Re: [dvd-discuss] Geeks in government: A good idea?

[microlenz(at)earthlink.net]

On 17 Aug 2002 at 16:53, Jon Lech Johansen wrote:

Date sent:      	Sat, 17 Aug 2002 16:53:52 +0200
From:           	Jon Lech Johansen <jon@nanocrew.net>
To:             	dvd-discuss@eon.law.harvard.edu
Subject:        	Re: [dvd-discuss] Geeks in government: A good idea?
Send reply to:  	dvd-discuss@eon.law.harvard.edu

> On Sat, Aug 17, 2002 at 08:47:17AM +0200, Tom (tom@lemuria.org) wrote:
> > On Fri, Aug 16, 2002 at 07:30:35PM -0700, microlenz@earthlink.net wrote:
> > > And where are the free Windows players? Now that the DeCSS, a trade secret
> > > is known, where are they? or the Linux ones? or GNU, GPL? 
> > 
> > mplayer, vlc and livid are three that come to mind immediately. all
> > three break CSS. the vlc team has even written a library (libdvdcss).
> 
> The real question is: How many commercial Linux distributions include
> such players? I'm not aware of any. 

And while I am no great fan of Windows....more importantly where are the 
Windows free players? THere are hundreds of millions of machines that could use 
one....I don't see too many at tucows. 
 
> 
> > the vlc team had the first useable Linux DVD player, and IMHO one of
> > the reasons they were faster than livid even though they started later
> > was that they didn't stop to fight the dinosaurs first. they just wrote
> > code and that was that.
> 

a la Declan....actually Declan has a good point that even Kaplan recognized 
during the trial when he made his remark about the other kayakers coming down 
the Hudson River...

> The VideoLAN project was started in 1996. They already had many of the
> other necessary modules by the time they added the DVD module. As for
> dinosaurs, there weren't and aren't any around to fight. VideoLAN is a
> project at a French university. VideoLAN's partners include companies
> such as IBM, British Telecom, AT&T and Sun. VideoLAN was one of the
> winners in IBM's International Linux Scholar Challenge. The dinosaurs
> don't have any legal standing to attack VideoLAN, and PR-wise it would
> be suicide (not that this prevented the RIAA from threatening Felton).
> 
> The dinosaurs will however probably show up for the EUCD festivities.
> Now, if only I could find a sufficiently large asteroid on ebay.

To exile them to or to have it land on the RIAA headquarters...see that a piece 
of it hits the MPAA and BOTH of Jack Valenti's homes...

> 
> -- 
> Jon Johansen
> nanocrew.net
> 
> http://www.eff.org/support/jonfund.html
> 
> MR. LEVY:  I'm sorry, your Honor. I actually have a technology expert
>   with me. Would the Court like to or would they agree to hear a very
>   brief statement on this point from that expert?
> THE COURT: No.    -- MPAA v. Reimerdes injunction hearing, 2000/01/21