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Napster Ruling Stayed
StoryMan was the first of a flood of readers to note: "Napster ruling has been stayed. Doesn't have to close by midnight! Woohoo!" As of 10:15 GMT, CNN is displaying a note that says "The injunction barring Napster from trading music online has been stayed. Details to come." Watch this space for updates.Update: 07/28 10:26 PM by H :Thanks to Sgt. Owen for the first real link about the stay. Update: 07/28 10:58 PM by t : And to michael hirschorn, who points to this story at inside.com.
We believe one answer to this is our website at www.fairtunes.com which enables you to send money directly to ANY artist thereby bypassing the record industry.
Support your favorite artist not the middle man.
Matt
How likely is it that temporarily shutting Napster down would cost the company more than 5 million dollars?
There will never be a way to figure out what it would cost.
Anyone can provide their service. If I was willing to shell out for the servers I could be doing exactly what they're doing within a few days. Many have already done so. People only use them because they're in the habit of using them, any interruption will mean that people will find another provider and never come back.
Of course, you have to balance that against the fact that they have no income. Like ICQ, they don't get any revenue at all from people getting or using their client or connecting to their server, and if they ever try to collect, people can just move to someone else willing to do it for free.
If you ask me, Napster is just following standard IPO scam procedure: give stuff away (preferably leveraging someone else's content), become famous, vaguely imply that you'll make some money somehow in the distant future, go public, and keep afloat on money of dumb investors, all while drawing hefty salaries.
Yay for Napster! They're the Good Guys, right?
---
Despite rumors to the contrary, I am not a turnip.
Hank Barry, CEO of Napster
Mr. Barry is stating that because:
A) Like a typical Corporate Monkey, he's saying that to improve his company's image.
OR
B) He is truly ignorant.
I have a firm belief in option A. Let's face it, everyone *knows* what goes on inside of Napster. Sure, everyone would like to believe that they're "Just sampling the music to see if they like it." and if they do, they'll "buy the CD."
See, there are conflicting arguments at work here. The two primary arguments are "We're sampling the music! If we like it, we'll buy it!" and "Music should be Free! I refuse to pay outrageous prices for CDs." Okay, so you refuse to pay high prices for CDs, and Music should be free....but you'll buy it if you like it?
Look folks, deep down inside, we ALL know what Napster is for. No, don't knee-jerk and say I'm supporting the RIAA - I'm not. I think the RIAA is just as guilty, if not MORESO than Napster. They're dicking the Artists AND the public, and keeping the bulk of the cash for themselves. But stealing from BOTH isn't going to solve things.
Lots of people will say "Well, why not shut down IRC. It also facilitates the transfer of illegal material." Um, was IRC *designed* to do this? Are the creators of IRC *profiting* from that? Guess what, folks....Napster is both. Napster is walking in your house, stealing your stereo, and giving it away on the street - and the people buying it are screaming "Equipment should be Free!" and "We're just borrowing it to try it. If we like it, we'll buy one."
But we all know in reality, They're going to keep the stereo.
-- 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.
--
What do people think about voluntarily paying your artist online for music you've downloaded?
We believe this is one answer to the MP3 situation and have started a website at www.fairtunes.com that allows you to do exactly that. It is the Stephen King model implemented for music. We allow you to securely send any amount of money using your credit to ANY artist.
But do we live in a society that can adjust to a voluntary system when we've lived so long in a system that has always set the price for us? Can we handle the freedom that Napster gives us? Can we be trusted to use Napster responsibly? Young kids might always pirate music, and we accept that, but is voluntary payment an option for everyone else?
Matt.
Here I was ready to cancel a busy Friday night. Thank the heavens.
Bite the hand.
Napster is wrong and so is the RIAA/MPAA. These transactions should be between the creator and consumer. The creator gets to choose how much is charged for their goods and the consumer gets freedom of choice.
The distributor is just a middleman easily replaced by whatever mechanism so long as the creator has chosen that mechanism. What has happened is the consumer has said, we want our music via digital download. Now it is up to the creator's to decide how to implement that. Or more realistically, it is time for those of us with a better way to present it to the artists. Not to the distributors whom we'd be competing.
This is not the way to build a lasting empire.
