The Maximalist Future: Be Sure To Pay Off Your Lawsuits Before Heading For The School Bus

from the it's-a-stretch-to-call-this-fiction dept

There's a movement underway to remove all control from your life and turn it over to others. It's not an organized movement. There's no figurehead leading the way, but between the government, the legal system, various rights holders and their offshoots and professional patent thugs, a steady removal of individual rights and personal ownership is taking place.

With rare exception, it's being done on an incremental level. The government has been increasing its control over all aspects of life, whether it's what your children eat or which products and services you can use. Various agencies called into existence by an unprecedented terrorist attack nearly a decade ago have broadened their areas of control, without fear of oversight or reprisal. The legal system is no better, endlessly entertaining frivolous lawsuits and vindictive show trials, when not playing "Home Field" for various industries and special interest groups.

Various industry groups have done the same, aided by this same government and indulged by the legal system. Between the RIAA, MPAA, ASCAP, BMI and others in the royalty-collecting field, an earnest (and dishonest) ongoing effort is being made to extract money from every single interaction with a copyrighted work, whether it's a stream, a download, an upload or simply a backup. Having discovered that suing your way to profitability is nearly impossible, these groups instead hope to bleed every service dry, drip by incremental drip.

Aggressive patent holders are doing the same thing. While there are still a number of high-dollar lawsuits filed (usually in hope of a much smaller settlement), patent litigators like Lodsys are aiming lower in hopes of a small, but perpetual income stream. All of these groups hope that the dollar amount is small enough that only a slim minority will complain or withhold payments. They make it sound so reasonable. "It's only .575%. It's so small and hardly noticeable!"

But "small" becomes a killer when everybody wants a piece of the action. Those increments all add up to real money sooner or later. But even worse, the chilling effect of overreaching legislation and thousands of litigious actions takes an incredible toll.

An amazing/terrifying piece of "speculative fiction" has surfaced over at Ftrain, although after reading this, you'd be hard pressed to agree with either of those two words in quotes. Paul Ford's piece, "Nanolaw with Daughter" (subtitled "Why Privacy Mattered") paints an eerily prescient picture of where we're likely headed. It starts with this gut-punch of a sentence:

"On a Sunday morning before her soccer practice, not long after my daughter's tenth birthday, she and I sat down on the couch with our tablets and I taught her to respond to lawsuits on her own."


Ford's world is filled with lawsuits upon lawsuits. Everyone is on the receiving end of one settlement notice or another, all piling endlessly into their inboxes. Most can easily be settled for under a dime, but like any other small thing, it adds up to real money. Even worse than the dollar amount is living your entire life as a constant target. Or in his daughter's case, even longer:

"My daughter was first sued in the womb. It was all very new then. I'd posted ultrasound scans online for friends and family. I didn't know the scans had steganographic thumbprints. A giant electronics company that made ultrasound machines acquired a speculative law firm for many tens of millions of dollars. The new legal division cut a deal with all five Big Socials to dig out contact information for anyone who'd posted pictures of their babies in-utero. It turns out the ultrasounds had no clear rights story; I didn't actually own mine. It sounds stupid now but we didn't know. The first backsuits named millions of people, and the Big Socials just caved, ripped up their privacy policies in exchange for a cut. So five months after I posted the ultrasounds, one month before my daughter was born, we received a letter (back then a paper letter) naming myself, my wife, and one or more unidentified fetal defendants in a suit. We faced, I learned, unspecified penalties for copyright violation and theft of trade secrets, and risked, it was implied, that my daughter would be born bankrupt.

But for $50.00 and processing fees the ultrasound shots I'd posted (copies attached) were mine forever, as long as I didn't republish without permission."


Ford is dead on. There is nothing about that scenario that sounds far-fetched. The only thing holding some companies back from litigious action this insane is the lack of audacity to follow through on their lawyers' fever dreams. The precedent can always be found. All that's really needed is some sympathetic court to shove the case through. Like say, I don't know, the judicial farce known commonly as "East Texas"?

It gets worse. And by "worse," I mean more and more believable.

