AfterDawn: News

DVD Jon goes to trial again

One of the most famous legal cases is about to go to a retrial tomorrow. The case, filed by American movie industry lobby group MPAA, against Norwegian Jon Johansen, is about a tool called DeCSS that Jon helped to develop almost five years ago when he was 15. The tool allows decrypting the copy protection mechanism found on DVD-Video discs, called CSS.

Norwegian court decided in January, 2003 that Johansen is not guilty of "breaking into computer system" as the MPAA and Norwegian police accused. The trial is now going to Norway's appeals court and it is very likely that there wont be any new arguments from neither side, but simply extending the previous trial's arguments with new witnesses, etc.



Source: Aftenposten

Written by: Petteri Pyyny @ 1 Dec 2003 16:09

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• 4 comments

• rah

  cool so they sinmply waited for him to get old enough to sue, I better take away my 6 year olds computer, the MPAA might sue her in 14 years from now for downloading/ writing something

  1.12.2003 23:38 #1

• ArvoPahvi

  
  Sick MPAA. They are like IFPI and RIAA.
  
  Courtshow what's have been running in Norway 5 years could definitely not start in some other European countries like France, Russia and Finland.
  
  One well known person from the ministry of justice in my country told that "Similar court case could never work here. I wonder what norwegians are doing and why"
  
  In my honest opinion norwegians have simply too close relationships to american movie- and music industry. They do what Hollywood wants. Maybe Norway is not enough independent country.
  

  2.12.2003 03:19 #2

• GrayArea

  Didn't I read that Jon just released a piece of freeware a little while ago to strip the DRM out of protected i-tunes files? I know it's a different deal but that can't be helping his case?
  
  Or perhaps I'm just confused...
  
  As far as the MPAA goes, make no mistake, they (the "entertainment" industry, or perhaps more accurately, "marketing arm of Big Brother Inc.") want to own the world, and they will if people let this crap go on unchecked.
  

  We mustn't lower ourselves to the level of those we loathe, lest we become loathsome ourselves.
  

  2.12.2003 07:57 #3

• Dela

  The MPAA and RIAA have 1 serious problem and here it is....
  
  They don't know how to move on. Technology changes all the time and they dont want to move on from albums and full dvd cases and all that. They dont realise that they cant change technology back because they want to make money. They are living in the past and would seriously want to grow up!
  

  http://www.BillLonero.com - Check out a true artists music!
  
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  2.12.2003 08:30 #4