Posted on 12/08/2001 4:43:40 PM PST by Jim Robinson
Apparently you're not that familiar with how the net works. Technically, it's a piece of cake to make life miserable for renegade web sites. Politically, it's more difficult.
The 50 Napster copycats are too challenging for mainstream America. They may even promote the record industry as you speculate FR does with newspapers. Napster was becoming a real alternative, a household name, and had to be taken down. Although I haven't investigated the 50 little copycats, I suspect most are a real PIA to find all of what you're looking for. Most people with lives would rather spend the $12.95 at the mall.
Should an out of country FR pop up just because they don't want to link, they'd lose half their audience in the first month. Same with any domestic copy pirate sites. If their was political support for taking any of that down, their DNS would first be removed from InterNic. Think you could still get at them by their IP number? Their IP could easily be removed from routers at key hubs. Anything they use could be bombarded with denial of service attacks. (Trillions of page requests per-second, and nothing else gets through.) On a smaller scale, that's what took down ebay and MS last year. It's really very easy.
Osama probably thought he was invincible a couple of months ago as well. All it took was the political will. That's why I compare bootleggers to rats. They are easy to eliminate. But if there's no determination, they'll continue to scurry around in the dark as small little creatures.
Those were rare and insignificant incidents that could be handled in a number of ways. (Similar to what I explained at the beginning of #157.) They're certainly not justification for institutionalizing universal disregard for copyrights and intellectual property.
Well, not likely an impossibility, just a big inconvenience. I think there are almost always ways to find an article in a back issue. So we're back to a "conflict" between property rights and convenience.
Actually, my previous post about accounting geeks and legal geeks was spot-on when it comes to this "convenience" issue. Let's pretend that a fellow named Hawking decides to take up critical media analysis of the Los Angeles Times. (Let's also pretend that he's an American citizen, too, while we're at it. **smile**)
There's this little deal called the ADA, that mandates making things "convenient" for guys like our Mr. Hawking. In the normal course of affairs, when Mr. Hawking wants to look up an old LAT article, and doesn't want to pay for it, he bops down to the local public library, which has spent our tax dollars to acquire microfiche of old LAT newspaper articles - full text, mind you. Of course, there's a little problem with our Mr. Hawking: he has a hard time getting into the local public library, and there are further problems with his use of the microfiche equipment. This is what's known as a straight-forward, in-your-face violation of the ADA (brought to you in part by ceratin liberal media rags!). I believe that this situation is actionable without notification.
Is there another way, you ask? (to be continued...)
Gosh where do I start with this beauty. I'll just take it one at a time.
A. I'm very "familiar with how the net works". Before the tech crashed it was my living, now I just do home technology.
B. More MP3's than ever are being DL'd by the same people that used Napster and the software (like KaZaA) is not a "PIA". In fact it's much better and allows users to exchange many types of files. A simple way around the technically illiterate sue happy idiots who thought they solved their problem because Napster's main thrust was files that happend to have a ".MP3" as an extension. Problem solved, handwringers loose.
C. If you're so familiar with how the net works, would you mind explaining to me how having the hosting server pysically located in Canada (or wherever), but the URL still being "freerepublic.com", or "freerepublic.com2" would make a difference? In case you haven't noticed, nobody is doing a reverse DNS before visiting FR, they just peck in the URL. I'm not even saying that JR should do this, I was just pulling a quick example out of my a$$. There are infinate ways to skin our proverbial "cat out of the bag".
D. Can you give me an example of where Internic disassociated a DNS because of some idiotic US judge's ill-conceived ruling? Didn't think so. Internick is not bound by US copyright, tort or even criminal law (Thank God).
E. Last time I checked DOS attacks are illegal, and I would hate to see the backlash to any entity, public or private that sanctioned it for their own use. Besides, bandwidth is like a commodity and such an endeavor would be hugely espensive and probably contrary to international law.