“How many are left?” I asked.

She looked at her tablet and said: “Fifty-seven.”

“We can handle that,” I said. I walked her through the rest: Get rid of the ones without flags. Pay those a dime or less by hitting the dime button. How many now? (Only six.) We went through the six: Four copyright claims, all sub-dollar and quickly paid.

She opened the penultimate message and smiled. “Dad,” she said, “look.”

We had gone to a baseball game at the beginning of the season. They had played a song on the public address system, and she sang along without permission. They used to factor that into ticket price—they still do if you pay extra or have a season pass—but now other companies handled the followup. And here was the video from that day, one of many tens of thousands simultaneously recorded from gun scanners on the stadium roof. In the video my daughter wore a cap and a blue T-shirt. I sat beside her, my arm over her shoulder, grinning. Her voice was clear and high; the ambient roar of the audience beyond us filtered down to static."


ASCAP. BMI. RIAA. SESAC. Et al. This is what they really want. Music that is paid for multiple times with individual fees just small enough to be unoffensive.

I won't give away any more of the story but every single chilling word is worth reading, especially if you're on the other side of Techdirt's fence. If you think the laws currently in place don't cover enough ground and aren't doing enough to protect your content/product, just take a look at what can happen if you push hard enough for long enough. Everything in here isn't just easily imaginable, it's also highly possible.

And brace yourself for the last couple of sentences. They sum up the attitude of Big Content maximalists and overreaching government entities perfectly. Everything is actionable. Everything can be taken. Everything can be used against you.

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Filed Under: lawsuits, predictions


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  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 10:45am

    I'm about as anti-piracy as they come, but I have to admit, this guy has a good sense of humor. Fun story.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    FUDbuster (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 10:50am

    As a reader, I find having two guys named "Tim" writing articles on Techdirt to be confusing. Perhaps one of you could don a cool pen name? ;)

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Dark Helmet (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 10:55am

      Re:

      What does it matter? We all know free-loading pirate-panty-sniffer Mike Masnick is actually writing all these articles anyway. It's the sum-total argument completion that he isn't even creative enough to think up individual last names for his "authors".

      I mean, come on. Cushing? Who really believes that's a last name?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Rekrul, 31 May 2011 @ 11:21am

        Re: Re:

        I mean, come on. Cushing? Who really believes that's a last name?

        If he was still alive, Peter might have something to say about that...

        link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        MrWilson, 31 May 2011 @ 12:14pm

        Re: Re:

        "I mean, come on. Cushing? Who really believes that's a last name?"

        Old school horror or Star Wars fans.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        The eejit (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 12:48pm

        Re: Re:

        Peter Cushing lives in Whitstable
        I have seen him on his bicycle
        I have seen him buying vegetables
        Peter Cushing Lives in Whitstable

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Rekrul, 31 May 2011 @ 7:42pm

          Re: Re: Re:

          Peter Cushing lives in Whitstable
          I have seen him on his bicycle
          I have seen him buying vegetables
          Peter Cushing Lives in Whitstable


          If you've seen him recently, I'd be worried!

          link to this | view in chronology ]

          • icon
            The eejit (profile), 1 Jun 2011 @ 12:46am

            Re: Re: Re: Re:

            IT's a song by a band that was featured on a coimedy quiz show called Quite Interesting.

            And yes, I did see him recently...in Daleks 2150 A.D: Invasion of Earth.

            link to this | view in chronology ]

            • identicon
              Rekrul, 3 Jun 2011 @ 12:07am

              Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

              And yes, I did see him recently...in Daleks 2150 A.D: Invasion of Earth.

              Doctor Who and the Daleks is a better movie in my opinion, even if it is just a movie version of the first dalek story from the series. It has less dumb humor.

              I also quite liked The Creeping Flesh.

              link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Capitalist Lion Tamer (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 4:02pm

        Re: Re:

        I mean, come on. Cushing? Who really believes that's a last name?

