The collapse of the World Trade Organization's December meeting in Seattle did not affect
the Caribbean banana trade dispute. The WTO's ruling against preferential treatment for
Caribbean bananas remains in effect. The transition policy under consideration means that Caribbean
exporters, who have about 5% of the world market, will eventually compete with the giants
Chiquita Brands International and Dole Foods. Tune in Friday, April 14th, 10 o'clock p.m.,
for an update and discussion on the trade dispute. That's Friday, April 14th, 10 o'clock
p.m., on Labrish, with host, Hapke Selassie. Right here on listener-sponsored, non-commercial, WBAI 99.5 FM.
And you're listening to your radio station WBAI, and your time is 8 o'clock, time for Off The Hook.
I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a cuff, it couldn't get much worse, but if they could, they would, for Billy Boon, but the best expect the worst, I hope that's understood, for Billy Boon.
I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a cuff, it couldn't get much worse, but if the best expect the worst, I hope that's understood, for Billy Boon, but the best expect the worst, I hope that's understood, for Billy Boon.
Boon, Boon, Boon, Boon, Boon, Boon, Boon, Boon, 
Nothing's gonna stop the flow
Secret satellite, water over a powder keg
Left upon a dancing gun, nothing's gonna stop the flow
Nothing's gonna stop the flow
Secret satellite, water over a powder keg
Left upon a dancing gun, confusion will be here tonight
Secret satellite, water over a powder keg
Left upon a dancing gun, nothing's gonna stop the flow
Nothing's gonna stop the flow
Secret satellite, water over a powder keg
Left upon a dancing gun, nothing's gonna stop the flow
Nothing's gonna stop the flow
Nothing's gonna stop the flow, Nothing's gonna stop the flow,
Secret serenade, Water all around the cave,
Dust upon the dancing gods, Nothing's gonna stop the flow,
Secret serenade, Water all around the cave,
Dust upon the dancing gods, Confusion will be you and I,
Nothing's gonna stop the flow, Nothing's gonna stop the flow
Hi, how are you doing?
How are you doing? I just made that up.
It's been a crazy week, as I'm sure you know.
Oh, yes.
Well, it's basically one of those weeks where people from all over the world want to know what's going on,
and well, we're here to tell them during this brief time that we have.
What's going on.
Yeah, exactly.
Well, of course, we talked about it last week.
We talked about it before we stopped doing the show, that we were anticipating more action from the Motion Picture Association of America people.
And, of course, we got it.
We got exactly what we expected.
And, of course, that's what we've been involved in for the last few days,
and that's what we'll probably be involved in for the next couple of weeks.
There is a new injunction that has been filed seeking to keep us from having links.
That's right.
Links on our website to other sites that contain the DECSS code.
So now we can't even refer to other sources of information on a particular story.
I'm not even sure if they're comfortable with us talking about it on the radio here tonight.
So what kind of news organization do we turn into when we can't talk about specific items?
I don't know.
One that they like, obviously.
One that they would be happy with us to be, but I don't know.
It's rather troubling, to say the least.
Actually, we can dive right into it now, I guess.
Bernie S. is on a train right now, so he's going to be joining us in a little while,
as soon as he gets into the coverage area.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
Because you can't talk on the phone underground, at least not yet.
Well, there's a related story to this, and it's rather heartening,
that source code has been ruled as speech.
The United States Court of Appeals has ruled that source code is a constitutionally protected form of free speech.
That decision hands the U.S. government yet another defeat
in its efforts to keep intact federal rules limiting the export of encryption software.
Academics and civil liberties groups have mounted several attacks on the regulations,
winning a similar result before an appeals court in California,
a decision currently under review.
It caps a four-year legal battle by the National Security Agency
to bar Cleveland law professor Peter Junger
from making certain course materials available online to foreign students.
Amazing.
The court did not find the export regulations unconstitutional,
but ordered that the case be sent back to the trial court for reconsideration.
A three-judge appellate panel in Cleveland put the matter to rest
after finding that computer programming languages are forms of expression
that warrant First Amendment protections.
This is a great day for programmers, said Raymond Vasveri,
the ACLU legal director in Cleveland.
Now, Professor Junger will be able to publish online the chapter of his book,
Dealing with Encryption.
Attorneys for the government could not immediately be reached for comment.
You know they're pissed off when you can't be reached for comment.
They just don't want to talk to anybody.
Well, that relates to a similar case.
I think they made reference to it in California, the Bernstein case,
which basically found that you have to share the source code
with other academics internationally
so that you can manage to actually discuss cryptographic research issues.
Yeah, it's the same theme we're coming back to case after case,
and that's basically freedom of expression,
freedom of looking at source code,
freedom of figuring out how technology works.
And they really get angry.
I mean, they've been getting angry for a long time,
but now they're really exercising their power,
and they do have an awful lot of power
by trying to clamp down the people who speak up.
And, unfortunately, with the Net, it's very hard to do that.
It's impossible to do that.
I mean, they could wipe us out of the equation completely.
They could shut us down, lock us all away,
but that's not going to stop the source code that we're talking about,
the ECSS code, from getting out there.
It's just not.
People are going to wear it on T-shirts.
There are still those thousands of sites that have it up,
even if we're not there to actually link to it or list it
or whatever it is that we decide to do.
It's still going to be out there.
You can't control the Net.
And a lot of people hear, no control, that's bad.
Well, no control can be good,
especially when you're dealing with freedom of speech
and issues like this.
You were piping up with something.
No, no.
You thought better of it.
Well, I was going to say simply
that they only have as much power as we give them.
These are your elected representatives.
Sometimes I feel like they want to take more power than that.
Sometimes I just get that nagging doubt in my mind
that they're not content with the power we give them.
They want more power.
Understood, which is why you have to be vigilant
and keep them at the special level that they're supposed to be.
What would you recommend?
How do we keep them at that level?
Elect those persons who are more respectful of their position.
Okay, but what happens when the people that we want to elect don't win?
What happens then?
