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Music Media

Studios, RIAA Warn CEOs On File Trading 264

Posted by CowboyNeal from the don't-copy-that-floppy dept.
pcosta writes "Record companies and movie studios are turning an anti-piracy spotlight on corporate America, sending a letter to top CEOs this week warning of illegal file trading going on at 'a surprising number of companies.' Full story on C|Net." Earlier this month, they also warned schools as well.
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Studios, RIAA Warn CEOs On File Trading More

Studios, RIAA Warn CEOs On File Trading

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  • How to spend their money? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Jucius Maximus ( 229128 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:19AM (#4536702) Journal
    If the RIAA quit spending their money trying to shoot down file sharing networks, buying senators, and getting the attention of schools, corporate America, etc and instead channelled their resources into building a new business model, they might just come out on top. It seems to me they they are betting the farm on being able to prevent the evolution of the market. If they lose this bet, they will be obsolete and bankrupt.

    And what about these studios? Didn't Lucasfilm say something about studios eventually becoming unprofitable? You'd think...

    • If the RIAA quit spending their money trying to shoot down ...

      Ok, now IANAL, but Hilary Rosen is, I'm not sure of Jack Valenti's status, so I just refer to him as the RIAA Whore. Assuming the industry came to it's senses, these people would be out of work. Don't you think it's silly of them to advise the music industry to put them out of a job?

    • Why should they? This is probably going to come across as flamebait, and i really dont intend for it to be.

      Its their business, they can sell it in whatever manner they want. If their business model doesnt suit you, then dont expect them to change it jsut for you, because they dont have to. There are still plenty of people using the old business model, and to develop a new one would cost them money. I dont go down the local supermarket and bitch because i wander round the shelves, pick what i want and pay for it, rather than someone do it for me.

    • If the RIAA quit spending their money trying to shoot down file sharing networks, buying senators, and getting the attention of schools, corporate America, etc and instead channelled their resources into building a new business model, they might just come out on top.
      I wish you'd stop complaining about corrupt senators. The honest ones are just using an obsolete business model. Oh yeah, and supermarkets should stop complaining about shoplifting because they're just using an obsolete business model as well. If they really wanted to stop theft, they would add those ink cartriges onto food like they do in clothing stores.

      This has honestly got to be the lamest argument that gets consistently modded up to +5 on /.

      -a

  • Website Problems (Score:4, Funny)

    by fire-eyes ( 522894 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:20AM (#4536706) Homepage
    I wonder if certain organizations will have web site access problems this week...

  • I just realized (Score:5, Interesting)

    by fleener ( 140714 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:20AM (#4536707)
    I haven't gone to the movie theatre in more than six months and it's been over a year since I bought a corporate CD (only local artists now). Who needs 'em?
    • I beat ya! Last time I went was.....hell I don't remember it's been so long. I have bought CD's though. And I have also bought DVD's as well. DVD's and a decent TV is all I ask.
    • CD (only local artists now)

      If you work at some big dumb company, your CEO will now keep you from sharing those songs, regardless of the artist's intent. Duh, Big Dumb CEO is going to be convinced that music is not something for the coporate intranet if he is not already. The policy will be made and the violators shit canned. Thank the RIAA both for threatening lawsuits and raising FUD over bandwith.

      In the end, you will be lucky to have music at all in that kind of company. Just a little more FUD about company IP walking off in iPods and USB keyfobs, evil backdoored music software that's not MS Media Player and real info on the Media Player's licensing that makes it a backdoor and poof, you are without music.

      There are two things to remember as you are expected to put in more of your personal time for work and are alowed to do less of what you need to get done there. First, enjoying your job is like stealing from the company. Second, get back to work, you are not being paid for the power of your dreams. [despair.com]

  • Freedom ... (Score:5, Funny)

    by bizitch ( 546406 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:21AM (#4536710) Homepage

    The trouble with freedom and liberty is - you never know what people are going to do with it

    like ... trade music

  • Corporate Spying (Score:5, Interesting)

    by N8F8 ( 4562 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:22AM (#4536716)
    Is it corporate spying to monitor another company's network traffic? Not to mention that the only way they could identify the material as infringing would be to intercept that traffic.
    • Yes it is corporate spying.

      However, the laws do not matter if you are responsible for making the laws, and if you have friends (read senators) in high places.

    • Re:Corporate Spying (Score:5, Insightful)

      by dj28 ( 212815 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:34AM (#4536756)
      It's not spying. You yourself could get on gnutella and log the IPs of the people you are downloading from and the ones downloading from you. The RIAA probably has a lot of bots roaming gnutella and other file sharing protocols logging IPs. After the bots got a sizable list of IPs, they probably ran a whois on the IPs and contacted the corporations that these IP blocks belong to. It's hardly spying. Besides, isn't this what slashdot has been calling them to do; going after the people that violate the law, rather than the protocol? It seems like they can't win, even if they are doing the precise thing slashdot asked them to do.
      • silly man, we were only suggesting that because we assumed it would be too hard to actually do. Now that we can't get music for free, this seems like a really terrible idea.
      • It seems like they can't win, even if they are doing the precise thing slashdot asked them to do.

        And WHO, pray tell, is Slashdot?

        Do you think we all have the same opinions here? There would be little discussion if we did.

    • Rather than log IPs, use WHOIS, etc.. and go through all that trouble, I would be more willing to bet the RIAA is just targetting the Fortune 1000 who are all guaranteed to have high speed Internet access and just _assume_ that everyone is swapping music. What do they have to lose? Sounds like how Microsoft handles their antitrust trial... just throw lie after lie out until it strikes a nerve and people believe them.

