Be careful what you wish for, you might get it ... or not quite what you want ...
Google in paedo censorship debacle
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/29531.html
It could've been worse, but there were some severe errors here. I've made some updates to:
Chester's Guide to Molesting Google
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/general/chester.php
The Copyright Office has now posted all the reply comments concerning DMCA exemptions. The comments are available at:
http://www.copyright.gov/1201/2003/reply/reply1.html
This page contains reply comments submitted as a part of a rulemaking on exemptions from prohibition on circumvention of technological measures that control access to copyrighted works ...
Yesterday, my censorware report BESS's Secret LOOPHOLE ( http://sethf.com/anticensorware/bess/loophole.php) was in fact banned by BESS (a brand name of the censorware made by N2H2). Ironically, it was banned as LOOPHOLE, which means it would be prohibited by default in every installation, everywhere (doesn't the idea of that frighten you? - it sure frightens me).
Other people saw this. I saw this. There's no question it happened.
Today, as I went to write it up, I seem to be unbanned by BESS.
I wonder why they can't make up their minds? Or did they want to avoid giving me the ability to say I've been banned-by-BESS? Did David Burt, their PR flack, say it would be embarrassing?
Life's little mysteries ...
From: Seth Finkelstein
To: Seth Finkelstein's InfoThought list
Subject: IT: Google removal - Chester's Guide to Molesting Google
Date: Tue, 25 Feb 2003 11:27:35 -0500
New report:
Chester's Guide to Molesting Google
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/general/chester.php
Abstract: This report examines a newspaper-led campaign to have a site removed from both its host and the Google search index. The uproar turned out to originate from a single page of text of "sick humor".
I've investigated the background behind a campaign of a UK newspaper, the "Chester Chronicle", to have material removed from the web (not successfully - so far) and from Google's index (successfully!). The campaign appears to be a "moral panic" arising from confusing an archived text column of "sick humor", written under a pen-name of "Chester the Molester", for a paedophile site.
URL of Chester Chronicle article describing success against Google index:
"Sick website taken down"
http://iccheshireonline.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0100regionalnews/page.cfm?objectid=12663897&method=full&siteid=50020
Seth Finkelstein Consulting Programmer sethf[at-sign]sethf.com http://sethf.com
Anticensorware Investigations - http://sethf.com/anticensorware/
Seth Finkelstein's Infothought blog - http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/
Infothought mailing list
http://sethf.com/mailman/listinfo.cgi/infothought
[This was something I wrote to send to Dave Farber's list]
Subject: Re: [IP] Have ISP's walked into their own trap?
On Mon, Feb 24, 2003 at 08:12:12AM -0500, a comment was made:
> As ISPs move to fight spam by installing content aware filtering, have
> they cracked open the historical defense that much like common carriers,
> ISPs are not responsible for content in Internet copyright, fraud,
> pornography, and terrorism cases?
Dave, can I point out many obvious rebuttals?
1) If that were so, then ISPs which explicitly market built-incensorware (Surfcontrol/N2H2/Websense/etc.) as a feature of their service would be doing far, far, worse to this defense. I can't recall this ever being an issue.
2) The telephone company is allowed to offer blocking of various phone exchanges (i.e. phone-sex lines) without incurring content-based liability.
3) Similarly, the telephone company is allowed to monitor phone lines for various service-related problems without incurring such liability.
I think the deepest answer, though, is that anti-spam programs are not in fact directed at content _per se_, but the action of unwelcome solicitation. The repetitive content is used as a proxy for that solicitation. But I'd say it's important to keep in mind that the content itself is not the target. None of the programs have the goal of making, say, purchases of "rhymes-with-niagra" to be impossible (even though it sometimes seems that way from the practical effects ...).
A bit more prosaically, I doubt ISPs have any special hatred for merchants of oner-tay artridges-cay, in terms of the product. Rather it's the attempt to sell that product by trespass-to-chattel which is the problem.
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer.
