EU Law Could Make VLC Illegal

ZhengHe · Dec 8, 2005

As quoted from videolan.org

The battle is not over...

During the night of 22nd to 23rd December 2005, while everybody is preparing for Christmas, the French Parliament will rule about the "DADVSI" law. This vote will be made with minimal discussion, as an "emergency" has been declared on this law.

This law is the French transcription of the european EUCD (European Union Copyright Directive) text, which itself comes from the american DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act).
The main goal of this law is to restrict the rights of digital content purchasers. It most notably forbids them from working around technical content protection measures.
Doing so, writing or publishing software allowing to do so, or even merely talking about ways to do so becomes an offence that can be punished with three years in jail.

VideoLAN is directly impacted, most notably for its DVD reading capability (all Linux DVD reading software has the same problem). Should this law be passed, this would seriously hinder VLC's development.

The french website http://eucd.info/index.php?English-readers collects a large number of related articles and documentation, and has a dedicated english-speaking section.

Wacked, just plain wacked. Stuff like this makes me sick.

Shows the power and prowess of the French government under the EU doesn't it?

Maybe its the same reason they couldn't get their constitution passed,

and you know it won't stop at France. No, it'll go all the way to the European Commision with no trouble at all, and then we'll all be screwed

.

jmh547 · Dec 9, 2005

i understand that i is wrong to "steal" songs and movies and stuff. but i see why ppl do it when they see the "poor" sing / actors buying $4 million diamond ring (yes j-lo i am talking about you) and $850000 watch (puffy you da man). i guess ppl look at it like these ppl have enough money already.... ehh whatever my school provids napster for free.

mdameron · Dec 9, 2005

Wow, suprised theres less ****ed off people in here... VLC is a very popular app here. Wonder how long till that comes to the states too... what a crappy law.

ZhengHe · Dec 9, 2005

jmh547 said:
i understand that i is wrong to "steal" songs and movies and stuff. but i see why ppl do it when they see the "poor" sing / actors buying $4 million diamond ring (yes j-lo i am talking about you) and $850000 watch (puffy you da man). i guess ppl look at it like these ppl have enough money already.... ehh whatever my school provids napster for free.

Uhh, I'm confused. How does this relate?

mdameron said:
Wow, suprised theres less ****ed off people in here... VLC is a very popular app here. Wonder how long till that comes to the states too... what a crappy law.

Hopefully never again, though we have been through this before via the DMCA; and I thought we were the only ones with dumb internet laws. Guess I was wrong.

The thought of a country like France, so powerful in the commission actually agreeing to and passing this. It makes me sick. It will siginificantly curtail the OSI in France assuming it gets through and there's a fair chance of that given when its being voted on and even given the opposition.

jmh547 · Dec 9, 2005

sorry i was just ranting

ZhengHe · Dec 13, 2005

Oh, ok, no problem. Btw, does anyone have an actual transcript of the proposed law translated into English, because I'm having a hard time finding it? They seem to all be French.

More info on DADVSI: Here and Here

dicecca112 · Dec 13, 2005

use http://babelfish.altavista.com/ to translate the french to english, won't be perfect but you'll get the gist

ZhengHe · Dec 15, 2005

Fair enough, though I'm surprised that no one has bothered to professionally translate it. Would seem to be an important enough law to merit such a translation by the international community.

-maddog- · Dec 16, 2005

ADO link in sig.

EU Law Could Make VLC Illegal

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