Slashdot Mirror
More Napster Updates
Here's another quick round of Napster updates! First off, LinuxParanoid wrote in to tell us about Napster reinstating a portion of the accounts removed by the Metallica-inspired crackdown. Grexnix shared at article at the Beeb about Madonna's record company threatening legal action against Napster because a single from her not-yet-released album was leaked onto the net. DanCentury wrote in to tell us about The Offspring selling Napster hats, shirts and stickers on their website. gmr2048 writes "For anyone who may have owned an old HP4020 or 6020 or a Phillips CDD2000 or CDD2600 check out this lawsuit settlement HP/Phillips was sued because of the lack
of quality in these units. They have settled and you may be entitled to a repair/replacement or $200 (if you've disposed of your original burner)." Cool! Also, check out the Brunching Shuttlecocks' 'Napster of Puppets,' and 'Encyclopedia Brown and the Case of the Pirated Mp3s' at Modern Humorist.
From The Onion's "Our Dumb Century" book...
... the number of Americans describing themselves as "shocked" by Madonna dropped from 48 to 11."
:)
"Madonna Shocks Seven!
In the pop superstar's 132nd outrageous stunt of the past six months, Madonna shocked seven TV viewers last night when she appeared on a Barbara Walters special and graphically described oral sex she had performed on an unnamed NBA star
...The shocking remarks returned Madonna to the national spotlight after a three-day absence. Last week, during an appearance on Late Night with David Letterman she strapped a crucifix to her pelvis and simulated coitus, an act which shocked dozens of viewers, but was met with yawns by the millions of Madonna fans who had already witnessed far more impressive acts of sacrilege during her 1990 Blond Ambition tour.
According to a recent poll,
Just thought that might be relevant...
- Oliver
"exp(i*Pi)+1=0" - Euler
- Oliver
The right to bear arms is only slightly less stupid than the right to arm bears...
Copyright isn't really the issue. Extortion is more to the point. They have something we want, and they're going to make us pay through the nose for it. Why? Not because the market determined a fair price, but because the biggest corporations got together and decided that they needed to set some limits on the pricing in order to make sure they make more money, and keep making that money. This happens to be illegal. Did they care that they were ripping us off? Nope, and they'll never have to reimburse us either. So, tell me again why we should care when we rip off the record labels?
Here's some info if you'd care to inform yourself: http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2000/05/cdpres.htm .
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Class-action suits in general often do not really work out to significantly compensate the harmed party, but even so they form an important deterrent to prevent companies from deliberately producing shoddy products.
You seem to be suggesting that people should not take advantage of this settlement, because the lawyers profit from it. I'm no fan of lawyers, but they're going to make their money whether the people who were harmed collect or not.
It looks like the folks at Napster have the means to keep misguided attacks like the one coming from Metallica from ever bothering them again.
You can see the whole thing live here.
--The Colonel
You can find the Madonna single on GnuTella,
just search for "madonna music"
The Offspring's sales is interesting. In the opinions of many, Offspring is a good band, and certainly their record company is enjoying their record sales. For those of us who think that record companies leach both the artists and the fans, this is an interesting update. Should Offspring's record company go after Napster or Offspring for supporting Napster, it would be a good example of record companies acting against, not on behalf of, their artists.
-- Ken Kinder ken@_nospam_kenkinder.com http://kenkinder.com/
This is a short program I wrote a while back that actually composes classical-sounding music (based on pseudorandom numbers and a lot of music theory). It compiles for DOS and Linux; a DOS binary is included.
Will I retire or break 10K?
"Many artists enjoy the publicity the recieve by having their songs traded on Napster"
Many artists are also suing Napster and anyone else who either trades, or facilitates the trading of illegal mp3s.
True and true. The thing I've noticed is that the artists that are suing already have their own distribution channels and publicity machines. I'm glad that more and more are turning up in support Napster despite the fact that they already already have these things.
CDs cost too much! Why should I pay them $12-$18 when CDs are so cheap?"
If you think CDs are too expensive, don't buy them and don't listen to the music. Find cheap local labels, or get music from independent sources like mp3.com Don't download the music for free then complain that it's "too expensive".
I agree. I just wish it were easier to tell if a CD is too expensive or not. I have a few that I are worth at least $25 to me. The problem is, you don't get to know what you're buying except for one song--unless you want to wait for a year to go by to see what else gets played from that CD. I've been burned a bunch of times buying CD's because the one song they were playing on the radio sounded cool--then I get the CD and realize it's value to me is about $2 because every other track is crap.
