D-R-Aime?

... and other observations
What is DRAime? It's a blog that talks about D, R and ...M! I know what the D stands for, I know what the R stands for, but I have yet to understand what the M is for.
Management? Mismanagement? Misery? Mystery? All bets are on!
(For those who don't know, Aime, in french, is pronounced M and means to like - which gives us DRM)

Tuesday, January 25, 2005

Some comments on the VSDA brief.

From page 5:

Accordingly, “peer-to-peer distribution” in the present context is a misnomer under the Copyright Act, for nothing is being distributed.

This is in reference to peer to peer "distribution". I guess that section raises a good point, that this is more reproduction than it is distribution, since there is nothing tangible being distributed.

They also argue that "file-sharing" is a misnomer:

This is simply not a case in which two or more people make use of the same copy or phonorecord. Rather, each file “shared” results in an additional copy.

This I have to say is a bit problematic. Per Merriam-Webster:

Sharing: 2 a : to partake of, use, experience, occupy, or enjoy with others b : to have in common

Clearly this would qualify as sharing. I could also see a p2p system where a token is transfered with the file being shared that would indicate who has "the" copy at a specific moment, to ensure that the additional copy does not really count as one.

Later they discuss the following:

2. Remedies that preserve the noninfringing uses are permissible

It is said that for every legal right there is a legal remedy when that right is infringed, Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137 (1803). The problem in Sony was that the remedy being sought – a complete ban on sales of the Betamax machine – would itself infringe the rights of others. In such case, the remedy (and with it the liability) could be denied. In effect, the burden (B) of completely enjoining the Betamax recorder was greater than even a high probability and gravity of copyright infringement (PL). In this case, in contrast, if Respondents’ software can be modified to make infringing use less probable, it may be feasible to lessen the use of Respondents’ peer-to-peer systems for infringing reproductions without burdening lawful reproductions.

So let me get that straight, are they saying that there was no way to make the Betamax recorder less likely to be used for copyright infringement, but that it is possible to do so in peer-to-peer system? How about binding a tape with a device? That would have enabled the people using the betamax to tape shows and only be able to replay them on their own machine. As for the p2p software, what is proposed here? Most likely it has some holes as well, especially cases of "false-positives". They address this a few lines later:

In Sony, the potential remedy was limited. The plaintiffs sought a complete ban on the recording function and, in any event, a lesser remedy would have given the copyright owners power over a device beyond the congressionally established limits of the copyright.

Ah so really the issue is that any remedy would be a problem with the congressionally established limites of the copyright, no matter what they were. Of course for p2p, no such protection:

The district court should be given an opportunity to determine whether relief from the infringing uses may be attainable without over-burdening Respondents, the lawful, constitutionally protected uses to which their peerto- peer systems are placed, or the competitive benefits of Respondents’ technology.

This is essentially their conclusion:

Because the courts below failed to inquire into any available remedies, they also failed to properly balance the relevant harms, leaving no room to consider the reasonableness of imposing a duty to help prevent infringement.

So they describe a world where p2p software has "something" built in to prevent it being used to perform some illegal activity. I think I would have liked it better if, instead of just stating this view, the VSDA had actually proposed a solution. Of course their goal is to see this discussion happen, even if no solution is found it's better to have this "extra chance" since the way the ruling is at this point is quite favorable for p2p software.

Monday, January 24, 2005

Is this what "Resonable Care" is all about?

I guess you can always scratch your right ear with your left arm by going behind your head...

TiVo To Go

Sunday, January 23, 2005

Lawsuit to follow...

MGM versus Grokster, or I guess the movie studios versus p2p software.

From slashdot, it looks like one document was filed by the Video Software Dealers Association. I will try to take a look at it later and write some comment.

Link to the document in question.

Friday, January 21, 2005

It's for your own good

From a recent article

Japan's Sony Corp and Panasonic-brand owner Matsushita Electric Industrial,
South Korea's Samsung Electronics and Dutch Philips Electronics formed the
alliance because they want buyers of their products to watch or listen to
"appropriately licensed video and music on any device, independent of how they
originally obtained that content," they said in a joint statement.