What do we do?
Move to Canada.
Ah.
Ah, yes.
Well, that might be the case for some of you election dodgers,
but I'm going to stay put right here and fight.
You just keep trying, and you fight your way through.
Awful lot of fighting lately.
Well, this is the magic of democracy.
What, fighting?
Yes.
Constantly fighting for things that you never seem to get?
Certainly.
It's a very active situation.
Very frustrating situation, let me tell you.
Well, for whoever seems to be on the bottom, yes.
Listen to this.
This is something that the MPAA filed.
Remember, we were soliciting comments,
or they were soliciting comments to the U.S. Copyright Office
on the whole DMCA, Digital Millennium Copyright Act,
that basically makes all these wonderful things possible.
Well, the MPAA also filed a comment.
Of course, you knew they were going to do that.
Listen to this.
Many of the baseless assertions,
assertations, actually, they said.
Is that a word, assertations?
Yes, I guess it is.
Many of the baseless assertations,
that's a good thing to call them, baseless assertations.
It just feels like the name they should have.
And the comments flow from the false premise
that the purchase of a DVD or other copy of a copyrighted work
entitles the purchaser to exercise many, if not all,
of the rights granted to the copyright owner
by Section 106 of the Copyright Law.
It should be common ground that the only right relinquished
by the copyright owner to the purchaser,
as set forth in Section 109,
is the right to sell or otherwise dispose
of the possession of that copy.
Isn't that an amazing statement?
Well, there's a lot more to it than that.
Well, this is pretty much how they say it, then.
It strikes me as incredibly, I don't know.
Narrow?
Very narrow.
And to actually believe that people are going to enter into this,
willingly, yeah, the only right that you get
when you buy a DVD is the right to sell it again.
You don't have the right to play it on a player that you want.
You don't have the right to play it in a different country,
if you feel like that.
Who knows?
You have the right to skip over the commercials at the beginning,
or if they have those, who knows what other rights
they throw in there.
Basically, you agree to all rights as soon as you open up the package
and see what the rights are.
That's the way they want to run things.
It's unbelievable.
Anyway, to give some information on what they're doing with us,
they filed the injunction last Wednesday,
and the judge has, I believe, 21 days to file some kind of response.
Let's see if I can find the actual filing here.
They're taking another shot at us.
In fact, now it's just us.
Nobody else.
Nobody else is there.
Like I expected, when you're an individual against this kind of thing,
it's hard.
It really is difficult.
You have to come up with funds for lawyers.
You have to come up with contingency plans,
make possible travel arrangements,
all kinds of passports, things like that.
Has that finally worked through?
You got your passport all set?
We'll talk about it later.
Everything's cool.
Well, now it's really crazy,
because they've decided to turn it into this really personal issue.
I don't know if you saw the MPAA's website.
They got all these personal attacks against me, and it's funny.
But it's basically the first line.
In response to efforts by Emanuel Goldstein and his company 2600
to maneuver around the court's injunction against him
to cease posting the DACSS utility,
the member companies of the MPAA today filed a motion
to prohibit the defendants from hyperlinking to other Internet websites
offering the DACSS.
They actually used the term hyperlink, which I think is great.
Isn't that great?
They have an FAQ about hyperlinking, which we'll get into in a few minutes.
Really?
I want Bernie on the line for this, because it's just too funny.
On January 20th, the U.S. District Court, Southern District, New York,
issued an injunction prohibiting from posting the DACSS utility,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And they then say,
although I'm no longer directly posting the DACSS on my website,
it's just my website, nobody else, just me, one person,
don't nod.
It's not true.
I know it's not true.
I'm nodding to say that I'm listening.
Should I answer this?
With a ring that interesting, you can't nod.
That's only important calls get that ring.
Oh, okay.
Okay, turning off the phones now.
I should have done that from the beginning.
Yes.
Okay, so it is time to call Bernie Esso.
Let's do that.
Let's add him into the equation.
Okay, wait for the special code.
That's pretty quick dialing.
Yeah.
I learned that from Kevin, actually.
Really?
When I was hanging out with Kevin, he dials incredibly fast.
What does that mean?
A fast busy.
All circuits busy.
Why?
Why are all circuits busy?
Do I have to start all over again?
I just want to see you dialing.
That was pretty good.
Maybe I dialed faster than the switch could handle.
That happens sometimes.
Remember when we used to make modem calls,
we were able to get it down to, like, an incredible burst.
A 5ESS would be able to do it a lot faster than a DMS100.
It would just be a spurt.
Great.
I have a sense of progress now.
Ah, Bernie S., how are you?
Good evening.
You're live on the radio station WBAI in New York,
and we are talking about the Motion Picture Association of America
and the fabulous films that they have planned for us in the next year.
Fabulous films?
Well, yeah, that's all they want us to talk about.
We're not allowed to talk about anything else.
We can't talk about the lawsuit.
We can't talk about the links.
We can't talk about the injunctions.
We can't talk about the ECSS.
We can't talk about DVDs.
We can't talk about any future technology that might be related to DVDs
or that might be exploitable in the future.
Did I cover everything, Isaac?
I think in just covering that you violated certain restrictions.
Oh, by listing it, yeah, the list, of course.
Exactly.
Can we talk about anything, or should we just hang up now?
I think maybe that's what they prefer for us to do is just kind of.
Well, Bernie and I are known associates,
so we're equally covered under this injunction.
Fade to black, yeah.
What was the word again?
Servants and associates and all kinds of things like that.
They also have to abide by these court orders.
But, no, actually, we're still allowed to talk about things.
We just have an injunction against us right now.
It hasn't yet been accepted.
Hopefully it won't be accepted.
We're fighting this tooth and nail.
But they want us to stop, in their words, hyperlinking.
How about if we just link?
We don't hyperlink.
Hyperlink sounds more sinister than just linking, you know?
Hyperlink sounds like.
It sounds kind of out of control, like, you know, linking really fast.
That's their whole intent to make these things sound as sinister as possible.