--
Seth Finkelstein Consulting Programmer sethf[at-sign]sethf.com http://sethf.com
This recent message about spam blacklists struck me as much food for thought (note the ratio):
Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2003 13:48:53 -0800
Sender: Spam Prevention Discussion List
From: "Wolfgang S. Rupprecht"
Subject:Re: Humor, Media: Report on SpamCop's blocking problems
(Angel Rivera) writes:
> Agree with SpamCop and use it, or disagree with it and don't use
> it. I use it and have learned no shocking secrets to keep me from it
> at this point.
So do I. I was a bit wary of it at first due to all the bashing it took, but I haven't seen any gross lossage due to it. Our current spamload is hovering at just under 300 spams per person per day. Spamcop nailed 250 of them. If there are any false positive spamcop hits in there, they are totally lost in the noise.
summary from Fri Feb 21 10:00:26 2003 to Sun Feb 23 10:57:04 2003 (2.0 days)
total spam msgs: 1170
total good msgs: 502
total spam/day: 573.7
total spam/month: 17211
spam ratio: 69%
Msg:
497 Service unavailable; Client host [X.X.X.X] blocked using bl.spamcop.net
216 Service unavailable; Client host [X.X.X.X] blocked using relays.osirusoft.com
188 Service unavailable; Client host [X.X.X.X] blocked using dnsbl.njabl.org
92 Relay access denied
...
For some email I just wrote:
"Some days, I think about writing a book on civil-liberties activism. One chapter would be about getting fooled. My thesis there is that since civil-libertarians are fundamentally good-hearted, dedicated, people interested in fighting injustice, they are also particularly vulnerable to manipulative liars. And a professional spammer is almost by definition a con-man scammer lying thief (really - I do not mean this hyperbolically - spam is overwhelmingly made up of frauds - pump-and-dump stocks, sex lures, phony diets, get-rich-quick schemes, etc.)"
There's a partial transcript now up of the Copyright And Culture Forum which took place at MIT last November. The forum isn't new, but I believe the partial transcript is very recent.
It doesn't have my copyright And Culture forum quotes, but it does have the section which contains my question about activism
Search for my name on the page - it's about three-quarters of the way down, in the audience-discussion section.
Now my follow-up DMCA exemption comment (for censorware blacklists) has been submitted:
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/legal/dmcacom2.php
I didn't put in what I was thinking about the process. I've been pretty tired and that's a bad time to write. Maybe if there's another reply-round.
I can't wait to see what the censorware companies write about me :-(.
I may have a bet with Bennett Haselton of Peacefire over it ...
One extra day available for DMCA reply comments
http://www.copyright.gov/1201/comment_forms/index.html
"Note: This date has been extended from Feb. 19 to Feb. 20 in light of the heavy snowfall in the Northeast and the resulting closure of federal government and many private-sector offices."
So I'm busy doing
DMCA exemptions
material today. I'm debating how much I can let loose and say:
"This process is not designed for normal people. It's just not.
It may work for Washington wonks. But non-politicos simply
don't have the time or the expertise in order to sit down
and read through pages of requirements, and make lawyer-like
arguments."
It's probably not a good idea for me to formally write that. But it's what I'm thinking right now.
Two more DMCA reply-comment days left. The deadline is 5:00 P.M. EST on February 19, 2003. Operators are standing by now (or at least there are handy forms and guides below)
"EFF is helping individuals fight for DMCA exemptions."
http://www.eff\.org/IP/DMCA/2003-DMCA-1201-comments.php
"How To Win (DMCA) Exemptions And Influence Policy"
http://www.eff.or\g/IP/DMCA/finkelstein_on_dmca.html
"Winning (DMCA) Exemptions, The Next Round"
http://www.eff.or\g/IP/DMCA/finkelstein_on_dmca2.php
Crypto-Gram newsletter is being marked as spam by SpamAssassin again. It's happened before, see my earlier analysis of SpamAssassin and Crypto-Gram. Here's a guess as to why it's happening now (SpamAssassin version 2.43).
WARNING - I used a mail header from the crypto-gram subscription confirmation in these tests, since I wasn't subscribed to the mailing-list. That may affect the results. It's very important to pay attention to the mail header, as tests on it are significant. Using the raw text of the newsletter - that is, no mail header - is not an accurate test!
Results:
SPAM: Content analysis details: (5.20 hits, 5 required)
So it's over the limit.
