Filesharing Traffic Drops After RIAA Threats 635
bryan writes "According to CNN, facing the threat of lawsuits from a music industry trade group, fewer people are using online filesharing applications to swap songs. Internet audience measurement service Nielsen Net Ratings said traffic on Kazaa, the leading filesharing platform, fell 15 percent in the week ended July 6 from the previous week. It was during that prior week, on June 25, that the Recording Industry Association of America said it would track down the heaviest users of "peer-to-peer" services like Kazaa and sue them for damages of up to $150,000 per copyright violation." This follows earlier reports, from the filesharing companies themselves, that traffic was actually increasing.
Truly anonymous is the only way to go. (Score:5, Informative)
Please mod me up - we need help with this project. Please get in touch if you can code, or have ideas, or comments.
Re:CDRs? (Score:2, Informative)
Don't know if you're trolling or not...but is it really that hard to find a way to use CDRs aside from burning pirated material? How can you possibly tell if the usage of an online service has increased or decreased based on the amount of blank media sold of which only ONE of the many uses is to backup pirated files?
Re:Unreliable stats (Score:5, Informative)
AAA Predicted that 37.4 million Americans planned to travel over the holiday. --With the US population roughly at 291 million, that's about 13%..
For backup of my stats:
US Population Clock:
http://www.census.gov/main/www/popclock.html
Travel States: (search for July 4th on this google cached page)
http://216.239.37.104/search?q=cache:vb3Zo5s2UH
Heres the REAL news. File sharing traffic goes UP! (Score:5, Informative)
Silly File THIEVES and PIRATES use of P2P to commit robbery increases [washingtonpost.com]
There was an article on CNET about this... (Score:5, Informative)
Interesting quote from the head of Freenet [sourceforge.net]:
no recent change in stats (Score:5, Informative)
filesharing usage...here's the usage statistics today:
FastTrack 3,525,734
iMesh 1,175,244
eDonkey 770,032
Overnet 458,752
MP2P 199,214
These stats have actually remained fairly constant for a couple of
weeks now. Back in May there was a lot of fluctuation on the EDonkey
vs Overnet, and FastTrack was around 4.5M. I suppose it dropped
because college students went home for the summer.
At any rate, Slyck's stats have noted no increase or decrease in
filesharing in the last two weeks. So the media hype (both ways)
seems to be just that...hype.
Move along; nothing to see here.
Internal Time Warner memo (Score:1, Informative)
--
As many of you have probably read or heard, the Recording Industry
Association of America is engaged in a very public battle against
individuals using peer-to-peer Internet programs to swap copyrighted music
files. Their latest tactic, which they announced recently, is to identify
people who have made large numbers of songs available for uploading via P2P,
and then to sue them for copyright infringement. Some of these people will
undoubtedly be Road Runner customers. The purpose of this memo is to
describe for you the process that the RIAA is undertaking, and how we plan
to deal with it.
The RIAA has begun to troll the major P2P networks to collect the Internet
Protocol (IP) addresses for those individuals who are offering large numbers
of songs for uploading. These IP addresses are then tracked back to the
ISPs that control them. The RIAA then must issue subpoenas to the ISPs,
demanding that they turn over identifying information on the holders of the
accounts assigned to the IP addresses (i.e., the customer name, address,
telephone number and email address).
In the first three days of the RIAA's campaign, we have received subpoenas
directed at 18 customers in 4 divisions. Once the RIAA's campaign hits full
stride, we expect to receive several hundred subpoenas per month.
When we receive a subpoena, we will send a letter to the customer in
question notifying him/her that we are required to disclose his/her
identifying information to the RIAA. We will also provide the customer with
a copy of the subpoena, which includes contact information for the RIAA's
attorney. A copy of our standard letter is attached to this memo.
Most of the flow in responding to these subpoenas will be handled, at least
initially, by the Law Department. Road Runner has developed a tool that
allows us to tie the IP addresses to the specific customers and determine
their identifying information. The process is not perfect, and requires us
to get manual confirmation from the divisions' complaint coordinators before
the notice letters are sent to the customers. It is important that
confirmation is received promptly in order for us to provide advance notice
to our customers.
The letters to the subscribers will be signed by _____, who runs our
subpoena compliance program here in Stamford. To the extent letter
recipients want to contact TWC, we expect them to contact _____. If your
divisions receive phone calls or correspondence on this issue, please direct
the customers to ___________.
Thank you for your help with this. As always, if you have any questions
about any of this, please feel free to get in touch with us at any time.
Re:That's because I'm using iTunes now (Score:4, Informative)
I also have DSL and I'd be ok with the file sizes if they gave me an option of getting the WAV instead of the AAC but the AAC doesn't suck so I'm good. Hell since I'm mostly about downloading a track or two per album (and not always the "hit single" either) I'd even be willing to go a buck fifty to get the better quality file. Now a lot of people wouldn't but again, that's me.