"If the artists are in it for the art, they should welcome mp3 trading."
Try living off of "art". Walk into a supermarket and try to trade your mp3 collection for a loaf of bread. Art is nice, but money is a necessity. And do you really think that Metallica or [insert current teenage pop star] are doing music for "art"?
I'd suggest making money by working like every other musician out there. If you are talented enough you will make some money off of it--provided you have an efficient distribution channel to get your music to fans and potential fans. If you do well you get to make it a full time job. Also, I think Metallica does care about art even if they may (notice I said "may") care more about the money.
"All intellectual property should be free"
If this were true, most music wouldn't exist. Despite what your favorite left-wing writers might think, financial rewards still have an attraction for most people.
Sorry but I think you're way off base here. I think you're confusing the music you hear on MTV and the radio with "most music." The fact is that most music is not on MTV or your local radio stations. It's produced at a loss with a slim chance of being heavily promoted by a major label. Most music is *not* produced for the money.
"Anti-Napster 'advocates' want to destroy free music!"
No, many just think that the attitude of many Napster users is hypocritical and wrong. You don't deserve everything for free, no matter what Momma Slashdot says.
Thank you for being fair and using the word "many" instead of "all" (wrt Anti-Napster as well as Napster users.)
"Napster introduces a whole new paradigm of free information exchange which artists need to understand."
Perhaps *you* need to "understand" the current paradigm better. Most artists don't offer mp3s for sale. That is no excuse to download them illegaly. You can live without the new Britney Spears album. Trust me.
I think both things are important to understand at this point. I think the new paradigm is more important to understand than the one that's on it's way out though.
numb
People who sit back and just willingly take it up the ass from the record companies because that's what we've been doing for 20 years just sicken me.
"If you think CDs are too expensive, don't buy them and don't listen to the music. Find cheap local labels, or get music from independent sources like mp3.com Don't download the music for free then complain that it's "too expensive"."
Uhm, well, no. CD's are not just "too expensive" - they are conspiritorially overpriced. The record label oligopoly in this country is making money hand over first because of dumbasses like you who just mope around and consign themselves to paying $16-$18 per CD, and then go whine on Slashdot about how everyone else should too. Did you ever even stop to consider that maybe you weren't paying a fair market price for those CDs, that maybe that price is aritificially inflated by a quintet of record companies that have a lot more to gain through cooperation than they do through competition? Obviously not.
Because if you did, you'd realize that they are basically perpetrating fraud on every poor cad who has to by music from them. These companies have had literally no incentive, ever, to lower the price, because the have never had another competitor. They own the means of music distribution in this country, and many others. Period.
MP3s and the Internet represent the consumer's first real weapon against the record companies. For the first time there is a way to get out music at a much, much lower price, to the masses. Albeit this price happens to be free, what you fail to understand is that the innovation of digitally distributed music is a good, good thing. Eventually, a someone will find a secure way to distribute music on the Internet, and that will open the floodgates for literally anyone to make money selling their music.
Paying $12-18 for a CD is a bad, bad thing. We are getting ripped off everytime we do. You have obviously been deluded into thinking that is a fair price for a CD only because that's been the price for as long as anyone can remember. I implore you to think outside the box a bit before posting drivel like this. Maybe you'd realize that preserving the status quo isn't always a good thing, and that just because we've paid high price for CDs for as long as any of us can remember, doesn't mean that's the right thing.
--
I think there is a world market for maybe five personal web logs.
No, the FTC concluded that the record industry can't withhold advertising money from stores that offer their CD's at less than the recommended price. What this means is Best Buy or whoever can offer CDs at less than they pay for them (which is what was happening to attact people to the store and then hopefully sell them a big ticket item). CDs in general will not go down in price because of this.
And now it's time for all of the music industry to follow suit. They need to lower prices. Piracy is a result of outrageous prices! If CDs costed $4.95 a piece, would we see as much piracy? NO!!!
As much piracy? No. But there would still be plenty of it. Most people want something for nothing. That is why they use Napster, not as some grand protest.
And am I the only one who is sick and tired of music artists telling us bullshit like, "We don't have any control over the prices of CDs". I HATE THAT. Lars Ulrich sat there, and lied to our faces. You know it's bad when someone like Metallica cares so much about profits, that they are willing to lie, and try to get warm and fuzzy with their fans. Don't believe for a second. Artists have a lot more control than you think. They've just been locked into the "system" for so long, that they've lost sight of what's really important.
