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Interview with DMCA-challenger 141

Posted by michael from the next-contestant dept.
BrianWCarver writes "The Chronicle of Higher Education has an interview with Ben Edelman, the Harvard law student and internet researcher who is bringing suit against the DMCA with the ACLU. Slashdot covered the announcement of this legal challenge. To refresh your memory, Edelman wants to be able to research the lists of sites blocked by internet filtering software, and to be able to publish his research. He's no lawyer yet, but he responds quite well to several objections to the case."
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Interview with DMCA-challenger

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  • He's no lawyer... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Amarok.Org ( 514102 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @09:25AM (#3998115)
    He's no lawyer yet, but he responds quite well to several objections to the case.
    This implies that one must be a lawyer to understand legality, and to be able to convincingly argue one's position. Sorry, I don't buy it.

    • You mean, your superficial understand of the law?? (Score:5, Funny)

      by JohnDenver ( 246743 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @09:35AM (#3998174) Homepage
      Only lawyers can truely understand the law. You lesser life forms only have a superficial understanding and marginal charisma to argue your position.

      While you're being stupid, why don't you lecture us on how not all black people like rap, or you don't have to be an auto mechanic to have in-depth knowledge on auto repair! Stop! You're blinding me with insight! Ahh!!!
      • My old master's supervisor stated your point far more succinctly during a conference we were attending. Listening to a particular scientist's presentation, he leaned over and whispered to me:

        "That's what we call a blinding glimpse of the perfectly obvious."
      • Your biting edginess amuses me! Here goes my karma...I agree with you. But you forget, the parent poster here is a slashdot reader. To him, everything is perfectly understandable. He understands the subtleties of law and how to effectively debate them. He understands physics, cryptography, biology, auto mechanics, needlepoint, basket weaving, and calculus. Everyone here is an expert on all things. On the flip side of this, non-geeks know nothing. How could a politician ever understand technology? Laws are so horrible because politicians "just don't get it". Nobody really understands anything, except the slashdot reader. So, yeah, I agree with you entirely, but you're just gonna get modded to oblivion...like me.

        • But you forget, the parent poster here is a slashdot reader. To him, everything is perfectly understandable.
          Alright, you're trolling, but I'll bite.

          My argument was not that I am (or anyone else is, for that matter) an expert in law, physics, cryptography, biology, etc, but simply that this attitude that all things in the realm of law are exclusively in the domain of lawyers is ludicrous.

          On the flip side of this, non-geeks know nothing. How could a politician ever understand technology?
          This is exactly the same attitude I refer to. Everyone seems to thing that they are the masters of their domain, and no one outside it could possibly be reasonably competent in it.

          To quote Mel Gibson, "Let's just say I'm agreeing with you in a totally unusual way."

          • Guilty as charged. I was trolling. Even so, I appreciate that to some extent I'm sure we ALL understand laws. The point is, if there's any chance to fight the DMCA, it lies with competent lawyers and not just some guy who sort of understands law. But the whole part about the general slashdot attitude of "I understand all things, for I am g33k. All others know nothing" wears thin after a while. Sometime, just for fun, actually READ some of the shit that gets modded up here, when the poster is obviously clueless. I guess that's what makes /. fun.
            • "..if there's any chance to fight the DMCA, it lies with competent lawyers and not just some guy who sort of understands law."

              Not only lawyers are needed. Everyone who cares to read, or learn, or poke fun at, or not pay an arm and a leg for information that is timely has to be involved in the debate.
              See: http://chronicle.com/free/v48/i47/47b00701.htm for a really interesting take on how DMCA was overlooked by the academic world

              I say debate because fight implies win/lose.
              To win, the law would have to be repealed.
              How many times has that happened since prohibition?

        • I know absolutely nothing about needlepoint. ;o)
        • You forgot:
          - Only the Slashdot Reader has the ability, mental stamina and strong stomach to discuss the finer points of how great Slashsdot Readers think they are (with the exception of the Slashdot Reader that's actually doing the discussion which is naturally the exception)

          Not that i disagree with you ...

          This kinda reminds me of a survey of car drivers:
          - 90% thought they were good drivers and that most other drivers were bad drivers.
    • Hmmm...I wonder if he will start his presentation with:


      IANAL, but...

    • Re:He's no lawyer... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by kiwimate ( 458274 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @10:00AM (#3998329) Journal
      This implies that one must be a lawyer to understand legality, and to be able to convincingly argue one's position.

      I think it may imply the former, but not the latter. People are paid high salaries for the benefit of their expertise.

      To put it into a perspective which may carry more weight on Slashdot, many people can understand the principles behind routers and firewalls, but rather fewer are able to competently configure same when complex scenarios are involved. Consider, for example, how many people fail their first run of the CCIE lab portion.

      One may argue the semantics behind the formalization and/or certification of the knowledge required for a specialized task, but why be so demeaning? How many Slashdotters would leap to the defense were the above statement to be modified to read:

      This implies that one must be a { systems engineer / network engineer / pick your label } to understand { WAN configurations / how to configure a firewall / pick your prized specialized skill }.

      There's a difference between understanding something and knowing how to apply knowledge in an expert fashion. Don't demean skills that you don't understand or appreciate.
      • There's a difference between understanding something and knowing how to apply knowledge in an expert fashion. Don't demean skills that you don't understand or appreciate.
        With all due respect for lawyers (geeze, never thought THOSE words would cross my lips...err...fingers), my point was NOT that any average schmoe can effective manage a court case. It was simply that your moderately intelligent layperson CAN understand legal issues, CAN understand legal documentation given the motivation, and CAN produce resonable and convincing legal arguments to support their positions.

