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Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

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Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#391

Post by Spivak »

ghaff wrote: post #327
cfmcdonald wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aereo's business model was almost exactly identical to how the cable industry started - capture an over-the-air signal and deliver it to customers over a landline channel. If Aereo was in the wrong than the cable industry probably should never have existed.

There were lawsuits around the cable industry and they ended up having to re-license content as I understand it.

The important thing to note is that the cable companies won the lawsuits (with the arguments that are currently being made here, the courts agree with you!) which spurred Congress to amend the Copyright Act so that transmission was a copyright violation and cable companies needed to license.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#392

Post by Spivak »

OldHand2018 wrote: post #298
ghaff wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Or those companies that would set up 1000 TV antennas in a datacenter and then stream the signal. Aereo lost their case at the SCOTUS level. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aereo IANAL, but I have trouble believing that the number of antennas matters. (And I assume Aereo tried every workaround they could think of. Although I believe there's another case at the moment with another organization trying a non-profit looph…

Aereo lost their case because they received a signal, decoded it, saved the video to a hard drive, and then streamed the video from the hard drive to the customer. Their business model clearly depended on them offering DVR capabilities to customers, deduping videos, etc. - why else save the videos to disk and then stream from disk? If they simply streamed the undecoded TV signals to their customers, they would have b…

> Aereo lost their case because they received a signal, decoded it, saved the video to a hard drive, and then streamed the video from the hard drive to the customer.

No they didn't! In fact the opinion specifically calls out that the technical details of how Aereo transmitted the work didn't matter one way or another.

> If they simply streamed the undecoded TV signals to their customers, they would have been fine.

It would not have. After the cable companies won their case about the antenna on a hill Congress amended the Copyright Act to make it illegal.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#393

Post by Spivak »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #334
ghaff wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Or those companies that would set up 1000 TV antennas in a datacenter and then stream the signal. Aereo lost their case at the SCOTUS level. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aereo IANAL, but I have trouble believing that the number of antennas matters. (And I assume Aereo tried every workaround they could think of. Although I believe there's another case at the moment with another organization trying a non-profit looph…

> IANAL, but I have trouble believing that the number of antennas matters. (And I assume Aereo tried every workaround they could think of. Although I believe there's another case at the moment with another organization trying a non-profit loophole.) The main reason for the original cable companies to pay is a loophole about 'distribution' because they're taking one antenna and boosting+splitting the result. Having se…

First, I want to make something clear. The courts 100% agree with you. In fact you don't even need to bother with a bunch of antennas under the older version of the Copyright Act. But in response to cable companies winning their case Congress amended the Copyright Act to undo the decision and make rebroadcasting in (pretty much) any way a copyright violation.

Nothing about splitting or saving to disk or private copies or dedicated lines -- nothing about how the work is reproduced and transmitted mattered at all. You can't technical jiu-jitsu around a very human court.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#394

Post by TaylorAlexander »

tekknik wrote: post #378
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prusa 3D printers are open source. Their main product over the last several years has been the MK2 and MK3 line of printers. Millions of clones have been sold by well-equipped Chinese companies. The clones sell for 1/3 the price, but make some cost cutting measures to achieve low cost. The result is that there is plenty of room in the market for the first party company and the clones. Your suggestion that we outlaw b…

I actually didn’t mean the outlaw business thing as inflammatory. I challenge you to find a way to make this work when some can still make profit. I’m aware what you do on your Github, I looked it up. Interestingly I have many more public/oss repos than you. You have failed to address the point and gave one example of a company based around 3d printers. I challenge you to think about this across all industries and ho…

Also regarding open source repos: as a robotics engineer not all of my work is software. A major contribution I have made are the complete mechanical designs (including dual stage planetary gearboxes) for my off road rover robot: https://reboot.love/t/rover-and-skittles-cad-design-files-he...

My actual software contributions are smaller, though I did design an arduino compatible frequency hopping wireless networking library and associated open licensed hardware designs, some of which is under my failed company's github account.

My computer vision stack is under development and I don't have much on github at the moment. But the point was not that I am so great for making a bunch of open source contributions. The question (which someone else asked) was whether I would open source my own code. The answer is yes.