  • Big deal (Score:4, Insightful)

    by DNS-and-BIND ( 461968 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:23AM (#4536721) Homepage
    So, they did reverse DNS on IPs downloading songs, and determined those reverse DNS equaled corporate namespace. This is simply the corporate strategy of "going after the easy ones first". Much like H***er went after the easily-sold-out Czechoslovakia and Poland first; to gain cheap, easy victories for his troops, so goeth the record companies after the easily-thwarted corps.

    All this will accomplish is even more restricted access from work for the poor souls destined to work for big corps. The actual pirates who take advantage of the Big Bandwidth availible "from work" will simply shift to a different medium to accomplish their crimes.

    • Godwin's Law invoked (Score:4, Funny)

      by No Such Agency ( 136681 ) <abmackay@@@gmail...com> on Saturday October 26, 2002 @12:08PM (#4536857)
      Bzzzzzt! You lose ;-)

    • Much like H***er went after the easily-sold-out Czechoslovakia and Poland first; to gain cheap, easy victories for his troops, so goeth the record companies after the easily-thwarted corps.

      It's not widely known, but the art of scheduling opponents is very similar in both NCAA football and international affairs.

      In Hitler's case, he scheduled a few pansies in the early part of the season. Czechoslovakia and Poland were Division I-AA. The Netherlands and Belgium were lower Division I-A schools, from the weak Benelux conference (so weak, it doesn't even participate in the BCS!). His first test was the mid-October homecoming game against a highly rated French team and their vaunted "Maginot Line" 5 man defensive front. The French defensive coordinators made a further critical error in gameplanning that the Germans would just run the ball up the middle, so they utilized 10 men in the box throughout, letting the Germans use sweep plays and sideline passes to move the ball at will. After Homecoming, though, Germany scheduled a brutal series of games against Russia and Britain. A seemingly endless series of long bombs to test the British secondary failed to do much of anything, but the British couldn't make any headway moving the ball on their own. That game ended in a 0-0 tie. Against Russia, Germany built up a massive first half lead and the game seemed well in hand. With this, they confidently scheduled a December game with major BCS implications, against a very well-rested and deep US squad. The Russians mounted an effective ball control offense with a very effective defense in the second half and, despite devastating injuries, did nothing but push the Germans back and score at will.

    • So, they did reverse DNS on IPs downloading songs, and determined those reverse DNS equaled corporate namespace. This is simply the corporate strategy of "going after the easy ones first". Much like H***er went after the easily-sold-out Czechoslovakia and Poland first; to gain cheap, easy victories for his troops, so goeth the record companies after the easily-thwarted corps.

      You are missing a crucial point. Several, actually. First, Hitler was running around killing people (actually, having them killed) and the RIAA is trying to defend its copyrights. However you feel about copyright law, the law is on their side. Second, the only targets which the RIAA must pursue at this point are the easy ones. I'm betting that if they were actually losing revenue because people are downloading, that going after the corporate sites (Many MANY people still have no broadband or half-assed broadband like Pacific Bell DSL (*spit*) at home) would cut out most of the activity by people who would normally pay for music, as those people obviously have jobs, unlike me. I do my downloading from attbi cable at home, but I'm unemployed. (I'm a student.)

      All this will accomplish is even more restricted access from work for the poor souls destined to work for big corps. The actual pirates who take advantage of the Big Bandwidth availible "from work" will simply shift to a different medium to accomplish their crimes.

      See my point above about broadband at home. People who can afford CDs frequently aren't the types to do P2P at home. I am making generalizations, but no broader than your own.

      As for shifting to a different medium, even though I *do* have broadband at home, the upstream caps on nearly everything (For instance, DOCSIS cable is capable of a peak of about 11mbps shared bandwidth between others on your segment, but attbi caps at 256kbps and most other caps at 128kbps) have driven my friends and I to adopt CD-over-snailmail as our primary distribution method for large media, meaning movies, music, and software. A SVCD is generally two or three discs at good (near-DVD-though-lower-resolution) quality. MP3s are usually still sent via ftp. Entertainment software is anything from one to four discs (usually two or three now) and as such will take a long-ass time to send through these small caps.

      I don't dispute the upstream caps, btw; You can have upwards of 10,000 subscribers on a single line card on your cable head end. Even on a Cisco 7246 uBR with four MC16 line cards (each of which has six upstream channels) if everyone were sharing P2P at max speed, which is not an unreasonable view of the future, and you had (say) 2,000 subscribers per line card, then your maximum possible saturation is around 66mbps per line card, and it only takes 264 subscribers to use that up. You will never see 11mbps, probably more like 5 or 6, so we're talking about 600 subscribers broadcasting to completely use up all the available upstream, even with the cap.

  • Is the company to blame? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by solostring ( 620535 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:24AM (#4536722) Homepage
    Is the company to blame if its employees are using P2P applications to share files? Whilst I can understand the $1m settlement won by the RIAA for the company allowing its employees to use their intranet to share copyrighted material, this letter is clearly aimed towards employees using their internet connection to trade peer to peer across the net.

    My limited understanding of the law is that with P2P apps such as gnuttella, it is the end user who is at risk of prosecution, and not the organisation in charge of the network.

    If companies are going to be sued for not firewalling P2P apps, then where is it going to end? Will the RIAA set its sights upon the ISP's? The backbone carriers?.... where will it end? *sigh*

    • Re:Is the company to blame? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by vrmlknight ( 309019 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:30AM (#4536739) Homepage
      "Is the company to blame if its employees are using P2P applications to share files? "

      Actually yes the company is to blame for not blocking or stopping otherwise... The company owns (ok rents) the bandwidth and is responsible for how it is used if it is used illegally then they have to stop it

    • Is the company to blame if its employees are using P2P applications to share files?

      If they don't know about it, probably not. On the other hand, if they are aware that illegal activities are going on using their resources, and do nothing about it, then damn right they're responsible.

      Or to put it another way, if your employees are using a spare room in your business to produce crack, and you're totally aware of it, you're going to be in a heap o' trouble (even if you think drugs should be legalized).

