DMCA Stupidity
Posted: January 28, 2013 | Categories: Miscellaneous
OK, let me see if I got this straight:
I have a legal right to make one archival copy of copyrighted material I own, say for example to make a copy of a music CD so that if something happens to the original, I can still listen to the music, but if the disc has copyright protection, it’s illegal (through the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)) to break the copy protection in order to make that copy.
If that wasn’t stupid enough, now it’s illegal to jailbreak my smartphone? http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/01/the-most-ridiculous-law-of-2013-so-far-it-is-now-a-crime-to-unlock-your-smartphone/272552/
Imagine that I purchased an iPhone – I paid for it and I own it, and I want to install software on it that Apple doesn’t want me to install on it. Mind you, this isn’t software I shouldn’t install on it, or illegal software, but quite simply software that Apple has decided that they don’t want me installing on it. Apple’s telling me what I can and cannot do with this device – even after I’ve paid them their full price for the device. In order to be able to do what I want to do with this device, things that are not illegal, simply something I want to do with the device, the federal government has made it illegal to complete the process that allows me to use the device as I see fit.
Does this make any sense people?
Can you give me any other examples of situations where you buy something from a vendor and are not allowed to use it the way you want? Can you imagine GM selling you a car, but telling you that you can’t drive the car on any road you want? That the government would make it illegal for you, even after you’ve paid full price for the car, to remove whatever restriction GM has put in place to keep you off certain roads?
You’ve simply got to be kidding me. Make it stop people, please make it stop
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