RIAA Obtains Subpoenas Against File Swappers 1046
SniperPuppy writes "Fox News is reporting that the RIAA has secured 871 subpoenas against suspected file swappers, with 75 more being approved each day. Between this, and the latest versions of FreeNet and Kazaa Lite being released, will technology be able to keep traders away from court?" Apparently, just suing the "major offenders" wasn't enough of a warning shot, so now they're going after people who share as few as eight songs. Wait until the RIAA discovers all the stuff that gets posted to Usenet!
Shhh! (Score:5, Funny)
Pay the EFF now, or Pay the RIAA later. (Score:5, Insightful)
These are your options. Pick one.
RIAA [riaa.com]
Re:Pay the EFF now, or Pay the RIAA later. (Score:5, Funny)
(don't kill me for the bad pun please)
Here's another one. (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's another one. Don't break the law. The courts don't give a damn what you think about music or the RIAA. You can think music should be free all you want. That isn't going to change the fact that someone else has the copyright to it, not you. And despite the wailing and gnashing of teeth here, last time I checked, there was no right to copyright infringement of any kind. Just because it's cheap, and easy, and it's music doesn't get you an exemption in the eyes of the law. And don't scream fair use at me either. Distributing a song to 100,000 of your closest friends on KaZaa isn't fair use.
Oh, and I seem to recall most of Slashdot's posters saying "Go after the infringers, not the technology!"
Well, looks like they called the bluff. Now that they're actualy suing individuals, the tune around here seems to have changed.
Re:Here's another one. (Score:4, Interesting)
Here's another one. Don't break the law.
RIAA is after money, and whatever you are doing will become illegal unless you do something about it..
Sad but true ..
Time to break the bastards (Score:3, Insightful)
If we want the system to change, maybe we need to REALLY work at changing it, and that means bankrupting the record labels. You can help. Share everythi
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
NOTE TO RIAA (Score:5, Interesting)
The ONLY people we care about are the artists, and while your endless speeches talk about how music pirates are hurting artists, we KNOW that the only people we are hurting are the labels.
You, the labels, are the fucking hypocrite here. You shamelessly abuse the people we actually DO care about (the artists) and then sue US for hurting the artists??? Maybe you have forgotten, but WE ARE YOUR ONLY SOURCE OF INCOME.
Enjoy your BMWs and Mercedes while you have them, because the second there's a way to cut you and your friends out of this picture, we will do it, and I will then start buying music again because I, unlike you, actually DO care about the artists.
Rot in hell in the meantime.
Stop being a crybaby and pay for the damned music. (Score:4, Funny)
You are robbing millions of musicians who wouldnt make a penny before you started stealing music.
You are robbing rich CEOs who desperately need your money to buy their new set of houses and car collection
You are robbing millions of tax payers who will be forced to bailout the RIAA when the RIAA forces Bush to give them 20-30 billion dollars of your tax dollars.
Just give them the money. Or do you want them to steal it?
Re:Stop being a crybaby and pay for the damned mus (Score:3, Insightful)
Regardless of weather the RIAA is right or wrong in their ethical practices using Kazaa et al. is being just as unethical. If we want to sink the RIAA (and believe me I would) I would feel a whole lot better with boycotts and legaslation.
I can't believe that there aren't enough people who care on /. alone that we can't fight this fight standing rather than just pirating the music. Doing that says that you don't care that the RIAA is a megalomaniacal organization, but rather that you 'just hafta hear' the
Horseshit (Score:5, Insightful)
128K MP3s are promotional goods of NO commercial value outside their use in getting people to buy the real products, which are CDs and better than broadcast quality digital tracks. no moral or ethical issues here, other than the question of "why are people giving the record labels free bandwidth and promotional exposure?" Only RIAA propaganda says their is some. You can't believe everything coming out of your TV set.
Piracy has NOTHING to do with this, otherwise the RIAA would be spending their lobbying bucks on getting Congress to pressure foriegn governments into closing down bootleg CD PRESSING PLANTS pumping out bogus RIAA member content by the millions of copies.
This is about control. It isn't that the record companies mind us paying to distribute their content. It's that you and I have the same access to P2P channels to distribute our own material that they do, and they fear that they can't play on a level playing field even with billions in budgets and exclusive control over radio and major venue concert distribution.
Illegal? Certainly. But only because they bought and paid for politicians to make it so. The law said "swap audio on analog tape = legal, swap audio as broadcast-quality digital files - go to jail."
Your parents swapped audio tapes with ultimately, the blessing of the RIAA. Tape swapping got the word out and ultimately turned the Grateful Dead and ironically, Metallica into successes.
The record industry doesn't want it to be possible for musicians to succeed outside their system.
Not that it's a bad idea to stop uploading RIAA member tracks to P2P. They don't deserve distribution help. They deserve oblivion.
You really want to hurt the RIAA member labels?
If you just stop buying, they'll blame piracy and buy worse laws. Want Palladium made compulsory?
Just take every dollar you spend on entertainment and spend it on independent musicians. Go to their gigs, buy their records.
When the CEOs of the multinationals that own the RIAA labels find that the only record labels that are increasing profits are ones not affiliated with the RIAA or their lobbyists, the whines about piracy from label CEOs will cease to be accepted as excuses.
Their next logical move is to dump the brands the major CEOs have irretreveably tainted in the public eye. Their new investors will be buying catalogues and artists contracts, why would they be picking up the contracts of the management that destroyed their own companies?
Perhaps the new "Big 5" will be Apple, HP, Microsoft, Dell, and IBM.
Does this mean that music won't be run by fuckheads? No, but at least the fuckheads running the new music industry will live in the same world the rest of us do.
The ARTISTS pay for radio time, not the labels! (Score:4, Informative)
This is part of the reason why only a handful of the very successful artists actually make money.
The labels are a sort of specialized bank, giving a lot of money to artists (well, not actually giving it to the artists, but spending it on behalf of the artists, and then billing the artists for it).