        While not a lawyer myself (nor would I like to be), I do have significant experience in successfully managing legal affairs, lawsuits, etc without the benefit of law school, or even college for that matter. The resources are available for anyone to school themselves in procedure and nomenclature relating to legal matters.

        Much of what makes a lawyer effective is *NOT* their knowledge of the legal system. Laws, technicalities, etc... that can all be dug up by a minimum-wage intern with access to a decent law library and the Internet. What makes a good lawyer effective is their communication skills and being able to articulate their position.

        • This is irrelevant. I thought that the prime purpose of the American (by which I mean US, before you pedantic idiots start going on about Canada and Peru or whatever) lawyer was not to understand the law, or argue its meaning, but to take it into whatever contorted context allows them to string out a court case for as long as their client can afford, before getting them off on a technicailty.

          Surely this guy should have said "IANAL, so I can easily show these glaring mistakes in the DMCA and censorship, because if IWAL (I was a lawyer) I would ignore them and concentrate on the word "the" being used in section 102.2b(3) where clearly the word "a" would be necessary to convict my client"

      • you only HAVE to be a lawyer to go to patent court. You can represent yourself everywhere else. Although doing so is foolish, emotional attachment ruins objectivity.
      • The problem here is that not everyone needs to deal with firewalls and routers, or even their car engine, on a daily basis. However, we all have to deal with the law on a daily basis. Therefore, the ivory tower approach to creating laws (i.e. making them so complex you have to be a professional to understand them) is a Bad Thing(tm). Law is to govern the people, and since (in theory at least) "We the people...." are the government we should be able to understand the laws we live under. Or do you think that it's a good idea to have a tax code (just the tax code mind you) that is over 17 million words? The US tax code is two stacks of books, each 4½ to 5½ feet high.

    • Re:He's no lawyer... (Score:3, Informative)

      by WNight ( 23683 )
      That's pretty well how it is. You either need to be a lawyer, or invest so much time that you could be, to have read everything relevant.

      Should it be that way? Hell no. I've often proposed that the entire legal code an individual be subjected to be readable and roughly memorizable by "the average non-college educated person". So IMHO the legal code should be no longer than a reasonable read for a grade-12 student, use no words they aren't likely to have seen, and not be so complex as to confuse them. This does mean a very simple legal code, but it also means lawmakers would have to pick and choose.

      (The "exception" would be that the description of the spirit of the law wouldn't have to be included, just the actual rules you have to follow.)

      There is some legal precedent for this. Many judges are finding that ignorance *is* an excuse, at least in contract law with one uninformed party and one informed party where the uninformed party is shown a 20-page contract that they have to sign if they want a job/healthcare/a house/etc.

      In a system where the legal code was required to be understood by the majority of the people they'd either have to simplify it, or increase the level of education of the people and include legal classes as standard curiculum (this really should be, even now).
      • "You either need to be a lawyer, or invest so much time that you could be, to have read everything relevant."

        IANAL, and I have never taken any law classes, but I *can* understand the law (and I know this because I frequently have legal disscussions with my dad, who is a lawyer). Hell, most of the people who *write* the laws don't have a law degree (that's one of the reasons we have the Supreme Court). Think of it this way, you don't need an English degree to understand poetry, but it would make it easier to understand. The biggest problem is that most people, myself included, don't know how to search the law libraries.

        "I've often proposed that the entire legal code an individual be subjected to be readable and roughly memorizable by "the average non-college educated person"."

        The problem with that is that it leads to ambiguous laws. Take "Thou shalt not kill" for example. It's short, simple, and fairly easy to understand, but it is ambigous. Does it mean that I can't kill *anything*? If so, I'd better stop using anti-bacterial soap. Maybe it's just other humans that I'm not supposed to kill, but what about self defense, or killing one person to save millions (like killing Hitler to stop the Holocaust)? And then there's the question of liability. What if I order someone's death, is that the same thing as killing? Or what if I just refuse to stop a murder from taking place, am I liable for that person's death?

        "...include legal classes as standard curiculum."

        That is a very good idea, and thats exactly why it will never happen. If the government passed a law that actually made sense, it would set a dangerous precedent ;)

        PS, sorry about the Biblical reference, but it was the first thing that came to mind.

    • "He's no lawyer yet, but he responds quite well to several objections to the case."
      This implies that one must be a lawyer to understand legality, and to be able to convincingly argue one's position. Sorry, I don't buy it.

      Oh, calm down. Of course we don't need to be lawyers to understand the law or to be able to present a coherent, convincing argument.

      But, we expect those who are lawyers to be able to do both. I thought the above statement was a simple compliment and a suggestion that Edelman's comments were well said. And, having read the interview, I'd say the submitter was right.

      IMHO, it's the rare non-lawyer who really understands how a law works. And, it's the rare lawyer who really pays attention to what a law means. As with anything, there are plenty of exceptions.
    • He's no lawyer yet, but he responds quite well to several objections to the case.

      It's a meaningless comment who's sole purpose is to credit the kid. You're hunt for hidden assertions and stigma is meaningless and stupid.

      So quit interrupting with your pedantic tangents, it's not only annoying, it's an impotent attempt to make a point out of the pointless.

