

Doctorow's First Law - mikecane
http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/columns-and-blogs/cory-doctorow/article/44012-doctorow-s-first-law.html

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agentultra
_"Any time someone puts a lock on something that belongs to you, and won't
give you a key, they're not doing it for your benefit."_

Advice one would think would be common sense.

I agree that one should be willing to take a stance they are not willing to
back down from. Most people buy into DRM and EULAs mainly because they don't
care or notice. Creators it seems may buy into them because they think it's
the only avenue or feel they have no power to bargain. Either way, creators
and consumers do have all of the power and should recognize digital resellers
for what they are: _middle-persons_. Their job is to facilitate transactions
between two interested parties, not determine the terms of said transactions
themselves. You can bargain with them and you don't have to back down: if
they're worthy of your business they will consider your proposals.

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ars
How difficult would it be to pass this law?

"It shall be unlawful to place any kind of access control or restriction on a
copyrighted work without the permission of the copyright holder."

It will need some sort of exemption for personal use (like an encrypted hard
disk).

~~~
decode
I think it would be very difficult. Arguably, by controlling access to their
network, Google is putting access control and restriction on all of the works
in their web cache. Similarly, requiring a login on a server restricts access
to the Oracle instance running on it.

~~~
chc
These sorts of issues already exist in copyright law, and have been covered
pretty well. It seems to me that this would essentially be an extension of the
first sale doctrine.

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Goofball_Jones
Now Cory just needs to write something I'd actually want to read. Hope his
fiction isn't as preachy as his articles. Though this one wasn't as bad as he
usually does.

