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Remember 321
By Robert Boyd – San Jose, California

A great injustice has been done to the people of the United States, to a certain software company, and to the historical meaning of  intellectual property protection. By now, anyone who has even the remotest interest in the matter of copyright protection on the one hand, and the right of the individual to make backup copies of DVD movies he or she  legitimately purchased, on the other hand, knows that our ultra-conservative courts of law have ruled against the American consumer and against the leader in the development of software which makes it possible to make such copies.

That software firm, 321 Studios of St. Louis, Missouri, took on the powerful movie and recording industries in a quixotic effort to provide a legitimate product and service, but ended nearly bankrupt.

So why am I re-hashing this issue? I feel strongly that it needs to be revisited, the sooner the better, and any serious, responsible, civic-minded citizen should not rest simply because the matter seems to have gone down to defeat for the moment.

I wish I could have somehow impressed upon those self-righteous justices the vast imbalance in the scales whereon this issue was adjudicated. Consider for just a moment: whenever you see an ad for a DVD version of a movie, you’re encouraged to ‘OWN’ that movie. ‘Own your copy now!’ You’re told that by purchasing the DVD, you will possess it for life.

On the one hand, we’re told that if we lay our money down (whereby the various industries reap indecently vast profits), it will be ours to own and to keep. But as soon as you decide to treat it as if it were, indeed, your personal possession, you find out all too quickly that you paid all that money for the privilege of viewing the movie. That’s all! Just the privilege of watching it on your home DVD player.

You may NOT protect your investment by making a back-up copy in case it should ever become damaged or unusable. And unlike anything else you acquire by purchase, you may NOT, should you decide that you are no longer interested in viewing it, sell it or even GIVE IT AWAY to someone else!

The last time I bought a hard cover book (fully protected by copyright), I found I no longer had any use for it after about six months and I donated it to my Public Radio Station for their book and record sale. If I’d so desired, I might have tried to sell it to some one else – they do that sort of thing all the time on eBay, and there was a time when you actually give the book to a friend or relative. (I can’t count the number of Stephen King books that I passed along to a loving aunt).

Consider this
My argument, then, is that it should be considered false advertisement to offer a DVD movie ‘for sale’, and especially to use the word ‘own’ in the sales pitch!

But now consider this unforseen aspect of this story.

My copy of 321 Studio’s DVD-X-Copy does a lot more than just copy DVDs. Of special interest is its ability to restore a damaged DVD. I bought a DVD performance of an opera presented at La Scala in Milan, Italy. The DVD had a defect which caused it to stop dead in its tracks about five minutes into Act III. The seller replaced it, but the replacement copy suffered from a similar defect – the only difference was that it stopped about eight minutes into Act III.

I bought a product at my computer store which claimed to fix scratches or other imperfections on DVDs and CDs. It didn?t work, but I was unable to get m money back. So, one day I happened to notice that my DVD-X-Copy included a software application called ‘DVD-X-Restore’. Having nothing to lose, I gave it a try, and it worked beautifully!

But because of the judicial rulings in this matter, 321 Studios can no longer offer support for their products to American Citizens. That presents a real problem, because in the make up of their software, they inserted some sort of protective device whereby you must contact them if you ever have need to install the software more than three times.

Guess what! Last November, I bought a Compaq P.C., paying over $750.00 for it, in order to have a serviceable unit for working with multi-media projects. The Compaq turned out to be a piece of junk (or perhaps the Windows XP operating system was the culprit – I’ll never know for sure), but within two weeks, it crashed and I was unable to use the latest high tech ‘Restore’ capabilities built into it. I returned it for a full refund and stepped up to a $1,050.00 Hewlett Packard Pavilion. The Pavilion has given me nothing but problems since day one! The Hewlett Packard people have had to send me restoration disks on two separate occasions (in addition to the ones I originally created when I first brought it home).

Do you see it coming?

I’ve now installed my DVD-X-Copy software three times on computers that crashed. In order to re-install the software for which I paid handsomely (DVD-X-Copy was not cheap!), I need to obtain a new a activation code from 321 Studios. Guess what!!

This entire issue is ludicrous
321 Studios no longer maintains a web site presence, except for their overseas customers (for them, DVD-X-Copy is still legal!!!). If I’d like to use my copy of DVD-X-Restore, I’ll have to figure out some way to purchase it separately and hope that I’m able to acquire an activation code somehow.

Nonetheless, I feel certain that this entire issue is ludicrous and that one day in the not too distant future, those stalwart representatives of the American people will find some way to extract their heads from  — well, from where they shouldn’t be – and will get back to the business of protecting the consumers and honest, law-abiding citizens of this great country.

Certain Congressional denizens have begun to realize their errors, made in haste before they know very much (if anything at all) about the world of high tech.

So, I stand to raise my voice (figuratively speaking) with the hope that by doing so I’ll help to keep the matter alive and in the public eye. I ask you to do the same – if not on this specific issue, then on any issue dear to your heart. ‘Remember the Maine! ? or, perhaps ‘Remember Pearl Harbor!’ or perhaps even closer in time: ‘Remember 9-11!’ These were all rallying cries to alert a sleeping populace to an immediate danger.

I say: ‘Remember that you cannot OWN a DVD movie!’

When was the last time you had to sign a licensing agreement before they’d allow you to buy a book or a magazine? And I don’t recall ever being forced to accept Terms or Conditions before being allowed to go shopping at the mall. Nor did I have to divulge my name address, telephone number, and other personal data before being permitted to spend my money at a record store, a book store, a computer store, or other place of business.-

Doesn’t it somehow seem perverse that before I can browse through certain web sites that I have to ‘join’ or ‘register’ or agree to accept their ‘Privacy Policy’? And yet, without even a hint, they can load your computer full of ‘cookies’, effectively invading your privacy, burglarizing your home!

Those scales of justice, at the immediate moment, are heavily weighted  in favor of the avaricious, money grabbing blood-suckers. But have no fear, Mr. Gates will not always hold unanswerable sway over the access to your Personal Computer. The tables will turn, the scales will tilt the other way.

Thank you for listening (so to speak). Let’s hope that, indeed, God sees fit to bless America and her children.

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UPDATE:- See former 321 president Bob Moore’s response to Boyd’s article here.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 11th, 2004 at 2:35 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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