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More Napster Than You Can Shake A Copy-Protected MP3 At
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Napster Announces Key Building Block of New Business Model Bertelsmann Subsidiary Digital World Services Will Work with Napster to Enable Secure Management of Transferred Files
Redwood City, CA and New York, NY (February 16, 2001) -- Napster today announced progress on the development of a key aspect of the technology necessary to implement a new, membership-based business model supported by the recording industry. The solution, which enables secure administration of transferred files within a peer to peer structure, has been in the works for several months and will be implemented by Digital World Services (DWS), a Bertelsmann subsidiary with extensive experience in innovative digital rights management solutions.
"Today's announcement underscores one key fact: the real questions about Napster's future are economic, not technical or legal. Our alliance with Bertelsmann and the Bertelsmann eCommerce Group was our first important step toward a model that makes payments to artists, songrwriters and other rightsholders. This solution is further evidence of the seriousness of our effort to reach an agreement with the record companies that will keep Napster running, reliable, and enjoyable," said Hank Barry, Napster's Interim CEO.
Barry reiterated that Napster hopes to move to a membership-based service as soon as possible.
The solution the two companies have been working on will maintain the peer to peer structure of Napster, but will allow in the future restrictions to be placed on what can be done with the transferred files, such as limits on the ability to burn music files onto CDs.
"To work with Napster on the design and operation of a key component of its new business model is an extraordinary opportunity for DWS," said Johann Butting, CEO of Digital World Services. "The successful combination of Napster's very compelling user friendliness and popularity with an architecture that addresses the needs of rightsholders will be a very significant step for secure sharing of content over the Internet."
The technology will enable the sharing of MP3 files to which a protection layer will be added as the file is transferred from one Napster user to the other. The Napster client will be enhanced to support this protection. The solution will not use any existing multi-purpose DRM but a new security architecture that is specially tailored to the requirements of file-sharing.
"We are extremely pleased to partner with Digital World Services in bringing together and operating a key aspect of the technology we need to preserve file sharing and build an industry-supported business model. Through this agreement with DWS and the work we have done together to date, the architecture for one important component of our new model is now in place; we are building out this aspect of the system," Hank Barry added.
"We have been working with Digital World Services for several months to design this solution. They really understand the technologies involved and are sensitive to the user experience. We are confident that the new system will allow us to accomplish key goals of the record companies in terms of restricting use, while still maintaining and improving the performance and service levels of the Napster system," said Napster CTO Eddie Kessler.
About Napster Napster is the world's leading person-to-person file sharing community. Napster provides music enthusiasts with an easy-to-use, high quality service for discovering new music and communicating their interests with other members of the Napster community. Napster's software application enables users to locate and share music files through a user-friendly interface, and features instant messaging, chat rooms, and Hot List User Bookmarks. Shawn Fanning, then an eighteen year-old freshman at Boston's Northeastern University, founded Napster in 1999. In October 2000, Bertelsmann AG and Napster announced the formation of a strategic alliance to further develop the Napster person-to-person file sharing service. In January 2001, edel Music and TVT Records joined the alliance. This year, Napster won several Wired Magazine Readers Rave Awards, including Best Music Site, Best Innovative Start-up, and Best Guerilla Marketing.
About Digital World Services Digital World Services provides Digital Rights Management (DRM) solutions and services enabling the convenient use to digital works by making the process transparent for the consumer, retailer and publisher while protecting the owners' copyrights. The company offers clearinghouse services such as rights clearing, financial settlement, and administration of usage information. Digital World Services are experts in the digital delivery of music, content hosting, system integration, project management and distribution platforms. Based in New York City and Hamburg, Germany, Digital World Services is a Bertelsmann subsidiary.
For a fee, which will have to be reasonable (and they seem pretty smart about this part) you get to burn CD's or download to your Rio, but not to email the unencrypted file to your friends. Anybody see the problem here? A CD is the unencrypted file. The most clueless newbie can take this CD, re-rip it, and walla, one unencrypted .mp3 goes right back onto Napster.
The job is even easier if the fee-paying member downloads it to his Rio, because chances are his Rio requires an unencrypted .mp3 (and they must realize, as they seem to realize re: CD's, that users will not accept a system that requires them to buy new hardware).
Then of course there are the spoofing and ID problems mentioned by others. Napster cannot use watermarks or music-recognition software because, remember, Napster itself never sees the music file. The music goes straight from my 'puter to yours, without passing through their server, so if I named the file "medieval - king's singers - greensleeves" but it actually plays Jennifer Lopez, how are they supposed to figure that out?
I don't expect the forces arrayed against Napster to accept their proposal because, clueless as they are, they are smart enough to see how easy this system will be to circumvent. No crypto system has ever lasted long with millions of messages being passed, and it won't be long before someone will build an easy to use bypass and distribute it to 50 million of their closest friends.
Brackets contain world's first nanosig, highly magnified:[.]
"If they can figure their names" Does this mean that they will claim copyright on the filenames? If my band is called Sandman and we make a song called Metallica will "Sandman-Metallica.mp3" be blocked because I have used an illegal filename?
> You've gotta sin to get saved.
rot13 anyone?
-
Meep meep
Then if my name happens to be Springstein and I am trying to promote my new CD on Napster, my music will be blocked? What about if my band's name is Metallic? If they use metaphones, they might as well just give it up. Heck, if they block any music at all, they might as well give it up. Heck, they might as well give it up. Heck, they are.
