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RIAA Announces New Campus Lawsuit Strategy 299

Posted by samzenpus from the tell-us-everything dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The RIAA is once again revising their lawsuit strategy, and will now be sending college students and others "pre-lawsuit letters." People will now be able to settle for a discount. How nice."
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RIAA Announces New Campus Lawsuit Strategy More

RIAA Announces New Campus Lawsuit Strategy

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  • A Rose by Any Other Name... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Bonker ( 243350 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:36PM (#18188168)
    Demanding money with an accompanying threat is still EXTORTION, whether there's an actual lawsuit or not.

    • Re:A Rose by Any Other Name... (Score:4, Funny)

      by QuantumG ( 50515 ) * <qg@biodome.org> on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:40PM (#18188214) Homepage Journal
      Where's the Mafia? I mean, do the RIAA have a list of college-kids-not-to-sue, cause I would have expected one of these executives to have gotten "wacked" by now for threatenin' a mob boss' kid.
    • So, to protect against a lawyer, you must hire a lawyer. Old old saying... "To catch a thief.." This whole circumstance does quite the job cheapening the whole legal system. Using what proports to be the mechanics of the law as a revenue stream, and the fact that other lawyers, judges and members of this so called profession condone this by their silence says buckets about the profession itself.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by planetwc ( 1040394 )
        So to protect against a vampire, hire a vampire? Either way, your financial blood gets drained.

    • Re:A Rose by Any Other Name... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by garcia ( 6573 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:45PM (#18188296)
      They are going this route because people are starting to get their legal fees paid [slashdot.org] when the RIAA loses.

      What better way to stop that from even happening by not taking them to court?

      Why are they targeting college students? Not because they are the biggest file sharers but because they have the least amount of money.

      • Yeah... (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Greyfox ( 87712 ) on Thursday March 01, 2007 @03:18AM (#18191810) Homepage Journal
        I wonder if you could fire back a pre-lawsuit threat to countersue them for legal fees and offer to let them settle for a discount...
    • If the ??AA would actually sit down with people, listen to why they didn't do it, and resolve such cases (where the person really didn't do it) out of court without money changing hands, it would be fine. But they don't, which is why they've earned the moniker "Mafiaa" on /.. Instead, they go through a protracted legal battle (due to the ??AA's attorneys dragging their feet and filing countless ridiculous motions) in a feeble effort to try to claim their money by presenting incredibly flimsy evidence. On
      • That's the thing. Most college students share files. It's been happening since people could record - Reel-to-reel, 8 tracks, cassettes...it's just on the internet now. By the RIAA's definition, they are actually guilty. The jury is still out on whos side the law supports (no pun intended).

        If I sat down with 100 college students that had a P2P program running on their machine and files in their upload directory, I'm guessing that 100 of them would have swapped files with other users on the network. If I trie
    • I can see the legit/legal argument about settling out of court for X amount, and just by coincidence it happens to be a flat rate regardless if you downloaded 3,000 or 3 songs - or even if you flat out didn't for that matter. Although, I can not see how in the hell this could be legal - isn't this blackmail? You pay me, or I'll bring legal action for something I'm assuming you've done? If this is legit - what is stopping any of us /.'ers or anyone for that matter - going around with flyer's saying give me a
    • 10 years ago, I was one of the first people at IU to receive a threatening letter from the RIAA because one of my users on suso.org was hosting copyrighted mp3s. So how is this really a new tactic?

  • Almost four years later, the file-sharing population has continued to grow, while CD sales continue to fall. Digital music sales have grown since their introduction, yet have failed to make up for the loss in sales

    Is this true? Does anyone have sales or statistics?

    • Re:Piracy is hurting? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ZachPruckowski ( 918562 ) <zachary.pruckowski@gmail.com> on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:50PM (#18188370)
      Is this true? Does anyone have sales or statistics?

