Fast CD-R Drives Make For Twice the Piracy 524
Bowie J. Poag notes this Register story about an RIAA copyright infringement bust in New York. The RIAA claims the operation had the equivalent of 421 CD-burners, which, translated from RIAA-speak, means "156 CD-burners but some of them were fast". How they expect anyone to take their statistics seriously is beyond me.
My CDR is really slow... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:My CDR is really slow... (Score:5, Interesting)
Funny math. Next thing you'll see is that your PC is a few thousand times faster than the average computer! (ENIAC as basline? Maybe a 8mhz 286?)
Re:My CDR is really slow... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:My CDR is really slow... (Score:5, Insightful)
The "More is Better" School of Statistics (Score:5, Interesting)
Not statistics at all (Score:5, Insightful)
This reminds me of virtually any tax debate in Congress, excpet there it is at least partly statistics -- trying to extrapolate from known values and economic relationships to determine future revenue. WIth the RIAA, at least in the present example, we see simple nonsense. Of course, this sould be the work of the PR people, a group not known for math skills.
As for "the idea of increased sales through increased exposure" that's a matter for speculation, and a decision I feel that is wholly up to sellers to determine, not the consumer. I imagine the relationship of publicity (earned at the sacrifice of some profits) to ultimate profits (the number they really care about -- not sales) is a curve of some sort, with diminishing returns beyond a certain point of giveaway music. More efficient piracy will not advance the game, rather it may give the beneficiaries an added sense of entitlement, and reduced obligation to pay the big bad record labels for anything. This is not so much civil disobedience as yielding to temptation while feeling justified for just desserts or educating the greedbags.
On the publicity point, recall that Napster and P2P are pull not push mechanisms; you have to request what you want, thus you already know something about it and probably like it. This is less likely to spur sales than push, where the studios would promote music that is not yet established, and which they believe need promotion.
Someone MUST have done a decent study of this question
As an ethical matter marketing should be left to the sellers, with input from consumers but not pressure in the form of piracy. They have a right to be stupid; we do not have a right to coerce. If I were the seller, losing music to piracy would not immediately dispose me to start giving "samples" away for free -- I might go the RIAA route, even if it were illogical. Psychologically, it has to be a decision they feel they made on their own, or that upstarts demonstrate to be viable. Also, if the sellers can make more money not giving out free music, I can't blame them for a second.
Yes, but more importantly.... (Score:5, Funny)
This is the equivilant of 40 first posts, isn't it (Score:5, Funny)
Re:This is the equivilant of 40 first posts, isn't (Score:3, Funny)
Re:This is the equivilant of 40 first posts, isn't (Score:5, Funny)
Does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Does this mean... (Score:2)
Re:Does this mean... (Score:5, Interesting)
Now, if the product is a copyright violation, is the script itself a violation as well? What does the I-ANAL crowd think?
Re:Does this mean... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Does this mean... (Score:3, Informative)
Tell that to the guy that had to go to court and give up a six figure settlement [cnn.com] because Cage's estate sued for copyright infringement... for making his own version of that 'song'
perhaps they used the same math.. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:perhaps they used the same math.. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:perhaps they used the same math.. (Score:5, Insightful)
In 1984, they kept trying to get Winston to believe that 2+2=5, if it suited the Party's purposes to make that assertion. We now have the RIAA trying to get us to believe that 156=421, if it suits the RIAA's purposes to make that assertion. Coincidence?
Is it just me... (Score:2)
My god the humanity! They'll be able to make their own cd's! Why wasn't this reported before.
15 first posts (Score:3, Funny)
Re:15 first posts (Score:2, Funny)
Wow, it really works!
Re:15 first posts (Score:3, Insightful)
So if I download something with the T1 at work it's like stealing 1,000 songs? And if I burn them with my 24x burner, it's like burning 6 CD's?
Methinks we have discovered the formula that the RIAA/MPAA/BSA uses to come up with their "piracy" statistics...
Calculate what could have been copied on PC equipment circa 1987 and multiply by Moore's Law...
RIAA Math: Add more examples here... (Score:5, Funny)
MP3 over P2P (Score:5, Funny)
Re:RIAA Math: Add more examples here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Acutally, infinite isn't correct. The number of violations would be limited to the number of people in the world - 1. Oh wait, I forgot, they need a seperate license for the song for at work, in the car, and at home. Oops, wrong again, everyone needs a seperate license for each device they use at work, in the car, and at home. Woops, would they also need a seperate license for the song if they ran a dual boot and wanted to play the song on each OS but on the same system?
