Lockouts

In his “Counterpoint” sidebar to “Death by DMCA” [June], Fritz Attaway of the Motion Picture Association of America suggests that breaking technical locks should be illegal. But he forgets that a technical lock on a piece of content that I’ve bought and paid for is quite different from the padlock my neighbor puts on a garden shed.

Breaking a technical lock damages no property and inflicts no harm. How the knowledge to do so is applied has the potential to inflict harm. One reason someone would try to break such a lock is to steal content; this should be punished. The other reason is for the intellectual challenge of advancing the technology; this should be encouraged.

If I legally download or buy content for later use, I expect to be able to use that content when and how I see fit and not be restricted by arbitrary rules imposed by the recording industry in its efforts to improve its members’ cash flow. I’m learning French, and while I was in France recently, I went to a video store to buy a few movies. Fortunately, my wife reminded me that DVDs have country codes and that I might not be able to play the DVDs once I returned home.

It’s inconceivable to me that the recording industry thinks it is good business to alienate its customers. It is certainly alienating this one!

Keith Clifford

IEEE Member

Coquitlam, B.C., Canada

I thoroughly enjoyed “Death by DMCA,” as much for its detail and quality of writing as for the importance of the debate. What I noticed most was the difference between the article and the “Counterpoint” sidebar written by the representative of the Motion Picture Association of America.

While the article itself supported every statement with examples and facts, the counterpoint showed the shallow depth of argument that the entertainment industry is forced to defend.

Cyrus Miller

IEEE Student Member

Orono, Maine

As I read the article, I flashed back more than 40 years to when copiers first became commonplace. For a brief period, there was a push to forbid any copies of any copyrighted material for any purpose without prior authorization or royalty payments. Some claimed that without such regulation, print media would die in a decade. Such regulation did not, of course, come to pass; instead print media flourished. Consider how few trade publications there were in the 1960s. Look at how many there are now.

Next, I flashed back 55-plus years to when the television industry tried to forbid TV sets in restaurants and lounges, because they were using the broadcasts to help make money (selling food and drink) and not paying royalties.

Hollywood should learn from history. Openness means greater long-term prosperity for everyone.

Ronald O. Brown

IEEE Member

Casco, Maine

When I saw the Motion Picture Association of America’s claim that the DMCA has helped to create new stuff—iPod, instant messaging, DVDs, and all the popular entertainment gear out today—I just about died laughing. The DMCA has done nothing but kill innovation in the entertainment markets. It hinders the development of new material and destroys new devices—new lines of business—that could make not just the entertainment industry but others as well very profitable.

The association doesn’t seem to understand that copyright is not indefinite. I’m young, and Elvis and Walt Disney are dead—but under current U.S. copyright laws, I will be dead (and most likely my grandchildren, too) before their works fall out from under copyright and go into the public domain. That’s not what was intended by copyright, and I’m not happy about it.

Further, the U.S. population is not going to go out overnight and buy new TV sets (as much as the Motion Picture Association of America may like) just to watch the new DTV or HDTV stuff when, as the U.S. Federal Communications Commission mandates, all current standard definition TV channels are to be removed. A lot of people will stop watching, and they will be better for it.

Benjamen R. Meyer 

IEEE Member

Fairfax, Va.

The Game Goes On

Good heavens! Software engineers are providing an incentive for managers to finally learn to make realistic project plans [ Spectral Lines, June]? What is the world coming to? Next thing you know, the universities will be teaching software engineering as a distinct discipline from computer science—the same way they teach experimental physics differently from pure mathematics. Whatever will become of us?

Max Rible Kaehn

IEEE Member

Sunnyvale, Calif.