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Napster, Napster, Napster
michael.creasy was the first with the news: "After
The Offspring
started selling Napster merchandise, they are now being sued by Napster according to
an article at Sonicnet.com." That should wake a few people up. Update: This is not a lawsuit, it's a cease-and-desist. On the lighter side (this means it's a joke, for the differently clued), Brian Briggs wrote in to share the bbspot news story about Metallica's 'Download This' album.
...because just like Napster and unlike Gnutella, it categorizes the MP3s with their bitrate and length and such. OpenNAP. I wonder if OpenNAP has the ability to deny MP3s of a certain bitrate conditional (i.e. less than X, greater than X, not equal to X, equal to X) so someone could run an OpenNAP server with all "no-suck" MP3s (i.e. min bitrate 160 Kbit/sec)...
the real at&t mix
Can somebody explain?
http://dtum.livejournal.com
Napster doesn't give you music. Napster offers a service to come in contact with other human beings that may (or may not) have the music you are interested in. It doesn't censor, distribute or regulate any content. It also offers an ftp-like service, so that you can copy information that other person has stored on his/her harddrive, or offer some information on your own.
;-)
Wether such a service should be banned is highly controversial. However, I don't think it should be since Napster Inc is NOT distributing any illegal music tracks at all. Free market and freedom should rule here, not draconian laws and enforcements.
If you're going to ban companies that allow people to find eachother and share information, you'll have to shut down AOL.... Hey, wait a minute, that might be a good idea afterall, huh?
- Steeltoe
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/
I'm curious if an over-zealous legal department sent that C&D letter before Napster's administrative board could sit down and think about all this. We've all seen the frothing drool lawyers get into when it comes to potential copyright violations, and who's to say Napster's immune? Hell, they have an OBLIGATION to do so to protect their license. While everyone sits back n' chortles to themselves over the irony, they seem to be *deliberately* ignoring the truth of the matter so that they can have a good chuckle. Once again, point of note: NO LAWSUIT WAS FILED, it was JUST A CEASE & DESIST LETTER.
Moo
My italics. The technology behind how this works is explained here. Monsanto, the company that developed it, has decided not to market it, although they will continue research into this technology, to perhaps create an even more dangerous variant. The technology had the potential to create serious problems in places where farming is an important part of the economy. Enough information?
>It's not that peer-to-peer file sharing is wrong.
>It's that a multi million dollar VC-funded
>corporation
That's not saying very much thesedays, when a bunch of marketoids and a halfassed frontpage generated e-commerce site can get multi-million dollar VC.
A couple of weeks ago, MTV ran a special on the Ten Spot entitled "Napster: Grand Theft Audio" (ironic eh? using a play on the title of a popular COMPUTER game as an expose on their smear job of computer geeks).
Now, this being MTV, they did their best to slant the story against napster, protreying them as these evil pirates trying to murder innocent musicians (taking food off my baby's plate blah blah blah). And of course, metallica, and lars in particular, was the white knight that would slay the dragon, and save the damsel in distress.
Everything went according to plan... until they interviewed lars... and later when they interviewed the two napster guys.
And despite MTV's bias, everytime lars opened his ugly mouth he came off as the asshole that he is. He just couldn't help it, he sounded like a malicious SOB every time he spoke.
Meanwhile, the napster authors came off as just what they are: a couple of nice, kinda introverted, computer geeks; kinda shy and embarassed to be in the spotlight so much.
>Napster isn't a front corporation for a bunch of
>innovative software engineers...
Well, yeah it is actually. This isn't some destructive monstor like microsoft.
What *IS* Napster? It's a nifty little program written by a couple of college kids. When they finished it, people told them it was really cool and that they could make some money off of it. So they started a company.
Now, that may not adhere to the RMS/ESR/Slashdot ideal of "immediately open the source and give the copyright to the FSF", but that *IS* how a lot of innovative companies get their start.
And guess what? They didn't sell out. Did you know that thet don't run their own company? They hired professional management and a CEO and returned to codeing. Think they are liveing the life of the ostantiously wealthy? Think again. They (if Newsweek is to be beleived) share a small apartment in San Mateo. No Feraris, Porches, or beamers either. Try a '94 Honda.
Yeah... really evil guys.
john
Imagine all the people...
Napster could help lead the fight against IP facism by practicing what they preach and actually allow The Offspring to distribute Napster t-shirts, as long as they don't sell them. That way, Napster wouldn't look like hypocrites, and the Offspring would have to take a loss on the production costs if they feel strongly enough about using Napster's trademark.
The Offspring, like Limp Bizkit, are one of the bands that have come out in support of Napster - claiming that it helped musicians get their music to the public and that it was a Good Thing.
So, why the sudden change of heart? Obviously, lawyers didn't make this decision. It's ballsy, and it's weird, and it's risky. Is it just a big joke?
"Beware he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he deems himself your master."
Errr.... not quite. It appears the subtleties of the English language are lost on you. Quoted from Steven Pinker:
"Consider an alleged atrocity committed by today's youth: the expression 'I could care less'. The teenagers are trying to express disdain, the adults note, in which case they should be saying 'I couldn't care less'. If they could care les then they do, that means that they really do care, the opposite of what they are trying to say. But if these dudes would stop ragging on teenagers and cope out the construction, they would see that their argument is bogus. Listen to how to the two versions are pronounced:
[diagrom omitted]
The melodies and stresses are completely different, and for a good reason. The second version is not illogical, it's sarcastic. The point of sarcasm is that by making an assertion that is manifestly false or accompanied by ostentatiously mannered intonation, one deliberately implies its opposite. A good paraphrase is, "Oh yeah, as if there was something in the world that I care less about."
- He may not have a clue, and he may not have style
- But everything he lacks, he makes up in denial
that was BillG they were talking about right?Oranges are tangible (not tangerinable) -- they cannot be replicated like an MP3 or photocopy can.
Oranges can be replicated. You just take out the seeds and plant them, add water and sunlight, and BOOM! Orange heaven.
Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
Napster wouldn't have a penny of their funding if no one traded illegal mp3s, and you know it.
Napster wouldn't have a single user if music was offered at a fair price, and you know it.
:^)
--
+&x
And that's the fun of it, innit? Here's Napster saying "please don't give away copies of our intellectual property, because if it's freely available we won't have any way of generating revenue"--and in the background you can hear Lars laughing his head off...
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
I agree about the not paying bit..Artists have to eat, pay rent or mortgage, and get crazy bills like all of us. But I'd love to know how much of this money we shell out for those 18-buck cd's actually gets to the artist...I am guilty as well, of using Napster. I have a decent collection...And, unlike most people, I do sincerely plan to buy what I can from the artists I've heard. They deserve the money.
No, Napster is no more a good guy than Metallica (ugh) or anyone else that's suing them, but they are bringing many valid questions up that no one really truly thought about til now. If no stink had been made over this stuff, then we'd never have had a second thought.
-You're wearing...A bag? I have misplaced my pants.
I just finished a group final for a Stanford class called Computers, Ethics, and Social Responsibility, and our project focused on the ethical issues surrounding Napster. We cloned the Napster design for our ethics website, which is apparently allowable under Napster's Terms of Use agreement, as long as we don't mock them or cause brand confusion. Anyway, if any of you have a particularly strong opinion about Napster, MP3s, the RIAA, or artists' and listeners' rights, please consider posting it on our Outside Opinions page. Thanks a lot!
a prophet on the burning shore
Exactly what IS Napster's business model?
They aren't making any money off of me, if and/or when I use the Napster software.
Why DOES the company exist?
So far, this is the one element to the entire saga I've not yet seen clearly explained.
Of course, if the site wasn't either down, swamped, or blocked (who can tell, anymore?), I'd just go to their website and find out for myself.
Which still begs the question, how exactally do they plan to make money? I've downloaded hundreds of songs from them (And yes, I have the CDs for all of them) and never paid napster a dime. I'm not even using their client.
Finkployd
Try it some time -- after a couple of seasons you'll be ready to charge too (or at least you'll be losing money).
You can write and perform your own music too...
But to go through the process of planting, cultivating, pruning, picking etc, its more economical to just buy your oranges than to grow them yourself
You cannot compare virtual content, such as digital media, and physical products like oranges.
Like it or not, if you download a copyrighted song from napster (or anywhere else) and you DON'T have permission from the copyright owner, you are stealing, and you have NO right to complain if they legal owners get upset. As they say... sew the wind, reap the whirlwind.
DOS is dead, and no one cares...
If there's a Bourne Shell, I'll see you there
Which begs the question: is the idea that the digital era damages notions of IP seriously flawed, or is there a better approach to intellectual property that can coexist with global fat pipes and perfect data transmission?
There was a poster some time ago on a seperate topic that made allusions to Renaissance artists being commissioned and sponsered. Is there a way we could return to that model of art and distribution. For instance, what if Metallica's fans put up $20 a piece for them to produce an hour's worth of music to be publicly distributed? Or there's a trend to using advertizing to pay for services (the FreePC company, Eudora's sponsored mode, Geocities), that might be somehow applied (and evaded...) to music.
The conclusion I seem to be more and more driven to is that unless the movement away from outdated ways of thinking is somehow legitimized, then the situation will become ossified much the way the United States relies on oil for transport in the face of ecologic damage and better alternatives. Big business backs it's current stance and drives others into the ground.
Of course the flip side is, if a new intellectual economy doesn't come into existence, is that indication of the might of Corporate Media et al, or the wrongness of ideas like "Information Wants to be Free"?
Ushers will eat latecomers.
IP is just rude.
Is there any torture so subl
Yeah, Download This should have been a vinyl-only release. You know, 33-1/3 RPM LP format. Of course, no one could play it.
Just be sure to wear the gold uniform when you beam down -- you know what happens when you wear the red one.
"Just because 99.44% of its users are shuttling crappy, copyrighted material around doesn't remove the usefulness of the program. "
That is just silly. That is *exactly* like saying a nuclear bomb may kill 99.44% of the people within a certain vicinity of detonation, however one person on the fringe was cured of cancer due to "free" chemotherapy.
Your first two comments assume that a huge mass of people can evaluate everything collectively. It's nice on paper, but doesn't work so well in a world run by Governments, TimeWarner/AOL and RIAA controlling the media. Big governments and corporations DON'T want people to think for themselves, since they would then lose control and power. Hence we have created our "mass-mentality" which lulls us into _safe_ and _boring_ lives. Ever been in the military? If you have, then you know what I'm talking about..
You're talking about "justification" as if it's something else than an illusion we have about what we do to eachother. As if anybody _naturally_ need your "approval" to do what they do?
Civil disobidience can involve ANYTHING. Ever heard about revolutions? That's just an extreme case of civil disobidience.
You talk about selfish people. Well, look at yourself. Are you any better? We're all selfish, and we're going to continue hurting eachother until we "get it". A monopoly seems pretty "selfish" to me too, so what? It's just an expression of greed and violence, which is what our entire society is based on. Intellect can't easily solve this one..
Besides, I personally don't think you can compare _sharing information, knowledge and ideas_ to _stealing_..
- Steeltoe
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/
---
"It looks just like a Telefunken U47"
Noone is to be trusted my dear friend, trust me *slick smile* :->
- Steeltoe
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/
Before you start calling Napster a hypocrite, take a moment to see where Napster is coming from. If Napster does not protect it's trademark, then more people can use it, and soon it looses whatever value it has. Now, I am not defending "Napster or what they do", I have no say in that. I am only defending their right to defend their trademarks. It is what business is made of.
