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Grokster Decision Won't Stop RIAA, MPAA Suits 187

Posted by timothy from the happy-medium-elusive dept.
akahige writes "According to this Reuters article, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that the operators of Grokster and StreamCast are not liable for copyright infringement. On the other hand the *AA is appealing the decision to the Supreme Court, and has no intention of ceasing litigation against these or other P2P services. Next up, eDonkey. If ever there was a case where voting with your dollar made sense it was this one -- but too many people just can't get enough of Britney." We mentioned the court's decision a few days ago; this article stresses that the industry is gung ho to overturn it, and that this decision covers only part of the case.
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Grokster Decision Won't Stop RIAA, MPAA Suits More

Grokster Decision Won't Stop RIAA, MPAA Suits

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  • "Vote With Your Dollar?" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 29, 2004 @12:44AM (#10101002)
    Yeah, like that would work. Every boycotted sale is another that is claimed the result of piracy.

    • Re:"Vote With Your Dollar?" (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Let them claim what they want. They aren't getting my money.

    • Re:"Vote With Your Dollar?" (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Pinkfud ( 781828 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:01AM (#10101047) Homepage
      No, boycotting won't impress the *AA. But the loss of money would impress the recording companies that are members of the *AA. If they felt a big enough crunch in their bottom line, and understood that the *AA actions were the reason, there would be changes.

      • Re:"Vote With Your Dollar?" (Score:4, Insightful)

        by red floyd ( 220712 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:22AM (#10101104)
        Yeah, there would be changes... in copyright law.

        "Mr. Congressman, here's a briefcase full of campaign contributions. Those Evil Content Pirates(tm) are costing us even MORE money! Please fix it for us."

        • "Vote With Your Dollar?"-The Pity defense. (Score:2, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward
          ""Mr. Congressman, here's a briefcase full of campaign contributions. Those Evil Content Pirates(tm) are costing us even MORE money! Please fix it for us.""

          <rant>

          Oh lovely. The pity plea. Waaa those bullies are picking on me. Someone make em stop.

          Just think if most of humanity pulled the copout you just did. We would have never had the olympics to begin with because we would all be sitting around. Telling ourselves waa but I'm all flabby and weak, and that sports stuff is too hard.

          We would have ne
        • Well make sure there is so little money left that they can't afford the campaign contributions.

      • Re:"Vote With Your Dollar?" (Score:4, Interesting)

        by The Analog Kid ( 565327 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @07:50AM (#10101841)
        I still boycott the RIAA but I listen to Rush, Rush is an independent band atleast in Canada(they actually own their own copyrights, besides being great musicians they were smart thinkers back in the day), but in the US their music is distributed by Atlantic and Mercury (now part of Universal). To get around this to make sure Rush will get the most of my money off the sale, I have a friend buy it from Canada, then ship it to me, and I give him the money. Then I get the Anthem label only and the funny British spellings.
      • ...and somehow, in a giant coincidence, this year saw the return of *good* music to the airwaves. Funny how that happened just as they were losing tons of money at the same time as loudmouth assholes like me were screaming that profit pressure would eventually force the majors to go back to the tried and true business model of releasing product that doesn't suck.

        Folks, we already did vote with our wallet. And we've damn near won. The Killers, Black Eyed Peas, Franz Ferdinand, Dashboard Confessional, Jim

    • "Vote With Your Dollar?"-Lalala can't hear you. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:15AM (#10101082)
      "Yeah, like that would work. Every boycotted sale is another that is claimed the result of piracy."

      And why wouldn't it work. Have you actually tried it? Did you tell them in a written letter why you were boycotting their products. Or were you doing what legions of Slashdotters do? Simply come here and complain. Then wonder why you're getting no results.

      How about using that "other" vote. Or are we going to have to put up with another "I'm weak and defenseless. Will someone be my white knight?"

    • Re:"Vote With Your Dollar?" (Score:5, Insightful)

      by xigxag ( 167441 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:20AM (#10101100)
      It's well known among activists that an effective boycott requires organization, e.g. contacting the company in question [inminds.co.uk] to let them know you are boycotting them. Contacting the press to inform them what's going on. Just an unexplained dropoff in purchases will, as you suggest, be explained by the RIAA in such a manner as to demonize their opponents.
      • Just an unexplained dropoff in purchases will, as you suggest, be explained by the RIAA in such a manner as to demonize their opponents.

