifying that prosecutors must go after every infraction of the law. In fact, there are rules against this, giving all of us rights to sue for malicious prosecution.
So yes, this can "properly end" without a trial and with Dmitry being immediately freed. This is how it should end!
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Educate Others! (Score:5)
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Re:He's guilty (Score:2)
Re:How do they have a case? (Score:2)
IALOALTY
(I Am Less Of A Lawyer than You)
Re:Educate Others! (Tiny correction) (Score:2)
Not just no bail... (Score:2)
He hasn't even gotten a bail hearing. Nobody should have to wait this long for a bail hearing.
Re:Stop the presses....hold the phone...reality ch (Score:2)
No promise to drop charges sounds very much like "no decision" to me.
As long as not reaching a decision can keep the pressure off, they will just keep on not making a decision. The pressure must not let up one moment before Sklyarov is safely at home.
Re:This could be a good thing (Score:2)
There is nothing even remotely "good" about this. Sklyarov has a wife and kids. He's in jail for no good reason. It's easy to sit out here in our comfy offices in front of our comfy workstations where we read Slashdot all day and say "It's not all that bad that guy is stuck in jail."
You want the law overturned? Vote. Contact your representatives. Tell your friends.
Out of curiousity... (Score:2)
Acrobat (or another implementation) enables people to pirate eBooks (given some additional tools), even if you don't have a valid right to look at them. In fact, if the three things you need in order to read an eBook are: something that XORs with 102, something that unzips archives, and something that reads PDF, the PDF reader is the only really complicated part. If anything is "breaking encryption", it's the PDF reader.
Re:He's guilty (Score:2)
Consequences for Tobin? (Score:2)
Re:Blessing in Disguise (Score:2)
Go bust him out and get him on a flight home.
Anyone feel like helping?
Re:He's guilty (Score:2)
There is, however, another issue at stake. Its not just his being arrested for a crime whose constitutionality is questionable. Its the fact that his civil rights are SERIOUSLY being violated, and probably because he is a foreign national. He has not been granted bail or even a bail hearing (they keep saying they'll do that when they move him to San Jose, but that hasn't happened either) and he's been in jail for over 11 days. He's probably not been granted full counsel yet, and certainly has likely not been given the chance to talk to Russian diplomats (or else the diplomats would already be going public about protesting the unjustness of this). In other words, we're doing to him EVERYTHING we protest other countries (like China, or the Soviet Union (before the Fall)) have been doing to our citizens over the years.
Our constitution (the 5th ammendment) says that constitutional protection for due process applies to ALL PERSONS, not just to u.s. citizens (the 14th makes exceptions to states prosecuting cases, but does not make an exception for a federal prosecution).
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You know, you gotta get up real early if you want to get outta bed... (Groucho Marx)
Re:Where's the ACLU on this? (Score:2)
It is obvious you are not english (Score:2)
thanks (Score:2)
at least that's my flawed understanding of it
Get Adobe to pay for his legal defense! (Score:5)
exactly, Adobe can be the good guy (Score:2)
I think the US Attorney's office isn't willing to play this game---they're basically saying, "Too bad, if you didn't want this, you shouldn't have started. We're going to push forward now and not let you off. We're not going to lose face and look like we made a mistake too."
On protesting in China (Score:3)
So I can not really figure why you you think the chinese could really protest against the arrest of americans without jeopardizing their own safety.
Please do not assume the whole world lives under the same legal protections and human rights garantees you do. Why do you think the International Amnesty members never write letters to their own governments?
Re:Write your congressman! (Score:2)
Trust me, I've got first-hand knowledge of how legislators work. Tell them there's a problem, pref. through snail mail. They will at least write you back. Just be sure to include your name, address, and zip code.
Re:Where's the ACLU on this? (Score:3)
If I had to make anything of it, it's that the ACLU, like most of the rest of the political world, is horribly and depressingly ignorant of what's going on. We need to make them aware.
Isn't it ironic, don'tcha think? (Score:5)
Meanwhile, here in the US, a foreign citizen is still held hostage not for anything as serious as spying, but for challenging the authority of a corporation.
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Oh for crying out loud (Score:2)
The War on Drugs is appalling. The obliteration of the fourth amendment that resulted was predicted and dismissed back in the early 80's in almost exactly the same way the obliteration of the first amendment was predicted when the DMCA was passed in the late 90's. The result, a terribble erosion of our fundamental rights with nary a complaint from the mindless, spoonfed masses.
The government has a very long and very dark history of picking minorities (blacks, native americans, youthful males with long hair, recreational drug users, high school misfits, and now programmers) and stomping their rights in the name of a photo opportunity or two, and an opportunity to feed whatever the public hysteria of the moment happens to be.
Saying "I don't care, they aren't part of my group" is exactly what enables this sort of serial, unconstitutional abuse to succeed. At any given moment the majority of the people are fat, well fed, and happy
Grow up, and look beyond your own interests for a moment. You'll be shocked at the number of people who, because of what they are going through, are more likely to be open to your point of view on your particular issues as well, through bitter personal experience. But not if you dismiss their problems while touting your own (which are as irrelevant to them as their's are to you).