------ Curiosity killed the cat. {satisfaction brought it back | it didn't die ignorant | lack of it is killing mankind
Well I live in a country where there is a $150/year tax on owning a TV. (It pays for the BBC) Support for this tax is well under 50% according to opinion polls. However most people pay it rather than go without a telly. The few who go without a telly in protest will find their voice doesn't count.
OTOH, in the 60s, a small minority of Welsh-speakers in Wales *refused* to pay the BBC tax because they objected to not getting bills in Welsh. Some went to prison. Enough public outrage ensued at this injustice that the TV license people caved in. If these people had just binned their tellies, that would never have happened.
No. But the examples you cite infringe on *basic human rights* : the right to life and the right to own property. The right to "intellectual property" is not a basic human right (according to the US constitution or European convention on human rights or the UN or etc.)
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
Offspring is just being childish... napster's legal line is that they are not violating copyright, they just provide a service (that makes that possible)... Offspring is fairly directly violating a trademark. This really seems silly to me. Sure, it may make napster look hypocritical, but what does that accomplish? To keep their trademark, they have to defend it. It's really a different issue.
---
I hope you're not pretending to be evil while secretly being good. That would be dishonest.
Just because a song is long and stupid doesn't mean it's Napster-proof. Metallica's critics agree: "It's a horrible song." Then who in their right mind would go to the store and buy it? And Metallica spent how much studio time and money producing this? If anything, it's Metallica-proof. Proof that few people give a rat's ass about that pathetic hardcore turned pop band.
Oh and I disagree with the article... The BackStreet boys probably could come up with more than 6 minutes of music rhyming with fire, and love, and other crap like that... Especially with the help of other geniuses like NSYNC, Brittany, and Christina... Now those guys rock..
Be mindful of the future,
"It takes many nails to build a crib, but one screw to fill it."
By that argument the original American settlers would have accepted the British consumption taxes on them and not revolted.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
You're wrong. Napster is suing not to make money from The Offspring's (admittedly punk-effing-rock) actions, but to make sure that their name doesn't get jacked, to protect their trademark.
Trade-mark. Not copy-right.
Napster lives and dies on trafficking illegal music. If Napster didn't traffic illegal music, there would be no demand for it at all. The offpsring basically just pointed this out, after "supporting" Napster.
You're wrong. Napster is, in its purest form, a distributed filesystem that doesn't even know it. Napster is a very useful tool for sharing legal songs as well. Just because 99.44% of its users are shuttling crappy, copyrighted material around doesn't remove the usefulness of the program. Napster is a good tool for the job of shuttling around mp3s, whether crappy or copyrighted or both or neither.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
It says no irony required
:)
*cough cough*
How would destroying trademarks even be possible? Hijacking domains? I'm curious.
don't believe the hype
illenium.net - ultimate sk8 shop online
You misunderstand. I *wasn't* supporting people's right to illegally protest in any way. I was merely saying that it might be *effective*. Wheras "IF you don't like it don't buy it" is a fairly ineffective philosophy in cases like this.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
Well done, NYC. I searched through CNN, the Offspring site, and napster (had never been before) to find out what's really going on here.
Frankly, I'm a little disturbed Napster didn't approach the Offspring initially before bringing in the sharks, but, perhaps their current legal awareness level is higher than normal. Just seems a little odd that a 30 employee firm under massive legal assault wouldn't deal with Offspring before a cease and desist was issued that ultimately went public.
'Course, perhaps there's something else going on in there. Even bad publicity is good. >:)
Linux rocks!!! www.dedserius.com
www.dedserius.com
VB != VisualBasic
I read the MTV thing which says Napster and Offspring have come to an agreement, but this whole thing bugs me.
:) Heh!
First, I am a huge fan of Offspring, and I am sticking behind Napster, even though I don't use their program (I like gnutella). But both Offspring and Napster were being a bit dumb, imho.
First, Napster should have contacted them and worked something out instead of getting the lawyers into this. They just ended up looking really stupid in my book - much like Dr. Dre looks like an idiot for going after Napster when he himself is getting blasted by Lucasfilm for the THX sound.
But what the hell are Dexter and Noodles thinking when they start bootlegging stuff and selling it? These guys are not a bunch of uneducated boneheads. I gotta admit though, that did take some balls!
On second thought, I am starting to get the joke now...
That's funny, there's no mention of a lawsuit being filed anywhere in the article. There's a cease and desist order, but no mention of a lawsuit. As many previous posters have mentioned, Napster _has to_ defent their trademark or risk losing it. At this point, Napster and the Offspring have met behind closed doors and worked out a solution where no one loses face. Everything will be fine come morning.
-- Minds are like parachutes... they work best when open.
- A couple of weeks ago, MTV ran a special on the Ten Spot entitled "Napster: Grand Theft Audio" (ironic eh? using a play on the title of a popular COMPUTER game as an expose on their smear job of computer geeks).
Uh, not quite. It's a play on the criminal felony charge of "Grand Theft Auto", which was obviously borrowed by whatever computer game you're referring to."Prejudice is wrong; you should hate everyone the same."
Oh yeah, you're correct. Rolling Stone provides Yahoo!'s music news. I remember this because I found myself a little distraught that the article offered a bunch of related links to rollingstone.com, although no links to, say, the actual Offspring site. Gotta love news parterships.
Trade-mark. Not copy-right.
Po-tay-to, Po-tah-to. To-may-to, to-mah-to. <singing>Let's call the whole thing off.</singing>
Seriously, though. Copyright is ownership of the right to copy the material in a product such as a book, a song, or a video game. Trademark is ownership of the right to copy a product name or logo. The core issue is use of someone else's idea.
You're wrong. Napster is, in its purest form, a distributed filesystem that doesn't even know it. Napster is a very useful tool for sharing legal songs as well.
Hey, that's right, and a thermonuclear device is at it's purest form a recreation of the live-giving energy of the sun. It's a very useful tool for clearing land for canals and hydroelectric dams.
Just because 99.44% of its users are shuttling crappy, copyrighted material around doesn't remove the usefulness of the program. Napster is a good tool for the job of shuttling around mp3s, whether crappy or copyrighted or both or neither.
So, you're saying that Napster would've gotten all this media attention and accompanying venture capital with only 0.56% of it's current user base? Face the (pirated) music. Napster is only making money due to the large pirated user base and has no financial interest in stopping it.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
How many of you who are so steadfastly against the record industry ("They steal from the artists and don't pay them a dime!") have ever actually sent any money directly to an artist because you appreciated the great material they produced -- that you pirated?
This is a great idea. I wish someone would come up with something like http://www.paylars.com for every artist. If I could easily find a listing of the addresses where I could send money to various artists (not their agents, record companies, or other corporate flunkies), I'd certainly send them money. I honestly wish that there was a way to say to an artist "I love your music, I think it's great!" without paying through the nose to someone who will most likely never give any significant fraction of my money to the actual artist. I (and I'd bet many others) would be willing to pay a reasonable price, probably even more than the record companies pay the artists, for each and every MP3 I download. I would have no problem handing over $0.50+ for a high-quality MP3 (192 kbps+) with no restrictions other than on providing copies to others. (And these restrictions must not be software-enforced. SDMI is one of the worst ideas I've ever seen, and the implementation of that idea is absolutely horrid.) But I refuse to pay $20 for a piece of plastic that costs $0.01 to make and is then marked up 200,000% so that every jackass in the corporate foodchain gets a cut, while the artist is left with almost nothing.
--- Remove all references to mud-dwelling quadrupeds to email me.
I agree. Offspring is showing that they are smarter than the Napster folks. Ideally this is kind of deal that Napster should make with the artists that feel their rights have been infringed upone. They should allow any band that has songs listed in the Napster browse lists to produce and sell Napster merchandise so that they can make up any "losses" due to the swapping of their intellectual property.
Ideally Napster should release the logo under a sort of modified public license that allows bands to use it as long as it is not changed in any way or used to slanderize the company. Additionaly, bands willing to sell the merchandise would have to agree not to sue Napster. In the end everyone wins. Who wouldn't by a Napster/Metallica T-shirt after all of this mess?
Anyway, I find it histerical that Offspring has played this sink-hole situation so well. They are in a win-win situation right now. They look good no matter what... another $0.02...
Well, as someone whose club has gone out and had shirts produced for them before, I can safely say that it isn't a helluva lot of profit. Consider what Offspring shirts sell for at their concerts. This is nickels and dimes compared to that.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
"Dexter" (really Bryan, I think?) Holland quit grad school (USC) just shy of his dissertation to concentrate on music, so no Ph. D. Would that I had such distractions... Between Offspring, Bad Religion, and the Descendents there are a surprising number of scientist-types in punk (or whatever) rock!
After all, Napster is a legitimate business organization, and other entities have no right to make profits off of their hard work. As we know, Napster would never, ever make money off of anyone else's work, not even indirectly.
think about this for a second, guys...
under US law, you're required to protect your copyright, or you lose it. napster's hands are kind of tied here. if offspring ran this by their lawyers, they would have found this out, too.
Look at it this way: Up until the Internet, distribution inefficiencies made buying music similar to paying the cover fee to go into a club. If you didn't pay, you didn't get to hear the music, and that's why they could get $15 out of you.
Now the Internet comes along like a hurricane, and all of a sudden the nightclub walls have been knocked down. So now all the bands have to give concerts outdoors, and people can hear them whether they buy a ticket or not. Street musicians exist in the real world as well, and if they're good they can still make money by soliciting donations.
Admittedly, they don't make as much money as behind-closed-doors musicians do, but that's the way the cookie crumbles... the walls are gone, and telling people to pretend they're still up isn't going to work forever.
(note: above analogy probably stolen from here, please don't sue)
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Why does Napster sue Offspring.. they are cool and are for it anyway.
http://dtum.livejournal.com
If Napster didn't sue Offspring then they would be in a position to be sued by their VC firm for not exercising 'due diligence'.
"We were half way to Rivendell when the drugs began to take hold."
-- Hunter S. Tolkien
They are pretty much forced into a corner here. If they don't sue, then they might lose their trademark (since they aren't trying to protect it from dilution). If they do sue, then they take the risk of looking like hypocrites.
I don't think they had a choice but to sue here.
--- Biffster.org
"Bite my shiny metal ass."
``The government is slapping a $1000 tax on all TV sales and resales. If you don't like paying the extra $1000 then protest by not having a TV.''
Is that a sensible argument? No. Most people really want a TV enough that they'll buy one anyway. It would be an ineffective protest.
"Copyright" is a tax on copying, which you may believe to be good or bad. Maybe I object to the amount of market power that ends up in the hands of a few huge corporations as a result of this tax. Simply abstaining from buying CDs would be an ineffective protest. If these corporations also fund politicians' election campaigns, I may not have much strength to fight it politically either.
However, a campaign of mass civil disobedience can work. If enough people support unauthorised copying it will be impossible to stop and the authorities might think about changing the law.
I'm not supporting such a protest here [or rejecting it]. I'm just saying that the view which says "boycott it if you don't like it" doesn't address the problem. If someone really believes that the law is unjust (and isn't just acting selfishly) then they may be justified in performing unauthorised copying.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
After being on the cover of Newsweek, Napster must have the idea that lawsuits are the best form of publicity. 50 bucks and you get your name on all the online news sights. Sounds like a helluva deal. Fire the PR and Marketing departments and just invest in lawyers.
If Microsoft's business partly depended on the source code you sent them, then it would be justified. Napster relies on people trading copyrighted music (some of which is the Offspring's.) But you're a troll so you probably already knew that.