        But of course it will. It is a fact that people are sharing songs via the Internet. Whether or not that has lead to a drop in sales I'll not debate, but that's what the RIAA believes (or at least is claiming). A further drop will of course be taken as further evidence of an increasing problem, unless they're told otherwise. Of course, even then, they may choose not to bel

      • Re:"Vote With Your Dollar?" (Score:5, Informative)

        by h4rm0ny ( 722443 ) * on Sunday August 29, 2004 @05:55AM (#10101585) Journal

        Just an unexplained dropoff in purchases will, as you suggest, be explained by the RIAA in such a manner as to demonize their opponents.

        The RIAA however, may still realize the truth themselves, irregardless of what they put in their press releases. And more to the point, so may the labels that comprise it.

        A boycott comes much more naturally however, when people can move to an alternative. I've started buying music from smaller labels more often. Have a look at Magnatune [magnatune.com] I also like being able to buy individual songs from iTunes [apple.com]. If the money stays in the public's pockets, that's one thing. If they see it going to someone else they'll change their tune pretty quick.

        Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't spot that pun until I'd hit preview. Honest...

  • It's not about litigation, but threats. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by danamania ( 540950 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @12:47AM (#10101009)
    According to this Reuters article, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that the operators of Grokster and StreamCast are not liable for copyright infringement. On the other hand the *AA is appealing the decision to the Supreme Court, and has no intention of ceasing litigation against these or other P2P services.

    These rulings may weaken the case of the MPAA and RIAA if they get to the point of getting to a court, but I suspect their whole idea of litigation is much like the threats against individuals - no matter if they had a solid case against the MPAA/RIAA, just going through those motions would cost more than settling, so they'll push operators into a settlement under *AA terms.

    As far as I know, none of the individuals that the RIAA/MPAA have "sued" ended up actually being sued, just settling due to the threats.

    Is this what the MPAA/RIAA are doing now, despite the court's decision that p2p operators are not liable for copyright infringement?
    • That's exactly the problem. The RIAA and MPAA are modern day equivalents of the Gestapo. With the law on their side, and enough clout to make sure it stays there, they ride roughshod over anyone they can. It's not about collecting settlements, it's about the publicity. What they want is to make everyone believe they are watching and that they're invincible. And they're doing a damned good job. We need some kind of organized resistance movement, something that gets the same kind of publicity against their ta

    • Re:It's not about litigation, but threats. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by huchida ( 764848 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:28AM (#10101121)
      If a case has gone to court I'd like to hear about it. I have the feeling the RIAA doesn't want to take the chance of losing, which could happen if a case went before a jury... After all a jury could easily have one or two members with a folder full of mp3s on their computer at home, and worry that they're going to be next.

      They could care less about the money. I really don't think they even care about the lawsuits. This is all P.R., pure and simple. It's an ad campaign. And it definitely works-- P2P goes on, but many casual users (or would-be casual users) are being scared away.

    • "These rulings may weaken the case of the MPAA and RIAA if they get to the point of getting to a court"

      Well, no. These rulings should have no bearing on another trial, if it does make it to the Supreme Court. Additionally, it also ensures more end-user lawsuits.

      "but I suspect their whole idea of litigation is much like the threats against individuals - no matter if they had a solid case against the MPAA/RIAA, just going through those motions would cost more than settling, so they'll push operators int

      • The evidence is quite good, from what I remember, including stuff like hashes matching files originally recorded back during the Napster days.

        So you mean, if I rip my copy of Britney's "Baby Slap My Ass With a Trout" and compress it with LAME 2.6, it will be different from everyone else's copy compressed with LAME 2.6?
        • "So you mean, if I rip my copy of Britney's "Baby Slap My Ass With a Trout" and compress it with LAME 2.6, it will be different from everyone else's copy compressed with LAME 2.6?"

          Maybe. For example, a lot of the MP3s traded over P2P have ID3 tags with stuff like "Ripped by Clan 42" -- and when that matches stuff from way back in the Napster days, it makes for pretty compelling evidence.

    • Is this what the MPAA/RIAA are doing now, despite the court's decision that p2p operators are not liable for copyright infringement?

      That wasn't the Court's decision. The Court said that Grokster and StreamCast were not liable due to the nature of their networks. I don't know anything about eDonkey but if its P2P structure is similiar to Grokster and StreamCast, the *AA are fighting a losing battle. If eDonkey is remarkably different, it's another case. I'm not saying that they'll win, but court cases a

  • Big Business still rules all... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by chrispyman ( 710460 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @12:49AM (#10101013)
    You'd almost think these two associations would rather spend money figuring out how to intice people to pay money for something through a new business model instead of futilely throwing it away sueing your customers and not really putting much of a dent in peoples P2P ways. Besides, the question isn't did you break the law today but rather how many laws did you break today?

