Archive for the 'copyright' Category

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How not to do copy-protection: Sony Music

Published on November 4, 2005 in copyright and music. 1 Comment

Error #1: take a really broad definition of “backwards compatible”

Smith said the goal of the XCP technology is work with record labels and help them in better controlling the amount of copies made per user. He agreed that copying CDs for fair/personal use is acceptable, however, certain users exceed that limit. Now, he said, record labels and other software developers have the capability to limit the number of burns per CD. He further stated that record labels and others could control various aspects of copying, such as the quality of music at which the data is burned onto the new CD – in addition the number of burns.
The company said its technology is backwards compatible. Sony added that it has shipped approximately two millions compact discs that are equipped with XCP.
Sony tests CD protection technology (May 2005)

Error #2: assume all your customers are evil and should be protected against themselves

Our proprietary OD-DRM (On Disc Digital Rights Management) enables Record Labels and content owners to provide copying features such as controlled copying to hard drive, protected burning to CDR and transfer of protected files to portable devices. Consumers can therefore be enabled to make limited copies on CDR for personal use at the discretion of the Record Label but further copying is denied as these CDRs themselves are copy protected with no further OD-DRM.
from XCP Press Protect

Error #3: assume all your customers are stupid and won’t discover what you’ve done

The firestorm began when Mark Russinovich, a computer security expert with Sysinternals, discovered evidence of a “rootkit” on his Windows PC. Through heroic forensic work, he traced the code to First 4 Internet, a British provider of copy-restriction technology that has a deal with Sony to put digital rights management on its CDs. It turns out Russinovich was infected with the software when he played the Sony BMG CD Get Right With the Man by the Van Zant brothers.
from The Cover-Up Is the Crime (Wired)

Error #4: provide a really streamlined uninstall process

Mr Gilliat-Smith said Mr Russinovich had problems removing XCP because he tried to do it manually something that was not a “recommended action”. Instead, said Mr Gilliat-Smith, he should have contacted Sony BMG which gives consumers advice about how to remove the software.
Getting the software removed involves filling in a form on the Sony website, visiting a unique URL and agreeing to have another program downloaded on to a user’s PC that then does the uninstallation.
from Sony slated over anti-piracy CD (BBC)

Error #5: even when it’s discovered, no one will do anything against it

And because we are increasingly technology aware, your ever-increasing assault on not only our fair use but also our common sense will virtually guarantee that we use our God-given ingenuity to find a way around whatever bizarre restrictions you see fit to impose. Why? Not because we’re dying to break the law, but because you have sold us a crappy product, and, fundamentally, because it is not our responsibility to protect your profits.
from DRM this, Sony! (CNET)

It’s a pity the CD standard was developed by a company (Philips) and not by a standard body that is independent of commercial pressure. Otherwise the record companies could have been forced to call their shiny gray discs something else, because they are not CDs/Compact Discs. But Philips (former owners of Polygram, now Universal) won’t be hurrying to counter the amateuristic copyright-control efforts of Sony, Warner, Universal and the others.

I was already complaining about this last year:

Result: my Windows Media Player keeps crashing on it – mostly taking my PC with it, because the CD-ROM becomes inaccesible. My MusicMatch won’t play it, and I haven’t even tried RealPlayer, because I don’t want to reboot more than 3 times in a day, life’s too short. So I can only look at the cover and wonder what it sounds like.
from Portable audio & copy protection

Technorati: – – – –

European Patent Law Rejected

Published on July 7, 2005 in copyright. Closed


I was first made aware of the ‘software patent’ issue when Tobias Oetiker changed the front page of his MRTG site to protest against it. It now seems the European Parliament did the wise thing and kept its hands of the issue.

The European Parliament on Wednesday rejected a proposed law to create a single way of patenting software across the European Union, a blow to big companies who had pushed hard for its adoption.
The so-called software patent directive, rejected by a 648-14 vote with 18 abstentions, would have given companies EU-wide patent protection for computerized inventions (…).
But lawmakers said the measure would stifle enterprise and did not promote innovation, and that human knowledge can’t be patented. The move kills the legislation since the EU head office, which had drafted it, does not plan to set forth a new version. (…)
Companies such as Nokia and Siemens fought hard for adoption of the bill, saying patent protection would give them incentives to invest in research and development. Open-source advocates campaigned against it, saying that individuals and small businesses could be bankrupted by expensive legal battles with software giants over fuzzy patent law.
from European Patent Law rejected(Wired)

What kind of laws would give a fictional HugeCorp Inc even more ‘incentives to invest in research and development’:

  1. every thought an employee has at HugeCorp Inc, belongs to the company. Practically this means that, if ever an employee wants to claim an idea as his, he has to be able to prove it was conceived of in his free time.
  2. if an employee, certainly someone from the R&D department, leaves the company, he should sign a non-disclosure/non-competition contract. If HugeCorp Inc has doubts about the person’s willingness to shut up and do absolutely nothing with the knowledge that was gathered while working at their premises, the former employee’s memory can be erased, either chemically or with a hammer.
  3. whenever a new product or technology is developed at HugeCorp Inc, consumers can be forced to buy it. The normal process of customer adoption allows for inventions to be unprofitable because of such silly reasons as: too expensive, too user-unfriendly, no demand, better substitute available. This makes R&D riskful and should be eliminated.
  4. it is forbidden to reverse engineer anything that was developed at HugeCorp Inc. This includes decompiling software code, performing input/output analysis or disassembling electronic or mechanical devices. Replacing batteries in a watch, changing a tire on a car and decoding an imperfect DVD-encryption are therefor forbidden, except by persons explicitly accredited by the manufacturer.
  5. whatever inventions are developed at universities or other academic institutions may never be commercialised or released on a free basis to the outside world. They should be handed over to HugeCorp Inc for a symbolical sum (let’s say, a 19″ flat screen for the supervising professor, and free drinks for anyone involved in the development), where it will be prepared for commercial purposes (i.e. DRM and licensing mechanisms will be built in). If the product sells really well, a new wing will be donated for the department that inspired the development, and it will get a name like “HugeCorp Research Institute“.
  6. the “open source” movement is too large to be killed silently, but it should be possible for HugeCorp Inc to have some of its employees interfere incognito in the development process and introduce bugs, annoyance and controversy. Traditional practices like defamation, bribery, blackmail … can also be used to discredit open source personalities.
  7. any invention that has, could have, could be thought to have or eventually maybe might slightly have, a negative effect on the balance sheet of HugeCorp Inc, and that was not developed by HugeCorp itself, cannot be commercialized or released publicly. The person(s) responsible for its conception can be sued for that act, or under some other pretence, can be rendered life very difficult. Unless, of course, they work for EvenHugerComp Inc, in which case HugeCorp just keeps quiet in the hope not being sued themselves.
  8. The company cannot be held responsible for any personal damage its employees would suffer while researching and developing. If the employee does not like that, he can always resign and go work somewhere else. (In which case rule #2 is still valid)
  9. The company cannot be held responsible for the detrimental effects of its inventions on the environment, the market or its customers. If any damage is done, some other company can step in and sell the service of fixing it.
  10. The company cannot be held responsible for the actions of its employees, except if these actions would have a positive impact on the balance sheet.

Chinese music business model: copyrightless

Published on May 8, 2005 in copyright and music. Closed


China seems be showing that in a world where no one wants to pay more than $4 for a CD and most CDs are pirated, the artists can still survive.

In the USA, free downloads of copyrighted music are driving the recording industry to sue teenagers and holler about the morality of obtaining songs for free. But if China is the future, that’s all in vain. The genie is out of the bottle. Eventually, recorded music will no longer make money.
(…)
Yu Quan and most other Chinese pop artists similarly find ways to make money other than through selling CDs. A lot of it comes from sponsorship. Clothing, shampoo and computer brands pay to advertise at a concert. A bottled-water company put singer Wang Lee Hom on its products.
USA Today

The danger with this scenario happening in the US or Europe is that, while the RIAA/IFPI might lose some of their power over artists, that power might be turned over to the (artist management department of) ClearChannels of this world. And however talented you may be, you would better look good or at least ‘interesting’ too, or you might not be able to get a contract.

Just ask Kim Cleysters where Anna Kournikova’s money comes from.

via Standaard In-De-Hoek

Gentleman that’s going around, turning the joint upside-down

Published on March 2, 2005 in Belgium and copyright. 1 Comment Tags: , , , .


What started as a testcase for ‘quoting’ music without breaking the law (making use of Belgium’s citing right) and made for some amusing exchanges of condescending legalese, has become awkward since the author has voluntarily turned into a stool pigeon.

Some background: on Feb 13 the Skynetblogger Librarian had put a link on his blog that pointed to a RealAudio recording of “One-Trick Pony” by Nelly Furtado. When the IFPI, represented by its lawyer Olivier Maeterlinck, asked him on Feb 21 to remove this link (a classic ‘cease and desist’, that Mr Maeterlinck probably sends dozens of every week), the blogger reacted by putting up a link to a excerpt of the song (1:29 of the total 4:47) that he hosted on his own website. He then put forward that because of the right to cite (“citaatrecht” in Dutch) he should be allowed to do this. The right to cite an original work without explicit permission of the author is regularly used in written communication, but is restricted to the following purposes: critic, polemic, education or scientific efforts (“kritiek, polemiek of onderwijs, of in het kader van wetenschappelijke werkzaamheden”). It made for an interesting test case, which was noticed by other bloggers like LVB. IFPI did not seem to object to the excerpt (but started questioning the right to link to the song’s lyrics). The conversation took the form of an exchange of legal statements with long slightly abusive sentences, lots of unnecessary adjectives and the occasional disclaimer. The stuff they teach lawyers at university, in other words.

But then on Feb 26, Librarian published a post with a completely different story: he had removed all links to other bloggers from his site because they might contain ‘illegal’ (i.e. copyrighted) images or other content. Had he stopped at that, it would be nothing but overly cautious. But he also asked bloggers who wanted their link restored, to contact him and ensure him that all content on their blog was OK. Moreover, he said that whoever did not reply within 7 days was automatically suspect of providing illegal content, and if the blog was hosted by skynetblogs.be (probably the largest Belgian blog provider) he would report it to Skynet as an inadmissible blog (ongeoorloofde blog). This is not only pretentious (as if every blogger would read Librarian’s blog and react), but also equivalent with a social suicide.

I have no idea what his motivation is. It could be fear (for getting sued as a testcase) or irony (‘see, this is what this legislation would lead to’). It is really rather silly. If you want to know what the limits are of what you can do on a blog with copyrighted material, check with SABAM. It is responsible for protecting the rights of the authors and has published its prices: the price for putting music on-line: 13,07 euro per month for 15 minutes of audio, to be paid by the party responsible for hosting the actual files. SABAM has no prices for “linking to other people’s audio”.

I wonder, in the days of pirate radio stations, was it illegal to refer to their names and frequencies?