I think the longer they fight among themselves the better it is in terms of right. While this appears to be good for consumers in terms of compatibility, it is really about compatibility of restricted access.


One loss for the DRM camp?

I guess Sony finally admits ATRAC was not the best idea:

http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,12005964%255E15306,00.html

I wonder if this is good news or not for the consumer? Although one could believe this is a battle that was won, it could just be part of a bigger war where devices like IPOD that support both are worse for digital rights because they essentially allow both to run in parallel: "Yes put your mp3s, and you can also put those files where we control the rights you have". At least Sony, with its in your face approach did not confuse anyone.

One loss for the DRM camp?

I guess Sony will have to try again, since their first attempt was really bad.

http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,12005964%255E15306,00.html

I have to say I was realy surprised when I first learned that their devices would not support the mp3 format (which does not support DRM). This really hurt them; I saw people buy the device then be shocked when they learned they had to do all sorts of contortions to get their device to read their music. This is clearly good news short term for the consumer in terms of rights, but it could just be a small battle that was won, where as the whole war is much bigger than that.

Thursday, January 20, 2005

So I guess it all boils down to "reasonable care"?

This is straight from the bill:

"and who fails to exercise reasonable care in preventing use of that software to commit an unlawful act with"

So what is reasonable care? This really puzzles me... If they had something more explicit, say, having all internet programs required to query a central copyright server (for example by passing in a hash of the file, the file name, other pieces of date to uniquely identify the file), then maybe we would be on to something. But this seems so vague that besides triggering all sorts of lawsuits, what is the intent? Note that even a proposal like the one I discuss would not be sufficient IMHO. The issue I have with any solution is that false positives (cases where a file is not really subject to those limitations) trigger some sort of problems for a person that is not commiting any crime.

On top of everything, the definition of p2p software appears to be quite correct, and hence, quite wide. Windows File Sharing would definitely fall in that category. To quote the text of the proposed bill:
"software that once installed and launched, enables the user to connect his or her computer to a network of other computers on which the users of these computers have made available recording or audiovisual works for electronic dissemination to other users who are connected to the network."
I actually wonder if a tool like bittorrent would fall into that description since bittorrent, when simply launched, does nothing. You have to first have a tracker for it to do anything.

I wonder if this law will get anywhere.

Wednesday, January 19, 2005

Less rights ahead...

Looks like P2P is really the incarnation of the devil on earth:

http://news.com.com/State+bill+could+cripple+P2P/2100-1028_3-5540937.html?part=rss&tag=5540937&subj=news.1028.5

I guess this requires further investigation, more to follow.

Monday, January 17, 2005

My Mac loving friend's answer...

"You can just buy it again..."

Now that is a solution! I guess the M stands for, "May I have another one, please".

Sunday, January 16, 2005

Itunes

Here's a question: Steve Jobs decided that if you buy one of his 99 cents songs, you can only play those on five machines. Each machine has to be authorized by you.
What happens if you authorize five machines and all five crash and burn. While this could appear unlikely, it doesn't take much for this to happen. Your laptop or desktop could be stolen. You go to your parents house and authorize their computer which gets infected by a nasty virus. Over time, this stuff happens. So what do you do next?

I looked at the Apple website and there doesn't seem to be an answer.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93014

http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/authorization.html

I also looked at the terms of use (http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/legal/terms.html), and no mention of that problem either.

I guess that means you are at their mercy if this happens. So maybe the M in DRM stands for Mercy...

Eptisam

Saturday, January 15, 2005

Where to start...

This topic has been in my mind for a while now. Digital Rights... what are those?

Typically one thinks about rights as something good, right? It seems that in the 21st century, this word is being abused in the technology world. Of course, not all rights are created equal but our "Digital Rights", instead of looking like our voting rights or our freedom of expression rights, look more and more like prisoner rights or illegal alien rights.

This blog will look at what those rights, or lack of them, what they mean to us and how they impact us.

Eptisam