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All methods of piracy can have some beneficial network effects on sales

From their site: http://www.riaa.com/issues/piracy/default.asp

Each year, the industry loses about $4.2 billion to piracy worldwide -- "we estimate we lose millions of dollars a day to all forms of piracy."

FTA:

Maybe they should go after the real pirates ...

$1,000 as the initial charge for such infections, with further costs/damages being added afterwards seems quite nice. The idea of having Marc Morganstern, Mitch Bainwol and Dan Glickman all fined $1,000 per compromised machine, plus inflated damages and incarcerated whilst waiting for an ever-delayed trial à la Mitnick seems quite amusing.

Here is a link from a guy working in German company claming RIAA payed them to hack P2P networks and implant spyware software. Interesting. Not sure how legal, though.

This is really, really simple. it's just not usually described in less than a hundred words.

If something is in the public domain, you have absolutely NO control over it, neither does anyone else.

If you want control, don't put it in the public domain. If you like total sharing, put it in. This means sharing even with people you hate. Tough decision, but a few people have obviously made it both ways.

the faq seems to have been defaced, as we speak.

"OWNED BY YOGI! MOUAHAHAHAHAH

You fucker steal artists !

REAL FAQs ARE HERE AND HERE
"

i have censored a oh so original link to that other site...

If you want to play devil's advocate, that's fine. The RIAA certainly intimates their view that filesharing needs to be stopped, period. The Induce Act (S.2560) would potentially make hardware or software that can aid in infringing copyright illegal. If the Induce Act passed, a complaint such as this could be filed against anyone who makes something that aids in copyright infringement. What's the RIAA's position on the Induce Act you ask? The "RIAA Applauds Senate 'Inducement' Legislation." Those are the RIAA's words, not mine. Take it as you will.

Linkified:

http://computer.howstuffworks.com/question587.htm
http://www.riaa.com/news/filings/aimster.asp

"We consider downloading this code, or making it available for others to download, as theft," the company says in a statement.

How interesting, according to the RIAA this information is not recorded.

" While the RIAA does not collect information on the specific costs that make up the price of a CD, there are many factors that go into the overall cost of a CD -- and the plastic it's pressed on, is among the least significant. CD manufacturing costs may be lower, but it takes more money than ever before to put out a new recording."

Just like the amateurs at Google©.

let's face the facts:

- Google© is the favourite search engine for terrorists, paedophiles, communists, neo-nazis and George W. Bush (the latter commenting: "Whew, this is tricky!" when confronted with the confusing user interface of Google©)

- Google© has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google©-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer

- Google©'s investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google© so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google© has been on the decline since a new employee of Google© (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura, or "Goospeak") has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google©, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative. Trivia: the percentage of heterosexual Google©-employees has reached an all-time low of << 0.09% as of an assessment on 2004-08-22.

From their webpage.

This is very funny:

The principle that the work that one has created belongs to the creator and should be controlled by you is as timeless as it is global.

...snip!...

The copyright in the sound recording, i.e. the recording of the performer singing or playing a given song. This is usually owned by the record company.

Anyone want to take a guess on how long it'll be before the crackdown commences?

Actually, I just went to RIAA's website for the first time... all of the "latest news" articles on the main page are about lawsuits they've filed. Nice!

Don't they realize that something is wrong with their business when their news is about lawyers, and not musicians?!

Anyone want to take a guess on how long it'll be before the crackdown commences?

Actually, I just went to RIAA's website for the first time... all of the "latest news" articles on the main page are about lawsuits they've filed. Nice!

Don't they realize that something is wrong with their business when their news is about lawyers, and not musicians?!

I guess its a good thing that Windows users are responsible and would never do something like steal music and put it on an iPod... even though Windows makes up around 90% of the installed user base.

Copyright collective as a solution to the music p2p problem is not a new idea. Downhillbattle.org and the EFF have been saying that Voluntary Collective Licensing is the ideal solution for quite some time already. Even The Recording Industry Ass. Of America could get a piece of that money, even though it should go mostly to the artists.

Just like the amateurs at Google©.

Just let's face the facts:

- Google© is the favourite search engine for terrorists, paedophiles, communists, neo-nazis and George W. Bush (the latter commenting: "Whew, this is tricky!" when confronted with the confusing user interface of Google©)

- Google© has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google©-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer

- Google©'s investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google© so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google© has been on the decline since a new employee of Google© (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura, or "Goospeak") has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google©, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative. Trivia: the percentage of heterosexual Google©-employees has reached an all-time low of << 0.09% as of an assessment on 2004-08-22.