      EARTH AND JUSTICE TO YOU FUCKO!!!
    • "This implies that one must be a lawyer to understand legality.."
      IAAL & I do litigation.
      I occasionally see people in court with a similar modality. Their argument in support of defending/litigating for themselves,when not cost based, often is something along the lines of; "I understand the context and domain of this legislation. Hell, it's written in English & I speak English etc. etc.". Formally such people are known as "litigants in person". Informally, lawyers call them "easy meat". The reason, as others have alluded, is that to be able to argue ones point, convincingly or otherwise, requires an understanding of the point. What the point is requires a thorough understanding of the law, court procedure, statutory interpretation & the general issue. As for understanding 'legality' whatever that is, Yes you may understand the words in the statute but in a legal context they may not mean quite what you think they do. Even if they do what are the strategic considerations of that point? are you fucking up by making the point at that time, or at all? How will the court approach and interpret this statutory language? what are the policy objectives here? yada yada.

      I understand the desire of FOS people to fight bad law and thuggish corporations. As a GNU/linux user I support it and have helped in the past & will in future. But most geeks havent a clue. This guy is a law student and probably a bright one. In that respect he is better equipped than many geeks but he is still only taking a knife to a gunfight. Litigating is for professionals.

      • IAAL & I do litigation.
        And you admit it? *grin*
        Formally such people are known as "litigants in person". Informally, lawyers call them "easy meat".
        The litigants to which you refer are not the educated, informed, and well reasoned laypeople to which I refer. The people are "easy meat" are those who typically have a shaky legal stance to begin with, and don't rely on the services of a professional to find the most effective method of presenting that however flawed argument.

        As for understanding 'legality' whatever that is, Yes you may understand the words in the statute but in a legal context they may not mean quite what you think they do.
        I think you underestimate the capabilities of any individual litigant. While people by in large are generally clueless - you'll run into someone like me some day that will surprise you.
        Litigating is for professionals.
        Somehow I think you're a bit biased based on your profession - though I suppose I'm biased as well by my desire to be self-reliant.

        I think the major issue here is what kinds of cases are managable by an intelligent, well informed layperson, and which are better left to professionals. My original point (which has been completely lost to those who want to take EVERY point to it's not so logical extreme) was that you do NOT have to be a lawyer (or law student) to effectively utilize the legal system, up to and including representing yourself against professional lawyers.

        Lawyers certainly have their place... it's not however, as most of you would have us believe, a necessity to have your services to prevail in any legal context. In as much as the automotive oil industry would have us believe that changing our oil every 3000 miles is critical (which, BTW, sells a LOT more oil than is truly necessary), so too would the legal profession have us believe that we cannot manage our own legal affairs.

    • He's no lawyer yet

      You say that like it's a bad thing.

    • I submitted this story and I wrote that last line not to imply anything in particular. I just figured if I included some sort of summary of what you'd find there then it'd be more likely to be accepted than rejected. So there's my dark motivation...

      But, to address your statement, I think I would agree that it helps immensely to be a lawyer to speak with authority on legal issues, but I would never say that one must be a lawyer "to convincingly argue one's position". I am not a lawyer, and I feel I could give numerous arguments against the DMCA that many would find quite convincing. If I were a lawyer and were better versed in the relevant legal issues, I believe I could give even better or even more convincing arguments, or better yet, arguments that a court would accept, not just my neighbor.

      Some legal training might help you not jump to conclusions about the implications of other's statements!

      Brian

  • Liklihood of legal completion? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by AgTiger ( 458268 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @09:30AM (#3998142) Homepage
    Mr. Edelman: We've seen a pattern emerging of cases where legal action is threatened under the DMCA, but when push comes to shove, the entity making the threats backs off, and thus the law remains.

    What set of criteria do you feel must be present in a challenge to the DMCA that will give us our best hope of it being overturned, and do you feel your challenge meets these criteria?

    • You realize this is a offsite interview, and not a Slashdot interview, where the 10 highest questions are sent in?
      • Yes, I do. I also emailed Mr. Edelmen, and politely invited him to participate in our discussion.

        • Mr. Edelmen has responded to me via email. He's travelling abroad right now and is fighting with limited email access through an accoustic couple (!) dial up connection that is very unreliable. He's going to look for a Cybercafe or the like in order to get better access.

          He included the following, and requested that I forward it on to everyone:

          - - - BEGIN Ben Edelman's Comment - - -

          My apologies not to post this myself -- I have bad 'net access at the moment, effectively email only, as I connect with an acoustic coupler at a pay phone.

          It seems to me that the core question here is why we might hope that this case succeeds even where others have failed. Now, as I recall, there has only been one appellate case that has upheld the DMCA, so in fact the DMCA is still new & untested in important respects.

          In addition, the Librarian of Congress already recognized the problem here and provided an exemption that goes part of the way (though, as the complaint and FAQ try to describe, not all the way!) towards addressing the needs of those who seek to study filtering software. The problem the Librarian saw here is, it seems to me, a real one -- that the public has quite a substantial interest in knowing what filtering programs block, whether they work as advertised, etc. These public interests in disclosure of the block list are made all the stronger by the government's role as purchaser of such software (in libraries, public schools, etc.).

          So notwithstanding the failures of multiple DMCA challenges to date, I'm cautiously optimistic here.

          Ben Edelman
          http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/edelman [harvard.edu]


          - - - END Ben Edelman's Comment - - -

    • This is precisely why Mr. Edelman and the ACLU are going about things the way that they are. They are filing a preemptive lawsuit. No one has threatened them with DMCA prosecution and backed off. They are saying to a judge "look, this is what we plan to do. We want to to declare it legal before the filtering company decides to threaten us."

      Seems like a very good strategy to me.

