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Thursday, October 4, 2001
Sub-Zero 
Norlin's corollary
Roar at the mouse and its running dogs
| | My pal Jeff Gerhardt at The Linux Show has bravely gone balls-to-the-walls against the SSSCA — a new act that would require digital rights management software burned into every consumer electronic device capable of transporting "content." Here's the opening phrase, Sec. 101 (a): |
| | It is unlawful to manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide or otherwise traffic in any interactive digital device that does not include and utilize certified security technologies that adhere to the security system standards adopted under section 104. |
| | Here's Declan McCullagh's summary of that section: |
| | The private sector has 12 months to agree on a standard, or the Secretary of Commerce will step in. Industry groups that can participate: "representatives of interactive digital device manufacturers and representatives of copyright owners." If industry can agree, the secretary will turn their standard into a regulation; if not, normal government processes apply and NTIA takes the lead. The standard can be later modified. The secretary must certify technologies that adhere to those standards. Also: "The secretary shall certify only those conforming technologies that are available for licensing on reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms." FACA, a federal sunshine law, does not apply, and an antitrust exemption is included. |
| | Note: According to 47 U.S.C. 230(f), an "interactive computer service" means "any information service, system, or access software provider that provides or enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server, including specifically a service or system that provides access to the Internet and such systems operated or services offered by libraries or educational institutions." |
| | All of which makes the SSSCA the most user- and Net-hostile legislation mounted yet by the entertainment industry. Not surprisingly, it was reportedly authored largely by Disney. |
| | The SSSCA is worse than the Decency Act, because it's enforceable at the manufacturing level. If I read it right, it lets Disney and Sony tell Compaq and Dell what they can put in their PCs and makes it a civil offense for anyboy to make or sell any kind of computer equipment that "does not include and utilize certified security technologies." |
| | In effect it legislates the re-cartelization of the consumer electronics industry to comply with the increasingly verticalized content creation and distribution business. It's a backlash against Napster taken to an obscene extreme. |
| | Worst of all it trashes the Net as we know it by turning its enabling technologies into a copyright enforcement system at the very point where content is being "consumed": on your desktop, phone or PDA. |
Peace out
Pig on
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