      Who cares if it's true? They say it is, and there's not exactly a pirate's lobby to refute them. Truth is completely and utterly irrelevant. It's not a question of what's right or wrong, it's a question of what you say and how loud you say it. And the media cartels own the conventional news sources.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by hooded_fang ( 964565 )
      Interesting. The Canadian music industry has actually benefitted from downloading. Even my cat knows that an MP3 is not the real thing and Im not planning on shelling out any money for a cd with 1 or 2 good songs. I end up test driving a lot of stuff before surprise, surprise I end up buying it. It just makes sense. This whole thing could have been done differently if the RIAA hadn't listened to the "wisdom" of people like Lars Ulrich. Sell Mp3s super cheap right off the start with a online purchase coupon

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by SirTalon42 ( 751509 )
      A while back Slashdot posted some articles which confirmed that RIAA's profits were up, but their growth was slower than the rest of the economy so they use that to say their profits are 'down'. I think the last article I saw Slashdot post about it was several months ago.
    • "Pirates" can not be blamed for the failure of media companies to adapt to and profit from the Internet.
      DRM was an attempt to put the Internet back in the bottle.

      People expect to be able to download stuff at a reasonable cost, (and some amount of information people expect for free).
      People expect to to their play and copy purchased media without barriers.
      College students will "copy tapes", as they have no spare book or beer money to spare. if you use legal threats or take money from them, this will not incre

  • Pre-letter responses. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tackhead ( 54550 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:42PM (#18188256)
    > The RIAA is once again revising their lawsuit strategy, and will now be sending college students and others "pre-lawsuit letters." People will now be able to settle for a discount. How nice.

    Slashdotters are once again revising their RIAA strategies, and will now be sending RIAA extortionists and barrators "pre-letter responses." Barrators and extortionists will now be encouraged to go fuck themselves sideways with a bowling pin. How goatse.

  • Yay! (Score:5, Funny)

    by GFree ( 853379 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:44PM (#18188286)

    People will now be able to settle for a discount.
    Now that's what I call customer service!

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by countSudoku() ( 1047544 )
      Mee Too! I've never downloaded any cool, free MP3s yet, but I'd like to. Can I settle in advance, then copy the living crap out of my soon to be new favorite P2P service? How much is that going to set me back to begin with? This may become a viable new distribution model!

  • College student feeling the wrath (Score:3, Interesting)

    by kiyoshilionz ( 977589 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:45PM (#18188298)
    Well I got hit by something similar. I downloaded a torrent of Green Street Hooligans, didn't even watch it. Recieved an email from the campus computer folk, told me that Universal informed them of my "copyright infringement", and if I delete the file immediately and tell them that I did so, nothing would happen, but if I did it again, I would lose my Internet connection.

    I don't remember if they said what would happen if I didn't delete the file (which I did, I'm not going to stick my neck out for the principle of it) but I'm sure it would have been ugly. I wouldn't be surprised if the RIAA is doing this too - intercepting communications out of your friendly campus and then telling the campus to enforce their restrictions. Way to scare your customers. How do they stay in business?

    Any other people get busted/almost-busted/pseudo-busted at their university?
    • That strategy I can almost respect, assuming that Universal isn't using this as a strategy to backstab you for doing the right thing.
    • Way to scare your customers. How do they stay in business?

      Generally, when you have something offered up for sale, and someone finds a way to rip it off instead of paying for it, you don't think of that person as a "customer."

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by linvir ( 970218 )

      I don't remember if they said what would happen if I didn't delete the file (which I did, I'm not going to stick my neck out for the principle of it)

      And a jolly good thing you did, too. Campus network admins can tap into your computer's mainframe using soviet hacker programs, hack your files right out from under your C drive, and even report their findings to Universal Studios.

      I wouldn't be surprised if the RIAA is doing this too - intercepting communications out of your friendly campus and then telling t

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Firehed ( 942385 )
        Right out from under my C drive? Well I'm all set - I keep everything on E!

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by wes33 ( 698200 )
          for sure that will fool the OP, but I'm not so sure about the riaa

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by r_jensen11 ( 598210 )
          C:\? What's C:\? I think I remember something about A:\ and C:\, but that was back in 1993 and Windows 3.1... Fortunately, all my media is stored in /home/Media/, and if the right precautions are made, it can even look like there *is* no /home/Media/, only a /home/!

