Cringely Proposes a Music Sharing Alternative 730
WEFUNK writes "The I, Cringely 'Pulpit' column at PBS presents an interesting idea for a new business model to take on the RIAA. He suggests that a publicly traded company could legally and profitably buy a single copy of each record which could then be freely copied and listened to by its shareholders under fair use. His 'Snapster' (Son of Napster) proposal is essentially a digital music co-op that would let shareholders/consumers bring copyrighted material into a quasi-public domain. While fair use and the public domain continue to be lost in our courts and congresses, maybe the capital markets will offer an alternative." While a neat idea, it's doubtful that it'll ever be implemented. Still, it's a good read.
one word: my.mp3.com (Score:5, Informative)
Re:one word: my.mp3.com (Score:5, Informative)
It's a funny idea, but ultimately it's a silly one. It's the surest cause for the legislators to take away fair use, or change it so it's not so fair.
Say WHAT? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:It's been done (Score:1, Informative)
You can't legally copy entire works from the library, you can only use the original and return it. But nice try.
If you are in need of confirmation of this, try going into a music library and, in front of the clerk, photocopy a symphony. I guarantee you will be stopped.
Not Fair Use (Score:5, Informative)
The doctrine of fair use was originally adopted by judges ruling in early copyright cases. Ultimately, Congress incorporated the doctrine into the Copyright Act of 1976, where fair use is now codified at Section 107 of Title 17 of the U.S. Code. In creating section 107, Congress listed four factors to be considered in determining whether a use is fair or not:
(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether the use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
These factors are essentially the same factors that had been used over the years by judges, and Congress's stated intent was to preserve the fair use doctrine as it had evolved. However, as many courts have pointed out over the years, whether something constitutes fair use is very fact-specific. It is difficult to craft a clear, bright-line rule that explains which particular uses of a work are fair use and which are infringement. In short, the exact parameters of fair use are often determined based on the facts of specific cases.
Just from a quick look Cringely's idea, while novel, seems to violate several of the 4 criteria. This would be copyright infringement for comercial gain on a massive scale. No way any judge would believe that this falls under the intent of fair use.
Re:Open Letter to the Media Industry (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Best Article Ever (Score:5, Informative)
Your ignorance is equally breathtaking.
Cost to incorporate (where I live): $403.30
Cost to put your corporation on a penny stock [fool.com] market: Minimal (free? I'm not sure).
Amount of bookeeping required: Almost none, short of dealing with taxes. ZERO SEC requires, that's for sure.
You think such a corporation has to be Nasdaq listed or something? At best you might need to hire 1 accountant to get going. Big deal.
By the way, I'm incorporated. Want to buy shares? Well, I'm not selling right now, but the effort required by me is none. The only thing I'd have to send you is a paper saying how much stock you've bought, and get the accountant to record your purchase in the books. I never have to speak with you again, if I didn't want to. Total cost to me? About $0.10 if you include the price of the toilet paper your stock would be printed on along with the accountant's fee (assuming he enters everything in all together when closing the books at the end of the year, like with my corporation).
Here's a few examples [allpennystocks.com] that might be helpful to you. How many of them do you think are going to give out shareholder's packages every year? 2... maybe 3?
Re:Missing the point (Score:5, Informative)
Ownership is not transitive (at least in this sense). The assets of the corporation and the assets of the shareholders are separate (though the shares of the corporation are assets of the shareholders). Part of the definition of a corporation is that it is a separate entity from its shareholders.
Re:It's been done (Score:3, Informative)
Large publishing houses have a real love/hate relationship with libraries, on the one hand marketing to them heavily and on the other wishing they'd dry up and blow away.
Small publishers love the shit out of them, some of them making a living doing nothing but marketing to libraries.
KFG
Re:Best Article Ever (Score:4, Informative)
"Snapster is built on the legal concept of Fair Use, which allows people who purchase records, tapes, and CDs to make copies for backup and for moving the content to other media", says Cringely.
Baloney! That is not at all what Fair Use is. I am not sure what "lawyer friends" he spoke to, but if he bothered to read any of the Fair Use links on his own page, he might have thought twice about publishing this article. Fair use is what I did in the previous paragraph, quoting Cringely for purposes of criticism. It's always about partial copying of a work, and only for very specific enumerated purposes that are listed in the US copyright law (Title 17). Please see the actual law at http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107 [copyright.gov] if you don't believe me. It's quite an easy read. It discusses what is an infringement, and then lists exceptions, one of which is Fair Use (which is not the process Cringely describes).
Also, I believe media shifting is an entirely different topic. I am not sure where this exception to copyright infringement comes from (IANAL, but I don't see it in title 17. Can anybody post references to the legality of media shifting?). But the one thing I do know is that all the cases I have heard of it being legal have one thing in common: the use does not increase the number of copies being accessed simultaneously. When you make a backup of your media, you're not watching/listening to it at the same time as the original, or letting a friend do so.
Why not live our lives as corporations? (Score:4, Informative)
You can't just form a corporation with you as the sole director and owner, and escape liability, or taxes.