  • Gee whiz (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Richard Dick Head ( 803293 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @12:52AM (#10101024) Homepage Journal
    Nothing to worry! When one P2P goes down, there'll always be another. People get busted for drugs all the time, and yet I am always well supplied with pot. Thats the way the black market works :D
    • and I've just discovered this store in chinatown that has all the movies on DVD as they come out in theatres!
      and for 5$ each too!
      you can't get those prices and that kind of selection at HMV that's for sure.

    • Re:Gee whiz (Score:4, Insightful)

      by JaredOfEuropa ( 526365 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @06:53AM (#10101693) Journal
      Nothing to worry! When one P2P goes down, there'll always be another. People get busted for drugs all the time, and yet I am always well supplied with pot. Thats the way the black market works :D
      Wouldn't you rather see P2P stay legal? You will probably be able to continue to use P2P when it's outlawed, but you won't be so happy when the police come a'knocking to seize your beloved computers.

      Same with pot, by the way. You probably would not enjoy being caught with some. In contrast, over here pot is legal, and I can walk into a store not 3 minutes from my house to buy some.

      • Re:Gee whiz (Score:2, Interesting)

        by KontinMonet ( 737319 )
        Not quite true. It doesn't matter if you're in Holland, Switzerland, Belgium or wherever the rules have been relaxed - growing, importing, supplying, buying etc. strictly speaking are still illegal or very restricted, it's just that the authorities turn a conveniently blind eye to the illegal activities provided they are small enough operations. In Switzerland, for example, in the German areas of the country (Zurich etc.), it is quite normal to see people sitting on public stairs openly smoking. In Holla

  • The world needs renegade millionaires... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anubis333 ( 103791 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @12:54AM (#10101027) Homepage
    Why not just fund your own shitty record company, then find people that have copies of your artists in unprotected ('shared') folders available via ftp, or http. Then sue Microsoft, because they make Internet Explorer, and the DOS FTP client. You can even produce a lot of data to turn heads, i'm sure 99.9% of all illegal software distributed around the world in the past 10 years was sent via FTP --It must be stopped!!

    Or turn it into another suite based on the same principals. Sue Grokster because they are facilitating in the trade of child pornography, or sue M$ because people use IE for the same..
    • "You can even produce a lot of data to turn heads, i'm sure 99.9% of all illegal software distributed around the world in the past 10 years was sent via FTP "...

      That's a really poor assumption, and statistically, I'm sure it's way off the mark. Not trying take away from your point (there's other basis to do that), but then again, I've heard much worse. At the very least, IE's support for the FTP protocol is horrendous, far worse than what most pirates of 99.9% of illegally distributed software would realis

      • Re:The world needs renegade millionaires... (Score:4, Insightful)

        by scum-e-bag ( 211846 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @02:35AM (#10101242) Homepage Journal
        I don't think you have much of an idea about how the warez scene has worked over the last 10 years. Before the days of widespread napster use FTP was king. The most effective way to send large files was to send via FTP. Email couldn't cut it. Scripting HTML was a time waster. Newsgroups required to much computing power and setup time. FTP required a server and a client, simple. Nearly everything was sent via FTP as it was the most effective way of doing things. Pubs are sitll used, windows boxes that are not secure are great for pub dumps. I'm sure a semi-log scale of warez transfered on a vertical axis and time on the horizontal axis would be very interesting.

  • Grokster decision INDUCEs an Appeal... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 29, 2004 @12:57AM (#10101039)
    Chances are that the appeal to SCOTUS has a relatively low probability of success, but you can't fault the RIAA/MPAA/BSA/IDSA/Insert_Copyright_Fascist_Group_ Here from trying. Unlike the average joe, the trade associations are not crippled by throwing another lawyer or two towards their political agenda. And considering the stakes, and that they really have nothing to lose, an appeal to the Supreme Court is practically a certainty.

    The INDUCE act is a far larger threat. The very existence of this act, and the fact that it has influential support amongst key senators, shows how true the statement "political representation is isomorphic to money" actually is. The INDUCE act is designed to overturn the Sony Betamax case-- the very case that the Grokster decision was based upon. It would be a big mistake if this major decision was overturned-- Innovation in technology and culture will simply occur outside the United States and its draconian Copyright regime-- if such events have not started to occur already.

  • Gung ho? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It doesn't matter worth a damn if the MPAA / RIAA think they can buy judges on the Supreme Court to rule in their favor (like Judge "non-recusal-though- I -used-to-work-for-the-movie-industry" Kaplan). Every one of the anti-consumer rulings so far has violated the civil rights found in the U.S. Constitution. We, the people, know this. And we aren't going to take it sitting down. Any ruling is not going to be worth the paper it's written on if it continues the ruse of ruling against fair use, free speech

    • Re:Gung ho? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Cereal Box ( 4286 )
      Every one of the anti-consumer rulings so far has violated the civil rights found in the U.S. Constitution.

