DRM for Public Domain works at B&N

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by Requiem

Just a point I want to make here, a large amount of PD books are translations of even older texts. (Think Beowulf) The translator gets his copyright on the work he did, when theoretically he didn't change a single word. (emphasis on theoretically) Is that not copyrighting of work done on a title without adding any new material?

From the perspective of copyright law, translation is a subset of the rights inherent in copyright ownership. Therefore, it would seem to me that the translator does not have a copyright if the original material is itself still within copyright. In fact, unauthorized translation would seem to me to be infringement.

But if the original material is out of copyright, then I would think that the translator does indeed have a copyright in the translation. In a sense, the entire translated work is new material. Translation is a much more complicated and difficult subject than most people realize. All you have to do to appreciate that is try out two different translations of, say, Don Quixote or War & Peace. In fact, when I'm dealing with high literature of that kind, I tend to read two translations at the same time, because it's kind of neat to see the different ways the same thing is translated.

I am really indifferent to most of this, 99 cents for a well formatted book is more than reasonable to me.

Totally agree.

What I would really like to see is a more buffett style reader experience where I pay X amount of dollars a month for unlimited books and as long as I keep paying that X amount I will keep the ability to read those same books.

That would be an interesting business model. And it could be set up as a legitimate leasing situation, unlike the present business models of Amazon & Sony/Borders, which seem to claim lease but actually more resemble sales, from a legal perspective.

One other thing I have noticed are that people that scream about DRM are the ones that enable the bootlegging of whatever it is the DRM is protecting. (I didn't say perpetuate, I said enable)

I don't see any basis for making such a claim. Bootleggers defeat DRM easily. Those of us who see how DRM is being used to defeat the legitimate rights of users are not enabling pirates.

NO ONE has the right to take and freely distribute a copyrighted item, NO ONE. Which includes B&N's version of the PD files, Those specific copies contain newly copyrighted material and those copies ARE protected therefore the file is protected. I have never heard of 10 pages being DRM'ed while the rest is left without. I am not even sure if they have that ability. There are copies of PD that are NOT copyrighted and those are free to distribute. This is not a complicated issue in the context of the article.

B&N has no legal right to claim copyright that covers public domain material, merely because they package legitimately copyrighted material along with the public domain material. What they have is a practical right created by the DMCA ban on DRM removal tools. If B&N can't figure out how to segregate the two in one file, it would be easy enough to simply create two files, one with the copyright material, and one without, and sell the two together.

Hey guess what? That's the artists RIGHT to do what he pleases with his/her work.

Hey, guess what? There is no such right, except to the extent created by the copyright statute, which in point of fact and law limits the artist's right. That is what "fair use" is all about. And the problem with DRM is that it eliminates fair use.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by rixte

I'm not a fan of DRM, since I don't think it has any real benefit beyond making publishers feel like they're doing *something*, however impotent. But I'm not seeing how you're making the leap to DRM as a copyright elimination device (unless you mean the DMCA?).

Precisely, the DMCA facilitates the use of DRM to accomplish this.

Here's how I see it:

In the US, fair use is carved out from the ownership rights established in artistic works by the copyright law. In other words, fair use amounts to those rights which the copyright owner does not, in fact, own. Those fair use rights are owned by the public.

DRM prevents the public from exercising its fair use rights, because as a practical matter, the DMCA prevents anyone from acquiring the tools necessary to get around DRM in order to make fair use of the material involved.

Check out http://www.unt.edu/policy/UNT_Policy/volume3/19_2.html

It is beyond dispute, for example, that a university professor can take a slice/chapter/endnote from Infinite Jest, photocopy it, distribute it to his class, and not be in violation of copyright. This is easily done with the paper book, except for getting the damn thing to lie down right on the copy machine.

But DRM prevents a university professor from taking the exact same material in electronic form, and distribute it to his class on their computers. Instead, he has to hire a typist, get it typed into a file, proof the document, &c, and the bottom line is that the professor tells the class to buy the book from Amazon instead.