Performance vs Distribution (Score:3, Insightful)
You're confusing performance of the song -- playing it over a radio with very strict rules as to how the listeners can control what they're hearing -- and distribution -- getting a copy of the recording of the specific song you want.
Yes, artists want their songs to get a lot of radio performance so that people will *buy* the actual distributio
an obvious point (Score:3, Informative)
I regard this as a distinction without a difference from the point of view of exposing the audience to promotional material.
Yes, artists want their songs to get a lot of radio performance so that people will *buy* the actual distributions of the recordings.
For many many pe
Re:Stop being a crybaby and pay for the damned mus (Score:5, Insightful)
BUT -- you do not own the images. The images are not property. A copy of the image is not theft, for you do not own the image.
IF someone steals your physical property, theft is committed. If someone copies the photos, it is a copyright violation, which is a civil offense which should carry no criminal penalties, only monetary ones as determinted by a court.
I know it is common for artists and corporations to think that ideas or words or images are their property. But those things are not property.
Copyright was instituted to insure that, for a limited time, creators of new art could receive money for their work, *in order to increase the body of art and knowledge for all*. The idea was not to create a new body of property. Copyright exists to reward effort, for a limited time, and then, *the ideas or art are released for the good of all*.
The U.S. for most of its history refused to honor the copyrights of any other nation, much less consider such as property. Only in the 20th century did the idea of "intellectual property" arise. It is a new idea, a meme that could eventually retard science, medicine, art, politics, teaching, the list is endless.
One of the first proponents of "IP" on the net was Scientology, who initiated the first IP lawsuits against netizens back in the early '90's. The cult wanted to stop ex-members from talking about what they had been told, what they had read, based on the idea that the cult "owned" all that information as a trade secret. They've been the major backer of the DMCA and the new copyright police state.
You can't own patterns of information, which is what content actually is. But a new regime in the U.S. wants to create this new law, and they are getting away with it by selling the idea that they are protecting artists.
They aren't. Artists have historically been robbed, in payments for books, TV, music, movies, you name it. Artists who want to view their work as property are actually selling their souls to immortal corporations which will actually own the works in perpetuity.
Viewing artistic works as property will ruin the artists themselves. Keep copyright laws as they should be: don't give the major corportate powers the ability to acquire ownership of all the works of man -- for all eternity.
Re:Stop being a crybaby and pay for the damned mus (Score:5, Insightful)
Like I said, I'm a photographer. I do a lot of weddings, and one of the services I like to offer my brides is to put their wedding photos in a slideshow on a DVD, set to music. Makes it really easy to show all their friends and family their photos, because you can just drop the disc in the player, and show it to everybody on the big screen.
Well, at first I thought I would like to put big-name songs on the DVD to go along with their photos. So I call up ASCAP, who manages the copyrights for just about every artist out there, and asked how much it would be to sync some big-name songs to my photos. I wanted to make about three copies of the DVD (one for the couple, and one for each set of parents). Try $50/song. Right...I'm only charging like $300 for the service as it is, and it takes a couple hours to set up one of these DVDs.
Wouldn't it be great if copyrights were still 17 years? Then I would access to everything produced before 1985. That would be an enormous library of music in the public domain to choose from. Now, though, thanks to Disney, I can't get my hands on anything after like 1920. The real crime is that most anything that old isn't making money anymore these days anyway. They've locked out all the music from the 30s, the 40s, the 50s...even though probably less than 2% of music from those eras is still making any money these days.
Disney got rich off the public domain in the first place. Snow White was a Brothers Grimm tale, wasn't it? Cinderella was a Chinese fairy tale (with magic fish instead of a fairy god mother). Tarzan? Public domain. The Hunchback of Notre Dame? I doubt they paid Victor Hugo anything. Little Mermaid? Thanks Hans! Disney raided the public domain gold mine of the 19th century, but they'll be damned if you can do the same for their creations of the 20th.
Sorry for the rant...just pisses me off that I have to use crappy public domain music, or compose it myself...which actually isn't that bad with Apple's Soundtrack that comes with Final Cut Pro 4.
Re:Hey meta_ monkey... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why isn't the RIAA considered a trust? (Score:3, Interesting)
The Members of the RIAA (lables) are the for-profit companies. The members are who really own the copyrights, IP and Artists.
Suing the RIAA for anti-trust would be like suing NORML [norml.org] for being t
Fine (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Fine (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyone living abroad (Score:3, Funny)
Want to let a room?
Sue your customer (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Sue your customer (Score:2, Insightful)
Most likely by influencing US policymakers to influence EU policymakers to use their increasing power over the laws of individual European nations to change their laws to mirror those of the US. Then start suing in European courts, rinse and repeat on other continents where too many people decide they no longer want to pay for RIAA music for whatever reason.
Pay for the damned music you sneak thief! (Score:3, Funny)
Stop stealing the RIAA's profits and pay their damn tax!
You arent from Boston like me, so you dont get a teaparty.
What is needed is a standard defence (Score:3, Interesting)
- defend yourself without having to hire a lawyer
- give a solid, standardized argument that will minimize the damages you might have to pay
RIAA's tactics are based off the aversion people have to the legal system. But a collaboratively developed, standard defence can reduce the pain. And letting people know
Question (Score:5, Interesting)
-B
Can I email myself an ebook I own? (Score:3, Interesting)
This is simply unacceptable. Will all our traffic be sniffed by various copyright holders in the future? I don't like carry around thousand page books so I just scan them. If the publishers of america jumped on the RIAA bandwagon would I be a criminal and my ISP/
Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)
There used to be a service called my.mp3.com that used a tool called Beam-It, to check if a customer had a CD. If so, they could download an MP3 of it. MP3.com claimed their service was a form of time-shifting, and therefore legal and fair use under US law.
Universal took MP3.com to court and won. MP3.com was ordered to pay $250M to Universal. [bbc.co.uk] They could have been ordered to pay much more ($150K per CD, on up to 10K CDs,
Re:Question (Score:5, Interesting)
Um, they listented to what the music industry aligarchy wanted them to listen to. Bands without a label couldn't get widespread exposure (there are perhaps a dozen notable exceptions. Not much over the last 50 years).