      Will the RIAA set its sights upon the ISP's?

      The difference is that you are a consumer of the service, not an employee of the ISP. Or to put it another way, AT&T is not responsible for criminals using the telephone, but would be responsible if they know that their employees are engaging in criminal activity.

      • Or to put it another way, if your employees are using a spare room in your business to produce crack, and you're totally aware of it, you're going to be in a heap o' trouble (even if you think drugs should be legalized).

        Drugs are a bad example because they are specially criminalized. If you do something financial which is even vaguely drug-related, the government can seize all property which might have been used in the commission of a crime. That includes your cars which have been seen on the property, your place of residence, any equipment in or near the facility, et cetera.

        Even gun-running might be a better example.

        As for the RIAA setting its sights on ISPs, I certainly would were I in their position and mindset. (If it were up to me the RIAA would be gone already, but I'm a realist and so totally unfit for the job of running that particular show.) The ISPs *could* block most of these file sharing protocols in one way or another, and in some ways it would even be to their benefit, namely lowering bandwidth costs. Of course subscribers would depart en masse, but never mind that part, I'm talking about the RIAA's potential argument. It would be possible to sniff and analyze some packets to determine if they are being used for P2P and simply drop that user, so it is technically possible. You don't even have to sniff all the packets, just a random sampling, and you can cut out a certain percentage of the users.

        So the ISPs do have the technology to determine who is engaging in potentially criminal activity, regardless of their claims to the contrary. Just using P2P isn't illegal, but I frankly do not personally know anyone who uses P2P without using it for illegal purposes. ANYONE. And I know a lot of people using P2P apps of one sort or another.

        WILL the RIAA go after ISPs? If all else fails, probably.

    • As many people are quick to respond
      when discussing things like monitoring employees'
      activity at work, it is THEIR network, they
      monitor it, well, why don't they be responsible
      for it as well? Fair is fair...

  • Then again... (Score:3, Funny)

    by blitzoid ( 618964 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:25AM (#4536724) Homepage
    Let's just hope some of those CEOs are the ones spearheading all the file swapping.

  • This is insane.. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by fadeaway ( 531137 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:25AM (#4536725)
    What's next? Finding ISP's legally resoponsible for the actions of their customers? Telecom companies for allowing people to transmit illegal packets across their lines? IT companies for building networks that people can pirate on? PC makers for manufacturing the equipment that facilitates piracy?

    What the hell happened to the individual being responbile for their own actions. This is dirty, dirty business.
    • The nature of an incorporated business is that that individuals within the business can not be held legally responsible for its actions (I forget which accounting principle this was). If you find out that you're company is using child labor or something, do you expect to go to jail for that? In the same way, if you are using your company network to share copyrighted content then you arn't liable and it would be very difficult to ever convict you.

      • Re:This isn't insane (Score:4, Insightful)

        by nounderscores ( 246517 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:39AM (#4536775)
        good point. however if it becomes possible initate a multimillion dollar lawsuit against a company which has just one employee hosting a p2p file sharing service, it would be possible to cripple or sink virtually any company with internet access.

        All are sinful and fallen short of the glory of the RIAA's ideal happy little consumers.

        do you think the courts would let the RIAA have that kind of power to hold the entire economy ransom?
        • That's a good point.
          Proving intent on the net is very tricky especially when all you have is some IP addresses off a company with dozens of internal networks and proxys and routers and firewalls. Yeah, you have some numbers that might have entered the building. So what does that mean conclusively? Not much.
          And if you say no, no it's hardline time. We're going to fuck these bastards. There's a war going on, it's like martial law. They gotta pay and pay and pay. Alright, in that scenario this becomes too easily abused. It's so easy to setup a remote eDonkey server with a little rootkit action. It's all far too ambiguous to make a court case on. Like the previous post suggests --if you prosecute aggressively, how do you prevent abuse; if you don't prosecute aggressively, how do you have a case?
          Plainly the RIAA is just goofing around running up billable hours.

  • Yeah, this'll work... (Score:5, Funny)

    by grungebox ( 578982 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:25AM (#4536726) Homepage
    I'm sure CEO's will try and get their employees to stop pirating music and movies. We all know how ethical and moral American CEO's are...
    • For sure. I mean, given that there was at least a dozen dirty CEOs among tens of thousands, clearly that's enough proof for the Slashdot jury to pronounce them all immoral.
    • CEO's will try and get their employees to stop pirating music and movies
      Although sarcasitc, you raise a good point. Very few (if any) CEOs are techno-literate and even fewer know what is going on in the lowest levels of the company.

      When Hillary sends Joe CEO a threatening letter, he'll probably ask his CTO/CIO, "What is this P2P thing?" Then it goes downhill from there.

      Net-net, the BOFH continues to run his Warez/MP3 server with the terrabyte SAN, maybe chaning the machine name. "Oh that? That's the bandwidth infratructure terrabyte computer, hosting activated security scans. Sure, it uses all that disk space; we gotta stay compliant, you know. Yeah, for auditing. Last time they wanted to see how much space we were using, and how many active users^h^h^h^h^hscans it was running. Cheers!"

  • what about public networks? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by hikeran ( 561061 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:27AM (#4536730)
    What about libraries whom allow people to use wireless acces points that allow internet usage with their own machines? Will the library be held responsible for their actions?

  • Since threatening YOU hasn't worked... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by krinsh ( 94283 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:29AM (#4536736)
    Now they threaten your teachers and your boss; hoping they'll get better results if they make it look like said lawyers would be happy to sink their teeth into larger fish. How many people are going to lose legitimate business use of their computers and the internet because of this? I already know too many places that make you sign 20 disclaimers before you can actually log on to the local network to get your email.