> Napster is now in litigation over these issues
> and is pleading that it is not the entity that
> is actually stealing the music.
Hee hee, interesting argument. I bet the NRA used that too - it's not the submachine gun that killed the person, but the guy who pulled the trigger. Well, since submachineguns were designed specifically to kill, it would stand to chance that a killer will sooner or later get ahold of it and use it, right?
What's Napster designed for? It's open, relatively unmoderated and espressly designed to transport music. I don't know about you, but the last I checked, I haven't seen any free music with an open license for copying out of all the countless thousands of titles available, so their product was designed from the beginning specifically to transport pirated music. Design the product and the pirates will use it.
It's one thing to write a program to share GPL programs and quite another to share music that is overwhelmingly governed by copyrights. So Napster is guilty not only of promoting piracy, but also of being a hypocrate. A correct approach to what they're doing is to write a program promoting the sharing of new open license music in an effort to free up music and encourage new musicians to produce open license music - but I saw nothing of that on their site or in their software. Additionally, they should have approached other musicians and garnered permission to share their music, but there was nothing concerning that on their site either.
In conclusion - while the killer is guilty of putting 100 rounds of ammunition in a person within about a second or two from a weapon the NRA claims to be "recreational" it's clear that the weapon has a singular purpose of putting people in the ground and should be banned or effectively altered. Nueter Napster - force it to moderate the traffic of music and promote something many of us have forgotten - respect for other people's property and respect for license. If they fail, shut them down. They'll only make it harder for the rest of us. Currently they're giving ample fuel for the RIAA to use against us and unconstitutional laws are being passed by people who are swayed by this kind of fuel. In the end, Napster is shut down anyway and we're still screwed. Better to shut them down before the damage gets too deep...
Of course. Can you imagine what it would do to their punk band image if they went whining to their lawyers like a bunch of schoolyard crybabies? Can't do that. They'd look like a bunch of over the hill headbangers.
show me where the sonicnet article says that Napster is suing the offspring.
someone. please.
until then, slashdot really needs to do some sort of story verification.
So, all I need now is a large graphic of the Napster Logo that I can print on my T-Shirt Transfer Paper, and then iron that to a black (Hanes, Large, Pocket) T-shirt!
Heck, Maybe I'll go out and buy a Metallica T-Shirt (Black, large) and iron the Napster logo over the Metallica logo!
LongTail SSH Brute Force analysis tool is here!
Already not an issue!t ml
http://www.mtv.com/news/headlines/000605/story2.h
However, Napster and the Offspring have already come to an agreement. Read the MTV News story Offspring, Napster Reach T-Shirt Accord . Napster is now allowing Offspring to sell merchadies and is even giving them more stuff to sell.
--weenie NT4 user: bite me!
--weenie NT4 user: bite me!
"Computers are nothing but a perfect illusion of order" -- Iggy Pop
I'd think that Napster would be elated to have a band as popular as the Offspring supporting them.
.. let's see how it works out for them.
You don't get it. Offspring is not supporting Napster. They are attacking them by selling unauthorized Napster merchandise, which violates Napster's trademark. This is in retaliation for what they view as unauthorized distribution of their music. The interesting question is, if you're Napster, what do you do? Do you sue Offspring and get called hypocrites? Or do you not sue, and risk losing your trademark? Looks like they opted for the former
the difference between our pals over at napster and the nards over at the Offspring camp is that what napster does it does with style: they don't just grab mp3s and sell them to people, they provide a conduit for other individuals to trade software. if the Offspring had been a little more clever and a lot less blatant with their "sell someone else's copyright" scheme, napster would not have been forced to bring legal action against them (thereby making the people at napster seem like the bad guys... which, as my mp3 collection can attest, they certainly are not).
if napster was selling Offspring t-shirts then there would be some possibility of comparison. as of now, napster's not doing that. the Offspring should be distributing mp3s made by Napster, inc. instead of selling t-shirts.
grizzo: totally insecure, but very convenient.
Everyone uses napster. Everyone gets into mp3s. A few months down the road, when napster beats these lame lawsuits. In the meantime, they have got more press than anyone involved thought they could. They get even more people into using Napster and MP3s.
After a while of collecting data, they will go to some record company.
"We can garenty that your ads on napster will be seen by 30 million people. We can also garrenty that these 30 million people LIKE your music, and will WANT to listen to it."
Gee, DUH. What kind of company would turn down an advertising plan like that one? Of course napster is going to take off. Of course everyone involved is going to get rich. When they go IPO, they will blow away RedHat and the likes.
Its not every day that you see a hacked up IRC client on the cover of NewsWeek.
-b
It seems to me that the best thing Napster could have done was to issue the Offspring a license to produce the stuff they were selling.
Maybe you should learn to use a comma once in a while.
"The Offspring have succeeded in making Napster look like pricks where all of Metallica's rhetoric
couldn't."
By their works, they shall be known.
I just remembered this old Metallica song. . .
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Um, the Offspring are overpaid hacks churing out a an artless and completely uninteresting prouct. You ever hear their music?
--Hail Mary, for she has the largest shotgun of them all.--
According to this article on Wired, both Napster and Offspring decided to sell the merchandize. So nobody is ripping nobody off.
http://dtum.livejournal.com
For starters, as far as I can tell, Napster has yet to make a single cent from all this. Last I checked, which was before my University banned Napster, there were no ads anywhere. And even if there were they sure as hell wouldn't make any money for the Napster team. So don't go shouting from the hills that this is hypocracy! Offspring on the otherhand was making money off their endeavour. Big, big difference. Remember people Napster was designed as a file sharing program for mp3s. Legal or illegal the program doesn't care.
I don't give a shit if you think that it was for piracy or whatever. Until the author of the program says yes it was for piracy, all you have are simple assumptions. And making those kinds of statements is dangerous thing, tantamount to libel even! This latest little twist is only fuel for the media fire. Something we don't need, it only ends up helping to fuel the ignorence of society. Its bad enough that Napster has been labeled as a tool of piracy (well okay it is a bandwidth pirate). It is unfortuantly a connection general society will always associate. In the end this only further hurts the free market of innovation.
Groups like the RIAA, MPAA, and businesses like Mattell (with its cyberpatrol and constant copyright battles) only work to stifle innovation in the free market by closing down anything that doesn't follow their way of thinking. Sadly it is something that progress always seems to have to fight through. This whole thing isn't about whether some kid at some college is downloading a song that he/she doesn't own. Its about keeping with the old way of doing things, and controlling them.
I'll leave you some interesting tidbits before I post. The RIAA claims to be losing money due to Napster. In an article in CNet it talks about the lose of sales around college campuses. However the loses start before Napster was introduced and when compared to National sales is really irrelivent. National sales continue to raise about 20 percent, while most college areas only experienced a 4 percent drop over two years. But this can be explained mostly with online sales (which college students are more likely to do), and the introduction of cheap CD Burners.
[ sarcasm ]Hmm, maybe we should go after the CD Burner manufacturers next, they were obviously made to pirate music and software. Oh and while we are at it lets ban Hotline Software, IRC, umm FTP, and well hell, just about any digital medium for its ability to make perfect digital copies. [ /sarcasm ]
Seriously, if you listen long enough to both sides neither speaks a whole lot of truth. But I can sure as hell tell you whose gonna lie more to get what they want. The ones that have the greatest perceived loss and they can be summed up with four letters, MIAA.
Rant done,
Josh
I would wager that The Offspring had this in mind all along.
Imagine this:
1. The members of the Offspring realize this whole free sharing of music without their control is a Very Bad Idea.
2. They publicly announce that they support Napster by allowing any user to download their songs.
3. In a very smart attempt to make the Napster folks look like asses, they start bootlegging T-Shirts, hats, and stickers.
Currently, the only way Napster can directly make any money is by selling merchandise(there's a lot of investor support, but no actual means of profiting as of yet). Therefore, by bootlegging the only actual physical product (however minor) Napster has, the Offspring give them a taste of their own medicine.
Not only does this succeed in making Napster look pretty stupid, it also does it without alienating their fans. Good Job!
Karma: Dyn-o-mite!(mostly affected by Jimmy Walker reading your comments)
They say they are all for it, but they don't have any MP3's on their site, they have crummy real audio. And now they start selling Napster merchandise that Napster can't ignore, and will look stupid as hell if they do take legal action. I think they wanted this to happen personally. Its harsh, as I love The Offspring.
--Nuintari
slashdot : where an opinion can be wrong.
Oranges can be replicated.
Actually, there are now several agricultural corporations working on 'one-time' genetically engineered seeds: Seeds that you plant and they grow the regular plant, but then the seeds from those plants are infertile (can't grow a second generation). They're doing this, actually, for the exact reason that you mentioned: Farmers bought one year's worth of seeds, planted them, and reaped the seeds from the plants that they grew for the second generation. Agricultural pirating, you could say. It's everywhere, just not as obvious as on the internet.
Napster is not like radio. Radio stations pay royalties to ASCAP, BMI and SOCAN for the music they play.
That's an enormous difference.
I swear, if not for this whole nun thing, I'd blow all the boys at Napster from here 'till Tuesday! Thanks, boys! And I got a T-shirt for 'em, too, even come with something inside!
--Hail Mary, for she has the largest shotgun of them all.--
Umm, why doesn't Napster sell these Offspring
dudes a merchandising license for Napsterware for
$1.00. That would make all the suits happy, no?
Aside from the obvious reaction ("moo-ha!" and/or "told you Napster was a bunch of punk-ass bizznatches"), this news has me wondering:
In standard copyright cases, any reasonably with-it "artistic infringer" can weasel out from under his accuser by claiming "parody"; is a similar defense available in trademark cases?
If not, that's a precedent I'd love to see set with this case.
Your mouth is like Columbus Day.
Hmm, I'm gonna open up a channel for people to share music that may or may not be legit. I'm gonna form a company to make money off my actions and software, which indirectly makes money off possibly pirated music. Then I'm going to wonder why all these musicians are suing me. But here's one group that has given me express permission to let people copy and share music. Cool. But, those bastards - they're making money off my logo! I'll get them, how dare they take something of mine and make money from it.... sound familiar? While Napster has a right to protect it's trademarks, they should tread lightly in the areas hypocrytes fear to tread. They knowingly allow pirated music to flow through their network without the permission of the musicians - hell, they even promote it, and business is good and money flows. Now the shoes on the other foot. A band that has freely given permission is selling products advertising Napster. They should have asked, but then so should Napster. This is why it's important to obtain permission - it's respectfull and it prevents miscommunication and lawsuits - but then we can't have all those hard working lawyers living on the streets, can we... :)
The Offspring have succeeded in making Napster look like pricks where all of Metallica's rhetoric couldn't. From a Yahoo! news story the other day (before the lawsuit):
Generally, filing these kinds of lawsuits makes the plaintiff look like an asshole. Sure, they may be in the right, but it's just not a very "rock 'n' roll" thing to do. People who have been supporting Napster because it lets you give the finger to the record companies now get to see that Napster is just another player in the corporate system.
I'm reasonably sure our esteemed /. has mistaken the joke. Please, someone back me up on this. While Metallica has shown themselves to be stupid enough to pull a stunt like that, Napster...
Wait.. There are lawyers in this.. Goddamnit, you think people who went to school for a bajillion years would need at least half a brain.. But nooo.. Once you bring in the Armani-wearing sharks, everybody has to flush their brain cells and their common sense..
.sig: Now legally binding!
This is exactly right, there is a huge difference between (perhaps unethically) offering a service that can easily be used to commit illegal activities and actually committing those activities.
