meltinggoldanddippingthingsinit:
John Deere has turned itself into the poster-child for the DMCA,
fighting farmers who say they want to fix their own tractors and access
their data by saying that doing so violates the 1998 law’s prohibition
on bypassing copyright locks.Deere’s just reiterated that position to a US Copyright Office inquiry
on the future of the law, joined by auto manufacturers (but not Tesla)
and many other giant corporations, all of them arguing that since the
gadgets you buy have software, and since that software is licensed, not
sold, you don’t really own any of that stuff. You are a licensee, and
you have to use the gadget according to the license terms, which spell
out where you have to buy your service, parts, consumables, apps, and so
on.As software eats the world, it’s devouring the idea of private property – “that
sole and despotic dominion which one man claims and exercises over the
external things of the world, in total exclusion of the right of any
other individual in the universe.”The fact that the DMCA felonizes bypassing copyright locks, combined
with the proliferation of copyrighted software in gadgets means that
companies can turn their commercial preferences into private laws. Just design your gadget so that using is in any way apart from the official, prescribed way requires breaking a copyright lock. Now, anyone who violates your license terms is also committing a felony, punishable by five years in prison and a $500,000 fine.For a first offense.
What’s more, security researchers who reveal defects in these gadgets face the same harsh punishment, and routinely self-censor, even when they find potentially life-threatening bugs in medical implants or cars.
Other automakers pointed out that owners who make unsanctioned modifications could alter their vehicles in bad ways. They could tweak them to go faster. Or change engine parameters to run afoul of emissions regulations.
They’re right. That could happen. But those activities are (1) already illegal, and (2) have nothing to do with copyright. If you’re going too fast, a cop should stop you — copyright law shouldn’t. If you’re dodging emissions regulations, you should pay EPA fines — not DMCA fines.
And the specter of someone doing something illegal shouldn’t justify
shutting down all the reasonable and legal modifications people can make
to the things they paid for.GM went so far as to argue locking people out helps innovation. That’s
like saying locking up books will inspire kids to be innovative writers,
because they won’t be tempted to copy passages from a Hemingway novel.
Meanwhile, outside of Bizarroland, actual technology experts — including
the Electronic Frontier Foundation — have consistently labeled the DMCA an
innovation killer. They insist that, rather than stopping content
pirates, language in the DMCA has been used to stifle competition and
expand corporate control over the life (and afterlife) of products.We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Very Idea of Ownership [Kyle Wiens/Wired]
W T F ?
This is important stuff. As important as anything else happening under the Trump regime.
These people are trying to take away your right to own anything.
Others are trying to legislate that all rights extend from, and are subordinate to, property rights.Between them, they’re trying to strip you of all rights. To make you less that serfs.
FIGHT this.
Petition.
Protest.
Boycott.You can’t let this happen.
Anyways, this one goes out to everyone who’s afraid of socialism because they will lose their private property
…where are all the conservatives? they’ll no longer own their guns, they’ll be licensed, which means they can be repossessed and disabled at any time for any reason. LOL
Guns don’t require software to operate, so they’re conveniently exempt from this.
Guns don’t *currently* require software, but they will.
Also, corporations infringing on personal property rights is not a road anyone wants to head down. *No one* wants that.
Remember the distinction between personal property and private property. Personal property is what you physically have possession of and use. Private property is what you legally own and control, regardless of who is uses or possesses it.
Even though the tractors are the farmers’ personal property, under the DMCA the tractors are John Deere’s private property–and under capitalism, all property rights are private property rights.
Most forms of socialism seek to abolish private property but preserve and protect personal property. That’s the whole idea of workers owning the means of production–the people who use the factory equipment should own the factory equipment and reap the rewards that come from that work. Under a socialist system, the shit John Deere’s trying to pull would be (rightly, imo) regarded as theft.