Can The DMCA Be Used To Stifle Speech?
from the we're-about-to-find-out dept
Last summer, we wrote about a very questionable DMCA lawsuit filed by Coupons.com. The company lets people download coupons using its own software. The software is designed to limit how many copies of a coupon people can make. The company accused John Stottlemire of violating the anti-circumvention part of the DMCA by offering up some software that would help people get around the copy limit. However, he didn't just offer up software to do it, elsewhere he explained how you could do it manually, just by deleting a couple of files on your computer. That's hardly a "hack." There was no encryption to defeat, just some files to delete. Basically, Coupons.com couldn't be bothered to come up with a system that was actually secure and put in only the weakest of "protections."Yet, Coupons.com claims that telling people to delete some files is circumventing their copy protection. The EFF (along with the Samuelson Law, Technology & Public Policy Clinic at UC Berkeley) have now filed an amicus brief with the court pointing out the numerous problems with the charges. As the filing notes, the DMCA is focused on people providing a "technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof," and comments on a website hardly seem to qualify. It also notes that even if the court interprets written comments to be included, the DMCA is specific that it does not diminish any free speech rights. The filing also looks at other problems with the Coupons.com filing, including the company mixing up the difference between access controls and rights controls. Hopefully the judge realizes that this is (yet another) abuse of the DMCA and tosses the case out quickly.
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Filed Under: circumvention, coupons, dmca, speech
Companies: coupons.com
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Clear your cookies and you can get as many as you want.
Now sue me.
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wanktards
Wanktards like these just p*ss me off.
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why else would you have the dmca?
information security in any form is a game. in this game, there is no score; you either outclass, or you get outclassed. there is no league or state commission to regulate who gets to play.
there is a reason that couch potatoes can't just walk on to a football field and play professional football. we all know the amateurs would get killed in minutes, if not seconds. that's why there are boxing commissions, and football leagues.
when a company buys or builds something that they think will protect their "content", they are (whether they realize it or not) walking on to a football field to play against world class players. just like couch potatoes, they get outclassed every single time. rather than admit that the game is impossible to win and quit playing, the corporations have bought laws that make beating them illegal.
they know they can't compete, so they use their money to buy legal protection. what's funny is that by hiding behind the law, they just declared open season on everything with a digital lock or control. queue irony in 3.. 2.. 1..
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This is just a damned silly suit
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What's the problem here?
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What's the problem here?
So if people are "gaming the system" to get more coupons, don't they have to buy more things from the store, which means more money for the store... possibly from people who may not have gone to that store (or bought as much stuff) if they didn't have a coupon?
The only issue is if the store issued a "get it for free" coupon which people were using over and over. But that's an issue with the store, not the users or Coupons.com.
If stores were smart, they'd issue "20% off orders over $200" coupons and let people print them all day long. If people really want a gazillion of these coupons, they'll have to keep spending $200 at a time to use it.
Otherwise, the store should be happy it's getting more customers... and Coupons.com should be happy that the stores are happy with the results they get from Coupons.com (even if users "cheat").
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Re: What's the problem here?
CPGs do not know that you had exactly 250 boxes of Cheerios in your store at a given time. That's not how the supply chain functions.
So a store could cheat by printing out coupon after coupon after coupon and get free money with every coupon submitted. The brand pays out but never actually sells any product.
That's the problem here.
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