No matter how cool napster wants to be, they do need to actively defend their trademark in order to preserve their rights.
I understand that Napster has the right to profit from their logo and that suing The Offspring was just a business decision ... but do they honestly think it was a good one? I sure as hell wouldn't want to wear anything with the Napster logo on it after they basically screw one of their biggest supporters in the ass.
... ?
I always thought the whole idea of wearing something with the Napster logo was a sort of fight-The-Man mentality, but what if Napster *is* The Man
Also, it's probably worth noting that on Offspring's home page, they are selling Napster shirts and caps for $10 each and stickers for $1. If they're even making a profit on this stuff (which I doubt 'cos that's pretty cheap for a shirt), it's sure as heck isn't a lot.
How can Napster still survive? Who's paying for all the servers, their ISPs, who wrote all the software and keeps releasing new versions? Who has the money to sponsor Limp Bizkit? How can they be able to hire lawyers to fight with Metallica, Dre, and RIAA? Where all this money come from? Nobody would pay this money just for the idea of giving something free to people, it is not a rebellion. There must be a huge money stream hidden somewhere. Any thoughts???
http://dtum.livejournal.com
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
So let me get this straight, Metallica is so concerned with money that "Nothing Else Matters". Instead of releasing some music that their 3 remaining fans might appreciate, they release some crap and expect their loyal fans to buy it. Is it me or is this a bit childish? Perhaps if Metallica released something that didn't suck (early albums) people would be more inclined to shell out the $15 for the CD. "Napster Begone" might just be enough rope for Metallica to hang themselves with. Personally, if I ever spent so much money on Metallica merchandise that I couldn't afford a computer, I hope someone would hand me some rope as well.
Heard it the other day on the radio (DC101) here in Washington. This morning they said that Napster had reached an agreement with Offspring so that they could sell stuff with the Napster logo and the proceeds would go to charity.
There's a subtle difference between these two cases. Napster is technically (according to the laws of the US) NOT stealing copyright material. This is because they do not actually rip the stolen music, but only provide a means for users to share their music with each other. As Newsweek put it, they are taking the piano player's argument in the brothel: "Hey, WE don't know what's going on upstairs." However, everyone who runs/uses napster knows that its sole purpose is to provide people with an efficient means to steal music. Offspring, in this case, is legally in the wrong. Selling merchandise with a trademarked or copyrighted logo/name without written consent of the holder of the trademark is illegal. The public, however, sees the parallel, and realizes that Napster is more or less stealing music. Which is why the Offspring did that. Although I don't see why anyone would want to really stop Napster (unless they are a musician.) It provides you with free music that you can get at a moment's notice, unlike the old system of searching fileservers, ftp's, and web sites that would be taken down by the FBI. And I don't feel sorry for Metallica, who already has millions upon millions of dollars. I don't think they really need much more silver lining in their pockets at 15$ a CD. So Napster most likely will finally have to buckle under the lawsuits and provide only indie music, which will do the RIAA no good, because everyone will immediatly switch to GnuTella.
--meek
Penny Arcade has a strip about napster, that I think is just downright hilarious and sums up the situation quite nicely. :)
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
yet your version of satirical interjectivity comes at a point where the realisticly interpreted nature of the piece is no longer at question and thus should not be recognized as satirical literature, but alas, merely a bad joke.
Point taken, so allow me to rephrase:
Bad jokes. Live them. Love them. Learn to recognize them.
SOOOOOP.
A colour licence currently costs £104.00
The tourist rate is currently ~1.50. By my reckoning that gives ~$156.
FWIW, I feel this is superb value for 2 national TV networks, a developing digital network, 5 national radio networks, a network of regional radio stations, a worldwide radio network, and one of the finest news gathering services in the world. Just my tuppence.
The poor cook he caught the fits
And threw away all of my grits
It's a service. Like the radio. It's not too difficult of service to offer either. The vast majority of their infrastructure and value depends on regular people donating bandwidth and storage space. I think this market will eventually move to a free software solution, but we'll wait until after the first round of lawsuits to see.
--
+&x
since submachineguns were designed specifically to kill
... actually, you've got that precisely backwards. Submachineguns were designed specifically NOT to kill, but to wound.
Erm
The function of a submachinegun is suppressive fire, aka "bullet hose" -- the barrel is too short and the cyclic rate of fire too high to have any real pretensions to accuracy. And suppressive fire is far more effective when it leaves casualties behind its line of fire thrashing, screaming for mommy, bleeding, voiding bowels, etc. than when it simply leaves them dead. This is why submachineguns use comparatively underpowered rounds -- to produce disabling wounds while leaving the victim alive.
a weapon the NRA claims to be "recreational" it's clear that the weapon has a singular purpose of putting people in the ground
Wrong again! We'll shoot off three or four thousand rounds in a fun day out with my SMGs, and we've never put a person in the ground yet. Sent some old refrigerators, microwaves, TVs etc. to the next world, yes -- but last time I checked "people" did not include "household appliances", and man, blowing them to bits is INCREDIBLY recreational. Oh YEAH baby!
Thanks so much for clearing that up. So is FUCKING an adjective or an adverb?
numb
Actually, it wouldn't be justified anyway. You partially depend on food. Is it fair if I give you some food, then take some of your stuff without asking?
The unfairness comes from the idea that one party can conjure up an agreement out of whole cloth. Agreements require that both parties, well, agree.
(And no, I'm not a troll. I just happen to think copyright law is probably not intrinsically totally wrong.)
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
Though I'm sure the courts would disagree.. selling napster t-shirts is not really dilution. They are note not in any way diluting napster's right to call it's product napster, or to refer to it as napster, or have it know by napster.
No dice, it's still dilution in the eyes of the law. If you doubt it, try starting up a website that sells Microsoft t-shirts and see if you win the lawsuit with MS.
Josh Sisk
...with the proceeds to benefit a charity chosen by Shawn Fanning and Dexter Holland.
Yeah. I read that part and was once again puzzled by how Napster is planning to make money. I mean, that's just tossing away a possible revenue stream. I'm glad they're giving it to charity, but I just can't figure out the motivation behind Napster, Inc. This is getting more mysterious than Transmeta was.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Okay, IANAL, but isn't a "cease and desist order different" from being sued? If not, sorry for wasting your time.
i know for every trademark dispute, someone says this...but here we go again
in order for napster to keep its trademars in place..they have to do shit like this. If they don't, the trademarks go bye bye. I don't think napster is really evil in this respect. But they *ARE* a company looking to make money, whether or not what you think they're doing is good.
anonymous ftp, the latest in mp3 sharing technology!
FluX
After 16 years, MTV has finally completed its deevolution into the shiny things network
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -David Hume
"And that's the fun of it, innit? Here's Napster saying "please don't give away copies of our intellectual property, because if it's freely available we won't have any way of generating revenue""
Actually I think they said "please don't sell our intellectual property". And, in this case, the way the laws work, they had to sue, or at least come to an agreement. Trademark law says you have to defend your trademark or you lose it, while copyright law is immutable. So, if Napster turned a blind eye to people using their logo, then that's it. No matter how many people bootleg an offspring song, it still belongs to them.
I'm not getting into whether or not I like Napster, just remarking on the way the law works (as I, a non-lawyer understand it).
Josh Sisk
From m-w.com:
... with a legal order" somehow doesn't meet the above definition, that's QED. You can sue without actually seeking monetary damages.
SUE
3 a : to seek justice or right from (a person) by legal process; specifically : to bring an action against b : to proceed with and follow up (a legal action) to proper termination
From the article (the first sentence, actually):
"Napster Inc., makers of controversial MP3 file-sharing software, slapped pop-punk band the Offspring with a legal order Friday"
Unless you're arguing that "slapped
Slashdot is entertaining like pro wrestling is entertaining
then they're confusing trademarks with copyrights, and aren't as smart as they first appear.
No, because intelligent people recognize that copyright serves the interest of artists, while trademarks exist to fatten the wallets of the hucksters on Madison Avenue. With software, numbers are much better tools for distinguishing products. If the self-righteous Gnutella and Freenet programmers spent their efforts destroying trademarks rather than copyright, they might actually do some good.
Do you have a link for this? I find it interesting.
In this case, they were just protecting their trademark - they have to issue an order or else they lose their own rights to the trademark.
The Offspring don't have to obey the order, however... All Napster has to do is show that they made a reasonable effort to protect their Mark. (I agree with the earlier comment that the smartest thing they could have done, though, would be to send them a license agreement.)
And if the Offspring claim this is a case of "tit for tat," then they're confusing trademarks with copyrights, and aren't as smart as they first appear. It reminds me of playground argument tactics. (Of course, that fits right in with The Offspring's image.)
I can see the fnords!
For a group whose music I can only half-heartedly tolerate, they sure are a bunch of whacky guys. If I ever have a daughter and she insists on dating a real creep, I hope it's one of the OffSpring-type creeps.
After all, just like freely distributing pirated music supposedly generates great publicity for artists, distributing clothing with Napster logos and such should only further Napster's cause, right? . . . Right?
I'm really tired of this Napster deal. You know what? If you want commercialized music (ie, not free), then go BUY it. If you don't like the fact that you have to pay so much for it ($20 is a lot!) then protest by not buying it. Or set yourself on fire like the Tibetan monks or something. Just, for god's sake, quit whining about information wanting to be free and how evil the RIAA is and so forth. I agree, to a point, with all the points made by the pro-Napster side, but eventually it all get's so rediculous that you just can't support it anymore.
Sure, maybe you feel art should not be restricted or available only for a fee -- but it is. Art is a commodity and that is what keeps artists producing it. As much heart as a creative person may have, they need to eat, too. And if they are so successful that they can afford a gold Ferrari with sex slaves and a mexican house-boy, then cool -- I'm glad they could have such an impact on so many people and they deserve their cash.
The point being that two wrong's rarely make a right, and just ripping off music that someone else created -- when they have made it plainly obvious that they do not want their music distributed in such a way, is WRONG. Many people have posted before claiming "well, it's only wrong if you inject morality". No -- it's wrong if you inject common-sense, too. How many of you who are so steadfastly against the record industry ("They steal from the artists and don't pay them a dime!") have ever actually sent any money directly to an artist because you appreciated the great material they produced -- that you pirated? Never? That's what I thought.
The biggest problem our world seems to be facing in this arena is that when you sell oranges -- you have a set number of oranges to sell -- thus a limit to how many can be purchased. Someone can't buy an orange from you and then make ten more oranges out of that and give them to friends (who will then not buy oranges from you -- because they get them free from their friend). Oranges are tangible (not tangerinable) -- they cannot be replicated like an MP3 or photocopy can. With intellectual property, it almost feels like we're breaking a fundamental law of nature by not allowing it to be completely free -- only because a thought, video, song, game can be so quickly and easily reproduced for anyone who wants it -- at no cost. Still, as we've deemed art to be a commodity, whether or not something is easily replicable doesn't really impact on whether or not you are purchasing that unit and the rights to do what you will with it in entirety, but the rights to experience and own that copy of that information and share it with those you are able to -- so long as it is bound by that single existing copy. In other words, treat it like the oranges -- if you want all of your friends to see what an orange is like, let them taste yours -- but if they want their own oranges, they have to go buy them.
What it comes right down to is that you did not create this material. Someone else did. Who the fuck are you to decide how their work should be distributed? Don't rape the artist anymore than their record company already is, for christ's sake.