          I have a friend that got an email from our University saying that some movie industry threatened them because he downloaded Babel. He also said that it included instructions. He didn't tell me what these instructions were, but I seriously d

    • Way to scare your customers. How do they stay in business?

      You are only a customer if you buy something. Have you sent the RIAA a letter telling them that because of this tactic, you will be boycotting? How much did you spend on CDs last year? Here at /. love to hate the RIAA but that only matters to them if they are losing paying customers. If the 1.8 million /.ers actually sent all of these rants to the PR dept of the RIAA, they might care. If they thought they could win us back by stopping.
      • You are only a customer if you buy something.

        More from the chorus. Thing is, we ARE customers. Someone may not have paid for every movie on their computer, but most of us DO rent DVDs (often to rip them to our drives), most of us go to movies and a great many even go to concerts.

        The problem isn't that the copyright holders are suing their customers - the problem is there's so little opportunity for the competing voice to reach the folks affected by this - to remind them that, while Universal and Sony may s

        • I for one, (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Original Replica ( 908688 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @07:31PM (#18188876) Journal
          Welcome our independent artist labels, err, overlords. Maybe national CD sales aren't down, just "RIAA member" sales are down. I've purchased nothing mainstream for almost a year. I buy all of my CDs straight from the artists. Support your local talent. In New York City Subway, concerts come to you.

        • More from the chorus. Thing is, we ARE customers. Someone may not have paid for every movie on their computer, but most of us DO rent DVDs (often to rip them to our drives), most of us go to movies and a great many even go to concerts.

          What a load of bullshit. If you took something without paying for it, you are NOT a customer. Just because you rent a DVD or go to movies once in a while doesn't magically make you an impervious customer who is entitled to download anything they want and make sure a bunch of

          • Re:We're all "customers" (Score:5, Insightful)

            by cpt kangarooski ( 3773 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @10:55PM (#18190546) Homepage
            Admit it--you just want to pirate music without any consequences.

            Who the hell wouldn't want that? I would like very much to have a complete copy of the sum of human knowledge -- every book, every song, every film, every picture -- at my disposal. And I think that most people would probably like the same. Even if we only used a small fraction of it, it would be a great thing to have. And to get it for free (or nearly so) would be even better, since it's the cost of the thing that is generally the big obstacle to having it.

            Are you saying that you don't want a copy of everything there is, for free?

            Remember: copyright is like a necessary evil; it does a bad thing (temporarily and partially restricting the free flow of knowledge and culture) for a good reason (to encourage the creation of more knowledge and culture which can be partially shared immediately, and fully shared after a while). If implemented properly, the good outweighs the bad. But copyright is never a tolerable or desirable thing for its own sake, and it is always wrong to support copyright in cases where it would not produce more good results than bad results.

            Piracy is basically a good thing (it is the free flow of knowledge and culture) but which can have bad, or more accurately, self-defeating, results (in that it reduces the encouraging effect of copyright). Still, if the good of piracy happened to outweigh the bad -- i.e. if the good of freely flowing information was better than the reduction of encouragement to create -- then piracy would be preferable to copyright.

            We don't have to have absolute copyright or absolute piracy. We can vary them. We could arbitrarily say that copyright applied on weekdays, and not on weekends, if we wanted to. If this produced a better outcome than seven days a week of either copyright or piracy, then it would be what we should do (barring something better yet).

            So maybe it would be a good idea to allow ordinary individuals, acting non-commercially, to pirate music without consequences, accepting that there would be a bad effect in that less music might get made, and accepting that there might be a good effect in that people would be more free vis-a-vis music, while we still kept copyright for commercial purposes as well as for corporate entities.

            Don't dismiss the idea out of hand, and even if you ultimately don't think that it would produce a better outcome than the current system, if you think that there could possibly be any improvement to the current system -- particularly one that people could live with and which they'd be inclined to do anyway, even if there weren't a law about it -- then surely it would be worthwhile to consider it.

            To quote George Carlin's description of the current generation: "Gimme that, it's mine! Gimme that, it's mine!"

