3 ms·

I'm not usually fond of the argument that "all data is just numbers so copyright is invalid" (cue the "color of your bits " article) but I must say this is pret

by simias 12y ago

I'm not usually fond of the argument that "all data is just numbers so copyright is invalid" (cue the "color of your bits " article) but I must say this is pretty clever. I wonder if you could extend this principle by writing a program that would extract copyrighted material from public domain work. Like, you write a program that would take text as an input, apply a transformation and output the result. If you input the bible, you get the source code to DeCSS. Is this code illegal? I don't think you could fill a DMCA against the bible...

fishnchips 12y ago
If you have enough people you can establish a religion that treats a certain binary number (which also happens to represent an arbitrary algorithm) as a sacred text.
thisjepisje 12y ago
The source code would practically be in the transformation, the bible would only be a key.
- TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
  Eh, you could deliberately word-substitute and reformat the bible so that it, itself, contains the data in some form.
  - thisjepisje 12y ago
    Only if you could do that by some meaningful and simple process. If you simply generate a table (of the same length as the source code) that produces the source code when added to the bible, that's just basic cryptography, a sort of indirect way to store the source code.
    - TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
      Nah, what I'm proposing is steganography not cryptography. Encode it hidden within the text in terms of word lengths, comma positions, number of commas per sentence, word capitalisation, or some other property like that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steganography https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steganography
- CWuestefeld 12y ago
  Right, and that's what is interesting about the OP. They found a piece of information that is notable in its own right (by being one of the larger primes discovered through a particular algorithm). This single piece of information, without any further interpretation, can executed in order to perform the illegal DeCSS operation. IOW, somebody tells you that it's the Nth largest number proven prime by {mumble], and you copy that number out of the math book into an executable file, run it, and you're a criminal.
Allysquad 12y ago
Use Synesthesia to build up a coloured picture of the ilegal prime. Boom "Art".

by simias 12y ago

fishnchips 12y ago

If you have enough people you can establish a religion that treats a certain binary number (which also happens to represent an arbitrary algorithm) as a sacred text.

thisjepisje 12y ago

The source code would practically be in the transformation, the bible would only be a key.

TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
Eh, you could deliberately word-substitute and reformat the bible so that it, itself, contains the data in some form.
- thisjepisje 12y ago
  Only if you could do that by some meaningful and simple process. If you simply generate a table (of the same length as the source code) that produces the source code when added to the bible, that's just basic cryptography, a sort of indirect way to store the source code.
  - TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
    Nah, what I'm proposing is steganography not cryptography. Encode it hidden within the text in terms of word lengths, comma positions, number of commas per sentence, word capitalisation, or some other property like that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steganography https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steganography
CWuestefeld 12y ago
Right, and that's what is interesting about the OP. They found a piece of information that is notable in its own right (by being one of the larger primes discovered through a particular algorithm). This single piece of information, without any further interpretation, can executed in order to perform the illegal DeCSS operation. IOW, somebody tells you that it's the Nth largest number proven prime by {mumble], and you copy that number out of the math book into an executable file, run it, and you're a criminal.

Allysquad 12y ago

Use Synesthesia to build up a coloured picture of the ilegal prime. Boom "Art".