        I know. I can hardly believe it myself.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Phillip Vector (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 10:56am

      Re:

      You know. I thought it was the same guy. Now I see the first one was Dark Helmet (which I always read his comments with a grain of salt and humor) and this other guy.

      Sorry guys for mixing you two up. I still think this post is absurd, but perhaps he was trying to joke as well?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Dark Helmet (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 11:14am

        Re: Re:

        "Sorry guys for mixing you two up. I still think this post is absurd, but perhaps he was trying to joke as well?"

        Well, he IS commenting on a work of fiction, you know. Speculative fiction, no less, which of course doesn't describe reality but rather a possible reality.

        Are the descriptions here in really so far fetched that you would label them impossibilities, say, 30 years out?

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • icon
          Phillip Vector (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 11:32am

          Re: Re: Re:

          "from the it's-a-stretch-to-call-this-fiction dept"

          If anything, I'd say he's arguing that it's so close to the truth that it almost isn't fiction.

          Yes. I feel comfortable labeling it impossible for a kid of 10 being sued and them being responsible for it. Also, sued in the womb is going a bit to far.

          It just reeked a bit to much like someone who sees only bad in the world. Not my personal cup of tea.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

          • icon
            Dark Helmet (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 11:37am

            Re: Re: Re: Re:

            Meh, fair enough. I imagine there were many who felt the same way of speculative fiction 50 years ago as well....

            link to this | view in chronology ]

          • icon
            Josh in CharlotteNC (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 11:51am

            Re: Re: Re: Re:

            Yes. I feel comfortable labeling it impossible for a kid of 10 being sued and them being responsible for it.

            Yes, that would never happen. No lawyer would sue a kid for downloading a song.

            Oh, wait. They already have.
            http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20061219/121441.shtml

            They've also sued dead people, then tried to get it transferred to the surviving family members. Is there that much of a stretch to not-yet-born?

            link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 11:59am

            Re: Re: Re: Re:

            >I feel comfortable labeling it impossible for a kid of 10 being sued and them being responsible for it

            Because teenagers have never been sued for filesharing...

            And teen girls haven't been charged with distributing child pornography for taking topless pictures of themselves...

            link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            HothMonster, 31 May 2011 @ 12:19pm

            Re: Re: Re: Re:

            Dont forget tha 4 year old from New York who got sued last year for for hitting a women while on his bicycle:
            http://moms.today.com/_news/2010/11/01/5390292-child-sued-over-bike-crash-that-hurt-elderly-woman

            "However, New York Supreme Court Judge Paul Wooten ruled that she was “old enough to be held negligent under law.” He noted that “while the law presumes children under age 4 are incapable of negligence, for infants above the age of four, there is no bright line rule.” He also ruled that “Juliet’s lawyer had presented no evidence Juliet lacked intelligence or maturity, nor that a child of similar age and capacity would not have understood the danger of riding a bicycle into an old woman.” He then cited a few cases of young kids who’d been involved in accidents."

            link to this | view in chronology ]

            • icon
              Christopher (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 2:58pm

              Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

              You have GOT to be kidding me here? Suing a 4 year old for negligence? This judge needs to have a foot put up his butt.

              The fact is that the ONLY thing that should have been done is that the woman should have been compensated by the family for her medical co-pays and that is it.

              link to this | view in chronology ]

            • icon
              G Thompson (profile), 1 Jun 2011 @ 1:38am

              Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

              Yes this is because the Great country of the USA has no such thing as 'doli incapax' so therefore children have no presumption of innocence and are deemed fully responsible for criminal or civil matters. Where children can be charged as adults from 6yrs old and above (no other country on the planet does this - other than Mexico but only for major criminal matters)


              A story that states that respondents could be 'in vitro' is not that far fetched when you consider the above.

              link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Phillip Vector (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 10:52am

    Really?

    Is this the direction Techdirt is now heading? I admit, we all have our biases, but c'mon man. This is the second post by you that is so far on the left side, I can't see straight.

    Seriously. If this is the way TechDirt is going in the future, I'm out. If it was a joke post, perhaps a hint or 2 would be helpful.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 11:15am

      Re: Really?