Injustice must be resisted and fought, everywhere, in every context, or we shall all lose our freedom. This is a bitter lesson our parent's never bothered to teach us, and now things have progressed sufficiently far that we're all going to have the opportunity to learn it the hard way. Would that it were otherwise.
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Re:In Need Of A T-shirt (Score:2)
Re:Legitimacy in the eyes of the public (Score:2)
Use the self-destruct system that's already built into DMCA. Make your own CSS-encrypted DVD, or your own encrypted PDF, or whatever, and then sue the sue-ers for trafficking in devices that circumvent your technological measure without authorization. Then you'll have MPAA, Adobe, etc as defendants under DMCA, and nobody thinks they're hippie hackers.
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Re:what a terrible idea. (Score:2)
Even if you don't succeed in influencing their actions this time, you may cause them to think twice next time. And, unless Linux, etc. win to a totally unexpected degree, there will be a next time.
And remember: The attitude isn't unique to corporations. Every group that feels itself invulnerable starts acting like this. Positions of power are attractive to those who want to exercise power. That's why it's important to design systems to eliminate that kind of position. Safeguards only work for so long before they get jimmied. The constitution was a magnificent effort, but currently
Note: Just like the bubble sort, the "simple solutions" can work quite well in small, restricted environments. I don't know what the analog to a shell sort, or a heap sort would be. Perhaps something will occur to you.
But the open source community has created something precious. It has created a large group of people and other entities that work together without significant coercion. And one of the keys to this is that there is no easy point where one could grab control. This is a gift to the country from the military, who intentionally designed a system (the internet) that it was difficult to grab control of.
One of the characteristics of the community is that there are many individuals in it who are quite protective of it. This is probably a quite important element in its success, despite the slighting comments that are frequently issued. The Open Source community doesn't use lawyers extensively. It avoids acutal coercion to the greatest extent that it can manage. But it creates an environment protective of its creativity. And the current protests against both Adobe and the feds are a part of that. And allowing Adobe to "get out of jail free" on the excuse that "that's how corporations act" is damaging to the community. If words (and code) are our only weapon, then we must use them in our defense. Adobe has grossly violated our idea of proper behavior. My must react appropriately. They must be cast out. They, and their works also.
I have been described at times as having a religious orientation, and I accept that. It's not any conventional religion, but in mine, actions such as Adobe's are cardinal sins. They are sufficient to justify excommunication. And forgiveness requires restitution. If they intentonally do irreperable harm, then there can be no forgiveness. (Well, that's putting things a tiny bit too harshly.) If they don't even try to perform restitution, then they cannot be forgiven. Forgiveness requires repentance, and that's more than just a few words to/from a PR flack. That includes the acceptance of the responsibility for the damage that you have done, and at absolute bare minimum, your best reasonable attempt to repair the damage.
If corporations want to be considered as people, then they must be held to at least as high an ethical standard as people are. Considering their power, and the amount of harm they can do even by accident, I feel that they should be held to a higher standard. Judge for yourself what kind of person would act in this way. Would you want them as a neighbor? Would you trust yourself to do business with them.
Avoiding Adobe and all of its products is as much an act of self protection as anything else. This time the convicted person was a citizen of Russia. Last week it was a German professor. Who might be next?
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
Re:Stop the presses....hold the phone...reality ch (Score:2)
Spoke to Phil on the phone... (Score:2)
mindslip
Whoops, Re:Spoke to Phil on the phone... (Score:2)
Sorry!
mindslip
The message (in case zork.net gets slashdotted) (Score:2)
Representatives of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) met with representatives of the U.S. Attorney's office in San Francisco today. There was a productive dialog, however the U.S. Attorney's office gave no indication of dropping the prosecution against Dmitry Sklyarov.
Having explored good faith negotiations, the Electronic Frontier Foundation rejoins the call for nonviolent protests worldwide to secure the immediate release of Dmitry Sklarov and dropping of all criminal charges against him.
A protest is already scheduled in San Francisco for 11:30am this Monday, July 30, at the Federal Courthouse at 450 Golden Gate Ave. Additional protests will occur in 25 or more cities worldwide in coming weeks.
Re:i still disagree (Score:2)
Adobe pulled the trigger. They don't get to be sorry now that the bullet hit something. Their actions caused this chain of events to occur. They are not absolved of responsibility.
Re:OK,... (Score:2)
Re:OK,... (Score:2)
Allowing companies to buy laws and then enforce them selectively and then let that company avoid the consumer backlash is WRONG.
Re:OK,... (Score:2)
However, since Adobe purchased the (bad) law, and pointed the FBI towards Mr. Sklyarov, and is now attempting to distance themselves from what I believe many Americans will call an unjust arrest (once they are in possession of the facts of the case), I don't think we should let Adobe get away with it. Adobe can and should be tried in the court of public opinion, just as Mr. Sklyarov will be tried in the Federal court. Hopefully, the EFF will give him some very high-powered legal representation...if not, they're not doing a very good job of living up to their charter.
