David Touretzky: Response to MPA Threat Letter

“I write in response to your email of yesterday, in which you
allege that I am illegally providing a “circumvention device” as
defined in 17 USC 1201(a)(2). The only URL given in your complaint
was

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/

which is the address of my personal home page. I understand that
you are not objecting to my entire home page, but rather, to
certain portions of it that deal with DeCSS. However, you neglected
to specify the files that you object to. If you visit my “Gallery
of CSS Descramblers” at

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/DeCSS/Gallery

you will find the DeCSS code in several dozen forms. The C source
code is there, naturally. But the same ideas are also expressed in
many other forms….”

“I would like to know if it is the intent of the MPA to exert
editorial control over scholarly publications by computer science
faculty that deal with DeCSS, and if so, exactly which sort of
publications will the MPA permit in the future, and which sort will
result in legal threats such as your letter of yesterday.”

Complete
Story