The following item from the Politech maillist was sad news. Jon Johansen was one of several hackers who developed a method for Linux systems to read commercially produced DVDs that use CSS scrambling. Unlike the other hackers, Jon disclosed his real name. The others had jobs and were worried about repercussions but Jon was a kid and he figured who'd go after a kid. Well.... <sigh> DMCA is loaded with nasty potentials.
I saw Jon and his father at the H2K conference in New York City in 2000. Jon said that as long as he stayed out of California he'd be OK. (His father was very supportive, a great father for a techno kid. His summary of the case against his son was in the English venacular: "It's bullsh!t." Turns out that the long reach of MPAA and others who sought to fight DeCSS can reach to Norway. Audio files of his H2K session should be up at http://www.hope.net/panels.html; look for the entry "The Jon Johansen Story". There links to an MP3 and a Real Audio file. Side note: One of the arguments against DeCSS is that it is a DVD pirate's tool. But to pirate, one does not need to descramble the DVDs content. A bit for bit copy is all that's needed. Descrambling is needed, however, to view a scrambled DVD such as the one you bought at the video store on the Linux PC with a DVD drive that you bought. There is one way that piracy concern has some validity. The ability to descramble the DVD outside of highly constrained systems could allow the conversion of the content into other formats that, in turn, could be distributed widely. Much of the emerging intellectual property battles revolve around the claim that "fair use", "doctrine of first sale", and other practices of traditional media must be eliminate lest new media publishers go broke from piracy and other lost revenues. If some concerns had their way, the future tech products will come in a glitzy box that says "Do not open under the penalty of the law. Any attempt to understand what goes on underneath the consumer visible interface may result in criminal prosecution and/or civil lawsuits." In short, "Thou shalt not hack in any sense of the term!" <aargh> J.D. Abolins ---- . Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2002 12:31:39 -0500 . From: Declan McCullagh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> . To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Subject: FC: Norway charges Jon Johansen for copyright violations with DeCSS Other news coverage (via Slashdot) http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article.jhtml?articleID=256006 http://www.nettavisen.no/servlets/page?section=9&item=194062 http://www.dagbladet.no/dinside/2002/01/10/305441.html Background on the Johansen case: http://www.politechbot.com/cgi-bin/politech.cgi?name=johansen Photos of Johansen: http://www.mccullagh.org/cgi-bin/photosearch.cgi?name=johansen Johansen's testimony in DeCSS trial in New York city: http://www.eff.org/Cases/MPAA_DVD_cases/20000720_ny_trial_transcript.html -Declan ----- Forwarded message from [EMAIL PROTECTED] ----- Return-Path: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Message-Id: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> X-Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2002 17:51:41 +0100 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: "per chr. k. stokke" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Jon Lech Johansen charged FYI, everybody: Norwegian authorities (www.okokrim.no) have chosen to charge Jon Lech=20 Johansen for violation of =A7145 in the norwegian penal code: ".... any=20 person who by breaking a protective device or in a similar manner,=20 unlawfully obtains access to data or programs which are stored or=20 transferred by electronic or other technical means". If found guilty, he faces up to two years imprisonment and / or fines. Regards, pc per chr. k. stokke reporter/testpilot http://digi.no +47 73 92 94 49 +47 480 39 702 [EMAIL PROTECTED] ----- End forwarded message ----- ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list You may redistribute this message freely if you include this notice. Declan McCullagh's photographs are at http://www.mccullagh.org/ To subscribe to Politech: http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------
