[Linux-aus] FTA circumvention devices

[Jan Schmidt]

<quote who="Anthony Towns">
> On Thu, Mar 04, 2004 at 03:04:52PM +1100, Jan Schmidt wrote:
> > > Yay. Linux DVD playing is doomed.
> > > 7(e) then goes on to limit the exceptions that can be created to:
> > > 	(i) reverse engineering for interoperability
> > This one leaves me feeling comfortable enough to write DVD playback software
> > already, without the later clause.
> 
> I'd suspect that means breaking technological prevention measures
> on the device doing the decoding, rather than the software though,
> or at the very least requiring that the product you're creating can't
> be used as a circumvention device -- like it's a physical player that
> can't copy DVDs.  Closed source software could probably manage that,
> but it seems trivial to convert any open source DVD playing software
> into a circumvention device...

Plus, that's not why _I'M_ writing the software... _I'M_ writing it for
interoperability. If someone else modifies it for circumvention, that's
THEIR legal issue as far as I'm concerned.

J.
-- 
Jan Schmidt                                  thaytan at mad.scientist.com

<stibbons> Yeah.  The whole climax thing would make much more sense
           if I'd paid attention.