      It's pretty lame, I agree. This is the sort of thing that makes the copyright supporters sound reasonable.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        MrWilson, 31 May 2011 @ 12:27pm

        Re: Re: Really?

        If you don't think that at least some of the scenarios in the story are possible or even sought by the copyright maximalists, then you haven't been paying attention.

        They've sued schoolgirls and dead people. They've suggested its unfortunate that the death penalty doesn't apply to copyright violators. They've subverted the democratic processes of foreign governments. They've gotten law enforcement agencies to raid copyright violators' homes with firearms.

        Why are scenarios in the story so far fetched? Just add slightly more ubiquitous technology and escalate current lawsuits and legislative efforts to slightly more absurd levels - which seems to be the direction we're going.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 1:55pm

          Re: Re: Re: Really?

          I could write a similar story where roving gangs of music pirates take over every recording studio and concert venue in the world and force artists to produce new music so they can pad out their ipods. It isn't likely, but it is possible.

          The basis for this story is crap, because it assumes things that are directly opposed to copyright law. Example would be the whole sued in the womb thing. The maker of the imaging equipment has no rights to the images produced by it, in the same manner that a camera company doesn't own the rights to images you shoot with your camera. That is an obvious misrepresentation, and much of the rest of the story follows. It would require that judgements already rendered, decisions already made, law already written, and supreme court rulings be overturned.

          Really, it is just pathetic anti-copyright propaganda. It has no basis in fact or even potential.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

          • icon
            testcore (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 2:44pm

            Re: Re: Re: Re: Really?

            Right up to the point that they include in the EULA for the device (yes, it's possible to do that) that they own the copyright on all images output by the device. Really doesn't seem to be too much of a stretch.

            Unless, of course, you've got your head in the sand.

            link to this | view in chronology ]

          • icon
            Rikuo (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 3:07pm

            Re: Re: Re: Re: Really?

            "The maker of the imaging equipment has no rights to the images produced by it, in the same manner that a camera company doesn't own the rights to images you shoot with your camera"
            If you're thinking of buying the new Nintendo 3DS, check the terms and conditions. Nintendo claims it owns the copyright to any pictures/video you capture with the camera.

            link to this | view in chronology ]

            • identicon
              Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 7:48pm

              Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Really?

              They can claim to own your first born child. It doesn't stand up in court.

              link to this | view in chronology ]

              • icon
                greg.fenton (profile), 1 Jun 2011 @ 1:21pm

                Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Really?

                Not standing up in court is the whole point to this article. It doesn't matter if it doesn't stand up in court....no one wants to get that far. So instead, we threaten to sue you unless you pay us a penny for each thing you do. Too little to bother fighting, so just pay it away.

                And they don't have to actually take you to court. Just partner up with other service providers that agree to deny you services as long as you have outstanding liens.

                "Go get another provider" you say? But there aren't any others. All competition has been M&A'ed.

                Still way too out there for you?

                link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            MrWilson, 31 May 2011 @ 3:38pm

            Re: Re: Re: Re: Really?

            A world in which music pirates can take over recording studios is a world in which other significantly wrong things are happening. There would have to be massive social upheaval for people whose unifying trait is their interest in music to take up arms to force the artists they celebrate to create new music.

            It wouldn't take much for big corporations to control the world... they already do.

            link to this | view in chronology ]

          • icon
            Capitalist Lion Tamer (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 4:04pm

            Re: Re: Re: Re: Really?

            1. You should totally write that story. One of the Tims can write up commentary on it. Let us know when you've got it in the bag.

            Really, it is just pathetic anti-copyright propaganda. It has no basis in fact or even potential.

            Don't forget anti-patent, anti-trademark, anti-nanny state and anti-frivolous/vindictive lawsuit.

            link to this | view in chronology ]

            • identicon
              Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 8:28pm

              Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Really?

              and anti-intelligent. It's just pandering to the lowest common denominator in the piracy world. You ain't very brilliant sir.

              link to this | view in chronology ]

              • icon
                The eejit (profile), 1 Jun 2011 @ 12:51am

                Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Really?