Just for the record, yes I have used Napster. I find it to be a pretty unreliable service with a poor selection (unless you're looking for hip-hop) that belches up half-recorded MP3's most of the time. So I'm not wholly innocent here. But I also do not have a single MP3 of a group that I have not purchased the album of. If I like a group well enough to keep their MP3's around, I usually decide to go drop the $20 or so for each of their albums (as my large collection will attest to). But there are a lot of people who will grab every MP3 they can from an artist and never think twice -- or ever purchase any of the group's releases, let alone ever consider paying the group for the tunes.
---
icq:2057699
seumas.com
Offspring is not chalk full of lower IQ people as some of the more stereotypical bands are. In fact, the lead singer (Dexter, I think) was working his way toward a PhD in biology in Decatur Georiga (Emory, I believe).
I'll bet this was the intent all along. Napster is currently in heat regarding trademark allegations, etc. as Miou pointed out. However, by sending a cease and desist they shot themselves in the foot from a logical point of view. This is why (though IANAL):
Napster deals in giving out (essentially) copyrighted materials. Napster is now in litigation over these issues and is pleading that it is not the entity that is actually stealing the music. This is (sorta) true, they are the transport by which it happens.
So what Offspring did that is so clever is to hit Napster with their own medicine. They take the napster name and logo and offer a means for it to be distributed. I bet they personally don't manufacture a single thing for sale on their site. However those items probably don't come directly from Napster either. This means they are mearly offering a means to distribute them. This is very similar to exactly what napster is doing to everyone else. The best part is how much it costs Offspring to do this. And the answer is not much... a hell of a lot less than a lawyer, that's for sure. They get the added bonus of ego points for blatently outsmarting the Napster board of trustees. Proving with intellegence instead of finance that the RIAA is actually doing a Good thing, because Napster just dropped their trow to show the world it's just another FUD corp betting on IPO.
And to think I just liked them for their music...
- Sig
PLEASE can we have a "Napster" topic? This is worse than the Star Wars Prequel hype last year. Every day its Napster Napster Napster. I'm sure I'm not the only one who's tired of reading about it.
Shake your first, yell and scream? Yes! Watch for Lars next project "CD This." An 8 track that will tell those CD people off for the last might. A toung lsahing they'll never forget.
-- James Dornan
-- Prepared at the direction of, or to be sent to Legal Counsel, in anticipation of litigation. Attorney Client Pri
"It's all fair," an Offspring source said on Thursday. "We've already said you guys [can use] our stuff -- we're gonna do yours, too. You shouldn't have any problem with that, should you?"
Wait a second since when has this law been in place. If my friend lets me borrow a shirt to wear i dont expect to find him in my my house taking one of my shirts without my permision. I never realized that debts could be payed this way im just going to go break into everyones house who owes me money and if i get cought just tell them well The Offspring told me i could do it. No but really, Napster has every right to sue The Offspring because napster doesnt tell people to pirate the offsprings music and sell it for a profit they just gave people the means to do it. Its like sueing Browning for killing someone cause their gun was used or suing Microsoft because napster is used under windows and windows allows people to pirate music. Hell we might as well start suing @Home for giving people the bandwith to pirate the music. Next we can sue Gateway, Compaq, even IBM. Fuck it lets just sue everyone.
I used to think i was indecisive but now im really not sure?
Obviously if Napster lets them continue selling Napster gear they can lose rights to their own trademark. To avoid looking hypocritical, not to mention a legal mess, they should have offered to write up a contract with Offspring's people to sell the shirts at no cost. People who are fond of wearing corporate trademarks on T-shirts win and Napster keeps its "hands-off" image.
Who know this might still happen as the lawsuit hasn't been issued yet.
So, by the same reasoning the Offspring are using, I can send someone at Microsoft source to a "hello, world" program. Then, because I *GAVE* them some source, they have *NO RIGHT TO COMPLAIN* if I take their source, right?
Neat!
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
Richard Stallman, spokesman for the group offered the following, "Since there is no entity that represents the gnutella community directly, we feel it is our responsibility to protect their trademark from infringement by this corporate giant."
Users of gnutella around the world have been horrified to discover that the hazelnut spread maker is trying to cash in on gnutella's soaring popularity. "It's like, so uncool. Nutella might be 'free as in speech' since they list their ingredients, but they certainly aren't 'free as in beer'. The charge way too much for one of those jars. gnutella on the other hand, is really free.", complained an irate user known only as Anonymous Coward on the online discussion forum Slashdot.
In a telephone interview, Lars Ulrich of the heavy metal band Metallica said, "Well unh, if they want to... hey! What the hell was that? Just a second..."
Ferrero announce a its own countermeasure. "Starting tomorrow there will be free copies of gnutella available for download from our website." announced their CEO. He denied the this was a stunt aimed at drawing attention to the new brand prior to their IPO. "By nameing our spread Nutella, we are simply poking fun at the online community. Where did all these 'G's come from anyhow?"
Napster deals in Digital files. Digital files cost nothing to duplicate in digital form, which obviously isn't the case with T-Shirts. This produces a hole in Offspring's argument.
However...
Offspring could simply say "You're just paying for a plain black/white T-Shirt/hat/sticker, and you get a Free Napster logo with it!"
Or to extend on that idea, they should make some sort of mechanism on the shirts/hats/stickers that allows the logo to be interchanged with OTHER Napster logos that you can trade free of charge! (Or, you can make your OWN Napster logo, and 'Upload' it to your friend's hat.)
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon? :P)
(If you can't figure out how to E-Mail me, Don't.
Cool. People like you are sucking down so much bandwidth they need to get a OC-12 and a couple of OC-3's! Guess it isn't porn that is driving the infrastructure improvements on the Internet nowadays...
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Actually, earlier versions of the Napster client did have ads. They looked just like banner ads and were below the menus. For some reason, Napster didn't include them in later clients. Of course, at the time I only ever saw two ads run, "Your ad here" and "www.napster.com". But, at least now, it seems they should be able to get someone else to buy space. The companies selling mp3 players would love it. And besides, no one can complain that the ads take up bandwith and slow down their download times, like they do on the web, because one banner is pretty small in comparison to a bunch of songs.
The bus came by and I got on
That's when it all began
There was cowboy Neal
At the wheel
Of a bus to never-ever land
I'd rather be lucky than good.
Hmm, kind of gives you that warm fuzzy feeling again about Napster, doesn't it :)
--
-Earthman
Earthman
Say it to me face w/ out wasting space...
Napster has been banned here at my work - not sure if it is an infrastructure ban (port blocking), or in word only...
All I know is that they "blamed" me for helping in a DOS via Napster preventing clients from getting in - which is far from the truth. Last time I used Napster was several weeks ago - I don't keep the thing running, and I don't keep the system I am on here at work running all the time, either.
At any rate, there goes Napster for me - not that it is a big deal - @Home (bleh) is coming to me this weekend, and there is always gnutella if I feel a real urge for filling up my drive with more pap. Or FTP. Or Usenet. Or maybe my own fucking service I'll write.
<end of rant>
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
Last I heard radio stations were a very successful industry making money directly off of the attention that broadcast music gathered.
You are right, profiting off of the music directly is an enormous difference. In that light, Napster is not like radio. Perhaps someday it will be. (and hence my belief that a "Napster"-like service built on Free Software is a fine solution)
Besides if all major acts put the big tracks up on thier sites, they too, could profit in (deep scary voice)"music piracy."(/DSV) And Napster would be left going "but we've got indy music, too!" j/k
Comparing services like Napster and the radio is like comparing cars and star destroyers. They provide the service of tranportation. Napster gives you music.
--
+&x
Um, the Offspring are overpaid hacks churing out a an artless and completely uninteresting prouct. You ever hear their music?
Satire. Love it. Live it. Learn to recognize it.
Soup-O-Rama!
I disagree with the conceptual nature of your satire - for, as you may notice, satire is intrinsically a contrast to the aforementioned realism in the offending piece of literature, yet your version of satirical interjectivity comes at a point where the realisticly interpreted nature of the piece is no longer at question and thus should not be recognized as satirical literature, but alas, merely a bad joke.
--Hail Mary, for she has the largest shotgun of them all.--
"T-shirts... good," Holland then quipped in the announcement.
:)
Well, The Offspring did say that they were selling Napster merchandise in part to see how cool Napster would be about it. Guess they have their answer.
I just have to say this is a hoot and I am ROFLMAO. I bet the Offspring are, too. I wouldn't be surprised if Lars and Dr. Dre are also getting a nasty chuckle out of it.
Napster has been put in a lousy position. Because of their premature IPO they are now in a position to face the wrath of shareholders. If they don't act on their trademark dilution claim, then they could end up facing class-action minority shareholder suits, which are the pits.
If they do sue, they end up looking like hypocritical morons. They simultaneously draw the ire of pirates, fanatical anti-pirates and piss off a band that was actually helping them.
They are managing to hoist the Jolly Roger and wear jackboots at the same time. HipHipHooray for Napster. Avast, ye scurvy dogs! Keep yer lubberly paws off me trademarks!
Actually it is easier. I wanted something to listen to at work, and rather than lug all my cd's in (or rip them at home where I don't even want them and ftp them to my work computer) I figured I'd get a napster client and pull the songs I want. Since I'm going through a OC12 and a couple of OC3s at work, it didn't take long.
Finkployd
You've got to separate a band's music from a band's franchise.
.
Music, is heard for free on the radio playing in a passing car. If you stand outside a concert hall on the public sidewalk. Walk past the open doors of the nightclub. Sound waves travelling freely through the air, unregulated by corporate desires, unimpeded by government laws. I don't see why MP3's can't fall under the same category. It's of promotional value for bands to get their music heard. While you CAN pinch the bits for cash, because the band's FRANCHISE creates demand for the music, but ultimately, the music is free.
The FRANCHISE is what sells tshirts, concert tickets, and CDs. The franchise was expensive to create, and record companies deserve a return on that investment. Thats fine. But there's grey area there too - how restrictive do you want the IP to be? Obviously it could get worse. What if music CD's were like DIVX? Go to your record store, buy a CD, play it once for your fee, and the player will bill you every time you want to play it again. I'm quite certain this would be a record industry exec's wet dream. Quite plausible, technologically. Yes, you'd have to get everyone to buy new players, but what the hell, if you sold the music only in the new format, they'd buy the players, wouldn't they? But with thousands of artists, each with dozens of albums, how would the average consumer figure out what they wanted to buy? If the price was low enough, they'd take a chance and buy something they weren't sure of. If the price was higher, they might be afraid to make the investment. We stand in a situation like this today. CDs are too costly to take a chance on a crap band (the only reason this model works today is because most (ok, enough) kids buy CDs on their parents' dime - they don't have to work for it, so it's not that big a risk to them). Consumers get enough "free samples" from the radio, a single here, a single there, to tell if they want to buy an album. Now, look at Napster as a highly efficient optimization of the promotional method, decades old, offered by radio. It gives the consumer a much more powerful tool to browse and sample a WIDE variety of music, well beyond what the radio could possibly offer, including beyond the industry-blessed singles. It gives the consumer the convenience of listen-on-demand:
Say I'm a Frenchman, thinking of buying the Pink Floyd CD "Meddle". I have several problems with this. First, I don't know what the songs sound like. I have to take a risk of $20 to see if I like it. You'll very rarely hear such a song on the radio. Maybe on a special show, at 2am on a Sunday, on a station that specializes in classic/progressive rock - such stations only available in large American Cities. Compounding that, since this album was produced in the early-70's, 99.999% of record stores do not have it in stock - I guarantee that. This situation sucks, because here, a sale could easily be made, but my selection is so limited, I'll simply opt out of buying it. Maybe find a friend who has it and rip a CD. If I could buy the CD, I would, even maybe for $30, if I could listen to all the tracks first. There is a value in having the physical actual legitimate CD sitting on my shelf, both from the audiophile perspective, and from the perspective of the CD as a collectible (this concept kind of went out with vinyl though). Why would an item be collectible? High demand, limited physical quatities. You can't ascribe those qualities to bits on a disk, nor can you to sound waves propagating through air.
