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Law makers don't care (or for the most part, don't know) about details. They're not about to tell you HOW to do it, you're just damn lucky they said OK to passing the law. The original law slid through back in the days when there wasn't much in the way of copy protection; not the huge increase in home recorders - AND it was mostly designed whith the thought of floppies in mind (probably why there wasn't much opposition).
Right now, though, if you use a Lite-On drive along with CDClone, you can copy about 99.99% of all the CD's floating around. So you can still exercize your rights under the law.
As for the new copy protection schemes they'll be circumvented just as all have to date - If a CD has to be read by a CD drive to gather the data, then you should be able to do a work around on the protection scheme. For instance, one new scheme is easily defeated by simply blackening out the outside quarter inch of the CD with a felt tip pen - then any recorder can copy the contents per his/her legal rights.
I'm not a fanatic about copying disks; I don't do the swapping MP3 file thing on the internet, nor download the latest movies before they even hit the theaters; BUT, I am concerned about WE THE PEOPLE being pushed around by some of these sleazy, IMHO, corporations - and M$ seems to lead the pack.
If M$ hadn't used slimey tatics to force the oems, contractually, to dictate what Operating System we're forced to use, we would have had more and much better choices than Windows by now. The added competition from others certainly would have pushed M$ to produce a better product than this bug ridden, security joke that we have today. And don't give me that shit that we can always go to Linux - I have 3 systems running on Linux right now, but what about the normal John/Jane Doe's that don't have the knowledge or time to work through Linux. Not to mention that almost all software houses received plenty of pressure to NOT produce a Linux version of necessary business and personal software. There's always Star Office, you say - get fucking REAL!!! Industry consultants have been afraid to start advising clients to switch to Star Office. Those that have started down that path have been quickly jerked back to reality by "industry" pressures. Guess who in Hell they meant by "Industry pressures".
I don't make copies to distribute to every Tom, Dick and Harry that asks for one. But I DO have the intestinal fortitude to stand up for my rights, and the rights of others, and help them excersie their rights under the law regardless of any M$ pressure - how many of you can say the same. Or better yet, how many of you have the guts to do it without caving in?
Incidently, if M$ had offered Windows at the same $17 to $26 rate per copy that the oems paid (read the court transcriptions) then who would bother running off copies ??????
Here's hoping that collectively, this group can do the right thing and help people - and I'm not talking about the wholesale distribution of illegal disks, although I can certainly see why some use this as a tool to get back at the wrongs M$ has forced on us all.
I know these thoughts are foreign to the loyal fans of M$, and to those that can't see past Windows to understand that Windows is pretty much a poor collection of loosely woven routines. With REAL competition, I repeat, today we COULD have had a better OS to work with. It could have been a better Windows or whatever brand, but that would take a real spirit of competition in action, not a monopoly in action.........
Last edited by Woogieman at Today at 6:20 am
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