This is absolutely ridiculous. Artists have no control over how much they pay for a cd. They sign with a label, they make the music, the label advertises them and markets them and produces and sells the cds. The band can want to give away their CD for free, but it ain't gonna happen. The selling process is controled by the label.
If you ask me, I say keep running Napster, or Gnutella, as your taste preferes. And stop letting the criminal music industry tell you that you are a theif. Art should be free for everyone to enjoy!
So if you want to make a statement, don't buy RIAA CDs. Buy indie Cds, or go to MP3.com. That would make a statement. But when you try to make a statement about how the music industry is greedy and charge too much, and then go and show your own greed by stealing someone else's intellectual property, the only statement you make is about you own hypocrisy.
"Information wants to be expensive" - Stewart Brand, the same guy who said "Information wants to be free"
I was made aware of the story over on alt.binaries.sounds.mp3.d, and the one I read stated that her song was also available on fan's web sites. Shouldn't they go after THEM first if they're gonna go after anybody?
Pope
Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength! Monopolies offer Choice!
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
I. Thou shalt have no other MP3 Search Engines before Me
/kill a Napster user unless you are Metallica
II. Thou shoult not make unto Napster any incomplete MP3s
III. Thou shalt not take the name of the lord, Napster, in vain
IV. Thou shalt useth Napster every day to keep it holy
V. Honor Napster's Father, IRC, and its Mother, Fraunhofer
VI. Thou shalt not
VII. Thou shalt not try to pick up horny thirteen year old girls on Napster
VIII. Thou shalt not download MP3s that you do not have the CD of
IIX. Thau shalt not lie to Metallica just to have your account re-activiated
IX. Thou shalt not covet thy Neighbors DSL connection
X. Nor their MP3 Files, or any other 'property' of thiers
Shine on, you crazy diamond.
No. Read what I actually say, not what you'd like to think I'm saying.
I'm taking the position that being gouged for something and/or disliking the copyright is NOT a viable excuse for breaking the law and violating licensing terms.
There are other options to being gouged that hold water, buying discounted/used CD's, buying CD's from independant bands (I'll sell you some of our CD's for $10 at http://www.elfhill.com/Annwn), or just not buying CD's.
But taking something illegally is simply not a justifiable position just because you don't like the price point. You might not like the copyright laws (I sure don't either), but putting your fingers in your ears and singing la-la-la doesn't make the unsupportability of your position go away.
Copyright law is the only law we have for being able to make licensing demands on content. The GPL only exists because of the strength of copyright law, as does the BSD license, as does any licensing of content, open or not. Undermining just some licenses because you don't like them paints you as selfish and hypocritical; part of the 'gimme-gimme' crowd that makes Open Source and Linux and most of this community look bad to the outside world.
There are constructive ways to make changes in things you don't like; freely taking for your own personal gain is not one of them.
You probably already saw this by Larry Wall, but it's deeply well-spoken and correct: "When you force someone to give you something, it's no longer giving, it's stealing. Persons of leisurely moral growth often confuse giving with taking."
--
We won't have a say in the music industry until we provide content. So why aren't there any rapper/programmers. Both rappers and programmers are arrogant and prone to trash talking - seems like a natural fit. My coworkers are always saying things like "bitch couldn't optimize a hash join if you let him specify the cardinality of the tuples in advance." It seems like an easy transition from talking this kind of shit to busting phat rhymes. Why aren't any of us doing it? We'd have more pull if we produced music. If anyone wants to take action, I have the perfect stage name for you: NeXT Cube. Just screams geeky gangsta doesn't it?
Enough talk, lets take control of the music!
--Shoeboy
(former microserf)
An interview in Rolling Stone quotes them as saying some very interesting things. My personal favorite being:
Humorless sig goes here.
"Many artists enjoy the publicity the recieve by having their songs traded on Napster"
Many artists are also suing Napster and anyone else who either trades, or facilitates the trading of illegal mp3s.
"CDs cost too much! Why should I pay them $12-$18 when CDs are so cheap?"
If you think CDs are too expensive, don't buy them and don't listen to the music. Find cheap local labels, or get music from independent sources like mp3.com Don't download the music for free then complain that it's "too expensive".
"If the artists are in it for the art, they should welcome mp3 trading."
