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1 year ago
in Felten on MS-Google antitrust games on The Technology Liberation Front
It's Felten. F-E-L-T-E-N. Not sure why it gets spelled "Felton" so much. It's not like the latter is a common name, either.
1 year ago
in Here Comes Another Bubble on The Technology Liberation Front
Tim, Tom's ultimate conclusion about whether the use is fair might eventually be supported by a court, but Tom himself is most certainly not "right" in his assessment, either of what Michael Arrington actually posted on TechCrunch, or in the fragment of legal analysis he includes in his post. (And for Tom to characterize Arrington's post as "pissy" is rich. Tom, meet the kettle. You're both black. And pissy.)
Arrington didn't assert (or at least, did not assert in the post you and Tom link to) that *any* parody is automatically allowed as "fair use." Rather, in his (admittedly heated) post, he claimed the use of the photograph in the video was clearly a fair use, and mentioned a few reasons: the minimal effect on the market (i.e. one of the Sec. 107 factors), the "progress of ... the useful arts" which is a claim directly to the Copyright Clause (and of some limited value in actual cases), and the fact that the work is a parody. Parody isn't it's own special defense -- it's just a subset of permissible "fair use," tied to other factors such as whether a work is transformative, the effect on the market, etc.
It's also worth pointing out that you, Tim, may be overstating the case when you claim that a parody can only qualify as a fair use if the work being parodied is the work being copied. The parody/satire distinction isn't as strong as you suggest. William Patry's wrote about an illustrative case, Burnett v. 20th Century Fox, on this point earlier this year, and Bruce Keller and Rebecca Tushnet have written about it as well.
http://williampatry.blogspot.com/2007/07/i-was-...
And here's a discussion paper on the subject:
http://www.abanet.org/litigation/committees/int...
And even if the issue were limited to strict parodies of the work itself, the fact that Harwell (the photographer) is snapping celeb-style pics of a business journalist (and that the photo originally appeared in a sort of social calendar-style Wired blog called "Epicenter" is, in essence, just the kind of bubble-era buzz that the video is parodying.
That is not to say that I think it's a slam dunk fair use case. Tim, I tend to agree with your "on the one hand, on the other" analysis. In the end, I think it *is* a fair use, but a close enough call that it's not worth litigating. And of course, Harwell's already gotten more publicity out of her "whining" than she ever could have bought with whatever she charges for licensing (or with a photo credit in the video).
Arrington didn't assert (or at least, did not assert in the post you and Tom link to) that *any* parody is automatically allowed as "fair use." Rather, in his (admittedly heated) post, he claimed the use of the photograph in the video was clearly a fair use, and mentioned a few reasons: the minimal effect on the market (i.e. one of the Sec. 107 factors), the "progress of ... the useful arts" which is a claim directly to the Copyright Clause (and of some limited value in actual cases), and the fact that the work is a parody. Parody isn't it's own special defense -- it's just a subset of permissible "fair use," tied to other factors such as whether a work is transformative, the effect on the market, etc.
It's also worth pointing out that you, Tim, may be overstating the case when you claim that a parody can only qualify as a fair use if the work being parodied is the work being copied. The parody/satire distinction isn't as strong as you suggest. William Patry's wrote about an illustrative case, Burnett v. 20th Century Fox, on this point earlier this year, and Bruce Keller and Rebecca Tushnet have written about it as well.
http://williampatry.blogspot.com/2007/07/i-was-...
And here's a discussion paper on the subject:
http://www.abanet.org/litigation/committees/int...
And even if the issue were limited to strict parodies of the work itself, the fact that Harwell (the photographer) is snapping celeb-style pics of a business journalist (and that the photo originally appeared in a sort of social calendar-style Wired blog called "Epicenter" is, in essence, just the kind of bubble-era buzz that the video is parodying.
That is not to say that I think it's a slam dunk fair use case. Tim, I tend to agree with your "on the one hand, on the other" analysis. In the end, I think it *is* a fair use, but a close enough call that it's not worth litigating. And of course, Harwell's already gotten more publicity out of her "whining" than she ever could have bought with whatever she charges for licensing (or with a photo credit in the video).
1 year ago
in Dick Cheney, Privacy Advocate on The Technology Liberation Front
That pixelating of the Naval Observatory is annoying, but if you really want to see it, try Zillow (which also might come in handy if Dick Cheney decides he's like to buy it.)
http://www.zillow.com/search/Search.htm?addrstr...
http://www.zillow.com/search/Search.htm?addrstr...
2 years ago
in DRM on 9/11 Commission Report on The Technology Liberation Front
What a pain. It shouldn't be locked down like that.
17 USC 1201(a)(1)(A) prohibits circumventing technological measures that protect access to a work protected by copyright. It doesn't prohibit circumventing an access control that protects access to a work that is *not* protected by copyright. There are other parts of the DMCA that deal with other technological measures that protect "the rights of a copyright owner" (as opposed to protecting against unauthorized access to a work), which would include things like copying and distributing. While the DMCA prohibits trafficking in tools for circumventing this second type of technological protection measure, there is not an analogue to 1201(a)(1)(A) prohibiting the actual circumvention of this second type of protection.
Also, I notice you're trying to do this on a Mac. Try opening the PDF using the ColorSync utility that comes with Mac OS X. Then export (File->Export) it as a PDF.
17 USC 1201(a)(1)(A) prohibits circumventing technological measures that protect access to a work protected by copyright. It doesn't prohibit circumventing an access control that protects access to a work that is *not* protected by copyright. There are other parts of the DMCA that deal with other technological measures that protect "the rights of a copyright owner" (as opposed to protecting against unauthorized access to a work), which would include things like copying and distributing. While the DMCA prohibits trafficking in tools for circumventing this second type of technological protection measure, there is not an analogue to 1201(a)(1)(A) prohibiting the actual circumvention of this second type of protection.
Also, I notice you're trying to do this on a Mac. Try opening the PDF using the ColorSync utility that comes with Mac OS X. Then export (File->Export) it as a PDF.
