Lycos Mp3 Lawsuit? 80
jonathanclark writes "Lycos's mp3 search branch
is being
sued for what is being called "contributory
infringement". I'll be watching this one closely.
" Denial, Desperation, Litigation. My official 3 stages
of an industry about to change. Stage 4 is anyone's guess.
Copyright infringement? National Security! (Score:2)
MP3s are used to illegally distribute music. Music has a strong political effect. Witness Vietnam. Some would say that music got us out of Vietnam. Music has political and military power far overshadowing the effects of copyright infringement.
Even today, the phenomenon of Rock 'n Roll Terrorism is poisoning the minds of our population, especially minors. The most flagrant example of this is the anarchist band "Chumbawumba". The lyrics, "I get knocked down, but I get up again, no one ever gonna keep me down" is a clear reference to President Clinton and the Monica Lewinsky scandal. MP3, by allowing the speedy distribution of Rock 'n Roll to the entire world, is the delivery system for weapons of psychological warfare.
Recommendation:
List MP3 technology as a "munition" for purposes of ITAR. Make it a federal felony to export MP3 encoders and decoders, whether software or hardware, outside of the US and Canada. This will keep Rock 'n Roll terrorists from spreading their disease, and is a necessary infringement on First Amendment rights to insure national security.
Allow an exportable version of MP3 with a 35dB signal-to-noise ratio (note that CD technology gives a ratio over 90dB). The low fidelity of MP3-35 will not be a threat, as people have an immediate revulsion to music played with as much static as the equipment we use in public schools to teach children to appreciate Bach and Beethoven. Terrorist rock, sent by MP3-35, will simply be ignored.
Please consider the above recommendation and act upon it quickly. The mind you save may be your own.
but mp3s are legal... (Score:2)
ZIP searches are legal.. look at ftpsearch or archie... they are often used to find warez.. but that aint their purpose...
Cars can be used to do illegal things (such as bank robery getaway) but it doesnt mean that by themselves they are illegal...
Same with mp3s... If they advertized themselves as illegal mp3s, I would understand, but they dont....
Seriously, though... (Score:1)
They don't have to be ignorant of search engines; they just have to find something that they think'll stick. If that's "obscure," that's fine.
They were talking in the article about contributory mumble-mumble, so it sounds like there's already a contestant in the ring, so to speak.
Copyright infringement? National Security! (Score:1)
all i want to say is...uh huh...riiigghhhtt...
The parent poster of this really has their head up their a$$ so far that they don't realize what life is. Who cares about how music affects people?...certainly not me. I love music and am not about to let people tell me that it's corrupting our society...it's free expression. It's a reflection of our society, mainly from the people that think injustice is occurring. Get off your high horse and take a moment to realize what you are saying.
1. it costs roughly $2 to make a CD, the record companies sell it to stores for $10 and the stores sell it for about $12.
this is truly a showing of how the record industry needs to be screwed over. thank you.
Stage 4 (Score:1)
Don Negro
Stage Four is... (Score:1)
but mp3s are legal... (Score:1)
If they had ZIPs search... or JPG search it is legal...
porn search would be legal kinda too..
warez no...
Why not? A 'warez' search is just a ZIP search after all. ZIPs are legal!
I wondered how long it would be before Lycos had legal trouble. Yes, there is a great deal of legal MP3 traffic, but let's not kid ourselves here: Lycos' MP3 search is designed to let people search for pirate MP3s. They know the amount of pirate MP3 activity on the net, and they want the pirate's eyeballs just as much as any other user.
This doesn't mean their actions are illegal; but I just get sick of seeing people argue that Lycos is performing a public service helping people find indie artists' legal MP3s. If you think they didn't have pirates in mind from the start, you're delusional.
And RIAA is still full of it. (Score:1)
Damn, you are blind. (Score:1)
Sheesh. :)
Lycos sux because (Score:1)
Not ftp links to my mp3's (Score:1)
0" 200 7550848 "http://mp3.lycos.com/cgi-bin/search?query=Bach&o
If they're aliasing http links to ftp to make it look like there's no web page associated it's working. They were http links to my mp3's, before I shut the server down. Get an http server and some mp3's and try it out.
they already have those... (Score:1)
For your convenience, they have been bundled together at www.lycos.com
Intimidation (Score:1)
IANAL but isn't this itself of questionable legality.. "class action suit" anybody ?
Rant follows...