Try living off of "art". Walk into a supermarket and try to trade your mp3 collection for a loaf of bread. Art is nice, but money is a necessity. And do you really think that Metallica or [insert current teenage pop star] are doing music for "art"?
"All intellectual property should be free"
If this were true, most music wouldn't exist. Despite what your favorite left-wing writers might think, financial rewards still have an attraction for most people.
"Anti-Napster 'advocates' want to destroy free music!"
No, many just think that the attitude of many Napster users is hypocritical and wrong. You don't deserve everything for free, no matter what Momma Slashdot says.
"Napster introduces a whole new paradigm of free information exchange which artists need to understand."
Perhaps *you* need to "understand" the current paradigm better. Most artists don't offer mp3s for sale. That is no excuse to download them illegaly. You can live without the new Britney Spears album. Trust me.
"You must work for the RIAA!"
Good parrot. Have a cracker.
Tired of being the only one on your block who hasn't issued a rambling, meaningless legal threat to Napster? Can't afford high priced, low moral legal representation to craft elegant claims of damages and wrongdoing you have suffered at their cruel and perverted hand? Just click through this easy multiple choice form and your one hundred percent screwball legal threat will be generated and sent by Low Pass catfish to the acting CEO of Napster, Eileen Richardson. Don't delay, start now!
Napster Forgiveness Machine
Once again, Low Pass Industries is here to bail you out of your seemingly hopeless predicament. Our in-house polytheist chaplain (Mark Anthony Lynett) has agreed to read and provide nearly instant absolution for any confessions submitted via the form below. As everyone knows, the first step to forgiveness is the admission of sin.
So many of you self-proclaimed "do gooders" are out and about, saying, rather hypocritically I bet, that we're all pirates, and we're so evil, that we steal from musicians. Well, I completely disagree. I think our society is one which requires a large movement of people to change things.
I don't remember if Slashdot ran a story on this or not, but a week or so ago, the Federal Trade Commision concluded that music producers were engaging in price-fixing (forget the proper term, I'm sure someone will help me out). The FTC found that CDs cost TOO MUCH!
And Napster is what's going to make the prices go down. Remember back in the day, when VHS costed $100 per movie. That sparked a movement where people began copying their own videos. People, this is nothing more than history repeating itself.
Now we have videos for $14.95, or $19.95. Is it really worth $14.95 to have two VCRs, a bunch of cables, and the wasted time of copying VHS cassettes? I think not.
And now it's time for all of the music industry to follow suit. They need to lower prices. Piracy is a result of outrageous prices! If CDs costed $4.95 a piece, would we see as much piracy? NO!!!
And am I the only one who is sick and tired of music artists telling us bullshit like, "We don't have any control over the prices of CDs". I HATE THAT. Lars Ulrich sat there, and lied to our faces. You know it's bad when someone like Metallica cares so much about profits, that they are willing to lie, and try to get warm and fuzzy with their fans. Don't believe for a second. Artists have a lot more control than you think. They've just been locked into the "system" for so long, that they've lost sight of what's really important.
People we need to open our eyes. Artists who have embraced Napster are not going broke. If it weren't for Napster, I would have never bought my Offsping CDs! Let alone any of the large numbers of CDs I own now
If you ask me, I say keep running Napster, or Gnutella, as your taste preferes. And stop letting the criminal music industry tell you that you are a theif. Art should be free for everyone to enjoy!
Actually, my friends and I always thought the proper bastardization of the title "Master of Puppets" was "Pasture of Muppets." Unfortunately, I don't have the artistic skills neccessary to depict Kermit & co. in a field with the Metallica logo atop.
Here in Belgium, a guy was arrested yesterday for having downloaded 4 000 mp3 files and having put them on a cable server : "the equivalent of 9 500 CD in the mp3 format" -- the math is strange, they just counted that he transferred 95 000 files since the begining of the year, with a mean of 10 songs/CD. No word about Napster/Gnutella, only a vague sentence about the Galaxy server.
The complaint issued from the IFTI, the International Federation of Phonographic Industry (?).
It was a hot topic on Belgian IRC channels today. I'm amazed how mp3 stories begin to appear everywhere, even for non-computer-litterate people.
Here's a link from a local newspaper about it. It's French, but those of you who read it should find it as scary as I found it myself.