More like "The fuckers still steal our hard work, so no much sense in annoying the remaining customers."

Much like Google does.

Let's face the facts:

- Google has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Google is the favourite search engine for terrorists, paedophiles, communists, neo-nazis and George W. Bush (the last one commented: "Whew, this is tricky!" when confronted with the confusing user interface of Google)

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer

- Google's investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google has been on the decline since a new employee of Google (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura, or "Goospeak") has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative. Trivia: the percentage of heterosexual Google-employees has reached an all-time low of << 0.09% as of an assessment on 2004-08-22.

Yes.

Unfortunately, Google is not gonna "make it"(*).

(*) in colored letters

Just let's face the facts:

- Google has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer

- Google's investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google has been on the decline since a new employee of Google (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura, or "Goospeak") has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative. Trivia: the percentage of heterosexual Google-employees has reached an all-time low of << 0.09% as of an assessment on 2004-08-22.

- Google is the favourite search engine for terrorists, paedophiles, communists, neo-nazis and George W. Bush (the last one commented: "Whew, this is tricky!" when confronted with the confusing user interface of Google)

How is your comment related to the demise of Google?

Just let's face the facts:

- Google has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer

- Google's investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google has been on the decline since a new employee of Google (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura, or "Goospeak") has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative. Trivia: the percentage of heterosexual Google-employees has reached an all-time low of << 0.09% as of an assessment on 2004-08-22.

- Google is the favourite search engine for terrorists, paedophiles, communists, neo-nazis and George W. Bush (the last one commented: "Whew, this is tricky!" when confronted with the confusing user interface of Google)

Just let's face the facts:

- Google has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer

- Google's investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google has been on the decline since a new employee of Google (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura, or "Goospeak") has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative. Trivia: the percentage of heterosexual Google-employees has reached an all-time low of << 0.09% as of an assessment on 2004-08-22.

Is that someone pays attention to both.

You are so right!

Just let's face the facts:

- Google has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer, not the pet-project of laid-off Netscape employees

- Google's investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google has been on the decline since a new employee of Google (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura, or "Goospeak") has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative. Trivia: the percentage of heterosexual Google-employees has reached an all-time low of << 0.09% as of an assessment on 2004-08-22.

How is your comment related to the demise of Google?

Just let's face the facts:

- Google has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer

- Google's investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google has been on the decline since a new employee of Google (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura, or "Goospeak") has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative. Trivia: the percentage of heterosexual Google-employees has reached an all-time low of << 0.09% as of an assessment on 2004-08-22.

How is your comment related to the demise of Google?

Just let's face the facts:

- Google has long ago sold out to AOL Time Warner; the next round of IPO will increase their shares and they are likely to achieve a total majority of shares by the end of 2005.

- Gmail fails to meet the standard of users above Novice-level; those who are used to the comfort of a sophisticated email-client, like Microsoft Outlook, connected to a powerful and secure server-side solution, like Microsoft Exchange. When I called the Google-helpdesk ("Hoogle") and asked for POP3 and IMAP support, I heard the insulting sound of muffled laughter, then a "Sorry, we really don't ...", again laughing; then the line was dead. Mind you, we are paying > 80,000 USD per month in AdSense-fees.

- Gmail still does not work fully with less sopisticated browsers, such as Mozilla and Firefox. This may be caused by lacking standards-support in these browsers. Fortunately, barely nobody uses these nowadays, so the problem can safely be ignored for the time being. After all, the standard user-agent for web access is the mature and secure Internet Explorer

- Google's investment in Doubleclick.com and other "online marketing" agencies is a dubious move; personally, I can live with text-only advertising as practised by Google so far, but our company ads are exclusively deployed using latest Macromedia Flash technology, because this simply is what our professional customers expect of us

- The ethical credibility of Google has been on the deline since a new employee of Google (a "noogler", according to the company-internal nomenclatura) has leaked some disturbing information regarding cruel rituals of initiation, including gross acts of homoerotic sexuality, horses and mutants. However, law authorities are now more alert towards Google, since the so called FAGACT has passed the Californian legislative.

I'm surprised I haven't seen someone comment on this (or I'm too lazy to search the entire thread for this comment) is that the original US PATRIOT act included provisions that made it possible for copyright holders to hack your computers and even possibly due damages if they felt you were infringing on their copyrights. The "Deterrence and Prevention of Cyberterrorism" portion of the act would criminalize any act of hacking that caused damages or losses of over $5000 would be considered an acto fo terroism. The RIAA lobbied for a bypass so they could hack/destroy without any worries of criminal charges.