So what has happened here is that DRM has defeated fair use, which contemplates exactly the opposite, namely, that the class does NOT have to pay for using the material.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Oh, please. Copyright has nothing to do with "control" of culture for anything other than commercial reasons. If you want to witness real cultural control for political reasons, keep your eye on places where it's actually happening -- e.g. China, Russia, Myanmar/Burma, Cuba, Iran etc

Except he did not say "control." He said "cultural appropriation by increasingly-hegemonic corporate structures, the use of artists as a figleaf for said theft, and the restriction of available cultural material for current artists."

Which I think is a very precise description of exactly what is going on.

[rogue_ronin]

Originally Posted by Requiem

I am not really sure what you are trying to accomplish with your "milk crate" preaching, mixed with underhanded personal attacks on people who are trying to have a civilized conversation about an issue that involves us all. But usually when I see people preaching, I just ignore them, because that, my misguided friend, is MY right.

I'm trying to radicalize you. And there's nothing 'underhanded' about my 'attacks' on you. I'm calling you an enabler, straight-out. There is nothing 'uncivilized' about my contribution to the conversation. You just don't like it.

And if it involves us all, how is it that I don't count as part of the 'all'? The answer of course, is that when you live in the mushy middle, you fear and instinctively exclude someone who doesn't pat you on the head.

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Sony is not trying to make us supporters of a new Japanese Co-Prosperity Sphere, and Apple is not trying to turn everyone into hippies. So, "commercial reasons" are not particularly political -- unless you adhere to the point of view that your choice of soap is also a "political act." It's technically accurate but rarely a useful position. And it's bupkis compared to overt totalitarian control of information.

Never claimed either was, please point to the reference. (And of course, now you attempt to mock and provide straw men in an unnecessary attempt to marginalize me. I'm quite at the margins already.)

Really, Sony and Apple? Both are shining examples of attempting to ignore and eliminate openness.

And it is not 'bupkis', of course -- the main reason being that people being controlled overtly are aware of that control. It's much more insidious to be a member of a class of people that truly have power to affect others, and to use it to benefit only themselves while inculcating a set of values that breed ignorance, learned helplessness, and passivity.

Yeah, whatever. In some cases it can be difficult to knock out a market leader, in other cases it's a snap. Yesterday MySpace was the big dog, today it's Facebook, tomorrow it's Twitter. Google barely existed 20 years ago, and today they're a major force in the exchange of information and a major threat to Microsoft's OS monopoly. For all any of us knows, Sony or Apple could be gone in 10 years.

I know that you can't understand, but I'll try again. It doesn't matter what particular large company is in charge of any particular industry segment at any particular time. The mindset and class of people that form these companies will always prey on the rest of us. They can't help it -- their values are primarily those of profit and loss. Other values are abandoned, bit by bit, as individual members of these companies whittle away, trying to climb the sociopathic ladder of success. And they have disproportionate power to affect policy and behavior.

I.e. I don't see much of an indication, let alone definitive proof, that the whole world will be run by Buy n' Large by 2030.

That's largely because you've accepted the values that will enable them to do so. And, of course, it already is. The current worldwide economic downturn is a direct result of mostly US corporate ideology made into policy.

Oh, so you get to invoke vague doomsday scenarios of utter "corporate control" of content, but it's improper to point out the drastic nature of actual, existing and current methods of political control of content, in order to inject some perspective into the discussion? Nice.

Because, of course, DRM and the mindset that it grows from are largely corporate. You want to talk about the imperial impulse, mixed with pride, arrogance, nationalism, racism, the profit-motive and the resultant corporate propoganda which led to at least a million dead Iraqis? From a people that largely think they're exceptional? I don't, it won't add anything -- it'll just degenerate to name-calling. Glass houses, friend.