But this is the original term.
I mean, you know, I thought I hopped in the Wayback Machine for a second there.
I mean, you know, it's hyperlinks.
Well, that shows you about how far advanced their technology is.
They're still talking in the, you know, what is it, Mozilla lingo or something?
Early 90s, way back in the early 90s.
Yeah.
So, Bernie, I assume you've had a chance to read over the injunction.
How did that happen?
I turned the phone off.
How did the phone turn itself back on?
I turned this phone off.
You saw me do it.
I saw you do it.
The phone turned itself back on.
You didn't feed that phone some spinach, did you?
I mean, this is really distressing to me that a phone can turn itself on.
I mean, everybody out there heard me beep, and that means that the phone got turned off.
It's probably some—
All right, whoever's doing this, I challenge you to do it again because—
It's probably some of this PCS spam that's been floating about.
Have you been getting PCS spam?
I have not, but other people have been getting PCS spam.
As you know, with, like, for instance, Sprint PCS,
your short text messaging or SMS email address to send text messages to your PCS phone
is simply your Sprint PCS phone number at messaging.sprintpcs.com.
Well, since the phone numbers are in known area codes and exchanges in blocks assigned to Sprint PCS,
it takes no thought at all to send spam email messages to two blocks of email addresses
that belong to Sprint PCS handset owners.
And when there's no thought at all, that means spammers will quickly—
Oh, yes.
They've been hitting certain AT&T customers, and it's going to be a problem until these—
I have, since Sprint offered short messaging service on their wireless network,
I had been lobbying with them to have them allow you to choose an email address assigned
and have that point to something that isn't public, but they have refused to do that.
And, in fact, Sprint PCS has gone one step further in disrespecting the privacy of its customers
forcing the phone number of the handset to be sent to a website operator who operates an HTML site,
the handheld device markup language.
Those are the sites that can be accessed with the micro-browsers that exist on a lot of these phones.
Right.
So if you access one of these—I'm sure you've tried to access some of the sites on your Sprint PCS phone, haven't you?
Tried to, yes.
Sometimes you get that network is unavailable message.
Which you get charged for anyway, I might add.
Your Sprint PCS phone number is transmitted to that website operator,
and hence you may get spam as a result of that.
Well, I'll tell you, if anybody ever calls my PCS phone trying to sell me something,
they're going to hear words that they may not have known existed.
And I'll certainly get my money's worth for my first-minute incoming free.
But, you know, one company that doesn't have first-minute incoming free is OmniPoint,
and somebody I know got a spam call—actually, you know what?
He got a message to call back.
That's what it was, a message to call back on his voicemail, and he called back.
It's the Police Athletic League of Suffolk County calling everybody on OmniPoint to try and get money.
Do you believe that?
I have gotten spam phone calls on my Sprint PCS phone, but not spam short text messages yet.
However, other people are getting them,
and it's only a matter of time with Sprint transmitting mobile phone numbers to HTML website operators.
Yeah, but this wasn't even that.
This was an organization actually reaching out to portable phone customers,
and I don't know what they were thinking.
That's not going to win them much popularity.
Well, you don't get the first-minute free when it's a short text message.
You still get charged.
Anyhow, it's a very minor—as compared to this MPAA crackdown on the First Amendment.
Yeah, that's a good way you brought it back to the subject that we wandered 10 miles away from, but here we are again.
Yes, we're talking about the DVD incidents against us.
What I'd like to do is read some of the frequently asked questions about hyperlinking that appear on the MPAA website.
By the way, if anybody wants to see how the MPAA is totally tearing me apart
and really showing me the kind of person I really am,
go over to www.mpaa.org and see the horrible things.
Jack Valente, this guy knows my name now.
I mean, he's actually out there speaking out against me wherever he goes.
Are you okay?
He's hungry.
Are you all right, Bernie?
Oh, I'm okay.
I'm actually being chauffeured around Philadelphia.
I had to drop something off at FedEx.
Oh, okay.
Back in the vehicle, and I'm heading home.
It just sounded like feeding time at the zoo or something, but I just wanted to make sure you were okay.
All right, the defendant seems determined to evade the court's order.
He is transporting individuals—I am transporting individuals.
I'm bringing them.
Just hop on the old bus here, and I'll bring you over to our website.
I'm transporting individuals electronically to locations in order to facilitate the illegal copying of DVDs.
His behavior is analogous to driving someone to a home so that they may burglarize the home.
Consumers, creators, and anyone else who cherishes their right to protect what they own should take a keen interest in this case.
Well, you know, Jack, they are taking a keen interest in this case, but they're not on your side.
They're on our side because they realize that when you buy something, you should have the right to play it any way you want.
It's not about copying.
It's not about piracy.
It's about control of the media.
It's about being able to play something on a computer, play something on a machine, play something in a different country,
be able to fast-forward, rewind, do whatever you want.
And it's going to apply to other intellectual property in the very near future, like—hello?
Yes.
Oh, I thought I lost you.
I heard a beep on my PC.
It's an ominous sound.
Yeah, and electronic books.
All these things will fall under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act,
and you will not have the ability to choose how you consume the intellectual property that you buy and pay for as a result of this bad law,
which is why, of course, we're fighting it.
Now, let's look at a couple of questions here.
What is a hyperlink?
And let's wait until we read the full answer before jumping in with any ridiculous points they might make.
A hyperlink is a software instruction embedded on a website which, when executed,
causes a signal to be sent to another Internet location where data or material can be retrieved for viewing, copying, or further transmission.
Hyperlinks enable a computer user to quickly locate and retrieve data from another file or website location
without the necessity of having to search for it or manually input its Internet address.
A hyperlink puts the data or material immediately at hand.
All the computer user needs to do is click on the icon or underlined text that indicates the presence of a hyperlink,
and he or she will be taken to the desired data or material almost instantaneously.
The first part I was trying to follow but lost.
The rest of it seems on the verge of being reasonable.
Bernie, how about you?
It's not really an instruction.