                Just like Young Earth Creationism, then, panders to the LCD in Christianity.

                link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Christopher (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 2:55pm

        Re: Re: Really?

        I have to say that you apparently are living in a dream world where the IP maximalists don't have this as their wet dream and the road that they want to take us down in reality.

        As much as I would love to call this hyperbole? It really isn't.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      cjstg (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 11:59am

      Re: Really?

      everything in that story has had it's seeds already planted. the ultrasound photos: i've already seen things like that. how about singing in public: restaurants have now written their own happy birthday songs so they don't get sued by people who don't even have a copyright.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 10:54am

    Which is it?

    Is this article supposed to be some kind of warning or a how-to manual?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Jay (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 11:11am

      Re: Which is it?

      Why not both?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 11:20am

      Re: Which is it?

      It's supposed to be the ultimate in FUD. But you never know what they might dream up next week...

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Chris Rhodes (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 12:20pm

        Re: Re: Which is it?

        If you don't support the copyrights of ultrasound equipment manufacturers and hospital technicians, what incentive will they have to keep making ultrasounds?

        Why do you hate pregnant mothers?

        Just another free-loading piracy apologist AC.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 1:08pm

        Re: Re: Which is it?

        Its FUD now.

        Did you think ,back in the wild years of the 1990's, that music labels would soon expect you to pay for music every time you listened to it? No, you didnt. Guess what CEO's of the major labels are asking for.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Anonymous Coward, 1 Jun 2011 @ 3:07am

          Re: Re: Re: Which is it?

          Music labels don't expect people to pay every time they listen to it.

          You're a complete fucking moron.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    DannyB (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 11:22am

    We almost have the technology to help the record industry

    Once we get small enough digital signal processors and devices, it will be possible to have an ear implant device that can hear whenever you are hearing copyrighted music. It can record the charges to your credit card automatically and then batch upload those charges next time you are in range of an internet connection.

    The fees collected from licensing can be used to pay for the devices implanted at birth. After administrative overhead and other fees, there is nothing left over for the artists.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 11:57am

      Re: We almost have the technology to help the record industry

      Didn't we make this joke on a previous article?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Steven (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 1:46pm

      Re: We almost have the technology to help the record industry

      To actually make this something that could happen, you get rid of the 'implant in ear at birth' and just move to 'legally required chip in cell phone'. Not that far of a stretch anymore.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    John Doe, 31 May 2011 @ 11:23am

    This is actually believable

    Too many who don't follow this blog and all the lawsuits and lobbying taking place in the IP world, this story sounds like complete BS. But after seeing all the things being done by the IP maximalists and all the laws being pushed through in the backrooms of government, I would have to say this story is not nearly as far fetched as it sounds. I definitely believe that Big Content would love to have a system in place to levy a fee on every bit of IP consumption that takes place.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Ed C., 31 May 2011 @ 12:20pm

      Re: This is actually believable

      I agree. What's just as bad is that they push as much of their copyrighted material upon us as possible. Whether it be a printed pictures, logos or ads, or songs played aloud, there's always something copyrighted. It's already to the point that you can't take a picture in a public venue without catching something with a copyright--just think how much is caught on camera in a televised sporting event! Then, they push the laws to create as many violations of their "rights" as they can. I didn't ask for any of this, yet they still demand that I have to pay just because I caught it in picture or video and posted in somewhere! It's already to the point that their enforcement is selective at best, yet, if they come knocking, the cost of proving one's innocence is too high.

      Of course, the shills will say that it's not that bad, but later they'll demand how it should be worse!

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 11:40am

    From The Laughingstock Department

    you people are nuttier than squirrel shit.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      The eejit (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 2:01pm

      Re: From The Laughingstock Department

      Squirrel shit has no nuts. So it's pretty easy to be nuttier than squirrel shit. I mean, look at you!

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Capitalist Lion Tamer (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 4:08pm

      Re: From The Laughingstock Department

      It's been a long time (some would say "too long" but we had them shot) since we've had a visit from The Laughingstock Department. Thanks for stopping by.