In a typical company, the corporate officers, and the board of directors, ARE responsible for what happens, and have a fair deal of personal liability for what the company does. Their assetts are not the company's, true, and if it's merely a matter of the company going bankrupt, they will be okay.. but in many places, if the company dodges taxes, it WILL be taken out of the director's pockets, and if the directors instruct the company to do something illegal... they can be held accountable.
A corporation exists sort of like another person, but not entirely.
Re:Wow this usage seems very fair (Score:2, Informative)
RAII is talking about a different animal, the pro, commercial music maker. They have a "product". You want it? Pay for it. I don't expect to be able to walk into a 7-11 and snatch a bottle of Coke and tell them "Soda must be FREE! WooHoo!"
Unless Coke puts a GNU/GPL on the bottle, I guess I'll just have to pony up the buck and a half...
Re:Best Article Ever (Score:5, Informative)
As I understand the mp3.com situation - and EMusic got bought by Vivendi and our tech got merged with theirs, so I've been down there a number of times and talked to a lot of people involved, and read the court decisions, etc. - what they got in trouble for was making the initial copy needed to compress the CDs to mp3 format. That's it.
The logic of the court is, basically, whatever mp3.com is doing is by definition for profit. If you're doing something for profit, it's by definition not fair use. The point of copyright law is to ensure that, if you make money off copying a copyrighted work, the copyright owner gets paid.
So, while it would be perfectly legal for you as an individual to copy those CDs, compress them and stream them to yourself, because mp3.com did it for you for their own profit, it's clear copyright violation.
It is exactly the same way that you can photocopy a book yourself in your home and it's fair use, but if you pay Kinko's to do it for you it's a copyright violation. On the surface it seems the same and it seems fair that you be able to pay Kinko's to save you the effort and investment of a photocopier, but the whole point of copyright law is that Kinko's can't copy works without paying the copyright owner.
People can rail against this as being cretinous, but I don't see how the current idea of copyright can continue without the law being like this. If you think copyright should exist at all (leaving aside questions like the lunacy of the DMCA's anti-circumvention provisions), then I don't see how the law could be any other than this and still work.
Obviously not everyone thinks there should be copyright, at all, but that's a different issue entirely.
Re:Why make a copy? (Score:5, Informative)
Which leaves us "renting" the CD through the mail. Ever wonder why you never see CD rental places in the US? Why there's not a "nettunz" to go with "netflix?" It's because they're illegal [cornell.edu]. According to USC Title 17, Section 109, "Limitations on exclusive rights: Effect of transfer of particular copy or phonorecord":
The edits are necessary for clarity because this section also has a lot of cumbersome language about software; go read the original if you doubt my interpretation. Why can actual libraries get away with it? Because the next sentence says, "Nothing in the preceding sentence shall apply to the rental, lease, or lending of a phonorecord for nonprofit purposes by a nonprofit library or nonprofit educational institution."
So, could you set up a nonprofit corporation to do this? I guess so, although it'd face all the normal challenges a nonprofit does in trying to find the money to build its collection. And, your strongly implied personal copy before return would itself be illegal. If it were used pretty much only for this purpose, and got big enough, I bet the RIAA would try to claim that the nonprofit should know there's monkey business going on and try to shut it down. Whether they could would be up to the courts.
Re:Best Article Ever (Score:3, Informative)
The closest thing US law has to a "library copy" for music is that nonprofits are allowed to lend music. For-profit companies are not. The cost of the music is the same. If you wish to negotiate a custom license from the copyright owner to allow sending it to all your shareholders, you may, of course, do that, but you can do that now and it doesn't take any novel ideas, just a fat wallet.
TOTN (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Why not live our lives as corporations? (Score:3, Informative)
You're correct, but you can escape A LOT of liability and you can pick and choose what assets go where. Also, there's a lot more flexibility in tax law with corporations than there is with individuals. Essentially, if the income you make goes back into the corporation as capital (that could be a new MP3 player) its a business expense.
Re:Best Article Ever (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Red Cent (Score:2, Informative)
One red cent
Meaning: A single symbolic penny.
Example: I refuse to pay even one red cent for the work until you complete the whole job.
Origin: The "Red" refers to both the color of a penny (one cent) and the image that used to be on the penny, an American Indian head. Redskin is a slang term used for American Indians.
Before today's Lincoln penny was the Indian Head penny.
The Indian Head penny was first issued in 1859 and looks just like that as issued in 1908 (before the Lincoln Cent). The only difference was that those from 1859-1864 were of a different copper-nickel alloy while 1864 started the common bronze, which was used until 1982. (You didn't know it changed then, did you?)
The copper-nickel alloy has a reddish tint, which turns redder with time and skin oil.
Before the Indian Head penny was the "Buzzard Cent", as the One Cent coins in 1856-1858 were called. The flying eagle on the coin was damned as an ugly bird and it wasn't popular.
However, it was the first "small cent" using about the same size as our penny today. In the half century before this, One Cent coins were about the size of today's Half Dollar! (of course they were also worth something then)