Category: Civil Rights

Announcing ObscuraCam v1 – Enhance Your Visual Privacy! | The Guardian Project

The app that I have been working on with folks from WITNESS and The Guardian Project has been announced!

Announcing ObscuraCam v1 – Enhance Your Visual Privacy! | The Guardian Project.

Obscura Cam now in the Android market!

I am happy to report that the app I have been working on in collaboration with Witness and the Guardian Project is now available in the Android Market.

The app, Obscura Cam is the outcome of the first phase of our
Secure Smart Cam project to create smart phone camera software which allows for greater privacy and security in the capturing and sharing of media.

Of course, it is all open source

Free Chris

evilutionary virtual log >> Blog Archive >> Free Chris
Webmaster of NTFU thrown in jail on obscenity charges after opening his adult site up to soldiers in Iraq to post pictures.

From the post:
Chris Wilson, of Lakeland Florida, is the webmaster of NTFU, a user forum created in June of 2004 where people could post pictures of their wives or girlfriends nude. It recieved some national attention for the “G.I. Jane” controversy, but most recently for images of corpses in Iraq.
Chris granted interviews to dozens of news agencies and websites about this issue. He expressed his opinion on the morality of posting these images, and pornography in general. This sparked some major controversy with islamic groups, and anti pornography groups.
On October 7th, 2005, Polk County Sheriff officers raided his home and seized computer equipment and other files, including 20 films and 80 photos, and arrested him on 300 counts of obscenity charges. He is currently being held on $101,000 bail.

stay free, article roundup

Stay Free! Daily: This Month in New York City Critical Mass OR How Much Does It Cost the City to Run One of Those Police Copters All Night? – Story of what Critical Mass has become. Bikers vs. Police. Messed up!

Stay Free! Daily: Sucking on the tit of McDonald’s – McD’s, marketing to kids? I wouldn’t say that this image is evidence but there is no doubt.

Stay Free! Daily: Hiking through Manhattan – The highline!

Stay Free! Daily: Radio Free Clear Channel – Clear Channel doing pirate radio. Quick someone get the FCC on them.

Stay Free! Daily: How did Mad Hot Ballroom survive the copyright cartel? – I have always had issue with this. You can video tape a public space with visual private property in that space, but you can not have the sounds of that space if it includes music. Documentaries are greatly suffering because of this.

decrypt iTunes and iPod music / unprotect AAC files

m4a)” href=”http://www.hymn-project.org/”>hymn — decrypt iTunes and iPod music / unprotect AAC files
(m4p –> m4a)

  • To decrypt your iTunes protected AAC files so that they can be played on operating systems for which no official version of iTunes exists, such as Linux.
  • To use non-Apple AAC-capable hardware to play your music.
  • To eliminate the five computer limit imposed by iTunes.
  • To make archival backups of your music.
  • As the first step in converting your music from protected AAC to MP3, Ogg, or your other favorite audio file format, for use with your non-iPod portable audio player.
  • To demonstrate your belief in the principles of fair-use under copyright law.

    • The Betamax case of the digital age

    Wired News: File Sharing Goes to High Court
    I have my fingers crossed on this one. If these file-sharing services can be held responsible for the actions of their users, what does that mean for any company developing software that allows people to connect via public networks? What about ISP’s and common-carrier laws? What about FTP, IM, Email and so on?
    The devil in this one may be that the media companies will renew vigor in lobbying congress for legislation like the INDUCE act.

    Hillary support’s The INDUCE Act

    I was dismayed to learn that Senator Hillary Clinton has come out and in fact co-sponsored Senator Hatch’s Induce Act. What follows is a draft of a letter that I am writing to Sen. Clinton to express my concern. I hope that others will do the same.

    Here is some background material:
    http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:S.2560:
    http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,64315,00.html
    http://techlawadvisor.com/induce/
    http://www.corante.com/importance/archives/004563.html
    http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20040618-3906.html
    http://www.futureofmusic.org/articles/INDUCEanalysis.cfm
    http://action.eff.org/site/pp.asp?c=esJNJ5OWF&b=164928

    Like your iPod, read this:
    http://www.eff.org/IP/Apple_Complaint.php

    Please comment on the letter as you see fit.

    Dear Senator Clinton,

    I was dismayed to learn that you have come out in support of Senator Hatch’s Induce Act. I hope that on further consideration of the issues that this bill covers that you change your stance to better reflect the opinions of your constituents and for the betterment of our society.

    The Induce act as it currently is written does much to stifle free-speech, artistic and fair uses of media. Imposing legal responsibility on the makers of devices and software for illegal use such device or software will create a burden so great on manufacturers and creators of such programs that they will not develop or offer products that have potential for misuse.

    I fear that by trying to curb the theft of copyrighted material you will instead be curbing the ability for individuals and groups with legitimate uses for the technology that enables such to use it. Being thoroughly immersed in an academic and artistic atmosphere, I am witness every day to fair uses of technology that would not exist today were such a law in existence. In fact I feel that the software that I am using to write this letter would not have been developed simply because it includes the ability to cut and paste text from any source into the document.

    I believe that should this Bill become law that it will undo much of the progress of free-speech and alternative media creation that has been enabled by the internet, personal electronic devices, computers, tape recorders and so on. Furthermore it will be a giant step backwards and lead to increased power by the media and further relegate citizens to the role of consumer without a voice.

    I hope that you will reconsider your position on this matter.

    Thank you for your time.

    Sincerely,
    Shawn Van Every