With this ammendment, they can hack into peoples computers, search for infringing materials, and add them to their "TO SUE" list. Not only that, they were wanting to be able to be proactive, in a sense find people that are supposedly using P2P software and hack their systems so that they are unable to trade copyrighted material, or delete any offending materials.

This ammendment did get knocked down, but then the MPAA tried a similar amendment. i believe this didn't make it either, but both these organizations have kept bringing up new forms of these bills in one way or another.

Sound familiar?

Here's more details...

That is all this law is. Apparently no one is able to think for themselves anymore. This whole Inducement Act crosses a line which the government was not meant to cross and its all because the government is nothing more than a pawn of large corporations. This act inhibits our freedom of speach by taking away personal accountability. The only way someone could actually induce you to do something would be if they had a gun to your head, in which case it might be better to let them kill you instead of having to see what future the RIAA and the MPAA hold for technology in this country.

Just read this atrocious lie:

"The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) takes an uncompromising stand against censorship and for the First Amendment rights of all artists to create freely. From the nation's capital to state capitals across the country, RIAA works to stop unconstitutional action against the people who make the music of our times--and those who enjoy it."

Just do a quick search for the word "apple"

"How do you like dem apples?"

This is bad because the copyright weasel will undoubtably be teaching our children that eternal copyrights held by corporate "individuals" and heirs of dead creative geniuses are a good thing. When, in fact, I would rather my children learn that a much more intelligent and socially responsible copyright term was originally put into law, before media conglomerates started buying corrupt politicians.

I would also rather have my children learn that it is much better to make sure that the artists are directly compensated, by supporting local and independant musicians, rather than lining the pockects of corrupt business monopolies.

Is it just me, or doesn't the fact that the ACLU is hopping mad about this, due to the fact that it's censorship:

[from the article]

The American Civil Liberties Union said the decision amounted to censorship.

"What he's doing is enforcing his concept of decency on libraries around the state of Kansas, and that's not his business," said Dick Kurtenbach, executive director of the ACLU in Kansas and western Missouri.


AAAHHGGHGHHG!!!! Sweet jesus mother fucker! The ACLU is defending the RIAA.

What!?

You know, americans have a funny sense of Justice. It seems that to americans, the "civil liberties" of large,abusive litigous scumsucking bastard organizations is more important than possibly stopping that same company from blatently violating the spirit of the judgement against them. Well, that and the shitty music they were trying to foist off on the states.

Y'know, sometimes I think it's ok to live in a backwoods country like Canada.

*sigh*

Cornell University, the George Washington University, Middlebury College, University of Miami, the University of Southern California and the Wright State University (Ohio) have all pledged to have Napster up and running in the near future

Vagrant Records is not indie.

Thanks. Interesting, they seem to be exactly the same as the RIAA. Look at their "news" section and the "news" section at the RIAA. Also, their about pages are nearly the same.

I still cant figure out why other industy's trade organizations behave like the music's trade organizations. I guess that the rumors about the music industry just being sleezy is true.

Can a canadian or someone who knows fill us in if there is a parallel to the RIAA in that country (or any other country).

The closest thing I could find was Canadian Country Music Association. However their about us page differs greatly from RIAA's about us page.

Remember, frivilous lawsuits is a big business here in the US. We are familiar with the litigious bastards. We, believe it or not, actually have lawyers on TV telling uninteligent people that they will get them CA$H for any wrongdoing done to them.

Go to The RIAA's site where they make no bones at all about the fact that they represent the labels. They make an aside that they sort of represent artists, but only because they fight for freedom of speech so the labels can sell more CD's.

Notice, also, that they're a .com, rather than a .org ;)

bunch of pricks

They are not a law enforcement agency, can they say that the laws regarding copyright don't apply to us since we own the copyright?

I've been trying to figure out who the RIAA really is. No, they are not a law enforcement agency. And to my knowledge, they are _not_ the copyright holders either. Their members are the copyright holders. These members pay a voluntary fee (tax if you will) to the RIAA. The RIAA is an industry trade group. Other industry trade groups that you might be familiar with in the US are the National Cattlemens's Beef Association (the "Beef, it's what's for dinner" people) and the American Plastics Counccil.

Note that the latter two orginizations end in .org, while the RIAA ends in .com. In fact, the RIAA has bought the riaa.org domain, and it redirects you to the .com domain.

If you look at the pres releases by the RIAA, they have been into this suing thing for a long time, or at least back to 1996 where their archives begin.