It's just an address.
Your browser on your PC is what tells your computer to go there.
That's true.
It's basically a sentence saying, this is where the information is.
It doesn't say, go there.
The instruction is actually carried out by the user who clicks on it.
That's true.
That's a very good catch there.
The computer on your end is what's executing the instruction.
There's nothing on there saying, instructing anyone to do anything.
The instruction is uttered by the person who clicks on that link.
Here's the interesting thing.
It's really the equivalent of a list, and what we have said is if this does get granted
and if we are ordered to take down the links, we'll simply convert it to a list.
But the interesting thing about that is that there's software out there that will see a website address
and automatically convert it to a link.
So what do you do then?
You can't win.
You just can't win.
This kind of speech is going to be regulated.
You cannot say a URL because if you say a URL, it will be converted into a link,
and then you'll be guilty of a crime.
Unbelievable.
All right, next question.
Why is the 2600 Enterprise's website's hyperlinking a problem for the Motion Picture Studios?
That's not a great question.
I could come up with a couple of interesting answers to that.
What is theirs?
All right.
On January 20th, Judge Kaplan ordered the 2600.com website and two other websites
to stop posting the software utility DECSS that circumvents the copy protection on DVDs.
All right, I've got to stop it right here.
I've got to violate my own rule.
Is that accurate?
Is that what it does, circumvents the copy protection?
Absolutely not.
It has nothing to do with that.
Access control.
I mean, this is a bold-faced lie, isn't it?
Yes or no?
Yes.
You don't want to call them bold-faced liars, do you, Isaac?
No, I don't.
You're afraid.
I'm not afraid.
Folks, this is what this is all about.
This has made Isaac afraid, and we can't have that.
Oh, come on.
We can't have that because he'll do desperate things.
Jack Valenti is like a huggable sort of figure, you know?
You just want to...
A huggable sort of figure.
Oh, sure he is.
This guy wants to put me out on the street.
He's calling me a burglar transporter and all kinds of other things, and you want to hug him.
Well, I'm sure if you went over and shook his hand and said, you know, hey, let's put this all behind us, he's a very personable guy.
But he's looking out for the interests of his clients, which happen to be the major motion picture industry folks.
I'm really trying here, and you're not working with me.
I wish you could see.
Unfortunately, radio is not a visual medium.
What's going on over there now, Bernie?
I'm breaking into my house, and there's a dog upstairs barking at me.
All right.
We're going to continue while you get yourself ripped to shreds here with the answer to this question.
Okay.
So, yeah, circumvents copy protection.
Which it does not.
However, 2600 has created more than 350 active hyperlinks.
Is that all?
I thought we had over 500.
Well, we have a lot more.
Ever since they filed this injunction, more people have added their links.
We haven't even posted them all because we don't have time.
It's ridiculous.
We don't have time to go through them all, to post them all.
It's just they're creating so much work for us.
2600 has created them.
We didn't create the sites.
The links are just printing basically a sentence which describes where the information is.
Hyperlinks to the DECSS software on other websites.
There is no practical difference between the 2600 websites posting of DECSS and hyperlinking to other webpages from which DECSS can be downloaded.
Big difference.
No practical difference.
There is a big difference.
Bernie, you first, then Isaac.
It's like saying there's no difference between my saying there's a lot of gold in Fort Knox and someone else breaking into Fort Knox and stealing the gold.
And then saying, boy, there's a lot of gold around here.
Yeah.
Big difference.
Isaac, your point.
I'm kind of thrown off by that metaphor, but well, let's just move on.
My point is...
Why is it whenever you say you have a point, you never make it?
Because I'm trying to figure out the previous metaphor.
All right, all right.
Using their logic, it's that apropos.
There's just no relationship to reality.
All right.
I would have gone more for a footnote analogy.
What is this motion all about?
Since Judge Kaplan's January 20th ruling that barred the posting of the DECSS utility, the defendant has...
That would be me.
The defendant has blatantly attempted to evade the practical impact of that order by exhorting others to post the DECSS as many places as possible on the Internet.
First of all, that's grammatically wrong.
On as many places as possible on the Internet, not as many places.
And has created hyperlinks that link directly to the DECSS program on these other sites.
First of all, I have not blatantly attempted to evade anything, and those are really fighting words.
This is a very clear directive.
You're not supposed to offer it.
Exactly.
You're not offering it.
That is precisely what we are not doing.
And, you know, it took a lot of heart-wrenching decisions to even reach that point.
Because it definitely was doing something we didn't want to do, taking it off of our site.
And in January, we went through this.
The day before Kevin Mitnick was released, we were, you know, pacing all over the street in California, trying to figure out how to go about this.
And it was a painful thing to do.
But we did it.
You know, we complied.
And if we weren't complying with the court order, why did we feel so painful about doing it, you know?
I remember that day, Emanuel, that night, talking with you.
And you were, at that time, you were steadfastly saying, I'm not going to take that down.
This is the First Amendment stuff.
I'm like, Emanuel, they will put you in jail on account of court tomorrow.
And I'm glad you made that decision.
It hurt me just as much to try to convey this to you, which I think you understood.
You just needed a little encouragement towards the rational side of this stuff, where it's going to be much more difficult for you to fight this case,
which is a very righteous case, from behind bars.
You just can't do it.
I learned that myself.
You can't fight a case effectively from behind prison walls.
So you took the lesser of two evil approaches, but I'm sure that hurt you to have to make that decision.
Yeah, I mean, what I learned from that was that basically contempt of court charges are very difficult to fight.
That's a criminal thing, as opposed to this being a civil matter, where they can basically just take everything you own.
Violating the judge's order by refusing to take down this free speech off your website would have been, according to the EFF attorneys,
you would have been found in contempt of court, and you would have been locked behind bars.
And we wouldn't be having this fight now, which is the important fight.
And that's the thing.
We may be forced into doing that by the court, but we can still speak out against it, and we can still talk to other people.
And that's what this is about.
That's what they're trying to prevent us from doing.
