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diff --git a/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/en/right-to-read.html b/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/en/right-to-read.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1d29496 --- /dev/null +++ b/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/en/right-to-read.html @@ -0,0 +1,585 @@ +<!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" --> +<!-- Parent-Version: 1.90 --> +<title>The Right to Read +- GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title> +<style type="text/css" media="print,screen"><!-- +blockquote, .comment { + font-style: italic; +} +blockquote cite { + font-style: normal; +} +.announcement { + text-align: center; + background: #f5f5f5; + border-left: .3em solid #fc7; + border-right: .3em solid #fc7; + margin: 2.5em 0; +} +#AuthorsNote ul, #AuthorsNote li { + margin: 0; +} +#AuthorsNote li p { + margin: 1em 0; +} +.emph-box { + background: #f7f7f7; + border-color: #e74c3c; +} +#AuthorsNote p.emph-box { + margin: 1em 6%; +} +#BadNews li p { text-indent: -.8em; } +#BadNews li p:before { + content: "\021D2"; + display: inline; + position: relative; + right: .5em; +} +#BadNews p.emph-box { + margin: 2.5em 6% 1em; +} +#References { + margin: 3em 0 2em; +} +#References h3 { + font-size: 1.2em; +} +@media (min-width: 55em) { + #AuthorsNote .columns > p:first-child, + #AuthorsNote li p.inline-block { + margin-top: 0; + } + .comment { text-align: center; } + .table { display: table; } + .table-cell { + display: table-cell; + width: 50%; + vertical-align: middle; + } + .left { padding-right: .75em; } + .right { padding-left: .75em; } + } +}--> +<!--#if expr="$LANGUAGE_SUFFIX = /[.](ar|fa|he)/" --> +<!-- +@media (min-width: 55em) { + .left { padding-left: .75em; } + .right { padding-right: .75em; } + } +}--> +<!--#endif --> +</style> +<!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/right-to-read.translist" --> +<!--#include virtual="/server/banner.html" --> +<h2 class="center">The Right to Read</h2> + +<address class="byline center"> +by <a href="http://www.stallman.org/">Richard Stallman</a></address> +<p class="center"> +<em>This article appeared in the February 1997 issue +of <cite>Communications of the ACM</cite> (Volume 40, Number +2).</em></p> +<hr class="thin" /> + +<div class="article"> +<blockquote class="center comment"><p> + From <cite>The Road To Tycho</cite>, a collection of + articles about the antecedents of the Lunarian + Revolution, published in Luna City in 2096. +</p></blockquote> + +<div class="columns"> +<p> +For Dan Halbert, the road to Tycho began in college—when Lissa +Lenz asked to borrow his computer. Hers had broken down, and unless +she could borrow another, she would fail her midterm project. There +was no one she dared ask, except Dan.</p> + +<p> +This put Dan in a dilemma. He had to help her—but if he lent +her his computer, she might read his books. Aside from the fact that +you could go to prison for many years for letting someone else read +your books, the very idea shocked him at first. Like everyone, he had +been taught since elementary school that sharing books was nasty and +wrong—something that only pirates would do.</p> + +<p> +And there wasn't much chance that the SPA—the Software +Protection Authority—would fail to catch him. In his software +class, Dan had learned that each book had a copyright monitor that +reported when and where it was read, and by whom, to Central +Licensing. (They used this information to catch reading pirates, but +also to sell personal interest profiles to retailers.) The next time +his computer was networked, Central Licensing would find out. He, as +computer owner, would receive the harshest punishment—for not +taking pains to prevent the crime.</p> + +<p> +Of course, Lissa did not necessarily intend to read his books. She +might want the computer only to write her midterm. But Dan knew she +came from a middle-class family and could hardly afford the tuition, +let alone her reading fees. Reading his books might be the only way +she could graduate. He understood this situation; he himself had had +to borrow to pay for all the research papers he read. (Ten percent of those +fees went to the researchers who wrote the papers; since Dan aimed for +an academic career, he could hope that his own research papers, if +frequently referenced, would bring in enough to repay this loan.)</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> + +<div class="columns"> +<p> +Later on, Dan would learn there was a time when anyone could go to the +library and read journal articles, and even books, without having to +pay. There were independent scholars who read thousands of pages +without government library grants. But in the 1990s, both commercial +and nonprofit journal publishers had begun charging fees for access. +By 2047, libraries offering free public access to scholarly literature +were a dim memory.</p> + +<p> +There were ways, of course, to get around the SPA and Central +Licensing. They were themselves illegal. Dan had had a classmate in +software, Frank Martucci, who had obtained an illicit debugging tool, +and used it to skip over the copyright monitor code when reading +books. But he had told too many friends about it, and one of them +turned him in to the SPA for a reward (students deep in debt were +easily tempted into betrayal). In 2047, Frank was in prison, not for +pirate reading, but for possessing a debugger.