Stéphane
Instant Karma's gonna get you, Gonna knock you right on the head (John Lennon, 1970)
It's really too bad that Madonna has come out against Napster. Surely she, if anyone, should be able to find some way to use it to further her own fame.
Also, I wonder how much the single was really a work-in-progress, as the video was being shot in April, according to the Official Madonna Fan Club.
If only Microsoft would move to Canada, we'd finally get the the "Windows, eh?" edition.
-- Diana Hsieh
-- Diana Hsieh
GeekPress: The Weirder Side of Tech News
Before any of you go off and Slashdot http://www.cdrecorderclassnotice.com/ keep in mind what you are going to be supporting. Recently, there have been a plethora of class action lawsuits filed against hardware manufacturers by a few less than scrupulous attorneys out to make a quick billion. Both Compaq and Toshiba have come under fire recently by these class action suits. Toshiba recently settled out of court one suit for $USD 2 billion.
Now, I'm not advocating that the companies that produce faulty hardware should not be liable for the quality of the products that they produce, but these suits are getting ridiculous. Toshiba HAD to settle that suit because the total value of the lawsuit was more than the $USD 9 billion. Here's an article from the New York Times.
This crap is getting out of hand. Toshiba, to me, has been a good company. They sold a flawed product, just as many manufacturers do. The flaw was minor and did not affect that many people. Now a couple of lawyers looking to make a quick 30% of the take have decided that their pocketbooks are more important than the thousands of jobs that Toshiba provides around the world. All of you that have bought the great products that Toshiba has made over the last few years are going to have to pay more for anything you buy from them because these bastards are legally stealing from Toshiba.
Compaq is on the chopping block for the same sort of trouble now too. Put "compaq class action" into a google search and see what you come up with. I just hope that more people take notice of this type of legalized theft before all hardware prices go up by 30%. What's next, "My Nvidia driver didn't work great, so I'm going to sue the company out of existence?"
Of course, no one is bringing suit against Microsoft for knowingly releasing a product with some 64,000 odd bugs....
For:
Limp Bizkit
Chuck D.
The Offspring
Against:
Metallica
Dr. Dre
Madonna
On the Fence:
Weird Al (Question 4)
Anyone know any other artists' stance?
-----
The glaring contrast between Madonna and The Offspring (in respect to their attitudes towards napster) got me thinking about what types of bands seemed most opposed digital music vs those that have seemed to embrace it. Take a look at groups/artists that are anti-digital music: :)
Metallica
Dr. Dre (I'd like to know what his Ph.D is in
Madonna
Some that support digital music and fans:
The Offspring
Limp Bizkit
They Might Be Giants
and many more i'm sure...
What common trait do these groups share? The anti-digital music camp is composed of bands that either suck, or are past their prime, while the other side doesn't suck and are all younger and pretty "hip" bands. Now granted TMBG aren't exactly a new act, neither are the Offspring but they definately come from a different generation of artist than Metallica and Madonna. Of course not all pro-digital bands are young, Chuck D has been around a long time and was one of first artists to see the power of digital music, and hell The Who are famous for encourging fans to freely trade their music. Guess some were just ahead of their times.
One other interesting thing I noticed in the ten minutes of research I did for this post was that both Limp Bizkit and The Offsprings websites contained a ton of useful and interesting information for fans, both included streaming versions of all of their songs, videos, lyrics and even guitar tabs! Talk about fan oriented groups!
This has gotten me thinking about how the 'net and mp3s will really change everything, it's going to come in phases, but what's really going to finally bring the industry as we know it to it's knees will be when the next Big Thing in music is discovered online and completly circumvents the traditional distro system, tells the major labels to fuck off and goes direct to fans first, online, before releasing a CD. I believe the condidtions for this to happen now exist, the fan base (ie market) online is big enough, the technology is ready and media awareness of the whole deal is there as well. The first band to make a name for themselves entirely online is going to get gobs of free publicity as soon as the traditional media hears of them, and once they start getting mainstream attention, radio broadcasts and the like, it really will signal the terminal phase of the cultural cancer we know as the music industry.
"Listen: We are here on Earth to fart around. Don't let anybody tell you any different!" - Kurt Vonnegut
Sounds like Madonna still is in the shock-to-promote game, and plays that "sue-Napster" as advertisement for her CD. She leaked the song out in the first place. And, it is available from numerous sources just as easily as from Napster.
Too bad such airheads do not realize that their silly little promotion scheme has such large ramifications for freedom of speech - or basic freedoms in general.