IBM Wants To Patent A Printer That Won't Let You Output Unauthorized Copies
from the I'm-sorry-Dave,--I'm-afraid-I-can't-print-that dept
Stories about copying turn up a lot on Techdirt. That's largely as a consequence of two factors. First, because the Internet is a copying machine -- it works by repeatedly copying bits as they move around the globe -- and the more it permeates today's world, the more it places copying at the heart of modern life. Secondly, it's because the copyright industries hate unauthorized copies of material -- which explains why they have come to hate the Internet. It also explains why they spend so much of their time lobbying for ever-more punitive laws to stop that copying. And even though they have been successful in bringing in highly-damaging laws -- of which the DMCA is probably the most pernicious -- they have failed to stop the unauthorized copies.
But if you can't stop people copying files, how about stopping them from doing anything useful with them? That seems to be the idea behind an IBM patent application spotted by TorrentFreak, which it summarizes as follows:
Simply titled "Copyright Infringement Prevention," the patent's main goal is to 'restrict' the functionality of printers, so they only process jobs when the person who’s printing them has permission to do so.
As with so many patents, the idea is simple to the point of triviality: only a company more concerned about the quantity of its patents, rather than their quality, would have bothered to file an application. Nonetheless, it's a troubling move, because it helps legitimize the idea that everything we do -- even printing a document -- has to be checked for possible infringements before it can be authorized and executed.
It works as follows. When a printer receives a print job, it parses the content for potential copyrighted material. If there is a match, it won't copy or print anything unless the person in question has authorization.
But why stop with printers? We've already seen Microsoft's Protected Media Path for video, a "feature" that was introduced with Windows Vista; it's easy to imagine something a little more active that matches the material you want to view or listen to against a database of permissions before displaying or playing it. And how about a keyboard that checks text as you type it for possible copyright infringements and for URLs that have been blocked by copyright holders?
There is a popular belief that the computer in Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" was named "HAL" after IBM, by replacing each letter in the company name with its predecessor. That's apocryphal, but with this latest patent application IBM is certainly moving squarely into HAL territory.
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Filed Under: copyright, filter, patents, photocopying, printer
Companies: ibm
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Good.
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Re: Good.
Patent Reform is a serious issue, the bought and paid for congress critters we keep voting into power will make sure that IBM gets what it wants.
They have more than enough money to make YOU silent no matter how loud you scream. And if you keep at it, you will be visited by people that call themselves the law with assault weapons in your face as you are tackled and abused.
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Re: Re: Good.
Precisely. On reading the patent, it's pretty clear to me that they're describing something that simply won't work outside of some fairly narrow use cases in business environments.
I see nothing in there that looks to be a serious problem for home users or business users who don't want to use the functionality.
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It parses the content for potential copyrighted material?
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Re: It parses the content for potential copyrighted material?
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Re: It parses the content for potential copyrighted material?
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Re: Good.
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Killing Fair Use
This device would push the impression that there is no such thing as fair use.
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'Working as intended'
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Re: Killing Fair Use
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That helpfully narrows my search for a printer
Did they even think this through? What happens when people who bought printers not realizing this "feature" was in there suddenly have problems printing stuff that they have a right to (via fair use, personal backup, or whatever?) Customer relations nightmare.
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Re: That helpfully narrows my search for a printer
Big Media- we have to stop pirates from printing !
IBM- we have a solution that is totally trouble-free !
Kongresskritter- Perfect, we will legislate that all printer manufs have to use this tech ! Surely, that will solve this (non) problem forever and ever amen.
IBM patent licensing dept- cha-ching !
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IBM Wants To Patent A Printer That Won't Let You Output Unauthorized Copies
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Re: IBM Wants To Patent A Printer That Won't Let You Output Unauthorized Copies
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Re: Re: IBM Wants To Patent A Printer That Won't Let You Output Unauthorized Copies
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Re: Re: Re: IBM Wants To Patent A Printer That Won't Let You Output Unauthorized Copies
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LOL... I can't foresee this causing any issues whatsoever.
Because... ya know... there are never any false positives with this kind of technology.
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uhm, how?
Seriously, a 10 year old could come up with this, so it definitely fails the obviousness test. So how was this patent granted? Its not even a specific implementation of anything!
This is so stupid I can't even.
I'm seriously having trouble figuring out where to start tearing this concept apart. From making users take longer to get their files printed to the impossibility of "checking online resources for possible copyrighted works". If there was a database people could check for copyright against don't you fucking think someone would have invented this already?!? No thought for fair use... the very idea of printing a copy in the first place is because of fair use. How does this thing possibly know I am using it for non-commercial, non-infringing use???
Ridiculous. Obvious. Obviously ridiculous. What the fuck were you thinking when you paid someone 300 bucks to file this IBM? And what the FUCK were you thinking when you granted this USPTO?
