A federal judge in New York City ordered Web sites to remove software source code, a victory for the entertainment industry but an absolute slam at the Constitution. The case is about the DeCSS software that cracks the motion picture industry’s stupidly weak DVD encryption scheme.
The film industry’s strategy is part of a wider attack on the system of copyright that has been altered — drastically — to favor the rights of owners of intellectual property. We are moving quickly to a system where you will pay every time you read, hear or view anything — and “fair use” will essentially be banned.
If you believe this is a good thing, think again. The consequences of the path we’ve taken won’t be obvious for some time, but they will be dire. I’ll be talking about this a lot in coming months.