1) We're discussing DRM, not the validity of copyright laws. These situations have nothing to do with DRM

.

We're talking about both. They interrelate, and they've been the topic since long before you decided that you were the defender of corporate power.

2) Didn't you laud the value of copyright a few paragraphs ago? Either you like it or you don't, which is it?

Again: I like copyright that serves artists, I don't like cultural appropriation via continued copyright extension and rent-seeking. Try, just try to recognize the distinction.

3) The situations you cited have nothing to do with monopolistic practices. Even a small company can hold and enforce the rights to a well-known artwork.

The size part is true, as far as it goes. But, as a class, it still keeps control of culture in the realm of business and corporations for far too long. That's the problem. You think a small company that holds a copyright is going to revert it to the artist? Or will it be likely to sell it to some larger company at some future point? Remember, corporations above a certain size live for a very long time.

Sorry, not seeing much evidence of this -- other than the actions of totalitarian regimes. If anything, it's easier today than in the past to produce and distribute content without the backing of a large corporate entity, government and/or wealthy patron.

It's a hell of a lot easier to close someone down, too. Heard of the DMCA? Attempts to tier internet access? Or if you want to go outside the US, how about the efforts in France to shut down peoples internet access based on nothing more than a corporate accusation of infringement? Western democracies, right? It'll just keep getting worse, you know -- it's part of the psychology. Totalitarian regimes don't always grow from Russian Revolutions.

(That's just access related: as an example of how content is squelched by large corporations, how about the recent deal between GE and FOX that kept criticism of GE's mismanagement and thievery in Iraq off of FOX for quid pro quo regarding criticism of Bill O'Reilly? This is what happens -- and if it can happen in journalism, the supposed Fourth Estate, what do you think happens in smaller cases every day? It's a messed-up set of values that would kill us all for "success".)

As much as people squeal about DRM and limited formats, almost every portable device I've seen allows at least one open format (if not several). Rights holders may be focusing on halting the illegal distribution of their content, but don't care much (if at all) about those who choose to release it for free.

Sure, there are channels. But they're not the primary feeds of the people who control the content, are they? Look at the front page of MR, right now, about how Amazon forced Mobi off the Cybook, because it won't allow other methods of DRM on a device that uses Mobipocket. They're competing to be the distribution channel, and whoever comes out on top, you think they're gonna stop with that? Naive.

And I'm squealing, am I? You realize that I'm trying to play fair with you, attempting to call you on mushy thinking and internalized propaganda, right? I have tried to be explicit in my criticisms. I've questioned your values, but I haven't reduced you to a pig. You ought to consider the values you hold that allow you to do that.

Again, yet more evidence that radicalism is not exactly the key to rational thought.

Rational thought is the key to radicalism, however. Mushy, middle-path followers of their social superiors are pretty good at spouting catch-phrases about competition and success, though, much better than radicals. Who aren't really radicals, really, but who have had their values vilified by the powerful and driven outside the circle of acceptable debate.

The truly radical ideas are the ones that have devalued our democracy and our culture with the corrosive effect of commoditized thinking.

Emusic and Amazon's music downloads have always been MP3's, i.e. no DRM. Apple is making a push to selling music without DRM. The companies you're terrified of are doing exactly what you want, namely ditching DRM, and you're still afraid?

Yup, it's not just DRM. It's the marshalling of distribution streams by large retailers.

I mean, really. What are you looking for, a world where no one charges for digital content?

No. It's always money, isn't it?

The abandonment of all copyright?

No. Said so repeatedly, but you gotta keep setting up that strawman.

Or perhaps there a magic number of retailers that would satisfy you? 10? 15? 30? 100? If the market doesn't support the number of retailers you like, who has to pay to support their existence?

Maybe there is a magic number, have to cast some bones to see. I'm a magical thinker, see, devoted to wishful thinking and trusting in higher powers.