This is why the RIAA hates the internet so much, and why they dropped the ball so badly as to allow P2P to start in the first place. If iTunes had been around in 1995, there would have been no Napster. They don't give a shit about piracy (well, now the probably do, it's widespread enough to hurt), because they know all the same things that people post here - people downloading who wouldn't have bought the songs aren't customers. It's the decay of thier distribution network that scares them - if you can hear anything you want on P2P, you don't have to listen to the radio. This means you aren't hearing what the songs they want to hype, and you aren't listening to the commercials for the products they want to sell.
They did this to themselves, though, so it's pretty hard for me to feel sorry for them.
Re:Question (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe on some other planet. The vast majority of commercial radio stations have rigidly defined playlists. If it isn't on the playlist, it will never be played on the air. Even the station's program director may not have any say over the contents of the playlist.
Re:Question (Score:5, Interesting)
Try it... let me know how that works out for you...
The last time I tried to get my local band played, I was told that the band wasnt on their playlist, and if he put it on the air, he would get fired....
Why do you think that your local radio station still plays the same 5 year old songs, stopping only occasionaly to throw in the new stuff? their are THOUSANDS of bands out there who would die for the air time... but their not going to see a second of it.
but Im rambling now, I need coffee...
Re:Question (Score:4, Interesting)
What's the weather like on your planet? I don't know about you, but Clear Channel Communications owns 99% of all the radio stations I can pick up. The two exceptions in my very large metropolitan city are: NPR and my local University radiostations. I called up my city's "contemporary rock" station and asked the DJ to play an XTC -- any XTC song -- and he laughed at me and said "get real"...so I requested an album track by a band they DO play (Faith No More's "Midlife Crisis", which was released as a single about 10 years ago). He played FNM's "Epic" instead.
I have never heard some large metal bands on the radio -- Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Megadeth -- because my city's radio stations don't think it's what their demographic wants to hear. That seems unlikely, but I suppose it's possible that everyone who listens to AOR (a misnomer if there ever was one,) wants to hear the last 3 Red Hot Chili Peppers songs 10 times in two hours.
People don't complain because "it's always been like that" and they don't get any response when they DO complain. CC effectively owns US radio and they want to appeal to the lowest common denominator, so they will never ever ever play what people WANT but what people WILL TAKE. And people will take almost anything given to them.
Re:Question (Score:3, Interesting)
Hahahahahaha. I'm fairly certain you have no fucking clue what you are talking about. It's obvious that you have absolutely zero experience with the industry.
That would be like me saying "Yes sir ma'am, I'm fairly certain the problem with your car is a blown out clutch box." Keep in mind that I have zero experience with cars, and don't know if there is such a thing as a clutch box. It's pretty misleading to say you're f
Re:Question (Score:3, Insightful)
If you want to know what a song sounds like request it from your local radio station,
Yeah, I bet all my local ClearChannel stations would get right on that. "Yes, I'd like to request a song.. When Hell freezes over, you say?"
Re:You Can Indeed (Score:5, Insightful)
Justice is a vending machine that only takes $10,000 coins, usually a lot of them. And sometimes the chocolate bar still gets stuck.
Re:Question (Score:4, Interesting)
Both the uploader as a distributor and the downloader as a copier are individually breaking the law.
Merely receiving a copy without making or causing to be made, that copy, isn't possible in the online world. And offline, it could still be construed as contributory infringement perhaps.
Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)
No, not really, at least not that are germane to most
Space shifting -- the argument th
Support Freenet now, or Support the RIAA later. (Score:4, Insightful)
Which do you prefer? Corperate Welfare? Freenet?
http://freenetproject.org/ [freenetproject.org]
Options are limited, you are a slave to the RIAA, or you support freenet.
Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)
This is the fourth or fifth time I've seen someone make this claim here recently. Is there some US case law I'm not aware of that supports the claim? I certainly wouldn't want to bet my life on it looking at basic US copyright law, and many other countries have less permissive "fair use" rights under copyright law than the US offers.
Or is this just an old wives' tale, like "EULAs aren't enforceable, so you can just ignore them"? Plenty o
i highly doubt any concrete action. (Score:2)
Re:i highly doubt any concrete action. (Score:2)
Re:i highly doubt any concrete action. (Score:5, Interesting)
This is probably true. But if RIAA can trot enough "criminals" through a legal mill, then they'll be able to justify a bigger surcharge on recordings, blank media, or even internet access. Like the "recording surcharge" already on blank tapes & CDRs, it would go straight to the RIAA coffers.
And all these surcharges are exactly why folks are downloading instead of buying. Or to quote my 16 yr old daughter, "If new CDs cost five bucks, I'd buy them."
As for me, if Columbia Records (to use a specific sig-related example) would let me purchase an annual subscription to download Bob Dylan concert recordings on a next day basis, I'd be sending 'em my money today!
The real problem that the recording industry faces today isn't downloading, it's lack of imagination.
They already know (Score:5, Interesting)
It's clear that all piracy can not be stopped - the intent few will always pirate through more obscure networks regardless of the level of litigation, this is just a question of going after the most prominent network with the least tech savvy users.
Re:They already know (Score:3, Interesting)
Back in the day I tried to get mp3s via IRC and let me say "in queue, 96 of 115" is a lousy thing to see on dialup.
If they can get people to fear P2P networks there will be fewer sources for those geeks who feel it's their duty to uphold the network. Fewer sources means fewer songs available which in turn lowers the usefulness of the network.
Sounds like they figured it out.
What I can't figure out is Sony is part
Re:They already know (Score:3, Interesting)
"
Not for those in the know. On WinMX/Kazaa/etc you search only by filename, then slowly start downloading something that could end up being a 128kbps jstereo release of a different song that is mislabled.
on IRC I can just ask if anyone has From_Zero-One_Nation_Under-2001-EGO from 04.07.2001 and one of them will FXP it off a site that always has more bandwidth than you do.
now, if only something would come out tha
Right to bear arms and tiranny of the Corps? (Score:5, Insightful)
A pretty good argument is that armed citizens could defend themselves against a tiranny. How is that compatible with the current situation where corporations seem to have totalitarian powers over the US citizens? Granted, these corporations are not the US goverment, but the inaction of said goverment, either speaks of a very high degree of inefficiency or a very ingrained corruption.
