MPAA: Kings of Irony

Here's a quick timeline: ~2000: Anyone who could afford a DVD drive for their computer could rip movies with some minor hassle with free tools floating around the internet. ~2003: The free tools become easily usable by anyone with a brain stem and interest in doing so. The programs crack DVD encryption methods with frankly embarrassing ease and speed. 2007: RealNetworks tries to make a legitimate tool for ripping DVDs while leaving in some DRM (i.e., restrictions on use). 2008: The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) sues them for aiding infringement. The EFF files a brief supporting RealNetworks position, basically claiming it is fair use to copy your own DVDs and people have been doing it for almost a decade. Today: MPAA mocks the EFF for "living in the past". So, with dozens of commonly used programs out there for backing up DVDs - a perfectly reasonable thing to do, since the lifespan of data on commercial hard drives is basically infinite if you back it up properly - the MPAA decides to target one that actually keeps the encryption that they original put on the disks. Their definition of the past is pretty funny too, since (eight years ago/today/in the foreseeable future) DVD backup (was/is/will continue to be) easy and legal under the terms of fair use and really, really easy. I'm kinda surprised RealNetworks even found a market for it with the number of effective free tools out there.

The viable solution to internet piracy

The sad fact of the matter is piracy as it is currently defined cannot be stopped without enormous breaches of privacy. Absent the restriction of tools to even create programs that can effortlessly defeat protection methods, you can't stop people from copying digital information. Mostly because the mere act of being on the internet means you are required to copy things just to view/listen to them. This is a sample of some of the points of a paper I recently read at Cato called The Future of Copyright. My personal favorite part:

When American troops liberated the city of Luxembourg in 1944, they made a strange capture: a machine capable of recording sound on magnetic tapes. Shortly after the war, this German military invention made its appearance in private homes. Tape recorders integrated listening and reproduction in one device, but as separate functions. That’s no longer the case with digital technology. Today, to use digital information is to copy it.

Computers operate by copying. They couldn’t care less whether the physical distance between original and copy is measured in micrometers or in miles; both work equally well for them. Copyright law, on the other hand, must somehow draw a line between use and distribution. That means putting an imaginary grid over the chaotic myriad of network nodes, delineating clusters of devices that can be attributed to individuals or households.

Every person reading this article is actually copying it illegally. You can't help but do it. As you surf the internet your computer is constantly caching (saving locally) data that you are viewing. Anyone who has ever used the internet for anything is almost certainly a pirate. I'll let you all off with a warning this time. Humor aside, the problem is one that the music industry found itself in a long while ago with the invention and mass adoption of radio. John Philip Sousa was convinced anything but live shows would completely destroy music. The solution, after much complaining, was to just license the distributor. Now of course the distributor and consumer and creator is anyone and everyone on the internet. The compromise is an idea that is not new and is even talked about by both sides of the issue with increasing interest: mass public electronic media licensing. If everyone on the internet is a pirate, license everyone. Everyone who wants to buy in at least. You've solved 99% of your piracy problems by facing the reality of a system, the internet, that requires copying. You also don't even have to host the files themselves, users are more than willing to do so. The idea has merit but the problem is the pie to be divided. We need an organization as trusted as the Nielsen statistics are for downloaded media content to correctly award creators and their labels/studios/whatever. The only alternatives are to entire restrict piracy with the kind of locking down that would destroy the internet and privacy in general (people could still just rip stuff from friends/renters) OR to see an attempt to destroy internet and privacy while the major content holders die a slow and painful (for everyone involved) death at the hands of unrelenting technological innovation. Edit: Hahaha. Bonus quote from a Guardian article linked from the Cato piece:

"For somebody who has spent 30 years in the music industry, you instinctively know this stuff is going on. But when you actually sit looking at your computer and see a number that says 95% of people are copying music at home, you suddenly go, 'Bloody hell'," he said.

Turns out you could nuke the internet from orbit and the current copyright model is doomed. Note: Copying this work is no longer actually illegal in any sense, since I have licensed everything with Creative Commons.

