Backup Brain Rants

March 22, 2002

Senator Dianne Feinstein
United States Senate
331 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510

Dear Senator Feinstein,

In the past, I have been proud to count myself among your supporters, voting for you in all three of your runs for the Senate. Unfortunately, because you are one of the co-sponsors of the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act, I must reluctantly withdraw that support. This bill is ill-conceived and will ultimately fail in its foolhardy attempt to legislate technological progress. The history of copy protection schemes in the digital age, even when dressed up and spun as "digital rights management," is that they are easily circumvented. True pirates, motivated by greed, will always be able to crack any copy protection scheme, because it is impossible to implement a copy protection regime that is strong enough to completely lock down a digital copy without making it too difficult for the average consumer to use. The CBDTPA would serve only to inconvenience the honest buyer of digital media, and will do nothing to prevent the sort of piracy that is rampant in places like China.

The CBDTPA purports to promote the spread of broadband Internet service, digital television products, and digital content. It will fail, because imposing security measures at every link in the digital chain will inevitably degrade performance, impair the usability of digital devices, and inconvenience consumers. I often convert a CD that I have purchased to MP3 so that I may listen to its content in my car, while working at my computer in my office, in my living room, or on my portable music player (the Apple iPod so derided by Disney's Eisner in his recent testimony). As I understand it, the CBDTPA would prevent me from doing so, and would label me as a thief were I to circumvent the copy protection so that I may, as I do today, use digital content that I bought and paid for on these multiple devices owned by me. Instead, in order to comply with the CBDTPA, I would need to physically transport each and every CD between locations in order to lawfully enjoy its contents. I fail to see how making the use of digital content vastly more inconvenient for the consumer promotes its adoption and use. All it does is to protect the revenue stream of the owners of digital content, by requiring sacrifice from their customers.

The approach taken by the CBDTPA assumes that Americans are inherently criminal, and will choose to steal entertainment, rather than buying it. This is wrong, and will not be tolerated by either voters or, hopefully, by the courts. It saddens me that you apparently have been swayed to think of your constituents as potential thieves, rather than the good people they are.

As a book author who has nearly half a million books in print, I understand the importance of copyright. But the changes facing the entertainment industries due to technological advancement will not be solved by a technological or legal Band-Aid. Instead, the answer will be for the entertainment industries to adapt their business models to embrace, not fight, technological change. Laws like the CBDTPA are merely protectionist attempts to maintain the status quo, and will ultimately be as useless as bailing water with a fork. I respectfully, but strongly, urge you to reconsider and withdraw your support for the CBDTPA, and to vote against it in committee and on the Senate floor, should the bill make it that far. Like many of my friends and colleagues, I will actively work to defeat any Senator or Representative who votes in favor of criminalizing honest Americans in order to protect the profits of an entertainment industry too short-sighted to embrace the future.

Regards,

Tom Negrino