

Remembering the Case that Established Code as Speech - sinak
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/remembering-case-established-code-speech/

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btilly
My favorite twist of this case were the people who tattooed encryption code on
themselves so that they technically became munitions.

See [http://www.geekytattoos.com/illegal-tattoos-rsa-
tattoos/](http://www.geekytattoos.com/illegal-tattoos-rsa-tattoos/) for
details.

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derekp7
Does this work for code that may infringe on someone's patent? That is, if you
just publish the source code and not a compiled executable, would that still
put open source developers in jeopardy? Edit: Just found this on SFLC's web
site: [http://softwarefreedom.org/resources/2011/debian-patent-
poli...](http://softwarefreedom.org/resources/2011/debian-patent-policy-
faq.html#i-have-heard-that-distributing-source-code-is-safer-than-
distributing-object-code.-is-that-true) This appears to be more conjecture; I
was wondering if this theory has been tested in court yet?

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TheCraiggers
I don't think free speech gives you free reign to do things like infringe
patents or copyright.

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npkarnik
Fair use does in some cases

~~~
TheCraiggers
Fair use is a exemption that exists in copyright law. It's not free speech.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Fair use is a exemption that exists in copyright law. It's not free speech.

Fair use was a judicially-created copyright law doctrine founded on the First
Amendment freedom of speech and press _before_ it was codified, in a very
loose form closely mirroring the pre-existing judicially-created factors, into
the copyright statutes in 1976. So it is an express exemption in statutory
copyright law, but it is also closely tied to First Amendment free
speech/press.

And, independently of whether the statutory exemption applies, that the First
Amendment freedom of speech and press limits the scope of exclusive rights
that can be granted in copyright and permits those rights nominally assigned
in the statute to be violated when the government grant of those exclusive
rights would conflict with speech/press freedoms is the entire foundation of
the pre-existing fair use doctrine.

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j_baker
> Today it may seem obvious that communication using programming languages is
> protected by the First Amendment.

Actually, I didn't realize this. Good to know!

Though I kind of wonder what the limits to this are. Does a reporter have to
disclose source code if they use it to calculate something the
NSA/CIA/military don't want the world knowing? Can the government jail me for
publishing source code it deems "obscene"?

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rasur
>Can the government jail me for publishing source code it deems "obscene"?

It's an interesting idea, but obscenity is a tricky one to pin down.. IIRC
it's generally something that 'depraves and corrupts', and of course one man's
obscene is another man's Art..

What would be obscene code and not already fall in the areas of law that
already deal with illegality of code, i think that's one question to ask, in
order to answer your question.

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npkarnik
Very Relevant:
[http://www.crypto.com/papers/export.txt](http://www.crypto.com/papers/export.txt)

(current Penn professor Matt Blaze's mid-90s account of registering as an arms
dealer with US Customs to transport an encrypted telephone to Europe)

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borgia
I had absolutely no idea that there were previously such restrictions.
Registering as an arms dealer to export an algorithm?! Astonishing.

