Simons,B . "To DVD or Not to DVD" Communications of the ACM [0001-0782] 42.5 (1999). 31-.

 

This article outlines the tremendous obstacle presented to users of technology by the content-owning industry. Although the article is fairly short in length, it outlines the challenges posed by the DMCA and the entertainment lobby in general. It outlines the fallout from the release of DeCSS, the controversial program that allows users to break content encryption on DVDs. While DeCSS certainly has illegal uses, its released proved to be a boon to the open source community, as it allowed DVDs to be played on Linux.

Because of the decentralized nature of the open source movement uses of technology that require strict licenses is necessarily limited as there is no governing body to obtain and regulate use of licenses. This is especially true with licenses that prohibit disclosure of the underlying technology, as does the license from the DVD Copy Control Association. As a result of this, the extremely aggressive legal tactics of the content-owning industry pose a potential threat to the ability to choose what computer software to use, although it is interesting to note that it’s not clear that they have actually posed any hindrance to the open source movement.