Re: Re: FSF condemns partnership between Mozilla and Adobe to support Digital Restrictions Management
Chris Angelico wrote:
> On Mon, May 19, 2014 at 11:52 PM, The Wanderer <wanderer@fastmail.fm> wrote:
>> I was just thinking of a slightly more limited approach: decide that "if
>> the work is covered by DRM, then unless a non-DRMed copy is on file with
>> the central archive, anti-circumvention law does not apply".
>
> In other words, the anti-circumvention law applies only so long as the
> work covered is protected by copyright. That would be very reasonable,
> but I fear it probably wouldn't be accepted by the people who want
> anti-circumvention laws in the first place :)
>
> ChrisA
Copyright usually applies immediately when the work is created, in most
countries. There is no need of registration.
DRM is abuse, in its essence. It takes remote control on machines the
people use ("own"). There are many legitimate uses ("fair use") of
copyrighted works that may be (and indeed are) impeded by DRM
technologies. Moreover, laws vary between countries (e.g. copyright
duration), so the limitations may be not obeyed in DRM implementations.
But the main point is that DRM is a form of abuse, just like proprietary
software.
Anyway, the HTML5/Mozilla issue is not just about DRM: it is about
imposing an international internet "open" stardard that it is not "open"
nor "standard" at all, since it breaks the equality of conditions for
participating in the HTML5 protocol. The protocol is becoming partially
closed and proprietary (against the declared principles of W3C and
Mozilla Foundation), and the adoption of EME is capitulation, abandoning
the goal of having an open and free internet. (So, one cannot say that
Adobe/Mozilla implementation of EME/HTML5 is equivalent to current
proprietary technologies like Flash Player. Flash is not an open
internet official standard.)
Cory Doctorow says that the "open source" Mozilla sandbox that will run
Adobe DRM does not provide _ANY_ of the _four freedoms_ that define Free
Software. *Will Debian accept that as DFSG compliant?*
Cheers,
Hudson
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