      Your metaphor has been forwarded to the proper department for approval. Please allow 4-6 weeks for a response.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Brian Schroth (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 12:04pm

    "Paul Ford's piece, "Nanolaw with Daughter" (subtitled "Why Privacy Mattered") paints an eerily prescient picture of where we're likely headed."

    Can something really be "eerily prescient" if the predictions haven't come true yet?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 12:13pm

      Re:

      oh good an ESL (English second language) student... nice to have you attempt a comment.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        HothMonster, 31 May 2011 @ 12:30pm

        Re: Re:

        Not sure what this AC is talking about...

        Probably a first language English speaker who has no idea what prescient means and would rather insult you than face his ignorance.

        Either way I believe you are right I don't think something can be prescient until it has been proven to be accurate.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 12:43pm

          Re: Re: Re:

          if it appears plausible and the likely outcome, then it can be deemed prescient. Prescience can be called out ahead of time. It's just you may not be able to convince someone else that you're prescient. It's simply a statement that can't be proven yet.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Chris Rhodes (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 12:21pm

      Re:

      True. Should be something like "eerily plausible".

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 12:35pm

      Re:

      pre·scient/ˈpreSH(ē)ənt/
      Adjective: Having or showing knowledge of events before they take place

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Chris Rhodes (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 12:51pm

        Re: Re:

        And I submit that you would show that you "had knowledge of events before they took place", by predicting those events, and then having those events take place.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Ken, 31 May 2011 @ 12:09pm

    More IP Nonsense

    How long will it be that Disney starts suing people for posting photos of their Kids with Mickey Mouse, or posing a photo of your child at McDonald's Playland, or Chuck-E-Cheese, or on a sky slope or at a ball game? Companies are now claiming they own the copyright to any image taken on their property.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    chuck, 31 May 2011 @ 12:20pm

    Makes me glad that I am "older"
    I just might not have to deal with any of it.
    Hopefully I will still be here for the "Flying Cars" though :)

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 12:27pm

    Did you HAVE to give them ideas? There's no way the collection societies aren't going to use that "one or more unidentified fetal defendants" bit from now on.
    They already sue little old ladies and war veterans. Moving up to pregnant women is the obvious next step, especially since they can collect double from them.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Capitalist Lion Tamer (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 4:14pm

      Re:

      Goddamnit. You're right.

      The only advantage we have is that we already know what they'll be using next. I'm not really sure what kind of advantage that is, but at least we've got... well, we haven't really got anything, have we?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 12:33pm

    There's a movement underway to remove all control from your life and turn it over to others. It's not an organized movement. There's no figurehead leading the way, but between the government, the legal system, various rights holders and their offshoots and professional patent thugs, a steady removal of individual rights and personal ownership is taking place.

    I suggest you read the book Nudge by Cass R. Sunstein then ponder what his current job is!

    I cannot think of a more prominent figurehead/bureaucrat.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Hugh Mann (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 12:38pm

    Looking forward to reading the story....

    Sounds like it might be a fun read, though perhaps a bit heavy on the copyleft stuff.

    Two minor points, though:

    1. You really can't logically call something "eerily prescient" prospectively. That's the kind of observation that is really only valid in hindsight. You might believe it will later be found to be eerily prescient, but it's not yet until we see if it actually plays out.

    2. You can really see suing a fetus for an act it did not commit and could not contribute to? And, really, suing the subject of a photograph over the acts of the photographer - or the person who hired the photographer - in a situation in which the photographic subject was not a willing, or even knowing, participant? I was willing to go along with the other things in the part you excerpted as very unlikely, but logically possible in an extreme sort of way. Suing fetuses seems a bit beyond that. A minor point, though. Still makes for an interesting story - being born with some number of lawsuits already pending against you, settling most of them for some ultra-low NPV like you pay bridge tolls or something.

    HM

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 1:10pm

      Re: Looking forward to reading the story....