      Would this be the "right to free warez and MP3s" amendment?

      Last time I checked, you can still make backups of your CDs. However, it's the "sharing them with millions of my closest 'friends'" part that's illegal...
      • Would this be the "right to free warez and MP3s" amendment?

        I think it's in article I, section 8, clause 8 [house.gov]...

        "Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries"

        Which they've failed horribly at in both "limited times" and "authors and inventors".

        If corporate America wants to hamstring citizens such that they have a legal workaround (here's a dollar, we own it... or... here's

  • Subpoena Powers (Score:5, Insightful)

    by grimharvest ( 724023 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:02AM (#10101049) Journal
    Am I the only one who thinks that the subpoena powers granted to the RIAA are too broad? If a crime has been committed, fine. Then let the F.B.I. handle it and let the courts issue subpoenas where necessary. How in hell did private citizens come to be a the mercy of a trade group? I don't download files off Kazaa or anything, but nor do I like the idea of the RIAA being able to spy on people at its leisure. If there's need of an electronic wiretap, then let the Feds get a warrant for it. But this business of them serving subpoenas to whomever they like makes a complete mockery of the right to privacy. We have police agencies to investigate alleged criminal offenses. Since when did we start bypassing them for the convenience of big business?
    • Simple.

      Civil suits. You can sue anyone at any time for any reason.

      Joy.

      • Simple. Civil suits. You can sue anyone at any time for any reason.

        And a partial answer to that is loser pays winners costs. Bet that would cut down on suits and encourage some of those who might otherwise settle to fight.

        • And if the RIAA wins?

          Thats going to be one hell of a bill for the copyright infringer.
          • What about a system where it's court's job to decide how much the loser has to pay. So, if RIAA wins you won't end up paying all of their multi millon dollar legal fees. Only small part of it or maybe none at all.

            That's the system we've got in Finland and it seem to be working pretty well.

        • If you want to see why a loser pays system is bad, look at Australia. Its more sue happy than most of the US but the large companies are rarely the target. A individual can't afford to sue any large company and class action suits that would clearly win the US never get brought up. Small claims are handled by one of the way too many tribunals and as a result way to minor situations between individuals end up in court.
        • Loser pays is not even a partial answer. While it would discourage some frivolous suits, it also serves as an impetus for large organizations to litigate against weaker parties.

          Imagine your credit card company taking you to court in their jurisdiction....they can throw as many attorneys as they want at it, and well, you're already broke, you can't afford to amount a defense. They get a court judgment against you for the money, plus the inordinate amount of legal fees they've accrued.

          Because there is no

    • Re:Subpoena Powers (Score:4, Informative)

      by kmac06 ( 608921 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @03:38AM (#10101338)
      This is not insightful. AFAIK, the RIAA cannot subpoena anything, nor can they spy on people at their leisure. What they can do, and you could do as well, is file a civil suit (as the other respodent said). They do not have the power to implement electronic wiretaps. They can, of course, query your computer and ask if you have, say, Matrix 2 shared on KaZaA (something Warner Bros. busted me for :) ), but that's a tap no more than calling someone up on the phone is.

  • Rather than voting with your dollar... (Score:5, Informative)

    by TWX ( 665546 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:04AM (#10101052)
    ...try bugging the crap out of your representatives. Work to get copyright law changed. If enough people bug their senators and representatives they'll be forced to take some kind of action lest they be concerned with losing a re-election bid. As for this current situation, the Court has already ruled in the past that items, devices, and systems that have a legitimate use are legal, even if there are illegal uses for them. This is part of why they can't bust someone for drug paraphernelia unless they have actual drugs on them, because scales, paper, and the like all have legitimate uses. VCRs are legal even though they can be used to record copyrighted TV shows and copyrighted movies because they serve to allow consumers to legally view movies and tape shows for later review. The Court has already given its opinion that since Grokster is a filesharing service, not a specific music service, that it is theoretically allowing anyone to share or exchange any kind of content, and that users who abuse the law are the problem, not the existence of the software that technically as a side effect allows them to do this. P2P might be most heavily used by people downloading that which is copyrighted and not licensed for their use, but people do exchange legitimate stuff, therefore it should pass that test.
    • If they vote against what the corporations want, then they get fewer donations to their re-election campaigns. Less money means less advertising. And since not all voters will find the same issues to be of equal importance to them, it is much more effective for your politicians to pander to the corporations, get the money and use negative advertising to blast their opponent(s).