If I bought a Beatles album in the 60s do I have to buy a CD to get rights to a song that I already own just so I can hear it with the same quality as the original? There are plenty of instances of fair use where Napster is easily justified as-is.
beware the jabberwock, my son! the jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Its time we start boycotting the music companies esp the ones involved in the lawsuit: A&M Records; Geffen Records; Interscope Records; Sony Music; Entertainment Inc.; MCA; Atlantic Records; Island Recording Corp.; Motown Records Inc.; Capitol Records Inc. and not to mention all the other record companies out there. What I would like to see done is a month long boycott of not only the ones above, but all companies that own them and/or are owned by them. I would like to see this boycott take place all during the month of March. No one would buy and music or any of products made by these companies. I would also like to see this boycott not only take place in the USA, but worldwide. Lets take them down and force them to sell CD at a reasonable price. There is no reason we should have to pay 15 to 25 dollars for a CD with one or two songs on it. Another reason for the boycott is that Napster originally, to my understanding, was not about free music, but more about forcing music companies to lower there price and getting people to discover new artists. This is the only way, we'll never get the music industry to lower prices without a boycott. I hope your with me and will tell a friend and email this to other people because this is not about Napster or free music, this is about the greedy music industry ripping off the public with high outrageous prices.
When you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to reform. --Mark Twain
If the primary argument in the Napster case is that Napster is knowingly allowing the distribution of copyrighted material through their service, why is no one attempting to shutdown services like Hotline or Carracho? I understand that, contrary to these other services, Napster utilizes centralized servers, but the knowing allowance of illegal distribution is still congruent amongst all three.
Otto-matic
Actually it's not that hard to spot the RIAA productions. The RIAA mostly represents five companies: EMI, BMG, Warner Brothers, Sony, and Universal. If you look at the outside of the CD, the name of one of those companies will almost always be somewhere in the fine print. If there isn't, it's probably not a major-label CD, and you should buy it.
You won't have a perfect success rate:
But you'll still be right ninety-some percent of the time.
I'm not, incidentally, taking a position on the morality or pragmatics of an RIAA boycott. (I tend to avoid the major labels, which is why I know how to do it, but I'm not thoroughly consistent, and I do it mostly for non-napster reasons.) But if you want to do it, it's not that hard to do a pretty good job.
They can't. But why should that stop them? Quick, does your car have a catalytic converter? $20 says it does. For some strange reason, hardware manufacturers always like to jump in bed on these sorts of projects. All they have to do is stop releasing hardware that's open. Eventually you will need to get and use the new stuff. Maybe b/c your old hardware dies. More likely b/c it can't run any of the new software (which requires the new hardware) or is just too slow, or you can't impress your friends.
Some people have ten and twenty and thirty year old computers hanging around. But if all new computers were somehow incapable of supporting Napster, it would die, no matter how popular, within, oh, 3-5 years. And as a business they would prefer to attract affluent users, who are precisely the people that buy new hardware every year or less, and who would most rapidly not be able to use it.
CDR is great. We can all fuck over the RIAA with CDR. Until they switch to DVDA. Or something else. Because we don't have DVD burners. And in fact, they will move heaven and earth to avoid letting us have DVD burners that are compatable with DVDA players, because they learned their lesson. Seen a DAT walkman lately? It was poised to be the next big thing you know. Do you think there will be HDTV VHS? Hell no. Or firewire commerical DVD players?
Sorry my lad, they don't care about enforcing their little schemes on what we have, because they know that eventually we won't have it anymore. Except for a handful of people who enjoy antiquated systems, and that's small enough to tolerate. Napster was here, now, and popular. An unacceptable threat. And b/c we've foolishly permitted businesses of all kinds - record companies AND electronic companies - to be so large, a boycott of the new stuff will never fly. If every person on /. refused to buy the new media and the new players and never cracked and never backed down they'd basically tell us to go to hell. We're too small. And they're too big.
I don't think that we should give up, but I do think that we'd all better start working on workarounds, b/c the noose is tightening. What happens when Windows embeds the ID of your Pentium V into every mp4 that you make and emails you a cease and desist letter the second you try to ul it somewhere? We're not all using Linux yet.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
You can calculate a metaphone key. This is a reduction of the word to a more abstract pattern. It's how dictionary.com knows that when you type "thier" you really mean "their".
1) It's not stealing. It's copyright infringement. There is a difference. It is not insignificant. (and it is still a matter of some debate as to whether it's even copyright infringement)
2) Artists do not have the right to be compensated for their work.
3) But we do grant them the revokable right to be compensated for some particular copy of that work. (otherwise you'd have to give artists money for making stuff regardless of if they sold it! As I'm an artist, I'd appreciate it, but still be against it in general)
4) Artists only get to have a say in how their work is distributed when THEY sell it. Or if they agree to a contract with someone to whom they sell it as a prerequisite. EULAs pretty likely don't count, given the First Sale principle and the current mixed bag of judicial rulings on the legality of EULAs
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
While I don't think that it's exactly what you're thinking of, the Kosmic Free Music Foundation is a large repository of Free (speech, beer) music.
KFMF Website
-Matt
-Cheetah
has anyone ever thought about recording in analog, , , ,theres no way they can digitally tag that.
That's a lot bigger than 2.5 million...
You have a point but I don't think it is particularly serious - many mp3's are of pretty low quality anyway and the additional quality loss is a couple of orders of magnitude lower than an audio to audio copy. You're intercepting the digital output of your mp3 player [ie the signal it sends to the audio hardware] not the final audio. It's true that redistributing via Napster will keep adding that error back in but the point is that if you get a supposedly "secured" digital media file you can unsecure it as easily as you can play it.
Some people own music on older media and wish to listen to it in mp3. Is there some ethical difference between ripping a song off of a cd you own and downloading an mp3 of a song on a casette you own?