But for now, I'm sure that it isn't 3. Or 1. I'll accept 100, that's a good place to start. No one should pay to support their existence, but no one should pay one of them to drive the others out of existence. As always, arguments in this area devolve to money, and who pays. Freedom is always about the freedom to do business to the commoditized thinker.

Or, what's your alternative to the capitalist approach -- government distribution of content, perhaps? Or perhaps governments should subsidize any and every retailer and distributor of digital content?

Ooh, the communist boogie man, the evil government boogie man. Typical right-wing dog-whistling. Have I said capitalism needs to be eliminated? I haven't. But for the mushy, any consideration of limits on the rich and powerful is taken as an all-out desire to ban making money.

I'd settle for a limit on the size of corporations, elimination of all monopolies and monopolistic practices, and support for the arts and artists, in general. Because art doesn't fit neatly into the business frame, and it shouldn't be forced to.

And will eliminating DRM even make much of a dent in the formation of a monopoly? Apple's music sales are now increasingly eschewing DRM, yet the iTunes store, iPod and iPhone are still the big dogs....

Probably not. But the elimination of making it a crime to eliminate DRM might help. The elimination of perpetual copyright extension might help. The elimination of copyright holding by companies might help. A general prohibition on monopolistic behavior, and enforcement of it might help. Lots of possibilities. All of them anathema to the unbridled pursuit of profit, though, so unlikely to appeal to the mushy.

Your ideas seem rather hysterical and poorly thought out. Have fun winning people over to your position. :P

Another right-wing tactic: call someone hysterical, feminizing them when you think they're male. The obverse is calling a women strident, or shrill, making them un-feminine. Typical.

I've called you mushy, middle-of-the-road and subservient to your social superiors. But the real crux of my disappointment in you is that you won't even address what I'm talking about, you keep making the discussion about capitalism, or piracy, dropping into absolutism about my positions where I am not absolute.

Of course I am. Guess what? The requirement to pay for a sample has obviously not even remotely slowed down the practice.

Oh, yes it has. But not so much by artists signed by corporations that already control those copyrights. Who then control the copyrights on the secondary artist. Don't mistake that for grassroots use of music sampling.

Most of the examples I cited indicate that copyright does not seem to have done much to hinder the production of cultural products, and it certainly hasn't stopped artists from being influenced by their contemporaries. Read an interview with any artist in the last 20 years, and they will list their recent influences ad nauseum.

Influence is not use of older cultural material.

Man, do you even read what you write?

And you're massively ignoring the trends that are working to the contrary: e.g. open standards, market and cultural fragmentation, a proliferation in media outlets, easy distribution, radical drops in the cost of media production, rejections by artists of large publishers, and of course ignoring the plentiful evidence that belies your position.

Maybe I am. Probably because none of that has anything to do with infection with DRM, the criminalization of its removal, the use of corporate power to vacuum up cultural content, and the restrictions on use of cultural content by artists. Some of what you list are reactions to corporate overreach, but they have little power to undo the damage already done.

They are all good things, but largely stand separate from the massive center of the discussion. In fact, I would argue that all those things are an impetus for the growth of the sort of behavior that we're seeing in corporations and their political allies.

You're welcome to believe that the sky is falling, but I see no evidence for it.

That's because you're always looking down at the feet of your master.

I can play the insult game, too.

m a r

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by rogue_ronin

So commercial reasons are not political? (Because, of course, a la American Dream, all that wealth is just created by...

You're ranting. And while rants can be fun, they don't usually persuade anyone. Are you enjoying the rant, or trying to convince people?

The twentieth century is locked up, and so will be the twenty-first. The things that matter, that people want to talk about and use are imprisoned by the companies that "own" them.

This valid point is being lost in the midst of all the babble about evil governments and corporate conspiracies. Keep your talking points short and lucid, or you'll lose your audience.