            Meh. I agree, that people are greedy. People who listen to music are greedy, and want free music. People who make music are greedy, and want to be paid for their music. Neither side is good or bad. Copyright, as a utilitarian system, handles this adeptly. The genius of copyright is that you can appeal to the long-term greed of music listeners by getting them to suffer some short-term deprivations, and you can use those deprivations to appeal to the short-term greed of the music creators, who suffer long-term deprivations. Everyone ends up a winner, so long as you do it right. But for decades now, we haven't done it right, and it's getting worse. The reason that piracy wasn't such a big thing in the past is not because people acted differently. People have always acted the same. It's because more things were legal, so the same sort of conduct in the past was unremarkable, while now it is notable. Conduct hasn't changed, but the laws around it have, and not for the better.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by twostar ( 675002 )
      Any kind of response probably wouldn't have come from the MPAA it probably would have just been at the university level. I use to work at a ResNet while I was at school. It was a state school and so we were protected by strict privacy laws. We received and processed hundreds of DMCA complaints each year but we never released a name or other identifying information. We even developed special procedures to ensure privacy and compliance with the DMCA.

      We would track down students after receiving a complaint let

      • I use to work at a ResNet while I was at school.
        ...
        Typically we also showed them how to disable sharing on whatever they were running in order to reduce the likely hood of a repeat offence.
        So the problem (at the University level) isn't that students are downloading copyrighted material, it's that they're sharing it?

        Was there no clause in the student handbook or AUP that covered downloading?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by stubear ( 130454 )
      You're not a customer, you're a free-loader. If you don't want to pay for the entertainment don't consume the entertainment. It's quite simple really and if more asshats like you did this then perhaps things might begin to change for the better for people like me.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Overly Critical Guy ( 663429 )

      Way to scare your customers.

      You're not a customer.

      How do they stay in business?

      By selling products created by artists who sign contracts with them, not giving shit away for free and having freeloaders defend it by scapegoating them as bad guys.
  • I haven't really been following the whole RIAA suing people thing - have they won any court cases, yet?
    • They have easily won multiple cases against people, so yeah if they are actually suing you take it seriously. The burden of proof doesn't seem to be on them as much as it would be on the DA in a murder trial.

      I guess justice assume your innocent unless it's about pirating music.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AusIV ( 950840 )
        I'm not sure they've actually won many cases. Usually one of the following happens:

        They get a settlement without going to court.
        The defendant doesn't show up and they get a default judgement.
        Their case falls apart and they dismiss with prejudice.

        Are they winning cases? Not very often (that I'm aware of).

        Are they getting money out of people? Yes.

        If I'm wrong, please feel free to cite cases, but I've been under the impression that very few cases have been completed in court.

  • NEW George Foreman RIAA family lawsuits (Score:5, Funny)

    by linvir ( 970218 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:50PM (#18188374)

    Do YOU have illegally stolen music files on YOUR computer? It's more likely than you think! If you do, then our new discount lawsuits could be for you!

    Our patented lawsuit technology gives you a quick, easy settlement with no fuss. Order now and we'll even throw in this fantastic desk tidy. That's right: a discount lawsuit AND a desk tidy. All for the low one-time sum of 39.99

    Call now, and get your George Foreman RIAA family discount lawsuit settlement. We accept all major credit cards. Get your settlement now and pay nothing for six months. SIX MONTHS!

    Se habla español.

  • A letter to the RIAA (Score:5, Informative)

    by Dunbal ( 464142 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:51PM (#18188380)
    Dear RIAA,

          I feel that I must point out that the quality of the music distributed by your members has sunk to such depths that if I have to listen to any more of it, I might just gnaw my own leg off in desperation. Of course such a situation would be grounds for an inmediate lawsuit by myself against your members for the sum of $3,000,000 US. I ask that you kindly desist from producing such self-mutilation inspiring music and, failing that, I am willing to settle for ten percent ($300,000 US) in advance in order not to pursue the lawsuit in the event of my loss of a leg. Thank you.

          Sincerely...