Doesn't this permanent attack of personal rights, erosion of privacy and draconian regulations equate a tiranny?
Re:Right to bear arms and tiranny of the Corps? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Right to bear arms and tiranny of the Corps? (Score:5, Informative)
Inaction? The government is complicit, running a protection racket for the copyright industry. Audio Home Recording Act of 1992, DMCA, and the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, are just three of the most obvious bits of tripe to pass the U.S. legislature in the last decade+1, and more legislation is pending now.
If you are a U.S. citizen, get involved. Write your congressperson and tell him or her it's time to turn copyright protections back into what they were designed to be: a temporary grant of monopoly on the right to reproduce creative works in exchange for an ultimate benefit to the public domain, not a welfare program for multi-billion dollar industries and the great grandchildren of creative people.
Support Howard Dean (Score:3, Interesting)
This is America . . . Money walks, right? Almost all politicians get their money from rich, influential groups. Letters might make the politicians aware of the problem but only money will win their support. Howard Dean is the only politician I am aware to receive most of his $ support from regular individuals (if there are others, please post here). We should support these types of
Re:Right to bear arms and tiranny of the Corps? (Score:3, Insightful)
So, you've overintellectualized your apathy. I'm not impressed.
You are partly correct. The "tyranny of the majority" you describe is the tyranny of the disengaged. We are not governed by the intent of a majority of citizens, but by a majority of a voting minority. If you are not activel
Re:Right to bear arms and tiranny of the Corps? (Score:4, Insightful)
Normally, I think one would like to let an informed populace, living in a democracy, correct the situation. But what do you do when the laws in question are advocated by and for the media, who's job is to educate the general population? Do you think Time-Warner is going to launch an expose on the harm to the general welfare caused by monopolistic corporations holding title to all manner of so-called "intellectual property" for indefinite periods of time? Don't hold your breath.
It's a perplexing situation. A situation which by it's very nature indicates the value of p2p, anonymized communication, etc. These technologies are necessary to wrest control of our communications infrastructure from a self-interested oligarchy. Do you really think these people care solely about their patents and copyrights? Or do you see that perhaps they are also attempting to usurp the whole notion of end-to-end communication? The media giants cannot abide the notion that their world may crumble, so they're going to stomp on anyone who threatens to undermine their control of our communications infrastructure.
That is tyranny.
Sorry to say it... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sorry to say it... (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously, when 80-90 percent of the market at least visits the black market you know you've been very bad. The problem with the black market is that there are lots of "ethically challenged" retailers, so people get inferior products every now and again, which gives virtually every black market a horrendous reputation (just read the other comments).
They will need to lower prices to, let's say that 5$ price
Fine. (Score:5, Funny)
IRC is not a haven (Score:3, Interesting)
On a related note, I've been running Freenet for awhile, and the new version is pretty good. Although the flood of new people thanks to the slashdot post did slow things down for awhile, it's faster then ever now.
Might not be so bad... (Score:5, Funny)
Well, if they're going to go after people sharing that kind of crap, they can do it all they want for all I care.
Keep trying... (Score:3, Funny)
I laughed when I read this (Score:3, Funny)
OT: Note to moderators (Score:4, Insightful)
Please? (Score:5, Interesting)
My prediction for the future of file swapping? It'll still be big, perhaps even bigger than now. If a company wants to make money then the first step is NOT to piss off people who are already appreciating the fruits of their labor. All people do then is get an even more renegade attitude about it and keep swapping away, anonomously this time
Re:Please? (Score:3, Interesting)
I suspect heavy screening. You know what I mean. Cops don't give other cops speeding tickets. Benevolancy cards for the family so they don't give speeding tickets to them. Working for the gov't
My neighbors (Score:5, Funny)
Mega Corporations and their dying business models (Score:5, Insightful)
They don't want to stop file-sharing to protect artists. Bullshit! They don't give a rat's ass for the artists. All they want is to protect their business model and, of course, some well paid and obsolete corporate tycoons.
If they really want to stop piracy, or at least reduce it immensely, here's a recipe: Drop the price of a CD to $3.00. I bet you MP3 file sharing will go down the next day. But then... Ah, how's poor RIAA exec going to pay for his BMW? It's Easier to sue everybody.
I almost pity the poor bastards. They're dinosaurs fighting against two formidable foes: Time and Technology...
Scary (Score:5, Insightful)
So, even if you have never downloaded a copywritten mp3, the RIAA (if they wake up one morning and decide that they feel like it) can legally demand information about you from your ISP. Your real name, your address, your phone number, and who knows what else. This, my US citizen friends, is unacceptable. And don't get me wrong, I'm all for the enforcement of the law, but when my privacy can be violated for the sake of finding who the person is that stole the latest Justin Timberlake single so that the RIAA can fine them for between $750 to $150,000, then things have gotten out of hand.
And so it begins. (Score:4, Interesting)
If it pisses you off. Never give them money again.This is not a "boycott" which has the overtones of people who are willing to go back to buying once the companies clean up their acts. This is a "lifestyle change" where you realize that they will lie and fuck you over so you never give them money ever again. No matter how much they protest that they've "cleaned up" down the road.
Collusion - RIAA + AOL (Score:5, Insightful)
Ridiculous. The largest ISP doesn't get a single notice, while Verizon, the only ISP with enough backbone to fight for their customers, gets over 100. The RIAA is selectively punishing those who don't use AOL, because members of AOL put money in the pockets of RIAA members.
-R
Re:Collusion - RIAA + AOL (Score:3, Interesting)
Since AOL/Time Warner is part of the RIAA, do they even need to get a subpoena? They already have the user information a subpoena would provide.