I don't agree with you that foreign nationals ought to obey our laws while they are on foreign soil. I've read LOTS of books that are not allowed in many countries...I should be able to travel in these countries with the reasonable expectation that a) I won't be prosecuted for "crimes" committed outside that jurisdiction and b) that if it WERE to happen, the American Embassy would raise a bit of a stink. Idealitic, I know, but if one doesn't aspire to an Ideal, what's the damn point?
As far as your last point, I believe that I am a civilized person. I don't know that I live in a civilized society, and I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is not a civilized corporation on God's green Earth. By definition, a corporation pursues profit for its shareholders singlemindedly. That singleminded goal is not conducive to good citizenship.
Re:Keep the pressure on Adobe! (Score:2)
No typos that I see, but you did contridict yourself. You said that all conditions must be meet, then you make one condition that he be free, and the last one gives the implications that as long as they are taking concret steps to free him that it is alright for him not to be free. You probably meant to imply that even if he is freed that if they hadn't taken steps to free him you would still not buy their products. So try to be more clear on that point
Re:Educate Others! (Score:2)
I'm sure you can reword that better and make it a bit easier to understand, but a real life example that people can understand is very important.
Re:Stop the presses....hold the phone...reality ch (Score:2)
Re:You want a reality check? (Score:2)
My distinction simply points out that Slashdot made a false report. "US Won't Drop Charges Against Sklyarov" implies that the DOJ came out and said that (or at least that the EFF accused them of doing that). Show me the documentation. As of the time when the story was originally posted, there was nothing to substantiate the claims made here on slashdot.
I fully support the protest movement. Let's see that the wrongs are righted ASAP, but let's also hold /. accountable for accurate news if we are going to depend on them for information regarding this issue.
Stop the presses....hold the phone...reality check (Score:5)
But, one of the attorney's with the EFF (Forgot her name) was on NPR's Talk of the Nation: Science Friday less than an hour before this /. article was posted. She said the DOJ (or FBI or whoever they met with) had listened politely and said they would consider dropping the charges, BUT that no decision could be made at that time.
If what she says is true (and I'm more apt to believe the words of someone who was actually at the meeting) then I think /. is mis-representing the story. (Not that it is a surprise.)
Personally, I think there is a HUGE distinction between "hasn't decided whether to drop charges or not" and "won't drop charges".
Re:Write your congressman! (Score:2)
Adobe should put their money where their mouth is (Score:3)
I didn't say they should pay for his defense, since I don't know if I would trust whomever they bought.
Has anyone talked to RedHat? (Score:3)
(Emphasis mine)
So... has anyone spoken to RedHat to find out if either they are already a member, or if they have any interest in joining? Also, any universities care to join to give us an "Inside View" into whats going on (although non-profit members also have non-voting status).
The problem. (Score:2)
The problem is, he's in jail now, and there's a good chance that this case will never see a trial, but he could be locked up for a long time before somebody decides the case isn't worth pursuing. And there is very little we can do about it, at least with this specific case.
The REAL problem is, we raise our voices when someone has been wronged, which DOES have effect, but it doesn't have immediate effect. The problem is he got arrested in the first place, which means the laws are broken. Even if he's locked away for years, there is no restitution from the government because they've done no wrong, legally speaking. They had a proper case, a clear violation of a valid law (even if its a stupid one).
There are three possibilities here. We wait patiently for this law to get repealed. Look back carefully and see how many laws have been repealed lately. I mean, REALLY LOOK. You're not going to find many. At the very least, we're not going to accomplish anything by simply talking. We're too small of a minority to gain the proper attention. Which leads us to the second possibility.
Run for office. Get yourself elected to a position where, while you might not have enough influence to get the laws reversed, you will have a position you can argue against it in an open forum. The press will listen. Congress will listen, because you're in their face, and they can't simply walk away then. Even if you don't get elected, you can manipulate the issue into a major campaign issue and the issue will get discussed at length. People will hear.
The third possibility is we keep the law as it is. We stay away from politics all together. Instead we focus on the companies and take drastic measures to make sure that nobody will use the products of any company that implements encryption for the purpose of preventing competition. Ok. So how do we do THIS?
Well, thats not easy, but there are ways. The problem is, it will require a lot of us to be extremely ruthless. We will have to write free virus scanners that will locate this rogue software and complain to the user that they're using software could potentially be illegal, and cite court cases where people have been jailed for using such software. A lot of people could be scared into not running such software, or at the very least, they might pay attention, which means that congress might actually start paying attention. The problem is we might get into a situation where this is abused beyond the point where it does any real good but instead creates more problems than it solves.
In addition. We, as a community, all of us, need to write letters (snail and email) to the important people at every software company, promising that if they EVER do something as stupid as Adobe has done, you will no longer purchase any products they produce, and you will encourage all your friends and employeer to not use them either. The same will happen if they attempt to use a protection scheme that uses the DMCA to keep people from reverse engineering their products. If a product uses encryption legitimately, that algorithim should be disclosed, as any adaquate encryption algorithm should be unbreakable anyways. There is no reason to protect it otherwise unless they're trying to be anticompetitive.