I'm not talking about fan fiction. That's mostly "Mary Sue"s living out an adolescent fantasy. I'm talking about artists remixing their culture, for their profit. From stuff that should be available to them, but isn't because we keep giving more cultural assets and control to companies.

How much fan fiction do you read? (Rhetorical question; the answer is obviously "little to none.")

1) You've managed to insult a large number of intelligent, articulate people who are often well-informed about IP law technicalities, and generally in favor of less restrictive applications of those laws.

2) You've shown yourself ignorant of the habits of several thousand readers and writers who've been actively fighting against copyright encroachment on fair use for over forty years.

3) If you don't think fan fiction is remixing popular culture, you obviously haven't been paying attention.

The Wind Done Gone? Fanfic.
My Jim? Fanfic.
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies? Fanfic.
Bored of the Rings? Fanfic.

The difference between those, and the stuff at An Archive of Our Own, is that the ones at the archive (1) haven't been published in books and (2) don't have big lawyers to convince the original IP owners that they're parodies or transformative works.

(Except, of course, for the Shakespeare, Jane Austen & Sherlock Holmes fanfic, which could be published for profit without having to prove anything. The authors are having too much fun writing for friends to bother with the hassles. Also, the market for erotic Sherlock Holmes short stories is a limited one.)

I know fanfic--who writes it, why, who they write for, what they get out if it, what it can look like when it's done. You obviously don't. Knowing how wrong you are in your casual statement about fanfic, makes me question everything you have to say about topics I'm less familiar with.

If you want to persuade people, stick to topics you actually know. Right now, you sound like someone with a whole swarm of opinions that are mostly based on distorted understandings of topics you've looked at but not researched.

[ahi]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

You're ranting. And while rants can be fun, they don't usually persuade anyone. Are you enjoying the rant, or trying to convince people?



This valid point is being lost in the midst of all the babble about evil governments and corporate conspiracies. Keep your talking points short and lucid, or you'll lose your audience.



How much fan fiction do you read? (Rhetorical question; the answer is obviously "little to none.")

1) You've managed to insult a large number of intelligent, articulate people who are often well-informed about IP law technicalities, and generally in favor of less restrictive applications of those laws.

2) You've shown yourself ignorant of the habits of several thousand readers and writers who've been actively fighting against copyright encroachment on fair use for over forty years.

3) If you don't think fan fiction is remixing popular culture, you obviously haven't been paying attention.

The Wind Done Gone? Fanfic.
My Jim? Fanfic.
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies? Fanfic.
Bored of the Rings? Fanfic.

The difference between those, and the stuff at An Archive of Our Own, is that the ones at the archive (1) haven't been published in books and (2) don't have big lawyers to convince the original IP owners that they're parodies or transformative works.

(Except, of course, for the Shakespeare, Jane Austen & Sherlock Holmes fanfic, which could be published for profit without having to prove anything. The authors are having too much fun writing for friends to bother with the hassles. Also, the market for erotic Sherlock Holmes short stories is a limited one.)

I know fanfic--who writes it, why, who they write for, what they get out if it, what it can look like when it's done. You obviously don't. Knowing how wrong you are in your casual statement about fanfic, makes me question everything you have to say about topics I'm less familiar with.

If you want to persuade people, stick to topics you actually know. Right now, you sound like someone with a whole swarm of opinions that are mostly based on distorted understandings of topics you've looked at but not researched.

I think a great deal of a lot of your posts, Elfwreck, but in this instance I've found rougue_ronin cogent and articulate and even relatively restrained, while your responses to him seem somewhat less so.

- Ahi

[Lemurion]

I don't like DRM. I won't go so far as to say that it's evil, but there are a large number of companies using DRM and similar mechanisms to achieve goals that are not in anyone's best interest except their stockholders.

Personally, I believe the biggest reason for DRM is to enforce planned obsolescence on intellectual property. DRM is a great tool to make honest customers rebuy the same content over and over again. Effectively perpetual copyright (which is the end result of continuous copyright extensions) is just another tool for the same end. Eliminate competition, and allow rights-holders to resell things over and over again to the same customers.