I believe that the RIAA does quite well financially, and they actually probably like piracy and whatnot, becauase it gives them something to do. Otherwise they would just be the people making parental warnings and issuing awards for high selling albums. Think of which makes more money. Lawsuits or warnings and awards. Remember, the lawyers get paid if they win, loose, go to court or not.

If the RIAA were interested in music and getting people to buy music, then they would change their product. I mean remember the beany baby phenominon? People will buy just about anything. People obviously want music, they download it, right? Also, these people have no emotional attachment to their mp3 collection. I would be that the percentage of people do not have backups of their mp3s, nor would care to terribly much if they lost them all in a hard drive failure. I know of people that have been very upset when their CD collection was stolen or otherwise lost.

Why cant the RIAA do things like making meaningful reissues of older material? Things that come with books, extra tracks, live material, etc, etc? Kinda like SCO. They could a) sell a product or b) make money through lawsuits and press releases.

You can, of course, read about how the process works from the RIAA website or I can attempt to summarize: They log onto the same p2p networks using the same p2p software that everyone else can freely download from the internet. They look for songs from their signed artists, and if possible those who have large collections. They download several songs, documenting when, and from which IP address. They confirm that those songs are what they claim to be (artist, and title), then file a lawsuit with the IP address instead of the name of the person.

Once the lawsuit has been filed they can legally demand that the ISP connect the IP address and time of download to a name. Once they have a name and street address, they can send legal notice, and carry out their former scheme (settle for $3000, or be convicted and pay $MILLIONS later!). On their website, they bemoan this path in that they can no longer offer pre-lawsuit notification (less legal fees), so they are implying that with the court mandated extra steps, they have to spend more money to find the identity of the infringing party - which of course gets passed on to the infringing party as a higher settlement cost.

"Is it very long?" Alice asked, for she had heard a good deal of poetry that day.
"It's long," said the Knight, "but it's very, very beautiful. Everybody that hears me sing it--either it brings the tears into their eyes, or else--"
"Or else what?" said Alice, for the Knight had made a sudden pause.
"Or else it doesn't, you know. The name of the song is called 'Haddock's Eyes'."
"Oh, that's the name of the song, is it?" Alice said, trying to feel interested.
"No, you don't understand," the Knight said, looking a little vexed. "That's what the name is called. The name really is 'The Aged Aged Man'."
"Then I ought to have said 'That's what the song is called?'" Alice corrected herself.
"No, you oughtn't: that's quite another thing! The song is called 'Ways and Means': but that's only what it's called, you know!"
"Well, what is the song, then?" said Alice, who was by this time completely bewildered.
"I was coming to that," the Knight said. "The song really is 'A-sitting on a Gate': and the tune's my own invention."

Put this on a webpage: what a <a href="http://www.riaa.com/">bunch of pricks</a>

"the RIAA started using the 'John Doe' litigation process"

For those wanting to know more about 'John Doe' processes etc here is the RIAA's FAQ.

The RIAA lives of the customers who buy "legal" music (they never remember the Creative Commons license, isn't that curious?).

Excellent comment. In fact, the part about the "legal" music is almost taken verbatim from their about us page.

They are not interested in the earnings of the artists, of course; they only stand for their own earnings. Take into account that a musician earns more money playing in concerts, than selling discs.

This is what I've been thinking about lately. Who else is remotely similar to the RIAA or the MPAA? Technically, they are classified as an industry trade group. And that industry trade groups are put together by a group of corporations that are in a common industry for the purpose of government legislation and public relations. Other industry trade groups are the American Plastics Council and the National Cattlemen's Beef Association.

These other two organizations I know of though their TV comercials where they have slogans like "Beef, Its whats for dinner", or the plastics ads where they show how our lives have been improved with the advent of plasic materials.

Now, lets think of my interaction with the RIAA and the MPAA. Its been on the news, and how they are pissed off that people are downloading files, then suing these people, etc.

The RIAA and MPAA do not have a product. They are not a corporation. They cannot ever loose money. They are given money from membership fees from thier members. These fees are solely based on the market share and size of the corporation. They are like a voluntary tax!

Does this remind you of another organization that is purely based upon lawsuits and pres releases? You can find them by searching google for litigious bastards.

Dont worry about these guys. They will not be around too much more. SCO is almost out of amunition to prove thier existance, and being that the RIAA and MPAA have no more amunition than SCO, they too will just disipear.

The RIAA lives of the customers who buy "legal" music (they never remember the Creative Commons license, isn't that curious?).

