Sony BMG Says Ripping CDs is Stealing 767
LKM writes "Sony seems to think we should not be allowed to rip CDs we own to our iPods. In fact, doing so is stealing, and we should all re-buy songs, preferably one copy for each device. Says Jennifer Pariser, the head of litigation for Sony BMG: 'When an individual makes a copy of a song for himself, I suppose we can say he stole a song. Making a copy of a purchased song is just a nice way of saying 'steals just one copy'.'
I guess somebody should tell Sony about all the devices Sony produces that allow this stealing to occur!"
She continued her testimony saying... (Score:5, Funny)
Why would a Wookiee, an eight-foot tall Wookiee, want to live on Endor, with a bunch of two-foot tall Ewoks? That does not make sense! But more important, you have to ask yourself: What does this have to do with this case? Nothing. Ladies and gentlemen, it has nothing to do with this case! It does not make sense! Look at me. I'm a lawyer defending a major record company, and I'm talkin' about Chewbacca! Does that make sense? Ladies and gentlemen, I am not making any sense! None of this makes sense! And so you have to remember, when you're in that jury room deliberatin' and conjugatin' the Emancipation Proclamation, does it make sense? No! Ladies and gentlemen of this supposed jury, it does not make sense! If Chewbacca lives on Endor, you must acquit!
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:She continued her testimony saying... (Score:4, Funny)
In the land of the 6 foot hairless apes, the 8 foot wookie is still king.
Re:She continued her testimony saying... (Score:5, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:what bothers you about that joke (Score:5, Funny)
Oh, and wooooooo, season premiere tonight!
Suppositions (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Suppositions (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
When I read this all I could think was WTF? Actually I only got as far as W? and I felt neurons popping off like so many kernels of corn in my head. Isn't this considered fair use? I remember not long ago a certain in-duh-vidual in the head of the RIAA saying that this was a non-issue, that making a single copy for a friend was even a non-issue, and that the issue was file sharing. All of a sudden that asshat looks reasonable!
-nB
Re:Suppositions (Score:5, Insightful)
We should actually draw the line in the sand and tell the entire RIAA to get bent.
Re:Suppositions (Score:4, Interesting)
OK, I'm tired of this line. If you don't like RIAA's tactics, don't buy CDs from their record labels. It's easy. I've been using RIAARadar to not support RIAA labels since Napster went dark; and it's not like you miss much good music.
what I'm saying is that it's BEEN time to let the RIAA twist in the wind, and I really, really hope I'm preaching to the choir. Being a
Re:Suppositions (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm tired of that line. It doesn't matter if everyone stops buying music from RIAA companies. They'll still get all the royalties from radio, store music, and other places where compulsary license fees are collected. It is the law. They'll also amp up their lawsuits, DMCA complaint bots, and lobbying stating "piracy" is the cause of their decreased sales.
It doesn't matter if you don't broadcast or listen to their music, a false DMCA complaint will still take your site down. You will still have to hire a lawyer if they try to sue you because you wrote a communications app which may be able to transport music or generic files, some of which could be music. You will still be screwed if they pass a DRM law which requires all computers to run (Microsoft's) DRM system and you are not allowed to write software unless you buy some expensive key--assuming they will let you buy it at all. After all, if you are an open source coder, you must be "untrustworthy"
Even boycotting them, they still get money and they still continue with their insane behavior. That is not the end all solution.
Re:Suppositions (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Suppositions (Score:5, Informative)
"NBC/Universal general counsel Rick Cotton suggests that society wastes entirely too much money policing crimes like burglary, fraud, and bank-robbing when it should be doing something about piracy instead."
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070615-copyright-coalition-piracy-more-serious-than-burglary-fraud-bank-robbery.html?bub [arstechnica.com]
I think the best way to view these people is to imagine what happen if someone from the distant past were to come in to our time. For example, Jews from 1000BC or a Kansas school board from 2006. Both groups would have some bizarre views of the world, probably arguing with passion that heliocentrism and evolution are totally false. They may even advocate burning at the stake for people consorting with evil by using post-it notes or computers.
