Could this not be automated completely on the Mac using the Kindle app and taking screenshots?
If you did it completely âinsideâ the computer using software solutions of any sort, wouldnât that be âcircumventing a copyright protection mechanismâ in a âdigitalâ manner? If so, isnât that the DMCA issue that the robot solution is trying to raise awareness of? Maybe Iâm missing the point.
Iâm not sure how this isnât against the law. Isnât this a rather straightforward violation of copyright?
The fact that weâve made a system so ridiculous that this has become practical bothers me to no end.
The question is â as always â should it be?
I donât think itâs clear-cut at all; the owner of this book (owner, not licensee) has a right to read that book regardless of platform or device, and to make copies of it for archival purposes in a different format. These arguments hinge on interpretations of the first-sale doctrine, fair use exemptions from copyright law, and the DMCA , specifically the anti-circumvention exemption of 2003 (?) that allows literary works to be copied to prevent platform obsolescence.
I think this is every bit as against the law as just using DRM breaking software. Itâs circumventing digital rights management. If you get picky, itâs using digital means to do so.
I think using DMCA to prevent the person who bought the property to use it in a way consistent with the terms of sale (IE âto read itâ versus âto give away 1000 copiesâ or âto plagiarize itâ is an immoral piece of legal action, but given that DMCA exists, I donât believe that this is any less infringing than any other method.
In fact, DMCA could be used to outlaw everything more modern than monks with quill pens. Even Gutenberg used technology that could be described as âdigital.â Couple this with the way governments have been treating libraries, and I am beginning to wonder when they will simply outlaw reading altogether. As they squeeze the market tighter and tighter, demand will drop, causing prices to rise, causing demand to dropâŚ
The monks would still be using their fingers, though! That makes it âdigitalâ.
No, the DMCA prohibits the circumvention of an effective means of access control. There is no effective means of access control between the screen and the camera, so there is no circumvention.
This is called the âanalog holeâ and even the MPAA admits it is not a violation of the DMCA. in their brief on why people shouldnât be allowed to circumvent DRM on DVDs for the fair use purpose of criticism, they said that people wishing to make fair use could do so without running afoul of the DMCA by capturing the video on the screen with a digital camera.
However, Purgathofer is in Austria, where the prevailing law is the local implementation of the EUCD, not the DMCA. But like the DMCA, the EUCD protects effective means of access control, not analog reconversion. Whatâs more, Austria has a âprivate copying rightâ that says that it is not an infringement to make copies for personal use â provided no EUCD-violating circumvention takes place.
Any exception to the DMCA would have expired three years later (and the exceptions are made at 3 year intervals that started in 2001, so youâre either thinking of 2001 or 2004).
Further, there is no DMCA in Austria (itâs the local implementation of the EUCD).
But in any event, analog reconversion is NOT a DMCA violation. (nor, for the record, is it an EUCD violation).
Nope. Austrians have a private copying right â the right to make personal copies provided they donât circumvent an effective means of access control in so doing.
Ah, ok, I wasnât really familiar with the remaining exemptions. Yeah, youâre right - it does appear to be an exemption made in October 28, 2003. You are allowed to make a personal copy of an etext for certain specific functions, such as âread aloud.â For some reason I thought that had been gutted, but it only had been made impossible to achieve without an absurd process like this. I get it now - the absurdity here is a direct result of the absurdity of how the exemption was defined.
Edit: Oh, but that exemption was denied in 2006âŚ
Edit edit: But the exemption was re-granted in 2009?
A separate - and more important - issue.
Ah, so itâs only illegal most places. I donât know which is more depressing - that such an absurd process is required to make possible perfectly reasonable activities, or that even that absurd process is legally denied to AmericansâŚ
âRequired?â This is an art project. Itâs not meant to be practical or reasonable.
My understanding is the anti-circumvention exemption for literature has been extended multiple times and is still in effect. Regardless, I still think that first-sale and fair-use doctrines trump dmca, but whether my position is supported by the law is another question. I canât really speak to Australian law, but I think the same principles apply under that common law jurisdiction or at the very least, its still the ethically right way to look at it. Using that argument vs local laws, however, ymmv.
Reading this string of comments makes me realize how much I would hate going to law school.
I recall a few years back at a reading room in a special collection library (the kind of place where they let you check out books for a few hours but you canât leave the building with the books), this young woman was standing next to a table with a book spread open on it, taking photos of each page with her phone or digital camera. My 20th Century photocopy-loving mindset was blown.
Yep. It would be extraordinarily hard to do, well, almost anything today that did not include a âdigital componentâ.
