Companies tossing aside consumers' freedoms

The San Jose Mercury News ^ | Sunday, January 18, 2004 | Dan Gillmor

[Willie Green]

The digital revolution has been all about empowering people, to use technology in ways that broaden our horizons and our freedom. So when the tech industry began moving into consumer electronics, there were reasons to expect great things.

The consumer electronics companies, by and large, have sold closed boxes that deliberately limit customers' options. This is by tradition, in part for simplicity and ease of use, but also to placate an entertainment industry that tramples customers' rights in the name of curbing copyright infringement.

[DMCA]

Why do you hate Fair Use rights? You appear to think that they should totally be eliminated.

[sinkspur]

Why do you hate Fair Use rights?

Fair Use rights don't apply to software or music. They do apply to the written word, unless that written word is contained in a subscription section of a newspaper.

Let me ask you: why do you have problem paying people for what they produce? What makes you think you have the right to just take someone else's intellectual property and use it however you see fit?

[DMCA]

I have no problem paying people for what they produce. I do however have have a problem with Congress and the Court system corrupting the founders intent in regards to copyright.

Please provide a source for you claim that Fair Use doesn't apply to software and/or music.

Also please contact RIAA so they can correct this mistake on their website:

http://www.riaa.com/news%5Cnewsletter%5Cpress2000%5C022500.asp

"The fair use doctrine allows someone to use copyrighted material without the owner?s consent under limited circumstances. The exact reproduction of thousands of copyrighted works in their entirety, all for a commercial, for-profit purpose, has never been excused as a fair use. Moreover, whether consumers could rely on the fair use doctrine to individually load their own CDs onto Internet servers for personal listening, under the law, is completely irrelevant. The law is clear that MP3.com cannot stand in the shoes of its users for purposes of any fair use defense. Consider the implications of what MP3.com has done: The Supreme Court has said that individual consumers may be permitted to tape television shows for viewing at different times."

I am sure they will appreciate your expert advice.

[BlueNgold]

In your reply to me you took an extreme leap of logic, corrolating this issue to the 2nd Ammd issue. I did the same in my reply to you in order to illustrate how far fetched I believe your arguments are.

I also do not feel I am losing this argument.

You seem to be uspet that digital encryption may make it more difficult to make legal use of materials under 'fair use'. My core argument is simply this: (As stated before) To employ 'fair use' it is sometimes incumbent upon the user to go the extra mile. Sometimes you have to make a photocopy of a library book and re-type the material by hand. Sometimes you have to make a lesser quality audio or video recording. If the format available online does not lend itself to 'fair use', and the user has to take te extraordinary measure of actually going down to the store to buy the CD or video in order to gain access to the material that is not wrong nor is it an abridgement of rights.

Note to moderator: No offense taken in what DMCA wrote ... just a spirited discussion ... I too hope you find personally directed comments allowable as long as they are not demeaning or insulting ... this discussion is clearly not that.

[DMCA]

Please point out where I compared copyright to the 2nd adm. I did not. I said you where using the same logic as the gun grabbers. Let me repeat that, I said you where using the same logic as the gun grabbers.

As fo as bypasing the encryption, well, you can't. The DMCA makes that illegal, a felony that the FBI and Secret Service investigate. This is about as far away from the founders intent as CFR is.

[steve-b]

These issues have been explained to you so frequently that you may no longer be considered merely mistaken, but rather are established as a deliberate liar.

[sinkspur]

These issues have been explained to you so frequently that you may no longer be considered merely mistaken, but rather are established as a deliberate liar.

LOL!! That's your contribution to the discussion?

Take your nap.

[steve-b]

For every honest person like you, who will reproduce intellectual property ONLY for his own use, there are fifteen scoundrels who reproduce intellectual property and pass it around like candy to their friends, or even sell it, thereby benefitting from the work of others.

Someone such as yourself, who accepts the Sarah Brady argument for technology bans, is hardly at home on FR.

IOW, the abuse of others has lead to these electronic restrictions that, unfortunately, affect good people like you.

Irrelevant. Copyright holders simply do not have any legal right to restrict those actions that fall within the realm of fair use.

[steve-b]

If I own a piece of intellectual property, I will be happy if its use is restricted by whatever means.

Well, that's too bad, because the law grants you only the privilege of restricting certain specific actions (e.g. unauthorized distribution of copies).

I would be happy to plant land mines in my front yard to keep the neighbor's damn mutt from pooping on it, but I don't get to do that. The same principle applies here.

[sinkspur]

Copyright holders simply do not have any legal right to restrict those actions that fall within the realm of fair use.

Abuses of "fair use" (as is done on a daily basis right here on FR) have led to media producers and electronics makers cooperating. It's very easy to do, and the media producers are likely paying the makers to do it.