I think one of the real problems with this would be:
1. This is too complex for an ordinary user.
2. If there is a program made to "package" and "unpackage" the song in this manner, then it's a good possibility that someone in the 'biz could crack it. Face it, there are some smart people that work for these companies.
What I see happening is that things such as napster will be driven underground (similar to opennap). However, this will disable the "common man" from just clicking on AOL and grabbing the latest hit.
Those of us in the know, however, will still be stealing left, right, and center.
It's such a wonderful world!
Karnal
And, depending on the type of membership that the second Napster user has paid for, he or she will be able to do other things with the song -- burn it onto a CD, for example.
How would they stop you from burning an mp3 onto cd? I assume that these new, protected mp3's can be played in winamp, so how would they stop the "disk writer plugin" that allows you to decompress an mp3 into wav format and burn that wave file onto a cd in cd format?
Peer-to-peer is here, and it's here to stay. And there's nothing anyone can do about it.
Napigator shows over 200 non-napster.com
servers. And Napster is only one of the many peer-to-peer sharing utilities.
Napster clones may be the most convenient way to download music, but they are not the only way. You can still download music via HTTP, FTP, NNTP, E-mail, IRC and so on... if you're bored you can look at some of the ways suggested at http://decss.zoy.org/ .
It exists and it is called www.mp3.com.
)9TSS
It will hurt, but it's not the RIAA labels that will be hurt. It will hurt the smaller labels that make true music that's not advertised on radio. That's what the RIAA wants because the smallers labels are "stealing" profit from them by making their artists known.
The RIAA claim they are against napster for piracy, but their real threat is loosing market share because of better artists than theirs.
It's probably true that people who "pirate" mp3s
buy more CD's because of napster, but that's because they found something better to listen to than the music they heard on the radio, in which they were not interested at all. Since they like what they download, they are more likely to want to buy it.
The record companies can judge for themselves how much napster has hurt their sales if the majority of former napster users immediately boycot all CD purchases from major record labels. I believe napster users spent far more on CDs than average. Personally I have vowed to not buy any CDs for at least 3 months. I urge other people who are irritated by the RIAAs handling of this affair to do likewise. If they think they will see a surge in sales as a result of declaring war on their best customers, we need to reeducate them.
http://rareformnewmedia.com/
Why not just create MP3's from the CD's you already own, and avoid Napster entirely?
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
You could just number the songs you share 1.mp3, 2.mp3, 3.mp3 and so on.
:-)
To get an Index of what 1, 2 & 3 are you have to offer a copyrighted song to that user who shares those files.
Both parties can then generate trust.
It would be really interesting to see an article on game-theory specifically looking at strategies for peer-to-peer music Exchange.
Prisoners Dilmma...
Napster plans to hide the keys in encrypted form in its client software
HAHAHAHAHA! (ROTFL)
what a joke -- can anyone say DeCSS?!? It'll take "haX0rs" less than a week to get that key... or any other key not embedded in tamper-proof hardware.
All I gotta say is this simply the start of a really fun war.... where this war isn't really about obfuscating names, its about attempting to subvert all the forthcoming DRM stuff. ... and if we've learned anything here
on /., it is that hackers tend not to lose
anywhere but court.
The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much.
Simple.
.. Oops, hope the RIAA doesn't see this.
Search for *Mysterious*Ways*
Do you like German cars?
It's going to be a real pain having to spell all the song names backwards... Or having to ROT13 the whole file just to transmit/receive it...
Salocin.com
To be valid, the signature would have to be made by the original artist, not by anyone. This means napster should have a database of free artists, with some data to recognize their songs (md5+cddb id+tracks lengths?)
If an artist decides to distribute copies of his MP3 signature key with his CDs, it would mean he gives you the right to make mp3 copies of his songs and sign them to look like if they were signed by the artist himself. Without the artist's signature key, you would only be able to sign it with your own key, and napster will reject it because you're not the artist for that song in their database.
www.mp3.com?
Karnal
SMASH your radio!
IDing the songs sounds impossible, practically speaking.. the fact is, if the RIAA companies feel they can turn a profit from Napster, they won't allow napster to die, and if digital marking of songs threatens that potential profit, they'll probably get rid of it. Don't forget, these are song and dance masters. If digital marking threatens the money, they'll just start napster the company on a subscription service to the RIAA or the member corps, paying a certain regular fee just to operate. sort of like radio I guess. (An added benefit to that would be that small labels might get frozen out of the whole business model, since they don't have the clout necessary to insure that some amount of that money, however small, goes to them.)
napster won't have to worry about which artists get the money or how much they get. And if it's too much of a bother to figure out, the RIAA probably won't worry about it either. ;)
"Artist" that word is a distraction - it isn't whether their artists but whether they're the copyright holders. And all of those you named ARE the copyright holders of their songs. You don't have to write a thing to own it, that's called "work for hire".
So, once they get the names right, what will they do about permutations?
How many people misspell Springsteen as Springstein?
You get the drift. Can't users just misspell, and do it intentionally? Sure, its not a total solution, but it seems like it would work out some of the time...
Support a few technologists in Washington.
Expanding and recompressing the napster II format is a bad solution because mp3 is a lossy compression algorithm. It will sound like a tape recording of a tape recording and degrade with every iteration. This would in fact be one way to kill p2p that has been discussed before: populate the service with morons who don't care about sound quality so that the typical song returned in a search will be crap. Your suggestion would be one way to do it: make sure people are constantly decompressing and recompressing their songs and trading them like they were freshly ripped.
I thought I just got done explaining this elsewhere, but...