Of course this technique only works under American legal system where the defender of a stupid lawsuit still has huge bills (as opposed to loser pays costs system). This won't change since the only people with power to change it are lawyers (American politicians are almost exclusively former lawyers, etc etc). Eventually it will be economic madness to be anything but a lawyer in America. For instance you won't even be able to drive without earning lawyer salaries because of all the lawsuits putting insurance premiums up. And all the time they talk about about how this is defending your rights and protecting the consumer bla bla bla... I need to get out more.
Drop record industry sites from search DB. (Score:1)
'Net needs official common carrier status now! (Score:2)
It looks like not only ISPs and the USENET sites, but search engine sites too are in dire need of common carrier status. Otherwise too many sites will start self-stifiling thenselves rather than risk lawsuits thus diminishing freedom on the 'net. This would be a bad thing, IMO.
ISPs have already had all their hardware siezed because 'illegal material' was found stored on servers. This has to stop before it gets worse.
Stage 4: Legislation... Yup! (Score:1)
Stage 4 (Score:1)
The stronger the opposition, the fiercer the fight, the closer at hand is victory...
They can't win, so they try harder, but that can't change the outcome at all!!
---
Another thing: I think everybody should be responsible for their own actions, so if I put up a link to illegal content, the surfers themselves are responsible for what they do - ignore it or follow it, but it's your decision, unless I autoforward you there or put the contents in one of my frames. The usual disclaimer. And if I bought a CD, I should be able to get as many MP3's of it as I want, which applies for other areas as well.
(Rant: What I hate most is copy-protection for games, or worse, registration requirements. It only bothers legal users. Crackers always get through while I'm bothered by silly authentification checks.)
Stage 4 of business... Nap dap (Score:1)
All hail Discordia,
Beer recipe: free! #Source
Cold pints: $2 #Product
heh (Score:1)
It's Internet - no geographic borders here.. Those people just dont get it..
Potentially an even bigger problem than it seems (Score:2)
Heck, maybe non network saavy people can get into the act too. In most larger cities you can look in the yellow pages and get prostitutes under the thinly disguised heading of Escort Services. I'm sure if the religious kooks otherwise known as TV evangelists come up with the idea it'll be tried.
I can understand that the record companies are incensed by the proliferation of illegaly distributed music on the internet. This is the wrong way to go about problem though, not that there really is a right way. It does eventually effect there bottom line and I'm not a believer that just because a company is profitable or is excessively profitable it deserves to be shafted.
I do think that fairly soon these large record labels and the organizations that protect them will be gone. I sense a paradigm shift coming. With the advent of virtually free web space its quickly becoming possible to become your own manager, promoter and advertising agency. The internet is going to become a global version of the local scene: instead of band members and friends pasting flyers for your latest gig on every available surface it'll be a posting to web sites that promote your particular style of music and links to your latest MP3 single (listen to it a few times for free folks, but if you like it send us dough)
lycos mp3 search sucks/sucked anyway (Score:1)
"Embrace/Extend"! Hee hee! (Score:1)
Um... (Score:1)
What is illegal about ripping MP3s? (Score:1)
Tapes have the same properties as MP3, save for one critical point: Tapes cannot be copied for (nearly) free across the internet.
So, a more dangerous (to them) media and a less established one is the target they need to go after.
Besides, ask RIAA sometime about copying an album to tape to listen to it in your car. That has the same legal status as copying it to your RIO to listen in your car...
--Dan
MP3 -> (Score:1)
So, Everybody would simply rename there files to *.luv or something as silly.
The very Idea that it is illegal to index all the MP3 files on the Internet just because some kiddies are pirating music, is just nonsense.
Don't even think for a moment that nobody would taka advantage of it, if this would pass.
Why not hold Altavista responsible for the contend they point to ?
Astalavista would close for sure !
Legal Basis for Suit? (Score:1)
"It is the first time we have gone against the search engine process..."
That's a good idea. Who needs search engines anyway? Maybe these guys will "go against" the rest of the internet too. That'll get rid of ALL the MP3s. Who needs the internet anyway?
I think this is a good example of how you cannot fall far behind technology and then, just as it begins to threaten you, start a massive war against it. These types of empty legal threats reveal the music industry to be very uninformed.
Hasn't anyone told them that MP3's are legal? I've got 13G of 100% legal MP3, and I got many of them off Lycos( and that was before mp3.lycos.com, when no one was making a stink!) All search engines will provide links to illegal (at least most of them will) stuff, but not because they endorse it, but because the links are submitted and not moderated.