  • Whoa, wait a minute... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by krinsh ( 94283 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:32AM (#4536744)
    How is the RIAA able to tell what is on MY corporate intranet? This reeks of an intrusion into my Business Confidential data in and of itself.

    Please, please tell me some of you guys that maintain and monitor large corporate networks will bring this to your boss' attention when they get back from another RIAA sandpaper condo-media relations conference.

    • rewards (Score:3, Informative)

      by xixax ( 44677 )
      In the same way that rewards are offered to disgruntled employees for information on illegal software installations.

      Xix.

  • Well, (Score:2, Insightful)

    by kingofnopants ( 600490 )
    Since you stole their toys (software), their going to tell your mommy(boss) on you. The only thing that is different about this than little kids is that you aren't sopposed to share.

  • Letter the to CEO of the riaa (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:32AM (#4536748)
    Dear Hilary Rosen,

    This is a warning from the Recording Industry Asscociation of america.

    Some of your employees may be illegally sharing copyrighted material via P2P networks in your company. If caught, the leagl liabillities will affect your corporation. Please take the nessessary steps to prevent this from happenin

  • Extortion? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by iiioxx ( 610652 ) <iiioxx@gmail.com> on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:35AM (#4536761)
    I don't know, does this sound like extortion to anyone else? They seem to be saying "police your corporate networks for our benefit, or we will sue you."

    Now, most companies with intelligently run IT departments are policing their networks anyway. But this kind of thing seems to be saying that if an employee should happen to figure out a way to circumvent a company's firewall or proxy and swap files illegally on corporate bandwidth, that the company is somehow responsible and could be held liable. I think this goes beyond the level of reasonable control that companies should be required to exercise.

    It seems to me that the RIAA is going after the people with deep pockets, looking to make an example of a few companies. Why go after Joe User, when you can go after Joe's employer? It's a higher profile target, and there's more to gain.
    • I don't know, does this sound like extortion to anyone else? They seem to be saying "police your corporate networks for our benefit, or we will sue you."

      This seems less like extortion than Microsoft coming along to do an audit, and then telling you you have to pay for all of their software you are using within 30 days or they will raze your crops, sow your ground with salt, poison your wells, rape your livestock, and ride off on your women. Metaphorically speaking.

      Interestingly enough, in both cases it's just the holder of copyright protecting their assets, but we get really pissed off at them regardless.

      And before someone argues with my above paragraph, as I know you will because *gasp* this is slashdot, I know that there are legitimate uses of P2P music sharing, like if you already own the album. However, I think you could construct an argument that you might be getting a different version of the song (and how would you know without listening to it?) and if you do, you have acquired copyrighted material which does not belong to you. Accidentally download a remix and go to jail? Not today, but the RIAA would probably like to bring it about because any operating P2P system can be seen as a threat to them.

      All of this does only serve to support the theory that conventional means of music promotion and distribution are outmoded, and on their way off the stage as a result; or at least that their monopoly on our ears is fading. I don't think life will change much for MTV or Clearchannel or any of the other bastions of homogenized media, but much of the new growth will hopefully be outside of those systems.

    • What would be truly entertaining is to expose filesharing at ... oh, say the corp offices of nice deeply-pocketed companies like Sony, WB, Disney, Microsoft ...

      I'd really, really like to see how the worm swallows its own tail in that situation.

  • To a CEO... (Score:3, Funny)

    by ackthpt ( 218170 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:37AM (#4536770) Homepage Journal
    Dear Kenneth Lay,

    We have been using all means at our disposal, legal and otherwise, to determine the who and where of the sharing of our music property. We know you wouldn't want to see your name or the name of your company dragged through the gutter. So please cease and desist before matters become unpleasant.

    Yours truly,
    Hilary Rosen
    RIAA Counsel

  • uphill battle (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dollargonzo ( 519030 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:38AM (#4536774) Homepage
    i can understand teenagers et al sharing stuff online upsetting the RIAA, but these are *supposed* to be respectfull adults, who have plenty of money to buy CDs. if the RIAA only realized that most of the people who share content are not going to buy CDs anyway, and if they DO buy CDs, it has little to do with their sharing. perhaps if the CDs were of reasonable price, ppl would consider buying them.

    for example, the company i work for does not have a fancy license manager, and really anyone can steal the software if they want to, no one is stopping them, and we don't hunt them...but very few do. why? it is their ass on the line, and on top of that, they need support and consulting. if we spent a lot of money trying to stop them, for example by writing a license manager or working on protection/registration/activation schemes beyond a serial key, it would hurt the profit. if the RIAA feels that their profit is hurt, then perhaps they should revise their product or its pricing instead of going after people who use the most natural alternative.

    • It's not about money. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by mindstrm ( 20013 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:53AM (#4536816)
      I sit behind a computer for about 50 hours a week.

      Why should I force myself to drive downtown on what little time I have off to go hunting for a cd or two that I like when I can sit at my desk and grab whatever I want whenever I want, on my computer.

      It's not because I'm cheap.

      It's because the recording industry is NOT offering me anything near this level of convenience.
      • I love hearing people say things like this. I'm willing to bet that if the RIAA DID offer you this, you'd still get your music free and come up with another excuse.
        • Having never met me, you must know exactly what I do for a living, where I live, and how cheap I am.

          I'm not some guy living a block from the virgin megastore where I can get all the music I want, with a good selection. I wish.

          I'm also not saying that this is why all people pirate music.. but until the music industry does something to compete on a convenience level, they will be behind no matter what.
      • Get an iPod.
    • Linux is for those who hate Microsoft.

      Really? I use linux cause I can rely on it not falling over, yet have support for a large range of programs and an enourmous local user (and hence local support) base.

  • from the devils mouth (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    after reloading a few times to see if anything else showed up on www.riaa.com i found their words for what they're doing http://www.riaa.com/PR_story.cfm?id=580
  • I wonder how effective this will be, since about half the people I know in software development (and myself) are laid off and have been for some time. Maybe they should warn unemployment offices next?