SPAM: NO_REAL_NAME (1.3 points) From: does not include a real name
Right. The "from" is just the mailing list (I assume)
SPAM: FORGED_RCVD_FOUND (0.8 points) Possibly-forged 'Received:' header found
SPAM: MSG_ID_ADDED_BY_MTA_2 (0.1 points) 'Message-Id' was added by a relay (2)
It doesn't like something about the way the mailing is done.
SPAM: OPT_IN (1.5 points) BODY: Talks about opting in
" ... use his own resources and take Opt-In requests from Intel employees ..."
SPAM: US_DOLLARS_4 (0.4 points) BODY: Nigerian scam key phrase ($NNN.N m/USDNNN.N m/US$NN.N m)
SPAM: US_DOLLARS_2 (0.1 points) BODY: Nigerian scam key phrase ($NNN.N m/USDNNN.N m/US$NN.N m)
US_DOLLARS_4 : ... stole $1.5 million in jewels ...
US_DOLLARS_2 : Hot on the heels of our $20M funding, ...
SPAM: BALANCE_FOR_LONG_20K (-0.7 points) BODY: Message text is over 20K in size
SPAM: BALANCE_FOR_LONG_40K (-0.1 points) BODY: Message text is over 40K in size
"Good" points for being long.
SPAM: NORMAL_HTTP_TO_IP (1.3 points) URI: Uses a dotted-decimal IP address in URL
Anyone can get their own .mil domain.
<http://212.100.234.54/content/55/29026.html>
SPAM: SPAM_PHRASE_01_02 (0.5 points) BODY: Spam phrases score is 01 to 02 (low) [score: 1]
And a few misc phrases.
Sigh. Now to go try to see if anything can be fixed. Spam-wars, spam-wars ...
Update: Looks like the problem may be the " Razor" distributed message tests:
Date: Sun, 16 Feb 2003 12:10:49 -0500
Sender: Spam Prevention Discussion List <SPAM-L[at-sign]PEACH.EASE.LSOFT.COM>
From: Ed Allen Smith
Subject: Re: Media: Spamassassin blocks crypto-gram newsletter
...
By default - and by SA developer recommendation (I've been helping a bit
with it and _I_ wouldn't recommend using it for blocking on most accounts,
just for sorting mail into different inboxes... and I have some uncertainty
on the latest scoresets; I've been working on the SA GA and have been seeing
some problems with generalization), yes. From initial reports, at
least part of the problem is that _Razor_ is hitting the February 15th
CRYPTO-GRAM, so if SA is used with Razor going... I'll check the February
15th CRYPTO-GRAM vs SA 2.50-cvs, with and without Razor2 & DNSBLs.
It may wind up that CRYPTO-GRAM
has to be specifically whitelisted - SecurityFocus
is, due to that SF mailing lists can have, say, malicious JavaScript
legitimately being quoted in emails. We'll see.
-Allen
--
Allen Smith http://cesario.rutgers.edu/easmith/
February 1, 2003 Space Shuttle Columbia
Ad Astra Per Aspera To The Stars Through Asperity
So I've spend a good portion of yesterday evening and today investigating "How Appealing" is pornography, where the NetSpective censorware. had (that? the?) blogspot.com site as pornography. I've suggested some tests and we'll see what happens.
Note the How Appealing blog has a nice item on me, "Seth Finkelstein to the rescue".
I should note my concurrence with the the earlier statement:
My thoughts exactly: A former Pennsylvania state court appellate judge emails to observe, "The classification of your blog as 'pornography' by screening software is further evidence supporting the findings in Chief Judge Becker's opinion in [ the District Court Decision striking down CIPA ]"
If you want some irony, compare what NetSpective is saying in contrast, that "... NetSpective WebFilter Meets Federal CIPA Standards ....", that "... NetSpective WebFilter(TM) URL filtering solution fulfills all CIPA filtering requirements. ...."
Notably, accuracy seems NOT to be one of those requirements (and I'm serious here, that's one reason the law was, and is likely to be, struck down).
There's times when I wish censorware investigation could be my job. I've been busy all day job-hunting, so I haven't yet had a chance to investigate the blacklisting as pornography of the How Appealing blog by the NetSpective censorware.
