Legal constraints on Netizens: DeCSS, Napster, Clue.com, etc.

FRUUG presentation, Thu 2001-02-15. Notes by Neal McBurnett, available at http://bcn.boulder.co.us/~neal/talks/yokes.html

• Science and technology has created the miracle of cheap information distribution, lauded in books like Freeman Dyson's "The Sun, the Genome and the Internet" as one of the big 4 advances in civilization. Issue: too cheap to meter => too cheap to police.
• John Gilmore on What's wrong with Copy Protection?: "Why should self-interested companies be permitted to shift the balance of fundamental liberties, risking free expression, free markets, scientific progress, consumer rights, societal stability, and the end of physical and informational want? Because somebody might be able to steal a song? That seems a rather flimsy excuse."
• Specifically, right to hyperlink, "fair use" of copyrighted materials, publish your own source code, learn how things work and share it with others. Demise of open and interoperable technologies. Right to innovate.
• US Constitution, Section 8:

  The Congress shall have Power... To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;

  But what if copyright and patent laws are inhibiting the progress of science and useful arts?
• Current strategy by media conglomerates: get more protection than the laws allow by using flimsy "encryption" technologies and then using the new DMCA to prohibit users from defeating the extra technological protections.
• The Internet vastly complicates issues of jurisdiction
• Peer-to-peer networking and technologies like Freedom from Zero-Knowledge Systems make it impractical to police file transfers.
• DMCA - Digital Millennium Copyright Act introduces "anti-circumvention" law.
• Gallery of CSS Descramblers: raw code, translations, images of code, code in hypothetical languages, steganographic versions, midi version, dns version. Protection of DECSS via DMCA: "If you decrypt the enclosed encryption protected file using the secret key embedded in this document, I might utilize the DMCA and sue you to protect my intellectual property, so don't even think about it"
• Recent DMCA appeal by EFF - link below
• Napster judgement from the Ninth Circuit, 2001-02-12: "contributory liability may potentially be imposed only to the extent that Napster: (1) receives reasonable knowledge of specific infringing files with copyrighted musical compositions and sound recordings; (2) knows or should know that such files are available on the Napster system; and (3) fails to act to prevent viral distribution of the works. ... The mere existence of the Napster system, absent actual notice and Napster's demonstrated failure to remove the offending material, is insufficient to impose contributory liability."
• See US Rep Boucher's interview on Slashdot on these topics. He is planning to introduce legislation to preserve fair use, and explains how you can get involved.
• Haven't even gotten to patent issues - see LPF links below
• Conclusions: DMCA restrictions need to be overturned. Future of copyright vs innovation is big debate....
• My adaptation of "Waltzing Matilda": "Hacking Computers"

Fruug Blurb

Legal constraints on Netizens: DeCSS, Napster, Clue.com, etc.

It is increasingly the case, especially as the Internet gains increasing attention among lawyers, that the rights of developers and users are being affected. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act has been construed to not only prevent people from reverse engineering technology and freely sharing the results, but even from including relevant hyperlinks on their web pages. The success of Napster at allowing individuals to find and share copyrighed music from the big record labels has threatened the ability of emerging artists from using the same technology to promote their work. Giant corporations like Hasbro are claiming ownership of words like "Clue" in the context of ".com".

Thankfully, in this case the courts have ruled that Hasbro doesn't have a clue, or at least this particular clue. We'll hear reports from Eric Robison of clue.com about his successful defense of his domain name, legal opinions from Carl Oppedahl about Intellectual Property Rights, and rantings from Neal McBurnett about the freedom to develop and share your own work in the spirit of the Constitution's actual language on the subject. Bring your questions for the panel and we'll have a great time as always.

Links

John Gilmore's Copy Protection paper.

DVD for Linux et al (DeCSS) - Reverse-engineered version of DVD CSS (Content Scrambling System)
http://www.eff.org/IP/Video/MPAA_DVD_cases/20010119_ny_eff_appeal_pressrel.html

DeCSS Central
http://www.lemuria.org/DeCSS/ Gallery of CSS Descramblers - excellent exposition of techniques for communicating and hiding information via the Internet et.al (text, pictures, MIDI, steganography, from DVD-CCA's own DNS servers! ...):
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/De CSS/Gallery/
See also: http://decss.zoy.org/

Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA):
http://www.eff.org/ effector/HTML/effect13.11.html#I

Napster and peer-to-peer networking:
http://www.napster.com/pre ssroom/001013.html

League for Programming Freedom (patents, user-interface copyrights):
http://lpf.ai.mit.edu/

Clue.com's legal battle:
http://www.clue.com/legal

Considerations for innocent domain name owners:
http://www.patents.com/dno.htm