Google Groups : microsoft.public.windowsmedia.drm - the programmer of the Sony Rootkit asks in a newsgroup for free code for his work. Already strange ...
rechteabzocker - 11.7.2003 - 28.11.2005
Boycott Sony-BMG!
Their rootkit nonsense is now also affecting Macs:
Sony BMG has turned the Windows universe against itself with the XCP copy protection from First 4 Internet. Now a copy protection method also appears that is supposed to perform similar tasks in the Mac cosmos as the XCP software. Until now, there were hardly any Trojans and rootkits known for Mac systems.
Great. Hardly any rootkits and Trojans - until now the music industry pushes such nonsense in our face. What are they smoking at Sony-BMG anyway? One thing is clear: a CD from them will not come into my player again. Stigmatizing consumers as criminals and whining about how bad they have it, and then launching an attack on my computer with CDs? Forget it.
Sony BMG's Copy Protection with Rootkit Functions
At Heise, there is a report about the problems with Sony BMG's copy protection:
This software emulates rootkit functions - rootkits also hide their (illegal) activities from the computer user. The copy protection installs filter drivers for CD-ROM drives and IDE drivers, through which it controls access to media.
Ultimately, this is another breach of user data integrity. And considering the idiotic copy protection laws in Germany, you're not even allowed to do anything about it. And so, the individual's right to their property (this is not just about Sony's silly CD, the entire computer is affected!) is once again sacrificed on the altar of the music industry's arrogance.
By the way, this copy protection also includes monitoring functions for media other than its own protected content - and in my opinion, this massively violates data protection regulations, because regardless of what Sony wants to protect, what else is going on on the computer is none of their business.
Another reason not to buy CDs from Sony BMG.
GEMA and the Internet
Again, it's a privately run site that has been caught this time for uploading game trailers and now has to pay GEMA fees for the background music.
And what about GEMA and the music industry? They continue to do their job and in doing so, they also trample over virtual corpses. Doesn't matter, it's just the internet. It's just virtually already convicted and indebted youth before entering professional life. And anyway, where would we end up if everyone just uploaded random videos online for fun...
But it's not just that - in my opinion, it goes far beyond that. Not only are people criminalized for trivial matters on absurd grounds, but ultimately, GEMA and the music industry (and don't even get me started on the artists - they're at the very end of the sausage-making process and the 5 euros they would get for the game trailer site could really make a difference) are making double and triple profits from exploitation rights - even if they are only marginally affected, as in the case of game trailers (for whose background music, by the way, the game manufacturer has usually already paid - if it is original game music).
Where is the right to quote within reasonable limits? There is such a right for written works - why doesn't something like this exist for music?
EU Brainless about Copyright Infringements
What nonsense. If the proposal goes through, using open-source software will become risky:
A new draft law by the European Commission aims to allow lawsuits against users in case of suspected copyright infringement in software. In addition to the perpetrator, companies that feel safe due to their licenses would also come under fire. This was reported by the British trade magazine 'ZDNet UK'.
Given the current impression of the SCO case, it should be clear to everyone that such an idea is complete nonsense - because that's exactly what SCO wanted to do, to extort all Linux users. There are hardly any ideas stupid enough that they couldn't occur to a politician ...
Liability for Links after the Heise Judgment
After this interview with WDR, the following applies: "Anyone who sets such a link is in trouble":
You really have to be very careful. Due to these new rulings, you have to think: Who am I linking to? In the past, as a private individual, you would say: 'Come on, I'll put a hundred links one after the other' and be quite proud. Today, you really have to consider whether the person you are linking to is really trustworthy. You also have to check these links at regular intervals and see what is happening on the linked page.
Which - if it were actually the case - would factually mean the end of privately operated information offerings in the short or long term, as no one can check all their links. I have almost 5000 articles in my blog, which I certainly won't be able to check to see if there is something somewhere that offends someone.
And thus, this ruling has driven another nail into the coffin of the Internet, simply because judges repeatedly rate the alleged rights of rights extortionists higher than free speech and free reporting.
Music industry wants to taboo Allofmp3.com
Actually, it's more like censorship of positive reports about allofmp3 that the music industry is aiming for. So if you've ever said something good about allofmp3, or linked to it, or even recommended it: Waldorf and Stettler will surely send you a letter. And so the madness of cease and desist orders will continue, and the music industry will continue to finance lawyers but do nothing to stop their decline and will therefore eventually become completely insignificant. But of course, it's always someone else's fault ...
The Horror of Sony DRM
Who wants to know what Sony's digital rights management really means for a Windows user: Michael Amor Righi describes the joys he had with a CD and the DRM software, especially the removal of the latter ...
Found at zenzizenzizenzic
SCO Uses Legal Documents from Groklaw and Tuxrocks - wow, great, the advocates of their own intellectual property steal IP from other authors for their websites without citing the source. How embarrassing is that ...
