[sklyarov-chicago] Monday the 30th Plans

[Bob]

Michael Cannon said:

"
Now, what do we say as a group to engage the public
and help them to understand the purpose of standing
out in the hot Sun, stopping them in the street and
taking up their valuable time?
"

Here's my take on explaining this:

"
 Suppose you bought a house, but on taking posession, found a door with
a lock on it that required you to pay each time you passed through it in
either direction?  You "own" the house but are denied any use of it
without making addiotnal payments ad infinitum.  Further imagine that,
even with payment, only you could open the door and that this ability was
non-transferable.  Finally, when you went to engage a locksmith to remove
this thing, you found none would, because they faced jail terms if they
did so.  Tools for you to remove it yourself were unavailable for the same
reason.  This is what DMCA makes possible.
" 

I am not a lawyer, so I may havwe commited some error of logic here.

I think this where DVDs and other content are going.  (eBooks would
already be there if Adobe weren't incompetent.  DVDs aren't there now
becasue of DeCSS, but that only helps geeks.  For most people, DVDs don't
represent owned content antymore.)

I understand that some DVDs show up with ads for 'coming attractions (no
I'm not talking about porn) that the machines will not let you
fast-forward over.  If this is true, this may also be an illustration that
hits home. 


- Bob Niederman