I thought the only reason they went after Verizon in court was that Verizon wasn't coughing up the names after being 'politely' asked by the RIAA thugs.
"as few as eight songs"? (Score:3, Insightful)
As near as can be determined from the article, all subpoena's are related to sites that are publically offering songs for download. There is nothing about targeting those who download, or intercepting of private file transfers between two people sharing.
This is about people who are re-distributing works that they do not have rights to. The number of distinct titles is irrelevant to the legality, moralilty and actual damages of the act.
These actions are not "sharing". They are about publishing material without permission of the owner. If you want to defend that practice, fine. You have the right to do so. But the wording strikes me as deliberately trying to confuse this act with minor infringements.
I generally assume that those that need to confuse the issue have a weak case.
My read of the story shows no signs of snaring legal behavior and/or truly minor infringements in some sort of rabid enforcement move. I only wish the Federal Government showed this much restraint and targeting when going after "terrorists".
So what's the problem? (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, I just don't understand this mentality. Why do you feel like you're entitled to redistribute the copyrighted works of others? Why? When did this become a right? I can kind of understand downloading an MP3 of something you already own IF you can be sure it came from the copy of the album you own (i.e., none of this, "I bought the vinyl, now I'm entitled to the higher quality CD version" crap), but sharing the file to millions of people? I don't remember that being part of "Fair use".
Simple solution: stop sharing copyrighted materials over P2P. If P2P really is this wonderful tool for sharing Redhat ISOs and MP3s of lame garage bands, then put your money where you mouth is. Don't share anything copyrighted, don't download anything copyrighted, and fully support the RIAA and MPAA when they go after people that do either. No one has gone to jail or ever will for sharing non-copyrighted materials. There might be cases here and there of people getting hassled over misunderstandings (that professor who had "Usher" in his MP3 filenames), but no one is going to get charged with anything if they really are on the up and up.
Re:So what's the problem? (Score:3, Insightful)
Why do you feel like you're entitled to redistribute the copyrighted works of others?
Because that is precisely the intent of legal protection of intellectual property. The idea was to give a temporary monopoly on the distribution of a work in exchange for having encouraged the development of that work. The point of copyright law is to encourage the free (beer and speech) exchange of these works by contributing them to the public domain.
Now not only has the temporality of that social contract been void
Right to listen (Score:3, Informative)
Therefore you can download replacement versions as you please ( of the same song ). Until they license and then warrant the 'hard' product, that will hold true.
You are not really commiting any copyright violations.. ( though be prepared to present the alternate media if they come knocking on your door )
Oh, techically vinyl is the higher quality sound, the CD is lower q
Re:So what's the problem? (Score:5, Interesting)
Okay. They're going after the users, not the toolmakers. This is good. However, I'm still outraged for a few main reasons.
1. The max penalty is $150,000 per song. Had you stolen a CD from a store, would you be charged $2,250,000 (assuming that there are fifteen tracks on a CD, not unreasonable)? Any store would be laughed out of court if they wanted 2 and a quarter million dollars in damages for a single CD. However, the RIAA gets away with it.
2. The use of the DMCA outrages me. It's a violation of basic constitutional rights, like due process. They can subpoena you without a court order. They can force an injunction merely by notifying you -- they don't need to prove you guilty of something, merely suppose it. That's damned dangerous.
3. There are legitimate uses for P2P. If, indeed, I've performed "copyright infringement," by downloading music, then that means that I've violated a license to listen to that music. That means that buying a CD isn't buying a specially pressed piece of plastic -- it's buying a license to listen to certain music. That means I'm legally justified in downloading MP3s of the songs I own on CD. And often times, I misplace CDs. So I feel totally fine about downloading MP3s of those CDs. However, if the RIAA saw me doing this, they'd slap me with a lawsuit. And then I'd have to waste thousands of dollars on legal fees proving that what I was doing wasn't illegal. And that unnerves me. I mean, you steal a CD from a music store, and lights flash, alarms go off, etc. It's pretty clear-cut as to who's stealing music and who's walking away with it legitimately. But the possibility for false positives on illegality for P2P makes it far less justified to just "shotgun" off lawsuits, especially to only casual users.
4. A democracy is made up of the general will of the populace. MILLIONS of people in the country share files (lets save the debate about whether it's sharing or theft or whatever for another time. It's just the verb I'm using). Most of these people are college students and people in their twenties. These are the future of America. The RIAA is what, two hundred 50-year-old lawyers with a giant bank account?
The government should be responding to how people act en masse. Copyright is a civil granted right -- it's not a natural right. That means the people can revoke it. (As opposed to your right to life, to not be beaten up on the street, etc.) And if millions of private citizens are acting in concert in a manner contradictory to how current copyright law acts, well, it's time to change the law.
5. No one has gone to jail or ever will for sharing non-copyrighted materials
Tell that to Dmitri Sklyarov.
Re:So what's the problem? (Score:3, Insightful)
But if we're talking about Enlightenment-era philosophy, why not include the Federalist papers? They encourage a very strictly limited definition of copyright. Far less than the benefits enjoyed by the RIAA. Time for reform if you ask me.
Natural rights would be rights that you possess all the time. Your possessions, your good health, etc. This compares wi
Re:So what's the problem? (Score:3, Interesting)
"We all know" is a term that has caused more historical injustice than we could all know. 'P2P' is a popular term describing a handful of sharing protocols with wide news coverage. Peer-to-peer file transfers on the other hand are the foundation of network computing. All files move from one computer in essentially peer-to-peer fashion. It will be impossible to tightly legislate the
The RIAA is finally getting to grips with this (Score:5, Insightful)
All the people who think the RIAA is trying to protect an outdated business model and should just fall over and die need to take a good look at their own morals. Just because their business model is outdated (is it?) doesn't mean you can take the law into your own hands. What's more, the model isn't outdated at all. The musical horizons of most of you would not extend beyond playing the banjo if it wasn't for the RIAA.
