Proposed digital copy protection legislation (MANY USEFUL LINKS) (1 Viewer)

[Thomas Newton]

In my opinion, no other controversial copying purposes were clearly deemed "fair" by this case.

The Court only needed to come up with one significant legitimate use for the VCR to rule in favor of Sony, and the immediate case did not involve devices other than VCRs. Thus, timeshifting.

As for other uses, the Court specifically stated that unauthorized non-commercial use is presumed to be legal Fair Use. Copyright holders can challenge a use, but must show good reason why a court should disallow it.

 

[MickeS]

Why on Earth would this be of interest as far as copyright infringement goes? If I invent a videogame that automatically starts when a commercial starts and stops when the regular programming returns, that would reduce attention to commercial messages I'm sure. Just like the remote control does.

It has nothing to with infringement, they are two completely separate issues. I don't see how it could be infringement even if the show I watched was recorded.

For example, if I watch a show on live television, and I decide to turn off the TV during every commercial, that's not infringement. Right? I hope I'm still allowed to do that.

But would you argue that if I watch it on TiVo with a 30-second delay and do EXACTLY the same thing (turn off the TV and the TiVo, not fast-forward, skip or anything else), it WOULD BE violating the copyright?

Or is it the time-saving feature that's the problem?

Oh, and one more thing: chapter-skipping on DVD's must be copyright infringement too. After all, it IS a legal copy (much like the legal but perhaps unauthorized "fair use" copies used for time-shifting), and it's used to skip certain parts of the movie.

When will we see lawsuits against manufacturers of DVD-players, arguing they have to stop the chapter-functions because it violates the copyright?

/mike

 

[Bob_J_M]

Mike,

The point is that the copyright holders need to prove harm - or the clear potential for harm in a potential market. Skipping a chapter causes no harm. They also can't touch your videogame, because making a copy was not instrumental in your quest to avoid commercials. I believe the only features that are going to be struck down are features that totally and automaticaly obliterate commercials as a copy is made or played back, but who knows what will happen?

 

[Ryan Wright]

No, we're talking about making a copy of a work for the primary purpose of conveniently skipping the commercials, which is infringement.

Well, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this one. I simply will not accept that this is copyright infringement and will continue to skip commercials until I'm blue in the face - legal or not. I believe in and practice civil disobedience where appropriate, and it's plenty appropriate on this issue.

 

[Rachael B]

If they "rig" TV to try to make me watch commercials I will completely stop watching broadcast TV. This discussion has reached absurd extremes. Commercials as we have know them are obsolete IMO. "The times they are a'changin'", me thinks. I don't like 40 % sugar breakfast cereals, Big Macs, BC Powders, Chevrolets, Nike, or much of anything else I see advertised on TV. No amount of advertising is gonna change that for me anyway!

The networks best watch their step or they're just not going to have much audience. If they want to use copyright as a weapon, they'll win nothing. I'm unwilling to watch 15 to 25 minutes of commercials an hour in this reality or any other possible reality. Plop, plop, fizz, fizz, oh what a relief it is to fast forward through the slimey, generally dishonest ads.

Bob, it doesn't matter what networks wish we'd do! They serve us, not the other way around. Best wishes cats!

 

[MickeS]

The harm is to their businessmodel. There is no harm done to the copyright. I have not modified, re-sold or done anything else illegal with the recording. The recording is intact. The only thing I do is skip the commercial. By any sane measure, this can not be called copyright infringement.

/Mike

 

[Bob_J_M]

Mike,

Harm to a business model is one factor in determining whether a copying purpose is fair or not. It is the crucial deciding factor in cases where a whole, commercial for-profit work is copied for personal use.

The central issue is whether or not your use of the work is fair or not. If you alter the performance of the work it in a way that could devalue it in the commercial TV market, your use of the work could be judged unfair. If it's not Fair Use, then its copyright infringement.

Let's move on, okay? We'll see what the courts say this time. As Thomas Newton reiterated above, the plaintiffs need to demonstrate a liklihood of substantial harm. It won't be an easy task.

 

[MickeS]

But that's just the thing, the work ISN'T altered anymore than if I turn off the TV or switch the channel... but you're right, let's move on. I hope the courts have more sense than the TV networks for what is fair use.