Excellent comment. In fact, the part about the "legal" music is almost taken verbatim from their about us page.

They are not interested in the earnings of the artists, of course; they only stand for their own earnings. Take into account that a musician earns more money playing in concerts, than selling discs.

This is what I've been thinking about lately. Who else is remotely similar to the RIAA or the MPAA? Technically, they are classified as an industry trade group. And that industry trade groups are put together by a group of corporations that are in a common industry for the purpose of government legislation and public relations. Other industry trade groups are the American Plastics Council and the National Cattlemen's Beef Association.

These other two organizations I know of though their TV comercials where they have slogans like "Beef, Its whats for dinner", or the plastics ads where they show how our lives have been improved with the advent of plasic materials.

Now, lets think of my interaction with the RIAA and the MPAA. Its been on the news, and how they are pissed off that people are downloading files, then suing these people, etc.

The RIAA and MPAA do not have a product. They are not a corporation. They cannot ever loose money. They are given money from membership fees from thier members. These fees are solely based on the market share and size of the corporation. They are like a voluntary tax!

Does this remind you of another organization that is purely based upon lawsuits and pres releases? You can find them by searching google for litigious bastards.

Dont worry about these guys. They will not be around too much more. SCO is almost out of amunition to prove thier existance, and being that the RIAA and MPAA have no more amunition than SCO, they too will just disipear.

One 1987 Washington Post article reported that record executives believed that the price of a CD would eventually settle around $10.

Twenty years later, production costs have come down, but consumers are still complaining about the cost of CDs, which now are priced at upwards of $16. The industry's main lobbying arm, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), responds that prices have come down. According to an article published on the RIAA's Web site, "Between 1983 and 1996, the average price of a CD fell by more than 40%. Over this same period of time, consumer prices ... rose nearly 60%. If CD prices had risen at the same rate as consumer prices over this period, the average retail price of a CD in 1996 would have been $33.86 instead of $12.75."

Anyone who has burned a CD on his computer for less than a dollar may still wonder why a product that is so cheap to manufacture could cost so much. The answer is that while the cost of physically producing a CD has dropped dramatically over two decades, the costs of marketing that album have grown tremendously. For example, in the early 1980s, music videos were an optional route for the industry to promote their artists. Now labels are expected to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars producing music videos for all of their major artists. Even marketing a major album to radio can costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. And if an album is unlikely to get on radio or MTV, some labels have decided to launch costly television advertising campaigns to gain exposure for their artists.

However, the price of a CD isn't just paying for expensive marketing campaigns; it's also subsidizing releases by other artists that will never sell enough to make a profit. An artist at a major label may need to sell more than a million units before the venture ends up in the black. Most albums never sell anywhere near that. According to the RIAA, only 10 percent of albums ever achieve profitability.

Going to have to call you on that--Sony definitely has solid revenue coming from their various enterprises, particularly hardware and media sales. And don't forget, Sony is a weighty member of the RIAA. Sometimes I feel like slashdot forgets that fact...

I know some guys that offer free federally funded vacations and daily meals for maintaining MP3 servers.

RIAA Members Check what the label of the artist you are listening to is and check if that label is on that list. So, if you have a choice, then try to buy cds from labels NOT in that list !

Doesn't matter when international quasi-legal corporate organizations are the ones pushing the lawsuits. There is no safe country anymore.

I've got news for you, Six Degrees is a member of the RIAA. Look it up.

Face it, there's tons of incredible music out on the more obscure RIAA labels. The big 5 push mostly crap and the occasional good stuff, but there are literally hundreds of small labels with great music that are still RIAA members. I'll bet most of these slashdot idiots who profess to only buy 'indie' are actually buying from RIAA members that happen to be small!

Frankly, I don't care. The music is the most important thing to me, and I'll buy it if it sounds good. I've bought nearly everything that's come out on Favored Nations but guess what, they're in the RIAA too. I care, but not enough to deprive myself of incredible music. Steve Vai seems like a good guy (he started the label) and I'll bet there are more reasons to be an RIAA member than just to join an evil cartel and laugh with the devil. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt because he's dedicated to finding the absolute best talent and making their music available for me to enjoy. It's his big boy associates who we need to complain about and focus on.

riaa members

As much as we all dislike the RIAA's current crusade, I think a lot of people have lost site of what the RIAA is and who its members are. The RIAA is not some cartel of the big music labels like Sony. The RIAA is simply a lobbying group created to make sure the small labels have as much sway as the big labels by banding together. While it sucks that the music labels are trying to get more money out of iTunes, I do not think the RIAA is to blame here.