Over to our correspondent in Reality:
/. cares more about ripping off music than it does about freedom to link to things that upset people with money. Back to you in the studio, Bob"
"Napster, a company that facilitates downloading of copyrighted material (sometimes with the approval of the copyright holder, mostly not) has won a reprieve from their inevitable closure.
Napster have always guarded the protocol they use, and have changed the protocol to prevent others from interoperating with them on more than one occasion. For some unknown reason, the erstwhile 'news for nerds' site slashdot has posted three stories about this today. Interestingly, they have been posting stories about 2600 (which is currently not responding) court case at a rate of less than one a day. Your intrepid reporter infers that
Thank you, Casey. And, right after this break: How much would you sell your birthright for? We have 300 million people right here who don't need paying. But first, listen to these important messages..."
What will Napster users do -- continue d/ling like there's no tomorrow from Napster, or look for alternatives out of realizing that other means might be safer?
Any Napster users know firsthand?
Ceterum censeo Microsoftam esse delendam.
In the same story on CNN, as soon as Napster won their stay, RIAA lawyers in several courts filed motions to have the stay lifted.
did so! did not! did so! did not! did so! did not! did so! did not!
Hey you kids, stop your squabling, or you will both be sent to bed without any gnutella for desert.
the AC
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
They didn't need to look hard for reasons to grant a stay: the 9th Circuit judges tore the earlier court's decision to shreds in so many ways that the stay verdict document (pdf) is an absolutely hoot to read. They practically said "You're a load of idiots."
...
I especially liked this little technicality:
Copyright registration is not a prerequisite to a valid copyright, but it is a prerequisite to a suit based on copyright. [Kodadek v. MTV]
Apparently the plaintiffs had merely identified some 200 songs for which they allegedly claimed copyright without providing proof of copyright registration, and to add to their incompetence, they then tried to extend the claim to millions of songs which they didn't even bother to name, let alone declare under copyright. Apparently this is a legal no-no.
And lawyers get paid for all this fun. Sigh
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
The link is here
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
I don't think the court should even have considered shutting down Napster at this point. Shutting it off before a verdict can even be arrived at is a little like believing them guilty until proven innocent.
http://www.RIAAboycott.org/ has no new info...
Ceterum censeo Microsoftam esse delendam.
Is this the new "hot topic" to replace the Elian Gonzalez saga for the news media here in the USA?
I happened to turn on "Politically Incorrect" (a light, quasi-comedy based political talk show hosted by a comedian with 4 guests for the benefit of those outside the US viewing area) and the first topic discussed was, you guessed it, Napster.
The host actually had something insightful to say about the music industry's assertion that Napster was killing their sales. (Paraphrased) "When I was younger, everyone I knew taped songs off the radio, and swapped albums and tapes to be copied."
One guest replied, (paraphrased) "Yes, but the ratio of then was like 3 or 4 to 1, who copied. With Napster, I believe that it's like 1 person buys a CD and 20 million copy it." What??? Are we to believe that Titney Spears and Outta'Sync, with that ratio, would have sold 30 Gazillion copies each if Napster didn't exist? The above statement by the clueless guest is what an un-elightened, un-informed public probably really believes.
However, the host had a CLASSIC line, "Record executives are just people who don't have the people skills to be pimps."
The record companies will be happy to sell you songs individually, or sell them over the internet, but those songs must be encrypted, digitially signed, and permanently linked to a particular player, (a closed source, obfuscated player program or hardware.) And you gotta give them you player's serial number.
Oh, and they'll also be licensed and not sold, and, because they're now selling songs, they'll claim that there's no reason for any player to play unencrypted music, so all THOSE players will be made illegal. Of course, like software, they won't accept returns.
And if the player they've licensed for goes sour, you'll be stuck with megabytes of useless crap. They'll never let you convert your music to a second player, as you might be lying about your origional one breaking and you might be a pirate. So you'll have to buy it all over again.
Need I continue?
Oh, and once they've made everything else illegal, they'll put on limits. You can only play the music so many times before it disables, or so many times a month, or a limited timeframe to play it in.
And of course, once people forget about free music and think 'public domain' is a dirty word, the price will go up. $1? $5? $20? a track. The monopolies will screw you for as much as they [safetly] can. And then they'll work to make copyrights perpetual.
This is what the record companies want out of the digital future. This is what any 'copyright control' company wants. Music, lyrics, video, photography, software. This is what they all want.
