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Famed hardware hacker Bunnie Huang announces his newest project and goes into detail about how trouble from the DMCA was the impetus. He comments that unchecked power to license freedom of expression should not be trusted to corporate interests. The project, NeTV2, is being crowdfunded.
I'd like to share a project I'm working on that could have an impact on your future freedoms in the digital age. It's an open video development board I call NeTV2.
It's related to a lawsuit I've filed with the help of the EFF against the US government to reform Section 1201 of the DMCA. Currently, Section 1201 imbues media cartels with nearly unchecked power to prevent us from innovating and expressing ourselves, thus restricting our right to free speech.
At Boing Boing : Innovation should be legal; that's why I'm launching NeTV2
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @01:21PM (24 children)
... then your solution is transient.
As always, real solutions to society's problems are technical.
It doesn't matter what the law says you can do; it only matters what you can actually do—that's what separates criminals from the rest of the herd: They understand that they can actually do whatever they can get away with.
In a Free society, the non-criminals use this same insight for constructive purposes.
It doesn't matter what the law says; it only matters what the enforcers can actually enforce. If most people have access to a technical solution that evades enforcement activities, then a law is pointless and will be abandoned.
Uncle Same gave up on the Prohibition of Alcohol, because people could brew beer in their bathtubs.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @01:53PM (14 children)
GNU GPL.
Yeah. That's right. A tweak to legalese gave you a free software movement so influential that your corporate overlords embraced Linux which is now installed in billions and billions of devices worldwide.
Legalese changed the world.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @02:16PM (1 child)
I disagree.
I don't think it had anything to do with the GPL.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Tuesday May 15 2018, @12:03AM
You're welcom to present your case, however:
Linux wasn't the only openly licensed OS out there, not even the only Unix like one. But it (the one under GPL) is the one that took over the server and a big chunk of the embedded space.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @02:47PM (11 children)
Long before the GPL, people were sharing code. Knuth famously released his groundbreaking, advanced typesetting suite in 1978.
Stallman just tried to force this sharing by writing it into copyright law.
The BSDs (and the Apache-licensed software) have been enormously influential, and form the core and growing userspace of the operating system developed by the largest computing corporation in world history: Apple, a corporation that still makes headlines by releasing its work as open-source software.
Indeed, the GPL has never been well tested in the court system, which is the only place where legalese can be actually reified as enforceable law. It's usefulness is more convention than reality, proving that FOSS is more cultural than legal or technical.
People like sharing their stuff; they want others to support their work. People like getting stuff for free. People want to fix bugs and scratch their own itches. The implication is clear: Open-source software is a natural consequence of this Universe.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @05:36PM (8 children)
How terrible that you can't take Free Software and make it proprietary. What a travesty this is!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @05:39PM (7 children)
That's true Freedom: Voluntary Association.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @06:17PM (3 children)
Incorrect. True freedom is being able to do whatever, thus slavery is a result of "true freedom" and it just happens that the slaves were not able to prevent the masters from enslaving them. They are free to revolt and break free, and the masters are free to kill them.
This "true freedom" idea is really just anarchy so you should drop the high minded idealism. GPL/Apache/BSD are all examples of GOOD freedom where people are able to create software and apply the license they prefer. That is voluntary association, and if someone says you can't make proprietary software out of their freely available software then tough nuggets. While you're working on your ideologies try imagining a world where capitalism isn't the end-all be-all where everyone needs to bow down to the almighty "business".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @07:24PM (2 children)
So, your definition is bullshit.
You've been hoist by your own petard; your argument is a straw man.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 15 2018, @12:21AM (1 child)
Yes welcome to why you're ideology is so fundamentally flawed. Amazing that you think it implicates me. If only we were all saints who would never violate the well being of one another!
At least we can get some amusement tossing virtual vegetables at you!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 15 2018, @02:25PM
What about "straw man" don't you get?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @07:46PM
oh, stfu! noone forces you to use gpl'd software. there are plenty of mac-using sellouts pushing Slaveware As A Service apps leeched from bsd licensed shit. you can join your fellow whores.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Tuesday May 15 2018, @12:06AM (1 child)
Free association is alive and well with GPL. Nobody forces you to use it as part of your project.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 15 2018, @02:38PM
Both the GPL and Apache operate under free association. It's just that the GPL's set of free associations is smaller than that of Apache's.
Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]:
(Score: 2) by Adamsjas on Monday May 14 2018, @05:42PM (1 child)
QUOTE: Indeed, the GPL has never been well tested in the court system
Hasn't it won every test it was subject to? In many countries?
Maybe I'm mistaken, but I thought it had.
When people stop contesting an issue, because the lose every case, isn't that a definition of "well tested"?
If not, what do you think is missing?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @06:17PM
On just 13 May 2017: [theregister.co.uk]
The judge concluded that the GPL constitutes a contract, even though the FSF's long-held position is apparently that it is not a contract. In the judge's decision, there is talk of how other copyright cases
Also, such a case is subject to appeal, and nothing related to copyleft case law has ever made its way to the Supreme Court.
Furthermore, as the U.S. dictates world policy, especially regarding copyrights and contracts, that strongly suggests that the GPL's standing the world is still not very secure.
From what I know, there have been a number of settlements, but those are not judgments that form case law.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Monday May 14 2018, @05:38PM (6 children)
If your solution is to tweak obscure legalese then your solution is transient.
And yet somehow I get the distinct impression you are the "violently imposed monopoly" guy.
Isn't your whole thesis that we should be using contracts for everything?
And aren't contracts just tweaked obscure legalese?
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @05:50PM (5 children)
... of interaction, including agreements about how that contract will be enforced.
In contrast, law by legislation (such as the DMCA) is an imposition, more or less unilateral; not only can it be changed by the whim of the next legislative body (which can be targeted by special interest groups), but it's also only as useful as its enforcement is practical, a fact that frequently escapes the fantasies of bureaucrats, who mistake the laws of man for the laws of nature.
Get it yet?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @06:25PM (4 children)
Yes we get it, you're still a dummy pushing an agenda so hard you're eyes are stuck.
I think most people are done trying to have a rational discussion with you since you've developed a personal litmus test for "voluntary agreements" and refuse to acknowledge the limitations and frequent edge cases where your new version of society completely breaks down and/or reverts back to centralized governments. So at least I will stick to the first sentence, you're a dummy with a rigid brain but we all have hope that one day you'll grow a bit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @06:38PM (3 children)
Anyway, I don't really understand what your rebuttal is supposed to mean or what it's based on; it looks like a word salad for "Let's agree to disagree."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @07:04PM (2 children)
Nope, I'll agree you've got blinders on. I find all your reasoning to be naive and actively harmful, agree to disagree is saved for opinions where both are potentially valid. Your reasoning is simply flawed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @07:07PM (1 child)
That sounds more like your world view is being poked. Better censor your opposition.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 15 2018, @12:40AM
Ah yes, the sensitive conservative who can't stand someone criticizing their ideas and must roll out the persecution card. #sad
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday May 14 2018, @06:44PM (1 child)
It won't be abandoned. It simply will not be enforced any longer. Just as it is illegal to bathe without authorization of a physician. Or to buy toothpaste on Sunday.
The only way to get rid of a bad law is to actually ENFORCE it.
For some odd reason all scientific instruments searching for intelligent life are pointed away from Earth.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 14 2018, @07:11PM
That's the nature of politics; that's the nature of authoritarianism. It's totally unprincipled.