</p> + +<p> +Dan would later learn that there was a time when anyone could have +debugging tools. There were even free debugging tools available on CD +or downloadable over the net. But ordinary users started using them +to bypass copyright monitors, and eventually a judge ruled that this +had become their principal use in actual practice. This meant they +were illegal; the debuggers' developers were sent to prison.</p> + +<p> +Programmers still needed debugging tools, of course, but debugger +vendors in 2047 distributed numbered copies only, and only to +officially licensed and bonded programmers. The debugger Dan used in +software class was kept behind a special firewall so that it could be +used only for class exercises.</p> + +<p> +It was also possible to bypass the copyright monitors by installing a +modified system kernel. Dan would eventually find out about the free +kernels, even entire free operating systems, that had existed around +the turn of the century. But not only were they illegal, like +debuggers—you could not install one if you had one, without +knowing your computer's root password. And neither +the FBI nor +Microsoft Support would tell you that.</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> + +<div class="columns"> +<p> +Dan concluded that he couldn't simply lend Lissa his computer. But he +couldn't refuse to help her, because he loved her. Every chance to +speak with her filled him with delight. And that she chose him to ask +for help, that could mean she loved him too.</p> + +<p> +Dan resolved the dilemma by doing something even more +unthinkable—he lent her the computer, and told her his password. +This way, if Lissa read his books, Central Licensing would think he +was reading them. It was still a crime, but the SPA would not +automatically find out about it. They would only find out if Lissa +reported him.</p> + +<p> +Of course, if the school ever found out that he had given Lissa his +own password, it would be curtains for both of them as students, +regardless of what she had used it for. School policy was that any +interference with their means of monitoring students' computer use was +grounds for disciplinary action. It didn't matter whether you did +anything harmful—the offense was making it hard for the +administrators to check on you. They assumed this meant you were +doing something else forbidden, and they did not need to know what it +was.</p> + +<p> +Students were not usually expelled for this—not directly. +Instead they were banned from the school computer systems, and would +inevitably fail all their classes.</p> + +<p> +Later, Dan would learn that this kind of university policy started +only in the 1980s, when university students in large numbers began +using computers. Previously, universities maintained a different +approach to student discipline; they punished activities that were +harmful, not those that merely raised suspicion.</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> + +<div class="columns"> +<p> +Lissa did not report Dan to the SPA. His decision to help her led to +their marriage, and also led them to question what they had been +taught about piracy as children. The couple began reading about the +history of copyright, about the Soviet Union and its restrictions on +copying, and even the original United States Constitution. They moved +to Luna, where they found others who had likewise gravitated away from +the long arm of the SPA. When the Tycho Uprising began in 2062, the +universal right to read soon became one of its central aims.</p> +</div> + +<div class="reduced-width"> +<blockquote class="announcement"> +<p><a href="http://defectivebydesign.org/ebooks.html">Join our mailing list about the dangers of e-books</a>.</p> +</blockquote> +</div> + +<div id="AuthorsNote"> +<h3>Author's Notes</h3> + +<ul class="no-bullet"> +<li> +<div class="reduced-width"> +<p>This story is supposedly a historical article that will be written in +the future by someone else, describing Dan Halbert's youth under a +repressive society shaped by the unjust forces that use “pirate” as +propaganda. So it uses the terminology of that society. +I have tried to project it forwards into something more visibly +oppressive. See <a +href="/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html#Piracy">“Piracy”</a>. +</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> +</li> + +<li> +<div class="reduced-width"> +<p>Computer-enforced restrictions on lending or reading books (and other +kinds of published works) are known as DRM, short for +“Digital Restrictions Management”. To +eliminate DRM, the Free Software Foundation has +established the <a href="http://DefectiveByDesign.org">Defective by +Design</a> campaign. We ask for your support.</p> + +<p>The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a separate organization not +related to the Free Software Foundation, also campaigns against +DRM.</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> +</li> +</ul> + +<p class="comment"> +The following note has been updated several times since the first +publication of the story.