      1 vote, 100 votes, 1,000 votes lost on this issue? How many more votes can be gained or at least taken away from their rivals with
      • This is why I support campaign finance reform when that reform includes provisions making corporate political contributions illegal. Corporations have the right to free speech but they do not have the right to fund campaigns because Corporations do not vote. Only voters should be allowed to donate to campaigns. Also the time period used to collect contributions should be cut down significantly to say no earlier than 6 months before the election. This will stop the outright bribery of incumbents who collect
    • If enough people bug their senators and representatives they'll be forced to take some kind of action lest they be concerned with losing a re-election bid

      How does the opinion of a few thousand computer enthusiasts affect a re-election bid when the voting demographic is overwhelmingly influenced by what they see and hear on television? Let's have a look at our democracy. According to here [pbs.org] and here [census.gov] voter turnout for Presidential elections can be as high as 70% but, in the midterm elections, can be as low

  • Two words: BUY USED (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Windcatcher ( 566458 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:06AM (#10101056)
    Anymore, whenever I buy a DVD or CD, I make a point to buy it used, from places like Amazon. So far I'be bought several used movies that way and the quality has been all but indistinguishable from new. Just remember, every penny you put into their pockets is another penny that's available to pay their lawyers on this jihad.

    Anymore I think of it this way:

    - Tickets to Spider-Man 2: MONEY FOR THEIR LAWYERS.

    - DVD of xxxxxxxx movie: MONEY FOR THEIR LAWYERS.

    - xxxxxxx music CD: MONEY FOR THEIR LAWYERS.

    And what galls me the most is that the bastards are probably laughing to themselves that we're so addicted to this stuff that we can't help but pay them to do this. Well I for one have decided, no more. NOT ONE RED CENT.

    • Buying Used Still Helps the *AA (Score:4, Insightful)

      by EventHorizon ( 41772 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:39AM (#10101144)
      Noble stance. However, buying used still benefits the *AA. Every used copy you buy reduces the supply of used copies and can thus boost *AA profits on new copies--either because there are fewer used ones availible (and thus some people buy new instead), or because the used copies are more expensive and therefore new ones can also be sold at a higher price, etc.

      It's basic supply/demand economics. If you want to really want to accelerate the *AA's inevitable demise, stop buying their products altogether.
      • Reading Slashdot is like reading GRE writing topics where you're supposed to identify the logical problem hidden in the language usage.
        I got this one covered.
        Your assertion is based on the idea that the volume of the second-hand market is directly proportional to the market for new products. This is a false assumption for a number of reasons.
        First of all, a second hand product can be sold second hand more than once while a new product can be sold as new only one time. This fact alone mea
    • Anymore, whenever I buy a DVD or CD, I make a point to buy it used, from places like Amazon. So far I'be bought several used movies that way and the quality has been all but indistinguishable from new. Just remember, every penny you put into their pockets is another penny that's available to pay their lawyers on this jihad. [...] Well I for one have decided, no more. NOT ONE RED CENT.

      How about the pennies put into their pockets by people who will buy new if they can't find it used? Buying used still (indi
  • The INDUCE act only seems to cover cases where the P2P software companies make money from this alleged inducement to infringe. I have yet to see anyone propose legislation that would make, say, gtk-gnutella illegal.

    Seeing as how most of the commercial P2P software developers' "ad revenue" seems to come from installing spyware and trojans on unwitting folks' machines, I can't say I will be sad to see them go.

    • Someone also needs to remind legislators that the US != Internet. Instant Induce act makes law, all the US based P2P companies move to Togo, Nigeria, Trinadad... (and the spyware with it)

      Nothing will change except a bunch of Americans losing even more rights.

      -Electrawn

  • It's all relative (Score:5, Insightful)

    by poptones ( 653660 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:21AM (#10101103) Journal
    Just look at a map of the world. The US is this tiny chunk of land on one side of the globe. Thanks to the greed of the corporations based here, jobs are increasingly moving to those other places that collectively take up about ten times more area. And how many times over do the populations of china and india outnumber us?

    It's already happening: you buy or download a copy of your sleek new OS and the first step is to configure the downoad manager to connect to some ftp mirror in one of the free countries of the world. Do I care that mp3s or css are "protected technologies?" Fuck no - and neither do the people I've helped free themselves from the redmond overlord.

    Let'em sue. Won't make a damn bit of difference either way - you think ho-town is going to ignore a few Billion chinese who adopt different technological platforms than those of us in the "civilized" west? You really think Russia or Ukraine or even Poland are going to change their copyright system because the screaming brat in the west says so? Fucking christ, have none of you ever ordered online from an overseas vendor?