      -S

  • DMCA! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Rhombus ( 104176 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @09:32AM (#3998158) Homepage
    (to the tune of Y-M-C-A)


    Young man, you've been writing some code, I said,
    Young man, think it ought to be showed, I said,
    Young man, but what you shoulda knowed, is some
    Things... must... be... left... un-said

    Young man, there's a law that's been passed, I said,
    Young man, we hoped it wouldn't last, but now,
    Young man, if you break it, your ass will be
    Hauled... a-way... to... Club Fed

    We cannot stay with the DMCA
    Get hauled away with the DMCA

    You cannot circumvent
    Any music or book
    Can't even let your kid take a look

    That's why we're flamin' the DMCA
    Our guy was framed on the DMCA
    The Man gives us rules
    That we've got to obey
    But encryption just gets in the waaaaaay...

    Young man, there's no need to feel down, I said,
    Young man, hide yourself underground, I said,
    Young man, 'cause the Feds are in town, you know,
    There's no place you can hide,
    Young man, there's no place you can go, I said,
    Young man, when they don't like your code, if you
    Stay here, I am sure you will find
    That you haven't got no more time.

    (chorus)

    You sir, I hope you understand, we're im-
    Pa-tient, hope the Feds free our man, but no-
    Bo-dy... can resist our demand, we'll shout
    Til... they... free... D-mi-try

    Dima's... fate lies in our own hands, so please
    Help us... make them meet our demands, so call
    D.C., make them send this young man, back to
    His... own... home... and... fam'ly

    (chorus)

    --
    Mad props to: Jonathan Watterson
    jonathanjo@mindspring.com
    • Mama, just broke thier code flipped a bit against a hash showed these people for some cash Mama, life had just begun But now I have broke the D-M-C-A Mama, ooo Taken by the F-B-I If I'm not back again this time tomorrow Carry on, carry on, as if nothing really matters

  • Website filter lists (Score:4, Funny)

    by SpatchMonkey ( 300000 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @09:33AM (#3998164) Journal
    Who wants to bet that chronicle.com is going to be added very very soon ..?

    • Re:Website filter lists (Score:2, Insightful)

      by pmz ( 462998 )
      Who wants to bet that chronicle.com is going to be added very very soon ..?

      This is by far the most frightening aspect of website and SPAM filters. Institutional filters, like N2H2, serve only the political or righteous interests of those who employ them. How can naive rules about what is and isn't pornography, for example, actually accomplish anything good? This is no different than choosing which books to burn, which people to take off the air, or what topics newspapers can publish. Internet filters are censorship; there is no excuse that can change this fact. For this reason, we should question the motives of any organization that uses them.
    • The beauty of filters is, companies regard their list o' sites as a competitive secret, so you can't really find out who's on the list. It's a beautiful system to exploit.

      The Dianetics folks have their own, special filters than prevent you from seeing through the terms of the cult, for example. That's the sort of precedent that libraries might want to think about when they're being strongarmed into accepting filter systems. Gee, if it can be misused this way...

      Our local libraries, to their credit, have put up a fight for the right of people to view whatever they want on their systems. Of course, the Republican Party has ripped them up and down over it -- doesn't make "common sense" to take the risk of exposing children to the icky stuff in life. Libraries should be for upstanding Americans to peruse copies of William Safire editorials...

    • Businesses use filters because maybe they want their empolyees to work on what they pay them for and not to be looking at pornography on company time....consider that for a minute. Schools are in a similar situation. They want kids doing school-work and not accessing adult material instead of learning. I admit there are major flaws in most filtering systems such as inadvertantly blocking research topics but in many ways these filters are necessary in some form.

  • Excellent. (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    At least he is doing something good before he becomes consumed by the love of money.

  • I for one.. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by bsDaemon ( 87307 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @09:41AM (#3998208)
    would be very glad to see this work out. Apparantly, the filter they use at my local public library uses filters a lot of stuff that isn't pornographic at all. My sister had a report to do about communism and was trying to do stuff there, but they blocked communist-related websites. my school for the longest time blocked http://www.gnu.org (the BSD websites were unaffected though). I also could not find stuff about UK politcal parties from school. They cut out a lot of stuff that is blatantly unconstitutional to cut.
    • The filtering industry is not the problem. The problem is the use of filtering software on public computers. Attacking the industry retards the development of more effective filters and does nothing to prevent the goverment from using the old heavy-handed and inneffective filters on public computers.

  • I have asked it before and do it again. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    WHY isn't the current laws enforced instead of creating new ones?

    Maybe I'm missing something but why the hell isn't the police busy searching all the napster clones and gnutella? No matter how much it's encrypted in the end you still connect to another machine and download the material so it IS traceable.

    We are talking about several houndred thousands of people commiting crimes every day, why not trace them down and drag them to court? Why are new laws needed?
    • This probably has a lot to do with the fact that many law makers were once lawyers themselves. More laws lead to more criminals (regardless of whether or not the laws are just) which lead to more cases where lawyers can make themselves a career from.

      There is probably more to it than that, but not much. :/

      -Colin
    • This is becaus if we actually inforced the laws instead of making new ones Polititions wouald be able to do their job by just meeting up once a month or so and reviwing the cases in the fedral courts.

      The polatitions would have to spend the rest of tyhe time with their constituants and most would be away from the capital where all the parties and free lunch^W^W lobiests are.

      Hell they might miss out on some jucy bri^H^H^H corperat hospitality.
    • I don't see how your type of approach can result in any revenue for Senator Hatch.
    • The current laws aren't enforced and new ones are created because everyone in power feels they must prove that (only?) they know what is best. Any previous action was not good enough or was incorrect in their view. This is a common problem among those who _want_ to be leaders. It builds their ego and gives them a sense of power to make policy - even when policy already exists.
      Simple enforcement of existing policy does nothing for the enforcers reputation, but gives credit to the creater.

      In my opinion, ego-stroke policy generation is exactly the type of action that should lead us to elect ONLY people who do not want to be leaders or elected officials.