I guess you were right, an infinite number of copyright violations are possible!
Re:RIAA Math: Add more examples here... (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, if someone has a pirated copy then all their descendents, and their descendents' descendents and so on have access to that pirated material as well, thus robbing the RIAA of income for an infinite succession of generations.
What's more, it's uncountably infinite.
THESE are the people they should be going after (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:THESE are the people they should be going after (Score:5, Insightful)
What we are suffering from today is a perversion of copyright; the notion of intellectual property, which has been regarded (legally) as actual property, and so we come to the absurd situation where someone can be considered to have 'stolen' intellectual property (and thus harmed the owner) without:
Thus when entities such as the RIAA assert that 'theft' of intellectual property is costing them money, they are asserting that the following process is taking place:
Re:THESE are the people they should be going after (Score:4, Insightful)
We live in a world where information has value. Laws have been created/altered to take that into consideration. Remember, IP laws were originally created to prevent stagnation--if someone can't make a living off of their IP, they won't continue creating it.
That hasn't changed. What has changed is the fact that copies of the information can be had for pennies. For some reason people can't seem to conceptualize the fact that there is something wrong with copying something you don't have the rights to. They seem to think that because they haven't actually taken anything away from the original owner, it isn't theft. They're right--it's not theft in the conventional sense. But it is still a violation of copyright laws. It is, to some extent, immoral because the creators of the IP had a good faith agreement with the population (through the government) that their IP will not be used without compensation. By living in a country which acknowledges and respects IP, you agree to follow those laws. You agree in the same way that you agree to obey any other law. You don't break the speed limit (or if you do, you deal with the consequences). You don't hurt or injure others. If you don't like a particular law, there are (usually) ways to go about trying to repeal them.
You say that the RIAA asserts that 'theft' of IP costs them money. Whether this is correct or not is up for debate (although I am inclined to believe that more people don't buy music they have downloaded than actually do, and I suspect that there are some people who would have bought the music if they hadn't had it available for "free"), however it is against their law and it is within the RIAA's rights to enforce their copyrights. They may actually lose money in these enforcement practices--it's impossible to say for sure--however it is within their rights to control their IP.
You can call them foolish, you can cite examples where they would make more money by allowing copyright violations, however that does not give you the right to illegally copy their property.
Piracy for Profit... (Score:3, Interesting)
Statistics? (Score:5, Funny)
Who, the RIAA's or The Register's?
(ba-dum-bum-cha!)
RIAA in a spin over CD copying bust (Score:3, Informative)
"Perhaps the truth is less interesting than the facts?" asked Amy Weiss, the RIAA's Senior Vice President of Communications recently in this email to The Register.
It's a question which has baffled many of our readers, and us too. Perhaps it's a kind of Zen koan, which needs to be repeated many times before making sense. If so, we can't report any success.
But the RIAA seems to be having a few problems with the facts itself.
Yesterday it issued a press release announcing a piracy bust in New York which unearthed 421 CD-R burners.
Only there weren't 421 burners, but "the equivalent of 421 burners."
In fact, there were just 156. How did the RIAA account for this discrepancy?
"There were only 156 actual burners, but some run at very high speeds: some as high as 40x. This is well above the average speed," was the official line yesterday.
Apparently another example of the Association's difficulty grappling with new technology. After the RIAA's website was hacked, with large sections rendered inaccessible, spokespersons explained the difficulties were due to a sudden upsurge in popularity.
Well, that's one way of putting it.
The other curious aspect of yesterday's release is the use of Secret Service agents in the bust. The Secret Service, we naively presumed, was employed to protect high-ranking elected officials.
Re:RIAA in a spin over CD copying bust (Score:5, Insightful)
If you are a computer criminal, depending on the exact circumstances of your offense you will either be visited by customs, secret service, FBI, or local police.
As for this whole 156=421 thing. Does this mean I can sell my burner on ebay? It's pretty fast can I say 2 CD burners! only takes up one drive bay!
There's nothing wrong with burning CDs for personal/fair use. However, despite the number of burner discrepancy, this was an actualy piracy operation. It's not only illegal but not right. People like that should get busted.
