DRM for batteries

[Jon Callas]

On Jan 6, 2008, at 9:09 AM, Steven M. Bellovin wrote:

> On Sat, 5 Jan 2008 15:28:50 -0800
> Stephan Somogyi <cryptography at lt.gross.net> wrote:
>
>> At 16:38 +1300 04.01.2008, Peter Gutmann wrote:
>>
>>> At $1.40 each (at least in sub-1K quantities) you wonder whether
>>> it's costing them more to add the DRM (spread over all battery
>>> sales) than any marginal gain in preventing use of third-party
>>> batteries by a small subset of users.
>>
>> I don't think I agree with the "DRM for batteries" characterization.
>> It's not my data in that battery that they're preventing me from
>> getting at.
>
> Correct.  In a similar case, Lexmark sued a maker of print cartridges
> under the DMCA.  Lexmark lost in the Court of Appeals and the Supreme
> Court declined to hear the case.  See
> http://www.eff.org/cases/lexmark-v-static-control-case-archive and
> http://www.scc-inc.com/SccVsLexmark/
>

Also remember that there is a specific exemption in the DMCA for  
reverse engineering for the purpose of making compatible equipment.  
It is there precisely to protect people like the printer cartridge  
folks. That's why they lost.

Going back to the '60s, there was the Ampex case, where they made  
compatible tape drives for IBM mainframes. IBM sued, and lost in the  
Supreme Court. This is what gave us the plug-compatible peripheral  
biz. My memories of this say that some judge or other said that  
copyright is not intended to give a monopoly.

That doesn't mean that other companies can't pull crap and try to sue  
competition away. But they're wrong, and the effect may help the  
little guy, because by now, the big guys ought to be able to pay for  
lawyers smart enough to know the precedent.

	Jon

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