ARTS & FARCES internet

I wish I had the intellectual capacity of John Gilmore, who thinks incredibly deeply about so many incredibly complex issues.

Recently, he aimed its laser-beam intellect at the gathering storm surrounding the protection of digital content.

Gilmore blasts Intel for joining the entertainment industry in its endeavor to force the technology industry to help it protect “content” in digital form. (Intel co-chairs the Broadcast Protection Discussion Group.)

Dig this:

“The heart of the difference between Intel and I on this point is on what you called ‘the need to protect content.’ I believe that there is NO need to so-called protect so-called content. In fact, both the structure of our society (free speech and capitalism) and the structure of our technologies (open standards that plug together in innumerable ways to satisfy innumerable desires) require a lack of restrictions on who can transmit what information to who.”

“Intel builds machines that process data. ‘Content’ is just data. Every piece of data that an Intel processor or networking component handles is copyrighted by somebody, under the Berne Convention. It’s all ‘content.’ You could talk about ‘protecting data’ but people would realize that preventing it from being copied does not ‘protect’ their data. Frequently you NEED to copy your data—e.g. onto a backup tape—to protect it. So instead you use this made-up word ‘content.’ Since nobody knows a definition for ‘content,’ you can say the most outrageous things about it and get away with it.”