This along with
... other sites which are blocked, including Arts & Letters Daily (http://www.aldaily.com), Technorati ((http://www.technorati.com) and Blo.gs ((http://www.blo.gs).
Quoth the How Appealing blog:
Look on the bright side, though: If my Web log is classified as "pornography," perhaps some actual pornography has been classified as a Web log devoted to appellate litigation.
(indeed, that probably has happened somewhere!).
I suspect this is a similar situation to my censorware report:
CyberPatrol - 247 bans for the price of 1
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/cyberpatrol/247for1.php
That described 247 sites blacklisted as "Partial Nudity, Nudity, Sex Acts/Text", and we never even found what site they wanted to target! Interestingly enough, it also began with the blacklisting of a law site, in that case http://www.archerlaw.com/.
If any lawyers or journalists are reading this, and want to back me up in these investigations, let me know! Deep censorware work is NOT risk-free. (and if anyone has a way to make this my job, even better!)
Thanks to Math class for poets: law and life and email for the information.
Censorware is about control. I say that repeatedly. The biggest public-relations victory the censorware-makers ever achieved, was to get censorware called a "filter", and to have that control described as "filtering". It's not mere partisanship. Rather, the terms "filter" and "filtering" channel the discussion into a thought-pattern of extracting the assumed, bad, even toxic, material, leaving a purified result. As opposed to censorware, which concerns what's required to control a person, to prevent them reading prohibited content. I have a sinking feeling I'm going to be saying this over and over again in the run-up to the Supreme Court CIPA arguments.
I've been digging around to try to find the original material on the satellite TV DMCA-related case (DirecTV, Dish Network, etc.) The case involved others laws besides the DMCA, conspiracy and "manufacturing a device for the purpose of stealing satellite signals, 47 U.S.C. S 605(e)(4);"
I wish so many reporters didn't have such an aversion to referencing primary sources (probably because it would show how little work they did in, rewriting or excerpting a press release). Here's what I've found:
U.S. Department of Justice press release on "Operation Decrypt":
http://www.usdoj.gov:80/criminal/cybercrime/OPdecrypt_walterPlea.htm
"Operation Decrypt" defendants and charges:
http://www.usdoj.gov:80/criminal/cybercrime/OPdecrypt.htm
Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section
http://www.usdoj.gov:80/criminal/cybercrime/ipcases.htm
Seven more reply-comment days for DMCA ...
Useful general references:
"EFF is helping individuals fight for DMCA exemptions."
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/2003-DMCA-1201-comments.php
"How To Win (DMCA) Exemptions And Influence Policy"
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/finkelstein_on_dmca.html
"Winning (DMCA) Exemptions, The Next Round"
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/finkelstein_on_dmca2.php
Article below:
http://www.infosecuritymag.com/2003/feb/news.shtml#4
LAW & ORDER
DMCA Opponents Target Change
by ANNE SAITA
Programmer Seth Finkelstein has some advice when venting about shortcomings of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act: Watch your language.
Finkelstein won one of two exemptions from the U.S. Copyright Office the last time it sought input on the controversial law in 2000. And he did it, he says, by carefully crafting an argument based on practical effects of a DMCA prohibition that prevented decrypting "censorware blacklists" used by content filtering software.
"The most surprising thing about the process was that they listened,"Finkelstein says.
Every three years, the Copyright Office must make a public inquiry into adverse effects caused by specific DMCA restrictions that protect copyrighted works. The first deadline for written comment is over, but it's still possible to chime in by filing comments on one of the 50 arguments now on the record-including 10 related to information security (www.copyright.gov/1201/2003/comments/index.html). The deadline is Feb. 19.
Even the Copyright Office admits its 2000 recommendation ratio of 2 to 235 is "modest," mainly because most comments, though eloquently presented, failed to show how the law inhibited research. Admittedly, examples were hard to come by in the last round, since the law was still relatively new and untested in the courts.
This round is different. Though there are fewer written arguments (mainly because of stricter submission guidelines), there also are more specific instances to cite, such as Princeton University professor Edward Felten's legal tussle with the recording industry over publishing an academic exercise in breaking the watermarks on musical digital files.