Those who want to control the internet (like the government and seemingly yourself) may win a few battles, but they'll lose the war in the long run. The best and brightest are in the private sector and your contention that sealing all the holes would be a "piece of cake" is absurd. Certain solutions to certain "problems" may be a piece of cake in the very short term, in the long run it will be impossible.
I've heard something like that was around but never cared to investigate. I'm sure it could be defeated in a few weeks. There's bound to be some kind of fingerprint that routers could ID and interrupt in some way. Just the news of another dozen people getting fined each week would drop traffic to almost nothing. Are you deliberately trying to not see the obvious?
"C…If you're so familiar with how the net works, would you mind explaining to me how having the hosting server pysically located in Canada (or wherever), but the URL still being "freerepublic.com", or "freerepublic.com2" would make a difference?"
Because most people like me wouldn't respect FR if it were simply an illegal pirate site running from copyright laws. This should be obvious.
"D. Can you give me an example of where Internic disassociated a DNS because of some idiotic US judge's ill-conceived ruling? Didn't think so. Internick is not bound by US copyright, tort or even criminal law (Thank God).
E. Last time I checked DOS attacks are illegal, and I would hate to see the backlash to any entity, public or private that sanctioned it for their own use. Besides, bandwidth is like a commodity and such an endeavor would be hugely espensive and probably contrary to international law. "
"The best and brightest are in the private sector and your contention that sealing all the holes would be a "piece of cake" is absurd. "
Until 3 months ago, you couldn't give me an example of the world uniting to defeat a modern terrorist organization that also thought it was untouchable. You're making my case for me that it's political, not technical. DOS attacks are not illegal if Congress authorizes a regulatory agency to conduct them. US Courts will back them up the same way they back up sutting down any kind of illegal business that you might open in the middle of Times Square. International courts? More politics. You're showing a lack of imagination here.
You can't define a single method accessible by the majority of ordinary citizens that I can't describe how to defeat. Try me. Except for hackers playing around with exotic tools, defeating this is a piece of cake technically.
===================================
A few years ago, I was walking down the street in one of Manila's poorer neighborhoods when I came upon a gaping hole where a sewer grate used to be. It was an experience doubtless familiar to many who have traveled in the Third World: someone had presumably looted a humble—but essential—piece of the city's infrastructure. It brought home to me not only what a robust infrastructure we take for granted in the West, but also how easily it can erode.
I am reminded of that missing sewer grate by an all-out battle brewing here in the United States—only the gaping hole we're threatened with is in the stacks of our public libraries. And in this case it's the publishing industry doing the looting. As we plunge into the digital realm, the nation's 16,000 public libraries are striving to uphold their tradition as protectors of public access to new books and articles. But publishers, in an increasingly bald, frontal assault on the library's mission, have something very different in mind: a pay-per-use model for information content that will largely shut libraries out.
The battle is being waged on many fronts, from legislative initiatives and lawsuits to the publishing industry's unilateral pursuit of copy-protection technologies that will keep users—including libraries—from sharing digital content. One of the loudest and most shameful voices in the debate is that of Patricia Schroeder, president and CEO of the Association of American Publishers. The former Colorado congresswoman enjoys a distinguished 12-term record of championing women's rights and sponsoring legislation such as the Family Medical Leave Act. But in her latest incarnation as a front for the publishing industry, Schroeder has been quoted as saying that publishers have to "learn to push back" against libraries, which she portrays as an organized band of pirates!
At her most hyperbolic, Schroeder has implied that if libraries let people borrow electronic versions of books and journal articles, there will be "no copyright left."
There's no question that publishers need to control content in cyberspace. But to hear Schroeder tell it, legions of librarygoers are primed to topple the publishing industry. She conjures up visions of readers pirating electronic copies of the latest works by E. O. Wilson and Maya Angelou faster than Napster users swapped songs by Metallica and Britney Spears. Her industry's answer to this far-fetched scenario is a preemptive campaign to make people pay for any and all access to published works—even those borrowed from libraries.