    Already these nations are becoming less vocal about their EU intents: they've already seen one empire crumble this last century, it doesn't take a genius to see we're legislating ourselves into global irrelevance.

  • Lobbying againh pushing the indust new legislation (Score:4, Informative)

    by MysteriousMystery ( 708469 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:23AM (#10101110)
    I know a lot of people agree with this, and many people have started petitions and things like that, but we in the "tech" community really need to organize a continuing and consistant lobbyist group to take on the ridiculous and continuing legislation being pushed by many large corporations and organizations who look out for their own interests over technological innovation. It's time we stand up and make our point realized that it isn't the governments job, to create legislation to protect antiquated business systems such as those in place for some of the parties involved with pushing the induce act. Too many people, not just general consumers but media types fail to understand simple things like fair use with regard to copyrighted materials for example, that would allow even copyrighted material to LEGALLY be transmitted via a peer to peer system for example. Just because something is copyrighted doesn't necessarily make any re-distribution of it criminal or piracy. But the RIAA doesn't want you to know that, and thus most people don't. This link from Groklaw should explain a lot of this. http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200402050 05057966&query=RIAA+ It's time to take action and start lobbying for ourselves. Let others know the legal truths, and don't allow the rules to be changed around us any longer!
    • As a thinking point, what would happen if all tech workers went on strike simultaniously?
      • All of us Americans need to go on a strike on a certain day. THis would reign in the elite and let them know who is boss.

        Read this for more info [american-pictures.com]on this technique.

        • All of us Americans need to go on a strike on a certain day. THis would reign in the elite and let them know who is boss.

          People would complain because their garbage wasn't picked up. People would get fired. Nothing else would happen. Systems don't generally stop working without one day's maintenance. Qwest's managers answered the phones during the latest walkout. Next idea.

    • Great. Where do I send my $50?

      You mean, you didn't volunteer for the position? You don't even have a Paypal account to accept donations?

      No domain name, no website, no mailing address?

      Oh, so you posted to slashdot - great and all, but if you really wanted to matter, you'd do something more.

      I chose my battle - alternative education. See, I think kids need a good education in order to make wise decisions as adults. And, there are lots of tough decisions coming in the next 100 years. So, I'm part of a compa

      • Starting small (Score:4, Informative)

        by MysteriousMystery ( 708469 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @03:20AM (#10101310)
        Well, I think it would best to start small, I have no artistic talent in the visual sense whatsoever, and while I have a background in journalism, my legalese is severely lacking to adequetely write up goals and agendas. But I have decided to start a Yahoo group, and if enough people are interested in helping from there we can start a site and move on.
        When I was writing that post I was thinking about what I could do, but like many of the other people here, I'm just a poor college student with minimal funds and time to spend, however, if enough people put their free time (myself included) towards organizing something we can start a new trend.

        Since your suggestion of the name techrally was taken for a Yahoo! Group, I came up with OpenTechnology meaning opening up technology rather than closing it via legal restrictions (this as opposed to the open in open source).
        http://groups.yahoo.com/group/OpenTechnology/
        The group is completely open to anyone with a Yahoo! account who wants to join. Let's try to get organized and see what we can accomplish.
        • Ok, so here's what you did: You went to Yahoo groups, and registered a new group, wherein you posted a single

          ADVERTISEMENT
          The idea of Open Technology is to keep the growth of technology open
          from legislation that can impair its continual evolution. Please, feel
          free to help come up with a better mission statement, and ideas for
          starting a real organization, this Yahoo! Group is only a placeholder.

          ...?

          What next? How are you going to promote your ideals? How are you going to get people to join? It might be as

  • If I'm lucky, there is an RIAA member reading this (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:27AM (#10101120)
    Instead of going out and attacking something new and different that you don't understand, like you did with the cassete tape, and how mix tapes off the radio would ruin you, accomodate.

    Make a new liscence upon which a file share system can purchace and then share. Make it of a reasonable cost, then hunt down the radicals. Its radio OVER a packet-switched network with a device analagous to the cassete recorder at the end. The entire economy is in a slump, and you are offering what is at times an inferior product. Filesharing may have contributed, but so have you. People might take you seriously if you had more than one reason for the slump, some of which were internal.

    Go Mr *AA man and sue to your hearts content. The precedent is there now, and its not in your favor. Find a new way.
    • Instead of going out and attacking something new and different that you don't understand, like you did with the cassete tape

      What they understand is with a tape, the 3rd copy of a copy is pretty bad, especialy if some of the recorders used automatic recording level control, are mis-aligned, have wow and flutter, have dirty heads, etc. Each generation is a guranteed loss of quality. Soon there are few 1st gen recordings and lots of bad 3rd and 4th gen copies.