The legal counsel and the PR departments of these record companies face a similar handicap, in that they can't possible adjust to our time. We need to develop a time machine so we can return them to a time they understand
Re:Suppositions (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Suppositions (Score:5, Funny)
I really don't think they are trying any more. I think we can say they have mastered that just fine. Lets see, I have canned response to sony. I wrote it down on an index card, just a second let me get it. Okay here it is..
Contact details (Score:5, Informative)
http://pview.findlaw.com/view/1755781_1 [findlaw.com]
Re:Contact details (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DC133FF933A15752C0A967958260 [nytimes.com]
Always interesting when people put their foot in their mouth publicly, without stopping to consider how much of their lives are available for review.
Re:Contact details (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a FAX (Score:5, Funny)
For extra points, tape several sheets together and write "We Will Not Purchase Music From Sony BMG Until You Change Your Position," feed it through the fax machine, tape the ends together so they receive never-ending protest message, take a picture of yourself doing it (not your face, of course), post it on imageshack.us, and share the joy with the rest of us.
You can do it. I know you can.
Re:It's a FAX (Score:5, Funny)
Re:It's a FAX (Score:5, Insightful)
No, better yet, the previous post's message, but written in white on black rather than vice-versa. Then you get the best of both worlds!
Re:It's a FAX (Score:5, Funny)
Re:It's a FAX (Score:4, Funny)
oh dear, you've done it now. Who knew rule 34 applied to faxes?
I wish I was able to see the look on the face of whoever reads those faxes.
Re:Suppositions (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Suppositions (Score:5, Interesting)
Not news. (Score:5, Insightful)
The hardware people are reasonable, they want their stuff to be able to play everything, and record everything, and they want it to work 100% of the time.
The music people just want you to buy their stuff over and over and over. They don't care if you EVER listen to it.
It's a big corporation, and all the parts aren't always working in the same direction, so don't throw down on the people who make stereo equipment, and the DVD-W's you're using to flawlessly copy movies, just because the music people are douchebags.
Re:Not news. (Score:4, Insightful)
Speak with your wallets and speak to the shareholders; across the board.
Sony execs should be self-policing their other divisions, period.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
From most indications the Various music labels are fighting above their weight class as they seem to have more influence then industries that make much much
Re:Not news. (Score:5, Insightful)
Ahh.. so that's why they always invent their own formats for cassettes, memory sticks, interconnectors, etc... Or wait, no, I'm confused now.
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You can tell the PS3 to rip the contents of a CD to the PS3's harddrive. It can do it automatically when you insert the CD into the drive.
Re:Not news. (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not up on all this stuff, so could you tell me which Sony company [yahoo.com] makes money off hardware and which is the entertainment company, so that I can refuse to do business with the idiot corporation but still support the slightly less idiotic one? Because if you can't, in my opinion, that's exactly like giving me money to put in the checking account I share with my wife, but not liking her and refusing to give any money to her. It all ends up in the same place and will be distributed among the same people.
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Remember, there is a difference between Sony's hardware division that makes stuff that plays music, and Sony's music division that signs artists, and distributes music.
I think people do remember that. They just like to point out how hypocritical it is to have one company where one division tries to make money by complaining about people copying music, while the other division tries to make money selling hardware that makes it easy to copy music.
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Re:Suppositions (Score:5, Funny)
Is this true??? We must do something to improve the quality of lawyers! Also I'm trying to figure out why 40% of sick days are taken on Mondays and Fridays, but that's another issue.
Re:Sony is not welcome in my wallet... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Sony is not welcome in my wallet... (Score:5, Insightful)
We can laugh about this, but isn't that really what a media tax is? A fine for NOT buying the copyright material through normal channels? (Additional burden - assumption of guilt: you pay the fine on media that MIGHT be used to hold a copy of copyrighted material. If you use the media for data, or even as a coaster, you still pay that "fine".
