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Salvo fired across Apple’s bow by BluWiki

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

News is coming out that BluWiki is taking a rather aggressive legal stance against what it believes are “Baseless legal threats.”  In a nutshell, Apple is none too pleased with the fact that BluWiki is hosting forums that contain information on how to use your iPhone to run software that has not been approved (or has even been rejected) by Apple.  The complaint raised by Apple is another heavy handed use of the DMCA, claiming that allowing a discussion on how to use an iPhone with unapproved software is in itself violating the law.  It pains me to think, that we have really fallen this far from a free market and a free society, that anyone could even consider that talking about how to use a product you paid for in a way you want is illegal because the manufacturer doesn’t like the idea.  So back in November of 2008, a letter demanding the takedown of all content containing information on ‘hacking’ your legally purchased iPhone be taken off the site.

The interesting thing about this new report is that we are not only seeing a site claim safe harbor, based on the fact that its the users posting the information, not the site itself, but they are actually taking the stance that it is not illegal to talk about such topics at all.   As reported on Ars Technica, this is much like how it does not make you a terrorist just because you describe how to make a firecracker.  More importantly, just because you make a piece of hardware, you do not have the right to tell me I cant talk about how to use it in ways you don’t like.

The DMCA has such a broad and clumsey interpretation as to effectively make legal things illegal because you had to break the almighty encryption to do it.  Imagine if your car had a lock on the hood, and anytime you needed to add oil or do basic maintenance you had to undo a padlock to open the hood…now its perfectly legal to change your oil and service your engine, but for sues you because you broke into the engine compartment by circumventing their ‘lock’ and thats against the law.  In fact the law has been interpreted in ways so broad as to even bring into question the legality of accomplishing the same task without breaking the lock because the effect is the same.  Insanity…yes, and why havn’t you been calling your congressman about it yet?

images modified from original work by jpovey

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