      What terrifies them is with P-P, the 100th gene

  • But it's not just Britney; you should know better (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 29, 2004 @01:53AM (#10101167)
    The problem is that it isn't just Britney. You, presumably, are part of the problem, and your attempt to disavow any personal responsibility by pointing to "Britney" fans, is indicative of the prevailing, pathetic attitude.

    It's not just the "lame" artists. All artists who have signed contracts with RIAA member studios are guilty, and financially supporting any of them, implicates you too.

    I have not and never will knowingly financially support proprietary music. By proprietary, I mean any music for which it is not granted at least those freedoms guarunteed by the GNU GPL for software.

    I will not be the fan of any man. But I will gladly partake amongst any as a fellow.

    Don't buy into the fan/artist power structure. The only free society is a horizontal society.

  • 3Com Megahertz (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Graymalkin ( 13732 ) * on Sunday August 29, 2004 @02:44AM (#10101257)
    If ever there was a case where voting with your dollar made sense it was this one -- but too many people just can't get enough of Britney.


    Please do yourself a favor and pull your head out of your ass. In case you haven't noticed just about every movie and record album available in the US is published by RIAA or MPAA member companies. Sales of Britney Spears records alone aren't filling the coffers of *AA member companies. This meme is a logical fallasy and a completely ludicrous preposition.

    Unfortunately I see this meme perpetuated more and more, people want to equate what is in their opinion bad music with the ridiculous actions of the RIAA. The bands that are cool to like are signed with the same labels as the pop favorites. The same is true of cool movies, they're made and published by the same studios that are responsible for films like Gigli and Kazaam.

  • It doesn't matter (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Flavius Stilicho ( 220508 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @03:36AM (#10101333)
    The majority of the people just don't care much about this issue. They know downloading songs and movies is illegal but will keep doing it as long as they feel they can get away with it. When they no longer can they'll stop or find another way of getting the content. Right or wrong, this issue just isn't that big a deal outside of the libertarian /. crowd. Ask a few people outside of your normal crowd. Most of them will probably yawn.
  • Next up: RIAA vs. All humans of Sol1 RIAA Claims that afformentioned humans have been using an ancient P2P protocol called the "internet" for some time now to illegally share songs such as: "What its like to be 44 and forgotten" by once famous teen pop idol Brittany Spears. RIAA is suing for imediate cease and desist of all internet usage.

  • A new form of distribution (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    By the way we must find a new form of distribution to promote real culture over the world again. I'm thinking of a non-profit organisation that will help artists to sell their creations (music, video, ...) over Internet P2P sharing or anything similar. If the price for an album were about 5$ or less, there will be a lot more legal listeners. And you know how much an artist earn on an album today ? It's totally crazy and current scheme only promote commercial songs, that are exactly the opposite of culture a

  • Fair Use (Score:5, Interesting)

    by TheToon ( 210229 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @04:01AM (#10101383) Journal
    First, IANAL.

    In my country (Norway) we have quite good Fair Use laws (y'all will probably remember the "DVD-Jon" case and its positive outcome).

    We can:
    1. Copy any media (CD, DVD, LP, MC, VHS, whatever) for our own use as much as we want to.
    2. Share with family (parents, siblings... maybe 1. cousins but that's it)
    3. Share with close friends, and this is interpreted in a strick sense. Your best friend that you grew up with? Sure! Someone from class or a cow-orker? Nope, not close enough.

    This complies with my sense of justice pretty well. After all, is it fair use to share your new CD with music with people you meet on the bus?

    As a compensation for this, artists get paid from a fund. It's the same fund that was started when MC copying started and is/was funded by sale of empty music cassettes.

    I bet that most audio copying today does not go straight to P2P networks. How many of you rip your CDs to a) play them on your DAP (mp3/ogg) player or b) have a copy in your car, but do not put the ripped files on P2P? I bet there are a lot of you out there. Maybe this can be used to make statistics to counter the RIAA drivel.

    Any time I rip a CD with CDex, it does a lookup to freecddb.org. There are other services for this, like gracenote and others. We could assume that the total hits to these pages, minus lets say 10%, are legitimate rips of CDs. Then we would have an estimate of the amount of legal (legal as in fair use) ripping out there.
  • But will be killed by Congress. Which really sucks because Bittorrent is actually quite useful. I got SP2 off of it when I couldn't get it anywhere else. (Until it was pulled, of course!)

    And of course if you're a gamer and don't feel like selling your soul to Fileplanet, bittorrent is great for getting demos, patches, and mods.