So I guess everyone was stealing... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:So I guess everyone was stealing... (Score:5, Insightful)
We're supposed to shut up and pay.
Re:So I guess everyone was stealing... (Score:4, Insightful)
And the surprise is?
This is what happens when companies are allowed to make the laws. Most corporations have one goal: Make more money. The higher price and more times you pay for the same product, the better. Capitalism can be good, competition is the best, but it needs to be regulated, as has been proven time and time again.
When all the major record companies "agreed" on using lots of cash on DRM and MAFIAA, they knew that they were going to screw their customers. But they also knew that people wouldn't stop buying music. But this is where they stepped wrong. RIAA can't stop piracy, and DRM can't either.
Now they are making more and more desperate statements (like the example in this article), to try to compensate. Fortunately it won't help, and they will at last be forced to listen to their customers. DRM-free music is getting more popular every day, and the music industry will soon realize that they have to follow that example.
Let this be a warning for all corporations, that eventually they will get burned if they screw with their customers.
Re:So I guess everyone was stealing... (Score:4, Insightful)
To make your example a little more realistic - it'd be like reducing traffic accidents by simplifying the road system. Eliminate five & six way intersections, for example. Go to on-ramps and limited access/exits for highways. Don't have a lot of varying speed limits in a given length of road. Some will disagree with me, but going to traffic circles rather than red lights or stop signs can reduce accidents.
As for laws, you'd be looking at eliminating stuff like requiring hand signals for turns, having a person walking before the car holding a torch and ringing a bell. Honking your horn before making a turn. Stuff like that.
Sony is once again being EVIL. (Score:5, Interesting)
What about the people that do get hurt by piracy? What about the people that make money from it?
No I am not talking about MP3 player manufactures or CDRW producers. There was a story on Slashdot about a site that was full of pirated eBooks. There received a take down notice that caused a lot of problems because.
1. It invoked the DMCA for no valid reason.
2. It included one work that was published under Creative Commons.
The up roar over those errors what loud and I feel justified. However no one pointed out that the site did have many ebooks that did violate the authors copyright. Also that site was in the process of raising venture capital and was selling ads. That site is in it for the money just like the publishers.
So we have several groups.
We have the media companies. They are big and vile. They want total control over all media and don't really care about the consumer or the artists rights.
We have the pirates. I will restrict this to the those that are into it for the profit. They are acting like fences. They don't actually break any
copyrights they just help those that do connect up with the people that want the material and make a profit doing it. Oh they will often wrap themselves with the freedom banner but the truth is they are in it for the money.
We have the artists and the authors. They are getting ripped off by both the media companies and the pirates.
You have the hackers and users. They want to use the media they buy any way they want to. It should be completely legal for iTunes or any other software to rip DVDs so people can play them on their computers and media players! Bit Torrent isn't a pirates tool anymore than a sheet of paper is a counterfeiters tool.
As the end user of media we are not hurt by the pirates but we are hurt by DRM and are offended by the erosion of our rights by the media companies. We tend to side with anyone that is against the media companies. But the truth is people do deserve to be paid for their work. It is just as wrong to violate the copyright on a book as it is to violate the GPL. Authors and Artists have the right to be paid for their work. Just as we have the right for fair use. And the DMCA, DRM, RIAA, and MPAA are NOT THE SOLUTION they are if anything a huge part of the problem. DRM makes pirated media easier to deal with than legal media.
If course I wonder when the video companies will realize that bit torent is a small leak in their dike, the flood is NetFlix.
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Re:So I guess everyone was stealing... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So I guess everyone was stealing... (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course they sued the cassette recorder manufacturers, lost, and set a president that copying is fair use. They've been fighting to prove that distributing over the internet is legally different (which is likely is). So while putting songs on kazzaa might be illegal ripping CD's has already been set as fair use. So her statement ignores history. It's inconsistent with the legal history that exists. She might want to go and buy off American politicians but you need to make sure that doesn't happen.