Beyond figuring out where the boundry SHOULD be between copies of music and profits, the computer, the internet, really ought to be used as a tool, a far more powerful and potent tool of promotion than radio ever was.
Through the late 80's and 90's, industry was wondering why so much money was spent on computers, but productivty wasn't going up. Then the internet arrived, and productivity started to rise. Napster offers the same kind of synergy for the music industry. They're too blind to see it. They seem to want to keep things as they are, and I'm betting they'd like to go to a DIVX model if they could. This is where it is the place of the consumer to put a foot down, and drag the music industry kicking and screaming into the 21st century. Yes, I classify MP3 downloading as a form of civil disobedience. I believe that people should be able to freely download any MP3 they want and listen to it, and give it to their friends, and sure, those that can't afford to buy the CD, shouldn't have to - they don't enjoy the benefit of having the physical CD, they have to live with the same stigma they guy who steals newspapers out of the vending machine does. It's called the honor system. People with honor, deserve to be treated with honor, the ones with no honor, just ignore them, they're not hurting anybody, really. The ones with honor will buy the CDs they like, and delete the music they don't like. The record company will still make lots of money - they could even provide music through their official sources, and charge like a nickel a song, which most people will pay for, as a sample-basis. This is high enough for them to make a profit (considering a copy costs them nothing to produce), and low enough to keep the "barrier to entry" where people of less capital means can download honestly. Sharing the files freely with others should be encouraged (and collecting money for sharing the files will be forbidden by law, and enforced). And in this way, the awesome tool that is the internet can be used FOR the record company's benefit, FOR the band's benefit, CDs will still be sold, money will still be made, and I'll be able to listen to that King Crimson album before I plop down $20.
The only way this can work AGAINST the recording industry, is if they are making a huge amount of money through "mistake" purchases.
Well, judging by the last 3 CDs I bought, that may not be far from the truth. .
I just remembered this old Metallica song. . .
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
What if the offspring didn't WANT to sign anything? The point that the offspring are trying to make is better made if the offspring REFUSED to sign anything.
Mike
Slashdot 's editors are dickheads
I was sure this article was a joke, and I had to read it, and these comments, several times to convince myself otherwise. Here's the thing though - if Napster went after Offspring for this, they are COMPLETE idiots.
By all logic, they ought to be happy that more merchandise with their logo on it is going out to the public, and that a band is saying good things about them. Where are they losing money? They can sell their own merchandise too if they want. They had a chance to REALLY make a point by not doing anything about Offspring (even though under current law Offspring is in the wrong). That would've been great!
--
grappler
Vidi, Vici, Veni
Napster can't make money. They talk about making money in the distant future by charging membership fees, but they've already been cloned. They're in the same situation as ICQ: everybody uses them, because they were the first, but nobody will pay them, because anyone willing to open a free service could replace them.
Now, Napster sees that merchandising might produce income, but they're not the ones doing it. If they could only monopolize the merchandising, they just might make a buck.
Really, they're just another IPO raider, out to get in the news so they can fill their pockets with retirement funds and the life savings of naive day traders. That doesn't mean they won't take a real profit if they can.
Personally, I've never believed that IP law should protect merchandising. It only encourages entertainment companies to make shows for children with the sole purpose of making the children want the toys. If just anyone could churn out 10000 Jarjar dolls, would the character have been in the movie?
Napster isn't SELLING someone elses copywrited material. Even though its mute at this point because they've reached an agreement, napster never SOLD the music. If the Offspring had been giving away the T-shirts, it would have been different altogether.
IANAL, but IMHO:
While on the surface, these issues seem to be mirror-images of each other, there is a small but subtle difference that makes them unrelated. Napster's legal defense rests on the idea that they do not distribute mp3's--they only provide a channel of distribution. It is actually the users of Napster who distribute the (often copyrighted and pirated) music. Whereas, Offspring is distributing Napster merchandise, not simply providing a forum for this purpose. If Offspring were instead operating an auction site of some sort where users could go to sell Napster merchandise, then these would be parallel issues.
In my mind, Napster has no choice but to pursue the Offspring in the courts, if they wish to preserve the integrity of their argument. If they failed to do so by the reasoning of those in the Offspring camp, they would then be admitting to the charge that they (Napster) are distributors of illegal mp3's, and by extension, liable for damages.
I don't agree with the RIAA or the rest of the gub'mint no-good-niks. But how else can you enforce such things?
Metallica was once a tiny metal band, just trying to get by. Lugging their shitty gear around the country in a van. Surviving one night in New York only by grace of a space heater lent to them by Anthrax, which they set up in a roach-filled basement and tried to get enough sleep to kick heavy metal ass at the next night's show. Yeah, they've been Headbangers of the Rich and Famous for fiteen years. But you never forget.
Blatant ignorance of copyright law is bad. You're not Robin Hoods. You're breaking the law, and stealing from every artist whose music you download for free. To the musician, proliferation of MP3s is like stealing the Linux kernel and releasing it under the BSD license. ;-)
Would the RIAA and the music industry have such a bug up their ass if Napster never were? No. Lars is right, people. It's about scale. It's about degrees.Sure, we all made dub-tapes. I still do. It's not the same. I buy a tape ($3) and make a copy of a song for a friend. Illegal? Sure. But much better than being able to download dozens of songs in a high-quality format for pennies of ISP connectivity. There are shades of grey here, people.
I've heard the sad little comebacks. "Well, I heard this song by the Prancing Ninja Panckaes, and went out and bought the CD the next day!!" Whoo fucking hoo. How many CDs have you bought, directly because of Napster downloads? "Um, maybe two or three." And how many songs have you downloaded via Napster? "Um, two or three... hundred."
The Offspring are a bunch of dumbfucks. In the twilight of their (rather sad) career, trying to make another buck selling Napster merchandise before they fade away to the realm of VH1's "Where are they now?" If they support Napster, let's see them put up every song off theur new album, full length, in high quality, up on their web server. They talk the talk but they don't walk the walk. I guess this is what '95 MTV thinks of punk rebellion? There's nothing more pathetic than watching 40-year-old punks devise a corporate (yet hardcore punk!) upstart against "the man".
Yes, this is flamebait.
The_Messenger, proud to contribute to the pointless Napster flamewars.
---------///----------
--
I like to watch.
Napster leaves a prominent customer uniquely poised to provide the forward looking information. A solutions-oriented get-it-done attitude is going to give rise to all who use Napster, on a going-forward basis. So, a customer voice response system helps them in the concepting of feature availability (i.e. spin-offs such as Wrapster.)
In order to assure that the established Napster standards engender a timely demographic, they *MUST* be certain that their opponents red flag. The sweet spot made available by doing so maintains such closure. In view of the fact that a value-added core competency team proactively blows them away, Napster will ensure its future well being. They're almost there, believe it or not. Napster IS a task-oriented environment. The competitive product lines touch base on the killer app, so a core competency team WILL succeed for Napster. The cost effective goal establishes an action item for a resolution.
We all know that Napster empowers the high-performance, high-flow transfer of files, which leads me to believe that extensible growth years are ahead. IMHO, Napster should go forward in enterprise-wide technology. It may be the only thing that saves them.
I don't understand, Is the albulm Download this a joke?
The 'Napster Begone' track is so long and so horrible that no one in their right mind would take the time to download it. Our loyal fans will buy it though, because most have spent so much money on our merchandise that they can't afford a computer.
This has to be fake, right? If not ( or even if so ) Metallica really sucks.
Yeah, but in the spirit of things, The Offspring is doing the same thing. Music has been traded off of newsgroups, IRC and webpages for a lot longer than Napster. The main difference is that Napster, as a company, has a really smug attitude. "Oh...we would never dream of encouraging music piracy." The legal grounds may be more grey, but Napster is attempting to make money through the theft of other people's hard work.
The Offspring is doing the same thing (although they aren't seeking millions of dollars in venture capital for the 'Napster T-Shirt Project'). I think band was trying to test and see it Napster really has the same, "It's all about sharing and community" attitude that many of its users do.
Dana
Remember Napster don't condone piracy (at least in public). Their stance is that of a common carrier - they don't want to play any kind of IP law radicals. So when their IP was used by someone else, they took action. I wouldn't do the same thing, but as a business, this action from Napster is not surprising.
If Offspring started producing product with Teac logos on it because they condone copying their music onto CD-Rs, Teac would probably take action too. Or Offspring used the logo of a major telco because their songs were copied over their phone lines.
There is a wakeup call here. Napster are not IP radicals. They're just another business, behaving the way businesses do.
tangent - art and creation are a higher purpose
postmoderncore - art and creation are a higher purpose
I'd say that Napster has every right to not want it's logos used unauthorized. Having "Napster Ware" would be a very, very good way to generate revenue for a company that gives stuff away for free. If that is taken away from them now, there isn't much left as it stands. The popularity of Napster probably has created a very large demand for various merchandise with its name stamped all over the place. Looks like Offspring hit the Napster nail on the head.
Napster is going to have a hard time not looking like a hypocrite with all of this.
Yes, trademarks are a differant thing from copyrights. Yes, Napster is not directly (or so they claim) performing copyright violations anyway. Yes, this is potentially a bigger deal, since as opposed to simply providing a service that allows illegal trading to occur (the same can be said of the telcos), The Offspring are directly ripping off Napster's trademark.
However, public opinion is rarely based on facts, and is more often based on perception. And as far as the public's perception of this will run, we've got a really fantastic case of the Pot and the Kettle going on here.
Not to mention the necessity of striking at a the group that stood up in their defence. That's going to look pretty bad too.
Napster would have been better of simply mailing them a merchandising agreement, and then striking at anyone else who started selling products with their name attached. But then, it's a little late now...
All operating systems suck. Some just suck less than others. (and some are virtual black holes)
Offspring says that they allow napster to use their product so offspring should be able to use theirs. The difference is the offspring is selling merchandise - if they were trading or giving it away their argument might hold. But I just tried to trade them a metallica shirt for a napster shirt and they wouldnt take it. punks.
to email me: take my
no, I am talking about offspring--although it would be rather neat if someone inBad Religon had that type of degree too
Slackware: old school feel, new school gear.
The napster merchandise wants to be free! The Offspring shouldn't be charging for it!
I don't really like the Offspring's music, but I love their sense of irony.
Well, The Offspring did say that they were selling Napster merchandise in part to see how cool Napster would be about it. Guess they have their answer.
I'm still waiting for a more official word, but I have to say this seeming hypocracy is not at all encouraging.
-- "God, Root, what is difference?" - Pitr, "User Friendly"
Though I'm sure the courts would disagree.. selling napster t-shirts is not really dilution. They are note not in any way diluting napster's right to call it's product napster, or to refer to it as napster, or have it know by napster.
Offspring are clearly selling shirts with logos that refer TO napster, they do not pretend napster is theirs or anything.
The real issue is copyright.. the napster logo is not theirs to sell on shirts.
Personally, napster losers should be honored.