    As someone so eloquently said in this forums: "As far as I can tell, as an American, I cannot go through my day without breaking the law. My quest is no longer to be a law-biding

  • I think it was inevitable (Score:3, Interesting)

    by HangingChad ( 677530 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @09:39AM (#10102231) Homepage
    That corporate culture would move from treating their customer base as a revenue source to treating them like criminals. What it really demonstrates is how little respect companies have for an individual customer.

    And, really, why should they? MSFT knows that they'll lose a certain percentage of companies audited by BSA, but not all of them. And there will be more new ones to take their place. MSFT losing one customer is meaningless but the BSA action would likely boost licensing from a thousand others who heard about it.

    RIAA gets a double bonus from their legal action. Not only does it scare away people sharing copyrighted music, but it also taints all downloaded music, even from legal sources. Can't have muscians getting popular outside the major labels, now can we?

    The CD music business is hugely profitable and a collalition of five or six companies pretty much own the lift. The whole pipeline is set up to control prices. So the RIAA lawsuits protect that turf while they figure out how to squeeze even fatter profits out of iTunes and other legal download companies. The lawsuits will likely continue because there is no downside for the big labels. Unless you think our spineless Congress will step in and do something for the average citizen...HAHAHAHA! Don't hold your breath.

    The only recourse I think consumers will have is to unionize. Consumer unions. Where groups of people band together to negotiate for something like cell service. I do that for some of my customers. Negotiate big software and service purchases. And, let me tell you, vendors would roll over and bark like dog if I asked them to. My customers get a better deal because they're buying in bulk. Consumer unions could do the same thing.

    The downside would be, taking an example like cell service, everyone has different needs and wants different features. That's what fragments the union. Another problem is when the union leadership turns into AARP, which started selling its constituency instead of representing them. I personally get some pretty incredible offers from vendors, as would the leadership of a consumer union.

    Still it has potential. A consumer union with enough members could pretty much dictate price and service terms, but it's like trying to herd cats keeping them together.

  • The RIAA is missing the point (Score:3, Informative)

    by HappyFunnyFoo ( 586089 ) on Sunday August 29, 2004 @10:09AM (#10102337)
    By aggressively targeting unencrypted P2P networks, the RIAA's attempt at halting filesharing, specifically of pirated music, will fail miserably. The reason is simple: more and more users will switch to anonymous and encrypted P2P networks such as bittorrent and WASTE, both of which basically nullify the possibility of lawsuits and make it impossible to track offenders / pirates. I have been at LAN parties where some users have connected to 50-100+ Peer WASTE networks. Unless an insider is present, each user is connected to the network through a PGP style 2048 (or higher) bit key. It is almost impossible without a hell of a lot of, literally, undercover spies (tens of thousands), to break a WASTE network. It's also ridiculously illegal to even attempt to find one. WASTE lets you fill your hard drive with whatever you want without basically any fear of big government or big agencies like the RIAA eavesdropping. By suing users using "lighter" P2P networks, the probability of the RIAA succeeding becomes even lower as more users will simply switch to methods to get files that are untraceable. This is a culmination of the effects of the recording industry first attacking Napster, which used a centralized server method; now users have moved to a decenteralized server method (ALL of the current protocols follow a super-node configuration) which basically means it's impossible, unless a LOT of lawsuits are filed, to halt the network. When the RIAA attempts to stop the third level of file sharing, i.e. completely anonymous and/or encrypted file sharing, it will reach a roadblock that it cannot hurdle over with ANY form of legal action. The RIAA has made two giant mistakes: not embracing Napster, and now not embracing supernode style P2P networks; it is nearing the end of its life and further lawsuits demonstrate that it is only capable of acts of desperation. The end is near for the RIAA as a functional part of the music industry.
    • Except bittorent isn't anonymous. You can see all the IP addresses of your peers download/uploading the file.
    • 1. BitTorrent is not even approximately anonymous. Sorry.

      2. WASTE is too hard to use for the average user. You need to find and join a network that has good content in order for it to be useful, which means actually communicating with people already in the network and convincing them to let you join. You can't just download the program and go. If *AA force users onto WASTE, they've won.
  • They will sue everyone and take out the ones that cant afford to fight. Nor can the few that remain standing have enough left to counter-sue for damages...

    For the industry its a 'cost of doing business' and they will ( they think ) reduce the options p2p downloaders have.

    On a different note, sharing lossy versions of broadcated works IS technically legal... Someone needs to stand up to these people.
  • So, having lost when suing Morpheus, which uses a network on which something like 95% of activity is sharing songs illegally, they're going to try for eDonkey next, a network where 95% of activity is sharing adverts for porn sites. That'll work.

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