Re:RIAA in a spin over CD copying bust (Score:3, Funny)
now he only need one copy because he will visit one room for a looooong time
Re:RIAA in a spin over CD copying bust (Score:2, Informative)
Re:RIAA in a spin over CD copying bust (Score:2, Insightful)
The Secret Service's original purpose was to catch conterfeiters. That's why they are part of the Treasury dept (although this will change with Bush's re-org)
Re:RIAA in a spin over CD copying bust (Score:2, Informative)
OT: What's wrong with US law enforcement (Score:5, Insightful)
This is the big problem with Federal law enforcement -- there's so many different law enforcement arms, and few of them like to cooperate with the others. I heard on NPR that they want to form yet another to combat terrorism! Why not have:
(1) FBI -- Enforce federal criminal statutes, including counterfeiting and narcotics, as well as felon apprehension. This gets rid of the DEA, the non-protective Secret Service roles and the Marshalls Service. Essentially focuses on criminal acts comitted in the United States.
(2) Homeland security. Immigration, border security, customs, counter-terrorism, counter-espionage and government protection, including Presidential Security. Eliminates border patrol, customs service, and the rest of the Secret Service function. Essentially focuses on crimes involving extra-national activities and government security.
The constitutional standards for (1), which would mostly involve US citizens, could then be kept higher without a risk to national security.
Re:And RIAA's Press Release... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:And RIAA's Press Release... (Score:2)
If they had said "the equivalent of 421 12x CD-R burners", that would have been a bit more accurate.
What I find funniest about this story is the link to the RIAA:
http://riaa.org/PR_Story.cfm?id=592
"PR STORY?"
Not good PR, but PR nonetheless I suppose.
More numbers (Score:4, Funny)
And those three individuals were actually fifty four guys but they have rights equivalent of three normal citizens.
Actually this is a good thing right ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Actually this is a good thing right ? (Score:5, Insightful)
If they keep this stuff up, eventually everything they do will be dismissed as wrong -- no one will even bother to look for the merits.
Re:Actually this is a good thing right ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why would they issue some half-assed stat like the one given when they could have done this?
Two answers:
1) They're not competent enough to do that
2) They are, but have a motive that precludes them from presenting a clear picture.
It's alot like the Iraq isssue. I've read convincing arguments for an Iraqi invasion from German Marxists... and the stuff our right-wing hawkish administration presents "has a certain syrup, but just doesn't pour." (Gertrude Stein phrase, I believe). Why is it so hard to make a convincing case when there's a convincing case to be made? I think it's the wrong motives. They keep even otherwise adequately intelligent people from seeing the obvious.
You forgot... (Score:3)
Re:Actually this is a good thing right ? (Score:3, Informative)
I'm all for freedom of speech and lebensraum to use what I legally buy, but "35,000 finished CD-Rs, 10,000 DVDs" can hardly be concidered fair use. No matter how fast the drives used to make them were.
I don't appreciate the creative math of course, but 35k pirate cds is not something to stand up for (assuming no twiddling was done in that figure)
Re:Actually this is a good thing right ? (Score:5, Insightful)
because it is illegal?
because the music industry makes less money?
because we won't have as nice music if the music industry struggles?
because someone is making money doing things that are illegal?
I have come to the point in my life where (right and wrong) and (legal
and illegal) are now completely separate, and surprisingly, not even
aligned completely.
Should we have laws that support a bloated industry that controls
access to information -- simply because they have existed in the past
and have enough money to have laws passed that perpetuate their
existence? I think not. after the repeal of some law in 1996 that
limited media channels to 40 stations, clearchannel now owns like 1400
stations (estimate) and have has one of the top 4 stations in like 90%
of all metropolitan areas. One source.
In fact, I think people like music, and people will always make nice
music and it will be available. we have the ability to make it
happen. simply fuck the money part. for all of you who start jumping
on me about how naive that idea is -- ask yourself first how much you
depend on the 'current context' of "it's just the way things work now"
to judge that idea.
However: regardless of legality, should we even have a centralized
organization that, in effect, makes decisions about what music is
popular and available, and at what price? I think not.
And if you think about it long enough -- and this one will draw flak
I'm sure -- I've also come full circle on the social contract for
intellectual property. In most cases, the contract is no longer
helpful to society, it's just benefitting the ip holders. In effect,
without much explanation here, I conclude we should scrap/eliminate
the majority of our IP protections, or at least change them
significantly.
If people are interested I'd be glad to share my views on why IP has
come so far its generals bad -- but that is much longer post.
As for my initial question -- I reject ALL of my hypothetical
answers. In fact, if you go even a very little bit outside our current
context, it's pretty easy to see that copying is NOT bad at all, at
least in the (right and wrong) sense.