The people who think technology will solve this problem need to think again. There will always be ways to illegally exchange copyrighted materials. But there won't be some kind of Uber-P2P app that destroys the RIAA in one fell swoop, with kissing and credits. Reliable, Cheap, Mass-appeal: pick one-and-a-half.
Some people seem to think it's more of a social dynamic. The cat's out of the bag, can't put the genie back into the bottle, so much for Pandora's box. They think nothing of sharing music. It's just a natural thing to do, and since so many people are doing it, everybody else will just have to adapt. It's the mob mentality: democracy at its very worst. These people talk about freedom and individuality, but they seek cover behind the anonymity provided by the mob. Even if that anonymity is just an illusion, like it is on the Internet.
What the RIAA is doing now is exactly what they should be doing. They are not demonizing any particular technology. They are not pushing for overly broad and vague laws. They are simply tracking copyright violations. If you don't like that idea, then stop violating copyright. It's really simple.
Personally, I couldn't care less. Sometimes I'll grab a few tunes off Gnutella or Usenet, or post a few albums. But I've stopped telling myself that file sharing will dramatically change the way the music industry works. If anything, it is the other way around: the music industry will do more to change the computing industry than vice versa.
Besides, I like to go outside and browse in the record store. It's not so bad.
Re:The RIAA is finally getting to grips with this (Score:3, Insightful)
The people don't want parking tickets either.
The courts are already getting bogged down.... (Score:3, Insightful)
The RIAA's subpoenas are so prolific that the U.S. District Court in Washington, already suffering staff shortages, has been forced to reassign employees from elsewhere in the clerk's office to help process paperwork, said Angela Caesar-Mobley, the clerk's operations manager.
So, I guess this means that the court is so busy that they can't go after other types of criminals, such as Enron executives and terrorists...
A glance into who received subpoenas (Score:3, Interesting)
Verizon, which has fought the RIAA over the subpoenas with continued legal appeals, said it received at least 150 subpoenas during the last two weeks. There were no subpoenas on file sent to AOL Time Warner Inc., the nation's largest Internet provider and also parent company of Warner Music Group. Earthlink Inc., another of the largest Internet providers, said it has received three new subpoenas.
So, I'm wondering if users of RoadRunner, owned by Time Warner Cable, are somehow being granted a "pardon" as well by our associates at the RIAA for using TW's services.
Sampling CD's (Score:3, Interesting)
The music industry should try and promote new artists a bit more. I'm not suggesting it might curb all piracy but playing different tracks, promoting other artists people haven't heard might just tempt them to buy CDs. Makes sense doesn't it?
My suggestions to promote other artists (which might curb the downloading music trend):
1. Rotation on the radio stations blows. Stop hourly regualar rotation of the same 5 songs.
2. Some music stores have demo CD's that you can listen to in the stores. It would be nice if some were more open to sampling to more CDs.
3. Better promotion on labels' websites.
4. Finally, albums more than 2 years tend to jump by %25. Lower the premium, which has stopped me from buying some CDs - and people might not download older albums either.
RIAA is winning every battle, but losing the war (Score:3, Insightful)
Do they really think people are going to go back to buying the latest hits at $17.99 a pop when it's still so easy, even without major filesharing programs, to burn a copy of the lastet CD from someone else in your dorm, or to swap mp3s over IM with trusted friends only?
I don't begrudge their attempts to pursue legal remedies but at this point the barn door is wide open and the horse is halfway to the next county.
Clerks office "more like a clearing house" (Score:4, Insightful)
Links to tens of thousands of legal MP3 downloads (Score:5, Informative)
If everyone started downloading legal music instead, we would make short work of the RIAA, because people would start buying CDs from indie bands, and seeing their shows, instead of enriching the major labels every time you buy a Britney or New Kids CD. The RIAA would also have no cause to complain - these music downloads are not copyright violations because the artists give you permission to download them.
Probably the best known site for downloading MP3s is of course MP3.com [mp3.com] . See especially their genre index [mp3.com] . Click the link. You will be quite astounded at how many genres there are.
Unfortunately the website usability of MP3.com is atrocious, and their streaming audio seems to be buggy - I can't get it to work in either Explorer or Mozilla. To get an MP3 file to download to your hard drive, you have to register, which I'm sure will result in merciless spamming. May I suggest registering with a throwaway email address from spamgourmet [spamgourmet.com] ?
The Open Directory Project has Bands and Artists [dmoz.org] and Styles [dmoz.org] indices. Not all the artists offer downloads, but the site says they list 48,000 artists and I imagine many of them offer downloads.
There are better sites for hosting MP3s than MP3.com. Some of them allow you to buy the band's CD from the same page as the MP3 download. Among them are The Internet Underground Music Archives [iuma.com], CDBaby [cdbaby.com], Epitonic.com [epitonic.com], Lulu [lulu.com], SoundClick [soundclick.com], Matador Records [matadorrecords.com] and insound [insound.com] .
Monotonik provides BitTorrents with zip files containing 60 to 100 MP3s apiece available here [gametab.com].
If you prefer the higher quality, patent-free Ogg Vorbis [vorbis.com] files you can find several download sites here [vorbis.com] . Ogg Vorbis players are available for many platforms - WinAmp will play them on Windows, and I understand iTunes on Mac OS X supports Ogg now. There are open source Linux ogg players and encoders, even an open source fixed-point decoders for embedded applications where the CPU doesn't have floating point hardware.
There are also peer-to-peer applications for distributing legal music. See Furthur Network [furthurnet.com] and konspire[2b] [sourceforge.net] .
Unfortunately, musicians are often not very good website designers, so poor usability is a significant obstacle to getting music directly from artists' websites. If you're a musician, and you'd like to know how you can improve your website so more people will download your music, please read my article If Indie Musicians Wanted Their Music Heard... [kuro5hin.org].
Finally, there is the problem of finding the music that's actually worth listening to. The labels do serve the (somewhat) legitimate purpose of picking out the good from the bad. But we can do that ourselves with legal downloads by using collaborative filtering, for example by downloading our music with iRATE, which you'll find at
and Yet (Score:3, Insightful)
and yet still no listening to music lovers request fo downloadable song tracks which we are willing to pay $0.99 per track..
and yet RIAA business model burns..