I am also the lead engineer on a farming robot, which has lots of software I wrote myself. I am pushing hard for us to become a non profit and release all of our IP with an unrestricted license. So yes to the other commenter's question, I am very willing to follow my words with actions.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#395

Post by darkarmani »

csharptwdec19 wrote: post #308
ghaff wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I read the judgement at the time. I should re-read. Though CDL would seem (IANAL) to be more analogous to the DVR in that it's transforming the original product in some manner rather than just boosting a signal. ADDED: Would it actually be fine to stream an OTA channel? I don't actually know. I'm not sure it would be a business model for anyone but would that be considered a public performance?

> Would it actually be fine to stream an OTA channel? I don't actually know. I'm not sure it would be a business model for anyone but would that be considered a public performance? The answer is no, and that's why Aereo lost their case. It is important to note that Aereo lost their case under a specific carve-out for broadcast transmission. Back in the 70s there were a few cases around CATV operators doing the exact…

> This is also why the Slingbox back in the day survived legal challenges (if there even were any.) The Customer had to have their own physical hardware at the location receiving the signals.

So could areo sell the physical hardware to the customer and then buy it back at the end of the billing cycle?

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#396

Post by xhkkffbf »

zucker42 wrote: post #387
xhkkffbf wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why treat authors differently than any other laborer? Does the ownership value in a house disappear when the carpenter dies? What about in car? Art takes work. It makes sense to give the artist something concrete that can be sold so the artist has a chance of earning a living. If that right is passed down to the kids, at least the artist has something to pass along, just like other laborers.

Houses and cars are scarce, while digital copies of a book are non-scarce.

No. The first copy of a book is VERY, VERY scarce. It can take years for an author to churn it out.

Here's a deal: go write a book. If you are overjoyed to see people pirate it, I'll personally buy a copy. But I guarantee that you'll be heartbroken to see people steal.

Have some respect for people who work long and hard.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#397

Post by s1artibartfast »

vulcan01 wrote: post #389
s1artibartfast wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would they want 30 years of archived websites?

To prevent others from buying it, causing another lawsuit?

Why would there be another lawsuit? Book publishers dont care about archived websites. They care about IAs side activity of digitizing books and ignoring copyright. I can see them bankrupting the IA to stop their copyright infringement, but I don't think they have an interest is stopping the sale of the archive. They may not even have a legal ability to stop a sale during bankruptcy.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#398

Post by a1369209993 »

ericathegreat wrote: post #353
a1369209993 wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rather, if you do sufficiently good work in the process of breaking the law (as the IA has done here), you should be able to break that law without penalty.

So... If I smash in the windows of a Nike shop, steal all the shoes, then give them to homeless people, I'm excused? No crime here?

If your doing so somehow has no adverse effect on the shop, sure! That's why copyright infringement is laudable, and stealing is wrong: the latter means the person stolen from no longer has any of the shoes.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#399

Post by manigandham »

ericathegreat wrote: post #355
matheusmoreira wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's perfectly reasonable to gate access to that value It's also perfectly reasonable to distribute that information widely and without limits. The fact information is valuable to someone doesn't make it scarce. The harsh reality that creators need to face is that only the first copy need be paid for. > I'm sure you wouldn't argue that anyone can watch a movie for free just because someone else made it I would. Ins…

Why would someone pay in advance for something that they will get for free at the same time as everything else? Fundamental limitation of capitalism is that one of its goals is to acquire the maximum amount of value for yourself, while losing the minimum amount. Even the most successful Patreon users rely on "Patreon exclusive content" for their supporters to be able to make some kind of livable money.

That's not a goal of capitalism. It has no goals. All it means is that you, the individual, own the means to production. And you own the resulting profits or losses, regardless of how much value you create or how efficient you are in the process.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#400

Post by Camillo »

jacquesm wrote: post #89

I have three favorite properties on the web: Wikipedia, the Khan Academy and the Internet Archive. Whoever thought this was a good idea should own up to it and step down, this was a dumb move if there ever was one and risking one of the prime - and very fragile - properties on the web like this was highly irresponsible. Keep in mind that IA already has plenty of enemies who are continuously monitoring it and hoping t…

It's heartbreaking that they're going to self-destruct over _this_. The Internet Archive holds invaluable collections of digital content for which there is no replacement, and they decided to put all of that work in mortal danger just to replicate the services that thousands of libraries already provide? For a few months?

The only guess I can make is that there are people with power at the IA that fail to appreciate the value of the unique services the organization provides, and would rather be running a traditional library instead. Once the dust has settled, I would be interested in reading an account of how this happened.

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