And that's what's really scary about all of this.
I thought about filing a motion myself, after reading this latest motion.
It's called the BOW motion.
Okay.
And I'm going to mail it directly to Jack Delaney.
That sounds like a constructive thing to do.
But along those lines, I wonder if people could bring charges against the MPAA for, I don't know, all kinds of things that they're doing that offend the average person.
It doesn't cost much to file a civil suit in federal court.
It's like $75 or something.
And hasn't Jack Delaney said that if it takes a thousand lawsuits a day to squelch this, we will?
Yeah, and where do you think that money is coming from?
Coming from the cost of your movie tickets and your DVD expenses, which are also too expensive as it is.
All right.
Let's continue with these questions, and we're going to take some phone calls as well.
The list of DECSS hyperlinks on the 2600 Enterprises website has grown to over 350 sites, making the defendant's site, in effect, a distribution center for the ready availability and delivery of DECSS.
Well, you're simply listing other sources for this.
You've gone from offering the program itself to saying, well, you know, this exists, and if you are interested in further information, you should consult these sites for more information.
And I maintain that if you were to look at records for how many of these things were accessed, downloaded, linked to, whatever, it goes way up every time they file one of these motions.
So would that not make the MPAA the primary distributor because they're telling people about it, and people are expressing an interest as soon as they do so?
A lot more effectively than we can, I'll tell you that.
I mean, just look at how many people have mailed us new sites since they did this.
It's probably double whatever it is we had up when they filed it in the first place.
Definitely there would have been a lot less interest in DECSS by the general public had they not made such a huge public deal about this.
Absolutely.
Distributing or trafficking software that circumvents copy protection is illegal under federal law.
Of course, this isn't about copy protection in the first place.
All right, here's another question.
You guys are going to like this one.
Doesn't restricting the use of hyperlinks infringe the First Amendment's protection of free speech?
Yes.
Oh, I'm sorry.
I wasn't aware we were supposed to answer that.
Okay, well, that might be your opinion, but guess what?
The MPAA does not share it.
United States law recognizes that freedom of expression and protection of copyrighted material go hand in hand.
The MPAA defends Mr. Goldstein's right to criticize the MPAA on his website.
They defend my rights?
That makes me feel really good.
Knowing Jack Valente is out there defending my rights to Curacao.
Where have they defended that, Emanuel?
I don't know.
But his right to express his views does not give him the right to use his website as an engine for distributing an illegal software program that allows unauthorized and illegal access and copying of motion pictures.
You're not distributing it.
You're simply mentioning that they're—
What are you telling me for?
Go out there and tell them.
I know I'm not distributing it.
Okay.
Actually, hopefully the judge is listening, and he knows that we're not distributing it.
The point is you're not distributing it.
Right.
You're simply listing people who are distributing it who don't happen to be under this injunction.
All right.
But, Isaac, this is the key phrase that will put you in your place.
Emanuel Goldstein has no more right to distribute DECSS in this way than he would to distribute keys to your house and a map because he did not like your furniture.
What?
He didn't like your furniture?
I don't like my furniture.
That's the kind of line that can only be written at 4 in the morning.
Keys and a map.
If you didn't like my furniture, why would you want to send people to go steal it?
I don't get that.
You can have my furniture.
It's just one of the clumsiest ways of trying to invoke the house analogy that I've seen in recent years, and it doesn't work very well.
I don't know.
It's funny, but it's also very scary because every time this happens, I get sobering talks from other people.
They could make you pay for their legal fees, which is probably half a million dollars, and take away everything you own, put you on the street, probably shoot you, too, while they're busy with everything else.
Who knows?
But here's the thing, folks.
When you really believe in something, when you have to take a stand in something, you go as far as you can, and you don't back down.
And we can go pretty far.
We can go as far as is necessary because we have a lot of people on our side for this, and we've been doing this for a while.
We've been putting out the magazine for quite some time.
We've been threatening the law since before.
It's never quite come to this, but we've had a lot of practice, so we're ready for it.
I don't know.
We've just got to see what happens next with the motion, with the injunction.
All right, we have a new issue of 2600.
Did you get your issue, Isaac?
Oh, yes, I did.
I got mine with a couple of special surprises in the envelope.
There are a couple of little treats in there, yes, perhaps.
Well, was the paper cut my special treat?
He threw this thing at me across the studio and wound up slicing my hand with the cover.
You can't prove that.
It's not on the radio.
Oh, I'm sure.
But would you like a second copy?
No, no, that's okay.
Got a whole pile here.
In fact, I can deliver about five at once.
Yeah, you'll get a couple of special bumper stickers.
Well, actually, you won't now.
You have to be a subscriber to do that, and since all the subscribers have had it sent out,
you're not going to get it because they're all sent out.
But they are available on the website.
The H2K sticker I don't think is available on the website.
It might be in the future if there's demand for it.
But we have the Stop the MPAA web stickers.
Web stickers.
Bumper stickers.
Web stickers.
That's a good word I just made up.
Yeah, we have those available, and they're part of our fundraising for the legal defense team that we're still putting together.
So go check that out.
I've seen them popping up in some interesting places.
I don't condone putting them right on the glass of the movie theater that you go to as you stare the person in the face.
But I can't control what people do with these things.
I can't.
You mean somebody was buying their ticket, and they just put that sticker right there?
That's not very nice.
No, I think they did it at 4 in the morning, and then the first person that waited in line saw that instead of the person's face when they were trying to buy the ticket.
You know, the transaction went smoothly because you really don't need to see the person's face.
Sometimes you don't want to see the person's face.
There's that, too.
There's that, too.
But hopefully we'll see these things on trucks and cars and boats and airplanes and whatever else.
There are a number of ticket sellers who are also very huggable.
You know what I'd like?
You know those little laser pins that can spell out words?
I'd like to see Stop the MPAA right there on the screen.
Don't do it after the feature starts, but certainly before the feature, it's a good laugh.
Of course, people probably won't know what the MPAA is unless they're movie buffs.
