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                Date: 2000-01-26
                 
                 
                Offener Brief für DeCSS-Programmierer
                
                 
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      q/depesche  00.01.26/3 
 
Offener Brief für DeCSS-Programmierer Johansen 
 
Das nordische Linux-Website linuxguiden.linpro.no hat eine  
Petition für DeCSS-Autor Jon Johansen organisiert. In dem 
offenen Brief wird das Vorgehen der norwegischen Behörden 
scharf kritisiert. 
 
Einerseits ist das Kopieren von Filmen auf DVD absolut  
unprofitabel, was Journalisten wie Behörden vielfach nicht wissen  -  
andererseits ist zur Herstellung einer perfekten DVD-Kopie DeCSS  
nicht erforderlich, heißt es in der Erklärung. 
 
Für die US-amerikanische Filmindustrie sei Jon Johansen ein  
Versuchskaninchen um zu erproben, wie weit sie gehen könne,  
bevor jemand aufsteht und "Halt" ruft ... 
 
Die Petition liegt auch in einer englischen Übersetzung vor & kann  
online unterzeichnet werden: 
 
http://linuxguiden.linpro.no/protesteng.php
                   
 
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An open letter of protest against the treatment of Jon Johansen 
 
Jon Johansen, member of the norwegian crackerteam MoRE was,  
Monday 24. january, apprehended and charged by DoEC for  
involvement and distribution of DeCSS.  
 
[...] 
 
I would like to express my deepest protests against these charges,  
as reverse-engineering is not considered illegal, neither in the USA  
nor in Norway. Though none of these actions can be considered  
punishable by law, they are still under prosecution and charged  
with breaking copyright of DVD-products, even if they have not  
been involved in any "piracy actions", but a project to let DVD- 
movies bought and paid for be accessible for anyone. 
 
It's a little known fact amongst journalists and authorities that DVD- 
copying is extremely non profiting. A DVD-burner costs about  
5000NOK (625USD), and is not commonly available in Norway. A  
fresh DVD-medium (aka CD) costs even more than the DVD's  
publically available in norwegian stores. 
 
This can be done without even having access to DeCSS, due to the  
DVD's not having copy protection schemes, only READ protection  
schemes. That means you can create a perfect copy of any DVD,  
without the use of DeCSS, and then play it like an original DVD.  
This does, as stated earlier, not come in handy, as the price for  
this copy would be rather high. 
 
[...] 
 
DeCSS may ease copying DVD's, but this is not the primary  
intentions of this software, and as such Johansen has not done  
anything illegal, and is know spoken upon as a "guineapig" for of  
the american film industry, as a test of how far they can go before  
someone sets their foot down to stop them. Shall we then  
apprehend and charge the creators of the mp3-format, just because  
it eases copying music digitally? Do we have to charge the  
producers of knives, due to that they can be used to hurt other  
people? We're saying that DeCSS was made for a good purpose,  
and it's up to ones own mind to choose the use of it. Johansen is  
not responsible for any piracy acts that comes from the discoveries  
his team made. 
 
[...] 
 
The part that is illegal is copying and distributing DVD-movies  
without proper authorization. This is not what Johansen is being  
charged with, and as such he's being wrongly accused of  
something he didn't do. 
 
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edited by  
published on: 2000-01-26 
comments to office@quintessenz.at
                   
                  
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