The ill effects of NAPSTER continue......

And, if you don't like what Sony or Panasonice is doing, buy somebody else's stuff.

[steve-b]

Also, exactly how does one "fair use" music?

OK, just this once I'll do your homework for you:

1. "Space-Shifting" (e.g. copying a CD to tape in order to play it in a car that has a tape player but no CD player).

2. "Time-Shifting" (e.g. copying a radio broadcast for later listening).

3. "Format-Shifting) (e.g. converting CD audio to MP3 files for use in an MP3 player).

[sinkspur]

I would be happy to plant land mines in my front yard to keep the neighbor's damn mutt from pooping on it, but I don't get to do that. The same principle applies here.

Sorry. If people don't like equipment that restricts what they do with that equipment, they won't buy it, and the manufacturer will quit making it.

THAT'S the principle that applies here. No company has to make a machine that allows you to copy a DVD or music. And you can't make them do it.

[sinkspur]

OK. You can do that now.

[steve-b]

Abuses of "fair use" (as is done on a daily basis right here on FR)

Why are you wasting your time by telling me? You need to be reporting this stuff to JimRob. (If you haven't been doing so "on a daily basis", then I'll have to conclude that you are (again) blowing smoke.)

And, if you don't like what Sony or Panasonice is doing, buy somebody else's stuff.

You are evading the issue, which is government intervention.

[sinkspur]

You are evading the issue, which is government intervention.

Where, in the article, does this stupid author accuse the government of intervening?

He's pissed that the manufacturers are doing this ON THEIR OWN.

The government shut down NAPSTER, but that was because they were giving away music for free.

[bk1000]

"Also, exactly how does one "fair use" music?"

Back in the LP days one could record a copy onto tape for one's use. Nowadays one might be expected to buy one copy for the home, and buy another copy to play in the car. If I recorded a copy for a friend was that theft? If I loan a friend a book to read have I sinned? Do libraries pay authors royalties? Has anyone you know ever disseminated the accounts or descriptions of a major league ball game without the express written permission of major league baseball? That fiend! The big issue here is over those that sell multiple copies, not individuals making one or two copies.

[agarrett]

Fair Use rights don't apply to software or music. They do apply to the written word, unless that written word is contained in a subscription section of a newspaper.

  Ummm, hold on Sinkspur. Are you sure that Fair Use does not apply to music? I was under the impression that it explicitly did so apply.

  To take a simple example... If there is a news report that takes place at a local shopping center, and there is some music playing in the background - do they need to pay royalties to the producers when airing the report? We've already discussed parodies, where I recall a case involving Weird Al Yankovic that explicitly said he could use some one else's music (Michael Jackson, I think) without their permission for purposes of parody.

  Now, I can't think of anything similar for software offhand. But that doesn't mean Fair Use doesn't apply. At least as I understand it, Fair Use is the default assumption. Unless there is some law specifically forbidding it, Fair Use should be assumed to apply.

  Is my understanding incorrect, or is there a law I'm not aware of? Thanks for your help,

Drew Garrett

[BlueNgold]

You compared the logic to gun grabbers, which I see as an extreme not germane to this topic. The gun grabbers want to squelch a constitutional right. The companies and artists involved here simply intend to use technology to maintain their copyrights. I see no comparison so I used an extreme example to make that point. Call it sarcasm.

I don't see encryption in the same light as you do. You need not bypass it, simply use another source. Buy the CD and copy it onto a digital tape, buy the DVD and copy it onto a VHS or DVT, buy the book or newspaper and scan it or photcopy it...

There are legal and accessible ways to maintain fair use. The copyright holder is not obliged to make it easy, or even accessible. Many fair use products rely on ground up re-creation without the benefit of downloads, copying, or taping. IMHO the founders would not be appalled, or even concerned. (In their day fair use meant transcribing or type-setting by hand. I think they understood the user had an obligation to perform some of the work to generate a 'fair use' product.)

We will apparently have to agree to disagree on this. It's been fun. Take care, and keep fighting for what you believe in.

[DMCA]

Let me try this yet another way. By saying your logic is the same I me that you wish to ban a tool/device that has legal uses simply because it can be used to do harm. That is what I mean. I never equated it with the 2nd adm.

About copying that DVD to tape, on a reasonably current setup you will have to bypass Macro-Vision which is illegal.

Once the mandatory change over to digital TV happens the alternative sources of non-digital content will dry up, pluging what some in the industry call the 'analog hole' & tech like the 'broadcast flag' that future equipment will have to follow stop Fair Use DEAD. How do you exercise your Fair Use rights if the only way to exercise them it by breaking the law.

This isn't what the Founders intended.

[drlevy88]

Just try that without their permission

Many people have, and have won the court cases.