And another thing. Adobe needs to make a massive display of goodwill VERY soon. Along the lines of fully funding the defense costs (top of the line) to this poor prisoner, along with adaquate compensation for his trouble and a sincere public apology. If they don't, they need to be destroyed. Any legal means we can, we need to make sure that company goes down the toilet, which is better than they deserve. It must be made an example out of so no other corporation that has an interest in making money will ever be so bold to try something as stupid ever again.
-Restil
Poking a wasp's nest will provoke a response... (Score:2)
<P>
I never said that it was safe: defying authority <b>always</b> risks consequences. Judges have enormous power (much more so than most people realize) and disagreeing with one is extremely hazardous. I never meant to imply otherwise. Nevertheless, jury nullification is an established legal right. <i>The District of Columbia Court of Appeals -- the second highest court in the United States -- explains that the jury has an "unreviewable and irreversible power...to acquit in disregard of the instruction on the law given by the trial judge..." (U.S. v. Dougherty, 473 F.2d 1139 (1972).)</i> (<A href="http://civilliberty.about.com/gi/dynamic/of
<P>
As Alexander Hamilton remarked, the basis of jury nullification is the depth of the jury's conviction. To my mind, they key term is "conviction", not in the sense of whether the defendent is guilty or not but rather do honest people have beliefs which they are willing to fight for. I don't want to either pound drums or stand on a soapbox: exercising the right of jury nullification is not a trivial undertaking and will almost certainly provoke intense (and possibly painful) response. My point is that if this is something that someone considers doing, they had better be damn sure that they are sacrificing themselves for something they believe in enough to sacrifice their own personal well-being for, because there will be a price and the price will be high. This isn't something to do because you're bored and it's re-run season on TV.
Re:He's guilty (Score:5)
Well, sort of. It is rare, although perfectly legal, for a jury to, for example, decide that the law under which a defendent is being tried is unjust and therefore refuse to convict. This principle upholds the ancient right of a democratic people to return to themselves the power and authority they may have temporarily granted to others. This right is fundamental to democracy and violation of this right directly leads to armed rebellion and insurrection, as governments always seem to forget sooner or later.
Things don't often go that far, primarily because citizens in our society (USA) are remarkably poorly educated about their rights and responsibilities as citizens. My wife would argue that since it is obviously in the best self-interest of government that the average citizen remain in ignorance of his/her rights, and since the government runs the schools, that this is deliberate. Me, I'm open to argument. We treasure our heritage of 'civil disobedience' as the primary means by which we express displeasure with our government and judiciary, but just as one medicine can't cure all illnesses, one means of protest should not be expected to right all injustices.
The (condensed) point is that citizens of a democracy are not bound, legally or morally, to blind acceptance of the dictates of those in power, regardless of how they came to be in power. The fundamental characteristic of a true democracy is the ability of those governed to correct injustices perpetrated on them by authority. Thomas Jefferson believed that the only way a free people could maintain their liberty was to occasionally reminded the government that the consent of the governed is subject to change. While no one is advocating violence (certainly I am not,) there are alternatives. Passive resistence can include refusal to cooperate (denying information or assistance to government, for example,) or the supplying of false information (yes, sir: I've got 15 kids here. No, you can't see them: they're all out right now.) There's also active resistance short of armed rebellion, including the refusal of a jury to convict someone of breaking an unjust law. All of this does require a significant minority of citizens willing to act together, which is where things most often break down, but that's another topic, I suppose. (It'll have to be: I've got a meeting in 5 minutes.)
Re:what a GOOD idea. (Score:2)
So modify these stupid Outlook worms to send emails to everyone in an address book stating how bad Adobe is. Hell, it'll look like it came from a friend, and people will be more likely to read it.
But, until then, I keep getting people's resumes...
HI Mom!
Re:He's guilty (Score:3)
(from "The moon is a hash mistress")
Honestly, I could care less about this guy (Score:2)
First off, let me say that I think it is undoubtably unjust that this man is in jail. The DMCA is a joke, and yet another argument for campaign finance reform, IMHO. The RIAA and MPAA are charlatans and crooks, and I'm hoping karma bites them in the ass realsoonnow.
Having said that, there are many, many other issues that are more deserving of attention. At the end of 1999, 1 in every 137 US residents were incarcerated. [drugwarfacts.org] An estimated 30% of those are there for non-violent drug crimes. In 1999 alone there were over 1.5 million people arrested for drug related crimes. Sklyarov is an isolated case, whereas the imprisonment of otherwise peaceful citizens goes largely unreported because it is sadly so common. The abuses of personal freedoms in the name of the drug war are much more odious than those commited in the name of the DMCA. The United States has declared war against its own citizenry in the name of fighting drug abuse. Ask yourself which is more important.