As to the existence of a "Pro-DRM Lobby" of corporate IP hegemonists, I think recent developments with HD video are clear evidence of the way a number of corporations are approaching things.

Look up HDCP encryption and you'll see what I mean. Even a home-made Blu-ray has to be encrypted and locked down if it is to be played back over a computer.

There is a movement to lock down and limit our ability to enjoy content so that corporate interests can continue to monetize it.

At the moment we're caught in the middle of a nasty feedback loop where we have the content industry on one side fighting for tighter controls, and the information must be free lobby on the other side seeking to deny all the fruits of copyright. Unfortunately, the content industry has pushed the legal pendulum too far in one direction, and the backlash is leading to widespread piracy.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by ahi

I think a great deal of a lot of your posts, Elfwreck, but in this instance I've found rougue_ronin cogent and articulate and even relatively restrained, while your responses to him seem somewhat less so.

Thank you! We'll probably continue to disagree somewhat on the future of PDFs, but I respect your opinions; they're grounded in real understanding.

I found rogue_ronin's posts in this thread to be mostly coherent--because I'm well-versed in copyfight propaganda. He jumped between DRM, copyright law, and cultural appropriation by corporations as if they were interchangeable concepts, without explaining the connections. He's also insulting those who disagree with him, implying they're ignorant or thick-witted, and claiming that those who find his arguments lacking are insulting him.

Ranting. Not explaining, not persuading. I'll admit that some people are persuaded by rants, but there's not many of those at mobileread.

(Also, he insulted fanfic! How dare he imply that Kirk/McCoy slash is anything other than high art!)

Were I in the right mindset for his arguments, they'd be perfectly clear. At the moment, I'm in the middle of an insanely busy weekend after a terribly hectic work-week, and the more subtle nuances of DRM-DMCA-Berne Convention-Disney's attempt to take over the world are a bit beyond me... and his posts come across as rants, not discussion points.

If one's arguments require the reader to already agree with one's conclusion, or if they require the reader to have already made the same mental connection between points, they're not valid.

That doesn't mean they're wrong--they just don't work as supported points intended to persuade.

(I think most publishers' free pdf ebooks are bad, because they're not tagged, have no bookmarks, and have page sizes that look awful on a dedicated ebook reader. Someone else might also think they're bad... because he doesn't like Acrobat Reader and he once got in a screaming fight with customer support at Adobe. His arguments, with the same conclusion as mine, are not valid.)

[Kali Yuga]

I agree that rogue_ronin is ranting, though I think he's doing so in a rather incoherent fashion. Or maybe it's his philosophy that's incoherent. Hard to say, I guess.

However, pretty clear to me, rogue, that your defining characteristic is not so much your self-proclaimed radicalism, it's pessimism (coupled with, as per usual, a nice dose of confirmation bias). You conveniently ignore any evidence that does not support your "Big Is Bad" thesis, you seem convinced that humanity is doomed to be spoon-fed content by a single monopolistic entity, and seem incapable of presenting a workable alternative.

Who cares that 30 years ago, there were 3 dominant television networks in the US, and now there are hundreds of television broadcasters? Or that anyone with a good amount of bandwidth can set up their own podcast and/or streaming radio station and access an international audience? Or that independent record labels barely existed in the past, and now are abundant and able to distribute their works easier? Or that a single author who wanted to self-publish 10 years ago had almost no means to do so, and now has options including print on demand and self-publication of e-books to an international audience? Or that the cost of making and distributing digital media has dropped precipitously? Or that political opinions used to be relegated in newspapers to "Letters to the Editor," and now proliferate on blogs? Or that many of the enforcers of copyright are just as likely to be small as large or even non-profit organizations (e.g. ASCAP, BMI)? Or that media companies are getting disrupted by new technologies and new mediums every time we turn around? Or that the companies you decry as vile monopolists barely existed 10 or 20 years ago? Or that right in front of us, there is a veritable explosion in e-book publishers, retailers and distributors, who are rushing to get the public e-books using a wide variety of devices -- many of whom are eschewing DRM?