In a decade or two, anything less will be like being illiterate

I casually linked a 12 year old who is doing a lot of development on a major Javascript framework in the previous post. Here he is giving a talk at Google on jQuery. The tools will only get easier and the next generation will have no problem picking it all up with their sponge-like brains. There are four consequences of this that I can immediately think of:

• More open source development. It looks great on a resume, there is a possibility of making a big name for yourself (publish something in academic journals, giving talks at Google, etc.) the satisfaction derived from contributing, and naturally you, like everyone else, get the benefits of the improvements.
• Possibly a citizenry that can more easily identify logical fallacies. Perhaps nothing is more important for a democracy besides free speech. As with the open source stuff, people should demand more transparency from their elected officials, and even if they don't get it though official channels, they will always find ways to fulfill this need.
• A greater appreciation for mathematics. Hopefully higher level math taught earlier, when the kids can absorb basically any information.
• More rational discussion of basic scientific facts about the world around us. Less of this tragic, mortifying stupidity.

Nature Conservancy and the Cumberlands

The Nature Conservancy has just completed a massive land deal to save the Tennessee Cumberland from development. For those not familiar, the Nature Conservancy is the most successful conservation group you'll never hear about. The reason? They are not a very political group. What they do is purchase land development rights (or just outright buy the most important/endangered land). By that and other land protection mechanisms which are rarely legislative in nature, the Conservancy can achieve its goals (open space, environmental protection, biodiversity, etc) without being bent to the fickle will of legislators and election cycles. In terms of conservation, it doesn't matter who is in office as long as the property rights are enforced (and we will be having bigger problems if that isn't the case). This kind of thing is especially handy in situations where agriculture is being forced out by sprawl. Farmers see their property value rise and they can't pay the resulting taxes. Many enjoy farming but are simply forced to subdivide and sell some or all of their land to survive. Here is where the Nature Conservancy can step in and buy up development rights, which devalues the property and massively reduces the taxes. This is an amazingly simplified example, but one that is easy to conceptualize and I can't think of anyone that could possibly be opposed to such things. Everyone wins in such a scenario. Property rights are commonly referred to as a bundle of sticks. In the case of the Cumberland, the sticks the Conservancy have bought are often very specific. Logging companies were part of the deal and still own a lot of land - but they can by condition of contract only harvest new growth and must allow public access for recreation. The Conservancy retains the right to do any other kind of harvesting by what is called an easement (essentially a very specific property right) and it isn't too likely they'd ever give it up. This kind of "everybody wins" attitude coupled with sustainable practices and the preservation of natural beauty is why the Nature Conservancy is, if they needed some more GIS expertise, a job I would be willing to take a pay cut to accept.

Spending Iraq conditioned on withdrawl by Dec 08

It seems the more centralist DLC Democrats have finally bowed to pressure from the rest of their party regarding Iraq. Having capitulated on or ignored every other issue - torture, wiretapping, habeas corpus, executive authoritarianism - the more pragmatic needs of being reelected in 2008 have edged out previous reservations on Iraq. I was always amazingly unconvinced regarding the excuses of this group of Democrats in failing to preform as they suggested they would in 2006. They must realize how unpopular their opposition is, and how they could stop the war instantly with the "power of the purse" invested in them by the Constitution. Even if you do not believe this is the right course, you must concede that the Democrat's in Congress deception on this issue lacks the transparency and honesty they had promised. For as defeated as the Republicans seem to be, their libertarian-authoritarian breaking points do not seem as wide as the gap between the DLC and the masses that elected them a year ago. As a side note, I would just like to add Harry Reid is a vapid, corrupt legislator. His continued support of the Pirate Act - demanding stiffer and criminal penalties regarding copyright infringement - demonstrates his surrender to special interests whose motives are entirely counter to the public good. Similar to how taxes work (at a very high tax rate, you can lower it and actually increase revenue by reducing the incentive to cheat and because there is more consumption and growth in general), extremely protected copyright rules are unenforceable and actually reduce the innovation they are meant to encourage. Wow that was a long side note. UPDATE on copyright sidenote: In his talks, Cory Doctorow has repeated one of his many complaints of the current copyright legalism - everyone is guilty of copyright infringement, intentional or otherwise, and (to quote him) "Once everyone is a criminal, no one is free." If you criminalize normal behavior there is no need to trump up charges to quash dissent. I'll admit at first I was skeptical of such rhetoric. The first part is undoubtedly true. In a very technical sense humming a few bars for a friend or the mere act of your computer passively caching pictures on websites as you surf could be considered copyright infringement. The second part - that it would be used to suppress free speech - I felt needed an example. The Russian Federation has generously provided one. Unquestionably this is simply the start, and you should take care not to fool yourself. This will happen in the United States. It wouldn't need to be by government, the private sector would have no problem causing a similar chilling effect on free speech.