News from the copyfight movement
DUI Defendants Skip Charge By Asking How Test Works
"SANFORD - Hundreds of cases involving breath-alcohol tests have been thrown out by Seminole County judges in the past five months because the test's manufacturer will not disclose how the machines work.
All four of Seminole County's criminal judges have been using a standard that if a DUI defendant asks for a key piece of information about how the machine works - its software source code, for instance - and the state cannot provide it, the breath test is rejected, the Orlando Sentinel reported Wednesday.
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Hollywood Foots Bill for Spy Cams
LOS ANGELES -- Every 10 feet or so in Santee Alley, there's someone standing behind a cardboard box full of discs. Each mumbles the same mantra: "DVD, DVD, DVD, DVD, Estar Guars" -- Spanish for Star Wars.
They're DVD bootleggers, and they're the target of a new system of surveillance cameras recently installed by the Los Angeles Police Department with money from the Motion Picture Association of America.
The MPAA, which represents major movie studios, contributed $186,000 toward the cost of the cameras and a software monitoring system that detects human movement.
The devices beam video to the LAPD's Central Area station, where the software alerts officers to activity. If there's rampant selling of bootleg DVDs, undercover police are dispatched to the site.
But a visit to Santee Alley suggests that the trade in bootleg DVDs is no more of a threat to the movie industry's theatrical sales or DVD revenue than the $20 "PREADA" handbags or $9 "Ray-buns" sunglasses are to their high-priced, authentic cousins on Rodeo Drive. With the new MPAA/LAPD surveillance system, another small chunk of everyday privacy has been jettisoned in the name of protecting movie industry profits.
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Digital photos can look great, but some labs won't print those that appear too professional
One of the benefits of digital photography - the fact that amateurs can take better-looking photos and doctor them using photo-editing software - is also becoming a bane. Photofinishing labs increasingly are refusing to print professional-looking photographs taken by amateurs.
The reason: Photofinishers are afraid of infringing on professional photographers' copyrights.
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