I respect what you're saying but I think that based on the number of people who've been downloading MP3's and the price that iTunes is asking for individual tracks that they're going to appeal to plenty of people selling it the way they're doing. The Dial-ups are going to require the file size be small enough to at least get in a night and so many people out there are ok with the MP3/AAC kind of quality already that it will be a non-factor to most.
And In (still other) other news... (Score:3, Informative)
'LOSE', NOT 'LOOSE' (Score:0, Informative)
Re:Excellent point (Score:3, Informative)
If we want to be perfectly honest, let's stop calling it sharing -- it's not that either, it's distributing.
If you want to get really picky, it's making available for distribution.
Re:How were the measurements made. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:How were the measurements made. (Score:1, Informative)
So while this isn't a truly accurate method, it does give an indication of usage.
Re:Unreliable stats (Score:3, Informative)
Okay, the "real" statistical problems here...
IF those people using file-sharing apps form an essentially random cross-section of the population, and if none of those people had any way to engage in their normal filesharing activity while on vacation, then you would see the same percentage drop in filesharing as people going away for the long weekend - though only for the time they stayed away from home, so we have effectively a factor of 3/7ths on top of the raw number of vacationers.
(Quick summary of the above - under idealized conditions, a 13% travel rate that week would translate into a 5.6% drop in filesharing over the course of that week).
I see it as likely that the incidence of filesharers does NOT count as a random selection from the general US population. For the most obvious confounding factor, we could fairly consider both "travel" and "owns a decent computer with a broadband connection" as luxuries heavily dependant on income. This would cause the numbers as presented to increase, in that if a higher percentage of filesharers went on vacation than nonfilesharers.
For another confounding factor, looking at usage patterns over so short a period of time (for measuring social change) as a week carries very little weight. Large short-term fluctuations can occur in almost any measured variable. As an example, last week I had pizza for five meals, about three meals more than in a normal week. Can we attribute that to the RIAA's threats, or just a coincidence?
In order for the RIAA to validly claim their threats "caused" the drop in filesharing, they would need to somehow undo their threat and watch levels return to normal. And repeat that a number of times, with consistent results. And even then, they could only call it "likely" that their threats caused the changes.
Re:Pretty common scenario (Score:5, Informative)
I'll leave it as an exercise for the readers to find a reference for marsupial pouches.
Re:That's because I'm using iTunes now (Score:4, Informative)
1 Hrm...iTunes music store. 0.99$ sounds about right. Been meaning to pick up that new autechre album, anyways.
2. Search "autechre": returns 0 results.
3. Hey, that's a bummer. Lets see if they've got anything else.
4. Search "boards of canada": 0 results.
5. wtf
6. Search "aphex twin": 0 results.
7. wtf * 2
8. Ok fuck this. Preferences->Deactivate iTunes music store.
Maybe this has changed since last time I was on, but the selection sucks. Maybe autechre and boards of canada might be considered 'obscure', but aphex is on a major label and is quite well known. Until the iTunes store evolves from yet another place to buy eminem's music, I'm not putting any money into it.
Re:udpp2p (Score:4, Informative)
Re:udpp2p (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Reverse (Score:3, Informative)
Of cource you could try
www.earthstation5,com
The RIAA can't find you and it is free.
Re:you're shitting me, right? (Score:3, Informative)
I'm sure that probably a lot of music hasn't made it to iTunes yet that people are looking for. How can it not be? The sheer volume of stuff people want is incredible and hopefully it will all (or at least mostly) make it on there.
I think the thing to keep in mind is that yes, no commercial company can measure up to the file sharing networks RIGHT NOW but they're relatively new and have to take a much different approach to assembling their catalog than Napster and Kazaa did. The upside to this is that by doing it "by the book" they might be around 5 years from now and making a profit.
How can something that isn't even finished yet be obsolete? Before you judge them to be completely devoid of merit let them run for a while and take into account what they have to go through to make this music available in this manner.
iTunes probably works well for me because I'm not a big audiophile. I've got a lot of music by many peoples standards but my collection is probably tiny compared to many others. Much of the older stuff that I like (like the Beatles music) I already owned on CD's before Napster appeared so I don't feel a lot of need to go looking for it. Should I need it in the future though I'm sure it'll make it onboard.
Its not stealing, it's trespassing. (Score:5, Informative)
Seriously. No one calls "patent infringment" "patent, stealing", no one calls "trademark infringement" "trademark stealing".
Copyright infringement isn't stealing either, though they can both be independently illegal. The difference here is that the copyright holder doesn't lose his rights. His exclusivity is infringed upon, but nothing is taken.
If people are going to insist on analogizing it to something else, I would suggest TRESPASSING. If I put my foot in your yard, I've trespassed. But you still have your yard; you just aren't enjoying it exclusively.
Anyone who calls copyright infringement "stealing" has an agenda, and shouldn't be trusted.