I did a pilot project together with the SmartFrame guys around 2016 and I remember we also discussed this technical weakness of their DRM back then.
But it turns out, it doesn't really matter in practice. You removing the DRM from the image is a completely different legal aspect than you saving an unprotected JPEG. Circumvention of the DRM is easier to sue for than pure copyright infringement. SmartFrame's business value is that it protects just enough for an IP insurance to cover you, while not slowing things down unnecessarily with better encryption (that won't stop determined techies anyway).
Also, by "recovering" the image in this way, you strip it off IPTC copyright metadata which makes your copy illegal to use in the UK, for example.
> Also, by "recovering" the image in this way, you strip it off IPTC copyright metadata which makes your copy illegal to use in the UK, for example.
Is that still true when there's no copyright on the image?
How could that possibly be enforced? If it were read, stripped out, but then replaced (not altered) would that be okay?
> Also, by "recovering" the image in this way, you strip it off IPTC copyright metadata which makes your copy illegal to use in the UK, for example.
Not sure about the UK but in a lot of countries there are exceptions for interoperability which would nullify this issue since you are converting from an obscure, undocumented and not interoperable format to a standard image format.
Yeah, we did get format shifting but it only lasted a few months until the Tory government reversed it. There's nothing that reasonable in Fair Dealing.
This was always the case with DRM music back in the day, or DVDs after it was cracked etc.
Or, the very much infuriating HDCP that was cracked before being in use and that hasn't stopped anything but legal use. Causing immense frustration worldwide.
(they actually were, but stopped doing so once I pointed out the facts to them.)
I know of two further sites where SmartFrame is being used to stop people "stealing" out-of-copyright images, and to label them as protected by copyright.
This is simply a land-grab, attempting to enclose the (digital) commons.
There's also the fact that, for images that do remain in copyright, there are exceptions in law allowing reuse for study, review, parody etc.
>you strip it off IPTC copyright metadata which makes your copy illegal to use in the UK
I might be mistaken, but that doesn't sound right. Not all formats even support that metadata in the first place. Can you point me to more info on this? Is there UK legislation that refers to such low-level details as image file metadata?
> You're talking about something that's out of copyright? Copyright law doesn't specify anything for out of copyright works.
Yeah, except no. Circumvention of effective protection measures is a separate crime from infringement. If you do it, except for certain specific exceptions, it's a felony punishable by up to five years in federal prison in the USA.
No, in the U.S., the anti-circumvention provisions only apply to works still protected by U.S. copyright. (The criminal violations are also only applicable to willful violations done for commercial advantage or private financial gain.) Generally speaking, the Copyright Clause only empowers Congress to create restrictions "for limited Times" -- even the anti-circumvention rules are probably subject to this.
Nimmer explains: "Section 1201’s limitation to works that are under U.S. copyright protection means that, to the extent a technological measure effectively controls access to public domain works, circumvention of that measure does not violate the statute. (But intermingling a small amount of current material into the collected works of Shakespeare could effectively undermine that status.) By the same token, to the extent that a work, currently protected abroad, resides in the U.S. public domain for formal or other reasons, then, as to it as well, circumvention of technological measures remains nonactionable (unless, again, some protected material were intermingled with it)." 4 Nimmer on Copyright § 12A.03 (2022)
> You removing the DRM from the image is a completely different legal aspect than you saving an unprotected JPEG.
Wait, but if I understood this article correctly... They are saving an unprotected JPEG. Each 256x256 chunk is a separate unprotected JPEG, as can be seen in the network inspector screenshot (it wouldn't show the preview on hover if that wasn't the case). When going through that route, he isn't even working around any kind of copyright protection; saving an image from that screen is normal operation of the software (it isn't even a modified copy of the browser or JavaScript manipulation or something like that).
> Firstly, they claimed that the photographs were still under copyright.
Note that you can in some cases copyright the digitisation of out-of-copyright photos, if there is intellectual creation involved in their restoration or touching up. Simply removing blemishes ins't enough, but I don't know what they did in this case.