"It's going to be harder for them to say there's not enough evidence in certain cases," he says. But, he adds, "though the chance is greater, it's definitely not a sure thing."
One more item regarding "In Defense of Copyright Law" by Doug Isenberg (link from Donna Wentworth / Copyfight), because the following part is quite relevant to me:
Still, there are no "copyright police." Some copyright chicken littles would have us believe otherwise by citing the interesting case of a computer programmer who along with his company was criminally charged under the DMCA in 2001 for creating a software program that circumvented technological protections on e-books in the Adobe format, even though neither the programmer nor the company actually copied any e-books. But, charges against the programmer were dropped, and a jury in December 2002 found the company not guilty. Apparently, copyright law has not run amok.
Dmitry Sklyarov was jailed pre-trial. For what? DMCA violations and conspiracy. I'd say that's "run amok".
I have a standard offer for lawyers who write things such as the "chicken littles" paragraph above. I say: Since, according to you, there is no risk, well then, there should be no problem at all for you to agree to represent me pro bono for any relevant charges arising from my censorware work. No risk, right? So there's no risk in your making such agreement, right? Here's how you can show you believe it yourself, when there's a risk to you!
I have yet to find a lawyer, who makes derisive comments like that quoted remark, who will then take me up on that offer. In this case, since it's not good to be represented by a hostile lawyer, I'd have to modify the offer from "represent me" to "cover all my legal defense expenses", or something along those lines. But that's a detail, since I don't expect any interest in it.
Note: Some readers may wonder, what about the DMCA censorware exemption, which I was instrumental in winning. That covers actually performing an encryption circumvention, but it doesn't cover publishing about it, to help others obtain the blacklists. I'm just one person, the blacklists are huge. The problem is that if I give other people the whole censorware blacklist, that's likely a copyright violation, and if I give them the tools to obtain the censorware blacklist themselves, that may be a DMCA code ("trafficking") violation.
I started to take apart "In Defense of Copyright Law" by Doug Isenberg (link from Donna Wentworth / Copyfight). It's not worth it. Here, for example, is the problem with just one sentence.
Yet many of those same critics refuse to recognize that the law applies equally to every copyright owner, from starving artists to The Walt Disney Company, as well as everyone in between.
This is almost too easy. Yup, equally. In exactly the same sort of this equality:
"The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread"
Anatole France, Le Lys Rouge [1894], chapter 7
How many starving artists were helped by a retrospective copyright extension? That's a trick question. The answer is NONE. BECAUSE THEY ARE ALL DEAD!. Not dead because they are starving. But dead because prior copyright didn't expire until they had been in their graves for decades. Now it's more decades. So:
The law, in its majestic equality, applies equally to the rich existing corporations as well as the long-dead poor artists ...
And that's just one sentence.
Sigh. I know, the idea is to stir the pot, to get noticed by saying outrageous things. All part of the journo-game. And I suppose I just got sucked into it.
The Supreme Court friend-of-the-court brief representing the Online Policy Group and Seth Finkelstein in the CIPA case (Federal mandatory censorware law) is now available.
OPG:
http://www.onlinepolicy.org/action/legpolicy/cipasupremebrief030210.pdf
SethF.com:
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/legal/OPG_Seth_Finkelstein.pdf
and automatically converted to HTML:
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/legal/OPG_Seth_Finkelstein.html
Seth Finkelstein is a computer programmer and civil liberties advocate. Since 1995, he has dedicated thousands of hours to studying commercially developed Internet blocking software. These efforts have revealed many of the mechanisms employed by blocking software, which Mr. Finkelstein has described in articles and reports. For his efforts "in the fight against government mandated use" of such software, Mr. Finkelstein received the Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award. Mr. Finkelstein is interested in ensuring that the Court understands how commercially developed blocking software operates and the dangers that it poses to free speech.
http://onlinepolicy.org/media/cipasupreme030210.shtml
San Francisco - The Online Policy Group (OPG) and software expert Seth Finkelstein today submitted a brief to the U.S. Supreme Court supporting a lower court decision that the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA) places unconstitutional limitations on free speech of library patrons by requiring the use of technology protection measures in libraries receiving certain federal funding or discounts.
