Protests Continue Over DMCA Charges
against Russian Programmer
Some 100 artists, software programmers, and free-speech activists marched July 30 in San Francisco to protest the ongoing detention without bond of Russian programmer Dmitry Sklyarov for allegedly violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The demonstration came a week after like-minded members of the New York Linux Users Group leafleted passersby outside the New York Public Library. Protests are also being scheduled in August for cities ranging from Raleigh to Seattle, encouraged by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which unsuccessfully negotiated July 27 with the Justice Department to drop charges against Sklyarov.
The San Francisco marchers carried a “Free Dmitry” banner and placards proclaiming, “Reading is a Right, not a Feature”—a reference to the software Sklyyarov helped develop that cracks Adobe’s eBook encryption. DMCA is “poisoning the atmosphere for the exchange of free ideas,” protestor and novelist Philippe Tapon told Reuters July 30.
That same day, U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) applauded Skylarov’s arrest as proof that the DMCA “is starting to bear fruit.” The Senate budget includes $10 million for copyright prosecutions, which would be a $6 million hike and would fund 155 agents and attorneys, 80 more than in FY 2001, according to the July 28 Wired.com.
Posted August 6, 2001.
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