Someones bound to stand up (Score:3, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
Illegal becomes legal if YOU change it (Score:3, Insightful)
As a recent example that comes to mind, look at the overturning of the sodomy laws in a few US states that still had them on the books. On the day prior to the overturn you could have been arrested for having sex with your gay significant other, however one day later and you were LEGALLY able to do so without fear of arrest.
Did the morality of the situation magically change overnight? No, of course not. What changed was that society at large recognised that the legality didn't gel with the morality, and therefore overturned the law itself because it was not considered to be of "benefit" to society any more (it never was IMHO).
So should it be for copyright law in the digital age, where information can be easily copied for near zero cost (other than buying hard drives etc).
I am reminded of another good example, though fictional at this time, of matter replicators as seen on Star Trek et al. If we could download the recipe for a meal and replicate it, should that be deemed illegal, or should we end world hunger virtually overnight?
If it is accurate that most (>50%) people download music then we should overturn the whole concept of copyright, move with the times, get rid of outdated business models (distribution monopoly through artificial scarcity) and start over. Society should base laws on accepted morality, not corporate buyoffs of laws paid to politicians.
Finally I just want to say this:
Listening to a song on the radio is legal. Time-shifting a recording for viewing or listening later is legal. But if I download that same recording from P2P to time-shift my listening to when I want to listen to it instead of when some DJ decided it was time to listen it, suddenly I'm a criminal. What the fsck???
(The answer of course, is that by stripping out the ads the radio station can't sell their advertisers the audience. Yes, YOU are the PRODUCT being sold BY radio stations TO advertisers. It destroys yet another outdated business model. Middle-man based industries are the ones dying off, and it is these industries that are now paying off the politicians to keep themselves in control that little bit longer until they can cash out.)
Quizo69
Re:Illegal becomes legal if YOU change it (Score:3, Informative)
Careful. The last time I used this analogy [slashdot.org] on here, I was accused of spouting nonsense. I was told to maintain a grip on reality and that replicator technology was impossible. I believe it was compared to unicorns and leprechans.
Fact is, we'll h
what they should have been doing all along (Score:5, Insightful)
shutting down the networks is akin to closing a road just because people speed and suing the contractor that built the road. cities, though, have to bitchslap those who are actually breaking the law. siren, lights, ticket, court date.
and that's just what the RIAA is learning now. they can go after the networks all they want, but as long as the end users feel immune from harm for their trafficking, another network will spring up in its place. by going after the actual swappers, the RIAA is finally going to make a dent in its little problem here.
argue about the inequality of the music industry, its uneven balance away from the artists themselves, the unfairness of the current copyright schema, and all that jazz... but that's the way the world turns today. the consumers are not going to instigate change in the music industry - the balance will favor the artists only when the artists start standing up for themselves. and truly, if the balance were that unfair you'd see that happening.
laws are another matter, but the same necessity. just like the musicians need to stand up and wrestle back some control over their art, the American people need to stand up and wrestle their government back from corporate interests.
the whining that goes on in here and around the net is disappointing. we know what the current regime is. we know what the consequences are. unfair or not, we shouldn't act surprised when you get caught.
GNUnet NOW! (Score:3, Informative)
Granted, I am now downloading GNUnet and have not used it before, but here is the big one that GNUnet offers:
Deniability.
Since on GNUnet it is unclear both who has the goods you're looking for and who originated the search, and transfers do not happen directly, just because there is data coming into your box does not mean that you are it's destination. Similarly, data coming out does not implicate you as the source.
Lawyers nightmare, anyone?
I guess its time to go back to 'trusted' sharing (Score:3)
Too bad the RIAA lost my business due to this crap. If i cant sample something, im not going to fork out 20 bucks 'just to see'. I have purcahsed over 500 CD's, and even more vinyl recordings over the years. And many beacuse i was able to hear them in their entirety FIRST.
Screw them. No more $ from me. That ends today.
Oh, and before you say im stealing, first look up the true definition, and also note i send cash direct to artists of stuff i keep... the ones who CREATED the stuff in the first place.
Every buck i send them is more then they got from the industry...
Bad "Conspiracy" Feeling about this (Score:5, Interesting)
There were no subpoenas on file sent to AOL Time Warner Inc., the nation's largest Internet provider and also parent company of Warner Music Group. Earthlink Inc., another of the largest Internet providers, said it has received only three new subpoenas.
Doesn't it strike anyone else as *amazing* that the LARGEST Internet Service Provider in the nation does not have ANY subscribers being sued?????
HOW are they deciding which filesharers to sue? Surely there must be several thousand AOL'ers sharing mp3 files. Are they overlooked because they share through IM or what???
My paranoia is telling me the RIAA is being used an an underhanded strongarm technique to consolidate ISP's. Chase away one ISP's customers by suing them, and likely they will change ISP's as well.....
*mumbles* gotta stop watching too much TV....
blue
If you get sued (Score:5, Informative)
First, *YOU DO NOT NEED TO HIRE AN ATTORNEY*, you are entitled to represent yourself. And you should.
Second, the Courts tend to give leniency to pro se parties. This means the laws of evidence aren't quite as strictly enforced and you can get away with a lot of stuff attorneys can't. Believe me, I know.
Third, there are few things attorneys hate more than dealing with pro se litigants. You never know what's going to turn up and whether or not the judge might allow it because he/she feels sorry for the pro se guy.
Fourth, this gives you the opportunity to create a circus atmosphere. Invite the media. Make angry speeches. Just go nuts.
Now, if the RIAA wants 5,000 cases like what I described above, their attorneys will literally tear their hair out. A lot of them will quit, a lot of them will boost their fees, and a lot of them are going to be pissed off at the RIAA for giving them such a headache.
DO NOT ROLL OVER AND SETTLE. FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT! If enough people respond this way, the RIAA will lose, and it will lose in a very, very ugly way. Don't think you need an expensive legal team to give them a problem. You, yourself, with $15 of copies at Kinko's can literally shove their crap back up the orifice it came from.
