It's somehow comforting to know that it's not only US law on internet matters that goes wonky. I posted on the asinine DOPA legislation this morning; in France, the government asked their constitutional council for a ruling on a law, and ended up with some very messy results - it looks like any open source reverse engineering of DRM is now criminal, with rather hefty penalties:

France's Constitutional Council has made a stringent new copyright law even harsher, modifying three articles of the law and striking out a fourth in a review of its constitutionality. The changes mean that unauthorized sharing of copyright files such as music tracks will become a criminal offense, while those who reverse-engineer DRM (digital rights management) systems in order to develop interoperable software will face six months in prison and a fine of $36,000.

This got discussed on today's (July 28, 2006) CNet Buzz Out Loud podcast, and they were asking the audience if this was as bad as it sounds. The ComputerWorld report sounds pretty bad - is it really as big a mess as it looks like?

Technorati Tags: DRM, music