[free-sklyarov] New stuff up on EFF

[Edmund A. Hintz]

On 10/15/01 4:07 PM, mlc67 at columbia.edu thus spake:

>No, there is (in most instances) still freedom to talk privately in the
>US. To be charged with conspiracy, you must be planning something illegal.
>For example, if X and Y make plans to murder A, then X can be charged with
>conspiracy to commit murder, even if Y actually pulls the trigger.

     Yes, but that's the whole problem with the DMCA and it's ilk: it 
moves us rapidly in the direction of creating and enforcing laws where 
*talk itself* can be a crime-for instance explaining how a circumvention 
device works. While we can currently talk freely in private or even in 
public about how to create a Molotov cocktail, DMCA style laws could make 
the actual understanding of the Molotov cocktail illegal. Once we have 
laws against Owellian thought crimes, then when X and Y discuss it, they 
are guilty of conspiring. And our much touted freedom of speech is truly 
dead, rather then floundering like a prize bass in the angler's net.


Peace,

Edmund A. Hintz              **|**     "You may say I'm a dreamer,
Mac Techie, Unix Geek,      *  |  *      But I'm not the only one...
Mac/Unix Consultant        *  /|\  *     I hope someday you'll join us,
<ed at hintz.org>              */ | \*      And the world will live as one.
'78 Westy                    *****      Imagine."
                     http://www.hintz.org