Mod me down if you wish. And again, I hope that Sklyarov goes free, and soon. But I think that on the balance his incarceration, while unjust, pales in significance when compared to other issues. And the drug war isn't the only one that can be deemed more important: poverty, AIDS, and environmental abuses all rank higher in importance, due to the fact that they affect so many more people.
And no, I'm not saying that /. shouldn't cover this. Their audience is interested in DMCA related issues. But I will continue to dedicate my efforts at raising awareness of the tragedy that is the drug war. I feel it is more worthwhile to do so.
Re:American programmers in Russia (Score:2)
But you have a "who watches the watchers" problem. As well as identifying the people responsible. Even once you do that how do you get a jail to hold them or charges brought? AFAIK the US has never even charged anyone with "high treason"...
The US constitution assumes a well motivated (and armed) populace able to take corrective action on government misbehaviour.
Re:American programmers in Russia (Score:2)
Such laws should be responsible to the US constitution which unambiguiously voids them.
Re:This could be a good thing (Score:2)
Remember that most of the US constitution is about denying rights to government (and denying government the ability to deny rights to people) the default is that people have every right possible. Unless otherwise stated.
Re:DMCA (Score:2)
Thus ignoring the majority of the affected parties. The copyright consumers. IIRC it is actually the job of the US congress to represent a couple of hundred million of these...
The current copyright law (the DMCA) is over 150 pages of lawyer-speak, far too much for everyone in Congress to read, comprehend and have an opinion on - just the way the media companies want it.
Sounds like they took the approach of "if we don't understand it then it's accepted". Rather than actually doing their jobs which is to either understand it or dismiss it.
Re:He's guilty (Score:2)
Probably more people know the words than understand their meaning...
The (condensed) point is that citizens of a democracy are not bound, legally or morally, to blind acceptance of the dictates of those in power, regardless of how they came to be in power.
Remember that police, lawyers and judges are also "citizens" so the same applies to them.
That's a bit offensive (Score:3)
The crime Rosa Parks violated was unconstitutional in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment because, had a similarly situtated white woman been there, it would not have been a crime.
The DMCA's constitutionality is undisputed, except as applied in the Felton case (suing over a threatened lawsuit, not an actual judgment under the DMCA) and the DeCSS injunction (suing over the overly expansive LANGUAGE of an injunction order, not the DMCA in itself).
DMCA is wrong -- its bad policy. There are certainly theorists who argue that even distribution of executable object code is free speech (Professor Junger, for example). But hey, there's a huge difference between these highly theoretical arguments and the blatant 14th Amendment egregiousness that infected the South in the 60s.
There is a reason that the American public ultimately got behind the civil rights movement -- they understood that it was wrong and why it was wrong. I have yet to poll a newbie without loading up the questions to find someone who "gets it."
This is not to say that killing the anticircumvention provisions of DMCA is not a righteous cause -- its that the present incarceration of a Russian Hacker is so far from a Rosa Parks scenario that you are simply deluding yourself.
Re:I wonder how DMitry feels (Score:3)
Perhaps he feels more like a victim of the illegal laws of a banana republic.
Re:Disruptive actions (Score:4)
If the entire internet shut down for a minute or two no real harm would come but the message would be sent loud and clear.
If the event was executed correctly and your boss got mad at you you could always point your fingers at everybody else and say "gee boss our systems are working fine but there seems to be a internet wide strike" it's not like your boss would know.
If that fails you can always rely on "just reboot your machine it should work fine afterwards" it's not like they haven't heard that one before.
I wonder how DMitry feels (Score:5)
Re:He's guilty (Score:4)
Hang on, there, guy. Sklyarov was an employee of a company (and, incidentally, the principal of the company was in the US at the same time he was). Prima Facie, the company may have broken US law - but they broke it in Russia, where it wasn't illegal. Sklyarov did not sell or distribute the software he's alleged to have co-written anywhere - the company that employed him did. And he wrote it, not as a private individual, but as an agent of a company under the direction of that company. So whether the company is guilty or not, Sklyarov does not personally have any case to answer - and how you prosecute a Russian company for doing in Russia something which is legal in Russia I don't know.
Does anyone have a surface mail address for Dmitry (Score:5)
So: anyone got the surface mail address of the place he's in, and how you write to a prisoner there?
Re:I wonder how DMitry feels (Score:3)
I'm going to quote, here from the book "Martin Luther King, Jr. -- Civil Rights Leader, by Robert Jakoubek. (I thought that I had King's own autobiography, but I can't find it, right now).
Rosa's decision to not stand up was, by all accounts that I've seen an impulsive one. What was notable about it was that it was at a time when leaders of the community were looking for an incident to rally around, and they chose her arrest. It was a synergy of need and opportunity.This is not to say, however, that she was a country bumpkin who didn't know what she was getting into when she "quietly but firmly said 'No.'". She was an active and respected member of the NAACP who would do things like take the stairs rather than ride a 'blacks only' elevator. So when she stayed seated because her feet were tired, she wasn't just thinking of the next 60 seconds, or even the next 60 days. She looked years into the future and decided to take a stand for her feet by staying seated. The rest, as they say, became history.