/Mike

 

[Ryan Wright]

How about this for a new topic of discussion:
http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/t...usic-kazaa.htm

Kazaa, Verizon propose to pay artists directly
(snip)
"Historically, there's been a clash between the content community and new technology, back to the player piano," says Verizon vice president Sarah Deutsch. "We're proposing the idea of a copyright compulsory license for the Internet, so peer-to-peer distribution would be legitimate and the copyright community would get compensation. It's hard to get the genie back in the bottle."
Kazaa lobbyist Phil Corwin says a $1-a-month fee per user on Internet providers alone (it's unclear whether costs would be passed along to subscribers) would generate $2 billion yearly: "We're talking about a modest fee on all the parties who benefit from the availability of this content."
Recording Industry Association of America president Hilary Rosen calls the proposal "the most disingenuous thing I've ever heard. It's ridiculous."

All I want to know is, who died and made Hilary Rosen god? Why does it seem like this woman gets to make all the policies and even laws on how I listen to my music?
My favorite quote from the article, talking about PressPlay and MusicNet (where you pay to download tiny selections of music that can't be burned to CD and quit working if you ever cancel your subscription or reinstall Windows): "It would be like me opening a video store, charging 10 times what others were charging and only offering videos in the Beta format," Guerinot says. "In any business, when you have billions of downloads occurring, you don't say we're going to ignore that market and try to create something else. You serve your customers."

 

[Bob_J_M]

Considering how tiny this article is, I'm amazed at how the author was able to change his focus so many times. It takes special skill to write this incoherently. Or, to be kind, maybe the article was originally 100 times larger?
Nonetheless, the Verizon/Kazaa proposal is an excellent topic of conversation. Maybe there are better articles about it? I want to know how in the world they plan to divide the pot of money between all the artists whose works might be out there on the internet!?
With peer to peer networks, there is no central tracking. Even if there was, how could the central tracking computers reliably identify what works were being copied. Moreover, how could anyone determine if the copier is a legitimate consumer or something else? They can't expect consumers to report which works they have chosen to copy. No matter what system I can imagine, someone would have to verify that the copy recipients are really consumers and not record company employees who automatically download everything their company produces (as just one small example of how the system can be abused).
Here's an anology to illustrate my concerns: Suppose that a company's chief executive finds it too expensive and cumbersome to determine who in his company is contributing the most to the company's success. To set people's salary, he decides to count the number of times each employee's name is mentioned in e-mail messages. Concern #1: The system is arbitrary in its measure of value; Concern #2: The system encourages manipulation; Concern #3: These two factors combine to discourage useful productivity.
I postulate the following: Any fair system of dividing the "compulsory license fees" proposed by Verizon/Kazaa must be at least as intrusive and costly and difficult to implement as any copy protection system that would achieve the same degree of fairness.
This is true because, when you come right down to it, the primary purpose of copy protection technology is to provide and enforce a fair system by which a work's value can be determined.
I'm open to other viewpoints, but my initial conclusion is that this is a non-solution. Vaporware!!!

 

[Ryan Wright]

I want to know how in the world they plan to divide the pot of money between all the artists whose works might be out there on the internet!?

That was my concern. There would have to be a tracking system implemented to determine which files were being downloaded. Otherwise you'd end up with big-name bands getting paid the same as no-names.

Also, why should my grandmother, who uses the Internet to send email and has no idea what an MP3 is, pay this $1 a month fee?

It's a good step in the right direction, however, there are an awful lot of bugs to be worked out.

 

[Thomas Newton]

This is true because, when you come right down to it, the primary purpose of copy protection technology is to provide and enforce a fair system by which a work's value can be determined.

If you think that copy protection is about determining fair value, or that the record companies are mainly interested in the welfare of the artists, there's a bridge in Brooklyn that you should consider purchasing ...

 

[MickeS]

Isn't there already a very similar system in place for recordable CD's (the ones that have to be used in standalone CD-recorders)? I take it this would work the same, so I don't see a problem with it. In fact, I think it's a reasonable solution to the problem, but yes it does have some wrinkles that need to be ironed out before it can be implemented.

/Mike

 

[Ryan Wright]

Thankfully! :
SONICblue Wins Stay of Tracking Order
Wed May 15, 3:47 PM ET
SANTA CLARA, Calif. (Reuters) - Electronic device maker SONICblue Inc. said on Wednesday it won a stay of a court order that would have forced it to track the television viewing habits of people using its ReplayTV (news - web sites) digital video recorder.
Full story @ http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...sonicblue_dc_1

Isn't there already a very similar system in place for recordable CD's (the ones that have to be used in standalone CD-recorders)?

Well, you have to pay a "tax" on recordable CDs for standalone recorders, but the money goes to the studios. You think they pass it on to artists?
The whole battle here has nothing to do with the artists. Most artists don't care about P2P sharing. They see virtually no money from album sales so it makes little difference to them whether you buy their CD, hear them on the radio, or download the album from Kazaa. The battle is about the recording industry. It's about people like Hilary Rosen losing control of the industry (and thus, the unlimited pockets of consumers continually pouring billions directly into her business). She knows we don't need her anymore. The labels are obsolete in this day and age, and their stranglehold on distribution channels mean jack shit with the Internet around.

