US Senator Orrin Hatch Pauses On PC Destruct Button (Kinda) By Thomas C Greene in Washington Posted: 19/06/2003 at 21:55 GMT
US Senator Orrin Hatch (Republican, Utah) backed down slightly from his bizarre remarks Tuesday advocatingHacking computers belonging to copyright scofflaws.
On Wednesday Hatch posted an announcement on his Web site saying, "I made my comments at yesterday's hearing because I think that industry is not doing enough to help us find effective ways to stop people from using computers to steal copyrighted, personal or sensitive materials. I do not favor extreme remedies - unless no moderate remedies can be found. I asked the interested industries to help us find those moderate remedies."
It would appear that Hatch is in favor of first exhausting peaceful means before resorting to violence, a code of self-restraint enshrined in American political culture from the early days of union labor struggles right up to the current conflict with Iraq over weapons of mass destruction.
On Tuesday, Hatch had mused about granting the media cartel an exemption from laws discouraging the destruction of property, and said flatly that he was "all for destroying [the] machines" of file traders and software pirates. He reckoned that a few hundred- thousand such incidents would send exactly the right message to the masses.
Now he's saying that he's 'all for it' as a last resort, in case the RIAA campaign of lawsuits, home invasions and other forms of quasi- legal intimidation should have less than the desired effect.
In other developments, Senator Hatch's Web site appears to be in violation of a software license requirement related to the javascript menus he's using, the irony of which has tickled the Internet's blogging community.
In another development, a sharp-eyed Reg reader has noticed that the Mormon Senator's Web site features a link to adult content at Bignaturals.com. Load this page and find the graphical link to 'myUTAH Search.com' about halfway down on the right-hand side, for some silicone-free Utah search action.
Milonic Solutions' JavaScript code used on Hatch's website costs $900 for a site-wide license. It is free for personal or nonprofit use, which the senator likely qualifies for.
However, the software's license stipulates that the user must register the software to receive a licensing code, and provide a link in the source code to Milonic's website.
On Wednesday, the senator's site met none of Milonic's licensing terms. The site's source code (which can be seen by selecting Source under the View menu in Internet Explorer) had neither a link to Milonic's site nor a registration code.
However, by Thursday afternoon Hatch's site had been updated to contain some of the requisite copyright information. An old version of the page can be seen by viewing Google's cache of the site.