Dmitry's case may end up being the spark for a similar historic synergy, or it may turn out to be a flash in the pan. We shal see where it goes.
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Re:American programmers in Russia (Score:4)
In order for this to have a similar effect, you would need the Russian people, if not all of Europe to make this an issue. Then, maybe you'd have enough international pressure on the US to do something.
mirror and more city links. (Score:3)
Direct links to boston, LA, and seattle information are at boston.freesklyarov.org [freesklyarov.org], la.freesklyarov.org [freesklyarov.org], and seattle.freesklyarov.orb [freesklyarov.org].
Protests are also scheduled in NY and LA. There's interest in the UK as well, see ntk.net [ntk.net] for more details.
Re:mirror and more city links. (Score:3)
Re:American programmers in Russia (Score:5)
And you think it wouldn't happen to an American? My thoughts are with Sklyarov, and I plan on continuing to write to my legislators and spreading word of his abuse under a law that has no place in this country.
( for the wary, the link is to http://www.usatoday.com/news/comment/columnists/t
Russian Government? (Score:3)
Adobe wins (Score:5)
- There is a public outcry and protests. Adobe sees this as a direct threat to their corprate image and as a direct result....their sales.
- Adobe meets with EFF, and drops their support for the case, post-indictment.
- It is a PR victory for Adobe, they say they made a mistake, and their critics back down, the protests stop and Adobe looks like a good company that made a bad mistake and is owning up to it.
- Since this is a criminal case, not a civil one, Adobe cannot drop the charges against Sklyarov. The prosecution continues, Adobe looks like an innocent bystander in the whole matter and one of the "good guys" or at least no longer the enemy. With their corprate image restored, it's a win-win situation for them. Sklyarov goes on trial to be made an example of, and no one is viewing them as the "big bad corporation" anymore.
It was a cunning, calculated move, and I wonder how long it will take people to realize this. Everything Adobe wanted has been accomplished. They win. Sklyarov and everyone else loses.
Re:Keep the pressure on Adobe! (Score:3)
It has come to my attention that you asked the FBI to arrest Dmitri Sklyarov on grounds of delivering a speech at an academic conference. You may now have retracted the original request for practical reasons, but you still seem to be supporting the laws that made such act possible. This I find to be morally and ethically wrong.
Therefore I state that I will not purchase a single Adobe product, and that I will advice all my customers, friends, and family to do likewise until all of the following have come to pass:
a) Dmitri Sklyarov is free, and has received a reasonable compensation for the time he has been imprisoned,
b) You have publicly denounced your support for the laws that made this farce possible,
c) You have taken some concrete and effective steps to free Sklyarov and to repel the unjust laws that were used for his imprisonment.
Yours sincerely etc
I hope some native speaker of American English will correct the inevitable typos and grammatical errors, and that others may find this a useful template for a letter. If not, post good reasons why, and come up with a better letter...
Disruptive actions (Score:5)
How...archaic.
Seriously, you want to make people sit up and take notice? Co-ordinate an "internet" black-out. Just change the routing tables on those pricy Cisco routers for a few days, particularly ones pointing to-and-from
That should get some media attention. To increase the likelyhood of media attention, just re-route all traffic from the NY Times, Washinton Post, CNN, ABC, and LMNOP Inc. That should make p = 1.0 of media exposure.
Week are geeks. Hear us roar. But expect some serious lagtime on that ping. And email? Talk to the hand....
Worried about being laid-off? It's happening to all propeller heads nowadays, so don't fret too much. There's plenty of company at the bottom.
Re:On protesting in China (Score:3)
My comments were not intended to criticize Russian and Chinese citizens, but rather to celebrate the fact that in America, the government, media, and people are still able to learn and express themselves and are willing to do so to make things better.
America is not perfect in this regard, but I wholeheartedly believe that humanity can make it better -- and not just in America, but worldwide.
chinese, russians, americans (Score:4)
America has its bad laws just like any other place, but at least there are people who still give a damn. And as long as that's true, and as long as we aren't silenced, there's hope.
Here's to giving a damn.
We need a protest in Las Vegas (Score:3)
Re:Welcome to the United States... (Score:4)
I guess what I'm saying is, don't throw around the justifiably serious charge of treason just because people disagree with you. Yes, the DMCA is a bad law. Yes, its passage was a classic snapshot of all that is ailing the legislative process in America these days. Yes, the reps and senators who wrote it, voted for it, and are still supporting it probably were swayed by the gobs of money thrown at them by the networks, the content providers, and the software issues. Yes, it sacrifices time-honored proctections of the public for the narrow self-interest of some corporations.
For these reason -- as well as the basic affront to the Constitution that it is -- the law is bad and should be amended, repealed, or overturned. For these reasons, its supporters are misguided at best and quite possibly cynically manipulative.
But they are not traitors. Do not so quickly cut people off from the body politic based on a difference of opinion. Do what we can do: Call your rep. Write your local TV station. Run for office.