Media Release: U.S. Supreme Court Considers Internet Blocking in Libraries
For Immediate Release: Monday, February 10, 2003
Contact:
Will Doherty
Executive Director
Online Policy Group
press[at-sign]onlinepolicy.org
Seth Finkelstein
EFF 2001 Pioneer Award Winner
sethf[at-sign]sethf.com
Daniel Bromberg
Attorney
Jones Day
dhbromberg[at-sign]JonesDay.com
U.S. Supreme Court Considers Internet Blocking in Libraries
Online Policy Group, Seth Finkelstein Submit Court Brief
San Francisco - The Online Policy Group (OPG) and software expert Seth Finkelstein today submitted a brief to the U.S. Supreme Court supporting a lower court decision that the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA) places unconstitutional limitations on free speech of library patrons by requiring the use of technology protection measures in libraries receiving certain federal funding or discounts.
OPG and Finkelstein's brief, prepared by attorneys Daniel H. Bromberg, Charles Morse, and Josh Fairfield of the law firm Jones Day, argues that CIPA's technology protection requirement forces libraries to use commercial blocking software. Because blocking software censors speech that receives full First Amendment protection and may discriminate against certain viewpoints, OPG and Finkelstein argue that CIPA should be subject to strict scrutiny.
"Using commercial Internet blocking software to comply with CIPA, libraries force the political, social, and cultural biases of software manufacturers with differing community standards onto library patrons in their own communities," said OPG Executive Director Will Doherty. "Especially for 'controversial' topics -- such as politics, medical health, child abuse, abortion, sexual orientation, and gender identity -- the biases inherent in Internet blocking software are unacceptable."
"Censorware is not filtering, it is electronic book-burning," commented Seth Finkelstein. "It's a pre-slipped slope denying any privacy, since all reading must be monitored."
"Technology is no panacea for those who wish to regulate speech on the Internet," observed Daniel Bromberg. "As CIPA shows, attempts to regulate speech on the Internet through purely technological means can pose special dangers to free speech."
The amicus brief from OPG and Finkelstein accompanies the main legal argument from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other plaintiffs in the U.S. government's appeal from a decision of a special three-judge panel striking down the library portion of CIPA on May 31, 2002.
For this media release:
http://www.onlinepolicy.org/media/cipasupreme030210.shtml
OPG/Finkelstein brief to the U.S. Supreme Court:
http://www.onlinepolicy.org/action/legpolicy/cipasupremebrief030210.shtml
ACLU brief to the U.S. Supreme Court:
http://www.eff.org/Legal/Cases/Multnomah_Library_v_US/20030210_multnomah_brief.php
More on Children's Internet Protection Act:
http://www.onlinepolicy.org/action/legpolicy/cipa.shtml
Seth Finkelstein's website:
http://sethf.com/
About OPG:
The Online Policy Group (OPG) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to online policy research, outreach, and action on issues such as access, privacy, and digital defamation. The organization fulfills its motto of "one Internet with equal access to all" through projects such as donation-based email list hosting, web hosting, domain registrations, and now colocation services. OPG focuses on Internet participants' civil liberties and human rights, like access, privacy, safety, and serving schools, libraries, disabled, elderly, youth, women, and sexual, gender, and ethnic minorities. Find out more at http://www.onlinepolicy.org/
- end -
Infothought mailing list
http://sethf.com/mailman/listinfo.cgi/infothought
http://www.eff.org/effector/HTML/effect16.04.html#III
Winning (DMCA) Exemptions, The Next Round
EFF Hosts Seth Finkelstein's New Primer
EFF is pleased to announce the release of "Winning (DMCA) Exemptions, The Next Round," a wonderfully succinct guide to the comment-making process written by Seth Finkelstein, who proposed one of the only two exemptions granted in the last Library of Congress Rule-making.
Seth's guide explains the process in clear and simple English. The guide tells you how you can submit effective comments and participate in shaping copyright law policy. If you are having difficulties making lawful use of particular digital media because of a technological protection access control, we encourage you to submit comments to the Librarian of Congress.
