Digital Citizen

Background

When you install or first run a Microsoft operating system, the computer wants to communicate with a server at Microsoft to learn if it is a legally obtained copy or not. If the OS isn’t deemed legal by Microsoft’s server, or if there’s no response from Microsoft’s server, the OS will run with what is described as “reduced functionality” by one Microsoft representative. This is also known as a form of DRM (digital restrictions management); the proprietor gets to determine how legally obtained software will operate even after it has been obtained. Some proprietors, like Apple, use the power of DRM software to change the terms of the deal after a sale is made. The only way to implement DRM is with proprietary software. After all, if the software respected a user’s freedoms to share and modify the program, someone would distribute their version with the DRM parts ripped out. Only proprietors like DRM. Paraphrasing Cory Doctorow of Boing Boing, nobody wakes up and wishes they could do less with their computer than they expected to do when they bought it.

What just happened

Today Microsoft Windows XP and Vista users received an unpleasant education in the power of proprietary software and DRM.

Boing Boing has the scoop: Microsoft’s DRM server died.

The result: users of legitimate Microsoft Windows XP and Vista are being told their installations are counterfeit and denied the full use of the software. Only the proprietor (Microsoft, in this case) can restore the full functionality of the software.

On the Microsoft forums “Doug in Singapore” says Microsoft’s response is:

Thank you for your response.

I’m sorry to inform you that the Windows Genuine server might be down for few days. I have escalate the issue to our Genuine team, kindly try to validate again on Tuesday 28 Aug 2007.

Thank you for contacting Microsoft Technical Support.

One of the more hilarious responses comes from “ARGlen” (apparently a Windows Vista user) who writes

I was contemplating going back to XP and this may just be the straw that does it.

Yeah, that’ll show ‘em who’s boss.

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Champaign County Illinois, USA uses a pair of ES&S machines to prepare and count (plus physically store) the ballots. Use of the ballot preparation machine is optional—one can fill in the bubbles manually with a pen or pencil. This first machine can also (at the voter’s option) scan a completed ballot and report to the voter how it read the ballot, informing the voter of their vote as well as any mistakes such as voting for too many or too few candidates in a race. But all voters must feed their voter-verified paper ballot into the counting+storage machine. I despise the use of the counting machine.

I also despise that both of these machines run on proprietary software; citizens in Urbana, Illinois are fighting for instant runoff voting (IRV) for local elections. You should help them in their fight. IRV requires voters to rank the candidates instead of voting for one candidate; if the voter’s first choice doesn’t win, the vote rolls over to the second choice, and on down the line. With IRV, voters don’t need to fear that they’re “throwing their vote away” on an unpopular candidate who supports their political goals. IRV is a great step to increasing participation in elections both for broadening the candidate pool and encouraging voting.

Unfortunately there are dark clouds in the forecast: If Urbana and Champaign County stick with computer vote counting, they’ll have to convince the proprietor (ES&S) to change the vote-counting software to work with instant runoff voting. This is one reason I endorse the use of free software, software that respects a user’s freedom to run, share, and modify programs. Urbana ought to have the freedom to get whomever they want to alter the software to support IRV. Urbana can pay to send their modified software through the government-required approval process and then use the software in citywide elections.

The silver lining in this cloud is the Champaign County Clerk, Mark Shelden: When I was part of the recommendation committee that evaluated electronic voting machines for Champaign County, I discussed this issue with Mark Shelden and he agrees that a free software voting machine is preferable. Free software voting systems also mean jobs for our community: Champaign County could become a hub of voting software development. We didn’t have any such machines to choose from back then, and ES&S was not interested in selling us a license to their software under a free software license. But as more people evaluate voting machines and find serious problems with them, I think this position will change.

Save some room for Apple, whose behavior would be as objectionable as Microsoft if Apple had the clout Microsoft does. Apple distributes proprietary software, thus denying its users software freedom. Apple’s proprietary word processor doesn’t support OpenDocument (ODF), a file format for electronic office documents which is fully published and available for any developer to implement in any program they wish. ODF is quite unlike the formats used with Microsoft Office programs which are ill-documented and changing from time to time to throw off compatible alternatives (better known as competition). ODF will help you keep your documents readable long after you stop using whatever office programs you use now. In 5 years, you’ll be glad you can still read the old files. Imagine how necessary this is for governments which retain documents for hundreds of years. We don’t know what the complexities come with that requirement, but it’s a safe bet that relying on software nobody will run is unwise.

There’s a petition to get Apple to make their programs read and write ODF documents in their proprietary office suite. Apple has already added code to work with Microsoft’s alternative office format—Microsoft Office Open XML—a format which is considerably younger than ODF, seen less use than ODF in the real world, and has considerable technical problems (including needlessly reinventing the wheel instead of relying on standards for math and scalable graphics, Microsoft wants programmers to follow their unique path to embedding math and scalable graphics; why be compatible with other programs when one can do what Microsoft wants?). Microsoft is currently pressuring governments foreign and domestic to adopt Microsoft OOXML as a viable means of storing documents electronically.

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There were [...] sixteen Democrats in the Senate, forty-one Democrats in the House — this could not have been passed without the Democrats. And so, in essence, this congress is very — there’s very little difference between this congress and the congress that gave Bush the PATRIOT Act without reading it, gave Bush the authorization for the Iraq war, gave Bush the Military Commissions Act. They have rolled over consistently, and they even rolled over on the Iraq spending bill after Bush vetoed it [...]

Prof. Marjorie Cohn, Thomas Jefferson School of Law, president of the National Lawyers Guild, and author of “Cowboy Republic: Six Ways the Bush Gang Has Defied the Law” on Democracy Now! (transcript, video, audio)

Prof. Cohn also said that “the violation of FISA [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] is a felony. And each violation can result in five years in prison.” and Pres. Bush’s domestic spying was in violation of FISA, “So the Bush administration has been breaking the law, has been committing crimes.”. With the new law the Democrats “have not only legalized what Bush was doing before, but I think it’s highly unlikely that the Bush administration officials will be brought to justice for the felonies that they have been committing since 2001″.

How many Leftists will remember this come election time?