
Petition to Repeal the DMCA - haven
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/repeal-digital-millennium-copyright-act-dcma-and-pledge-prevent-legislation-anti-circumvention/4Yy3p2qW
======
AnthonyMouse
Title is misleading. It's not a petition to repeal the DMCA, it's a petition
to revise it. And surprisingly it actually gets the facts right for once:
Revising the law to allow circumvention for non-infringing acts would be a
pure win. There is no legitimate reason to prohibit circumvention when there
is no infringement, all it does is make criminals out of good people.

That still leaves the issue of whether circumvention should be criminal (as
opposed to civil) when infringement does occur, and the related question of
whether distributing "circumvention tools" should be illegal in itself, but
those are things people can reasonably argue about. (I personally think
they're both inane, especially given their demonstrable complete lack of
effectiveness at their stated purpose.) But I have never heard any legitimate
argument whatsoever in favor of prohibiting circumvention _when there is no
infringement_ , e.g. to unlock a phone or make fair use of the copyrighted
work. So if anyone can supply any reason whatsoever why that should be
prohibited then let's hear it, and if not then let's fix it.

~~~
haven
While the EFF's position on revising the DMCA is referenced by the petition,
the petition itself does actually does ask to "repeal the DMCA", presumably in
its entirety (which I personally support).

~~~
AnthonyMouse
Again, the _title_ is misleading, including the title in the petition itself.
The text is talking about a revision, which makes good sense. The DMCA itself
is a larger piece of legislation that includes various other provisions not
related to circumvention, like the safe harbor for sites that comply with the
notice and takedown provisions. (Which has its own set of problems, but
_repealing_ that would not be helpful, because then there would be no
statutory safe harbor since Sec. 230 of the Communications Decency Act that
provides a safe harbor for most other things explicitly excludes "intellectual
property.")

~~~
haven
Okay, I see what you're saying. The petition title suggestion of repeal seems
to be downplayed to only anti-circumvention notions.

On the other hand, the safe harbor provisions under the DMCA just protect you
from penalties under the DMCA. I'd vote repeal the whole debacle (granted I
haven't read the DMCA in a few years, but I don't recall seeing anything I
liked save for the self-limiting provisions of the statute).

Edit: I'm wrong. Was thinking of just Title I. Title II and III are indeed
worth saving!

~~~
AnthonyMouse
>On the other hand, the safe harbor provisions under the DMCA just protect you
from penalties under the DMCA.

You might want to re-read Sec. 512.

~~~
haven
Touché. After looking at it, I realize I was thinking of just Title I of the
DMCA being the whole thing. You are totally right about Title II & III (Title
IV boat vessel hulls... heh)!

Now that I'm better informed... (thanks!) I change my position to repeal of
Title I of the DMCA in its entirety, not the entire DMCA.

~~~
caffeinewriter
The sad part is this will most likely end up providing us with a history
lesson on the DMCA instead of any actual action. Same with the petitions to
legalize marijuana and most of the other ones.

------
pstuart
It now has one more vote than my own petition:

[https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/make-alcohol-
sched...](https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/make-alcohol-schedule-i-
drug-under-controlled-substances-
act/hs6KnSGJ?utm_source=wh.gov&utm_medium=shorturl&utm_campaign=shorturl)

Please note that mine is not a joke, but is designed to be rejected by the
administration. The goal is to capture on record why a known dangerous
substance is allowed to be sold for recreational consumption.

It's been a hard sell, because people:

    
    
      - are too lazy to click on a link
      - don't care
      - love their booze and don't understand my proposal
      - don't believe in the petitioning process
    

edit: formatting

~~~
KC8ZKF
Prohibiting alcohol would require an amendment to the constitution.

~~~
dllthomas
I don't see why. Yes, it was done that way last time; but we currently
prohibit substances at the national level, that has been upheld by the Supreme
Court, and I don't see any reason at all that should work differently than for
alcohol. If I'm missing something, please elucidate.

~~~
pstuart
It _is_ being done at the national level by the DEA. They are judge, jury, and
executioner.

~~~
dllthomas
... are you saying that the DEA currently enforces alcohol prohibition, or did
you missread what I said?

~~~
pstuart
I was referring to other drugs, specifically cannabis.

This petition was in direct response to the DEA's recent refusal to remove it
from Schedule I status. This keeps it in the same class of drugs as heroin and
cocaine.

~~~
dllthomas
Yes, that was precisely my point: we are currently doing it for other
substances, no reason I see we _couldn't_ include alcohol. Plenty of reason we
_shouldn't_ , of course, but I think most people here agree those reasons
apply to things we're currently banning, which is the thrust of the whole
discussion.

------
thejerz
DMCA is not bad.

Like patents, it's become a popular punching bag here on HN. Well, I stand
loud and proud against "the HN mob" of wanna be's and know it all's. I'm ready
to get downvoted to hell on this one, but it's important that someone speaks
up. I am pro DMCA! (And patents!)

Generally speaking, DMCA and patents are a pain in the ass for a really young
company. Startups want to move fast and break stuff... which is great...
except they typically do so at the expense of people who came before you and
busted their butt just as hard as you're busting yours. Why should you get to
play by a different set of rules then they did? You shouldn't.

