13 Years After DeCSS Case, Congressional IT Endorses VLC 106
New submitter robp writes "After a link to VLC showed up in one of HBO's DMCA takedown requests, I recalled how often I've linked to VLC in my own copy, and how often I've seen that app noted across traditional-media outlets — even though you could make the same arguments against linking to it that Judge Kaplan bought in 2000. Now, though, even the House's own IT department not only links to this CSS-circumventing app but endorses it. Question is, what led to this enlightenment?"
Re:Enlightenment? Try Unawareness. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:They needed to use it. Duh. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:They needed to use it. Duh. (Score:5, Informative)
According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Dianne_Feinstein [wikipedia.org], she acquired a permit in the 70s and surrendered it in 1982.
The Federal government is not bound by the DMCA (Score:3, Informative)
TheDMCA was heald not to apply to the goverment:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2008/08/air-force-cracks-software-carpet-bombs-dmca/
Re:They needed to use it. Duh. (Score:5, Informative)
Where's the news? As soon as some politicians notice that some "illegal" tool, device, substance or whatever is useful to them, suddenly it's no longer illegal.
Technically, VLC isn't illegal. It can play all sorts of formats and by default it cannot play encrypted DVDs. Now, if you install libdvdcss, well, VLC is just reading the decrypted stream that libdvdcss provided, but that is through your actions, not VLCs or its developers.