 

[Bob_J_M]

The idea is also anti-capitalist. Socialized art, more or less.There is no meaningful exchange of legal tender. No buying decision. The end user pays the same no matter what, so they have little motivation to pre-screen content. They'll have their intelligent software agents go out there and download anything and everything they might be interested in. As I said before, this encourages a corrupt system - a system in which everything is promised and nothing need be given (you have no motivation to complain - you didn't pay for it!) Everything is advertising and nothing is substance. Quality is unimportant. The goal is to get as many users as possible to request the download and increment the counter. The game of making money then becomes akin to the game of getting your web site to show up in the popular search engines. I notice they have several night school courses at the Cambridge Adult Ed Center with titles like "Manipulating Search Engines." Is this the future of music marketing, too?

Would the method of compensation take into account the time and effort expended by the artist? Would it differentiate a two-minute guitar ditty from a two-hour symphony? The more I think about this scheme, the more holes I see in it.

I don't know how the current recordable CD taxes and other blank media taxes get distributed. My guess is that the administering organization keeps track of pre-recorded media (e.g. CD) sales and divides the tax proceeds proportionally. If so, this method requires a parallel distribution channel that operates according to normal market forces. The internet distribution method we're talking about here could easily supplant all other distribution channels, leaving no reasonably accurate way to assign relative value to works.

Thomas, you are testing my patience. Did you hear anybody say that the record companies are mainly interested in the welfare of the artists? Is that what you believe? I said nothing even remotely approaching those words. Read before you rant!

The system of copyright is designed to assign fair market values to works. Copy protection enforces the exclusive right to copy and thus ensures that the value assignment feature of copyright works properly.

 

[Thomas Newton]

The system of copyright is designed to assign fair market values to works. Copy protection enforces the exclusive right to copy and thus ensures that the value assignment feature of copyright works properly.

Copyright is an optional incentive that is supposed to be designed with the public first and foremost. It has little or nothing to do with assigning fair market values to works; for the mechanism of copyright is limited monopoly.

As for copy protection, it interferes with the public domain and the lawful Fair Use of copyrighted works. I don't see why you continue to be so attached to it.

 

[Bob_J_M]

Thomas,
Much of your reply is from a "what's best for me" perspective. Naturally, nobody likes paying $16 for a crappy CD (or even a halfway-decent CD). We'd all like to have more listening stations and online free samples and un-bundling of songs, etc. CDs that don't behave like other CDs should be labeled as crap so we don't accidentally buy them. ...But enough about what's best for the consumer - let's talk about what's best for society as a whole, because that is what we're after.
The "meaningful exchange of legal tender" that I referred to occurs when you listen to reviews and word of mouth and (hopefully) samples of the work (etc) and make the decision that it is worth $16 of your disposable income to obtain a copy. Your exchange of legal tender for the copy is a meaningful assessment of the work's value. If they wanted $16 for a three-minute recording of Paul Anka's "Having My Baby," you probably wouldn't pay it. If it were five cents, you might buy it for joke value. In this way, our system establishes the fair market value of a work.
Imagine a society in which a tax on consumer electronics finances a system that pays the same flat sum of money for every writing, picture, song or movie. Obviously, this process doesn't offer any special rewards for the most useful, important and inspiring works. It fails to discourage would-be artists or writers whose creative contributions are not useful to society.
This is a ridiculous extreme, but it illustrates the societal importance of assigning meaningful values to creative works. It is hard to see how Verizon/Kazaa can do any better than this. If they can somehow track the movement of individual files, they still can't distinguish a masterpiece from a piece of s**t. Pay by the byte/word/minute/etc.? No good. Rely on the system you'd be destroying to set the relative value of works? Short-sighted.
The closer we can get to a system that rewards work according to its benefit to society, the richer we will be as a society.
Ideally, there would be a direct negotiation between the author and each and every person who has any interest in his/her work. Ideally, in fact, all payment would be "whatever you think it's worth" and everyone would make an honest effort to evaluate each and every work they experience - and then pay the author accordingly.
Unfortunately, ideal systems require the vast majority of the people to behave ideally, of their own free will. If we are evolving as a species, maybe we'll get there some day. For today, our economic and legal systems do a pretty fair job of rewarding good work and encouraging reasonable behavior. Copyright law does a pretty fair job of integrating creative works within the mechanism of this system.
The Verizon/Kazaa idea ignores copyright. Or you might say, it assumes rampant copyright infringement and tries to assess the total value of this infringement in some way (how?) and tax the equipment that is used to infringe (how?) and distribute the tax proceeds to those whose copyrights were infringed (how!?) As I said in my first reply to this sub-topic, I'm dead-set against any scheme of this ilk, including, for example, the tax on audio CD-Rs. This is not a path we should go down.
I'm not attached to copy protection - or even copyright law. If a better idea comes down the pike, I'd happily go with it. This Verizon/Kazaa thing is a worse idea.