  • Sneakernets: The Original P2P System (Score:5, Interesting)

    by bluemonq ( 812827 ) * on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:53PM (#18188408)
    It might not be nearly as convenient, but I've been hearing that in the dorms my fellow students are posting the names of songs that they would like to "buy". Some cheap 32-128MB memory tokens float around; discreet messages are sent telling them to keep an eye on "the SanDisk with a sticker on it" or the "green Dell one that has a crack in the casing".
    • I know what you're talking about, we did that a lot in the 90's and it was a lot more social
      meeting face to face with people. And you know you get to meet people and you help them out
      and then they help you out.. Like with my notebook lately, it has sometimes problems starting
      up with new tunes and a friend of mine will hook it up to his notebook with what I believe is a
      starter cable and jumpstart the music machine or the movie engine. Then sometimes its his
      laptop that has novelty stalls from time to time and

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by nurb432 ( 527695 )
      If you are on a captive wan, just use protected shares with encrypted traffic. In theory, the *AA would have violated something if they take a peek inside.. ( cybercrime breaking and entering sort of thing )

      The problem is that you still have to get the original file into the 'protected net'. thats where they can nab you.
    • Hmm, teenagers are sharing whole DVDs full of MP3s. That must be a great bandwidth saver...

  • We Will Sue You (Score:5, Funny)

    by Jherek Carnelian ( 831679 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:54PM (#18188428)
    Buddy you're a boy, make a big noise
    Playing music in school, gonna be a big man some day
    You got music on myspace
    You big disgrace
    Kickin your ipod all over the place

    We will, we will, sue you
    We will, we will, sue you

    Buddy you're a young man, pirate man
    Shoutin' in the school gonna take on the MAFIAA some day
    You got music on myspace
    You big disgrace
    Wavin' your napster all over the place

    We will, we will, sue you
    We will, we will, sue you

    Buddy you're an old man, poor man
    Pleadin' with our lawyers gonna make you pay today

    You lost your court case
    You big disgrace
    The MAFIAA kicked you off of myspace

    We will, we will, sue you
    We will, we will, sue you
    • If only I had mod points today...

      Did you make this up? Because it's very, very good!

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by jgoguen ( 840059 )
      That's absolutely hilarious, and yet so disturbingly accurate. But what happened to the kids of the RIAA executive who got sued for piracy? A "stern talking to"? Well can't the colleges promise to give the students a stern talking too instead? Or does that only work when someone rich gets sued by accident?
  • Really, this is just another incarnation of the 'I'm anonymous on the Internet.... What? I ain't?' You can't just flaunt the law and expect to get away with it forever. Doesn't matter whether you 'feel' you should be allowed to share music/video with a couple million of your best friends, the law in most countries says you can't.

    So admit you are breaking the law and do it like a criminal, out of the open and looking over your shoulder. Swap with people you KNOW. If you are doing it online do it in clos
  • And if you call now, we'll throw in this knife set absolutely free! That's a $400 value!

    This offer won't last long, so call now!

  • Are they still bothering to obtain evidence? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by iamacat ( 583406 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:58PM (#18188488)
    They could just send a letter to every student and figure the ones with guilty consciousness are going to settle. With all the popups I am getting about winning various sweepstakes, it may even be legal.

  • Leveraging the university? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by venicebeach ( 702856 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @06:59PM (#18188502) Homepage Journal
    As others have asked, what exactly is new about this?

    From TFA, it seems to me that one of the new aspects of this strategy is:

    Basically, the letter is sent to the college or university, and is then forwarded to the student.
    So the student gets a letter delivered through the university. It's not clear if some kind of university action is implied or explicity stated in this letter, or if the universities have agreed to cooperate with the RIAA. Either way I bet getting the university to communicate with the student is a way of providing additional leverage. Perhaps now you are not only threatened with financial damage but with your educational status being revoked?
  • People will now be able to settle for a discount.