Re:Actually this is a good thing right ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Good and bad need to be quantified. They're inarticulate words for such maters. Let's substitute those for moral and amoral. Let's also consider "copying" to mean "propogating of idea or art", as this is the subject being discussed. We'll also ignore the fact that every action a computer takes is a copy.
Immediately with this defintion, most slashdotters will think "copying is good!" The reasoning is that all sciences and arts benefit when their practicioners are exposed to new ideas. Programmers and engineers are intimate with this notion, as their occupations firmly rooted in and built upon the idea. The paradoxal result is that value is attributed to information; information becomes valuable. These are seperate things.
So, here we have the two sides of the coin: Scientists and Artists can further their crafts by being exposed to new works. On the other side, the copyright side, Science and Art is furthered when its practicioners are given incentive to create and explore. Copyright, and Copyleft; Only one of them has federal backing.
The copyright side says that any copying diminishes the incentive to create new works. The RIAA says this penalize artists and society, but the RIAA also calls decreasing profit growth rates (market saturation) a loss. The first part is true, but only some times.
And there is your answer. Copying is "bad" as long as it removes the incentive to create new works. The great divide is between the letter and spirit of the law. The letter leaves interpretation open that the incentive for new works should come from the author, while the spirit is simply that "new works" be incented [reference.com] (not a Bushism). Progress is the spirit, and the spirit doesn't give a damn about ancestral authors, so long as they are given their due.
Society always builds on the works that came before. Cultural progress is retarded when access to previous works is restrained. Because these new works are built upon previous works, they compete with the ancestral work. Because this competition diminishes the author's incentive over time, the past always tries to control the future.
I feel this is evidence of a strong imbalance in the current system. The drive for survival is normal, but when it is given force over the struggling newborn, something is sick. Free societies must restrain the past from controlling the future.
Equivalent (Score:2, Funny)
Is that like 'the equivalent of being pregnant'?
Either they're capable of writing CD-Rs, or they're not, sheesh.
You see... (Score:5, Funny)
I hope you're right (Score:3, Funny)
Re:I hope you're right (Score:5, Insightful)
It's logic like that that allows the DEA to prosecute people for playing techno music and selling bottled water (something the DEA has officially classified as "Drug Paraphernalia")
Re:You see... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:You see... (Score:5, Funny)
So does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:So does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
The register needs to check its facts (Score:3, Informative)
The other curious aspect of yesterday's release is the use of Secret Service agents in the bust. The Secret Service, we naively presumed, was employed to protect high-ranking elected officials[*]. Perhaps this is a further indication of who's really in charge.®
Uhh... no.. actually, the Secret Service was created to track down counterfeiters [bbc.co.uk].
Re:The register needs to check its facts (Score:5, Informative)
*Bootnote: In fact the task of talking into one's sleeve at a press conference only came 28 years after the Service was
counterfeit money (Score:5, Interesting)
As you should now be able to see, none of this applies to any of the CDs which were being burned at higher than average speed.
Statistics (Score:5, Insightful)
The **AA doesn't give a damn what the general public thinks--this is all PR for bought-and-paid-for politicians. The lobbyists will show up, wave around these silly statistics, flash some money and boom! suddenly there will be more laws/levies/taxes on recordable media faster than you can type 'cdrecord'.
Equivalent, eh? (Score:2)
As Disraeli put it... (Score:2)
C'mon, such a huge percentage of all statistics out there are dubious. Did you really think the RIAA is above a little "data cooking"?
I have three cars!!! (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah... I think that'll work...
Would someone PLEASE bust them for lying. I can't even consider this "spin doctoring." You can't make a claim with any amount of seriousness that a "fast" cd writer is the equivalent of two or more "average speed" drives. I can't decide which is worse: Scientology or the RIAA.
Re:I have three cars!!! (Score:4, Funny)
I do so NOT want to pay insurance for the truckload of motorcycles [gpz1100.com] I would have to claim... I'd rather just pay the fines (or "fun tax" as I like to call them. :-)
What's next? (Score:5, Funny)
Just another sign of these idiots' attempts to ignore the progress of technology out of sheer stupidity and too much laziness to develop new business models that embrace it.
