Whoa! Watch the bandwagon.

You may or may not be aware of some legal nonsense going on in the States whereby the AACS-LA has decided that even putting up a particular 128 bit hexadecimal integer on your website which so happens to be the same as one of their randomly chosen HD-DVD encryption keys is illegal. Their premise? They claim that the DMCA makes it illegal for anyone to reproduce this number without their permission, which they won't give, because it can be used to circumvent the DRM. But there's a good reason for having this number, not least of which is that it's a number so how the hell can you claim ownership of it? That's like me saying zero belongs to me and anyone wanting to use it must pay me a royalty. Such a claim would be treated with the disdain it so richly deserves so why one earth is anyone in the legal profession even entertaining this idiotic notion? Well, OK, the AACS-LA lawyers are no doubt getting paid a very large sum of money so I'm sure for enough cash they will entertain all manner of stupid ideas, but beyond that, why?

But there's more. The AACS-LA say that this particular number is just one of many encryption keys and thus it owns the rights to a whole bunch of other numbers (the quantity of value was unspecified I believe) and using them would be naughty too. They haven't just said this in a statement; they are making this claim in a lawsuit against websites which have published the number at the heart of all this silliness.

Enter Ed Felten, a professor at Princeton. He has come up with a genius idea which allows everyone to own an integer and if his system issues 2^128 numbers then we could, based on the AACS-LA premise, sue them for using our numbers. My number is

79 6E E4 46 10 72 DF 11 1F 55 E4 2C 0C 63 8D 0A

so keep your greasy mitss off it or I'll sue!!

There is a serious side to all this - Felten is pointing out the absurdity of someone claiming to own a number. The reason why this is such a big deal is that the number in question is a key which allows the DRM on HD-DVD discs to be circumvented. You might think "Well people shouldn't be trying to make illegal copies or be buying pirates so what's the problem?" but unless you circumvent the DRM these discs often will not play on a standard PC. If you own a legitimately bought disc then it is no business of the copyright owner as to what device you use to view it and so they have no business blocking your usage of the disc in a PC.

Sadly, the American legal system appears to be so weighted in favour of the utter paranoia employed by corporations in order to protect their interests (read: cash cows) that there's a chance they might actually win this nonsensical argument. So, sicne there's not really a lot we can do about it, I think everyone should get their own number (or maybe a few) from Felten's kindly provided system and then maybe set an example by licensing it with a Creative Commons Sharealike License which means you grant anyone and evryone the right to use your number(s), as this chap has.

The number above is mine, all mine, but the following numbers:

8C BC 03 EA 37 95 33 F3 7E DB 93 85 D3 E4 8F C4
24 CA FB 2A CE 25 15 E5 21 1A CE 56 B0 80 69 F9
5F 58 D1 4F 47 C1 A0 1F B7 88 A8 15 B4 77 8D 70
15 53 D2 0D 8E 12 28 4E 48 01 83 0C 56 69 19 CC

You can do what you like with under the CCSA license. Have a ball.