Well despite the fact that napster is not "selling" copyrighted material, this is probably as close to a real world example of the murky waters that napster inhabits. However since napster to my mind is not really trading on it's reputation for being a morally upright business. I really don't think the loss of public respect for them (because they are suing the offspring for copyright violation) is going to affect their operation. (maybe alot of people consider napster to be like o'reilly or one of the other "cool" companies, but I have never spoken to them)
Except fot the fact that news and COMMENTARY (such as yours) are covered under fair use. :)
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Jeff Croft
http://jeffcroft.com
http://industrystandard.org
http://newbeetle.org
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Jeff Croft
http://jeffcroft.com
They are. for $15, they will make and send you a T-shirt (not a napstser product) with the Napster(tm) logo on it.
They are in no way infringing on napster's trademark. Napster does not own a trademark in the shirt making industry.
I'd think that Napster would be elated to have a band as popular as the Offspring supporting them.
Sure, it may not have been with cold, hard, cash... but Napster sure needs some support in the commercialized-music area...
-- Dr. Eldarion --
Not a bad comment but I must point out one thing. "Pop Music" != art. We should all stop refering to pop musicians as artists. The musician part is negligable in a number of cases as well. I'm not saying that music itself is not art. However Art is something that transcends monetary value, and cannot be commodotized easily, not by the artist, the critic or the viewer of said art. The artist does not concern oneself with such things as how much they stand to earn for their art, only the beauty that can be found in it.
I also don't like the description of unauthorised copying as theft, but that's a different argument.
One last thing to consider. You say that you only own mp3's of music that you have a CD for. Guess what, the RIAA would like to put you on the same level as the people you're lambasting for just taking the mp3's. You really ought to delete all of the mp3's you downloaded, get an mp3 encoder of your own (preferably from the fraunhoffer[sp?] people as others may soon be totally illegit) and encode them yourself. You see, *my* fair use copy is not *your* fair use copy, even if they happen to bit-for-bit the same. Oh, I almost forgot, the RIAA will say that you shouldn't even have mp3's of works from labels that they represent, as your computer hard drive is not covered under the AHRA of 1992 or some such. So you better make sure that you only store them on your HD long enough to transfer them to an (AUDIO)CD.
Did I miss anything up there? The point is that the RIAA is doing some pretty ridiculous things, we don't agree with them, and we're picking a fight. Napter is not exactly a company full of saints here, however they are high profile, and a perfect vehicle for the moment. I personally think that it's a wonderful way to find music from overseas and flush out my jazz collection (I've put some out-of-print mp3's ripped from vinyl and watched the verve spread like love). I also have to sit back and watch the 13 year olds destroy the very industry that made them the pop-zombies that they are.
Haven't you ever wished you could respond to a Cease and Desist order by saying, "All right, I'll cease, but I flatly refuse to desist. I will fight that to the end!" (or possibly vice-versa)?
Classic case of 2 wrongs don't make a right. This is very closely related to the discussion about crack backs. If it is wrong for someone to crack into your system, then it is wrong for you to crack back into theirs. If it is wrong for Napster to facilitate copyright infringement, then it is wrong for those that are having their copyrights infringed upon to retaliate with the same tactics.
This is old testament justice, and while people might like it (not necessarily excluding myself), it doesn;t change that it is flagrant violation of a law. Great thing about the US...if you don't like something, speak out about it!!! Get the law changed! But breaking the law you are having an issue with is the most ineffective type of rebellion in existence.
You know what? Fuck you all. Fuck the RIAA, Metallica, Offspring, Dr. Dre, Britney Spears, I don't give a fuck. Everyone has been copying audio decades ago, and nobody has said shit about that. Give me a break. Tecnically, and that's what matters, Napster is not doing anything illegal, period! Is that so fucking hard to realize? I think there is a little difference between acting as a mean to let ANYONE do WHATEVER THEY WANT TO DO (i.e. trade good public domain music like Bach, Stravinsky songs, or trade hiphop trash, who cares). If people are so excited about Napster, then something is kinda wrong. CD's are nice, but not everyone can afford all they want - hell, at least not me, I am poor. If you want to make me stop using Napster, or having quick access to information, then you better pay my CDs, bills, cut off my telephone line or something.
Something funny that I think nobody has ever realized is that trading MP3s has been possible for years - _lots_ of years, in fact. Again, only because of the fucking stupid 'internet media' hype and all the shitheads getting online, there has been this enormous impact of the program. Hell, go sue CuteMX, gnutella, sue ICQ, sue the guy who made IRC for including file-sharing functions, make the FTP RFC classified. Fuck you all hypocrates. And for all pop artists who can no longer eat: I HOPE YOU DIE.
Thank you for your time.
Holy Cow! They produce a giantic boring long trite song of 55 minutes that is purposely terrible ... just so no one downloads it using Napster?
Works for me all right. I promise I will not download it. I think they have discovered a cure.
Now if only all other recording artists follow suit, and only produce similar albums, the problem will be cured. Gee! Why didn't someone think of this sooner?
And it sounds like Napster's being hipocritical, since Metallica didn't say it was OK, but Napster's not the one sharing MP3s - they're only providing a means for other people to do so. Using Napster's service to distribute unauthorized Metallica MP3s is against Napster's policy, and will result in your account being terminated and your IP address banned if they find you (but of course they're not looking, which is why they shouldn't be in trouble: they're a common carrier and they don't monitor their content).
--
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Anyone wondering about the potential cleverness of The Offspring:
:)
Last I heard, Dexter Holland, the lead singer, was very close to finishing his Ph.D. dissertation in molecular biology. This was even once a question on Jeopardy (and no, not the Rock&Roll version)
From a band whose music just oozes sarcasm and irony, I wouldn't be surprised if this was panned and intentional.
Then again, their music also helped inspire me to quit one of the crappiest jobs I ever had, so I may be a bit biased...
I understand that artistic property such as music is something that is never going to have a clear cut solution from piracy, but when faced with such an apparently easy solution to getting this music for free, it seems deafeningly obvious that these guys are ignoring the whole "you can run but you can't hide" outlook on things. Napster had a central bannable server, gnutella comes along with a solution. Gnutella begins to be cracked down on, everyone moves to FreeNET and other easily available options.
I appreciate the delicacy of a previous poster as he mentioned that a single, independently released cd can pay for a days food, that's a very valid arguement, the distribution (albeit at times pirated) of music is not meant to hurt you, it seems aimed more at the bigger (we'll take 12 dollars, you can split the rest of the 3) middlemen.
What will I do by this? Well first off I'm not really a giant fan of this group, but I may just get it some night at home, convert it to wav, break it up into tracks, push it back to mp3 and offer it up myself. Why go through the trouble if I don't even like the guys? I think this is an admirable way to combat piracy, it makes sense because it kills a lot of the people who would download this, because they can, but I'm more offended by Lars' stupidity towards the situation. I understand that they may not know exactly who to talk to about this new type of technology, but for God's sakes, I just _know_ that some geeks are emailing them. I wish more people would listen to the guys that write these types of programs, or are at least familiar with some better ways of working around this... excuse me for the MS-esque retort, but for goodness sakes guys... innovate! Realize the marketing structure for standard music purchasing is rapidly changing due to technology. T3's a bane? Depends who ya ask chief, personally, high speed connections aren't going away, and when a better infrastructure is implemented among our nation's isps, creating a 56 meg cd isn't going to stop anyone...
eor - (end of rant)
Here's the official word from Napster, now: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE JOINT STATEMENT FROM NAPSTER AND THE OFFSPRING SAN MATEO, CA and LAGUNA BEACH, CA - Napster and The Offspring have agreed to work together to offer a more complete line of Napster products. Profits from the line will go to a charitable organization agreed to by Dexter Holland and Shawn Fanning. "The Offspring have been great supporters of Napster," said Fanning, Napster's Founder. "We are looking forward to working with them." Dexter Holland stated, "T-shirts...good."
Okay, this whole time I have been supporting free trade and whatnot; supporting Napster in a fundamental way.. and they pull this?!? What company in their right mind would sue someone for free advertizing? This is completely against any kind of business sense.
Before their lawyers popped their heads out, they seemed like a perfectly nice company. Now they are on my "Laugh On Sight" list. Go Metallica.
-Effendi
-Effendi
How does this get a 4??...Theres a huge difference, The Offspring will make money off of the sales of Napster "Ware", Napster makes jack shit off of some kid having an MP3 on their computer and some other kid downloading it via Napster's program. Thats been the whole damn point of Napster's case, they make no money whatsoever off of anything that gets passed through their system. Shit, even Napster is basically free. If there were an economy in place based on the trading of goods and services as opposed to a monetary system, then maybe The Offspring would have a point, but the fact remains we are not early tribal man. Grok can not go to the grocery store with the wheel he just carved and get a cart of groceries. The offspring cannot assume any profit from selling bootleggedgear bearing the Napster logo simply because they don't care if kid A uses Napster to facilitate the exchange of an Offspring track to kid b. People have to wake up, suing Napster is assinine because they simply made a product that can and is abused. Telling the Offspring that they have to stop selling crap with the Napster logo on it is smartbecause if I were napster I sure as hell wouldn't want my name associated with crap like The Offspring.
Yeah, ok but...
This isn't about what is legal and what is not, in my mind. How much money do you think Offspring had hoped to make off Napster t-shirts? I really don't think this was about just making a few bucks on the side, more about making a statement. I think it's brilliant. It exposes the true nature of the beast, not the PR image that they would like you to see of the saviours of free music battling the evil monsters of big record labels.
When I saw the blurb the other day about Offspring selling Napster merchandise, I kind of went, 'huh? What is that about?' Now it is clear as crystal. They can stop selling shirts and caps today, hell -- they may never have even sold _any_, and the point is made. Napster is a commercial interest, just like any other. They are out to make a buck (nothing wrong with that, I've made a buck or two myself) and will defend their interests by whatever means they must use, even sicking their lawyers on someone.
But enough of the 'freedom fighter' crap, already. We see you now for what you are. Kinda cool how they got maneuvered into this situation. Kinda like a good game of chess.
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
so that only leaves one choice - make it licensed Napster materials.
And apparently that's what they did... since it seems the whole thing is over with now and Offspring is legally allowed to distribute Napster-branded merchandise, with the proceeds to benefit a charity chosen by Shawn Fanning and Dexter Holland.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
ESR did mention in the Magic Cauldron that one viable business model is to give away the software but to make money off the accessories. If this is what Napster is doing, then perhaps there should be some recognition of its rights to retain trade-marks and co-branding. The way that I look at it is that if you think of information travelling as a wave on a pond and energy representing the transfer of money, then to really benefit you either have a standing wave ripple front moving in a single direction where all energy is concentrated at the edge (licensing, charge of direct sales, etc) or else have it oscillating in an enclosure in which case you charge a small amount but spread it across a space-time domain. Either case you have to put energy into sustaining itself, either through a uni-directional strong front travelleing fast or else in maintaining persistent backwards compatibility. (I hope I haven't muddled the analogy too much). Either way you want a net increase in energy otherwise the dissipation means that the source/inspiration for the content disappears. The concept of a starving artist may not appeal to programmers with high-expense rations in Silicon Valley so somehow you need to survive the lean period of development. If merchandising is the only solution when going up against an entrenched system, then is it fair or injust that they try to preserve their air-supply? I think we all tend to root for the underdog against the existing economic interests but sometimes the deadwood needs to be cleared before the new broom can sweep clean.