So, when it's all boiled down, Lycos is being sued for catagorizing it's MP3 search engine to a different machine?
I can understand why "No one at Lycos was immediately available for comment" because they are all too busy laughing.
~Nameless, the blameless moderator
Potentially an even bigger problem than it seems (Score:1)
The record companies need to stop panicking and learn to embrace MP3 as a useful media. I'm not familiar with the history of such, but I'm sure such FUD was running rampant when Cassette Tapes came out. Or reel-to-reel for that matter. "You mean they can dub their vinyl onto Cassette's now, and share them with their friends?!". It's human nature that people will copy things, no matter what medium they are on. I hope MP3's will swing the whole financial situation of the music industry back in check. The big record companies
make boatloads of money and the artists usually end up making didly squat. MP3 and other electronic distribution format is feared because it takes away the power from the corporations and put's it into the hands of the artists, where it should be.
Stage 4 win/lose (Score:1)
alternate stage 4: lawyers win (legislation and lawsuits preserve the status quo, new technologies get shafted)
As a sidenote, it seems to me that the way for Internet distribution of music to take off is to break the big recording companies stranglehold on radio. If artists signed with goodnoise or MP3.com started getting radio time, the internet music business would go big time, and leave the current bunch of (insert profanity here) record companies in the dust.
Stage 4: Acceptance (Score:3)
What is there to sue Lycos over ?? (Score:2)
From a business point of view... If you follow the links on Lycos for its MP3 Search, you will find information on how to obtain, install and use a ripper to pull tracks directly off of a CD. This information is displayed on a Lycos Webpage, created by a Lycos employee. It is not a link that Lycos happens to be displaying. This certainly implies that Lycos is advocating the illegal use of copyrighted materials. I can certainly see why the music industry (tm) would be upset about this.
No one is saying that allowing small bands to place their own music on the web in MP3 format is bad, or illegal. The music industry is concerned with the illegal use and distribution of material that it owns.
Now, I also think that the music industry would like to see MP3 banned, and closing off access to the small independent bands, thus ensuring their own monoply on an already tightly controlled industry, and a continuing increase in their own bottom lines. However, that is not what the possible lawsuit against Lycos is about.
NOTE: I am not stating that Lycos does or does not advocate music piracy. These are my opinions as expressed by me.
Shut it down... (Score:1)
Stage 4: Regulation (Score:1)
What is there to sue Lycos over ?? (Score:1)
By your logic, the RIAA should be sueing all of those consumer electronics folks who build stereo's that will copy a CD onto a blank tape. That's illegal, right
It wont wash... (Score:1)
Stage 4 (Score:1)
lycos mp3 search sucks/sucked anyway (Score:1)
I agree with you that many of the links (most?) that MP3 search engines include are garbage. But you have to look a little deeper than that and wonder why? I can tell you from experience that Lycos's (and other) MP3 search engines that I have used always start out as having a very good catalogue of links. But many of these sites, faced with the increase in traffic that a search engine of this nature causes, end up getting closed down in a hurry. I think that because Lycos had a higher profile search page, this happened more quickly than it would otherwise.
You shouldn't fault the engine either for the content or the lack thereof. It's only a reflection of the internet itself and MP3 are a diffcult commodity to track.
Joe Pranevich
Does Lycos need hits this bad? (Score:1)
Sorry, no warez though.
Joe Pranevich
Lycos sux because (Score:1)
A quick browsing of the page is all you need to do to understand how the system works. There's nothing being, in my opinion, hidden.
Joe Pranevich
They will not accept it. (Score:1)
but mp3s are legal... (Score:1)
There was a story about this in Wired [wired.com]
But yeah, mp3s are legal as long as material is put up by those with the copyright, or you own the material and your mp3 is purly for archival purposes.
Freedom to link! (Score:1)
I think this is another manefestation of the problem with the legality behind linking to somebody's site. Really all lycos does is link to the mp3's and the pages that contain them. If what comes out of the lawsuit is that lycos is infringing on copyrights, then anybody who links to another site which does "bad" things would be liable.
For example: What if person A put up a site which linked to a person B's home page. Then, what if B put up for download a bootlegged mp3. Is A liable for contributing to copyright infringement because anybody (C, for example) could use A's site to get to B?
I think we should stand up for our freedom to link to any darn site we please, and express our displeasure of these crazy lawsuits.
Whiny Babies Never Win (Score:1)
http://www.ifpi.org/piracy/index.html [ifpi.org]
They have a little bit about "What is Piracy?"
