[icecast] [fred at vonlohmann.com: Re: pho: How Live365 fights back...]

Thu May 31 19:21:03 UTC 2001

This is a mail in response to streamripper being threatened by legal
action from Live365.  The DMCA strikes again.

jack.

----- Forwarded message from Fred von Lohmann <fred at vonlohmann.com> -----

Reply-To: "Fred von Lohmann" <fred at vonlohmann.com>
From: "Fred von Lohmann" <fred at vonlohmann.com>
To: "Jack Moffitt" <jack at icecast.org>, <pho at onehouse.com>
Subject: Re: pho: How Live365 fights back...
Date: Thu, 31 May 2001 12:18:39 -0700
Precedence: bulk

1. I agree with Jack's sentiment -- Americans who tape the radio don't think
they are breaking the law, and the same goes for those who save streams.

2. Now what the law *actually* has to say about taping from the radio is a
complicated subject, as it happens. If you do it with an analog cassette
deck or MD player, it's legal (17 USC 1008). If you do it with a computer,
well, who knows? AFAIK, a court has never addressed the fair use argument in
this context (partly b/c the RIAA has no incentive to litigate in this case,
which it would likely lose).

3. But, after the passage of DMCA's section 1201, a court may NEVER reach
the fair use question for digital streams. According to at least one court,
all you have to do is embed a "no copy" bit in your stream (even if the
stream itself is unencrypted and in the clear), and anyone who builds
software that ignores the bit is liable for unlawful circumvention, *even if
the recording would otherwise have been fair use.* See Real Networks v.
Streambox, 2000 WL 127311 (W.D.Wash. Jan.18, 2000).

Anyone want to venture a guess on whether Live365's <smirk> sophisticated
<\smirk> anti-copying measure, detailed below, qualifies as a "technological
protection measure" under 1201?

>Live365 put a large string in one of there HTML files
>that reads:
>
>// DEFINITION clegg n - large swift fly the female of
>which sucks blood of various animals [syn horsefly,
>cleg, horse fly]
>
>repeated about 100 times. they did this to over run a
>buffer in my html parsing code, thats why streamripper
>crashes.

If Real's "no copy" flag qualifies, I don't see why Live365's html wouldn't.
Ah, how I hate DMCA section 1201!

Fred

----- Original Message -----
From: "Jack Moffitt" <jack at icecast.org>
To: <pho at onehouse.com>
Sent: Thursday, May 31, 2001 9:07 AM
Subject: Re: pho: How Live365 fights back...

> > I think it's unfair and inflammatory to call the copying of a digital
stream
> > analgous to the analog taping of analog broadcast radio.
>
> I think it's also unfair and inflammatory to misuse 'digital'.
>
> For streaming applications, and for most practical storage, digital
> copies are not exact copies of the original, but lossily compressed
> ones.
>
> Sure they can be infinitely recopied without loss, but they still aren't
> as good as the CD.
>
> And even if they were, or if radio broadcasted sending raw audio
> digitally, I WOULD STILL BE ALLOWED TO MAKE COPIES.
>
> Streamripper and similar tools are perfectly legitimate tools that have
> perfectly legitimate purposes.  I find these things most often used by
> the broadcasters themselves to make archives of their broadcasts, since
> a lot of the broadcasting tools out there don't do this for you.
>
>
> The intent behind using streamripper to save a stream you like, and
> taping a broadcast from radio, is the same.  And both _should_ be
> protected by fair use, to hell with what the DMCA says I can or cannot
> do.
>
> jack.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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