Re:Isn't this covered by U.S. law? (Score:4)
The right way to fight this is on constitutional grounds, as the Constitution is a law... the supreme law of the land.
Die Hard 4 (Score:5)
I don't exactly know, but I'm 100% sure that Bruce Willis or Steven Segal would star in the movie version.
D
Mad Scientists with too much time on thier hands
Re:I wonder how DMitry feels (Score:5)
Not quite. Rosa Parks was selected by the NAACP to challenge the segregation laws that existed at the time. Her "sit-in" was a planned protest and she was specifically chosen because she was a nice church-going older lady(read: not an angry young male) who was in good standing in her community.
The anti-DMCA movement could use a Rosa Parks! Imagine the reaction if we could find a nice, sweet older (American, church-going, etc) lady who was willing to be imprisoned because she circumvented copy protection. Instead we have a Russian Hacker. A double negative connotation.
Intelligence: Finding an error in a Knuth text.
Re:Adobe wins (Score:3)
In all seriousness, the fact that this case is actually going to be proscecuted mya very well make many of these coporations quite nervous... it gives the DMCA a chance to be taken into court on the grounds of being unconstitutional. Although the case would drag on for quite some time, it may lend some momentum to having this Act repealed.
Then again...
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Re:He's guilty (Score:3)
I believe the US government was more then willing to completely ignore the matter (happens all the time, getting a warning instead of a speeding ticket), but Adobe called up their lawyers and basically required the government to act on a law that's on the books (could you imagine the lawsuits over law enforcement refusing to enforce a law on the books). Once he was arrested a chain of events occurs (and from what I can tell he technically *did* break the law while in the US), which doesn't really give any shortcuts out; one pretty much has to follow the court process till the end. When one is arrested the government is commited to due process, which Adobe forced them to do.
Sklyarov from all accounts *did* break a law (whoops on him), it is a law full of loop holes that are being used for unintended purposes (shame on Clinton & congress), and Adobe is using the US government to run ruckshaw over a foreigner, and twist the law to things that the original drafter hadn't really intended it's use for (context wise)... shame shame on Adobe. Of course now Adobe wants to hide it under the run and act like they never meant for this to happen when it was them in the first place.
On a side note, I tend to agree with how the once you are arrested method currently works, other than it can be painfully slow; but once someone is arrested there is no turning back, so the arresting officer needs to make *damn* sure that something did occur, elsewise be expecting that "unlawful arrest" lawsuit to be coming over the fence. If they could just arrest and release people as they wish without any checks and ballances with no end trial, imagine the amount of abuse that would occur.
The heat should not leave Adobe's feet on this one, Adobe's fault should not be forgotten (and sadly it almost seems their PR dept has gotten if forgotten), since it is their fault that they twisted the law in this manner.
Where's the ACLU on this? (Score:3)
I'm not the biggest fan of the ACLU, but I am surprised that they haven't weighed in on this.
On the other hand, the cynical side of me is not surprised, saying, "of course they haven't weighed in -- they've been in the back pockets of big media for years".
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Re:Where's the ACLU on this? (Score:3)
Considering the ACLU is, oh, 1000 times larger than the EFF and considering the government actually cares what the ACLU thinks, I think they could be helpful.
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Re:Where's the ACLU on this? (Score:5)
In fact, I just used the ACLU's [aclu.org] search page, and remarkably there is zero mention of Sklyarov, not even on their Cyber-Liberties [aclu.org] page.
The silence is remarkable -- and deafening.
All you ACLU fans should take note of this.
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Laughable (Score:4)
From the Wired article:
"Nothing has changed since 1998 that would lead members of Congress to upset the careful balance that was struck," says Bob Holleyman, head of the Business Software Alliance.
What is this guy smoking? "Careful balance"? The whole problem with this law is that there's no balance at all! It's completely one-sided, giving copyright holders dictatorial power over consumers.
Guilty until proven Railroaded(er innocent) (Score:3)
Legitimacy in the eyes of the public (Score:5)
As long as the public sees this as "a bunch of hackers" or "hippie anarchists" running around demanding the release of foreign national accused of committing a felony, nobody will take it seriously.
What we need is to have some establishment companies themselves coming out publicly against this as an abuse of the law they lobbied to pass, in the same way that the civil rights movement only gained popularity when a significant number of whites stood up and said these Jim Crow laws were wrong. Adobe has already recanted on their desire to prosecute Dmitri, if they went one step further and condemned the FBI action as overstepping the DMCA, it would make more people sympathetic to the cause.
No, I don't know how to do this.
czep
You want a reality check? (Score:3)
The reality check is that your distinction doesn't matter- the fact that they are aware of the situation and *have not yet dropped* the charges is sufficient cause for alarm.
Bryon
Keep the pressure on Adobe! (Score:5)
We need to keep the pressure on Adobe. We need to let them know that the boycott [boycottadobe.org] will continue. We need to let them know that they cannot pressure the FBI to press charges against someone and then back-off when they witness the PR fallout. Keep writing the letters. Keep sending the emails. Keep encouraging people to boycott this company!