Napster and any other way of letting the MASSES trade media that's unencrypted and not digitally linked (Masses != computer nerds who know FTP or IRC.) risks this bright future for record companies. It gives the heretical idea that people should question copyright. Something which they haven't seriously done in decades. Like the witches at the stake, Napster must be destroyed for that reason.
Computers don't necessarily make information free. They're good at processing information, duplicating it, checking it, debiting accounts... Thus, they allow control at a fine level that would have been impossible in the past. The media companies want this control, and are holding our public heritage as a hostage until they get it. This is why you they don't release content on the internet.
To those who think this isn't happening.. They're working on a specification for encrypted-USB speakers. Intel demo'ed a graphics chipset that encrypts every pixel to your monitor. DIVX came and (thankfully) died.
The internet gives everyone a press. As a famous quote goes ``Freedom of the press is only for those who have one.'' The internet must be controlled to protect those who already have presses. The media companies own the presses, and they claim to own the content they publish. Generally, they don't create that content, but they're damn good at grabbing control of it. They are powerful, and used to scheming for what they want.
Napster.com has been updated with a list of Napster-friendly bands /artists to support (buy buying CDs).
TheGeek
TheGeek
http://www.geekrights.org
Kill the monkey
If naspter had been shutdown for even a few hours, it would have turned millions against RIAA as opposed to the current situation where there just isn't a critical mass agasint them yet.
Once naspster is shut down, then people (like the bands on my web site) have a real case against RIAA for using their monoploy power to prevent their music from being heard which results in poor sales.
And the next time the RIAA is talking about "how will the artists get paid" ask them about how much the artists get paid for cutouts and "clearance" cds.
Is it really so unreasonable of the artists to object to someone distributing their work without their consent? It's not just a matter of money. Napster is just the internet age equivalent of a record bootlegger: they make money of someone elses work, without the artist's consent. The artist has no control over the quality, the format, the packaging, _and_ he doesn't get payed.
Before you label napster as a cyberspace patriot, only there to fight for your electronic freedom of speech, at least try to consider the other side as well. If you compare napster to radio, which should be a good comparison, don't forget that (legal) radio stations pay artists a certain amount of money for their work, and the artist (or more accurately the owner of the work... quite often the record company) at least has the option to decide which of his songs are ok for radio, and which he would rather chuck in the bin than let anyone else hear.
As I understand it, it was this situation that infuriated renowned control freak Lars Ulrich so much that he wanted to take legal action. Metallica were in the studio finishing an album, and were astonished to hear their unfinished, unreleased album on the radio. Someone had distributed a demo using napster, without asking metallica if it was ok with them.
That metallica are filthy rich, and haven't made a decent record in 10 years is completely irrelevant. If open software coders find that a commercial company which is considering an IPO takes their work, rips off the COPYRIGHT notice, and makes money distributing their proprietarised work, then how would slashdot readers respond?
Reuters
CBC
Wired News
MSNBC
CNN
--
www.kitchengeek.com -- Nosh for
The Motion to the Ninth Circuit, which resulted in the stay, is available here, in .pdf. Makes for a very interesting read.
Sounds pretty good, until you realize that $1 million is a drop in the bucket to the recording industry. I don't know what their revenues are off-hand, but I will say that I work for a large corp. (somewhere around #150 on the Fortune 500, I think), and we don't even blink at the gain or loss of $1 million.
The boycott has a long way to go if it wants to have an impact on the recording industry.
Never take moderation advice from sigs, including this one.
I can't help feeling that being on either side is right. The side we should be on is the artists' and not napster or the RIAA. In my eyes, they are both (at least partially) thieves. Think past all of the "they are taking my freedom" bs and think about what napster is REALLY used for and then choose a side.
Suppose we were to celebrate by only using Napster to download songs whose owners intend for them to be spread without charge?
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I don't understand why the court granted this stay.
Napster claims that the injunction would have put them out of business. The injunction did not state that Napster had to shut down, merely that it had to stop helping people copy copyrighted music.
Further, the court asked RIAA to post a 5 million dollar bond to cover any losses suffered by Napster as a result of the injunction if Napster ended up winning the case. How likely is it that temporarily shutting Napster down would cost the company more than 5 million dollars?
What reason did the court have for staying this injunction?
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
Neuracnu Coyote presents:
The RIAA vs Napster: A Diologue
aka: Monty Python and the Holy Internet Startup ---
[SupremeCourt] Bring out your copyright infringers!