For one thing, it isn't a matter of deserving the content, its more a form of civil disobedience. Big Music bends customers over at the cash register, so lots of customers say "fsck this" and leech mp3s. Maybe, just maybe, if Big Music would stop anal violating the pocket books of the customers, the allure of mp3s would diminish. I mean, the difference between $20 and free is a lot, but if CD's were a more realistically priced $10 new, $5 old/used, the time spent waiting for those mp3's to be sucked through the modem might not seem worth it. Of course, it would be best of Big Music choked on its own greenback vomit, but some things are destined to remain only dreams.
-={(Astynax)}=-
-={(Astynax)}=-
"Darkness beyond Twilight"
Hate to break it to Napster, but it's very easy to bypass the encryption scheme by simply re-recording the MP3 audio into another file. My Creative Sound Blaster Live! Value can easily do this with the built-in software mixer. It can record from the Windows WAV device, or "What-U-Hear" (records whatever is playing through your speakers, i.e. you can mix sound fron different sound devices, like WAV and CD, or WAV and MIDI). So, I play the song with Napster's special player, and record it at the same time...no quality loss, and I now have a nice, unencrypted WAV file that I can do whatever I want with.
DennyK
Blocking songs by name isn't going to work. Alternate naming systems will arise in about a millisecond. The Rolling Stone's 'Lady Jane' could easily be '1@dy J@ne' for instance. Or ROT13, or ... You get the idea.
You're not wrong in principle, but I think you're not taking into account how labyrinthine the law really is. Sure an admin can go through their lists, and he'll probably look at the names and consider the namestrings to identify the songs and artists and so forth. (Which the courts probably do as well I guess.) But a lawyer might look through that list and see a bunch of namestrings which only hypothetically identify the same songs as the ones on the CD he bought this morning. REally for a lawyer to talk conclusively about the copyright status of the song represented by the namestring, there should be some (trustable) copyright info worked into the string. Otherwise the copyright status of the song represented by the name isn't totally clear.
I realize this is sort of a rationalization, but it's just to point out that what you may consider a clear conclusion isn't so clear once you bring the law into it. (Really this is only a rationalization to the extent that the RIAA can show that Napster contributes to copyright infringement, which they seem to be able to do, but that still doesn't detract from my point I think.)
The RIAA has won the battle, but they've lost the war. If we can't use Napster anymore, we'll find another way to rip off our favorite artists in peace. It's an inconvienence, but no agency, business or industry can stop us from our god-given right to rip people off. They should ask the software world how successful they've been with warez. After that, they should give the fuck up and let us steal in peace.
Ok, ill do my bets not to laugh too hard at Napster's ideas or RIAA's hopes.
1) Scalability. Not going to happen. simple. 56k users will be completely screwed...
2) can anyone say memory hog?!? I dont know about you, but i use Napster IN THE BACKGROUND. It may be sucking up my bandwidth, but NOT my memory at this point. But to have local encypt/decryption on EVERY song EVERY time it plays, I'll never be able to compile to compile at the same time... So, again, scalability.
3) Crackers/(or good bored coders) will have it overcome in a day, patched in a week, and perfected in 2 weeks. simple.
4) OTHER services will take Napster's place. simple. Your average 9 to 12-yr-old may have his/her parents pay for membership, and they might be too ignorant to know any better... but those who want to get them for free will be able to do so EASILY by using gnutella or any of the many other options out there... I prefer FileNavigator myself... but I must admit, most connections time-out... someone needs to scale these alternatives before June....
5) Each and every reader here knows damn well they will never pay for an mp3. simple. Go check out the Ogg Vorbis format discussed on Binary Freedom for example.
6) oh yeah... SCREW THE RIAA.. ignorant corporate old bag bastards.
-vanguard
"I think, therefore I get paid."
I would like to see someone argue to me that ebay should be allowed to list auctions for cocaine or nuclear materials because they're only "listing" and not involved with the actual transfer.
Hoo boy, you sure ruined your post by including the ebay analogy. ebay lists whatever users type in. If they receive complaints, they remove it. And note that when they receive complaints and remove the offending material, they are not fined, prosecuted, shut down, etc..
Compare to Napster, who removed all the people trading Metallica the one time they were notified of anything, and are still getting fined, shut down, etc..
And another note: your argument, while it makes some "common sense", really has little if anything to do with actual law. I'm sure you've noticed by now that the law rarely has anything to do with common sense.
We can just md5 the names of the mp3s on our HD and search for the md5 version of what we're looking for. Or something
Say what you will about the ethical justification of copying other peoples music, but at least Napster has sparked off an impressive amount of innovative projects. Here is something I came across recently: Docster.
For the goatsex paranoid, here's a short abstract:
Imagine all the researchers you know, with a new bibliographic management tool that combined file storage with a napster-like communications protocol -- docster. Instead of just citations, docster also stores the files themselves and retains a connection between the citation metadata and each corresponding file. Somewhere in the ether is a docster server to which those researchers connect. They're reading one of their articles, and they find a new reference they want to pull up. What to do? Just query docster for it. Docster will figure out who else among those connected has a copy of that article, and if it's found, requests and saves a copy for our friendly researcher.
Of course, we cannot do this. Libraries depend too much on copyright to attack the system so directly. But what if we focused instead on altering the napster model enough to make it explicitly copyright-compliant? After all, many cases of one researcher giving another a copy of an article are a fair use of that article. Fair use provides us with this possibility and it's not a giant leap to argue that perhaps coordinated copying through such a centralized server could constitute fair use, especially if docster didn't compete with commercial interests.