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Re: uhm, how?
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Re: Re: uhm, how?
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Re: Re: uhm, how?
This is not actually true (at least in the case of most printers).
What is true is that some printers include a hard-to-notice pseudo-watermark to allow tracing a print back to the specific machine that produced it. Also, money includes features that don't copy accurately with readily available scanners and copiers.
But the vast majority of machines will certainly allow you to make a traceable, poor quality copy of your money.
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Re: uhm, how?
It does set forth a method for accomplishing the result, so unless there is some art out there, it'll probably get through the USPTO in one form or another.
https://www.scribd.com/doc/312461758/Ibm-Print?secret_password=uhnboMw21MqI0FraOnWv
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QUICK!!! someone get this information to the teachers unions, if anybody can kill it they can.
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they are constantly trying to get ad revenue or copyright strikes on videos that are fair use,
parodys or commentary ,
AS its really impossible to just program a database that
will have all the data for this to work effectively.
I thought you could no longer get patents on simply Do this
function on a computer or computing device
Unless you describe in detail how it performs this
task.
Youtube bots work using data from a list of songs and videos ,films ,
sent to them by film companys and record companys .
A company could just have a white list,
of websites and domains in the printer,
eg only print pages from this list .
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Privacy much?
Legal documents, Financial and Tax documents, Medical documents, Love letters, Ransom notes, $100 bills, etc. you trust corporation to do the right thing and not try and monetize that information?
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Re: Privacy much?
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This isn't about copyright
Simply titled "Copyright Infringement Prevention," the patent's main goal is to 'restrict' the functionality of printers, so they only process jobs when the person who’s printing them has permission to do so.
It works as follows. When a printer receives a print job, it parses the content for potential copyrighted material. If there is a match, it won't copy or print anything unless the person in question has authorization.
Nothing stops this mechanism from being used to suppress printing for other reasons. And that's the point of its existence. Mechanisms like this that are ostensibly designed to serve one purpose will quickly be utilized for others.
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Re: This isn't about copyright
Back in the day, we thought it funny that, in the Soviet Union, for instance, photocopiers were rare. And you had to have special permission to use one at all.
That is because information is a powerful thing.
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Nice defensive patent for the commons
copiers and fax machines.
Even if IBM were to buiLd such (they will not),
it prevents other more evil companies from doing
so.
Let's say Evil Corp wanted to do so. Where is
the repository to be located that will decide if
there is some alledged copyright violation?
Who will control and update the repository?
Who will be responsible and liable for false
positives?
As a user, why would I want my document to be
transmited over the net (even if encrypted during flight it could *NOT* be encrypted at rest).
And now consider that I am a law firm.
Possibly dealing with a copyright lawsuit.
Bravo IBM. The best vapourware ever.
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You don't need a parser for that
You don't need a parser for that.
ALL material that you can print is copyrighted.
Copyright exists the moment something if fixed in tangible form.
There might be non-copyrighted material, such as works in the public domain, but that is the exception rather than the rule.
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So...thanks, IBM?!
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THOUGHT
That you could MAKE something, for personal USE, and not worry about Paying anything to the Original creator..
NOW if we are talking printed TEXT...this is to easy to Bypass, Augment, Facilitate, change...And the AMOUNTS of verification of DATA would depend on to many Formats, Backgrounds, Augmentations...
So that if I TRIED to print out a Personal Use Document, a copy from a site, it would take 10 days to verify the data...
Can you see trying to Print a CR recipe for Chocolate moose??
This is worse then transcribing the Bible..
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Let Them Patent It
They would deserve each other.
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Erm, isn't everything essentially copyrighted when you write it? Also, how would this authorisation be issued? What if the copyrighted material is indeed your own original work? I suspect what it means is that independent artists are locked out, unless they get corporate permission for a legacy company, but it's pretty vague. Especially if the plagiarism checker mentioned isn't easily fooled by changing a few words, meaning that original work is in danger of being misidentified.
One final thought - is there really such a problem with people printing copyrighted material that someone is being paid to come up with this kind of thing? At least the whining about digital piracy makes some logical sense, if misguided, since the concern is largely that pricey physical copies are replaced but infinitely reproducible digital ones. Which real world problem is being targeted here?
"This unauthorized printing can be problematic for copyright holders, such as book authors"
Really? People are printing books on printers using ink more expensive by volume than vintage champagne at high levels, rather than buying a second hand copy or pirating a digital version? I really, really doubt that.
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Start-up
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Re: Start-up
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No more Pentagon Papers,
The govt is cracking down on leakers.
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Save the trees
Society was supposed to be paper-less years ago, so now IBM is enforcing it. Most documents can be filled out and signed online, so why should anyone be printing anything?
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Re: Save the trees
Because my books don't fail.
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2 days
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