[SupremeCourt] Bring out your copyright infringers!
[SupremeCourt] Bring out your copyright infringers!
[RIAA] Here's one.
[SupremeCourt] $2500 in court costs for the injunction.
[RIAA] Here you are.
[Napster] It's not illegal!
[SupremeCourt]
[SupremeCourt] What?
[RIAA] Nothing, here's your $2500.
[Napster] It's not illegal!
[SupremeCourt] Here now - he says it isn't illegal!
[RIAA] Yes it is!
[Napster] It's not!
[RIAA] Well, it will be soon. Our lobbyists are working on it.
[Napster] Stealing music is freedom of information!
[RIAA] No it's not. It'll be illegal any moment.
[Napster] I don't want to file Chapter 11!
[RIAA] Oh, don't be such a baby.
[SupremeCourt] I'm sorry, that's an impropper injunction. Here, little Internet Startup, have a stay against that injunction.
--
How will it continue? You decide! Get involved, send emails, sign petitons, write your congressmen, boycott the RIAA. Do something!
--
Here are a couple of quotes:
Napster went too far. A wildly popular software application and Web community for its millions of users, the company took already-existing Internet protocols (FTP, gopher and HTTP), added a nice Web interface and marketed itself as the best place to "share" music.
The judge was fast to point out that if these uses were so substantial, then it should not harm the company's bottom line to prohibit the infringing uses, but save the noninfringing uses. And, if the company cannot find a technological solution that allows it to separate its legal uses from its illegal uses, then maybe "the 19-year-old who was clever enough to invent the program" is not so clever after all.
That is the moral of the latest chapter in the Napster story. A company that is smart enough to write an application that is used by 20 million people should be smart enough to find a way for that application to conform to the law. And if the company does not think that conforming to the law is important, then maybe it is not smart enough to succeed.
Napster is not out of the water yet. Just because the Court of Appeals gave them a reprieve doesn't mean that Napster still can't get shut down by the RIAA. I could get into the philosophical reasons why Napster shouldn't be shut down, but a lof of you know them already.
I've already heard the standard cries of "I'm gonna burn my Metallica CDs!" and "I'm gonna send a flaming e-mail to Hilary Rosen!," but c'mon, what effect will that have? So what if you burn your Metallica CDs, you already bought them, right? And so what if you flame Hilary Rosen? You're just giving them ammo to use against you ("Look at this Napster user, see their blatant disregard for us?!?"). That is why I suggest that the planned boycott for the RIAA should go on. If you're going to send a message to the RIAA about how you feel about Napster, hit them where it matters most: their wallets.
And yes, I realize that this may give the RIAA more reason to cry "They're downloading music from Napster, so now I can't afford my new Lexus!" and the such. But then again, they're going to latch onto whatever they can squeeze sympathy for their side out of.
And if this doesn't make the RIAA listen up, I don't know what will.
Further reading:
www.boycott-riaa.com
www.riaaboycott.org
Napster Buycott (that's not a typo :))
RIAA Member List (for the boycotting, duh!)
RIAA Contact List (let your voice be heard!)
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The real Raunchola isn't cool enough to have any imposters
I'm listening to the audio broadcast of CNBC's market report on the way home tonight and they started talking about napster's stay of execution... this dumb ass Stock & Blond's bimbo comes on and then gives an update of how the MP3 related stocks are doing today and I quote "MP3.com, who's technology is behind Napster was unchanged." Please shoot me now.
when they ban enctryption only criminals wi$21*J *#JF$%!@#$':
There are numerous messages over on the chat board at the Gnutella website that indicates that others are having the same problem.
I always thought that something was likely to happen bad to gnutella, seeing how it loaded the network so heavily with only 3000 clients at a time - the most I ever saw was maybe 5000. Napster had a total of 23 million users (not all of whom were logged in at any given time).
Has the gnutellanet gotten broken into islands? Is there a failure in the protocol?
I don't believe there really could only be a few users because there is a message on the Gnutella site that says they had to install a new server and buy more bandwidth to handle all the hits and client downloads they are getting.
Maybe decentralized peer-to-peer isn't all that it's cracked up to be - or at least the kinks aren't worked out of it yet.
Ah, I see this message posted on the development board:
-- Could you use my software consulting serv