  • The real users of filtering? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by teamhasnoi ( 554944 ) <teamhasnoi AT yahoo DOT com> on Friday August 02, 2002 @09:45AM (#3998228) Journal
    Q. What about the counterargument that if people were really upset about their inability to see the list of blocked sites, then they just wouldn't buy the filtering software?

    A. There are a few different problems with that argument. First is that the people who are buying the filtering are not, by and large, the people who are subject to the filtering. The person in a particular library who is buying the filter, for example, is likely the network administrator of the filter, probably a pretty savvy computer user who can figure out a way around the filter. If anyone can do it, it's the person who's in charge of putting it in. He's the expert in computers, after all. ... So the person who's making the decision is, oddly, not all that affected by the filter, as I think about it.

    I thought the biggest users of filters were clueless parents who heard some horror story of the internet, bought a filter and installed it just so they could be 'hands-off' parents. Parents don't want the responsibilly of monitoring the net usage of their kid.

    I think putting the computers where everyone can see them, and actually discussing! what's out there is a far better answer than filtering, which is trivial to get around for even the dumbest of kids/adults. Go to a friends house or other computer (unfiltered), download the QNX internet browser floppy disk [qnx.com] for instance.

    Actually, unless OSS is filtered (Goddless heathens! Communists! Child Molesters!) you could do that right there.

    • I thought the biggest users of filters were clueless parents who heard some horror story of the internet, bought a filter and installed it just so they could be 'hands-off' parents. Parents don't want the responsibilly of monitoring the net usage of their kid.

      You forgot the part about clueless parents telling their kids to install the software.

      Older Brother: What password should we use?
      Younger Brother: Fr33P0rn
    • I thought the biggest users of filters were clueless parents who heard some horror story of the internet, bought a filter and installed it just so they could be 'hands-off' parents. Parents don't want the responsibilly of monitoring the net usage of their kid.


      Even then, they're not really affected by the filter, because they can just enter a password to bypass it. Still, with state (and attempted federal) laws sometimes requiring the filters in certain places (such as libraries as he stated), and those places certainly seeing more users than the average home computer, it's likely that the libraries and similar places are among the biggest sources of income for the people creating and selling this software (not to mention that one good-sized library will buy more licenses than they're likely to sell to the home users of the neighborhood that library is in).

      The big parts of the problem as specifically related to libraries are that:
      1) the people using the library computers to access the internet may not have another way to gain access (though this also means they may not be very adept at determining whether or not the information they find is correct and/or useful)

      2) public expectations of a library vary from one neighborhood to the next (in some areas it's quite possible that a certain level of censorship is not only practiced in a library, but also expected by the people that utilize that library)

      3) many libraries do not have a really good computer staff, and therefore do not know how to manage the software well (to reduce overblocking and extend the filter to block unwanted sites), and even if they wanted more information, there's really not much information available until/unless you log complaints about overblocking / underblocking (and this goes for the parents trying to take the hands-off approach as well as libraries, schools, and other institutions)

      Obviously, when it comes to parents and their kids, I believe that discussion is always the best answer for dealing with ethical and moral issues, as well as just dealing with any questions the kids may have (rather than dodging the issue), and that parents should be more aware of what their children are doing. Still, parents should be able to make informed decisions about this kind of software, and with laws preventing recovering the lists of blocked sites from these types of software (because of defeating encryption), and the software publishers/developers themselves unwilling to publish the information, they're being prevented from getting the information needed to really make an informed decision. This tends to leave them with either the option of overblocking (and underblocking) and possibly limiting their children (especially teen-agers) from important information that they may simply be uncomfortable discussing with their parents (and therefore may not discuss with their parents, especially if a piece of software their parents installed blocks them from the information), using other means to block them out entirely (which probably wouldn't be very effective since the kids usually know more about the computer than the parents eventually), or leaving it open and unmonitored.

    • Re:The real users of filtering? (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Ahh, yes. To be a truly good parent, you must never give your child a moment of privacy. You must be looking over his/her shoulder always. Sit and watch them play video games, read over their shoulder, sit behind them and watch as they surf the net and chat with their friends, follow them around as they are having fun outside.

      Guess how long it will be before your child goes into full rebellion mode? Kids need some freedom. Maybe these filters aren't the answer, but that doesn't mean that you're an irresponsible parent for installing one. Personally, I would do something more along the lines of recording the sites they visit just to check for anything overly objectionable. Keeping in mind, just because they visited a site, you don't know why they visited it. So you can't just jump to some conclusion without talking to them first. Anyway, it just annoys me when people immediately conclude that any parent who uses a filter is automatically a poor excuse for a parent.

    • If anyone can do it, it's the person who's in charge of putting it in. He's the expert in computers, after all.

      HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

      ummm no. I have NEVER met a computer expert that maintained the filters used at public libraries. they are NOT experts and even clued-in people that are carelessly throwing these terms out there are hurting the matter further.

      If he wasa a computer expert it would be a server that was running a realy proxy/filter like Squid or the commercial counterpart. that allow you to block with PLAIN TEXT FILES and easily add/remove without having to reboot/etc...

      No they are installing crap like net-nanny and the other low-quality/poorly written commercial software that has encrypted block lists to fight against their competition from stealing their list.... Why? because if it was up to the quality and speed of the actual software they would fall flat.