Oh, and I'd like to declare... (Score:2)
But I use the Evil Commie P1-r4t OS Linux... maybe the RIAA will come get me for that one
And you are surprised? (Score:3, Insightful)
I would think /.ers already knew our four letter friends (MPAA, RIAA, etc) lie through their teeth at every avaliable opportunity. They keep saying how p2p is running them into the ground (yet keep posting remarkable profits) and how nobody buys CDs anymore because of it (yet they manage to sell hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of carefully marketed trash from Dion and Spears).
The fact that they count funny when doing a "bust" of evil pirates is exactly what I'd expect. I'd be surprised if they came out with an announcement stating that
-- MG
I bet the RIAA doesn't use basic economics (Score:3, Insightful)
These groups, I'm sure, don't use take into account "Opportunity cost". Just because I bought a pirated CD for $2 (or obtained it for free), doesn't mean I would also pay $20 for a legimate copy if no pirated copies existed.
Or equivalently... (Score:5, Funny)
421 !=156 (Score:3, Insightful)
As Benjamin Disraeli said, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics". We all know which kind were looking at here.
Re:421 !=156 (Score:5, Funny)
Sorry for the language.
How did they get 421? (Score:3, Interesting)
The only reason the RIAA published this number is to make the media grab it more. This is the same thing they did with "Everyone using Napster is pirating music", which wasn't exactly true (many were, but not all). The media ate up the RIAA's headline, and ignored the real truth behind it.
Now I understand... (Score:2, Funny)
The automotive insurance companies must use the same "math", and since my car is so fast they are charging me like I have two (possible three :-) )...
IN SOVIET RUSSIA... (Score:2, Funny)
$90 Million Anually (Score:5, Funny)
Doesn't add up. RIAA's math skills should be used to power interstellar space ships.
Re:$90 Million Anually (Score:3, Funny)
I believe they were - and NASA lost a couple expensive toys because of it.
Hope they have decent load balancers (Score:2)
ASUS 52X drives? (Score:2, Funny)
What about the DVD-Rs? (Score:2)
And if there were DVD-Rs there, did they count them in the CDR numbers?
Since DVD 18 can hold roughly 17 gigs, did they count that as 18+ burners?
When the RIAA reports these numbers, it makes me wonder how they do their taxes.
"Well, let's see. I gave a dollar to the kids in Ethiopia, and there are 3 million kids, so I'm going to write this off as the equivelent of 3 million dollars, because I don't know which kid is going to get it. Hmm, that sounds about right..."
Another "Equivalence" (Score:3, Insightful)
"The Recording Industry Association of America is the trade group that represents the U.S. recording industry."
Indeed. Well, their supporting facts to indicate that they represent the entirety of the recording industry includes this:
"RIAA® members create, manufacture and/or distribute approximately 90% of all legitimate sound recordings produced and sold in the United States."
So, you've heard it here, folks. 90% = 100%.
The proof of the corollary theorem, 1 = 2, is left as an exercise to the reader.
Re:Another "Equivalence" (Score:3, Insightful)
a=b
a^2=ba
a^2-b^2=ba-b^2
(a+b)(a-b)=b(a-b)
a+b=b
b+b=b
2b=1b
2=1
--Joey
This is what the RIAA should be doing (Score:5, Interesting)
When the HRAA (home recording rights act) was passed, it set a dangerous precedent of being presumed guilty. No matter how one wished to use home stereo equipment which can copy audio digitally, one was treated like a media pirate.
For example, when I was burning a CD of my own music (which I own the copyright on) two years ago, I was not allowed to make a digital copy of one of my songs to the new CD. What happened was that a flag saying the song was a copy was set; my CD recorder does not allow me to make digital copies of copies. It assumes that all such activity is piracy, even though I use this equipment to make copies of my own songs.
In addition, the CD player forces me to pay extra for CD blanks because it assumes that my activities are copyright infringment activities. In other words, I have to pay the media companies royalties for the privledge of copying my own music. Fortunatly , there is a bug in the firmware which allows me to work around this issue and use far more inexpensive "computer" CDR blanks.
The RIAA and MPAA are trying to cripple computers in a similar manner, which such abominations as the SSSCA. They should stop treating honest computer users like criminials and start persecuting people who willfully engage in piracy.
People who do not think piracy is a problem are mainly in the US, where it is not the kind of problem it is in other countries. In México, for example, one can hardly walk down a street in a shopping district without noticing stands where people sell burned copies of music CDs, complete with inkjet printouts of the cover art for the CD. These kinds of sales do hurt the profits of the RIAA. Obviously not to the extent that every person who buys a burned copy is someone who would have bought a legitimate copy otherwise, but certaintly to a lesser extent.
