<CONTENT /> v.3

Saturday, March 23, 2002

Making Fun of Cop Movies. Robert De Niro and Eddie Murphy star in what is meant to be a satire of cop movies and reality television. But satire is not a vaccine against stupidity. By A. O. Scott. [New York Times: Movies]
8:27:53 PM

Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act (S.2048):
11:32:51 AM

What Hollings' Bill Would Do. The proposed copy-protection bill from Senator Fritz Hollings would demand restrictive technology on practically all new devices. Here's a rundown on what the law would do if passed. By Declan McCullagh. [Wired News]
10:57:27 AM

Anti-Copy Bill Slams Coders. Sen. Fritz Hollings' new bill embeds copy-protection tech in digital hardware devices. But the proposal would have an even bigger impact on the software industry. Programmers, look out. Declan McCullagh reports from Washington. [Wired News]
10:56:56 AM

[SSSCA Introduced in Senate]

SSSCA Introduced in Senate

Posted by michael on Thursday March 21, @06:40PM
from the call-to-arms dept.
Peter BG Shoemaker writes: "Wired is reporting that Hollings has officially submitted his newly renamed SSSCA, carrying the moniker Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act (CBDTPA). It carries all the provisions we've been worrying about...there is a new battlefield folks..." Newsbytes has another story. Reuters has a story about News Corporation and Disney lobbying in support of the bill. I haven't seen the exact text of the bill as introduced; it will probably be in Thomas tomorrow. Update: 03/22 00:12 GMT by M: Declan McCullagh has collected several documents pertaining to the SSSCA, errr, CBDTPA. He's got a faxed copy of the bill (barely legible; read it on Thomas tomorrow), plus statements from Hollings (read it!), the MPAA, the RIAA, and several lobbying groups for the tech industry, who seem less enthralled about it.
[slashdot.org]

10:55:33 AM

More Details on the CBDTPA

More Details on the CBDTPA

Posted by michael on Friday March 22, @06:59PM
from the only-the-beginning dept.
Gemini and many others wrote in with still more info regarding CBDTPA, formerly the SSSCA. Wired has a story. Cryptome has transcribed the text. The Senate Judiciary Committee has a web-form where you can submit comments (although directly contacting your representatives may be better). IMHO, the best thing people can do is explain to less-knowledgeable folks exactly what is at stake. When ABC News (Disney) and Fox News (News Corporation) discuss this, they're not going to be spending much time talking about the downside. Update: 03/23 00:55 GMT by M: EFF has an alert with a sample letter to Congress and background on the issue.
[Slashdot: News for nerds, stuff that matters]
10:51:17 AM

Google v. Scientology update

Google Restores Church Links. As free-speech advocates squawked, the popular search engine restored links critical of the Church of Scientology, which had warned the search engine to remove them. [Wired News]

10:44:41 AM