Links:
"Winning (DMCA) Exemptions, The Next Round"
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/finkelstein_on_dmca2.php
EFF is helping individuals fight for DMCA exemptions.
http://www.eff.org/IP/DMCA/2003-DMCA-1201-comments.php
My report on UK Parliament Mail - The Ministry Of Silly Messages ( http://sethf.com/anticensorware/general/uk.php ) has been getting some coverage.
It's in The Inquirer, in an article Man solves un-parliamentary language conundrum
One critical insight I advocate in the spam-wars, is that the problem is going to be dealt with one way or another. Spam is not an "intellectual" problem, like sex-talk, hate-speech, etc. Spam is a "physical" problem, of cost-shifting and denial-of-service.
I suspect Parliament's trouble arise from conflating the "physical", the flood of solicitations, with the "intellectual", messages using words which were deemed an impropriety.
From: Seth Finkelstein
To: Seth Finkelstein's InfoThought list
Subject: IT: UK Parliament Mail - The Ministry Of Silly Messages
Date: Fri, 7 Feb 2003 13:45:06 -0500
New report:
UK Parliament Mail - The Ministry Of Silly Messages
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/general/uk.php
Abstract: This report examines messages being rejected by a mail system in use by the UK parliament.
I've reverse-engineered why the system used by the UK parliament to scan mail for "inappropriate content" was bouncing messages ranging from Welsh newsletters to a Shakespeare quote. Censorware is not fond of pussy-cats and tit-willows.
URLs:
E-mail vetting blocks MPs' sex debate
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/2723851.stm
Software blocks MPs' Welsh e-mail
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/2727133.stm
Plaid up in arms as Commons spam filter bans Welsh
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/29199.html
UK Parliament Mail - The Ministry Of Silly Messages
http://sethf.com/anticensorware/general/uk.php
NTK (Need-To-Know) coverage
http://www.ntk.net/2003/02/07/
Cyber-Rights & Cyber-Liberties (UK)
http://www.cyber-rights.org/
--
Seth Finkelstein
Anticensorware Investigations - http://sethf.com/anticensorware/
Seth Finkelstein's Infothought blog - http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/
List sub/unsub: http://sethf.com/mailman/listinfo.cgi/infothought
Let me try this from another direction. In physics, for light, there's a phenomena called "wave-particle duality". That is, in some ways a photon of light acts if it's a tiny billiard ball (a particle) and in other ways it acts if it's a ripple in material (a wave).
So asking "Is something program or data?" is a bit like asking "Is light a particle or wave?". As an intrinsic property, it's always both, But this doesn't mean everything stops there. Depending on extrinsic considerations, in different circumstances, one or the other aspect is the way it is taken in a particular situation.
In a legal analogy, I mentioned the same action being accident or murder depending on the state of mind. What I was attempting to express there, was less the specific idea that the distinction between accident and murder can be based on intent, and more the general idea that it's based on certain extrinsic rules on how to place the very same action. Did the person intend to do harm? How much did they intend? Even if they did intend, is that intent excusable? ("justifiable homicide"). However, the target is just as dead, regardless of the outcome of this rule-based determination procedure of what legal category should apply to the action.
I do think what might be called "program-data" (or "speech-code") duality has profound implications. But I also think discussion of those implications often gets derailed into an uninteresting side-path where people ask
"How can treating dual-thing as aspect-1 in situation-1, be reconciled with the fact that dual-thing is treated as aspect-2 in situation-2? Is dual-thing actually aspect-1 or aspect-2? Surely, since dual-thing can be both aspect-1 and aspect-2, then it must be treated also as aspect-2 in situation-1, and aspect-1 in situation-2. Ha-ha-gotcha!"