Music Industry and Its Alleged Interest in Musicians' Rights
Music industry wants 95-year protection period for sound recordings and justifies this by saying that musicians should earn money from the rights to their music throughout their lives. Pretty cheeky, when it's precisely the music industry that makes the most money from these rights and musicians - if at all - only receive small contributions. The music industry doesn't care about musicians at all. They only care about increasing their own revenues without having to contribute even a bit of effort.
One can imagine what's behind this when you look at when the old songs were produced that the music industry still heavily relies on, because they are incapable of producing anything that goes beyond one-hit wonders. Because the copyrights for music from some bands from the 60s and 70s will expire in the foreseeable future - and then the gentlemen in the executive suites would actually have to take risks and support new bands to still have significant business in the future.
You can't live forever off the songs of the Beatles or the Stones ...
Bill Gates attempts to blackmail Denmark
Bill Gates tries to extort Denmark with Navision. After Microsoft bought Navision, the 800 jobs are now being used as leverage against the Danish government to bind it to Microsoft's wishes regarding the software patent directive in Europe.
When you look at which companies are in favor of the software patent directive and what methods are being used (extortion, bribery, lobbying, FUD) to push it through, it really makes you sick. These are practically mafia methods. And the motivation behind the whole thing is probably just as honest as the mafia's.
There's already the first Microsoft denial - so there must be something to the extortion story. In the article about the denial, there's also information about other companies that have put pressure on Poland. And apparently it worked in Poland - at least in part.
It's really disgusting what behavior these companies are displaying - Siemens is extorting the German labor market with the threat of moving its mobile phone division to Poland, for example, and is extorting the Polish government with the same jobs over software patents. The whole mess only works because politicians are unable to talk to each other and actually pursue common European goals - and thus put a stop to these games of the industry giants. Because every politician only wants to secure their own advantage and at most looks out for their own interests in their own country, companies can happily play countries off against each other.
Filter to stop internet film sharing
Filter to Stop Internet Film Sharing - more nonsense from rights holders. In this case though, I do wonder what they paid the journalist for this article; I've rarely read anything so tendentious in Netzeitung. Anyway, it's bollocks all the same - whoever wants to share files will do it. Without any filters or signatures on the files preventing anything. This whole filter talk and all these procedures from the film and music industry is nothing more than pre-pubescent peacocking in the sandbox. Look at my muscles, wow how cool am I. Behind it all is just a little boy who has no idea what he's doing.
A solution? I don't have one. It's not my job anyway. I'm just sitting on the sidelines laughing myself silly over all these great approaches, whose childlike optimism is only surpassed by faith in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. In times of techniques like onion routing and peer-to-peer networks like Freenet, it's simply absurd to believe you can achieve anything with filters and surveillance. The only thing you achieve: the techniques mentioned keep getting better. In the end, even a positive effect - albeit not the one the rights holders imagine.
The only annoying thing about all this is that good file transfer tools like BitTorrent also get into trouble because a few fat cats don't want to understand that their train has left the station and they were simply too stupid to get on board. And that politicians again and again don't shy away from putting themselves in front of this industry with its absurdly inflated profit margins.
The artists? Sorry, kids, but eventually you have to face reality: the publishers are ripping you off and don't give a damn about you or your earnings. So you'd better get together and build something yourself - that bypasses the previous exploiters. Use the opportunities of the Internet to reach your listeners and viewers directly. Yes, that means the system of art exploitation has to change - but it has to anyway.
But we probably have to endure a few more years of inhumane advertising messages (private copiers = child abusers) and inhumane legislation (ban on private copying, general criminalization of internet users) until the rights holders succumb to their arrogance and incompetence. Then maybe there's a chance for a fresh start.
The poor film industry and the triviality threshold
Film industry mobilizes against "piracy clause" - when I look at all this whining, I lose the desire to watch films anyway. I hardly go to the cinema anymore since there are only megaplexes left, where you feel about as comfortable as in a train station hall. And DVDs - sorry, but what am I supposed to do with films that torture me in my home cinema with 15 minutes of advertising for other film garbage I don't want - and if I wanted it, I would have gotten it long ago anyway.
Instead of actually thinking about how to respond sensibly to modern technology, the film industry prefers to think about how to further cement an outdated business model. And it cries out for help from the state. What a load of nonsense.
US music industry accused deceased of file sharing
US music industry accuses deceased of file sharing - they must have taken advice from Kanther. But I do find it quite nice of the music industry that they now want to possibly drop the lawsuit. You have to be persistent - even dead women over 70 shouldn't get away with file sharing without a computer...
Music industry warns heise online over report on copying software
Music industry warns heise online over copying software report - I hope Heise's lawyers have a lot of fun when they (hopefully!) tear apart the music industry in court. I definitely trust Heise's lawyers much more than Waldorf and Stettler ...