Just look at the fight over the back issues of journals and magazines. Following a legal precept called the "first-sale doctrine," once libraries have purchased a given copy of a magazine or book, they have been free to archive it and make it available to their patrons. But now, when libraries subscribe to a journal online, their access to back issues is at the vendor's discretion. Since publishers now see libraries as a threat to their ability to profit from this body of published work, they are trying to overturn the first-sale doctrine. What's more, journals and magazines are just a piece of a larger picture; both sides know that any new rules will likely govern access to e-books as well.
Perhaps even more troubling is the publishing industry's wholesale attack on the "fair use" provisions of copyright law, whereby parts of works can be legally quoted or copied for noncommercial and educational purposes. Take, for example, a scheme spelled out recently by Peter Chernin, president and chief operating officer of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, which counts HarperCollins Publishers among its vast media holdings. Chernin is calling for legislation that, according to Publishers Weekly, "guarantees publishers' control of not only the integrity of an original work, but of the extent and duration of users' access to that work, the availability of data about the work and restrictions on forwarding the work to others." Put in plain English, Chernin is advocating a world that precludes the possibility of libraries as we know them, save perhaps as repositories for the fast-aging hard copies they already hold.
We will undoubtedly hear much more from Schroeder and Chernin as this complex battle is joined. However, the answer is emphatically not to abandon the core mission of the library but to reinterpret it for these times. Whatever systems are developed to control the exchange of published work in the digital realm, we need to insist on provisions for the kind of public access that libraries have traditionally made possible. Too much is at stake to let the publishing industry undo the careful copyright balance we have all come to rely upon.
All of which brings me back to that Manila sewer grate. Just as residents there came to treat gaping holes in the street as a normal—even acceptable—condition, we could get used to a world without public libraries. But the absence of free and accessible information would leave a gaping hole in our "infostructure" and result in an impoverished world. It is a world we can—and should—resist.
Seth Shulman is a freelance writer and author of the recent book Owning The Future.
Are you trying to be comical?
Sorry for arguing with you. Until I talked to you, I didn't think there was any single person that could "defeat" a world wide network with untold thousands of intelligent techies in different countries with different laws. I didn't realize that all of these silly people will never find ways around elfman's brilliant technical solutions
Hell, who am I to argue with invinsible ignorance.
It all boils down to this: There are people that love freedom, and people that love control. You want to have federal agents spending time chasing after dopey 12 year olds exchanging files because of laws that were written in the 1800's instead of having the market and law reflect the information age, I don't.
You want a day when "Congress authorizes a regulatory agency" to perform DOS attacks on web activity that the said agency deems unfit. I can't believe you've been on this forum for this long and can't see how dangerous that could become.
If the ridiculously hypothetical happend where a politically motivated judge shuts down FR, and JimRob found a way to keep up the good fight, you would quit posting (like a good little boy) I wouldn't.
If you're so stuck on copyright laws that were concieved before the concept of digital information flying around the world at the speed of light, I suggest you not visit the forum as you're part of your own perceived problem.
I'm pretty much done with the back and forth so I'll let you have the last word (as all controllers must).
You might start by learning to read. I said, " the majority of ordinary citizens". No wonder you were laid off.
Hackers and "dopey 12 year olds" will find a way to trade CDs the same way they were dubbing cassettes in the 80s. Most of us grew out of it. The laws that shut down the technology that makes that capability as easy as checking email are no different than the laws that kept those dubbed cassettes out of Kmart.
You've simply created a little fantasy world of what I want. You can't even form a rational argument to support your paranoia. Just vague references and posturing.
If Jim refused to abide by an order to either cease and desist or only post links and if he went underground (which I'm absolutely sure he would not do), you'd be here alone with only the NWO tinfoil crowd.
I'm pretty much done with the back and forth so I'll let you have the last word (as all controllers must).