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Actually, according to copyright law in most places and glossing over the use of "stealing" for "copyright infringement", yes, making those mix tapes was technically illegal. This is one reason I believe places like Europe need something closer to US-style fair use exemptions for copyright, instead of the watered-down, half-hearted framework allowed under the EUCD.
If you read between the lines of the Gowers report in the UK, for example, it sounds a lot like his team concluded that this was justified, but
OK, they just need to admit it (Score:5, Funny)
In that case... (Score:4, Insightful)
Next Step (Score:5, Insightful)
Yours sincerely,
RIAA.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Dear sir or madam;
We respectfully request that you cease and desist from listening to our music. The license you purchased from us only allows you to listen to each song once. This was clearly printed on the wrapper included with CD or in the EULA you agreed to before you downloaded the song.
We are presenting you with this opportunity to comply with the law (see statute on next twenty three pages). If you fail to comply with the law we will have no choice but to file a law suit against you.
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The ??AA's Holy Grail would be a technology that allowed people to pay money to experience their products and walk away with a good feeling about it (to encourage future sales), but at the same time render them unab
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"The ??AA's Holy Grail would be a technology that allowed people to pay money to experience their products and walk away with a good feeling about it (to encourage future sales), but at the same time render them unable to remember the specifics (to encourage paing money for the same thing again)."
So that explains modern pop music. It's all so clear now.
Re:Next Step (Score:5, Insightful)
Dear sir or madam;
We respectfully request that you cease and desist from listening to our music.
When you have bought a CD, you are
The Real Reason CD's are so expensive (Score:3, Interesting)
We've all wondered about how they could justify high prices for CD's. You are in fact, already payin
Well if it's all stealing (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Well if it's all stealing (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Well if it's all stealing (Score:5, Funny)
Thank you for contacting us to resolve your long history of copyright infringement. We are happy to see that you recognize that you have been stealing from us and want to rectify the matter. I am sure that we can reach an amicable solution without having to sue your grandmother. As you know, we, the RIAA members, have long been victimized by earworm performances.
Excellent question.
Of course you have to pay. Earworms are unlicensed and uncompensated performances of a mechanical recording. Now, did you have a question to which the answer is not obvious?
Of course. We will be happy to prorate the licensing fees for you. Our prorated fees for samples/clips start at 50% of the normal rate. However first we need a few details:
- were you thinking about work or doing work while enjoying the earworm, or were you home on your own time?
- were you at an educational institution instructing, attending, or auditing a class? We do offer educational discounts of
- were you at the time singing along, humming, or in your case, grunting along with the performance?
- were you at any time during these unlicensed performance:
- banging your head
- tapping your feet
- tapping your steering wheel
- playing your 'air guitar?"
If so then on top of our usual full rate, you also owe us public performance royalties.
Us. You pay us. Are you so stupid you could not figure this out? We don't care which artist's work you were enjoying, so long as we get our cut. Don't worry, if you cannot remember the title or artist, we will put the artist's pitiful slice of pie into an interest-bearing account of which the artist will never see a penny. Er, what I mean by that is that we will try to figure out which artist should receive the royal- hell with it I'll come out and say it. We don't give a rat's ass about the artist, but if you do not pay up we will sue.
Thank you for your patronage. We look forward to your continued business.
Sincerely,
RIAA Member
that is bull (Score:3, Informative)
sony sucks.
Why does Anonymous hate knowledge and freedom? (Score:5, Insightful)
"Citation, please?" is a lazy rhetorical technique which in online discussion forums like Slashdot has come to imply much more about the person asking the question than about anything else. It roughly translates from moronese to English as:
- I'm a moron,
- I disagree with you, but
- I'm too ill-informed to argue my side of the debate, and
- I'm too lazy to look up the resources which are freely available which would help me construct an argument, so
- I'm going to take the low road, and snidely suggest that you defend your argument, whereafter
- I'll assume that you are wrong and I am right because you didn't respond by falling all over yourself by quoting chapter and verse to me,
- but because I have this lingering sense that I might not know what the hell I'm talking about, I'll just post this retort as "Anonymous".