      I dunno, you might have to sue the foetus as well as the more directly guilty parties because if you didn't they could claim they had rights to the photo, especially as it is an image of them and is therefore part of their publicity rights and they might also at a later date sue the manufacturers for enabling a breach of their right to privacy in the womb.
      To forestall all that, you might have to sue them to have your rights declared paramount.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Overcast (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 1:11pm

    Science moves forward. Technology moves forward, medicine does as well.

    But politics... they are moving backwards to the days of feudalism.

    An excellent post, Thanks.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 1:56pm

    I know it sounds petty, but this is why I have been forced to take the position of IP minimalist i.e. anarchist. Someone's got to be their nemesis or else theyll get completely out of control.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      The eejit (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 2:03pm

      Re:

      Correction. Anarchy is NOT a lack of order - is is a lack of orders. I'm a minarchist myself, similar, but not the same as, American Libertarianism, only without the added astroturfing.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 2:14pm

    Mike,

    Can we get a separate RSS feed for the two Tim's and remove their stuff from the main RSS feed? I wan't to stab my eyes out every time I read a few sentences from them.

    Thanks.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Capitalist Lion Tamer (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 4:16pm

      Re:

      Wouldn't it just be simpler to stab your eyes out? I mean, as compared to the logistical nightmare of creating multiple custom RSS feeds?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      The Devil's Coachman (profile), 31 May 2011 @ 5:37pm

      Re:

      Then start stabbing! I can help if you want. I am also very good at assisting people in stepping in front of trains, trucks, etc., as sometimes people lose their nerve at the last moment. No, I do not do the cleanups.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 31 May 2011 @ 5:52pm

        Re: Re:

        I am also very good at assisting people in stepping in front of trains, trucks, etc., as sometimes people lose their nerve at the last moment.

        Judging from some of your previous comments, I'd imagine that you might also be "very good at assisting people in stepping in front of trains, trucks, etc.," even when they never wanted to.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    NullOp, 1 Jun 2011 @ 5:51am

    The Future

    It has long been known it is easier to control/manage something rather than create that something. So all the control agencies are fighting hard to increase their control and revenue from whatever it is they control. We can forget about the legal system helping with this problem as they are benefiting greatly from it and are not about to back away from the trough. This behavior will probably never be curbed as there is far too much profit involved since nothing is created. It's a disease that should be cured but will not be since the legal system is Big Businesses whore.

    Oh, and btw, the record labels would love for you to have to pay every time you listen to a recording you "own."

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Peter S. Chamberlain, 1 Jun 2011 @ 10:20am

    Mimimalist Future Copyright Sonograms etc.