Well, it's still a big leap, but think of the benefits. Say there's an article from 1973 that's suddenly all the rage. It doesn't exist online yet, so a patron request comes to you from some other library, and you've got the journal, so you fill the request. But forty-eight other researchers want that article too. If that first patron uses docster, any of those other folks also using docster can just grab the file from the first requestor. If others don't use docster, they can request a copy from their local libraries, who -- I hope -- do use docster. Nobody has to go scan that article again, and suddenly there is redundant digital storage.
Sounds good, no?
Cui peccare licet peccat minus. -- Ovid, Amores.
Since CueCat and other sources are out there, why not create a program where people can scan in a CD's UPC, have that become the band/album name, then list out the tracks after the number?
For example, the song Urban Suicide from the band Dink could be found on napster at 7-2438-30333-2-4_05.mp3. They would have to sit there and ban different types of UPC numbering, etc, to keep people from passing these around.
What's more, there's plenty of databases already up where people can find UPC codes in existence, so it shouldn't be hard to find an interface to pull out a certain album's UPC number and have a client search Napster for it.
It's just a thought. I don't like the fact that the RIAA is trying to tell us that a band name like "James" will be banned from passing through its servers, or their hit song "Laid". I mean, what if James Rutherford's country song "Laid Off" is passed around Napster because he wants to share it? (I don't believe this guy exists, but just for example). Where does the RIAA get off telling Napster, et. al., that he has no right to do so?
Dragon Magic
Human nature is the same everywhere; the modes only are different. -- Earl of Chesterfield
ALPINE. No matter what you guys say, it is a damn good solution. The best thus far IMO. *You* get to control the number of peer connections you maintain, the number of queries you make, the rate at which those quries are distributed to the peer network, the number of queries you will respond to from other peers, the number of file transfers, etc. Also the proxy idea sounds damn cool.
Actually, someone should create a napster "proxy" that will make queries on your behalf. Since a connection TO napster is not necessary to exchange files, you can still trade for free. The SDMI/DRM requirements will be what "kills" napster
Considering a file copyrighted by default might be a solution to this. To mark a file as freely distributable, an artist would have to sign it with a digital certificate and indicate what kinds of right he would like to grant.
An audio CD could include a data track with a digital certificate that can sign only the tracks on that CD, or also all of the artist's previous works.
Since copyrighted music has been around for decades, making it the default case isn't really wrong. It would however have to be implemented in a way that can't be circumvented, while still giving to the purchaser the rights to unlimited backups and transfers to other media. The only thing that would really need to be disabled is the wide spreading of copies of the works.
Don't forget FTPs and the thing that started it all...IRC
The point isn't to actually block them, but just to make napster a giant pain in the ass (moreso than it already is). Forcing users to rename files in order to share them, and by that also making them difficult to search for, is one way to effectively decrease the usability of napster.
---
Bob Fucking Costas. Does anyone else hate that motherfucker?
I agree that most napster users will move to other apps to get their free music fix. But what if the hard drives and other storage mediums don't allow files to be stored that aren't signed with some sort of industry certificate?
What, any files at all? How would you sell hard drives that are that crippled?
Or you mean files stored in a particular format? In that case you'd just use a different format. Once encrypted the hard drive can't possibly know what's in the file.
It would however have to be implemented in a way that can't be circumvented
Presumably you mean a way that would take more effort to circumvent than you'd expect anyone to be willing to put in? I don't see how a copy protection system that can't be circumvented could even be possible. If something can be made in the first place then it can also be copied.
Um, AboveNet and UUNet...
Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.NAPSTER.COM 208.184.216.239
[abovenet]
NS2.NAPSTER.COM 63.108.185.111
[uunet]
Registrant:
Napster, Inc. (NAPSTER16-DOM)
1475 Veterans Blvd.
Redwood City, CA 94063 US
How about "Magetagelagicaga_sageek_agand_dagestragoy_thagem. mp3"?
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
The 'work for hire' thing is related but different. The _popstar's_ performance is routinely considered work for hire by the label, whenever they can get away with it. Now, if it's not, that doesn't mean the popstar ends up holding copyright, they have to sign that away. BUT, if they simply sign it away, the term expires in something like 40 years, so the popstar's _grandchildren_ might benefit from earnings from the hit record when, many years from now, the copyright returns to the artist and the artist's estate. (We'll not get into whether _they_ are entitled to profit from it- this time!) However, if it was 'work for hire', the term NEVER ends, and the artist will NEVER, EVER, EVER get their material back. Not in 40 years, not in 400, not in 40,000,000.
The record labels managed to get a rider on some bill that _changed_ the status of many recordings _to_ work for hire, basically taking a large number of existing works and changing the rules under them to give the record industry permanent ownership rather than 40-year-ownership, but major label artists were rightly _so_ upset that they actually organised, lobbied, and got the new legislation overturned by publicising just how bad the record labels were in doing this, and exactly what they were doing. So currently the only artists who will NEVER own their songs are, well, pretty much every new act being offered a contract _today_, including every one in which you don't need the artist's consent to revise the contract.
This very likely includes Britney and the others, so odds are they not only don't own copyright, but they can't and will _never_ own it. However, I can only be _absolutely_ certain that they don't own it _now_. It is just possible that one of the ones mentioned is not work for hire, in which case maybe in 40 years they or their heirs _might_ own copyright to their material.
Did you know that nearly all of the musicians you hear on the radio are technically hired laborers?
The *AA may be frothing about IP theft, but other businesses are apparently booming on it.
I've been shopping for a new hard drive, and I see businesses such as Best Buy describing the humongosity of their drives in terms of how many thousands of 4-minute MP3s you can store on them. (Surely they don't think people are buying drives to store 20,000 MP3s that came from their own store-bought CDs, eh?)
