Slashdot Mirror
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.
>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 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
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...
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.
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"'
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 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"'
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...
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").
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").
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.
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.
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.
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.
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 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.
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.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
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.
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!
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/
...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").
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
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
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/
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.
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
Yes, in case it's not clear from my earlier posts, so do I. I think it would be worth it if only for the finest news service in the world. BTW their online news magazine is excellent.
[Minor point: the dosh doesn't pay for the world service, that's funded separately]
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
"T-shirts... good," Holland then quipped in the announcement.
:)
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?
I seem to remember Napster saying things like "We support Artists (getting paid)" and the such. So Offspring comes along and says "tit-for-tat": "We think napster is great, now let's profit off their IP" Their words of "support" are just parody, not sincerity.
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
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
I'm so tired of this. Napster _is_ a useful tool for exchanging legal data... It reminds me of other things: FTP, the world wide web, the internet... Oh, wait, "sex" is the most searched for word on the internet, right? The only reason the internet exists must be to transport smut.
Granted, nobody is arguing that Napster would have very little money and not much attention would be paid to it if people didn't use it to trade things illegally. The real question is whether Napster is responsible for how people use their service. I doubt many people would argue so fiercly against an ISP with a user who distributed questionable content. Should they be sued? Perhaps Metallica should file suit against the internet. They could start by suing every major network service provider and work their way down to local ISPs. After all, all of these must be responsible for the data they carry, correct?
People need to think about what kind of a precedent will be set by these Napster dealings. Would we rather set a standard of freedom of information, or hold everyone who provides modes of communication responsible for all of the information they carry?
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)
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 --
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...
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."
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
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.
Do you actually believe this drivel?
Napster wouldn't have a penny of their funding if no one traded illegal mp3s, and you know it.
You're right about the first part, though, I did have trademark and copyright confused, and I didn't realize that if Napster didn't defend their trademark that they would lose it.
-------- "All I want in life's a little bit of love to take the pain away" --Spiritualized
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
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.
"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 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
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.