    I’m a retired lawyer but not a copyright or IP expert, and have read through the DMCA but not taken any courses on it since it was enacted after my retirement. Please tell me you’re kidding about the copyright royalty demand for posting the ultrasound pictures of your as yet to be born child, and they don’t really send those demands, either to proud parents to be or impe3nding new defendants in utero, yet. I’m sure they will now, but please tell me they haven’t until you so brilliantly suggested this new income steam. I’m still not clear about what in the ultrasound picture they claim to have created by their own intellect, too. What would the total liability of the pre-born child whose ultrasound was used in the famous “Is something inside telling you to buy a Volvo?” commercial, the parents, or Volvo, be?
    I’m lost track of the lawsuit over the claims of some large medical enterprises to some manner of legal rights to individuals’ apparently un-recombinant DNA. Since we know you can gather DNA samples from soda cans, cigarette butts, spit on the sidewalk, etc., not to mention certain felony crime evidence kits, would the person who originally acquired that unique DNA by conception and birth be liable for making it available to anyone other than the medical facility claiming rights in it? Since no human actually designed the DNA, it escapes me how any person or entity could claim to have acquired intellectual property type rights in it.
    My elderly parents were running a small hotel in northwestern Pennsylvania many years ago when it honored reservations by and had as guests a number of fellows on their way to a now-infamous meeting of leaders of a certain infamous organization variously called the boys, the Mob, the Mafia, etc., the existence of which, in a brilliant takeoff on a brilliant PR campaign by the Devil, J. Edgar Hoover, the D.A. of Brooklyn and New York, and others had been persuaded to say didn’t exist, complete with a slogan, “No, Virginia, there is no Mafia,” itself ripped off from the Baltimore Sun’s famous “Letter to Virginia.” They carried heavy gun cases, claiming they might do some crow hunting, which would have required incredible skill with the weapons we saw, and tipped well. Shortly thereafter, the hotel received a demand letter from SESAC, of which none of us had ever heard, demanding royalties for some obscure march played at halftime of the Super Bowl which had been playing on the TV in the hotel bar. Mother (a) confused them with the Musicians’’ Union, (b) confused that with the Teamsters who were involved in a high-profile investigation at that and other times, and (c) was sure this was somehow connected to our recent high-tipping guests. I checked with someone knowledgeable and got this resolved cheaply once I learned that they did exist and represented some, albeit a few, artists we had ever heard of. Then, of course, ASCAP, who we had heard of, contacted the hotel, about, for example, some piano and sing-alongs, and they mistakenly responded that they paid SESAC instead. A quick conversation with them, and a quick call to the Hotel Association, revealed that they had already negotiated reasonable blanket license rates for small hotels. I knew abbot BMI but don’t know if they ever made a demand or not. We considered copyrighting a bunch of my aspiring musician kid brother’s and some of his friends’ guitar licks etc. forming our own Performing Rights Society, and seeing how many small businesses would pay them, but didn’t actually do that.
    Don’t get me started on DRM. Somehow I cannot figure out how that would work on DNA or individual people. If the rights to my DNA belong to Johns Hopkins and my wife’s to the Mayo Clinic, and we and our child live in Texas, what court has jurisdiction and venue of the lawsuit and which state’s law applies? If you buy a prize cow or bull, how many cloned copies, and how many natural copies, are you allowed to make, and how would they divide3 up the royalties? I suspect that it violates the license on MS Excel if I get one of my good computer geek buddies to create a program that runs on it, compares some options, and prepares bankruptcy court filing documents that comply with a set of official requirements the government sells no workable program to create, and the commercially available ones tend to be expensive, clunky, and hard to use.
    Lee DeForest was apparently quite good at spotting patentable elements in circuitry in the early days of radio. Two people at two different companies apparently developed television independently. That’s why they have no gone to first to file.
    The law book companies—a field now reduced to a small handful because the big ones that used to compete in some things have merged, been taken over, consolidated, etc.,, --have set it up so that the electronic copies of these same books turn into pumpkins and have to be re-purchased frequently. That’s outrageous. Even more so is the state governments and politicians letting them assign and copyright the only official and proper ways to cite laws and court cases created by public officials with public money that are open public records. You end up with expensive books you have to buy because the official comments on the law don’t appear in the free versions or the electronic versions, and you have to keep replacing them because they change six pages every two years.
    My copyrighted and un-copyrighted copies of the Constitution say Congress is authorized to grant patents and copyrights for limited terms of years. It escapes me how Congress thinks it can grant retroactive copyrights, except to cure accidents like the poor guy who forgot to renew the copyright on It’s a Wonderful Life, or copyrights for “limited” terms longer than the author’s or anyone’s natural life, or in virtual perpetuity.
    There are a whole lot more content users than copyrighted content creators. I’m both but consume a lot more than I create, especially that I may ever try to sell. I grew up on paper books, including law books, that you could use or show to a judge or anyone else without having to pay for them all over again. If a mystery writer I never heard of even on writing Web sites until I read about him on a computer site can make a chunk of money selling his work exclusively on line at ninety-nine cents a book copy, surely there is a way they can do a better, more efficient, and cheaper job of this. Now the fun problem is that I need a copy of what one law book said in 1999, nobody I know has a copy anymore, and the publisher won’t sell it to me or wants several times the original price, making it unaffordable.
    One would think that if the EU can force us to change our law on some parts of IP, they, plus the majority of Americans I know who want good privacy protection, should be able to get Congress to pass some, if they want to pretend this is still a representative government.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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