  • why the RIAA wins this round (Score:5, Insightful)

    by fermion ( 181285 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:57AM (#4536825) Homepage Journal
    This is probably the most fair thing the RIAA has done. As has been said many times already, if you want to share music, look at porn, or run you own business, buy your own high speed connection. The connection is not all that expensive. By attacking the RIAA on this, we are allowing ourselves to be distracted from the larger fight.

    Why I believe this is true. There is much ranting in press and /., ranting that I believe is fair, about executives treating company resources as their personal possessions. So I pose this question. Why is it wrong for an executive to borrow a plane to take his family on a trip and right for an employee to use the broadband connection to share music. Before you answer that questions think of the opportunities cost s in both situations and the relative compensations of the people in question.

    In this post dot-com, post Enron world, accountability rules. If half a companies broadband is used for non-business related activity, it is valid to ask why. Music and porn sharing is also raises liability issue of a safe workplace. And, though downloading music on your personal account may not be stealing, downloading music on an account primarily used for profit is much more likely to be stealing.

    So, lets not send letter to the RIAA about this. Lets concentrate on the characterizing the RIAA as overgrown script kiddies and general all around mal-contents. Again, if you want to share music, buy the connection. It seems we have much more power when we pit the financial interests of the telcos, who want to sell us broadband, against the financial interests of the music pushers, who want us sell up plastic disks. Both know on which side their bread is buttered.

  • Information-Nazi's (Score:2, Interesting)

    by dh003i ( 203189 )
    This's why I think the world would be better off if Jack Valentini (movie-nazi) and Hillary Rosen (music-nazi) were dead. When I think of all the good people that died at 9/11, it's really too bad that that building couldn't have been full of crooked lawyers, politicians (i.e., the Kennedy who murdered that young girl), and lobbyists (i.e., Jack Valentini & Hillary Rosen). If 10,000 people were going to die, I'd rather it be 10,000 people who were assholes and crooks. But of course, its always the most crooked people who live the longest.

    Jack Valentini & Hillary Rosen can go fuck themselves. Most teenagers and most college students do share copyrighted files, which is a good thing. This means its possible that the future will be filled with people who aren't information-nazi's.

    Fuck the RIAA and the MPAA. Firstly, most people who download music weren't going to buy the CD's anyways, especially people who download alot of music. Who the fuck's going to buy a 100 CDs in a few days anyways? Yet people download hundreds (possibly thousands) of CDs. The MPAA and the RIAA aren't righteous; they're just looking out for their own best interests.

    That said, perhaps a good business model for them would be to offer people unlimited downloading provided they buy so many CD's a year (i.e., if you buy, for example, 50 CDs a year, you get unlimited downloading). The point is that they'd offer unlimited downloads to people who buy alot of CDs a year. The other thing they can do is stop fucking us over on the price of CDs. New CD's go for 18 dollars, which is almost as much as a DVD -- that's bullshit. Sometimes, the sound-track to a movie will cost more than that movie itself; absolutely outrageous. The other thing they can do is stop pushing for such absurd lengths and scopes of copyrights; 10 years of copyright protection is more than enough to make 99% of the profit to be made from any copyrighted material.

    Hint to RIAA and MPAA: you don't make money by pissing off your customers and calling them crooks.
    • Fuck the RIAA and the MPAA.

      Uh yeah. "Fuck them up their stupid asses"... This isn't moviepoopshoot.com ;-)

      i.e., if you buy, for example, 50 CDs a year, you get unlimited downloading

      50 CD's a year?! That's almost a thousand bucks (plus about another $480 for a fast enough connection)! Geez, for that kind of money I'd expect Hillary Rosen to come to my house and receive a "download" from me.
      • Then perhaps 20 CD's a year, which amounts to $360. The point is, this would give people alot of incentive to buy alot of CD's a year, because in exchange for doing that, they'd get unlimited downloads of "copyrighted material".

  • simpsons jab at RIAA (Score:4, Funny)

    by evacuate_the_bull ( 517290 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @12:13PM (#4536883)
    Milhouse (as Fallout Boy): Movie stardom is just so hollow.
    Mickey Rooney: Hollow?! The only thing in show business that's hollow is the music industry.

  • What a surprise... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @12:21PM (#4536917) Homepage
    You mean company employees breaking copyright laws on company time using company equipment could create liability for the company? What a shocker.

    Of course, as an employee I expect a bit of privacy as to what I do during my work, but if the company is clearly aware of me doing something illegal or very obviously avoiding to investigate (like after receieving reports of such), I would expect that. So, I'd consider the company liable only if it failed to respond to it, very much like an ISP could be liable if it fails to take down a homepage carrying illegal material after recieving notification.

    The problem is that at most companies and just like in the rest of the world (look at P2P booming), they don't look at it as any real crime. Many companies I've heard of have taken steps to stop various programs and "conventional" downloading of mp3s, but only to save company resources (bandtwidth, employee time) and not to prevent crime or to remove liability. And I hardly think this letter will make much of an impact.

    Kjella
  • These crap stories should be under RIAA/MPAA topic so I can easily eliminate them !
  • Many Corps/Orgs have Acceptable Usage Policies already.

    Our operation has had one for several years.

    As a network admin, I would receive a monthly report from the regional center (mainframe & network gate) detailing network/internet use.
    We only validated the "Top Ten" offenders and reported contraventions we found.
    This was probably the most distasteful part of my job but, it was part of my job.

    We also did regular server scans for suspect files such as .MP3, .avi, .mpeg, etc.

    I haven't been in that job for a couple years, I stepped down to middle management.