How about, instead of logged in Slashdot participants falling all over themselves to defend every other statement they make from Anonymous "show me a link" asshats, the asshats start reading a little more and learning about the world around them? Don't agree with what someone said? Look it up! You're using Slashdot, so you are already USING THE INTERNET. There are dictionaries and encyclopedias and actual laws, on the internet, mere seconds away from where you are now.Google (fucktard) [google.com]
Wikipedia (fucktard) [wikipedia.org]
Urban Dictionary (fucktard) [urbandictionary.com] (particularly useful when somebody calls you a name you haven't heard before)
Encyclopedia Dramatica (fucktard) [encycloped...matica.com]
United States code (aka "the law" for U.S. residents) [cornell.edu]
If you care enough to post, then please devote the five or ten minutes that it might take to research the topic and post your own link refuting the statement that you don't agree with. I'll help you get started, here: U.S. Copyright Law [copyright.gov]. You don't need a degree in law to read and understand well written laws. If you can't read and understand a law, that's a pretty big hint that it might be broken in some way. Finding relevant sections of the code can be challenging, but Google can be quite helpful with that.
Look it up!
For once I prefer the RIAA position! (Score:5, Informative)
Re:For once I prefer the RIAA position! (Score:4, Funny)
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This is where I normally try to be insightful (Score:5, Funny)
I want to throw a phonebook at her and knock her off the podium. Preferably mid-sentence with video footage. Big yellow book smacking her in the side of her head from out of nowhere. Sure, I'd go to jail for assault, but that video would be on the internet. Being shared (she would call it stolen) and laughed at by thousands of people. That would be my solace.
Sorry for my lapse of any real discussion, but some people just need a good old whack upside the head.
Re:This is where I normally try to be insightful (Score:5, Funny)
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Yeah, I'm all for that.
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No, a better way to deal with it would be to get her fired.
Naaah. I'm happier working at a computer shop where I can happily tell clients to avoid ALL things Sony. I love the looks on clients faces when I tell 'em about 12-year-olds and grandmothers getting sued... I tell 'em about Sony's brain-dead DRM schemes when they complain that they {for some reason} can't watch a Sony movie on their Sony Media PC. I tell 'em about Sony rootkits...
...and until Sony wises up, I'll KEEP steering people away from them. They're now going to be losing sales on movies, and most
ripping is stealing.... (Score:5, Insightful)
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"...I suppose we can say he stole..." (Score:4, Insightful)
Making a supposition, however, isn't the same thing as proving one, nor does it constitute a good prima face argument in its favor.
Sony might have missed this. . . (Score:4, Insightful)
Well I think Sony Electronics might have heard of this (betamax anyone?) [wikipedia.org] but Sony BMG hasn't? Aren't they part of he same corporate entity, or at least owned by the same corporate entity? Are the board members suffering from multiple personality disorder or something?
Sony vs. Universal? (Score:5, Insightful)
That was back when Sony regarded themselves as a technology company rather than a content provider, of course.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Four Words (Score:5, Informative)
This is old news... (Score:3, Funny)
It's only a matter of time... (Score:5, Funny)
Much more damaging (Score:4, Insightful)
I think it would be nice to see the record cartel shrink even more as people spend more time listening to live music or playing it themselves instead of being passive consumers of recorded music. Folks might also consider patronizing independent artists.
Memo to HR: fire yourselves (Score:5, Funny)
Oh wait... is she hot?
