Michael Shamos Declaration, in MPAA v. 2600

Pittsburgh, PA; June 30, 2000

Source: http://www.cryptome.org/mpaa-v-2600-dms.htm

See related files:
http://www.eff.org/IP/Video (EFF Archive)
http://cryptome.org/cryptout.htm#DVD-DeCSS (Cryptome Archive)
http://www.2600.com/dvd/docs (2600 Archive)

[7 pages]

Leon P. Gold (LG-1434)
William M. Hart (WH-1604)
PROSKAUER ROSE LLP
1585 Broadway
New York, New York 10036
(212) 969-3000 Telephone
(212) 969-2900 Facsimile

Jon A. Baumgarten (pro hac vice)
PROSKAUER ROSE LLP
1233 20th Street, N.W., Suite 800
Washington, DC 20036-2396
(202) 416-6800 Telephone
(202) 416-6899 Facsimile

Attorneys for Plaintiffs

I, MICHAEL I. SHAMOS, declare under penalty of perjury that the following is true and correct:

1. My name is Michael I. Shamos. I am a faculty member of the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University and serve as Co-Director of the Institute for eCommerce at Carnegie Mellon.  I teach courses in eCommerce Technology, Electronic Payment Systems and Internet Law and Regulation. In these courses I give lectures on compression technology and broadband networks. My resume is attached as an exhibit hereto.

2. I am also an intellectual property attorney admitted to practice before the United States Patent and Trademark Office. I was admitted to the bar in 1981 and am a partner in the Web Law Firm, the largest intellectual property practice in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. On May 18, 2000 I gave the keynote address to the American Intellectual Property Law Association's Spring Meeting entitled "Digital Property in the 21st Century."

3. I was engaged by Proskauer Rose LLP, counsel for plaintiffs in this case, to conduct certain experiments to investigate the feasibility of obtaining DVD decryption software (DeCSS), using that software to decrypt commercial DVDs, converting the decrypted videos to DivX format and transferring those DivX files between computers on local area networks.

4. In preparation for this experiment, I purchased a new laptop computer, specifically a Sony VAIO PC-XG18[?] (650 MHz) with 128 megabytes of RAM, 18 gigabytes of hard disk and a CD/DVD drive running Windows 98. I also purchased a commercial copy of the DVD of the movie "Sleepless in Seattle."

5. At all material times the Sony Computer was connected to a local area network at Carnegie Mellon University, through which Internet access was obtained. Except where noted herein, the bandwidth of the CMU network is 10 megabits per second. This network extends to faculty and student offices and dormitory rooms.

6. All of the activities described herein were performed by me personally or Carnegie Mellon staff members acting at my direction and supervision.

7. We obtained the following accessory programs from the Internet: WinZip 8.0 (for compressing and decompressing files), LeechFTP 207 (for transferring files over the Internet) and mIRC 3.71 (for engaging in Internet Relay Chat sessions).

8. We "visited" the website 2600.com and consulted the "archives" section thereof to obtain a link to a site where a copy of the DeCSS software might be found. The 2600.com page contains links to numerous web pages at which DeCSS software may be found. We followed the following link: http://home.rmci.net/bert/fuckthelawyers ("rmci").

9. The rmci link displayed a page containing a link which when clicked caused a file named DeCSS.zip to be downloaded to the Sony computer. This process took 27 seconds.

10. Using the WinZip 8.0 program, we decompressed the DeCSS.zip file into a temporary directory, which yielded the executable file DeCSS.exe and two dynamic link library (DLL) files, wnaspi32.w2k.dll and wnaspi32.w98.dll. The dynamic link library wnaspi32.w2k.dll is necessary to run DeCSS under Windows 2000.

11. We inserted the "Sleepless in Seattle" DVD into the DVD drive of the Sony computer and ran the program. This resulted in multiple .VOB files comprising decrypted video of the movie. We then removed the DVD from the DVD drive and were able to view the movie using the standard Windows Media player without further processing. This demonstrates that the DeCSS program successfully decrypted the DVD and copied it to the Sony hard drive.

12. Windows 98 imposes a limit on the length of disk files. Because decrypted DVD files are very large (greater than 5 gigabytes) we decided to do further experiments using Windows 2000 to remove the size restriction.