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
So pretty much by turning off the digital outputs, Napster is only allowing you to play your payNapster MP3's through POS computer speakers? What if you have a kickass home stereo with a digital input? "Digital output is not licensed" is what Napster would tell you! Bullshit! If you license music, they shouldn't be able to dictate what speakers you play it through....
----
Mike
one problem, i see with their subscription model is the quality of service. i mean look at napster now, most of the songs you download are missing some bytes at the beginning or at the end or have little sound glitches in them. thats ok as long as its free but no one is gonna pay for broken mp3s.
I really like the musiccity set of servers. They have about 30 different servers, all of which are very fast.
Try Denmark (small country in northern Europe), not exactly third world. Still there are no copy rights at all over there, wouldn't that be a nice napster server??
Make a man a fire and he will be warm for a day, set a man on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life
Can anyone say Gnutella?
Smeghead every day of the week.
well, if they don't want us to share their music, then lets not hand ours over to them. Imagine this as a market position. You can either buy music you cant share from RIAA approved networks, or you can download music that's equally as good from networks that don't have RIAA music on them, and you are encouraged to share them.
I wonder, after having listened only to inependent non-riaa music for 3 years, who's concerts we're gonna go to. Who's t-shirts we're gonna buy.
what a wonderfulo meatspace denial of service condition the RIAA may have just created for themselves. If they don't allow their music on free networks, and good music is on free networks, then they're creating a bariier to entry into the music distribution market for themselves.
That's just plain dumb, and I have no problem with using it against them.
-OR-
if you're a computer criminal with a mean streak (not me, mr man). then I guess you can make it extremely hard for the RIAA to give their lovely blacklist to napster over the internet...."What use is a phone call when you can't speak"
"Let him go, Ralph. He knows what he's doing." --Otto Mann (simpsons)
Most of us use cars to go from Point A to Point B. Obviously there will be some bad seeds who use cars to facilitate killing but not in large quantities. And certainly not enough in so much as to require us to, as you put it, resort back to walking from place to place.
Sure a few people are trading non-copyrighted music on Napster but the majority of us are knowingly trading copyrighted material.
...Nine Inch Nails - Big Man with a Gun.mp3
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
If I'm reading the article correctly, the Napster II client relies on trusted clients so that once a P2P connection is made to transfer a file, the MP3 is 'tagged' as a copy. What's to stop people from compromising the clients so that the tagging process simply doesn not happen? All MP3's would then be listed as 'original' and the whole copyprotection scheme goes down the toilet. Com'on Napster. EVERYBODY knows that trusted clients are a bunch of hooey.
Alright, suppose Napster II becomes a reality and due to some magic, groundbreaking encryption the system survives long enough to function. Why should I share files (music that I paid for) with million other subscribers who I don't even know? If incredibly smart music companies think that I will agree to make my PC a free distribution channel for their music they are very, very wrong.
For Immediate Release:
At a press conference this morning, Napster CEO Hank Barry officially conceded defeat to the RIAA.
"It's obvious that we cannot afford to fight this battle any further. Alright guys, you win. You've shut down Napster. Enjoy your victory."
Sources indicate that a fruit basket was delivered to RIAA HQ from Shawn Fanning at roughly the same time as Barry's announcement was made.
"Seeing as we no longer have any use for the napster.com domain name, we have opted to sell it to Bornagainnapster Inc., based out of <insert name of country with good Internet connectivity, loose copyright laws, and little respect for American lawers here>.
"Of course, hypothetically, if Bornagainnapster Inc. decided to use the napster.com domain name to point the millions of existing Napster clients to their own Napster root servers, the source for which we released earlier this morning, the service would appear to continue uninterrupted to current users of Napster's service. Please note however, that this is entirely the prerogative of Bornagainnapster Inc., and Napster Inc. of America has no remaining control over what happens to the technology we've released into the community.
"It's been a slice. Thank you."
Napster Co-founder Shawn Fanning then announced his plans to relocate to <insert name of country with good Internet connectivity, loose copyright laws, and little respect for American lawers here> to accept a position as CTO with "an unnamed Internet media company".
Okay, so it's a bit far-fetched, but if Fanning and Co. are really interested in seeing Napster continue to survive, wouldn't this be a feasable option? The main reason why Napster continues to dominate other file-sharing media such as Gnutella for MP3 distribution is the existing user base, and simple presentation to the user. It is still, IMHO, best-of-breed for it's purpose, which is providing access to MP3 files. The reason the RIAA has been able to go after Napster, is because of the centralized root servers. Why not just move those servers out of the RIAA's reach? Sure, it will take a little maneuvering to prevent legal difficulties, but I think it could be done...
Opinions?
- Adam
First, the RIAA will, in the near future, have some success at stopping Napster, as one particular service, from distributing copyrighted material. They will accomplish this because Napster is a corporate entity and Napster will cooperate with the courts, because that is in the best interest of their shareholders.
Second, other services, whether they are OpenNap servers, Gnutella, FreeNet, or whatever, will emerge from Napster's ashes and allow people to distribute copyrighted material.
Third, the RIAA will notice that there is not one particular corporate entity to go after in this case, and will take the issue to the legislature instead.
Fourth, the legislature will pass unambiguous laws that declare distributing copyright material online illegal, and there are medium penalties (like fines, and possibly jail time for multiple offenses).
Fifth, some people will continue distributing copyright materials online. Most won't.
Sixth, some people will get caught. Most won't.
The parallel I am making should be clear. This is analogous to the United State's so-called war on drugs.