That continues: "However, according to established case law, the courts have said that copyright can only subsist in subject matter that is original in the sense that it is the author’s own ‘intellectual creation’. Given this criterion, it seems unlikely that what is merely a retouched, digitised image of an older work can be considered as ‘original’."
There has been a huge attempt by Bridgeman and others to create FUD in this area. It didn't work. Partly because Wikipedia is willing to go to court if necessary.[1]
> if there is intellectual creation involved in their restoration or touching up
Bizarre how people come in saying 'no.' with a big full stop, give a confused precedent from an entirely different country and legal system, then quote from links I gave them that paraphrase what I said and make it clear that it isn't a simple 'no.' or 'settled' like they said it was.
>you can in some cases copyright the digitisation of out-of-copyright photos
I don't have an opinion in either direction but it seems unnecessary to criticize the disagreement of others when even your own link refutes your claim, as Animats pointed out above. "Let's not throw stones in glass houses" and such.
Are there any examples to cite that support your claim?
"No ... settled" vs an actual official UK government website on the subject contradicting with actually there's a "degree of uncertainty". How much of a better source can you get than that?
DRM is insane concept. I haven’t yet seen one that would actually “work” but like other commentator said main goal is to be obstruction enough to prove that you circumvented copyright policy in first place and to add to that it makes big bosses feel safer.
As far as I’m concerned if you have something that is sooo protected don’t upload it to public web; to access anything you have to, first, download its contents, second - eventually decrypt/decode.
I’ve noticed this lately. Found a streaming site and it just has so much more content and the site is so well organized and I’ve found lots of good shows on the front page. Netflix is lacking good suggestions and Amazon video really sucks and is more trying to push paid for videos which I want nothing to do with.
Pretty sure that Netflix DRM isn't too strong. I tried to save some series that was about to get removed. Didn't bother in the end but pretty sure it wasn't an insurmountable task to get the video to save to disk. I think I couldn't close the window while downloading, but apart from that inconvenience...
Windows is probably one of the most pirated software on the planet.
I know at least two USA people that I grew up with, that have upper-middle class lives now with money made in these consumer digital products spaces. Lots of free-culture people complain (rightly!) but the amount of commerce that is generated with (unfair?) DRM is substantial. As an American, it always hit me that China flagrently ignored copyright, like Disney etc knockoffs.. how can authors get paid? how do photographers get paid to have real lives? It is easy to complain about DRM and I agree, but it is not a complete discussion without the part where creators get paid, somehow.
This would be true if copyright were held by authors and lasted within their lifetime, but that has not been the case for a while.
The idea that authors were complaining about their work being copied (rather than being flattered by it) or that all artists before copyright were poor due to rampant plagiarism is not accurate at all.[1][2]
As one of those free-culture people, my complaint about DRM isn't so much that I can't legally copy the thing that I want to copy. My complaint is that legally empowering DRM has allowed non-creatives to abuse protections intended for copyrighted works to enforce basically any restriction that benefits their business model. e.g. DRM on printer cartridges, garage door openers, or OneWheel batteries is NOT LEGALLY ENFORCEABLE, but merely putting DRM on those things gives you the ability to legally harass lawful competitors for the decade it takes for SCOTUS to say "no, seriously, there is no copyright in your god damned battery DRM".
Furthermore, copyright does not protect all creators equally. There are access-to-justice issues in the underlying law, life+70 terms do not help anyone other than large legacy publishers, and the technical restrictions being implemented in the name of trying to make things easier on copyright owners also risks throwing out the entire concept of Fair Use on the Internet. It is very deeply accepted law in the US and other countries that when copyright and free speech are in conflict, free speech generally wins out. However, technical restrictions cannot adjudicate the law; and mandating technical enforcement by means that do not respect exceptions in the law is effectively repealing those exceptions.
This, collectively, creates a tiered system in which creators with better representation, deeper back-catalogs, or who create works that are less likely to be flagged by an upload filter are protected by the system, while those who are independent, getting started in their craft, or are just engaged in review or critique are treated as alien and suspect. The current system, inclusive of any proposed changes by the copyright maximalists, will not actually get photographers paid. You cannot represent every copyright dispute in court, and the technical systems intended to substitute for court representation are a mockery of the judicial process.