    Recently, two employees had 'net access removed for six months and were advised a note would remain on their personnel file for two years. They had uploaded a US Military handbook to one of the Unix boxes and this is what got them into trouble. I found it funny that none of the other folks who had e-books, mp3s, pr0n, video files were even questioned.

    I guess that in the *buzz word warning* "Post 9-11" times we are in, some things are more serious than others. (BTW We are not a US company)

    My point? If your company has an "Acceptable Usage Policy", read it, remember it and if you feel you must save this stuff to the network, be careful!

  • Aren't they right? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by llamaluvr ( 575102 )
    If your company (or group of companies) had a product (or a lot of products), and these products were being stolen in mass quantities, wouldn't your CEO ask them to stop? If I were him, I wouldn't just let them keep doing it!

    As unpopular as the DMCA is, it is the law of the land, and under it, IP logs can be subpoenaed (remember Cringley's column on BayTSP [pbs.org]?). So, they are allowed, with just cause, to check to see if someone really is distributing copyrighted works. This should be an acceptable part of the DMCA (one of the few)- if I had reason to believe somebody was stealing from me, I should be allowed (or the authorities should be allowed at my urging) to take appropriate measures to stop it (like putting up survailence cameras).

    We should really stop all this talk attempting to morally justify using P2P to distribute copyrighted works. The RIAA is not going to cry a river for those who can't afford CDs, and give them a bunch of free MP3s. I can't afford a Porshe (or even a used Taurus, for that matter ;P); that doesn't mean I am justified in stealing it.

    Now if the RIAA and their companies were price-gouging basic necessities like food, water, or oxygen, then stealing might be necessary. But having a huge music collection is not a necessity!

    Until more people start computing more responsibly, whether it be at work, at school, or at home, then the RIAA has every right to demand that folks stop stealing from them.

    • Re:Aren't they right? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by hackus ( 159037 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @12:50PM (#4537036) Homepage
      This has nothing to do with responsible use.

      If THAT were the case, such things as VCR's and CD-RW's would have coin deposit slots built into them or they would be outlawed as defined by the RIAA.

      What this fight is over is who will control your computer because ALL other forms of information in the future will be computer generated. No more TV's VCR, DVD players, or Radio's...all existing media outlets and distribution channels will become exitinct.

      Media giants know this, and they want to control your computer. They want to control:

      What you see.
      What your opinions are of what you see.
      How much you can bear to pay for what you see.
      What you do with the information, and if you use it pay additional royalties for the use of that information.

      Without this control, thier business models as they exist today won't work.

      However, what they don't understand, is that if we as a society permit this sort of control, the internet will cease to exist, for one, and there can be no such thing as free speech, free software.

      It will only be speech, and those who have the cash are the only ones that will be heard in this new vision.

      Technology enables the individual to make decisions and to be much more indepedant from being tied to distributor resources, like Muscians for example. So all the money you normally pay the RIAA for distribution, is not valuable on the internet since one person can do exactly the same thing the RIAA does, at basically far less cost.

      The RIAA wants to repserve the value of thier distribution channels as they exist today, so the muscian won't have a choice and won't get any ideas they can do it themselves, cutting out the RIAA.

      THIS is what this whole thing is about, really.

      The RIAA could care less about you guys copying music. You have been doing it for decades with tape decks. What has changed is that the internet makes them irrelevant.

      The Billions that they make could be going to muscians pockets, and not into price fixing, which they do with thier distributors right now.

      They MUST be stopped, or my very busines, and the software I use will become ILLEGAL in this country.

      And STOPPED they will, if not by us, 3 Billion raging Chinese Linux users who will.

      Hack

  • I this really a problem anymore??? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Chanc_Gorkon ( 94133 ) <gorkon&gmail,com> on Saturday October 26, 2002 @12:45PM (#4537010)
    Napster was popular. So popular even my non techy friends were aware of it as well as Kazaa, Morpheous and others. But now because Napster is dead and many of the others have had rumors of, or had spyware in them, most of those non techy folks don't use P2P anymore. Even my techy friends don't mess with it because it's more hassle then it's worth and they are tired of going halfway thru a download and it blows up on them or there's nothing out there. Why is thr RIAA still on the warpath with this stuff when hardly anyone uses it anymore (they have all just gone back to using hidden ftp sites! :)).
    • Dude...check the statistics.

      Way more people trade music via P2P now than ever did on Napster (even in its hayday!)

      I can't remember the exact statistic...but it's at least double the traffic.

    • Uh.. a LOT of non-techie people use P2P. It's the only thing they know. To them, it's:

      1. Download and install Kazaa/Morpheus/et al.
      2. Search for and double-click the song.
      3. Profit!!!

      The spyware thing can't possibly be a deterant. Most average people don't know what it is to begin with. And I don't think a lot of your average users know how to browse FTP. Some can barely browse the Web. Of course there are the select few who have run across FTP while uploading their websites to Geocities or whatnot. If anything, your theory would be the other way around. The techies know of the alternatives and are sick of the spyware and the hassle. The non-techies are sick of going halfway through a download and having it die. To them, if this happens, their P2P client is just 'broken'.
    • Just because this is true between you and your friends doesn't mean it's true for everyone.

      Kazaa is reaching new popularity heights every day now. It is *way* more popular than Napster was in it's peak.

      Anyways, spyware free stuff like Kazaa lite and WinMX exist. I currently use WinMX most because it has tons of 320kbps Mp3's, mostly from former AudioGalaxy users.

  • Does anyone know if there's been any research done on music and productivity in the workplace? I'm sure the CEO's could be swayed to support file sharing or even a corporate jukebox (music streaming computer), if there was a potential increase in productivity associated with it. CEO's like money. Phrase your arguments for network freedom in the form of an opportunity and they're going to be much more responsive to your pleas..