No, the US can never "win" the war on drugs. Nor can it win the war against distributing copyrighted material. However, it can certainly scare the majority of people into not participating. And that is all the RIAA wants to preserve its profits.
napigator works with beta 8 and 9 just fine, and we've just released a few alpha's of napigator v2.0 that integrates into napster itself like one of its normal pages.. v2.0 release will be out in a few days.
Moderators asleep at the wheel here. This is the most insightful thing I've read in weeks. I've found the best music in the last 16 months from mp3.com, certainly NOT Napster.
The July 2000 issue of Wired spotlighted Sealand, a sovereign 'country' created from an abandoned oil rig in the Atlantic. The idea is that it can be used as a file server without the burden of national laws. This sounds like an excellent way to get around the copyright laws Napster is currently facing.
What if Napster (or another company) decided to move the central database like this? Could it be stopped without going after individual users?
Adversive
My cat's breath smells like cat food.
I do not understand the analogy to murderers in gangs in the city. First of all, it would have to be quite the bloodbath (think millions and millions of people) for authorities not to be able to arrest "everybody."
Nevertheless, consumers get frustrated when they buy a CD from their favourite artist when they know that a minute fraction of the cost will go back to support the artist. Why should we encourage the record companies?
I am tired of people comparing downloading copyrighted material to shoplifting. My morals are high enough that I do NOT buy RIAA material. Do I download it? Yes. Am I downloading it in place of walking to the record store and purchasing the CD? No.
Same goes for software. I refuse to pay $1000 dollars for a piece of software. I find it comical that any one company would ask such an exhorbitant sum. So I download it from an FTP site. Am I downloading it in place of buying it from Adobe over the web? No.
My original (and deemed "Overrated", by an Anonymous Moderator) argument stated that consumers will always win, and in a nutshell, will never be screwed over. The RIAA and other said companies have to listen to their agravated consumers, and continue cautiously.
- Ando
Actually ebay does their own auditing as well. Go search for something like hardcore preteen sex pictures or something along the lines. It may be initially posted but they'll pull it down themselves.
Do you consider Britney Spears, The Backstreet Boys and N`Sync artists? They make money on lyrics they don't right, music they don't play and dance moves they paid someone else to come up with.
3/4 of commercial pop music today isn't "art"...hell if it is we're in a load of trouble.
They are performers, not artists.
You don't have to be a geek to find what you want online. All you need is patience coupled with curiousity and interest. seek, and ye shall find...in one way or another. :)
A Penny for my thoughts? Here's my two cents. I got ripped off!
I guess all of my songs will have to become 3l33t!
Mmmmm, br1tn3y sp34rs - 00ps 1 d1d 1t 4g41n
Since I think we all know Napster and the RIAA will not introduce any competant means of blocking copyrighted songs beyond a simple name check on the title of the MP3, the day has finally arrived when that stupid script kiddie hacker type will come in handy. Sure, Napster will block any songs that have Metallica in the filename (ignoring the fact someone might write a song called "I hate Metallica") but will their filters catch:
|\/|3T4||C4
?
No, they certainly will not. In the future the only people who will be able to use and understand the songs available through napster will be these ever-present script kiddies.
It's kind of like encryption, for the stupid.
--
--
RumorsDaily
Like:
U2- Mysterious Ways.mp3
U2- Mysterious_Ways.mp3
U2- Mysterious Ways.MP3
U2- Mysterious_Ways.MP3
U2- MysteriousWays.MP3
U2- MysteriousWays.mp3
U2- Mysterious-ways.MP3
U2- Mysterious-Ways.MP3
U2- Mysterious Ways.mP3
U2- Mysterious_Ways.mP3
U2- Mysterious Ways.Mp3
U2- Mysterious_Ways.Mp3
U2- MysteriousWays.Mp3
U2-Mysterious Ways.mp3
U2-Mysterious_Ways.mp3
U2-Mysterious Ways.MP3
U2-Mysterious_Ways.MP3
U2-MysteriousWays.MP3
U2-MysteriousWays.mp3
U2-Mysterious-ways.MP3
U2-Mysterious-Ways.MP3
U2-Mysterious Ways.mP3
U2-Mysterious_Ways.mP3
U2-Mysterious Ways.Mp3
U2-Mysterious_Ways.Mp3
U2-MysteriousWays.Mp3
U2Mysterious Ways.mp3
U2Mysterious_Ways.mp3
U2Mysterious Ways.MP3
U2Mysterious_Ways.MP3
U2MysteriousWays.MP3
U2MysteriousWays.mp3
U2Mysterious-ways.MP3
U2Mysterious-Ways.MP3
U2Mysterious Ways.mP3
U2Mysterious_Ways.mP3
U2Mysterious Ways.Mp3
U2Mysterious_Ways.Mp3
U2MysteriousWays.Mp3
U2- Mysterious Ways.mp3
U2- Mysterious_Ways.mp3
U2- Mysterious Ways.MP3
U2- Mysterious_Ways.MP3
U2- MysteriousWays.MP3
MysteriousWays.mp3
Mysterious-ways.MP3
Mysterious-Ways.MP3
Mysterious Ways.mP3
Mysterious_Ways.mP3
Mysterious Ways.Mp3
Mysterious_Ways.Mp3
MysteriousWays.Mp3
Only 47,000 variations on this track, and 2.5 million songs to go.
I guess they'll have to listen to each one of the last variation just to make sure. Or else face a shitstorm when anther band gets banned for having a song with the same title.
I thought *my* last data-entry job could get mind-numbing.
