Acidus wrote:
] Ok, I see what they are doing: IMs are 2 party point to point
] conversations, like phones. This raises more questions than it
] answers.
]
] -Personally I dismiss an IM conversation is like a telephone
] call. Its more like sending telegrams to each other. I wonder
] how consent applies to telegrams: Is it illegal to keep a copy
] of a telegram without 2 part consent? Or is the very natural
] of sending someone a message as a block a consent to store a
] copy?
]
] -I argue the very nature of Chatrooms and IMs are so different
] than telephone calls,
]
] ...
]
] Can the consent consent laws as written even apply to IMs and
] chatrooms?

[ This is very interesting. I tend to agree with Acidus, for many of the same reasons. I'd draw an anology with email also. Email is stored, explicitly, as part of the specification... people have conversations all the time via email, so is it more of a letter analogy or a phone conversation anlogy. The lines have begun to blur as networks speed up and become ubiquitous.

I, for one, save every single IM conversation I have. It's a setting in iChat, which I enabled, because people often IM addresses or phone numbers or URL's which I fail to record or use... sometimes I accidentally close the chat window, forgetting that there was something upscreen that i wanted to keep. At any rate, every IM i've sent, or that anyone has sent me, since i got my Mac, is stored in a folder on the hard disk, sorted by name and date. In the same way, I keep all potentially useful email, and save physical letters/correspondence that may be needed in the future. If I could get a digital text transcript of my phone conversations out of the phone, I might save those too.

Anyway, I don't expect this law to go much further, if it even holds up to appeal. -k]

Acidus wrote:
] -What about conference calls? Do you still only need 2 of the
] parties to consent? (in 2 person states, GA is 1 person).

All parties must consent. "2-party" is a euphemism.

] -How does consent factor into a chatroom, arguably the digital
] equivlent of a conference call?

I'm not sure. It ought to depend. I think an open IRC channel is a public place and you should have no expectation of privacy. However, if you have a +i channel then thats different.

] -Personally I dismiss an IM conversation is like a telephone
] call. Its more like sending telegrams to each other. I wonder
] how consent applies to telegrams:

Email is like telegrams. IM is like real time telegrams. There is no direct analogy and possibly the laws should change to reflect that.

] -I argue the very nature of Chatrooms and IMs are so different
] than telephone calls, you can't *not* violate 2 party
] consent.

I don't agree. If you are having a private chat with one person then you have an expectation of privacy, same as with a phone call.

] The consent laws basically
] say you can't "cache" this data for later, by recording the
] stream, without permission from 1 or both parties.

Not exactly. They say you can't cache the data and then disclose it (ie as evidence in a court).

] -Furthermore, the infrastructure itself causes me to violate
] the laws without even knowing it.

It is my opinion that laws ought to apply to people and their behaviors, rather then technologies and their architectures. There are cases where technologies make new behaviors possible, and in those cases we need new legislation, but simple ideas such as the notion that a private conversation is private ought to apply without respect to the technological mechanism through which the conversation takes place.

In almost all cases where it has been argued that old laws do not apply or that new laws must be created because of the technical architecture of a system, such arguements are almost always wrong and consistently employed dishonestly.

However, this simple principal, that laws apply to people and not things, is not widely understood or respected.

The copyright maximalists have successfully argued, both nationally and internationally, in the dishonest and narrowminded fashion which has become their hallmark, that copies of material made by http proxy caches or local web browser caches are copies from the perspective of copyright law, and all restrictions and royalties ought to apply.

This is bald faced attempt to squeeze revenue and control from the architecture of the system. It has absolutely no relationship to the actual behavior of *people* redistributing copyrighted material to *other people* without permission that the copyright laws are intended to regulate. And yet it persists, because our political system is more concerned with power then with right and wrong.

Wrapping things back to ground here, I would argue that the NH law ought to apply to private chat room conversations, and that cacheing and other incidental copying shouldn't fall under such a restriction. The point of the law is to protect your privacy by preventing the distribution of the material, and not the copying thereof.

] ] The consent laws basically
] ] say you can't "cache" this data for later, by recording the
] ] stream, without permission from 1 or both parties.
]
] Not exactly. They say you can't cache the data and then
] disclose it (ie as evidence in a court).

Perhaps I have a basic misunderstanding of what you can and cannot do. I was under the impression that if you and I are talking on a telephone, and we are in a 2 party consent state, unless I get your consent I can't make any recording of the conversation at all, for any reason. This includes making a recording just for me so I listen to our conversation again and again for my own enjoyment.

Is this true?

Decius wrote:
] Acidus wrote:
] ] -Furthermore, the infrastructure itself causes me to violate
] ] the laws without even knowing it.
]
] It is my opinion that laws ought to apply to people and their
] behaviors, rather then technologies and their architectures.
] There are cases where technologies make new behaviors
] possible, and in those cases we need new legislation, but
] simple ideas such as the notion that a private conversation is
] private ought to apply without respect to the technological
] mechanism through which the conversation takes place.
]
] In almost all cases where it has been argued that old laws do
] not apply or that new laws must be created because of the
] technical architecture of a system, such arguements are almost
] always wrong and consistently employed dishonestly.

There is another way to attack the problem. Explicit licensing. If IM clients understood what terms text typed in a given discussion space or chat room were licensed under, then many of these problems would start to dissolve. Or at the very least, could be approached in a different way.

You gave the example of +i on an IRC channel indicating that its more private. I'm of the opinion that they type of social cues are what we need to foster the development of to attack these particular set of problems.

In certain venues, you know its acceptable to record, such as when a public official is speaking. In other venues, you know it is not acceptable to record, such as seeing a play on Broadway or a Rolling Stones concert. Other areas, are very grey, like open mic night at your local coffee house. The only way to attack the problem is through the creation of shared conventions.

The law should not address the architecture, but the architecture can address the problem in a way the law already allows. That would be the path of least resistance. In this case, recording consent law is different from place to place. IP law is the same, hence, that may be the best way to tread.

I think a way to distinguish if you are speaking with a "public" or "private" voice in regard to IM and chat rooms is a "good idea"(tm). I think it should follow the place, as opposed to the speaker.