    It becomes more and more apparent that this is now part of their business strategy, and not primarly to defeat piracy this way. Tomorrow... Local shops with RIAA reps where you can settle lawsuits without going to court for convenience? Advertisements on how to best lower your lawsuit expenses? Lawsuit insurances?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by rworne ( 538610 )
      No, what you will see are requests for coupon codes for "10% off your next settlement offer" on fatwallet.

      Another great idea:

      RIAA pre-lawsuit gift cards. Load them up with $10, $40, or $250,000,000 - great gift for college students and little old ladies!

  • When will we just say enough is enough? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by nurb432 ( 527695 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @07:08PM (#18188630) Homepage Journal
    How long is it going to take before the public has had enough of this garbage and put a stop to it?

    it could be stopped tomrrow.

    • Re:When will we just say enough is enough? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by westlake ( 615356 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @09:19PM (#18189854)
      How long is it going to take before the public has had enough of this garbage and put a stop to it?

      as long as it takes the geek to admit that he isn't entitled to everything that isn't nailed down.

      the divide between town and gown is an old one, of course.

      off-campus, no one cries in their beer when a free-loading student with time on his hands, a pricey computer and unlimited bandwidth has to cough up some cash or forfeit some privileges.

  • Lawsuit Money (Score:3, Funny)

    by lymond01 ( 314120 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @07:10PM (#18188648)
    I wonder if students can get financial aid to help with this...

  • Piracy for the Poor (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Yfrwlf ( 998822 )
    Please share with the poor who will never see this stuff any way. Copying isn't stealing, it's sharing ideas. Don't let these dying businesses try for force their old ways upon you. Make them get with the digital age and employ different business practices if they want to continue to have a business. Of course, even with sharing, as we all see, they will still continue to make millions of dollars from their crappy uncomfortable ad-ridden theaters. Don't let their greed fool you.

  • Profit!! (Score:5, Funny)

    by teslar ( 706653 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @07:14PM (#18188690)
    Ok, I think I can guess the Powerpoint Slide that led to these letters:

    1. Get postal addresses of students accross the U.S. via their University
    2. Send them pre-lawsuit letters
    3. Wait for a fraction of the students to take up the discount offer
    4. PROFIT!!

    Note the absence of both an ??? and an "prove that the individual is infringing copyright" steps.
  • What if you post your garage band music that may or may not have a similar title to or cover version of something the RIAA would be after? When they send you a notice, you could then point out that their letter is an admission of unauthorized downloading of YOUR copyrighted works? You were just making them available on a shareware basis, right? And didn't their tech read the legal disclaimer on your web page indicating that by downloading this file they agreed to remit $49.95 to your paypal account?

  • Next Step (Score:3, Funny)

    by rlp ( 11898 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @07:43PM (#18188996)
    The RIAA's Department of Pre-Infringement sends you a letter warning that they know you were planning to infringe and demanding a settlement.

    (Oops, I just infringed on the work of Philip K. Dick).
  • All this discussion seems to miss the point about what happens if the MPAA actually is successful at stopping downloads of 'product'.
    Since all the downloading results from an inability to come to an agreement of what price people will pay to watch MPAA product, then if people can't watch MPAA product then they will watch something else.

    MPAA product is in its most basic form a sequence of video images edited together in standard film 'grammar' devised over the past 100 years that tells a stand

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by sweatyboatman ( 457800 )

      When this begins to happen then the MPAA comporations will really be up shit creek

      Copyright holder organizations have shown a consistent behavior in the face of technological change: seek special protection through lawsuits and legislation. They will do the same with the scenario you envision. When hardware & software improve to allow tools to play and produce real-time film-quality images, they will also allow the tools needed to identify and report "infringing" material in real-time. (Just as they

  • Reverse Tactics (Score:3, Interesting)

    by codepunk ( 167897 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @08:19PM (#18189382)
    Ok turn on your mp3 recorder right now and record a copy of your voice.

    Start out with this content is copyrighted by "Your Name"

    Then you can just spend some time saying la, la, la, la, la, la, la or whatever
    trips your trigger. Now put it on a p2p network share folder changing the name to metallica.mp3 or whatever trips your goat. Place a sniffer on the connection, when the goons grab your file
    trying to figure out if you are hosting copyrighted tunes you slap them with a big ole fat lawsuit
    for copyright infringement.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by fishbowl ( 7759 )
      The point of your post is well taken but I see it from a different direction.