A lot of people don't know, and you have to explain it to them.
But they'll think of the MPAA in a bad way after that.
If there's a movie shoot in your neighborhood, or if you have a movie shoot, by all means, put the MPAA stickers, Stop the MPAA stickers, on all of the many vehicles involved.
Better yet, Bernie, so that you don't get yourself beaten up by Teamsters.
What you want to do is tell the people on the set what's going on and get them on your side.
I think that's a better course of action.
Yeah, a lot safer.
Than the vandalism.
All right, let's take some phone calls.
212-209-2900, right here at the radio station WBAI.
Let's go over here.
Good evening.
You're on the air.
Oh, howdy.
How you doing?
Daniel C. Okay, yourself?
Well, you know, I've had better weeks.
It's been fun, tribulating, but kind of energetic as well.
An analogy for you, on your behalf of Hyperlinks, you know, basically copying things, is that it's like you are directing someone to a copy store.
Here, you have a book you want to illegally copy.
Well, you know, I don't know what you're doing, but you direct them to a copy store.
Well, that's good, except I don't want to have the illegal copying part in there, because this isn't about copying at all.
It's about, you know, figuring out how to view something on a not necessarily cleared device.
But, yeah, I do take your point.
And, in fact, that would not be illegal.
If you're copying a book that you own for your own use, it falls under the fair use clause.
Well, then you could use the analogy and say how just use the whole thing is an example of how they're just so out of place.
This person is using the book for their purposes, and you're just directing them to a copy store.
So, either of you breaking the law, no.
Or, you know, another analogy there is you have a document that you want to copy.
However, that document says on it that you may only copy this thing on Xerox copiers.
And if you go to a meter copier machine and try to copy it there, if it does copy, it's illegal for you to do that.
And it's illegal to tell people where there are meter copiers that you could go to and copy this document.
I definitely wish you guys a lot of luck and hope folks will contribute to your legal defense fund.
I imagine there's some sort of way to do that on your website.
Well, if you go to the website, there's a special online store button there.
And if you go there, you'll see that we have a brand new Stop the MPAA t-shirt, which is similar to our cover.
Now, the shirts won't be out for another week probably, but we're taking orders now.
So all the information is there.
And what if someone just wants to make a plain old contribution?
I'm not sure how you do that because...
Send the shirt back.
Yeah, you could do that as well.
Send the shirt to me. I don't have one.
Yeah.
Well, the thing is, I don't know.
You know, we don't have a way of doing that.
We have the online store, but you have to buy something.
Well, you should set up a blank object.
And you have to buy it for the right price.
But it's your store, right?
Yeah, it's our store.
Okay, so basically set up an item in the store that's a donation.
A $20 bumper sticker sort of thing?
I don't know.
Yeah, I think we have to send you something.
How about a thank you card for your donation?
Yeah, we could do that.
You could sign it.
I don't know if we could set the price.
Why does something have to be associated with it?
I'm just thinking software-wise.
I'm not sure if there's a way to do it.
Well, I'm sure there is.
All right, we'll have to work on that.
It's going to take us a long time to figure this out, many man hours.
But it's a service we owe.
Okay, bye.
Thanks a lot.
Think about the amount of time invested into figuring it out
as compared to the amount that you would receive.
I don't think we'd break even.
We're not very good.
How about you order a $20 single pixel on your screen?
I don't know.
Anyway, I think I have a better metaphor for you.
All right, let's hear Isaac's metaphor.
A footnote.
I have here in my hands a research paper.
The first sentence of the paper is this.
In 1981, a paper by a mathematician named John Hutchinson
showed how systems of contraction maps on suitable spaces
could be used to generate self-similar fractal sets.
Now, in the end of the paper,
there's a section here called References.
And if you seek down, you see J. Hutchinson.
Fractals and Self-Similarity, Indiana University,
you know, pages 713 through 747, 1981.
It's a footnote, which simply refers you
to a source of further information,
which is very similar to what that single page is.
You're saying this is the situation as it is presented.
Doesn't the information refer you to the footnote?
What?
Because the number is at the bottom of the page.
Yeah, there's a little number at the bottom of the page.
Very few people go from the footnote to the text.
Correct.
Yeah.
But I, okay, keep going.
My point is that you are simply referring the reader
to another source of further information.
It is their choice to go about continuing
and researching this further by going to that other site.
You are simply providing a service
of a listing of sources of further information.
I think that's a very responsible thing to do
as a media fellow that you are.
Why, thank you.
I'm a media fellow.
Well, that's a good thing to be called.
What do you think of that, Bernie?
You're a fine fellow.
No, I don't mean that.
I mean the analogy.
Somewhat.
You're not.
What the MPA is saying is that when you click on this,
you're basically downloading the information,
and you're pointing to a page where there may be a wealth
of equally or equally protected First Amendment speech
on the page that that link points to.
And by succeeding, if they succeed in this junction
and get a federal judge to restrict you
from posting links to these websites on your site,
then any other information that happens to be on those sites
that is of value to anyone for whatever reason
will be inaccessible through your site.
So just because it's pointing
to where other people can download this software,
which doesn't violate copyrights,
any other information at that site that it points to
is inaccessible to them through your site.
And that's something I don't think you dwelled on at all today.
Okay.
But here's something that I'd like to read,
a letter that we...
Just be careful that there's no URL in there.
I'm making sure of that right now.
This was actually posted to the H2K list.
I am mirroring DECSS on three of my websites.
A while ago, I received an e-mail from the MPAA
where they kind of tried to threaten me
to remove the mirror and the software.
Well, they kind of sent me the e-mail as a Word document,
and since I only run Unix, I kind of replied to them
and told them that I wasn't able to read the e-mail
and that they had to send it to me as plain text.
Well, they did, four times in two days.
And they said that I had to remove it
or else I would get sued and have to go to court
in Santa Clara or something like that.
That's the other case.
That's the case California has no jurisdiction
over most people on the planet.