LL
Even so, Napster is still (trying to) indirectly making money off of these bands that they say they respect the copyrights to. They are trying for an IPO right? Their software woulnd't be popular without the trading of these bands' music goin on on their networks correct? Their company wouldn't be worth an IPO w/o popular music. How else is this company going to make any money (besides an IPO)? They have no way to produce revenue short of one small banner ad on their website. Now if they actually sold advertising space on their napster program things would be a little different. They'd actually have a legitimate source of revenue, but as it stands it looks like their just trying to get rich quick without reguards to the law. It would also help if they allowed other files to be traded over their networks, legitimate files such as hardware drivers or classic books (not still under copyright) in some sort of electronic format. This is totally uncool of napster and I don't see how anyone can still support them.
To an already insane situation. You have to admit that the Offspring have either A) a good sense of humor or b) someone really clever (or stupid depending on how you want to look at it working for them to pull off a stunt like that. The problem lies in the fact that while Napster may not be guilty of any wrong doing (echoes of "common carrier" and IANAL go through my head) the Offspring definitely are. Selling unlicensed merchandise is clearly a crime, unfortunately the case is not so clear cut with what Napseter is doing. I wish I had some sort of clear cut answer on the whole Napster good/bad thing. It's clearly illegal under current laws but use of Napster has opened me to worlds of music that I would have never have listened too. I even spent $60 at Amazon (I know, I know) during lunch today on CDs.
Bite me RIAA
Pete
The sole purpose of the Internet is to get porn and bomb making plans into the hands of children.
Now, I feel it is important to support the artists and I like to have the very best audio fidelity. But if it were not for Gnutella I would have never known that I enjoyed the music of Ladysmith Black Mambazo - particularly not her rendition of the Lion Sleeps Tonight, one of my favorites from my childhood.
Does anyone know of an MP3 to WAV or AIFF decoder for Linux? I don't mean a player, rather one that saves to files. I'd like to make an all-Lion and all-Louie-Louie CD for the amazement and torment of my friends.
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
Copyright issues and all that other dreck aside this is a realy bad move by the napster folks.
For one there alianating the band that is problably one of there biggest supporters among "signed artists" and one of the only bands thats taken the time to sit back and say "hey...shit...we're getting downloaded like crazy but our record sales are actualy going up as a result not down"
Second there not realy getting hurt that bad by it. I mean the offspring arn't making a hell of a lot of profit off of the things if you look at there prices (I used to produce promo stuff way back when and can honestly say that there not getting a hell of a lot of a return on these things at those prices) when you factor in production, cost of order processing,etc and from what I can see from the pictures on the offspring website there not trying to tie there product to napsters in any way (like putting there logo on the front and napsters on the back of anything stupid like that). If I was napster I'd be considering it free advertising and damn good press actualy
--
"The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it."
-John Gilmore
It's sortof lame to just put up a "good move, guys" post, but I'm so impressed, I feel compelled. I don't know who thought of this from the Offspring "camp", but it's just beautiful. Now if Offspring decides to sue/say bad things about/throw rotten tomatoes at Napster, really, who is going to blame them?
"Napster's all about freedom from greed through IP restrictions." Yeah. Right. I can hear the sound of any remaining illusions collapsing right now.
Tweet, tweet.
Napster is getting worse and worse as the days go by. Now, I understand that they are a business and theat they must protect themselves legally (Metallica/Dr.Dre) and their marketing image and trademarks, but to sue someone "on their side" is insane. They are just pissing off everyone, fans, RIAA, Bands. Who's going to be left to want to use their product when Napster begins charging for their service, which I know is comming up soon. Mark my words.
To be fair and give them the benefit of the doubt, perhps they asked The Offspring to stop and they refused. Anyways, GNUtella will get the same job done and you will never have any problems with a corporation behind it.
--- RFC 1149 Compliant.
Maximum props to the Offspring for fighting fire with fire.
:)
In much the same way Napster is claiming no record sales are being hurt the Offspring can claim that no merchandise sales are being lost
Can anyone confirm that the lead singer from the Offspring has his Ph.D in Molecular Biology?
"A day earlier, another source in the Offspring camp said that if Napster issued a cease and desist order, it would "expose a huge hypocrisy.""
I'm beginning to think Metallica has a point. It's not that peer-to-peer file sharing is wrong. It's that a multi million dollar VC-funded corporation designed to create proprietary peer-to-peer file sharing software is wrong. Napster isn't a front corporation for a bunch of innovative software engineers... it's just a company trying to sell other people's music for free. if we're going to smack the recording industry in the face hard enough to get their attention, we need a truly distributed system, with proxying, encryption, and random port selection, so you can't profile it. So rather than sitting around on slashdot bitching about it, let's go write some code for gnutella!
just a thought,
-mwalker
--
What happens when you outlaw guns
"It's all fair," an Offspring source said on Thursday. "We've already said you guys [can use] our stuff - we're gonna do yours, too. You shouldn't have any problem with that, should you?"
I'm not sure whether Holland's trying to make a point, or is dead serious, or both.
I understand Holland's actually kinda cool with Offspring music being traded/pirated/whatever over the Internet...and it wouldn't surprise me if he's trying to make a point while meaning every word. "It's good enough for you, it's good enough for me" type thing. Of course, Napster could be playing "do as I say, not as I do"...but that would be hypocritical, now wouldn't it?:)
Plat
Now with nearly 100% legal mp3s! (except for the four Body Count mp3s - sorry Ice T.)
Someday, you're going to die. Get over it.
I like Napster.
I like the Offspring.
I NO like lawsuits.
regards.
"If voting could really change things, it would be illegal. " - Revolution Books, NY
Anyone remember Ignition, and when the Offspring didn't get radio air time and were on Epitaph? I knew a lot of people that thought the Offspring sold out with Smash, and some of their early songs seemed like ripoffs of TSOL. It looks like the Offspring haven't lost their sense of irony after all, they're just spreading it to a larger audience.
Maybe I'll have to start buying their albums again.
Just curious...
--
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
I am beginning to agree with you more and more, day by day.
Laws and technicalities are one thing, but every damned employee of Napster knows that his company is successful right now because everybody uses it to get free music. Yes, it broadens people's tastes. God yes, free, available music is very healthy for the spread of culture and such. But napster is still exploiting a very questionable legal loophole.
I'm starting to think that Napster is doing nothing more than using the mp3 idealism in all of our hearts as a cash cow. Shame on them!
You're all missing the point. Napster never violated any copyrights or trademarks. The USERS of Napster did. In this case, the Offspring ARE actively violating a trademark. There is no hypocracy in Napster suing the Offspring over this. For those who are counting, my comments alone violated 5 trademarks.
Esteemed sirs:
I could not help but notice that you are endorsing the dissemination of culture over the internet by selling Napster merchandise!
My brother, scrawny code-geek he is, would desparately like to wear apparel celebrating the technology behind sharing of files over the internet. To my mind, this would make an ideal birthday gift. The problem is, we both loathe Napster. It's slow, inefficient, and tied to a central database that Metallica and their legal eagles can subpeona. Thus, he downloads all of your songs using Gnutella, a peer-based network based around public domain software rather than a central service based around proprietary code. If you would be so kind as to design a decent "Gnutella" t-shirt, I would be ecstatic! Since there is no trademark, and no-one to sue or be sued, you can promote Gnutella -and- turn a tidy profit! A shirt in "L" size would be ideal.
As for myself, I find an IP-based file sharing scheme to be too invasive of my privacy, which is why I endorse FreeNet, a system that offers technological guarantees of anonymity. Like Gnutella, it is a "free software" project with no enforced trademark. I'd be delighted if you could design a snazzy FreeNet hat I could purchase from you.
While you are at it, "NFS", "FTP", and "IRC" T-shirts commemorationg the death of the music industry and the overpaid hacks and lapdogs churning out artless product for it would be spiff-a-riffic.
SoupIsGood Food
Youre really tired of this Napster deal? And I'm really tired of hearing someone 'explain' the advantages of treating everything like oranges.
All your 'high on a hobby horse' arguments just rehash why we have 'property' - of course people can get 'gold
Ferraris' from selling property, of course they can control who gets their property, and of course you can use words like 'stealing' - though I think 'rape' in this case is an abuse of that word.
What you seem to forget is all that emotion comes AFTER you have agreed on property. Hell, people have been through this before with slavery, with suffragettes - don't try and give me the line 'the law says its property and so it IS'. I'm not advocating breaking the law, I'm just saying we're involved in a debate here about what the law should be, so its really lazy to just use arguments that derive from accepting your case in the first place.
Your one and basic argument thats left here is that 'Art is a commodity and that is what keeps artists producing it...they have to eat too'. So how far back do you think the history of art goes?
It is not just the production of property - its the channels for distribution, the economic models for pricing based on perceived demand and supply curves, its about all sorts of things that, in particular, are often anathema to artists. Lars said himself that he felt it imperative that Metallica keep the business side separate from the artistic. And it sounded as though it wasnt that easy - and I'm not surprised. Once something is treated as property it does indeed enter into a whole system with some wonderful powers, a very very effective system. But this is a system with 'haves' and 'have-nots'. And it seems to me that there are some areas of our lives which should be kept out of such systems - or at least protected from them as much as possible - and art is one of them. Actually art is the least problematic case for me. What about Health? Education? Law? - all areas where it seems to me that money perverts the distribution of resources relative to how most of us would imagine such systems should distribute resources. Centralisation is not the answer, but neither is commercialisation, with its attendant concepts of economic rent, the only reply.
cute, but that won't hold up in court.
As many people have already commented, Offspring is clearly breaking a law, it's not a grey area at all.
---
I hope you're not pretending to be evil while secretly being good. That would be dishonest.
From "Terms of use" on Napster.com:
Set forth below is a current listing of some United States trademarks owned by Napster.
Those trademarks followed by (®) are registered trademarks of Napster in the United States; all others are trademarks of Napster in the United States.
This list is not a comprehensive list of all Napster trademarks.
Updated: Feb. 4, 2000
Napster
MusicShare
Since it doesnt have a ® next to it, it must mean the trademark isnt registered? How are they able to do anything against offspring using it then? (I am not a lawyer)
Not to sound obnoxious, but the last 5 Napster stories posted on Slashdot had already been posted on The Swindle, in most cases days earlier. Regrettably, noone seems to have noticed. Owell.
There is a big difference between what Napster is doing and what The Offspring is doing. The Offspring are making money directly off of Napster's trademark, which is specifically illegal. (Sort of like if Microsoft started selling Slashdot.org merchandise from their website.) But Napster only provides a file sharing service; they don't make money directly from the Offspring's trademarks, or any other band. The legality of this is being sorted out in court, but providing a service that allows individiuals to share files definitely has not been decreed to be illegal yet. Selling merchandise with somebody else's tradmarks definitely is illegal.
Unhappy? Kill your television.
Though I am not a fan of The Offspring's music, I think this is a hilariously ironic look at the true forces hard at work at Napster. Napster isn't "the good guys", they're trying to make money like every other corporation, and they're not afriad to sue, just like every other corporation *cough* RIAA *cough*.
Napster lives and dies on trafficking illegal music. If Napster didn't traffic illegal music, there would be no demand for it at all. The offpsring basically just pointed this out, after "supporting" Napster.
This is altogether too funny, someone needs to moderate the story up (+1, Funny)
-------- "All I want in life's a little bit of love to take the pain away" --Spiritualized
Napster should collect the names of everyone who is buying napster stuff from The Offspring then The Offspring can stop selling napster stuff to those people.
Yessir, uh-huh, best damn irony ah've et all week.
Next, someone has to steal their source code and publish it. Not just some clone (there are enough of those around already), but stuff they have copyright on.
Ah'm gonna be laughin fer hours.