Research and commentary on digital technologies in public life
Today on Fritz’s Hit List: the Amana Messenger refrigerator.
This appliance, with its audio message feature, qualifies for regulation as a “digital media device” under the Hollings CBDTPA. If the CBDTPA passes, any newly manufactured Amana Messenger refrigerators will have to incorporate government-approved copy restriction technology.
Fight piracy – regulate kitchen appliances!
An article by Rob Lemos at news.com discusses the differences between “white hat,” “gray hat,” and “black hat” hackers. The article lists me as a gray hat.
In my book, there is no such thing as a gray hat. If you break into a computer system without the owner’s permission, or if you infringe a copyright, then your hat is black. Otherwise your hat is white.
This article, like so many others, tries to pin the “gray hat” image on anyone whose actions make a technology vendor unhappy. That’s why the article classifies me as a gray hat – because my research made the RIAA unhappy.
As a researcher, my job is not to make vendors happy. My job is to discover the truth and report it. If the truth makes a vendor look good, that’s great. If the truth makes a vendor look bad, so be it.
Ernest Miller at LawMeme explains why there is so little fair use in DVD reviews.
Today on Fritz’s Hit List: Big Mouth Billy Bass.
That’s right, your favorite wall-hanging, singing, dancing, animatronic fish qualifies for regulation as a “digital media device” under the Hollings CBDTPA. If the CBDTPA passes, any new Billy Bass will have to incorporate government-approved copy restriction technology.
Fight piracy – regulate singing fish novelties!
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What is Fritz’s Hit List?
Most readers have probably heard me, or someone like me, say that the Hollings CBDTPA has far-reaching effects – that it would regulate virtually all digital devices, including many that have nothing at all to do with copyright infringement. Though this argument is right, it is too abstract to capture the full absurdity of the CBDTPA’s scope.
To foster reasoned debate on this topic, I’m inaugurating a new daily feature here at freedom-to-tinker.com, called “Fritz’s Hit List.” Each entry will give an actual example of a device that would meet the CBDTPA’s definition of “digital media device” and would thereby fall under the heavy hand of CBDTPA regulation.
I’ll post a new example every weekday for as long as I can keep it up. Please email me if you want to suggest an example. (I have plenty of good ones in the queue already, but your suggestions may be better than mine.)