      The problem with the media industry's heavy handed approach to copyright, puts
      a damping effect on anyone who actually wants his copyrighted work to be freely
      distributed. Part of the reason for this is that the idea has been firmly ingrained
      in the minds of millions that "copyright" means "illegal to copy or distribute", which
      is not always the case. Copyright and controls on distribution are related but not the same.
      Also, people te

  • 100% lying (Score:5, Informative)

    by insomniac8400 ( 590226 ) on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @10:49PM (#18190502)
    Purdue had around 40 notices from the RIAA when they were paying for the stupid Rukus music site for all freshman to have access. When they dropped the service because it was dumb(and I think it didn't even work on ipods), the next year they get over 1,000 notices? It shows the RIAA is just trying to extort colleges into signing what are probably expensive contracts with crappy and useless download services.

  • 1PAA (Score:5, Funny)

    by Lehk228 ( 705449 ) on Thursday March 01, 2007 @04:29AM (#18192034) Journal
    Are you 1337?
    Are you a PIRATE?
    Are you a 1337 PIRATE?

    If you answered "Yes" to all of the above questions, then 1PAA (1337 PIRATE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) might be exactly what you've been looking for!
    Join 1PAA (1337 PIRATE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) today, and enjoy all the benefits of being a full-time 1PAA member.
    1PAA (1337 PIRATE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the fastest-growing 1337 PIRATE community with THOUSANDS of members all over United States of America and the World! You, too, can be a part of 1PAA if you join today!

    Why not? It's quick and easy - only 3 simple steps!

    * First, you have to obtain a copy of 1337PIRATES FROM OUTER SPACE THE MOVIE and watch it. You can download the movie (~130mb) using BitTorrent.
    * Second, you need to succeed in posting a 1PAA First Post on slashdot.org, a popular "news for trolls" website.
    * Third, you need to join the official 1PAA irc channel #1PAA on irc.1paa.us, and apply for membership.

    Talk to one of the ops or any of the other members in the channel to sign up today! Upon submitting your application, you will be required to submit links to your successful First Post, and you will be tested on your knowledge of 1337PIRATES FROM OUTER SPACE.

    If you are having trouble locating #1PAA, the official 1337 PIRATE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA irc channel, you might be on a wrong irc network. The correct network is pirateNET, and you can connect to irc.1paa.us as our official server. Follow this link [irc] if you are using an irc client such as mIRC.

    If you have mod points and would like to support 1PAA, please moderate this post up.

  • Spyware? (Score:3, Informative)

    by mgiuca ( 1040724 ) on Thursday March 01, 2007 @08:44AM (#18193202)
    OK have I missed something - cause one thing nobody has commented on is this para from TFA:

    One of the agents of the RIAA, such as Media Sentry, downloads a file from an unsuspecting file-sharer. A screenshot is made of the individual's shared directory, or several files are downloaded to ensure a viable case. The individual's IP address is then obtained. The RIAA then subpoenas the file-sharer's ISP requesting the personal information associated with that IP address when the alleged upload occurred.
    OK so, basically the RIAA sets up a file for you to download just so they can catch you (Entrapment [wikipedia.org]), which then installs itself on your computer against your wishes or knowledge (distribution of Spyware [wikipedia.org]), takes screenshots of your computer and sends them to RIAA (clear invasion of privacy [wikipedia.org]).

    And this is to enforce the law? Aren't there laws against doing such things?

    Furthermore, what shitty evidence is an IP address. IP addresses do not equal individuals, for several reasons.

  • Boycott RIAA (Score:3, Informative)

    by Intron ( 870560 ) on Thursday March 01, 2007 @10:50AM (#18194670)
    Gizmodo [gizmodo.com] is calling for a one-month boycott of the RIAA sponsoring music labels: Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal, and Sony BMG. Don't buy anything during March 2007 to let them know what you think of these tactics.

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