But I'm kind of Norwegian, and American law doesn't count here,
so I kind of sent them an e-mail where I told them
that I had no intentions of removing my mirror.
Well, then a few weeks went by,
and I didn't hear a single word from them until last Sunday
when I received an e-mail from a Norwegian lawyer.
And the message was kind of like,
if you don't remove your mirror during the next five days,
we'll take you into court.
So, uh...
For what?
I don't think they even told him
what they're taking him to court for.
Is there any Norwegian law that applies there?
Well, don't forget,
they did arrest that kid and his father there in Norway
for allegedly posting the code in the first place.
The MPAA has a long reach,
and they can work out things with other countries.
It's wrong, it's frightening, but it's true.
Here's another news item.
A federal judge ruled that online companies
can legally offer links to rival websites,
a service many new Internet firms use to attract new users.
This is kind of different.
Oh, this is the Ticketmaster thing.
This is kind of different than what we're talking about here,
but it also is similar in some ways.
The ruling was in favor of UpstartTickets.com,
which was the defendant in a lawsuit
filed by Ticketmaster Online City Search, Inc.,
that allegedly so-called hyperlinking should be banned.
Both companies offer tickets to numerous events
that consumers can purchase
directly over their respective websites.
Links to competitors' web pages have proven to be a service
that boosts the traffic to smaller Internet companies,
but the links often lead directly to a page
deep within the rival site.
While companies may benefit by more customers using their service,
hyperlinking to deep pages allows users
to bypass the front page area that contains advertising
web companies rely on for revenue.
Now, here's my question.
Couldn't the person simply do that themselves
and figure out how to bypass the advertising?
I mean, are they going to say that's illegal
for you to bypass the ad?
You have to see the ad?
Well, that's the next step.
It could very well be extended to that
because deep linking could be considered
by some twisted minds as being a means of circumvention
around the other copyrighted material
that one would normally have to wade through
to get to the deep link.
Yeah, that's definitely true.
If we spend substantial money to build up a site,
why should they be able to take that
and build their business on the backs of our hard work?
Ticketmaster attorney Robert Platt argued.
Now, that's what I don't get.
I mean, aren't they buying the ticket
at the place that they're sending them to anyway?
How are they being hurt?
Does anybody notice?
I don't get their complaint.
Just allowing them to sell more tickets makes no sense.
Well, maybe it's because they see the ad for tickets.com
and have a link to buying the ticket from Ticketmaster,
but it still seems to me Ticketmaster
would get the money for that.
Yeah, Ticketmaster still benefits.
The only way Ticketmaster doesn't benefit
when Ticket.com links to deep links
to where Ticketmaster sells the tickets
is that someone doesn't have to wade through
Ticketmaster advertisements to get to the point
where they can click buy to buy the ticket.
So it's just going directly to bypassing the billboards
and going right to the box office.
Well, there are ways to deal with this.
You don't leave that particular page
on the Ticketmaster site static.
You make it something that has to be loaded each time,
and the name changes regularly,
so you can't leave a static link on the opposing site.
Yeah, there's a technical way of combating that.
Acquire a cookie.
Insert some kind of strange JavaScript.
Of course, this makes a very large number of people upset,
like myself.
I do not accept cookies.
I don't have JavaScript on,
so I find myself somewhat bothered
by a number of sites that say,
you can't enter because you're not running JavaScript.
That really upsets me,
but I'm going to stop rambling now.
U.S. District Judge Harry Hupp
dismissed four counts of Ticketmaster's claim,
writing that deep linking by itself
does not necessarily involve unfair competition.
Hupp said hyperlinking was not illegal
as long as consumers understand whose site they are on
and that one company has not simply duplicated another's page.
So I think you could definitely apply that to us positively.
All right, 212-209-2900.
Let's take another phone call.
Good evening, you're on the air.
Speak up.
Hey, how's it going?
Let me turn the radio down here.
All right.
Or turn the computer down, rather.
Oh, listening on computer.
Where are you?
I'm in Massachusetts.
Wow, that's great.
I listen every Tuesday night.
Uh-huh.
Over a 56K modem.
Okay, great.
Hey, MPAA, a couple of months ago,
when this whole mess started,
I got a phone call at 7 a.m. on a Friday
from the MPAA's anti-piracy office,
or whatever they're calling themselves,
because it got out that I was distributing DEC-SS on floppy disk.
Oh, my God.
And I came up with this nifty little idea
where if I put it on five floppies and handed it to five friends
and had them put it on five floppies and hand those to five friends,
it would be a pretty efficient way of distributing the program.
I hate chain letters.
Wow.
Am I going to have, like, a great week after I do this?
No, no, it wasn't really a chain letter.
I get to go on a date with my crush or something?
It was a way to get some attention for the whole deal,
and it, in fact, did.
I star 69'd the phone number,
and, of course, it came back to the anti-piracy office over there at the MPAA,
and actually I called back.
It was around 8 o'clock in the morning when I was more awake,
and I was told that the office doesn't open until 9,
so I don't know why they were calling me at 7.
Wow, that's interesting.
Do you have that number?
I can do a quick search through my e-mail and get the number for you.
I also sent the number out to a few people
should they want to call the office
and turn themselves in for distributing the program.
That's the only right thing to do.
You know somebody's there at 7 in the morning.
Maybe it was just an underling trying to impress the boss
by winning the case before he came in.
Well, I asked, I figured I'd get a little cocky.
I said, well, is that program illegal?
Is it illegal to distribute that program for some reason?
And the answer I got was, before I answered that question,
do you want the summons delivered directly to you or your lawyer?
How did they get your phone number?
Apparently from my address, which is kind of interesting
because the phone number is not listed under my name
unless it's in a very old database.
Interesting.
We should call that number, every one of us.
Well, yeah, I mean...
The privacy number, not this gentleman's number.
No, no, no.
Oh, please don't call me.
To get clarification.
Well, you know you can always post it or e-mail it to us.
Actually, I did.
That's where I'm looking for the e-mail.