The people who willfully pirate music and movies need to be persecuted to the fullest extent of the law; I will go so far as to say that the law needs to be set up to make persecuting these people easier. But only the guilty should be punsished; methods for duplicating and distributing music and movies, which are very helpful for promoting independent artists, should not be crippled by the media companies.
- Sam
Old wine in new bottles (Score:5, Funny)
"We estimate the marijuana had a street value of 4.5 million dollars."
(Yes, if you sold it one eighth at a time to desperate, confused rich people.)
Re:Old wine in new bottles (Score:3, Interesting)
Big guys wanna take out the small guys, but big guys need to spin doctor it enough so that small guys look bad, so no one really notices the big guys' work in the noise. Big guys get to keep high prices and big guys make big government very happy. Small guys not very good as they undercut prices of the 'goods'. Big government keeps 'save the children' people happy because they are getting rid of the small guys. Also big goverment labelled small guys as 'Terrorists or Funding Terrorists', so that big guys are even more happy.
All in all more drug trade profit == more money and "donations".
'nuff said.
RIAA and reproduction (Score:5, Funny)
Therefor, a man who fucks for 5 minutes before delivering the cream to the woman, must result in triplets.
Of course, we're just talking about successful cases here... and I don't want to think about the poor guys who comes after 30 seconds...
Why not quote a "burn-rate" instead? (Score:5, Informative)
First, congrats to the RIAA for shutting down a real piracy operation. However, if they wanted to get the idea across without messing with the facts, why didn't they say something like "...able to churn out X CDs a day..."? They obviously went through the trouble of doing some sort of calculation to come with that 156 burners = 421 average burners, why not put it in real world terms? Shouldn't be too hard to come up with really big numbers like:
(x_burners)(average_CD_burnt_per_minute)*24*60
Lets say average_CD_burnt_per_minute (aka burn rate) of a 20x burner burning a 70-minute CD is:
20/70min = 0.286 CD/min
You have a fascility churning out:
156*0.286*24*60 = 64,247 CDs/day
Now isn't that a much more impressive number? (assuming I've got me numbers correct; my brain only half-works on Sundays, which is how I average more than a whole brain during the week
Re:Why not quote a "burn-rate" instead? (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems like the RIAA wants the CD burner to be equated with piracy, because they want to be the only ones who can legally make CDs of any kind, forgetting that other people can create and release music content too.
From the other side (Score:2, Interesting)
Why exactly is the SS involved here? (Score:3, Insightful)
From http://www.secretservice.gov/mission.shtml [secretservice.gov]
I don't see anything there about IP law, Fraudulent CD's, or other Piracy or theft laws. The Secret Service protects the president, and investigates Counterfeit CURRENCY, Securities Fraud, Bank Fraud, and other Financial Crime Thats why they are part of the Department of the TREASURY
So what were they doing at RIAA's latest Bust exactly? Though the Register did get the SS's role wrong, they were right in presuming that they really shouldn't have been part of this bust.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:where are we headed.. (Score:4, Funny)
you're using their bad logic (Score:3, Funny)
Guns don't kill people any more than spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.
35,000 CD's? Or 32,500? (Score:4, Insightful)
Perhaps the "35,000" CD's that were recovered were really 32,500 700MB CD's, but since they have a greater capacity, they "qualify" as being 35,000 650MB CD's.
That's 2947 in Dog CD Burners. (Score:4, Funny)
(I know. It's bad. I'm sorry.)
Re:repeat after me... (Score:2)
(Waiting for the smartass "Who? The RIAA or the pirates?" response from some immature
Re:repeat after me... (Score:2)
Re:repeat after me... (Score:4, Insightful)
CD burners are not a unit by which you can measure piracy, nevermind inflated "equal to" units of CD burners. The RIAA's purpose was to put the confusing math in the press release, so that hopefully dumb reporters would report that they had "over 400 CD burners" in their operation, rather than print the rather unimpressive number of CDs they distributed.
Re:Yeah.. (Score:2)
RIAA always forget to tell us that the other 79% buy more;)"
And I'm one of them. I'd have never bought Avril Lavigne, Michelle Branch, and Vanessa Carlton's album if I hadn't been able to use Kazzaa Lite to sample them in advance.
Glad I did, they are awesome.
Re:Yeah.. (Score:4, Funny)
Are you serious?
Re:subject (Score:3, Funny)
what does illegal music sound like? i'm not familiar with that particular genre...