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If it's wrong, Sony should give back copying levy (Score:5, Insightful)
William
well, if copying CD is thievery, (Score:5, Interesting)
More unneeded bad publicity (Score:4, Insightful)
Can you imagine if you were to use the metaphor of eating. If you hunger for food, and buy food to eat, you will eat it when you want. If you were suddenly told that you could only eat during certain hours and couldn't share your food with others who can't afford to eat, you wouldn't be to happy. Suddenly, there is a place where they stole the same seeds (metaphorically speaking) to make the same food but they gave it away for free. The people you used to buy the food off would go out of business right? So they try to bend the laws and make new ones to protect something that should be free (or at least paid back to the farmers) from the thieves.
Here is the problem with that analogy. The farmers work hard to make the food we eat, but they get paid tiny amounts of money for their goods. The store puts a huge markup on it and rips off the consumer.
Do you see the pattern?
If the RIAA, BMG, SONY, UMG, EMI, etc keep on proclaiming to the masses that they own the music, they will be killed off like the dinosaurs they are.
I certainly hope I stayed on topic for that.
Time for a lie down methinks.
Copying is besides the issue (Score:5, Insightful)
The only straw that's left for Sony to grasp at is not about copying, but about breaching licenses. But that would seem to apply more to DRM'ed material to me, than physical CD's. You do click through a license agreement when installing iTunes and there is also the DMCA to disallow decrypting DRM protected media. But what about CD's? I don't enter even something as little as a click through contract, and neither do I need to (normally, thank god) decrypt a CD to rip its content.
This Sony rep may "suppose" whatever he wish, but that's to me merely his opinion, not law or anything. If it's considered fair use to play a single intellectual property for own use on your own devices (and I can't really see how it could possibly be anything but that), then this should be OK. Let's not involve the copying part so much, because a computer copies files a lot, even sometimes when you don't know it or it's not 100% apparent to the user, or not necessarily a user initiated action. It copies a lot of things to RAM too, which is quite literally transfering material from your hard drive to another hardware device.
Involving copying will just make matters more complex to sort out and understand for their customers and is, besides, quite irrelevant. Who cares how many copies you make and to where? IMHO, what only matters is whether you breach a contract. And in that case, I can only agree with them that the copyright infringement here is if it's causing a financial loss to the copyright holder.
But then -- that would mean that, in this case, Sony would need to honestly believe an artist lose money on someone who carries an owned CD to the car stereo, which is quite crazy. Since that also means a user isn't purchasing two copies for playing it on another device.
Cognitive dissonance, resolved. (Score:5, Interesting)
I generally pay for my music. I won't claim that I own a CD for every song in my collection, but easily over 99% of them. I buy most of them used for a pittance, and rip them to my file server. I do not use P2P programs, or download from any of the massive music archives, or USE the NET to easily find anything I might ever what to listen to, or even copy (and keep) tracks from friends. I do this because I, as do most people, prefer to stay legal. I consider myself reasonable on that... Sony provides something I want, I provide them with the only thing they want.
So when Sony comes out and makes statements like this, calling me a thief for using the music I buy in the way I prefer, it makes me unhappy. This leads to a certain level of cognitive dissonance on my part - I want to engage in a fair trade of goods for money, but the other party considers my terms a form of robbery.
As I will not change my current behavior for the sake of making Sony feel better, nor will I give up the pleasure of listening to music that happens to fall under their control, they have effectively removed my mental barrier to "stealing" their entire catalog.
Congrats, Sony, you have made it clear you consider the two actions - Buying and stealing - equivalent. Thus, I feel no moral dilemma in seeking out and downloading every song you've ever published. You consider that the same as my buying them, so why would I actually pay for them? By simply downloading them all, you view me the same, yet I save thousands of dollars. Thank you, Sony, for making this so much easier!
Re:Cognitive dissonance, resolved. (Score:5, Funny)
Let's work out the 'legal cost'... (Score:3, Interesting)
I have 4 music playing devices (all Sony brand 'cause remember I'm pretending to be a big Sony fan), so I'll have to re-buy the songs online for each device.