If corporations do not understand that there will serious consequences to both their reputation and bottom-line when they pursue prosecution under the DMCA (regardless of how they feel the morning after!), then they will continue to do so under the flimsiest pretenses.
They want to make an example of Dmitry? Fine, then we'll make an example of Adobe.
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Re:what a terrible idea. (Score:5)
I'm not suggesting we punish companies out of vindictiveness - I'm suggesting that we make it clear to corporations that they need to choose their battles carefully. Corporations can ruin people's lives by following Adobe's example - and allowing them to do so in ambiguous cases like Dmitry's is something we cannot do.
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Re:Die Hard 4 (Score:5)
Re:I wonder how DMitry feels (Score:5)
As for being a civil rights hero, who would want to be that. Given the alternatives, come on, I'm sure he'd rather live his life without this whole experience; but experience, but if it wasn't Skylarov it would be someone else.
What makes him a hero? well, I think Emerson put it best: "A hero is no braver than an ordinary man, but he is braver five minutes longer."
Dmitry was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but he is providing a service to all of us by standing for our rights - the rights of people in a foreign country (to him), and for that we must be thankful and do whatever we can to help minimize his incarceration.
We rely too heavily on organizations like EPIC and the EFF to do our work for us and we should be ashamed of that. We need to take responsibility for the laws under which we live and properlyinstruct lawmakers with regard to issues like information provacy, copyright, and Intelectual property in a digital age, such that errors that result in such injustices as this aren't allowed to take place in the future.
--CTH
Re:surface mail address for Dmitry (Score:4)
American programmers in Russia (Score:5)
Write your congressman! (Score:5)
To find out who your Representative is, see: http://www.house.gov/writerep/ [house.gov]
To find out who your two Senators are, see: http://www.senate.gov/senators/senator_by_state.c
Remember to be polite and clear but firm. Tell them why the DMCA is bad and how it upsets the balance between fair use and copyright holders. Make sure to spell and grammar check it (it won't be effective if it is full of grammatical errors) and make sure it is not inflammatory or threatening.
Lastly, donate a buck to the EFF [eff.org]. They are the ones that will help you speak louder then you can by yourself.
Do your civic duty. Stop complaining to all the people that can't help you (the
Re:chinese, russians, americans (Score:4)
A- Russians and Chinese citizens know about this and arent doing anything about it. Knowing how the American media works, the rest of the world could be on fire and it wouldnt be reported in the US press. For all we know, they *do* care in Russia or China, or (whatever other country)
and
B- Russians and Chinese citizens know about this.
Maybe it hasnt been reported much in their media, since I dont have access to their newspapers, etc, I dont know.
-J5K
p.s. One of the reasons there wasnt much protest in China over the arrest of the academics could be that most people didnt know about it (if they had known, I couldnt tell you if they would protest or not, but...) The arrests were more for the benefit of upper level chinese govt officials than they were to drum up anti-US sentiment among the general population.
This could be a good thing (Score:4)
-all dead homiez
Re:Free Skylarov (Score:3)
But that is not mattering great, teh important thing is to fight the fight to get me out of teh jail before I am anal sodomize!!
Thank.
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Re:Educate Others! (Score:3)
- Very little mainstream media coverage since the arrest
- DMCA opponents much more vocal than DMCA proponents on this matter
- No attempt to put any kind of spin on the arrest in order to legitimize it
Why do I find this so insidious? Well, certainly it's tempting to say that the mainstream media won't cover this story because of centralized corporate control that supports the DMCA. I don't know if that's really it. Maybe the story is just too esoteric to make exciting copy for the average person. Any thoughts?But isn't it interesting that we aren't seeing a lot of editorials explaining in detail why a non-dangerous alleged offender of a disputed law *should* be held without bail? I mean, if someone can point me to an article that says "Yes, for the good of society, Sklyarov should be under lock and key and here's why." then I'd be very interested in reading it. But it took just a feather's touch of pressure to get Adobe to back down from that position. It's untenable under any reasonable standard of the legitimate use of force.
Finally, there's no PR campaign from the pro-DMCA, pro-arrest camp. Why? Well, because there's no way to *put* a positive spin on using excessive force against a relatively powerless individual to settle a corporate dispute. So in this case, the best spin, the best PR, is simply no publicity at all. The average American who has heard the story at all simply believes that a "Russian hacker" has been apprehended by the FBI. This vaguely suggests that there must have been some sort of national security threat. The supporters of DMCA would like it for things to stay this way.
Here's the sad truth of the matter: power doesn't need reason or persuasion to justify itself. That's why those in favor of Sklyarov's arrest have been eerily silent. Of course, we supposedly live in a democratic society, so power supposedly resides with the people.
Well, the people do have power if enough of them raise their voices. Right now we just have the tech community raising a voice. And that's a wonderful thing, and I guess for such a small community it holds a lot of clout (heh, imagine a general IT strike for even one day).
But this is an issue that politicians will take seriously if there's enough public response. As the subject line says, we just need to educate more people about the implications of something that sounds rather obscure. Well, it's worth a shot.