      Besides, any law or government should be be required to use or try to use an OSS or free option that is not going to give any company an instant monopoly.
      • The school district I graduated from in June had CyberPatrol (Under NT4 w/ microsoft proxy) installed in the proxy. We, my friends, were butting heads with it quite often. The worst was when it was reporting violations and we were looking through the logs (we had Apache running a proxy-server passthrough to the main proxy) and discovered that it was reporting the links on pages as well as the pages themselves. It was also bazar some catogories it used, Limewire under "Anonymous Proxies", Napster same catorgory. At one point we were contemplating the fact that they(CyberPatrol) said that they automaticly blocked sites w/ a notice saying you had to be 18 to view and wondering how we could get that on the schools web server somehow.

        So while the filtering were preventing us from going there it was also showing false positives.
      • Federally mandated, or community mandated blocking software would be of the form 'Package X must be installed on all machines in place Y.' I don't think anyone ever goes to the admin and says 'We'd like to set up a reasaonble way to filter offensive websites, could you set something up?' It's more like, 'We've been told some kids are seeing porn on the computers and parents are complaining, go install this on all of the computers.' and since that person is the one in charge of whether you keep working or not, you do it.

        Sucks, but it happens.
        Kintanon
    • He's the expert in computers, after all. ... So the person who's making the decision is, oddly, not all that affected by the filter, as I think about it.
      And conversely, the person who's most affected by the filters is the person least likely to recognize the situation as a problem. A non-techie library patron doing a report on Communism (to pick an earlier example) might get a big filter warning message popping up. (This is even assuming the filtering software goes to the trouble to tell you that you've been filtered, which some don't.) As any sysadmin will tell you, end users frequently don't even attempt to read or understand error messages, so the filter error could be interpreted as a down website. Even if it's correctly identified as originating in the filter, the user might believe that this was an acceptable use of the filter, i.e. that the website he attempted to view contained naked Russian chicks or instructions on how to build biological weapons for fighting capitalism. The least likely outcome is for the user to see the error message, realize that the filtered site should have been available for him to view, and then go to the trouble to complain about it in such a way that the installer of the filtering software hears about the problem.

      Indeed, the filter is designed that way. If it allowed you to see the content and judge for yourself whether it should have been available, it wouldn't be working, would it?
    • I thought the biggest users of filters were clueless parents who heard some horror story of the internet, bought a filter and installed it...

      Or, as I heard it put once, the parents buy the filter, but their children won't show them how to install it.
    • I have no issues whatsoever with a parent buying any sort of device they think is in their child's best interest. I may or may not agree with their estimation of the efficacy of that device, but their parenting techniques are none of my damn business.

      I DO have issues when filtering software goes onto publically funded computers, because that limits the scope of public discourse and inquiry into a field whose bounds are (secretly) maintained by a private entity. That's bad.

      Computers at home or in an office setting can and should have whatever software the purchaser wants to put on them. Computers funded by the public, on the other hand, have a different set of requirements. Makes sense?
    • thought the biggest users of filters were clueless parents who heard some horror story of the internet, bought a filter and installed it just so they could be 'hands-off' parents. Parents don't want the responsibilly of monitoring the net usage of their kid.

      Lots of people seem to be missing the point of publishing the list. You don't know until you try to go. The librarian, the clueless parent, the kids with the fr33POrn password won't know what they are missing until they try to look at it and get blocked, inhouse or upstream. The damage filters, especially in public libraries, can do is NOT to block porn and other prolefeed. The damage is to block real news and thought. The BSA counts free software as "pirate" software, you can bet your bottom dollar they would like to block the fsf website. A published list would give you a way to test out your ISP, library, or kid brother. If nothing else, the website with the list would be a good test.

  • Best Defense is a Good Offense (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Red Rocket ( 473003 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @09:47AM (#3998240)
    I'm glad this case is going forward but it's another one of those fringe cases that is defending against the rough edges of the DMCA instead of striking it at its unconstitutional heart.
    We need something that throws a spotlight on the huge potential of this law to do harm to fundamental freedoms that most people take for granted.
    Suppose we could enlist the cooperation of one of the major book publishing houses to bring an offensive and egregious suit against a library (for example) that accuses the library of theft of so-called "intellectual property" by allowing people to consume their product without compensation to them as the copyright holder.
    When the headlines start blaring about how the DMCA is being used to make libraries illegal then non-technical people might understand what's really wrong with this law.

    IANAL (but lawyers are good, despite the corporate "tort reform" rhetoric intended to smear lawyers and limit our access to the only branch of government left that hasn't been closed to the citizens.)
    • Since you made me think of it... I have a client who is suing all his old publishers under the DMCA (no, I am not helping him, in fact I argue with him about it regularly). These questions came up, and I'd appreciate input from folk (especially those who may be lawyers) who may have looked into it:

      1) If he does win any of his "$50,000 per incident" copyright infringement cases, and if the DMCA is later overturned, will he be required to pay back any "winnings"?? Or must the publishers then sue him to recover it?

      2) He claims that while the first provision is junk, the other three major provisions are sound. But as I understand it, if ANY part of a law is deemed unconstitutional, the ENTIRE law is then overturned -- *unless* it has a severability clause, in which case only the part(s) deemed unconstitutional is done away with. Anyone here who has read all the find print remember if the DMCA *has* severability??

      • It is my understanding that the judge's decision would stand, but any appeal would take into account the new legal standing of the DMCA. And likely there would be an appeal, (assuming he won).

        #include <IANAL.h>
        • And probably a countersuit to recover damages. BTW, latest word is that his lawyer says he doesn't have enough weight to pursue his cases anyway... this after he's already burned all his bridges and been blacklisted by all his former publishers. It wouldn't surprise me if publishers are pooling their blacklists, too -- why hire someone who has a history of coming back and suing you over an article whose reprint rights at worth at most $50??