I e-mailed it around January or December maybe.
Really?
Way back then.
Yeah, this was a while ago this happened.
But I can't seem to find it now.
Okay, listen, send it to us.
We'll read it on the air or get it out somehow
so people know who to contact.
One thing, has anyone thought to send
Jack Valenti an MPA t-shirt?
I'm sure he's getting them,
the other ones that have been made,
and we'll see about sending him one.
I don't know if the folks back at the office
will be too happy sending him anything.
Okay, I'll be looking for the newest issue on my newsstands.
It takes a little while to get up here.
I have to get a subscription or something.
Yeah, okay, well, they're out now.
Thanks for the call.
Hey, take it easy.
Oh, this is Interlogic, by the way.
Take it easy and don't let them give you any crap.
Okay, thanks a lot.
Too late.
We were thinking of actually printing the source code on a flag
and hanging it outside the hotel during H2K.
Hmm.
I don't know if we could fit it on a flag, though.
Oh, I'm sure you could.
Oh, okay, we're looking for creative ideas like that.
Remember, H2K is taking place.
Unless it would be readable.
Well, you know, it depends.
Depends on how close you got.
But H2K is July 14th through 16th.
Full information is also on our website about that,
and that's really coming together well.
We had a great meeting last week,
and we're going to keep posting details as we get them.
Oh.
A lot of things in store.
Speaking of conferences, this weekend,
or rather Thursday and Friday of this week,
is AES3, the Advanced Encryption Standards meeting.
Where's that?
Hilton Towers or something here in New York.
Okay.
So if anyone wants to send me $500-something so I can attend,
I'd appreciate it.
How do they do that?
Impossible for people to go to.
Well, it's a conference.
All right.
Good evening.
You're on the air.
Hi, this is Bertha.
How are you?
Okay.
I have an idea for how to distribute the ECSS.
Okay.
Although I did put your post when they first tried to sue you
on all the news groups with the links,
but I haven't heard from any lawyers.
Well, let's hear the idea.
Okay.
Set it to music,
and then copyright the program that can turn it back into code
and copyright the song.
That's an idea.
It could be musical notes.
It could represent particular bytes and so forth.
You could always just sing it, you know.
Oh, that too.
Four C and one, two, three.
Thanks for the idea.
Or another way is you could form a religious organization
and worship the ECSS as a deity,
and it might become legal to then pray to your deity
and mention his name and his code as a prayer.
That's a good one.
That's one we'll definitely have to consider.
I have another thing because it's taking me so long to get through.
My computer crashed.
My kitty cat went to heat,
and they friskeed behind my CPU,
and things are blown and all sorts of things bad.
My email is rugosa, R-U-G-O-S-A, at interport.net,
and I'm disabled and homebound a lot in the winter
and when it's miserable out,
and the Internet is basically my only way to talk to the world,
and I have a mental disorder such that if I don't talk to the world,
I get really crabby.
So if anyone wants to do a service for a disabled person,
could you email me?
If you're really good at Windows 95,
IRQ conflicts and reloading drivers,
so my sound card will sing to me and my modem will work.
I paid some guy, and he soldered my case closed,
my CPU case closed, to fix it because he screwed up, I think,
or maybe my hands, the diabetic neuropathy,
I can't open my CPU case anymore.
I forgot which screws to open.
But I'm really sad and desperate.
So R-U-G-O-S-A, as in wild roses, at interport.net,
also known as Rosaphilia, R-O-S-A-P-H-I-L-I-A,
at hotmail.com.
Okay, well, you got the word out.
We don't have all night to spend on this,
but if somebody can help, they'll email you.
Thanks for the call.
Let's see if we can squeeze in another call.
Good evening. You're on the air.
Hey, if source is speech, what about HTML?
I guess that's next on the list, right?
HTML is the source, the browser is the compiler.
Mm-hmm.
Oh, yeah, and Verizon sucks ass hasn't been registered.
Okay. I got to remember that one.
They have Verizon.
There have been some Verizon ads. Have you seen them?
I have not seen them.
Oh, they're out there. Good evening. You're on the air.
Hi.
Speak up.
Hello.
Hello, Emmanuel.
How you doing?
Hi.
All right, you said hi five times.
We're going to move on to somebody else.
Good evening. You're on the air.
Hello.
Yes, go ahead.
Yeah, hi.
I think I have the analogy you're looking for in terms of links.
Okay, make it quick.
All right.
Let's say you're running a store like Macy's.
Someone comes in, says, I want to buy a gun.
You say, we don't sell guns at Macy's,
but I understand they sell them at Kmart down the street.
Ah.
Kmart, you're not working for Kmart.
You're not guaranteeing that Kmart has the gun.
You're just saying, my information is,
those people who are separate and apart from me have what you want.
I like saying cameras instead of guns, though.
Well, whatever.
Yeah.
I'm just thinking because guns have a certain negativity among some people
and not amongst others.
Which is a problem in and of itself.
Cameras could be used to make a copy or a picture of intellectual property.
Well, I don't even think that's the issue.
I think the issue is that there is a product out there, which is this program,
and you don't have it for whatever reason,
but you know people who claim to have it.
You're not guaranteeing they have it.
You're not saying this is what it is.
You're saying, according to our sources, these people have it.
Right.
As somebody who feels strongly against guns, I agree with you there.
That's something that I would have no trouble with somebody saying,
this is where you can get one because it's not the same issue.
It's got nothing to do with it.
Right.
And that's my point.
My point is by linking, you're just giving information.
You're not actually giving the thing that you have been prohibited from distributing.
All right.
Listen, that theme music means our time is up.
Thanks very much for the phone call.
Bernie, we're out of time.
Thank you.
So have a good week, and we'll probably see you again next week or the week after.
Okay.
Isaac, fun as always.
I'm going home now.
All right.
Why don't you get the early bus.
Thank you.
Thank you all for staying.
If I'm not indicted or otherwise interred,
I'll be back next week for another edition of Off the Hook.
Good night.