13. We therefore installed a "clean" Windows 2000 installation in which the hard drive was reformatted so as to leave no files remaining from the prior Windows 98 installation. We copied the file wnaspi32.w2k.dll to directory e:\winnt\system32 as wnaspi32.dll.

14. We repeated all of the above steps and ran DeCSS again. It located 10 files on the DVD, five of which had the extension .VOB. We clicked the button on the DeCSS window labeled "Merge VOB files." This resulted in a single large .VOB file. We successfully played this file using Media Player to view "Sleepless in Seattle" (in this case with one of the alternate sound tracks) without the DVD inserted in the drive.

15. We converted the .VOB file to DivX, a highly compressed video format designed so that a DVD movie can be stored on a single CD-ROM having capacity limited to 650 megabytes.

16. We followed these steps:

a. We loaded the program mIRC, visited #divx by typing /join #divx. The #divx channel topic was "visit our home page at http://fm4.org." We did so.

b. The page has a "Tutorial" section and a "Guide to Fixing Desynch." We downloaded all required programs as specified on the page.

c. We followed all specified instructions to the letter.

17. For the DeCSSed movie "Sleepless in Seattle" this procedure produced a badly desynchronized DivX file, in which the audio was not properly timed to the video. However, the #divx site contains instructions for repairing the problem.

18. We removed the opening trailer of the film to assist in the synchronization process and performed the fixes as described in the "Guide to Fixing Desynch."

19. The result of this process was a successfully synchronized copy of a DivX for the film "Sleepless in Seattle" (in this case with the standard default soundtrack).

20. To obtain a DivX of a different movie from the Internet, we went to Internet Relay Chat and joined to #divx again under the name VaioBoy. We offered to trade "Sleepless in Seattle" for other movies. "[deleted]" offered to trade with us. Here is the chat log that resulted from this session:

Session Start: Tue June 27 23:15:45 2000
Session Ident: [deleted] ([deleted])

<VaioBoy> anyone have any divxes to trade for sleepless in seattle?

<[deleted]> sure..... army of darkness, entrapment, the matrix, the rock, fight club (2cd set), the professional, cruel intentions, half-baked

<VaioBoy> oh wow

<VaioBoy> lemme see

<VaioBoy> fight club is 2 cds? Is there a 1cd rip out there?

<VaioBoy> actually the matrix sounds great

<VaioBoy> where do you want me to send sleepless?

<[deleted]> i dunno if fight club is on 1 cd.

<[deleted]> but it's 2x the quality

<[deleted]> lemme just make you an acct on my ftp.

<[deleted]> do you have an ftp?

<VaioBoy> nope, but I can upload

<VaioBoy> I don't suppose you could install serv-u?

<[deleted]> you can upload and download ;-) cause that's where the matrix is : )

<[deleted]> I have an ftp. lemme make you an acct.

<[deleted]> 1sec.

<[deleted]> do you have a static ip???

<VaioBoy> yep

<[deleted]> k

<VaioBoy> hold on, lemme switch over to that

<VaioBoy> I have two net interfaces

<VaioBoy> I'll be back on irc in just a minute

<[deleted]> just what is it?

<[deleted]> ok

<VaioBoy> 128.2.179.23

<[deleted]> k

<VaioKid> ok fixed [handle changed]

<[deleted]> k

<[deleted]> do you have ICQ?

<VaioKid> nope

<VaioKid> I hate that program :)

<[deleted]> k

<VaioKid> so where should I connect to?

<VaioKid> if you will permit 2 logins, I can upload and download simultaneously.

<VaioKid> I have enough bandwidth that there shouldn't be a problem.

<[deleted]> you're gonna have to wait a minute.

<[deleted]> I'm moving the matrix into the ftp hdd at the moment.

<VaioKid> awesome

<VaioKid> thanks man

<VaioKid> you want me to start upping now?

<[deleted]> yeah. sure

<VaioKid> ok, where do I connect to?