As a purely philosophical objection, I don't think this works. Legally, line-drawing is done all the time. The deep problem, as I see it, is if the objection works as a practical issue. As in the following part of the DeCSS decision:
FN275. During the trial, Professor Touretzky of Carnegie Mellon University, as noted above, convincingly demonstrated that computer source and object code convey the same ideas as various other modes of expression, including spoken language descriptions of the algorithm embodied in the code. Tr. (Touretzky) at 1068-69; Ex. BBE, CCO, CCP, CCQ. He drew from this the conclusion that the preliminary injunction irrationally distinguished between the code, which was enjoined, and other modes of expression that convey the same idea, which were not, id., although of course he had no reason to be aware that the injunction drew that line only because that was the limit of the relief plaintiffs sought. With commendable candor, he readily admitted that the implication of his view that the spoken language and computer code versions were substantially similar was not necessarily that the preliminary injunction was too broad; rather, the logic of his position was that it was either too broad or too narrow. Id. at 1070-71. Once again, the question of a substantially broader injunction need not be addressed here, as plaintiffs have not sought broader relief.
Edward Felten discuss Programs vs. Data, and trying to distinguish. Here's an example I've given to people before, for consideration:
The ROT13 algorithm explained ("Caesar Cipher")
1) The decryption algorithm for ROT13 is to take the range of letters from a-z, and for those twenty-six letters, replace the first thirteen of them with the range of letters from n-z and the second thirteen of them with the range of letters from a-m
2) To un-ROT13, do a tr/a-z/n-za-m/ over each character in the file
3) perl -pe 'tr/a-z/n-za-m/;' < infile > outfile
Where did I step over the line, from "speech" to "code"?
Or where did I make the transition between "data" and "program"?
Ed Felten says "it seems unsatisfactory to call something a program or not based on the state of mind of its author.". I submit that for legal purposes, something along those lines of "primary use" or "dominant purpose" is the only system which will work. It's a bit like the different between accident/manslaughter/murder-second-degree/murder-first-degree. The same "data" (outcome) is treated differently depending on a legal "program" (ruling) regarding intent and effect.
I spent some time today digging into the story of UK
Members Of Parliament
having their mail blocked by a spam-scanning program, i.e.:
BBC News: E-mail vetting blocks MPs' sex debate
I found some original-source information the following UK Parliament site:
http://www.adaptwestminster.co.uk/SpamEmails.htm
By the way, the bounces look like this:
From: email.abuse.m33@parliament.uk
Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 16:11:09 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: RE:What is the mail system in use in Parliament?Message subject: What is the mail system in use in Parliament?
This is to advise you that your email has been blocked and will be deleted by the Houses of Parliament in due course since we believe it has inappropriate content. The intended recipient has not received the email.
In the event that you believe the email has been blocked incorrectly please contact the intended recipient directly to discuss it's release.
That's very poorly designed. It looks intimidating, as if you were being chastised. And having to try to get the recipient to discuss release, sounds like bailing someone out of jail.
Just another day in the spam wars ...
The was an interesting mention by Donna Wentworth at Copyfight of a recent Valenti interview
One portion of it in particular grabbed my attention, right after a mention of the famous "VCR is [to the movie industry]...as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone.":
Jack Valenti: I wasn't opposed to the VCR. The MPAA tried to establish by law that the VCR was infringing on copyright. Then we would go to the Congress and get a copyright royalty fee put on all blank videocassettes and that would go back to the creators [to compensate for videocassette piracy].
Umm, ... umm ... where have I just heard about something similar? Well there's the media tax in the "Audio Home Recording Act". And then there's the tax on bandwidth idea.
I'm beginning to wonder ... aside from all the talk of sampling and implementation details ... has anyone considered what'll happen if such a tax ends up not as a replacement for the copyright system, but as an additional source of revenue to the industry ?
I know, I know, that's not the proposal. But I'm pondering if anything happens, that such an outcome may be the eventual result.
I was inspired this weekend, and cross-connected the earlier domain searching to Google
Domains With Typographical Errors - A Google Search Strategy
http://sethf.com/domains/typos-google/
by Seth Finkelstein
Abstract: This paper describes a strategy for searching for domain names with typographical differences by using Google, and compares the results to a previous search using approximate string matching.
This is in response to a report
Large-Scale Registration of Domains with Typographical Errors
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/edelman/typo-domains/
by Benjamin Edelman.
He describes an extensive series of domain names with typographical errors which have been registered by a cybersquatter. and asks for help in identifying these targets. This creates what might be called an "inverse problem", of determining what are the target of the squatted typo'ed name
I remember the Challenger Accident.
Bad deja-vue