No end in sight for copy protection cease-and-desist wave
Further nonsense from the law firm Waldorf and Statler (or something like that - the Muppets are far more entertaining than the rip-off lawyers of the music industry).
At heise online news you can find the original article.
US film industry wants to take action against BitTorrent
Eventually the film industry will then sue the plastic bag industry because you can secretly smuggle illegal DVDs in them...
At heise online news there is the original article.
Music Industry Against Radio Recording
And more griping from rights administrators and customer extortionists. Yeah right, private radio recordings are responsible for the fact that this concentrated incompetence in the management offices of music conglomerates can't afford the latest Mercedes every year anymore. Lack of competence and company activities completely out of touch with the market are of course never to blame for their decline. Nor the fact that they were simply so stupid and ignored the Internet as a platform for so long - even today the actual music corporations contribute nothing or very little of their own, but manage at best to latch onto others (and even then they still complain).
These clowns will probably only be satisfied when someone wipes their ass for them and they get paid for it. And even then you probably have to bring your own toilet paper...
At netbib weblog you can find the original article.
Ministry of Justice wants to place further obstacles in the way of online copiers
No, Mr. Hucko, with such an absurd proposal, poor pigs is the wrong term. Stupid pigs is more fitting if you're suggesting extending the information rights of law enforcement agencies towards Internet providers to private snooping operations of the film industry. Such nonsense. At heise online news you can find the original article.
Save the iPod
In the USA, there's another crazy bill proposal to regulate music users. In this case, if the proposal becomes law, all devices that can play music without explicit permission from the music industry would be illegal. That includes the iPod - after all, it plays all music tracks without DRM. Or iTunes, which rips CDs and doesn't use DRM for files created this way.
EU Council approves new regulations to protect intellectual property
Great, now the blatant rip-off by the music and film industry is also being opened wide in Europe. The lobbyists have prevailed and the will of the people is being trampled on. The voter simply still has the worst lobby in Europe.
At heise online news you can find the original article.
Music Industry Sues File-Sharing Users
The only concept in the music industry: waves of lawsuits.
At tagesschau im Internet you can find the original article.
Music industry raids Kazaa
Apparently, a court in Australia has given the music industry permission to search several companies in the ISP sector (Akaai, NTT Australia, Telstra Corp and NTT Australia IP, as well as the Kazaa operator and three universities) and seize documents. What an absurd situation: granting police powers to an industry (albeit apparently limited to this one situation).
At algorhythm there's the original article.
SPD working group: "Film industry displays contempt for humanity"
Well, anyone should have already recognized from their previous behavior that they have a contemptuous view of humanity. The advertising campaign is just the latest escalation of all this filth.
When business associations value themselves and their supposed rights higher than law and society, then one shouldn't be surprised by such actions - these aren't slip-ups, no derailments, these are clear expressions of opinion. The heads of the film industry truly are this contemptuous of humanity.
This was just as much not a slip-up as Hohmann's speech...
At heise online news there's the original article.
State Minister: Illegal copying is like an evil disease
So cool: Mrs. Weiss is making herself just as much an accomplice to the large, established film and music industry and brings the same stupid and mindless arguments as the corresponding representatives of the US government. Of course, here too there is no appreciation whatsoever for citizens' rights to protect their own interests (e.g. availability of films across hardware generations). Of course, here too immediately the general criminalization of all private individuals who have copied copyright-protected material—for whatever reasons—at some point.
Fits perfectly with the government's concept of bowing to business and trampling on the citizen.
At heise online news you can find the original article.
Freenet and AOL warn file-sharing users
Hmm. So if neither AOL nor Freenet themselves monitor traffic (which I'm inclined to believe), then that means the mere accusation by a third party (some representatives of the music industry) with evidence created by them (since no one can verify whether their log file excerpts have any connection to reality) is sufficient to threaten a user with contract termination? That the music industry has a very strange relationship with its rights is well known - they like to adopt a "shoot first, ask questions later" behavior. But the fact that providers are now complying out of excessive deference is already concerning. Where are consumer rights in all this? This simply opens the door wide to arbitrariness. And that the self-proclaimed internet experts of the music industry would have scruples about simply blanketly accusing file-sharing users, well, no one will believe that, will they? There's also the question of how they actually want to prove anything. Most file-sharing networks work in such a way that the actual transfers (and only these are potentially rights violations) take place between file-sharing users themselves - that is, from host to host. Other computers in the system normally don't notice anything. So someone must be putting data on the network that is subject to foreign copyright, and wait until the transfer takes place. In Germany, I believe that falls under "incitement to commit a crime" - and whether a provider should then cancel a user's contract on such a basis, I do find questionable. Not that file-sharing networks particularly interest me - but the whole procedure stinks to high heaven. It's the same nonsense as the incitement to copyright infringement that a Munich aristocrat pulled off years ago.
At heise online news there's the original article.