 

[Matt Perkins]

"The system of copyright is designed to assign fair market values to works. Copy protection enforces the exclusive right to copy and thus ensures that the value assignment feature of copyright works properly."
Hello Bob -- I thought that copyright (in the U.S.) was designed to promote learning in arts and sciences. In other words, to get as many and as varied works as possible into the public's hands. The means toward this end is the grant of exclusive rights to original works of authorship. And, just to nitpick, the grant of a monopoly is the direct opposite of anything resembling "fair market value."
I can't see how compulsory licensing is anti-capitalist, and I hope you'll indulge me on this one so I can make the point. Compulsory licensing began (as far as I know) back when player-pianos (and the "software" they used, paper scrolls with strategially-placed holes punched into them) were introduced into the marketplace early in the 20th century. Musicians (i.e. publishers), who owned the copyrights in the musical compositions that the scroll-printers were "pirating," sued for copyright infringemet. The Supreme Court declined to support their infringement claim.
Very quickly, Congress added a new exclusive right to the Copyright Act, the mechanical reproduction right. But they did it smart, in one of the few really forward-thinking moments in the history of (American) copyright: they granted the right subject to a compulsory licensing system.
I say smart, because compulsory licensing did two things: (1) it gave composers (i.e. publishers) the windfall of licensing fees from anyone who wanted to use their composition in a mechanical reproduction; and (2) it allowed anyone in the world to create their own mechanical reproduction of a musical work. If you wanted to sell a mechanical reproduction of a song played at triple-speed, the author couldn't stop you. If you wanted to sell a song juxtoposed with "This Old Man" just to make fun of it, nobody could stop you. You could create your own work of art based on an existing work, or you could develop a business bringing art to people in new ways -- as long as you paid the modest compulsory licence fee.
This eliminated the possiblity of corporate censorship in the arts that gets so many artists and programmers riled up about the DMCA and the CTEA. Compulsory licensing is among the most knowledge-enhancing concepts in the history of copyright. Yes, it erodes the author's right to set the price of every use of the work. But the knowledge and expression it promotes is beyond measure.
In short, I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the value of compulsory licensing. If I misunderstood you please un-read this and get back those four minutes of your life.

 

[Steve Owen]

The closer we can get to a system that rewards work according to its benefit to society, the richer we will be as a society.

In principle, I agree... BUT... this is a two way street. In order for the public to respect those ideals, there has to be some trade-offs. One of those trade-offs is fair use rights (which the companies controlling copyrighted works are trying to take away) and the expiration of the copyright and passage into public domain (which the companies controlling copyrighted works have already managed to more or less take away).
Strict controls, indefinite monopoly, and overpriced access are NOT the ways to insure a benefit to society.
-Steve

 

[Bob_J_M]

Matt and Steve, You are both talking about the purpose or goal of copyright, while I am talking about it's architecture. I chose the word "design," thinking that readers would understand what I was NOT talking about (i.e. the purpose or goal). I'll have to phrase my thoughts more precisely if people are going to take sentences out of context and pick them apart.

To reiterate: Copyright law accomplishes its goal primarily by granting a limited monopoly to the creator of a work. The design strategy is to artificially create a market value for the work itself (above and beyond the cost of publishing, distribution, etc). Copyright law also contains checks and balances to further enhance the public good, but it is the exclusive right to copy, distribute and vend a work that rewards the creator of the work and thereby accomplishes one of the primary goals of copyright - to encourage the creation of useful works.

Copy protection systems did not exist when Congress thought of compulsory licensing. It may have been the best tool available at the time piano roll copying was an issue, but it isn't necessarily the best tool now.

I wholeheartedly agree with Steve about the unnecessary and inappropriate extension of copyright terms. I also believe the DMCA went too far. The copyright laws are out of balance. It's time for the lawmakers to start thinking about the public good and make a few adjustments. That said, I still think copy protection is as inevitable and unavoidable as locks, guns, fences, security systems, etc. To a certain extent, people need to be free to do whatever they think they need to do to make a living (wow, five "to"s in one sentence!)