If you think I know not of what I speak, check my sig....
Re:If you get sued (Score:5, Informative)
The papers have to be done exactly the right way or 1) the court clerk won't file them or 2) you could inadvertently waive the right to raise certain legal arguments. It's not all that easy to file responsive pleadings as a lawyer, let alone someone who is under the stress of a lawsuit filed by a big law firm and who is attempting to act as his or her own lawyer.
If you get sued, call a lawyer and make an appointment. We don't bite and usually there is only a small or no charge for an initial consultation.
If somebody showed up in my office with one of these, I would look at ways to possibly countersue RIAA or whomever and make some money on the deal for both of us.
IAAAL. This post is not legal advice for your specific situation or jurisdiction, and it is not a solicitation for legal services.
Wait until... (Score:3, Insightful)
When, instead of portable (read, pocket-sized) 20Gb music players, we have 20Tb players, with CPU speeds to match.
When the faster CPUs allow use of far superior sound compression algorithms that better model the sources of sound...
When transfer speeds make USB 2.0 look like RS232...
When said handheld players will be able to contain not your entire present music collection, but nigh all music in recorded history.
When all you might ever lack on any given day is the newest music, and that's assuming you even like it (since you're 20 years older), or even have the time to listen to it (since you'll have so much already).
While P2P is a terrible thing in the eyes of the RIAA, I can't help but think back to the '80's and two things of the past:
- recordable audio cassettes
- recordable videotape
Both involve magnetic tape that holds practically nothing compared to recordable media today, and it takes *forever* to record onto them. Yet, they scared the record and movie industries to death, to such a degree that the movie industry tried to kill VCRs.
The implications for the future are staggering by comparison. Not only is it *digital* media, its size and ease of recording will, IMHO, be the *real* nail in the RIAA's coffin, *not* the Internet. When you can get in your car, head ofer to your buddy's house, and transfer all music in human history, that will be the true death knell for any company seeking to profit from an artist's efforts. Organizations like the RIAA consume far more in funds and resources than are necessary to support individual artists; when those funds start drying up, there must eventually come a breaking point where being affiliated with the RIAA is a financial liability. After all, who here still pays someone to deliver ice--or milk? The RIAA *will* go the way of the dodo, but I don't think P2P will be their killer asteroid, it will be the slow, steady march of technology.
Will they pay exhorbitant sums to our legislators to close the "analog hole"? They may try, but I doubt such an effort can succeed. Unless they can ban general-purpose programmable computers and resistors, anyone can digitize sound and put it into an open format. I don't care how much clout the RIAA has with Congress, the tech industry is ten times their size and will not suffer being downgraded to the era of Timex-Sinclair ZX-80's and TI-99/4A's. May as well tell everyone to turn in all their cars and TV's and go back to radio with vacuum tubes.
Slightly OT late-night idea ahead...
As I type this, one way to speed the process might be to create a slick-as-butter, easy-to-use way for beginning artists to get some airtime. How about something simple where websites could run some Java or Javascript that let users listen to a minute of an indie artist's song? Indie artists could sign up at some central site, and any website running this Java or Javascript would go out to the site, pick an artist at random, and pull a minute of music that it can play if the user clicks the play button...
Re:And what if... (Score:2, Insightful)
And a good lawyer.
Re:Well quite simply... (Score:5, Informative)
The Grateful Dead were/are a good example of this. While they could be vicious pursuing commercial bootleggers, they would happily sell a fan a "taper ticket" that included a place to plug in & a roped-off area near the soundboard to set up the mike stands.
Or for true confusion, visit http://www.bobdylan.com ... the website actually features audience-taped songs from recent shows. Of course, Dylan has gone on record several times decrying commercial bootleggers.
I know there are many other bands & performers that do this kind of thing, but I'm an old mossback & there's about to be a Dylan-Dead tour ;-)
Re:This affects me not at all (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I don't get it... (Score:3, Interesting)
1. Going after downloaders on P2P is not really easy (or possible, for that matter) without large scale tapping.
2. Your possession of those MP3's might be arguably legal. Assuming the copies were from vinyl, there would be little that could be argued against it. But if they were CDs, an argument could be made that the CD is a distinct work. You might not buy that argument, but it is an argument.
However, the unchecked distribution is essentially complicitory infringement. Simila
Re:I don't get it... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure, and there are legitimate reasons for P2P that don't involve illegally trading material subject to copyright. But everyone knows (and I defy anyone to claim otherwise) that the vast, vast majority of P2P use if for this purpose. Contrary to what many here may believe, the courts aren't stupid or naive. If a technology is being abused by 99.99% of its users, they're not going to accept "But it has legitimate uses!" as a black and white defence without something a bit more convincing to back it up.
I would strongly suggest that you don't ask for legal advice on Slashdot. As I've just noted in another post, plenty of people will give you their "informed" opinion, probably modded up to +5 by those who agree with it. Unfortunately, as the EULA fiasco shows, "informed" Slashdot opinion frequently disagrees with the opinion of a court, and guess who wins in that case. :-/
My personal take, from a common sense perspective rather than a legal one, is that if both the source and the sink know damn well that they're involved in making an illegal copy of material, they should both be liable to penalties for copyright infringement. If only one party knows, and the other is innocent, then only the guilty party should be subject to penalties, though the other might be legally compelled to erase any copies they made without knowing. To my mind, fair reasons a party might be innocent include:
I'd like to think the current legal system reflected that, and I suspect that sooner or later case law will come down to something along these lines. But I certainly wouldn't claim that this is how the law is today, because I don't know, and neither do most other people posting here.
Re:Does Freenet actually work? (Score:3, Informative)
A lot of the Freenet tools can be located here:
l s [sourceforge.net]
http://freenet.sourceforge.net/index.php?page=too
Fuqid is hosted on Freenet, if you Freenet installed click the link above.
Another good trick is to use Freenet to add high bandwidth content (like Mp3s) to your websites