RE: DMCA alternatives (RE: Clarification (RE: "Fair Use" IsGetting Unfair Treatment)

["Rick Anderson" <rickand@unr.edu>]

> No, we don't want to make
> breaking and entering legal, even if the reason we want to be inside is
> completely innocent. But, that being understood and agreed upon does not
> preclude us from objecting to and attempting to invalidate a law that
> makes one a criminal for circumventing technology.

I guess the whole point of my analogy was to illustrate an argument that
is exactly the opposite of yours, Jeff.  It seems to me that
"circumventing technology" is indeed a problem if it means doing something
that is substantially like breaking and entering.  I keep trying to think
of another area of law that grants one person the right to lock something
up while simultaneously granting someone else the right to pick the lock,
and I can't think of one.

> That is the issue,
> which Rep. Rick Boucher has understood: "It's a broad overreach to have a
> person arrested under the federal criminal laws simply because they made
> software that circumvents a technological measure, I think the current
> case adds impetus to the growing effort to fashion an amendment to the
> DMCA that would restore the classic balance (of fair use rights),"

Actually, Boucher is addressing a different issue: that of criminalizing
the creation of software that could be used for hacking.  It seems to me
that what should probably be criminalized is the hacking behavior itself
(regardless of whether the hacking then results in a copyright violation).

-------------
Rick Anderson
Director of Resource Acquisition
The University Libraries
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rickand@unr.edu