When -- if ever -- your startup grows up, DMCA and patents are how you stay in
business. It has to be easy and cost-effective to protect your creations, or
else the incentive to create is greatly diminished and the ROI for R&D is
zero. Intellectual property protection is the keystone of a modern knowledge
economy. And if you don't understand why, I'd recommend taking a
microeconomics 101 on iTunes U or Youtube. VC, private equity.. hell, even
Wall St., wouldn't be in America were it not for our world-class intellectual
property laws.

Just because 100,000 people sign a DMCA petition doesn't make it right.
1,000,000 McDonalds hamburgers are sold every day... is that the right thing
to eat just because a million people are doing it? My point is: one of the
downfalls of voting websites like HN, reddit, or even the whitehouse.gov
platform is people who know nothing get their votes counted the same as people
who are experts on the subject. Well, I've been litigated for patent
infringement, and I work with DMCA at my current company, and I know both
issues intimately. DMCA, and patents, work. I know there are other startups
out there who depend on DMCA, and if you're one of them, upvote this.

For everyone else, please educate yourself on what exactly DMCA does and the
importance of IP laws in the American economy.

(N.B. Yes I am lumping DMCA and patents together a lot here, because the
complaints behind both of them stem from a lot of the same entitlement mindset
that startups are somehow entitled to implement technologies or host data that
is not theirs.)

~~~
foob
_it's important that someone speaks up. I am pro DMCA!_

The petition isn't entirely anti-DMCA and neither are many people on HN. The
DMCA offers a safe harbor for websites that host user submitted content and it
gives a mechanism for truly infringing content to be taken down. There are
alternative approaches that some might like better but they are unlikely to
happen anytime soon. In the meantime, these two aspects are both good for
businesses and I doubt that they're as controversial here as you state they
are. There are, however, serious issues with the DMCA. One of these is that
there's little to no recourse when the DMCA is abused by a company to take
down materials that they don't own the copyright to (this happens frequently).
Another issue is that circumventing DRM is illegal even if no copyright
infringement is taking place (this is the actual point of the petition). It's
not impossible to support the positive aspects of the DMCA while
simultaneously recognizing that it is far from perfect and in need of reform.

PS - I downvoted you. It had absolutely nothing to do with whether or not I
agree with you. You're baiting for upvotes/downvotes with statements like
_"I'm ready to get downvoted to hell on this one"_ and _"I know there are
other startups out there who depend on DMCA, and if you're one of them, upvote
this."_ You're also being unnecessarily insulting and condescending when
saying *"I stand loud and proud against 'the HN mob' of wanna be's and know it
all's," when this adds nothing to your argument. This behavior is clearly
against the Hacker News Guidelines
(<http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html>) and more importantly it's both
rude and nonconstructive.

~~~
thejerz
I agree with your comments on DMCA. Good thoughts here.

As for stating the truth -- how I don't care if people downvote my opinion,
observing how HN is filled with a majority of wanna be's and know it all's and
very few do'ers, or encouraging startups with similar views to support my
comment -- it isn't necessarily "baiting" for votes. That's colorful language
meant to incite dissent, and for that I applaud your salesmanship; but, I
actually find your PS to be a bit sanctimonious and churlish. But -- we all
have a choice to up/down vote based on content or presentation of someone's
comment. I guess I just care more about the content.

And for that, I give you an upvote.

------
RKearney
The DMCA has helped me get knock off websites taken down that consist of
nothing but one of my blog posts copy-pasted.

I had a very high traffic blog article copied about a half dozen times with
domain names purchased JUST to post the article and replace all the Amazon
affiliate tags and advertisements with their own.

Had it not been for the DMCA, I'm not sure what I could have done. But for
exactly $0 and 5 minutes of my time, I was able to email their host and the
content was taken down in less than a few hours.

~~~
kunai
Doesn't matter. The negatives of the DMCA greatly outweigh the positives.

Why should I not be able to hack my OWN tablet? Why can't I unlock my OWN
phone? Why is it that the government exercises near-dictatorial control over
digital rights? Sure, it does help with copyright issues, but there's a ton of
things in there that have nothing to do with copyright, like the law against
jailbreaking tablets.

The point is, the DMCA exists for a good reason, but it was written by people
who know nothing about how digital media works while they were in bed with the
RIAA and MPAA. It can be revised to eliminate the freedom-limiting aspects
while still preserving the good portions of the law.

~~~
bsimpson
All the laws about things that tend to be only well-understood by the younger
half of the population tend to be written by representatives from the older
half.

I'm sure there are politicians who don't know how to check their own e-mail,
but who have strong opinions on DMCA-esque legislation because they think
piracy === theft and overbearing laws like the DMCA are the only way to
prevent theft 2.0.

You have to be immersed in technology to understand the nuanced implications
of technology law, and most of our representatives have not spent their lives
immersed in technology like most of us have.

------
greenwalls
If the DMCA was repealed I have a bad feeling that whatever the current
administration and congress/senate would come up with to replace it would be
far worse than what we have now. When the DMCA was written the government had
more of a hands off approach to the Internet than it does now.

------
walshemj
Seeing as the president cannot propose his own bills is not this a rather
"pious" and pointless exercise - surly would not the effort be better spent
finding a sympathetic senator or congressman to introduce a reform the DMCA
bill.

------
haven
Text of the DMCA statute, for the curious:
<http://www.copyright.gov/legislation/pl105-304.pdf>

------
rshm
I would like to see the registered agent registration with the fees go away.
And replaced with the free and online 'registration of the point of contact'
approach.

