Posted on Wednesday 7 December 2005 - Popularity: unranked
More info about that French pro DRM and anti open source & free software bill I’ve posted about last week. The following comments should give you a much better idea of what’s going on in France:
The DADVSI law (Copyrights and laws bordering on them in the Society of the information) provides for, amongst others, the institution of DRM (Digital Right Management) at all levels: prohibition of Peer to Peer software and net surfer tracking, and with regard to web radios, they’ll be under an obligation to broadcast with a technology enclosing DRM.
Problem is that by doing so, the broadcasters can no longer use their programs of choice, but will have to purchase expensive, official ones, like Real Player and Windows Media Player (and actually, for nothing, because DRM is nothing more than a means by which companies protect themselves against possible lawsuits from the artists, since there are many workarounds for this technology). And since many of these webradios are non-commercial ones, they won’t be able to acquire these products, they’ll probably turn into outlaws.
Boing Boing has posted about is as well:
Creating your own compilations from a CD, extracting your favourite piece of music to listen to it on your computer, transfering it on a MP3 player, lending a CD to a friend, reading a DVD with free software or duplicating it to be able to enjoy it at home and in your country house : many common practices, perfectly legal, which the French government plans to forbid in fact. The copyright and neighbouring rights in the information society bill (DADVSI) (n°1206) which the French government will try to force through in the coming weeks by using an emergency procedure, actually legitimates the technical devices installed by CD and DVD editors and producers to control their use. And above all, the bill plans criminal penalty against people who would dare to remove those.
Here’s a nice blog in English to get the latest updates. Let’s hope we’ll see some positive news over there the next days.