<[deleted]> oh sorry

<[deleted]> :)

<VaioKid> np+)

<[deleted]> 24.8.102.212:21 vaioboy / vaioboy

<VaioKid> holy shit

<VaioKid> we are getting pretty good rates

<[deleted]> yeap.

<VaioKid> thanks again man

<[deleted]> np

<VaioKid> I'll upload more if I come across anything you don't have

<[deleted]> ok

<[deleted]> I think I want to start a trading club.

<[deleted]> of just DivX's.

<VaioKid> that would be really cool

<VaioKid> I have enough bandwidth to courier things

<[deleted]> I've just ordered a 60gig hdd.

<VaioKid> how much did you pay for that?

<[deleted]> 265

<VaioKid> shit

<VaioKid> maxtor

<[deleted]> yeap

<VaioKid> I'm going to get the IBM 75

<VaioKid> just because it's 7200 RPM

<[deleted]> that's too much : )

<VaioKid> haha

<VaioKid> NEVER!

<[deleted]> 5400 is just fine

<VaioKid> well

<VaioKid> my 9gig cheetah will still smoke it

<[deleted]> I've only got 800 bucks to last me until september : )

<VaioKid> but that's ok, it's to store movies anyway.

<VaioKid> ok man

<[deleted]> that's what my 60gig is going to be for. just movies.

<VaioKid> I am going to go code for a while

<VaioKid> Thanks again

<[deleted]> ok. np

<VaioKid> msg me sometime if you want anything

<VaioKid> vaiokid/boy

<[deleted]> alright

Session Close: Tue Jun 27 23:42:21 2000

21. We thus obtained a free copy of the DivX for the film "The Matrix" by trading a copy of "Sleepless in Seattle." Using basic cable modem service (approximately 640 kilobits per second), it took about 6 hours to download the DivX. The quality of the video was substantially better than VHS tape but not quite as good as a DVD.

22. We then conducted further experiments to determine how long it would take to share the DivX of "The Matrix" with others. Using a 10 megabit LAN, the file transfer took less than 20 minutes. Using a 100 megabit LAN available at Carnegie Mellon, the transfer of the compressed DivX of "The Matrix" was accomplished in three minutes.

23. There are over 1 million Internet hosts in the .EDU domain, indicating educational institutions. Most large universities maintain 10 megabit LANs. It is therefore my conservative estimate that at least one million university students and faculty around the world presently have the capability to transfer and share DivX files of feature-length movies in less than 20 minutes. Home cable modems are widely available that support transmission at up to 10 megabits per second.

24. Nortel Networks offers transmission technology that achieves bandwidth exceeding 1 megabit per second to the home over ordinary AC power lines.

25. Internet 2 is designed to run at 1 gigabit per second. It is currently deployed at several universities. At that speed it would take less than a minute to download a two-hour DivX file. An entire uncompressed DeCSSed DVD could be transferred in less than 10 minutes.

26. At a recent Gigabit Ethernet conference, discussion was held of a standard for a 10-gigabit transmission. At that bandwidth an entire DivX movie could be transmitted in a few seconds.

27. It is my opinion that using the DeCSS utility obtained through links from defendant Corely's website, 2600.com, it would be straightforward for a knowledgeable user of the Internet to produce his own hard drive a [sic] permanent unencrypted versions of protected movie DVDs.

28. It is my opinion that a user of the Internet with a degree of video expertise can easily locate and obtain software to transform a DeCSSed DVD into compressed DivX format and run correction software to resynchronize the audio and video.

29. It is my opinion that DivX movie files can be readily transferred and exchanged over the Internet and can be used to trade for other DivX movie files without the need to exchange any money.

30. It is my opinion that on mid- and large-sized college campuses in the United States, anyone with access to these networks [sic], including students, can currently transmit DivX movie files within the same campus network in less than 20 minutes.

31. Available bandwidth has been increasing in the United States at a rate of 5-10 times that of CPU processor speeds. Processors are currently doubling in speed approximately every 18 months.

32. Compression technology is constantly improving. Using MPEG4, it is possible to watch a DivX in full motion at a bandwidth of 858 kilobits per second, lower than T1 bandwidth.

33. I hold the opinions expressed herein to a reasonably degree of professional certainty.

Dated: June 30, 2000
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

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