I will agree with you that a lot of people in the tech industry have a "kill and eat the creative class" mentality about them. Their obsession with NFTs - financialization as copyright alternative[0] - is a good case study of that. However, the distrust of copyright and patent law is not merely a matter of demanding free shit. It is learned behavior from decades of copyright maximalists downplaying or ignoring our valid concerns by insisting that if they didn't get everything they wanted, they would take their toys and go home.
As for China, they've done way more egregious shit than just not prosecute someone selling Disney knock-offs[1]. They do not have a functional concept of freedom-of-speech[2], and the fact that media companies will shit their pants about knock-off goods but stay silent on actual censorship indicates that their priorities are hella warped. Who cares what we are allowed to say, as long as we can own it, right?
And that's really just a microcosm of the whole problem with copyright maximalism. Maximalists don't care about the death of fair use online, as long as they can negotiate their way out of whatever upload filters they shackle everyone else with. They don't care about free speech as long as they are on the inside and know how to negotiate whatever rules are imposed upon them. To them, copyright is not something that protects small creators; it's something that protects them from small creators.
[0] Note: a lot of people who bought NFTs did not understand this, and either thought they were buying actual copyright title, or thought that "right-clickers" were literally stealing their work. This was a misreading of the (already-flawed) ideas behind NFTs; the idea was that you could sell artifically-scarce tokens representing an otherwise freely-shareable work. Thus, instead of holding a monopoly on copying and using your monopoly power to fund the creation of new work, you could just rely on selling unregulated speculative instruments to do the same thing.
[1] Also, under no circumstances should Disney be allowed to continue owning Mickey Mouse in any country - but that's a slightly different issue.
[2] Including the slightly watered-down concepts of "freedom of expression" in other countries. The differences are narrow enough that it shouldn't matter.
> decades of copyright maximalists downplaying or ignoring our valid concerns by insisting that if they didn't get everything they wanted, they would take their toys and go home.
I want them to take their toys and go home. I don't believe civilization or culture would be harmed the slightest if the small benefit of copyright enforcement (against non-commercial copying) went away. Most creators don't make a living from their work, and keep trying anyway. If they do make a living, it's usually less because the work is amazing, and more that they (or their publishers) are really good at promotion and created a compelling narrative about the work. Parallel to that, and in a tiny minority, there are a few major artists at any given time that are printing money making content that sells itself, and a few more who are making content that has enough of a niche audience that they can make a living through patreon, youtube, substack, etc. Everyone else's stuff is not that good, doesn't resonate that well, and it takes promotion to sell it.
None of those paths to monetization require copyright enforcement against ordinary people sharing music or tv or movies or books with each other. If the content is good it will sell enough to make it worthwhile to produce. If it's not that good, the creator is more like a salesperson, and should get good at that, go hungry, or find a day job.
I always informally understood "wet" as something having (excess?) water. In that case, I'd say water is not wet because wetness is the result of adding water to something dry, which doesn't apply to water itself.
For water to be wet you'd need "wetness" to be a property you can substract from it, and yet I don't think "dry water" is a concept that exists.
At best SmartFrame's website claims "Protect your images from right-clicks, drag-and-drop actions and other theft attempts – even site-scraping bots."[0] They are using vanilla JavaScript to perform this "protection" not DRM.
The author's claim of an authorization header is not convincing. That header identifies the site pulling the images and using the SmartFrame API, allowing them to do the "Detailed image analytics."[0]
But it turns out, it doesn't really matter in practice. You removing the DRM from the image is a completely different legal aspect than you saving an unprotected JPEG. Circumvention of the DRM is easier to sue for than pure copyright infringement. SmartFrame's business value is that it protects just enough for an IP insurance to cover you, while not slowing things down unnecessarily with better encryption (that won't stop determined techies anyway).
Also, by "recovering" the image in this way, you strip it off IPTC copyright metadata which makes your copy illegal to use in the UK, for example.