    Corporations should consider a central streaming model. Have employees donate CDs to the repository where they get ripped, cataloged, and streamed to the waiting masses.. It places a load on the network, but the corporation doesn't have oodles of copies of music scattered around the building taking up space on their work stations and they can't really be hit for distributing copies of the music. The corporation is merely playing music over the users work station speakers/headphones rather than the PA system.

    I do something similar here but on a much much smaller scale. All my music resides on one machine in my lab. When I'm in my office or at home, my notebook points to the music server. The notebook retains a set of playlists in its library along with a catalog of the songs on the server, but the songs all remain on the remote box. It works pretty well..

  • Just a thought. . . (Score:4, Insightful)

    by PhxBlue ( 562201 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @12:56PM (#4537058) Homepage Journal

    Maybe employees who are working for these corporations should be doing their jobs. If they have enough time on their hands to use P2P networks--and waste someone else's money in the process--maybe that's one position the company can do without the next time some cuts have to be made.

    My office has a fairly liberal policy on non-business-related web use; but the shit would hit the fan fast if folks started getting busted for using Kazaa, etc., or even for using file-shares to trade music over the office intranet. A certain level of freedom to use the internet at work is good for morale; but that freedom doesn't need to include the "freedom" to violate copyright.

    'Course, most corporations with an IT department worth its salt will have the most popular filesharing programs' ports blocked, anyway. But from the sound of this latest RIAA temper tantrum, a lot of corporations' IT departments are asleep at the wheel.

    • Maybe employees who are working for these corporations should be doing their jobs. If they have enough time on their hands to use P2P networks--and waste someone else's money in the process--maybe that's one position the company can do without the next time some cuts have to be made.

      A higher mammal will take only a few seconds, perhaps half a minute, to enter Kazaa, search for a file... Now we suspend the clock on their time-wasting because they will be going off to do something else which may or may not be productive. A few moments later they spend another few seconds going down the list of search hits and clicking on all of them. Then they occasionally peek at the traffic window to see what's downloading, and what's downloaded.

      If it's not P2P it'll be bullshitting around the water cooler, or cleaning your fingernails instead of working over the latest budget proposal, or downloading pr0n. People always find ways to waste time because they're too lazy or too unmotivated to throw themselves into their work headlong to the exclusion of all else.

  • #Ruleset to allow your CEO to share all the music she wants

    block in quick on $ExtIf all
    pass out quick on $ExtIf proto tcp from {her IP/ her mask} to any keep state
    pass out quick on $ExtIf proto udp from {her IP/ her mask} to any keep state
    pass out quick on $ExtIf proto icmp from {her IP/ her mask} to any keep state

  • It can be difficult to stop... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Chicane-UK ( 455253 ) <chicane-uk@@@ntlworld...com> on Saturday October 26, 2002 @01:09PM (#4537115) Homepage
    I speak from experience here.

    I work as a technician / 'network engineer' at a college... We have spent a LOT of time trying to prevent our fantastic (mutter) students from getting on p2p networks but it is very difficult.

    We have tried many different things, including :

    * Recent installation of a firewall - it has helped a little, but some p2p apps go out on 'safe' ports like 80.. we haven't quite got to the packet filtering stage though.. this might help.

    * Using some of the tools on the quite amazing Trinux [sourceforge.net] security tool kit.. on our switched network, we set up a port span between the router, and a port in our office - we could then run utilites like ntop to identify who was hogging bandwith, or tcpkill all data on, for example, port 1214 (Kazaa). Very cool, very powerful, and of course it is free - I think if they have a donations page though, we should be paying a visit.

    * Installing policies and software on client machines to attempt to block students from installing things like Kazaa.. has helped a great deal, but those determined enough seem to be able to circumvent it.

    Maybe the RIAA need to be a little more sympathetic.. yes, in some situations companies can be using file sharing apps quite happily breaking the law. But in situations like ours, where we have spent bloody weeks of time trying to find solutions to stop it, they need to be a little more easy going! Our network has 1,500+ client workstations and only 15 or so technicicans to police it.. can be pretty tough to identify those abusing it.
  • Soon, the RIAA/MPAA will be sending letters to every household in America ordering them to cease and desist. Ever since this war on consumers began, I have been boycotting products (CD's, DVD's and movies) from these organizations. In the past 18 months I have probably saved upwards of $2000. Now, if I could just get a million people to join me for the next couple of years...
  • But maybe that's another one of those pesky laws that only apply to citizens. Because when we have examples like:

    Dear CEO:
    That's a pretty nice corporate LAN you've got there. Be a shame if we had to come in and audit your Microsoft licenses because you didn't send us a few more wheelbarrows full of money to make sure you're 100% compliant-- at least, until the next time we need to bolster our balance sheet.
    Sincerely,
    Microsoft
    and now, the latest:

    Dear CEO:
    Those are some pretty nice profits you've got there. Be a shame if we had to send in the copyright attorneys to take some of it because you didn't do enough to stop copyrighted filesharing on your network to satisfy us.
    Sincerely,
    Hilary and Jack
    ...it sure seems difficult to convince most rational people that these aren't instances of blackmail.

    ~Philly

  • How far will the RIAA go to save its arse? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Big Mark ( 575945 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @01:42PM (#4537296)
    Example:

    I am currently playing music very loud, as is everyone else on my corridor. As we can all hear each others music, which could be concieved as sharing it, are we all going to have to pay massive fines for daring to have stereos?

    Or would even the RIAA concede that as fair use?

    Whoops, I forgot... the RIAA can't reach us here in Britain.

    Or... can they?

  • CEO not CTO (Score:3, Insightful)

    by msheppard ( 150231 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @01:45PM (#4537308) Homepage Journal
    Interesting they are talking to CEO's and not CTO's. Would seem more appropriate to talk to someone in charge of technology.

    M@

  • You aren't safe at home either (Score:4, Interesting)

    by nomadicGeek ( 453231 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @02:03PM (#4537398)

    I've already gotten my cease and desist letter...