Here are the three types they list:
owner.
So who's selling MP3? I have 2 Gigs of em and I've never paid a dime. Nor have I met anyone trying to profit by selling them.
I left some comments for them. You should too.
Visit their feedback page here:
http://www.ifpi.org/feedback.html [ifpi.org]
Tell them what you think about this lawsuit!
---
The statement below is true.
Phonographic industry (Score:1)
Kind of gives you an idea of the mindset of the industry when they have an obsolete name like that.
What is illegal about ripping MP3s? (Score:1)
Is it not legal to rip tracks off of one's own CDs? So I want to put my favorite songs (again, off of albums I own) on my hard drive. As long as I don't distribute them, that's all legit.
I can also then burn them onto a CD and listen to it in my car. Legit.
Whether or not this is what people actually do is another argument entirely, but I don't think that Lycos can be held responsible for that. If they CAN the precedent this stupid lawsuit sets is going to be a Horrendous Thing indeed.
--
Pronouncable Acronyms (Score:1)
Stage 4: Legislation... (Score:1)
Legislation, if you've got the clout;
Loosing the game, otherwise.
But I agree: We'll see attempts at legislation here, and also in the attempts to combat the OSS revolution.
There may be an upside... (Score:1)
Copyright infringement is not (Score:1)
but mp3s are legal... (Score:1)
And just because the mp3s aren't "advertised" as illegal, doesn't mean a thing if it can be shown that the search engine was designed to facilitate the distribution of infringing mp3s.
Potentially an even bigger problem than it seems (Score:1)
Copyright infringement is not (Score:1)
Stage 4: Legislation... (Score:1)
Does Lycos need hits this bad? (Score:1)
Drop record industry sites from search DB. (Score:1)
This is a wonderfully subtle idea which makes excellent use of natural market forces!
Does anyone really believe that record sales have dropped as a result of mp3 dispersion? I, personally, am buying more cds now that I am exposed to so much new music on the net.
Suing the search engine is alot like suing a map maker for providing a map of a part of town where drug sales occur. I.E., a far strech for such a short-sighted group.
This is just becoming stupid (Score:2)
So they sue because Lycos puts their searcers into categories.. I sure hope common sense will prevail (if there is such a thing anymore..)
This is all getting very pathetic. There is no way to stop warez, mp3 and as bandwidth gets better, you'll see movies heading the same way. It's all about being there early, instead of doing what the music biz is doing now, fighting too late.
.. and I don't pity them one bit.
Stage 4 of business... (Score:1)
Seriously, though... (Score:1)
Unfortunately, this may well be the case... and surely I'm not the only person who think this whole anti-MP3 thing is getting out of hand...?
Copyright infringement is not (Score:1)
_______
Scott Jones
Newscast Director / WKPT-TV 19
Game Show Fan / C64 Coder
Mp3 search engines are a service to industry (Score:1)
Mp3 search engines allow RIAA to easily and cheaply find copyright violators whom they can prosecute. Unfortunately for them that would be prohibitively expensive and wouldn't amount to much because very few Mp3 site operators have a lot of money or make money from their site.
So they use strongarm tactics to control the flow of information. It is not illegal to publish the Anarchist's cookbook so how can it be illegal to make a MP3 search site.
Stage4submission and companies put spin on outcome (Score:1)
Chumbawumba came out *before* the clinton scandal (Score:1)
Chumbawumba came out over a year and a half ago.
Inability to Cope with Technology (Score:1)
This is a good thing. Large companies with old business models based on old technology should be afraid. Then they can get in gear and work with it or die off. Unfortunately, the change (whether embracing the technology or dieing) seems to involve lining the pockets of an awful lot of lawyers.
I guess it's clear which industry wins regardless.
Phonographic industry (Score:1)
Ban MP3? (Score:1)
Real Stage Four (Score:3)
ummm i feel a resemblence here (Score:1)
lycos mp3 search sucks/sucked anyway (Score:1)
A FTP-Search engine like mp3.lycos.com (former Fast FTP-Search) has a crawler checking all ftp-servers and offer found links ! If the links are nonworking, the delay between crawler and search-engine-view is to long -> make more crawler-runs and you get not so many broken links.
Because FTPSearch has thousends of ftp-servers the could not check every server hourly. Thats the problem - it`s the problem of FTPSearch !
As an example you will find more mp3`s on a search engine who has 3 days old links than an engine with 1 day old links.