One of the problems with the DMCA (the infamous Digital Millennium Copyright Act), is that it offers anyone with a whim and a pen the ability to censor the web (or try *really, really* hard to not awfully much effect).
Note the latest efforts of the ever-litigious Church of Scien_tology noted over at the Electronic Freedom Foundation - apparently the lovely Church-folk managed to send out 4000-some "take-down" notices to YouTube regarding video submissions that might be considered...critical...of that Church.
Neato, eh? Find someone whose work or writings you object to, fire off a DMCA takedown notice, and (at least temporarily) your targets work/writings vanishes - courtesy of the notified hosted ISP.
Perhaps it's time to rethink, and perhaps massively narrow the scope of, this legislation.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Yes, this new comment form sucks. No, it's not my fault - blame Google.