Ubuntu/FLOSS at CopyCamp.ca

[Russell McOrmond]

(I believe I'll leave this as my last message on this, given I'm heading 
into content that is more appropriate for the digital-copyright.ca or 
cluecan.ca discussion forums).

Michael Lacey wrote:
> What I meant, is these formats are the ones most targeted by the 
> industry and used to lock their content. I believe open sourced file 
> formats are an alternative that artists should be looking into.

   I believe you mean open standard, which nearly all the file formats 
you mention are.  The real issue goes back to who retains the keys for 
any locked files, and artists need to realize that it is in their own 
best interests to trust their fans more than they trust hardware 
manufacturers.   They already have major problems with being screwed by 
labels.  As much as I believe the questionably legal cartel of 4 labels 
that make up RIAA/CRIA/etc are bad for the music industry, I believe a 
platform monopoly (what Apple, Microsoft, etc are trying to build) will 
be even worse.


On file format standards:

   MP3 is fully standard MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3 
http://www.mpeg.org/MPEG/mp3.html , and AAC is fully standard MPEG-2 
Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) http://www.mpeg.org/MPEG/aac.html   They are 
essentially standard movie files with only the audio portion retained. 
http://www.mpeg.org/MPEG/audio.html

   While there may be patents involved in the codecs, the existence of a 
patent is not yet considered by international standards bodies to be a 
problem.   This has been a large battle in standards groups, and whether 
there should be a requirement for RF (Royalty Free) licensing of 
information process patents in standards.

   It is this problem with software patents that have pushed some people 
to OGG, but the nature of patents is that a third party not involved 
with OGG at all can still at a later date claim that their patent is 
infringed by OGG.  While I believe informational RFC's have been 
published for OGG, I am not personally aware of a standards body which 
has approved this file format.


   The only long-term solution to the information/mental process patent 
problem (IE: software, business models, etc) is to clarify the law to 
make them illegal.  An interim proposal has been made by a number of 
patent academics such as a Fair Use right which disallows enforcement of 
patents in recognized standards or as implemented in FLOSS (meaning: 
that you can't exclude FLOSS from implementing standards).


   I don't believe that the existing knowledge of software patents in 
one standard file format should make it considered not to be a standard, 
and the lack of knowledge of software patents infringed by some other 
format makes it considered to be a standard.  It is the standards body 
process that makes something a standard or not, not whether there are 
patent.

   There are FLOSS implementations of nearly every file format worth 
encoding or decoding, whether or not they can be distributed to backward 
countries that consider them unlawful.


   For hardware the standard licensing mechanism is RAND (Reasonable and 
Non-Discriminatory) which works quite well for hardware, but fails for 
software given the collection of any marginal cost discriminates against 
FLOSS and thus is not reasonable.

> I completely agree with the idea of owners choosing whether to impose 
> locks on their content rather than the manufacturers.

   While a common interpretation, this misses a critical piece in what I 
was mentioning.    The most controversial aspects of "DRM" do not relate 
to content, copyright holders of content, or manufacturers of media (IE: 
CDs, DVDs).    In my opinion copyright holders should be free to encode 
their content in any way they want, as long as it is consistent with 
Canadian law (including competition law relating to tied selling/refusal 
to deal).

   The primary issue with laws around "DRM" relate to the attack on the 
property, privacy and other rights of owners of *DEVICES* such as 
computers, PDA's, portable media players, etc.

   See the summary of the 4 different "owners" at the beginning of 
http://www.flora.ca/documents/digital-ownership.html


   The primary issue is whether the owner of a computer is the one that 
decides what software will run on it, or whether the government will 
legally protect hardware manufacturers that wish to lock the owners of 
this hardware out of being able to make that choice.  There is also 
proposals for governments to mandate that hardware manufacturers must 
not allow the owners to be in control of what they own.

See:  Petition to protect Information Technology property rights
       http://www.digital-copyright.ca/petition/ict/


   Anyone interested in Ubuntu should be interested in the rights of a 
computer owner to be able to install the software of their own choice. 
This includes people who want to re-flash their iPod or other such 
mini-computers to run Linux.

   The purpose of anti-circumvention legislation such as the DMCA (and 
the WIPO treaties) is to legally remove that choice from hardware owners.

> This is a very good argument, and I will be more than happy to sign your 
> petition. It'd also be a good topic to discuss at the Linuxcaffe on 
> Saturday, but I would like the main focus to be distributing and raising 
> awareness of Ubuntu and OSS.

   I do hope that people will check out the information on CopyCamp.ca 
and include targeting this audience as part of raiding awareness of 
Ubuntu and OSS.


   I live in Ottawa, but there are many other people part of 
Digital-Copyright.ca who might be able to attend a later meeting if you 
want one focused on hardware property rights and how anti-circumvention 
laws are effectively state sponsored theft of that hardware.  I agree 
that this should be a separate discussion at a later date, and not 
something to be confused with priority work relating to awareness/etc.


-- 
  Russell McOrmond, Internet Consultant: <http://www.flora.ca/>
  Please help us tell the Canadian Parliament to protect our property
  rights as owners of Information Technology. Sign the petition!
  http://www.digital-copyright.ca/petition/ict/

  "The government, lobbied by legacy copyright holders and hardware
   manufacturers, can pry my camcorder, computer, home theatre, or
   portable media player from my cold dead hands!"