MESSAGE
| DATE | 2004-06-06 |
| FROM | Ruben I Safir
|
| SUBJECT | Subject: [hangout] Old New I just want to get in the archives
|
Hello Everyone -
I've given this a lot of thought over Shabboes (The Jewish Sabbath). It
has definitely pervaded my dinner table.
About 3 in the afternoon, it occurred to me that the real threat of the
DMCA is not just that we can't play DVD's with Linux, or that the media
it's is controlled by a ogonopoly of Media Giants, or that the future
libraries in the the world are going to locked up for the privileged few
and information is going to be controlled to a degree of stifling the
free speech needed needed for the democratic process, what is a greater
threat is that we are going to FURTHER loose control of our ability of
present ideas and contribute to our society in meaningful ways.
Rap Music, (which I hate) started in the basements of ghetto minorities,
on the street. Without the ability to tape Rap music, and distribute it
on cassette, which was the Rap media of choice in it's formative years
of the early 1980's, it would have never seen the light of day.
When theaters of the near future abandon traditional film, which is
probably long overdue, for digital media, how is independent film makers
going to MAKE films that people can see without projectors. If you
don't have a legally acquired encryption key, you can not use the media
media of choice for people to CREATE new works.To quote the fictional Character Hilton "Hammerhead" Kreiger, "The Plex
supplies "em with conventional weapons, vidunits (currency) and American
Plexpress Cards - (The Gangs) know the rules - No Aircraft, No Nukes,
No combat in commercial zones -- and of course NO Suburban Adventurism
(in their gang warfare). (In return the Plex gets back) Only the Highest
raded Vidshow on 3 planets... the Plex makes a fortune in AD Revenues
(and gambling bets).
To control the content presented to the masses this severely is to
control the education and reference of discussion discussion for future
generations. Two of the most empowering thing to happen to mankind in
civilized history is the development of the Printing Press, putting
inexpensive books in the hands of millions, and the Internet, which
makes worldwide publishing and communication inexpensive and
instantane
I have been one stupid dude over that last few years. I've watched
technology after technology destroyed over the last decade by the wishes
of media giants, and have allowed myself to be strung along by the media
ous.industry and the computer software industry into apathy. I thought we
were moving to a state of technological freedom with increasingly
sufficticated hardware and software which improves presentation and
creation, facilitating freedom of expression.
Boy was I wrong, and a light is now going through my consciousness
similar to the one that occurred the first time I joined a Compuserve
Forum in the mid eighties, or the first time I ran Linux on my desktop
and realized it works better than Windows, or the first time I got
feedback from a Website I created. I'm realizing that what is the
current status quo, as it is being presented to the public by large
corporations, and the press, is actually a HINDRANCE to innovation and
freedom of thought.
The Internet was an Accident of the Government. Left to Corporate
America, it would never had arrived. I an now communicating to a few
hundred people using a technology -email invented over 3 decades ago and
which came into the public mainstream only 2 years ago in a major way.
Digital media has had to live with CDRW which is inferior to the Digital
audiotape killed as a consumer product in the mid eighties. And the
only computer system which can assure that people a free to innovate new
products and software, is being threatened to it's core by the DMCA.
All Intel has to do (and this is not to pick on Intel which I believe is
one of the better companies out their in terms of fairness), is to put
an encryption around the Bios of a computer which permits only licensed
OS's to run on it, and anything like a future Linux is dead before it
begins.
After all this consideration, I jumped on the net this evening, and sure
enough, it's like the entire community is working through this problem
in the same way, and drawing the same conclusions.
http://linuxtoday.com/stories/16556.html
"What CSS lets the consortium do is determine who will make players, and
on what terms, and who will provide content. If you can neither enccrypt
or decrypt the bit stream, you are locked out of both markets. If you
purchase a license to use the technology, then the consortium has a way
of controlling your actions. Want to sell a player that doesn't honor
region codes?. Hmm, maybe we'll revoke your license. Or maybe yes, of
course, but you gotta charge three grand for it."
This is EXACTLY what is happening, and what is instore for us in the
future. This combined with AOL's announcement that they are no longer
lobbying for open access on cable networks for all internet sites, means
that the forces of business are making an increased power grab for
control of access to information and services, which in turn destroys
the free market economy and our person freedom.
I am not happy enough to just join a Boycott, and petition a court
room. We, the members of the Linux Community, and the open/free
software movement, need to mature and take our seat of with the great
powers of the world. We need a LOBBYING GROUP. We need to not only
protect the rights of main stream American's and World citizens to
innovate and communicate, but to lay down the legislative and policy
agenda of the next hundred years to ensure that we are not victims of
technology, but it's beneficiaries.
--
__________________________
Brooklyn Linux Solutions
So many immigrant groups have swept through our town
that Brooklyn, like Atlantis, reaches mythological
proportions in the mind of the world - RI Safir 1998
DRM is THEFT - We are the STAKEHOLDERS - RI Safir 2002
http://fairuse.nylxs.com
http://www.mrbrklyn.com - Consulting
http://www.inns.net <-- Happy Clients
http://www.nylxs.com - Leadership Development in Free Software
http://www2.mrbrklyn.com/resources - Unpublished Archive or stories and articles from around the net
http://www2.mrbrklyn.com/downtown.html - See the New Downtown Brooklyn....
1-718-382-0585
____________________________
NYLXS: New Yorker Free Software Users Scene
Fair Use -
because it's either fair use or useless....
NYLXS is a trademark of NYLXS, Inc
|
|