So, the CD for my stereo is $3
Now, someone please name even ONE song that's worth that price? I can listen to the radio for FREE and hear most songs eventually.
This is a joke. Sony, please show me where the awesome musical masterpieces that are worth $6 per song are. I'm dying to know... cause what's out these days isn't worth a few quarters.
Idiots.
In all seriousness -- Sony's board (Score:4, Interesting)
From a legal standpoint, this an incorrect statement on a subject that not only has a Supreme-Court-level case precedent, but which was decided by an argument that Sony themselves advanced.
From a practical standpoint, Sony makes quite a bit of money from electronic devices that do the very things to which Jennifer is referring. It is not good business to level accusations against broad swaths of your own customers.
From an investing standpoint, her statement under oath, as head of litigation for the music unit, could easily be construed as a warning that in the future, Sony will consider litigating against their own customers for using Sony products in the way they were designed. She is in a position of management and her statement has forward-looking implications.
I have to agree with Sony BMG and more! (Score:5, Funny)
Buy the same thing over and over and over. You don't buy just one loaf of bread do you? You don't buy just one shirt do you? Why can't they get it through your collective heads that you NEED to BUY and BUY and BUY! Stop thinking! Stop budgeting! BUY BUY BUY!!! Who cares if they don't come out with anything new! BUY!!!
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
FUD, lies and more FUD (Score:3, Insightful)
For years, the content industry has been engaged in misinformation, claiming something as illegal that wasn't. Making private copies of your content, or even downloading content, is not illegal contrary to their claims, at least in many countries.
Why do you think they wouldn't start a spin about media shifting and fabricating something about it being illegal?
People are generally not lawyers. Instead, they tend to believe it if a lawyer claims something as being illegal. They hear something, hear it again (from a "different" source, like another media lawyer) and presto, instant truth. I'd guess this wasn't the last time we've heard that spin.
Out of print CDs? (Score:5, Insightful)
Listening to a CD more then once (Score:5, Funny)
ahhhhh!! (Score:5, Insightful)
Bush administration does it again!! (Score:4, Interesting)
We're already fed up with the handling of the war... and now BMG blows the whistle on the Bush administration's blatant violation of copyright law. I hope BMG takes care of this and faithfully executes their right, as copyright holder, to bring this man to justice!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You know what, I personally have no problem with paying again for each and every new copy of a song. But if that's the case, the CD is no longer worth any near what they are charging for it. If I have to pay for each copy, I want to be able to buy CDs for $1 each. Individual songs should cost ten cents. Because that's about all they are worth if I have to buy multiple copies. Oh, and I want a law (or contract) requiring Sony to make available new
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Record companies want it both ways in Canada (Score:5, Interesting)
A couple of years ago, though, I saw a Norah Jones CD at POS in a Chapters store, and it looked interesting until I saw on the back that it was encumbered with anti-copying technology. I wrote the record company (BMI IIRC) and asked how it is, on the one hand, that they are happy to take my levy money in return for private copying, and on the other hand, that they're attempting to block my copying? The letter challenged them to either give up their portion of levy revenue or drop copy protection. Their response was that the levy "does not begin" to offset losses due to private copying and therefore they had the right to copy-protect. (This whole discussion didn't even touch on whether such copy protection had any chance of working).
There are few industries that think they should get money (levy revenue) in return for something (private copying rights), and then not deliver (copy-protect the media). These companies have successfully exploited both consumers and artists for far too long, and deserve to be totally cut out of the producer-consumer transaction.
Re: (Score:3)
bad analogy time, and no cars!
No, zogger, that isn't a bad analogy; it isn't even an analogy, it's an excellent real world example of intellectual property rights run amok. Cargill (the Invisible Giant [ramshorn.ca] of the food system), the rumour goes, once published a saying in a regional corporate newsletter: "he who controls the seed, controls the farmer, and he who controls the farmer, controls the country." True or not, it's an alarming yet typical point of view found in the 'life sciences' megacorporations.
When you take the epistemological