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If you are outraged by this and anti-repair laws, there's a very simple solution, and that's to Repeal DMCA Section 1201. Section 1201 was invented to protect

If you are outraged by this and anti-repair laws, there's a very simple solution, and that's to Repeal DMCA Section 1201. Section 1201 was invented to protect DVDs primarily, and states that it is a crime to circumvent DRM technologies or to share the methods for circumventing DRM regardless of intent unless there is a Section 1201 exception, which is granted every three years on a Library of Congress review. Making an audio transcription of a DRM-protected eBook for your blind mother who lives with you? Until recently (because the EFF won a 1201 exception until 2024), illegal, even if you didn't commit any copyright infringement by sharing it with other people. As far as I know, no other civilized nation has anti-circumvention rules that do not consider intent. This rule is what allows John Deere to suppress tractor repair manuals, Apple to charge those who defeat their digital repair lockouts, DYMO to be able to sue anyone making paper with RFID tags to beat their system, and countless other fair-use activities to be restricted. Repeal Section 1201. End the nonsense.

kmeisthax 5y ago
>As far as I know, no other civilized nation has anti-circumvention rules that do not consider intent I'm pretty sure the EU has very similar law on it's books. DMCA 1201 is itself just an implementation of the WIPO Copyright Treaty, which pretty much obligates every country in the world to have a law similar to DMCA 1201. In fact, policy laundering anti-circumvention through the WTO is how the copyright maximalists overruled the public outcry against it the first time this was brought up.
- gjsman-1000 5y ago
  Then I would beg and hope that the EFF's complaint against 1201 is successful and finds DMCA 1201 a First Amendment violation. However, I frankly find that a bit of a stretch (otherwise, why isn't copyright itself a 1st amendment violation?), and the legal system is moving slower than a snail crawling up a rock with no oral hearings yet despite being filed in 2016.

kmeisthax 5y ago

>As far as I know, no other civilized nation has anti-circumvention rules that do not consider intent I'm pretty sure the EU has very similar law on it's books. DMCA 1201 is itself just an implementation of the WIPO Copyright Treaty, which pretty much obligates every country in the world to have a law similar to DMCA 1201. In fact, policy laundering anti-circumvention through the WTO is how the copyright maximalists overruled the public outcry against it the first time this was brought up.

gjsman-1000 5y ago
Then I would beg and hope that the EFF's complaint against 1201 is successful and finds DMCA 1201 a First Amendment violation. However, I frankly find that a bit of a stretch (otherwise, why isn't copyright itself a 1st amendment violation?), and the legal system is moving slower than a snail crawling up a rock with no oral hearings yet despite being filed in 2016.