    The complaining party, the Interactive Digital Software Association ("IDSA"), specifically requests that you immediately cease and desist in the distribution of copyrighted software. In addition, please inform the Abuse Department of (my ISP) in writing, that the alleged activity has ceased.

    I think that everyone needs to realize that when you fire up a gnutella client, you are broadcasting what you have on your computer and the files that you are sharing for all to see. It doesn't take much coding to start logging who is sharing content that you own. It also doesn't take long to cross reference the IP address and find out who owns those addresses.

    If you are sharing files on a gnutella client you can expect to get a cease and desist email from your ISP eventually. Many ISP's are receiving notifications from contents owners on a weekly basis. Sharing files on gnutella violates virtually every usage agreement that I have ever seen. Although the ISP's don't want to loose customers, they don't want to take the heat for being unresponsive.

    I don't think that the Copyright holders are going to change their minds anytime soon. Right now it is probably much cheaper for them to hire a few coders and a few lawyers and start scaring people than it is to try to develop new business models.

    I think that things will slowly change. There are already people out there trying out new business models. Some artists are also into it. Eventually someone will figure out a reliable way to make money and artists will eventually follow. I think that it is going to take years though. The establishment has things locked down pretty tight.

  • We have a legal streaming server. Sue us? (Score:5, Informative)

    by PsyQ ( 87838 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @02:09PM (#4537433) Homepage
    At my company, we're running a server were workers can upload their MP3s so all the other (1200+) workers can listen to them as streams via their standard MP3 player.

    We asked our local version of the RIAA whether this is legal, and after some debate with our legal department, they concluded that yes, it is. Even though you might argue that those streams could be saved to hard drive and taken home, it still is perfectly fine.

    I hope the US also has this much freedom, so you could just stream your MP3s or Oggs instead of putting them on a fileserver somewhere.

  • Very simple (Score:4, Insightful)

    by vlad_petric ( 94134 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @02:16PM (#4537466) Homepage
    They're doing this for a very simple reason: corporations have a lot more money than domestic users. A trial against Joe User would not get them much, aside from setting an example. A litigation against Big-Company would get them a lot more in terms of money.

    RIAA's intent is not to kill on-line music distribution, but to control it (and use it as a cash cow).

    The Raven

  • Why do this at work anyway? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Arcturax ( 454188 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @02:42PM (#4537580)
    First off, why should people be downloading music files at work? Given that under current law it is illegal, you should definately not be doing it where you can easily be monitored and fired and possibly prosecuted for it.

    Not to mention, you should also be doing something productive, not searching and downloading music you didn't pay for. If you want to do that on your own time, fine, but don't be so dumb as to do it at work. Same thing goes for porn, do it at home, not at work.

    While I don't agree with the RIAA's tactics and I know they are simply trying to save their dying buisiness model, I do agree that people should not be doing this kind of thing on company time.
    • You sound like a very uptight and frustrated middle manager.

      Not everyone has loads of work to do while at work. It should be noted as well that computers are now able to multitask. It's true! One can actually download music at the SAME TIME as reading email, sending a memo, and printing!

      As far as the legality of the whole thing goes, well, companies do their fair share of robbing their employees' pension funds blind while at the same time laying off thousands...so, they should expect their people to follow the example they set.

  • The only reason that the content merchants are acting like anal sphincters is because too many of you are supplying them with the cash to do so. I used to spend over US$1,800 per year on CDs, DVDs, and cinema tickets. But since the content oligarchy has gone over the edge with a multitude of misbehaviors, my cash outlay to support them has gone to ZERO. The content oligarchy dinosaurs survive only because too many continue to support them, their lawyers, and their bribery of the politicians. Boycott now, and soon you will be with me watching these reptiles sink into the tar pit that they oh so richly deserve.
  • To whom it may concern,

    There's something mildly hypocritical about your audacity to demand that I stop "pirating?" You stop, first.

    Give the artists a better cut, and quit looting and pillaging from their collective talents.

    Perhaps you should set a better example yourself, and then maybe, maybe, I'll start buying CDs again.

    Better yet, use that collective muscle you like to flex to push all of your member artists' music on to the Internet, through several distribution sites. I wouldn't want to see a monopoly in the Internet music arena, you know.

    By the way, leave out that cumbersome and futile Digital Rights Management stuff. I'm only going to pay for 192kbps+ MP3s. Furthermore; I'm not going to pay more than 25 per track. And that's if you're lucky. I would much rather pay ~$10.00 a month.

    Thank you for your time,

    Adam Carrington
  • Independent artists and small niche labels warn record buyers of semipornographic, run-of-the-mill crap released by RIAA labels.

    Nah.

  • All you have to do is quit buying any Recorded media period (It is perfectly legal to keep your money in your wallet). Don't download or copy or anything else to circumvent -- just Don't buy. I'll bet you that these same idiots doing the threatening from the RIAA/MPAA will be begging within 6 months for anybody to take their wares, and will probably be desperate to give it to the customers they way the customers want it.

    Unfortunately, there are too many of you though who seem to think that you can't live without new music or new movies. Until you guys realize that you can live, at least for a while, without RIAA's music, or MPAA's movies, you will continue to get fleeced -- And it will be your fault!

  • Great... another witchhunt, another wasted week... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Tenebrious1 ( 530949 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @10:41PM (#4539607) Homepage
    Looks like I know how I'll be spending all of next week. I expect to see the email from my boss forwarded from the CTO forwarded from the CEO by 10:30 monday morning.

    I'd love to reply and say "tell the RIAA to blow it out their ass", but I doubt that will get me too far. So instead, I'll have to dig up cache server and firewall logs, app managment logs, probably send around a few hunter/killer apps to look for mp3 caches. As far as I know, no one is running P2P on my network, but god help the sap I catch doing it this week...

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