          He may be my client (I maintain his computers), but I just can't feel much sympathy. More like "Serves you right".

    • And where pray tell will you find a major publishing house that is willing to take that step?

      They would almost certainly take a great deal of damage from the press and outraged politicians and the public.

      Just look how fast HP backed off [slashdot.org] of their threat [slashdot.org] to SnoSoft. They realized they had stirred up a hornet's nest and beat a hasty retreat.

      If any publisher were to take such an action they would probably encounter the same reaction as did HP and respond in the same way as HP.

      Even if they stuck to their guns and came out after the smoke settled and said "We just did it to challenge the DCMA." a lot of people would not believe that and their business might not ever get over the bad publicity.
      • Yes. That is a sticky wicket, ain't it?
        Hey, we don't actually do the things we propose. We just propose them, right? :)
        OK, how about a small publisher who specializes in more radical titles and who's customers are more likely to understand what's happening?
  • Perhaps the best that could come of this is if people start asking, "why does he need to file a preemptive suit to continue his research?" Academic research has always occupied a privileged sphere, and the DMCA poses a greater threat to these intellectual freedoms than possibly any previous legislation.

    It kinda reminds me of the situation when the NSA tried to stop academic cryptographers from continuing or publishing their results, slapping them with secrecy orders and citing national security concerns--however, they were beaten pretty soundly in court. Somehow, though, intellectual property seems more important to this government than national security. Say what you will, but the NSA had a much more legitimate interest in maintaining the breakability of codes than in protecting the rights of companies to obtain security through the combination of weak codes and obscurity.

    In the end, the NSA's arguments were found to be less than compelling when it came to restricting academic freedom. It's shocking that Hollywood's interests are not patently irrelevent in the same arena.

    It took a while for the courts and congress to stop being scared away from 'crypto anarchy' by NSA spooks, and to side with researchers. My hope for the current crisis is that these same bodies will stop being frightened off by the cries of doom and gloom from spookier spooks like Jack Valenti before academic (and even personal) research is further crippled in this country.

    telekon

    Hollywood's three leading products: Fear Uncertainty, and Doubt.

  • If you want real fun you should come over to the UK. Quite a lot of organisations/companies and public institutions when they first put on filtering did a rather blunt force job.

    Its all well and good blocking all references to the word SEX in URLs, but what happens when you want to access the County of Sussex or Essex ?

    • i had a similar problem while in on a friend's computer one day trying to research essex-class aircraft carriers, and on another trying to find information on oral surgery...
    • Just use the sites IP addy, thats how you could beat NetNanny. Also, creating 2 different winsocks worked.

  • Any other geeky lawyers? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Jacer ( 574383 )
    I'm no lawyer, but I plan on going to law school after I finish my poly sci degree. Laws like the DMCA really irritate me, so I was wondering if there are any slashdot nerds who are also lawyers, people who could consolidate and help inform people of the troubles such laws cause for people trying to remain within his or her fair use rights. We don't need more laws, we need more enforcement.

  • Hold the phone... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Flakeloaf ( 321975 )
    Did the Church of Scientology not use the DMCA to clobber Google [slashdot.org] a while back? If the clams (q.v. [xenu.net]) think that using the DMCA as a club is a lot easier than suing posters of their sacred texts the hard way, then they might just choose to step up and protect it. This would be a Bad Thing (TM).

  • Websense does ... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    censure the aclu website, under "advocacy group" label...
    • Hold on, do not blame WebSense (which I currently suffer at work too) for what your admin is responsible of (or someone in upper management). I have just tested it and I get to www.aclu.org with no hassle whatsoever.

  • New acronym (Score:2, Funny)

    by jim3e8 ( 458859 )
    He has a one-up on the rest of us because he can preface any legal uncertainty on /. with IAAAL.
  • Aren't these lists private property? Isn't anyone uncomfortable with the software companies being forced to divulge trade secrets? Oops, scratch that, almost forgot, this is Slashdot after all. Well, I guess publishing the blocked sites lists would make "open source" filtering a lot easier.
    • It's not about forcing companies to divulge trade secrets. It's about a researcher's right to reverse engineer code to see how it works.
      Are you in favor of jailing people who conduct research?
      • Are you in favor of jailing people who conduct research?

        Yes. I thought my post made it abundantly clear that I'm in favor of jailing people who conduct research. In fact we should retroactively prosecute and imprison those nefarious indviduals who have engaged in scientific research at any point in the past.

        Are you in favor of jailing software developers?

        • Are you in favor of jailing software developers?

          That response doesn't even make any sense, dude. Your Rush Limbaugh reasoning makes my guffaws giggle.

    • Re:Umm... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Kierthos ( 225954 )
      So what you're saying is that a list of URL's and the decision making trees to add to that list of URLs is now a trade secret? Bollocks.

      Most of these filtering programs use fairly simple (read: stupid) decision-making trees to determine whether a site is banned or not. Sure, it's real easy to see that most pr0n sites are banned, but guess what... they haven't gotten them all.

      And quite frankly, with the idea of "government mandated" filtering software, as a tax-paying citizen, I should have the right to know what sites and/or topics will be banned should I decide to use any of the computers that have these filtering programs on them.

      Kierthos
      • So what you're saying is that a list of URL's and the decision making trees to add to that list of URLs is now a trade secret?

        Whether or not it is a trade secret in the traditional sense of the term is irrelevent. These companies spent signifigant man-hours compiling these lists. Forcing the publication of these lists would be unfair to the companies.

        Most of these filtering programs use fairly simple (read: stupid) decision-making trees to determine whether a site is banned or not.

        I agree; most filtering software is fairly stupid and inneffective. However, reducing competition by publishing lists and methods isn't going to result in smarter and more effective filters.