Mind you, I am aware that this is not exclusively going in one direction; there is media consolidation going on, but lots of proliferation as well. And the proliferation is happening despite the existence and use of the DMCA, DRM, copyright enforcement, and regular kvetching over various issues by rights holders. Your primary response is that some vague amorphous collection of companies is going to mysteriously take this away is not proof of anything but your own pessimism.

And then there's the old saw that "Big Is Bad." How big? What standards should we use -- revenues? Market share? Market capitalization? Number of employees? Number of titles the company publishes and/or retails? The number of mediums the company participates in? The age of the company? Who gets the rights to which artworks when the company is broken up? Is there a "trigger" at which size a company changes from engaging in acceptable behavior to unacceptable one? Is the actual corporate behavior even relevant, or is it just the size that "proves" the company can't be trusted? Does size even matter, since there is apparently an entire "class" of individuals who are all trying to manipulate access to content?

Not to mention that no one is putting a gun to our heads and forcing us to buy from a specific retailer; if people are flocking to Retailer X, where is the moral imperative to stop these individuals from choosing to buy from Retailer X? Or is everyone -- oh, sorry, everyone except Enlightened Radicals -- a bunch of capitalist puppets? And if monopolization is as "inevitable" as you believe, what's the point? According to your own beliefs, they're just going to turn into monopolies again anyway....

(I.e. there is the argument that the arts and media have never been free of the prevailing ideological concepts of its given or subsequent eras of creation and transmission; artists are just as much the alleged victims of the economic, religious, political and social strictures imposed on everyone else. The idea that the arts are somehow "free" or "above" such elements, or ever could be, is inconsistent and/or wishful thinking. I.e., if we are living in a world where we are in the implacable grips of various capitalist power structures, the artists of tomorrow will be caught in just as tight a grip of the existing power structures of their era. There's a big difference between decrying the current economic structures, and crafting a viable replacement that does not generate its own set of problems, restraints and injustices....)

Oh, and who gets the fun job of breaking up a monopoly? A government, I presume. Oh, I'm sure there's no chance of that getting abused. Heck, Thailand right now can't even form a government for more than a few months without its political opponents shutting down the country, not to mention that unfortunately corruption is a substantial problem in Thailand. The US can't sponsor public media or arts without meddling in its content. And I presume these are the people that you want to be watchdogs over media...?

So while you proclaim the alleged superiority of your radical pessimism, I look around and see a world where information flows more freely than at any time in human history (even with, or despite, the presence of DRM), and when almost anyone in a democratic society has a better education and access to more artworks and media than all but the wealthiest families as recently as 200 years ago. I.e. the trend now is towards more access and availability, not less.


P.S.: I was reading Chomsky, Foucault and Marx while you were probably still in short pants. The novelty of your perspective has long since worn off for me.

[Lo Zeno]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

So while you proclaim the alleged superiority of your radical pessimism, I look around and see a world where information flows more freely than at any time in human history (even with, or despite, the presence of DRM), and when almost anyone in a democratic society has a better education and access to more artworks and media than all but the wealthiest families as recently as 200 years ago. I.e. the trend now is towards more access and availability, not less.

I see informations flow freely all over the world, and knowledge is more widespread than before; but still, half of this happens illegally. I have to thank eMule, the various torrent sites and the Onion-Tor network for the terabytes of information that flow throught the internet every second.

