[ale] Moving my phone into the 20th Century

Scott Plante splante at insightsys.com
Fri Apr 19 15:58:52 EDT 2013


These two statements were made when we discussed this back on 2/23: 





Yes, AFAIK, jailbreaking phones is still legal, but that doesn't mean 

the manufacturer has to make it easy or even possible. 




Jailbreak = getting out of chroot so you can do other things with the phone 

Unlock = Phone will only receive service on the carrier the phone is locked to 




❧ Brian Mathis 





in reply to by Charles Shapiro: 


<blockquote>



What? My understanding was that the DMCA provision affected *only unlocking* the phone, and that rooting it or installing a 3rd-party OS was still legal ( although it could theoretically expose you to civil suit). That said, my desultory research shows it _is_ illegal to jailbreak your tablet. 






http://gizmodo.com/5955130/jailbreaking-is-now-legal-for-smartphonesbut-not-tablets?tag=dmca 






Not that any of this makes sense. 






-- CHS 
</blockquote>





No one objected on-list that I can see. Does the group still accept the above as true? The installation of a third party ROM/OS should be fine with respect to the DCMA because you're just not using their software, rather than breaking the licensing protection of their software. Rooting their OS seems less clear cut to me, but perhaps it depends what you do once it's rooted. 

Scott 
----- Original Message -----

From: "Jim Kinney" <jim.kinney at gmail.com> 
To: "Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts" <ale at ale.org> 
Sent: Friday, April 19, 2013 1:56:53 PM 
Subject: Re: [ale] Moving my phone into the 20th Century 


Yes. It was not the courts that wrote the stupid rule. But the courts are generally where the designation "stupid rule" get applied :-) 




On Fri, Apr 19, 2013 at 1:10 PM, Chuck Peters < cp at axs.org > wrote: 

<blockquote>

On Fri, Apr 19, 2013 at 11:35 AM, Jim Kinney < jim.kinney at gmail.com > wrote: 



<blockquote>


And that 1 fact should be rammed down the courts throat to force a review of that ruling. 
</blockquote>



The courts didn't do this... The ineptitude of this falls on the US Congress and the DMCA law they made, and they left it up to the LIBRARIAN OF CONGRESS. 


In the article I cited, http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/01/the-most-ridiculous-law-of-2013-so-far-it-is-now-a-crime-to-unlock-your-smartphone/272552/ , under the heading WHO REALLY OWNS YOUR PHONE? 
The DMCA leaves it up to the Librarian of Congress (LOC) to issue exemptions from the law, exceptions that were recognized to be necessary given the broad language of the statute that swept a number of ordinary acts and technologies as potential DMCA circumvention violations. 


Every three years groups like the American Foundation for the Blind have to lobby Congress to protect an exception for the blind allowing for books to be read aloud. Can you imagine a more ridiculous regulation than one that requires a lobby group for the blind to come to Capitol Hill every three years to explain that the blind still can't read books on their own and therefore need this exception? 




Chuck 
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</blockquote>



-- 
-- 
James P. Kinney III 

Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail. What you gain at one end you lose at the other. It's like feeding a dog on his own tail. It won't fatten the dog. 
- Speech 11/23/1900 Mark Twain 

http://electjimkinney.org 
http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/ 

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