Or the gaping hole is a world without respect for intellectual property. (Actually, that would be a lot bigger than a manhole cover.)
I'm not afraid to let the market decide. If consumers will support a completely pay-per-view world, which I doubt, let it be. I think print holds an irreplaceable appeal. And its survival is supported if its electronic sharing is mitigated by driving consumers to their creator's web site if demanded.
Libraries are a public supported charity and will always exist in some form, even if they have to pay-per-view.
And finally, You don't have a right to my creation for free. That's the essence of communism.
Clearly we can see that you are full of corporate, pay-per-view baloney. We are not discussing "my creation", as in the creation of a single reporter. We are talking about large corporations, which force their menials, the journalists, to sign over the rights to their creations (for a minimal stipend). These large corporations, which increase in size and decrease in number daily, then sell these creations, which are NOT of their hand, to me and you and the rest of the public through the vehicle of the public library or university. THIS vehicle is the major source of income for these large media corporations.
Or are you so naive as to believe that they get their operating revenue from newspaper machines?
I paid for this stuff, with my tax dollars. And since I can get it at the public library, I should be able to get it at home over the Net. For free. Because if access is being denied to me, then it's being denied to handicapped people. And that's a prima facie violation of the ADA.
Just as the sexual harassment bill that x42 signed came back to bite him in the behind, we see that the ADA legislation that was trumpeted by these self-same liberals is going to come back to bite them.
You're just plain wrong on this.
I presume that you're just screwing with me, going to get a rise out of the free marketer egh? That's just way too overdone, too anti-corporate and statist.
Just incase someone's tempted to buy this, the majority of revenue to periodicals comes from advertising, not taxes. If I sell the right to my work to a publisher, no one "forced" me.
Just because state funded libraries buy copies does not mean that my publisher loses all his distribution rights. If that happened, its value goes down, I get paid less, and you'll have stolen my work from me and robed me of future income and my right to do what I wish with what I create. Again, that is the essence of communism.
This is not true of the entities that we are talking about. Advertising in The Los Angeles Times has little or no interest to people in the Ohio Valley or in Alabama.
However, LAT has an interest in peddling their rag and its archives to public libraries, college and university libraries, etc. in the Ohio Valley, Alabama and elsewhere. This is a very stable source of income for these entities, and now that they've begun eliminating microfiche and replacing it with online access, it probably is becoming quite the cash cow for the bean-counting geeks there. You don't suppose that when they began going to single-copy electronic archiving, their money people said, "Well, this new electronic method will pare our equipment and manual labor costs (microfiche for HOW MANY public and university libraries??!!?), so we're going to reduce the price for access."?
In fact, I'd be willing to bet that they went for the gouge. That's probably a nice little scandal in itself.
No, my friend - you'd be surprised at what's going on. I gave you that article above as a small sample of the machinations going on behind the scenes at your friendly local library.
One of the biggest problems we've had at FR is this "fair use" argument. The usages here are quite obviously the "fair use" of the statute; however, on the Net, it's easy to debate even the fact that the sun rises in the East. It's easy to cry "theft", and easier yet to get the "magnificent Ninth" to back you up. [Now, there was an instance where advertising was an instance of revenue. ;-)]
I've actually been setting you up for the big fall, and now I'll even let you see the banana peel before you slip on it.
Newsbank.
Documentation must be provided to users with disabilities in alternative formats. In selection of format, priority is given to the user's own format preference (following the ADA).
Jim laid bare his soul for discussion purposes and it's degenerated int the two of you are attempting to "out geek" each other.
Snap out of it, and move on.
I believe we've been complimented. ;-)
Do a search on "newsbank" and "pricing". As Spock was wont to say: "Fascinating!"
Merry Christmas to you all!
AND,......AND,........AND,.........."THE CHECK IS IN THE MAIL"..............Forever, Thanks!!!!! FOR FreeRepublic and The Freeper Family!!! (Your extended FRamily!)
Well, welcome home!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.