</p> + +<ul class="no-bullet"> +<li> +<div class="columns"> +<p> +The battle for the right to read is already being fought. Although it +may take 50 years for our past freedoms to fade into obscurity, most +of the specific repressive laws and practices described above have +already been proposed; some have been enacted into law in the US and +elsewhere. In the US, the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act +(DMCA) gave explicit government backing to the +computer-enforced restrictions known as DRM, by making the +distribution of programs that can break DRM a crime. The European +Union imposed similar restrictions in a 2001 copyright directive, in a +form not quite as strong.</p> + +<p> +The US campaigns to impose such rules on the rest of the world through +so-called “free trade” treaties. +<a href="https://stallman.org/business-supremacy-treaties.html"> +Business-supremacy treaties</a> is a more fitting term for them, since +they are designed to give business dominion over nominally democratic +states. The DMCA's policy of criminalizing programs that +break DRM is one of many unjust policies that these treaties impose +across a wide range of fields.</p> + +<p> +The US has imposed DMCA requirements on Australia, Panama, Colombia +and South Korea through bilateral agreements, and on countries such as +Costa Rica through another treaty, CAFTA. Obama has escalated the +campaign with two new proposed treaties, the TPP and the TTIP. The +TPP would impose the DMCA, along with many other wrongs, on 12 +countries on the Pacific Ocean. The TTIP would impose similar +strictures on Europe. All these treaties must be defeated, or +abolished.</p> + +<p> +Even the World Wide Web Consortium has fallen under the shadow of the +copyright industry; it is on the verge of approving a DRM system as an +official part of the web specifications.</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> +</li> + +<li> +<div class="table"> +<div class="table-cell left"> +<p class="emph-box"> +Nonfree software tends to have <a href="/proprietary/">abusive +features of many kinds</a>, which lead to the conclusion that +<a href="/philosophy/free-software-even-more-important.html">you can +never trust a nonfree program</a>. We must insist on free (libre) +software only, and reject nonfree programs.</p> +</div> + +<p class="table-cell right"> +With Windows Vista, Microsoft admitted it had built in a back door: +Microsoft can use it to forcibly install software +“upgrades,” even if users consider them rather to be +downgrades. It can also order all machines running Vista to refuse to +run a certain device driver. The main purpose of Vista's clampdown on +users was to impose DRM that users can't overcome. Of course, Windows +10 is no better.</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> +</li> + +<li> +<div class="columns"> +<p> +One of the ideas in the story was not proposed in reality until 2002. +This is the idea that the FBI and Microsoft will keep the +root passwords for your personal computers, and not let you have +them.</p> + +<p> +The proponents of this scheme gave early versions names such as +“trusted computing” and “Palladium”, but as +ultimately put into use, it is called “secure boot”.</p> + +<p> +What Microsoft keeps is not exactly a password in the traditional +sense; no person ever types it on a terminal. Rather, it is a +signature and encryption key that corresponds to a second key stored +in your computer. This enables Microsoft, and potentially any web +sites that cooperate with Microsoft, the ultimate control over what +the user can do on per own computer. Microsoft is likely to use that +control on behalf of the FBI when asked: it +already <a href="/proprietary/malware-microsoft.html">shows +the NSA security bugs in Windows</a> to exploit.</p> + +<p> +Secure boot can be implemented in a way that permits the user to +specify the signature key and decide what software to sign. In +practice, PCs designed for Windows 10 carry only Microsoft's key, and +whether the machine's owner can install any other system (such as +GNU/Linux) is under Microsoft's control. We call this <em>restricted +boot</em>.</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> +</li> + +<li> +<div class="columns"> +<p> +In 1997, when this story was first published, the SPA was +threatening small Internet service providers, demanding they permit +the SPA to monitor all users. Most ISPs surrendered when +threatened, because they could not afford to fight back in court. One +ISP, Community ConneXion in Oakland, California, refused the demand +and was actually sued. The SPA later dropped the suit, +but the DMCA gave it the power it sought.</p> + +<p> +The SPA, which actually stands for Software Publishers +Association, has been replaced in its police-like role by the Business +Software Alliance. The BSA is not, today, an official +police force; unofficially, it acts like one. Using methods +reminiscent of the erstwhile Soviet Union, it invites people to inform +on their coworkers and friends. A BSA terror campaign in +Argentina in 2001 made slightly veiled threats that people sharing +software would be raped in prison.