| Tuesday, September
4, 2001
I have been sent a copy of a document from Adobe purporting
to give their side of the story. Since the document itself says it is
copyrighted with all rights reserved I decline to reproduce all of it
lest Adobe send the FBI after me. I note that the document states,
"A: Sklyarov was not arrested for
anything he said or for presenting a
scholarly paper. According to the press release issued by the U.S.
Attorney's
Office, Dmitry Sklyarov was arrested as the copyright holder of the
"Advanced
eBook Processor," a product distributed by his employer, ElcomSoft."
Of course Sklyarov is not the copyright holder, and the
information that he is the copyright holder is contained in the complaint as
information the FBI obtained from Adobe.
Also "A: Adobe did not order the arrest.
That was the decision of the U.S.
government based on the information gathered in its investigation.
Q: Why was a criminal (vs. civil) action pursued?
A: The U.S. government decided to pursue a criminal complaint based on
its
judgment that ElcomSoft's activities violated U.S. law. Despite Adobe's
efforts to get ElcomSoft to cease and desist the for-profit sale of these
tools, ElcomSoft did not, so Adobe forwarded the information to the U.S.
government.
Once again I note that the only information on this case
came from Adobe to the FBI; that every account I have seen says that
"only a handful" of copies of the Elcomsoft program were sold; and
that this is a damage control document. Adobe also states
that the entire intellectual property community supports its position. It
then cites mostly publishers, including, surprise, the RIAA. It does not
cite PEN or any author association as being in support of the Adobe
position in this matter. Note also that the ebook
reader is only available for desktop computers and if you buy an ebook in
Adobe format you can't read it on a hand held. Well, actually, you can, if
you know how to get the Elcomsoft program (which only works if you have
the password to the ebook). I am told that it's not hard to find a copy of
the Elcomsoft program for free even though very few were ever sold. If
I get a URL to their document I will cite it, but I am not going to chance
publishing the whole thing given the copyright notice. 
The
LA Opera has its opening gala tonight, Queen of Spades. Tchaikovsky opera
success is measured by how many of those attending commit suicide after the
ending... I hate not having Ricochet. I hate it. I hate it. And
it is slower here than in San Diego on a dialup connection. I just hate this.
Earthlink seems very slow today. Everything is slow. I
hate it. Apparently Earthlink and everyone else are in a
conspiracy: I can't even download large web pages. Something times out. About
half the time I can't even see the BYTE site. I guess I am going to have to
try some other service, but what? I hate this. HP
buys Compaq. This may be interesting. HP has some good engineering. They also
have residuals of their old marketing team which sold products by the
philosophy of "if you don't know how good our stuff is already, you don't
deserve to have any. Grovel and beg and maybe we will tell you, but probably
not." Compaq has a more aggressive marketing style. Their
engineering has been Good Enough for me. I like the company as it is...
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