A friend of mine said that the way DRM is applied is just a way to apply old copyright schemes to a new way of sharing knowledge.
There's something I notice in this thread, and it is that everybody talks about USA copyright laws and DMCA. Still, that's just one country, and the world is much larger: DMCA here is toilet paper, copyright laws where I live are different, yet the main distribution channels do not care.
Why, when I buy something in digital form, do I have to deal with a DRM that suits only the US laws? As I said before, Italian courts declared that anyone can strip his/her files of any DRM if the purpose is to enjoy them in a different device; still, this is something that only someone with a certain degree of technological knowledge can do, not everyone; so, why do every distributor enforces something that reduces the rights that I have (I'm speaking only of Italy)?

In short: why do all those who distribute digital information consider only the laws of ONE country? By doing this, by enforcing a policy that is right for a country but not for the other, they dig and block what is a purchaser's right in another country.
That's the greatest mistake that I keep seeing: the internet is the same for everyone, but laws (and rights) are not. Either they make a universal copyright act, or distributors should start considering different approaches to different markets, and I assure you they usually do not, or not completely.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by Harmon

So what has happened here is that DRM has defeated fair use

Which, IMO, is exactly what DRM is intended for.

[Requiem]

You might want to read up on what Fair Use actually is, personal use is not included in US copyright law. It even goes further to be decided on a case by case basis. In US law this is it for "fair use" (I agree with Harmon on the professor example, he is dead on, but that is not what most of the ranting has been about. Not many of us are public officials or responsible for teaching a class, etc.)

Sec 106 and 106a are also of importance to the author's rights but not to my point here so it has not been included.

My main question; where in this law does it state anything about ever owning the material we buy? Technically we have never owned it, only the paper it is printed on. Therefore there is no material included with a digital file so the actual download is completely owned by someone else. I don't think that this is the best solution, but for now, and has been for awhile, the law. The interpretation of the law has been proven with the huge mp3 lawsuits and the rulings on those cases. Those precedents are the ones that matter as precedence seems to create the law in a fluid fashion rather than a true resolution.

I hate that the courts are making policy, but we are, and have been, going into a new era of information availability and the quickest to respond is always the courts. They judge based on their interpretation of the laws as written. The issue is congress, and until they get something going the courts will continue to see everything on a case by case basis and rule completely based on the framework of law that has been provided to them. (However meager and lacking they are)

Rather than rant about the situation on a forum, call your congress-person, call you local authorities, get involved in the real sense of doing something, though a radical "government and business is out to take over and get me" ideal is probably not going to get you anywhere except maybe on the FBI watch list.

US Code Chapter 1 Title 17 § 107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use

Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include—
(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.

[PKFFW]

Originally Posted by Requiem

Rather than rant about the situation on a forum, call your congress-person, call you local authorities, get involved in the real sense of doing something, though a radical "government and business is out to take over and get me" ideal is probably not going to get you anywhere except maybe on the FBI watch list.

But that takes so much more effort than simply downloading whatever you want from a file-sharing network and ranting on a forum board!!

Cheers,
PKFFW

[sircastor]

Originally Posted by Requiem

My main question; where in this law does it state anything about ever owning the material we buy? Technically we have never owned it, only the paper it is printed on. Therefore there is no material included with a digital file so the actual download is completely owned by someone else. I don't think that this is the best solution, but for now, and has been for awhile, the law. The interpretation of the law has been proven with the huge mp3 lawsuits and the rulings on those cases. Those precedents are the ones that matter as precedence seems to create the law in a fluid fashion rather than a true resolution.

You have to admit though, that with the exchange, there is an implied license that the instance you've exchanged for is yours to use, in a limited fashion. The ownership is in that license for use, not in the content itself. This is a basic component of exchange, and is the root of most (if not all) human interaction.

[anappo]

> US Code Chapter 1 Title 17 § 107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use

All of which are void due to DMCA. So this:

> So what has happened here is that DRM has defeated fair use

stands.

> call you local authorities, get involved in the real sense of doing something

Done that. http://ec.europa.eu/information_soci...0/index_en.htm

Have you? Or are you quite happy with the status quo?