</p> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> +</li> + +<li> +<div class="reduced-width"> +<p> +The university security policies described above are not imaginary. +For example, a computer at one Chicago-area university displayed this +message upon login:</p> + +<blockquote><p> +This system is for the use of authorized users only. Individuals using +this computer system without authority or in the excess of their authority +are subject to having all their activities on this system monitored and +recorded by system personnel. In the course of monitoring individuals +improperly using this system or in the course of system maintenance, the +activities of authorized user may also be monitored. Anyone using this +system expressly consents to such monitoring and is advised that if such +monitoring reveals possible evidence of illegal activity or violation of +University regulations system personnel may provide the evidence of such +monitoring to University authorities and/or law enforcement officials. +</p></blockquote> + +<p> +This is an interesting approach to the Fourth Amendment: pressure most +everyone to agree, in advance, to waive their rights under it.</p> +</div> +</li> +</ul> +<div class="column-limit"></div> +</div> + +<div id="BadNews"> +<h3>Bad News</h3> + +<p class="reduced-width"> +The battle for the right to read is going against us so far. +The enemy is organized, and we are not. +</p> + +<div class="columns"> +<p>Today's commercial +e-books <a href="/philosophy/the-danger-of-ebooks.html"> abolish +readers' traditional freedoms</a>. Amazon's e-book reader product, +which I call the “<a +href="/philosophy/why-call-it-the-swindle.html">Amazon +Swindle</a>” because it's designed to +swindle readers out of the traditional freedoms of readers of books, +is run by software with several +demonstrated <a href="/proprietary/malware-kindle-swindle.html">Orwellian +functionalities</a>. Any one of them calls for rejecting the product +completely:</p> + +<ul class="no-bullet"> +<li><p>It spies on everything the user does: it reports which book the +user is reading, and which page, and it reports when the user highlights +text, and any notes the user enters.</p></li> + +<li><p>It has DRM, which is intended to block users from +sharing copies.</p></li> + +<li><p>It has a back door with which Amazon can remotely erase any book. +In 2009, it erased thousands of copies of 1984, by George Orwell.</p></li> + +<li><p class="inline-block">In case all that isn't Orwellian enough, there is a universal +back door with which Amazon can remotely change the software, and +introduce any other form of nastiness.</p></li> +</ul> + +<p>Amazon's e-book distribution is oppressive, too. It identifies the +user and records what books the user obtains. It also requires users +to agree to an antisocial contract that they won't share copies with +others. My conscience tells me that, if I had agreed to such a +contract, the lesser evil would be to defy it and share copies anyway; +however, to be entirely good, I should not agree to it in the first +place. Therefore, I refuse to agree to such contracts, whether for +software, for e-books, for music, or for anything else.</p> + +<p class="emph-box"> +If we want to stop the bad news and create some good news, we need +to organize and fight. Subscribe to the +FSF's <a href="http://defectivebydesign.org"> Defective by Design</a> +campaign to lend a hand. You +can <a href="http://www.fsf.org/associate">join the FSF</a> to support +our work more generally. There is also a <a href="/help/help.html">list of ways +to participate in our work</a>. +</p> +</div> +</div> +<div class="column-limit"></div> +</div> + +<div id="References"> +<h3>References</h3> + +<ul> + <li>The administration's “White Paper”: Information + Infrastructure Task Force, Intellectual Property [<a + href="/philosophy/not-ipr.html">sic</a>] and the + National Information Infrastructure: The Report of the Working + Group on Intellectual Property [sic] Rights (1995).</li> + + <li><a href="http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.01/white.paper_pr.html">An + explanation of the White Paper: + The Copyright Grab</a>, Pamela Samuelson, <cite>Wired</cite>, + January 1st, 1996.</li> + + <li><a href="http://www.law.duke.edu/boylesite/sold_out.htm">Sold Out</a>, + James Boyle, <cite>New York Times</cite>, March 31, 1996.</li> + + <li><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20130508120533/http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/199611/msg00012.html">Public Data or Private Data</a>, + Dave Farber, <cite>Washington Post</cite>, November 4, 1996.</li> + + <li><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20151113122141/http://public-domain.org/">Union for the Public + Domain</a>—an organization which aims to resist and + reverse the overextension of copyright and patent powers.</li> +</ul> +</div> + +<hr class="thin" /> +<blockquote id="fsfs"><p class="big">This essay is published +in <a href="http://shop.fsf.org/product/free-software-free-society/"><cite>Free +Software, Free Society: The Selected Essays of Richard +M. Stallman</cite></a>.</p></blockquote> + +</div><!-- for id="content", starts in the include above --> +<!--#include virtual="/server/footer.html" --> +<div id="footer"> +<div class="unprintable"> + +<p>Please send general FSF & GNU inquiries to +<a href="mailto:gnu@gnu.org"><gnu@gnu.org></a>. +There are also <a href="/contact/">other ways to contact</a> +the FSF. Broken links and other corrections or suggestions can be sent +to <a href="mailto:webmasters@gnu.org"><webmasters@gnu.org></a>.</p> + +<p><!-- TRANSLATORS: Ignore the original text in this paragraph, + replace it with the translation of these two: + + We work hard and do our best to provide accurate, good quality + translations. 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