        Sure, it's real easy to see that most pr0n sites are banned, but guess what... they haven't gotten them all.

        No, but it keeps the 95% of children who aren't that net savvy from easily accessing porn.

        And quite frankly, with the idea of "government mandated" filtering software, as a tax-paying citizen, I should have the right to know what sites and/or topics will be banned should I decide to use any of the computers that have these filtering programs on them.

        Are libraries forced to provide lists of all the books they decided against carrying?

        • Re:Umm... (Score:2, Insightful)

          by Kierthos ( 225954 )
          Whether or not it is a trade secret in the traditional sense of the term is irrelevent. These companies spent signifigant man-hours compiling these lists. Forcing the publication of these lists would be unfair to the companies.

          Yeah, it brings me to tears to force a company to be accountable for it's actions. It produces a software that claims to filter web-sites. We cannot judge how accurate that claim is because of the DMCA. Therefore, as far as we, the consumer, knows, we are buying the program blind. And with government mandated filtering software, we're paying for it with our tax money. We deserve to know if that money is being spent effectively and productively.

          Are libraries forced to provide lists of all the books they decided against carrying?

          Been in a library much? All the ones around here, it's fairly easy to tell what they do and don't have. It's either listed in a card catalog or listed in a computer index (or both). If it's not listed, I go ask a librarian, and they can tell me whether they can get a copy through library-sharing programs. If they can't get a copy, guess what, they also tell me that. Therefore, a list can be generated, by brute force methods, if nothing else. Hell(tm), most libraries would probably be willing to provide lists of materials they never plan on acquiring, just to make things simpler for the people who would routinely ask. Your arguement lacks wang.

          Fact of the matter is this. The filtering software promises to filter out "offensive" sites. However, because most filtering software does not easily allow the easy access to the criteria judging whether any given site is filtered, we have no idea whether it's doing a proper job, under-performing, or over-reacting.

          While I don't like the idea of Johnny 4th-grader seeing pr0n from his school's computers, I also don't like the idea of those same children being "protected" falsely from sites that should not be filtered out because the designers of the software set the program up to filter out too much.

          Kierthos

  • Is there some way to contribute fund? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fire-eyes ( 522894 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @10:43AM (#3998622) Homepage
    Is there some way people can contribute to a fund to help with his legal costs?

    I'm not a rich man but i'd definately fork over us$40 towards such a fantastic and important cause.

  • Cyber Patrol case (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It's old news, but people who are interested in the Cyber Patrol case mentioned in the interview could do worse than to read this FAQ [sooke.bc.ca] posted by one of the programmers. He also has a links page [sooke.bc.ca] covering the ongoing fight against DMCA-style copyright extension in Canada.

  • Would this be a good way to attack the DMCA? (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It seems that the DMCA could be attacked as unconstitutional because it is for an UNLIMITED time while congress is only allowed to make copyright for a LIMITED time. Since there is no time limit on the DMCA, conceivably from now on stuff will never enter the public domain, even after the 'traditional' copyright protection has expired.

  • Librarian of Congress vs DMCA (2000) (Score:3, Interesting)

    by WinPimp2K ( 301497 ) on Friday August 02, 2002 @01:57PM (#4000022)
    Umm...
    It seems to me that the Librarian of Congress reported a couple years back (as required by the DMCA) on specific exemptions to the DMCA that should be allowed. I believe two exemptions were recomended...
    One of them was specifcally to allow decryption of the list of blocked sites in censorware packages. Has this researcher or the ACLU considered this before mounting their "challenge" to the DMCA?

  • Censorship (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Sir Homer ( 549339 )
    We were using N2H2's filtering software in school. One day I had to do a report on the Cold War, but most sites that delt with "the other side" where blocked from being "Tasteless". Same with democraticunderground.com and other anti-goverment poltical sites.

  • And with that, they extracted from the CyberPatrol program a full and complete list of all the Web pages blocked by CyberPatrol. And they published it on the Internet ... The fact is, this has happened before, and I'm sure it's unpleasant for the filtering company. They'd rather not have this happen. But to say we're going to go out of business -- well, I don't know.

    Well, it seems to me that although the companies can survive a "blip" such as the cited incident where a snapshot of their blocking list is published, I doubt they would survive if their lists were all forced permanently into the open.

    It seems to me that these companies are selling the effort that's gone into compiling their lists, and compiling these lists is no doubt the bulk of their ongoing development costs. Any competent system administrator can block a list of sites at their proxy without purchasing this additional software, provided they have a list of URLs. Obviously then, it's this list of URLs and the organization/accuracy of said list that's really of value, not the blocking software itself.

    Why should I spend money on them if I already have a list of sites I want blocked? I'll concede that I have never used third party blocking software, so I may be missing something here-- perhaps they also have real time filtration by context-filters rather than just "evil" URL lists.

    So, yes, the companies have a lot to worry about--they could easily get pushed out of the market if their lists are forced public, but to me, this doesn't seem to me to be such a bad price to pay in the grand scheme. So what if a handful of people lose their jobs or get pushed into other areas. That's a small price to pay when you think about all the problems that open-source lists can solve. Errata or questionable blockages could be challenged and removed or re-categorized. A broader selection of blockage categories could be maintained (and selected from by parents/schoolboards/sys-admins who want to use a subset of the list). A vast army of concerned parents could be enlisted to help keep the list current by contributing new block candidates if there was a universal list.

    Let the existing companies change their focus to develop more accurate context-filtration for when naughty bits get past the list, and leave the list to the global community, because the blockage list itself is an ideal case for open-source.

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