...when I run a wire from my sound card's digital out to the digital in and hit record? Who cares about the encryption? This is even easier than it was with DVD's because with audio, (unlike video) every person with a sound card has the ability to easily record what's being sent to their speakers. Until they get a decryption processor in the speakers there is no use in encrypting what they're distributing.
clients besides the official one, and older napster official clients, will no longer work
on the official servers. But there are other Napster-compatible directory servers that run OpenNap.
All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Come on now, it would be trivial for the RIAA's track "search engine" to convert everything to lowercase and strip punctuation. Then the only real variations would be whether the artist's name appears before or after the track name. Sure, there are still more variations but this definitely would eliminate tens of thousands of possibilities.
---
"Napster is going subscription? No, that's great, because you'll probably be able to pay a little subscription fee and then you'll get access to good proper ripped copies of all BMG artists.. That would be so worth it.."
I've said that quiet a few times in the last few months.. Now I find out the chunderheads aren't really embracing the future, they're throwing a bunch of bad close crypto at it..
I'm really suprised a big company like that doesn't have a better evil-master-plan then this.. Napster had a chance to use its userbase to lead the new mediaverse, now they're just going to be a hickup on the road.
I canot imagine that they will attempt to identify a song by the filename. I suspect they will introduce some sort of technology that scans the actual file's sonic characteristics in an attempt to identify material. This was discussed on slashdot a few months back.
maru
and we make a song called Metallica
Except many modern acts (Billy Joel, *NSYNC, etc.) are trademarking their names.
All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Hell you think song titles are exausted? their are always long title names like the band Anal Cunt. With names like "song titles are fucking stupid" "all our fans are gay" "i made your kid get AIDS so you could watch it die" and a ton more so song titels wont run out just be more creative.
i know i'm late to this thread but, isn't the burden of proof on the MPAA? i want them to PROVE i've never bought the CD or Tape or Album (1st generation CD) of all the music i've downloaded from napster and the like.
TIME is the Aether...
The the main reason Napster was created was so that you could download singles without having to buy a whole CD. Sure, if you have the CD, use that instead, but Napster is great for downloading singles.
...but it will be useful stepping-stone until the record companies can set up their own servers. Paying $10/month or whatever Napster wants for other people's unreliable, partially-completed, and often misnamed files is going to find a very limited audience. Especially with the recent rash of falsely named MP3s on Napster (ie. U2's latest album)... and if I had a dime for every song that cut out a few seconds early...
However, paying the same for high-quality, complete downloads from the RIAA's own high-speed servers would be acceptable. And all they'll have to do is tweak Napster's search routines to point to their own servers when they're up...
Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.
- Nietzsche
However, currently with the frenzy of 'Digital Rights Management' junk that recording companies see as a pre-requisite for distributing online music, few or none of these will be possible. Napster's biggest benefit to me wasn't getting music that I didn't pay for, but rather getting music I couldn't pay for by finding otherwise unreleased or unavailable songs from artists that I enjoy listening to, or previewing an album before deciding to buy or not to buy.
I used up all my sick days, so I'm calling in dead.
I don't see another use for a gun than commiting a crime, so they should be banned.
The difference with napster is that it has legitimate uses
What about privacy? You won't have any if you are paying napster. They will know who you are and that is not good if you are trading illegal music. I was pro file sharing before but now I am angry. Napster will die; P2P file sharing must survive. Go to other services even if they DO suck. Just use them for the sake of popularization.
~~Apathy alert: Approaching the Point of No Concearn
Sadly, I kinda find this whole thing funny, after all the pro-Napster evangelization I read on this site, paired with the open source evangelization.
After all, blatantly stealing an artists work IS unethical (yeah, yeah, we've all done it, but still). An artist should have the right to be compensated for their work (or at least have a say in how their work is distributed). Perhaps artists like Metallica who sue their own fans are a bunch of $%*&$-heads, but a vast majority of the non-MTVophile artists haven't done that. Technically isn't that equivalent to violating the GPL? (Here's a really stupid example)Consider if Microsoft created Openster, where evil software corporations could openly trade open sourced pieces of software, then blantly violate the copywright. That would certainly suck.
I'm not saying that the RIAA is right in charging exorbitant prices and taking away an artists rights, but perhaps Napster should give an artist credit where credit is due.
(In a perfect world) Maybe if users paid a low low monthly fee for unlimited usage. All the fees are put into a central pot, and once Napster has paid off it's expenses/shareholders, the monies are distributed proportionally to artists based on a percentage of how many users have that artists songs. Just an idea, probably won't happen. Oh well.
And for all the evangelization, I wonder if Napster ever was about providing free content. Consider, exactly how DID Napster corp pay off expenses before it was bought by Bertslemann?
If I could think of something pithy to say, I'd put it here. No really.
I would like to see someone argue to me that ebay should be allowed to list auctions for cocaine or nuclear materials because they're only "listing" and not involved with the actual transfer. That is utter bullshit; by that logic Osama Bin Ladin, or Moammar Khaddafi, aren't responsible for american deaths just because "they werent involved in the actions, they only indirectly facilitated what happened." Try and make a loophole through that and you end up justifying more than you want to eh?
If you want realistic discussion lets be realistic, we all know what napster is about. It's obvious that anytime napster wants, they can go through their servers and find listings of copyrighted materials by the thousands. So, to answer the first question; yes, they are knowingly facilitating the download of illegal material.
The real argument here is: what should napster be required to do to comply with copyright restrictions? _That_ is what i'm interested in hearing argued here. Should they be required to set up a system for copyright holders to request listings removed? Or should it be more restrictive where they are required to compare song names with a database of copyrighted songs? I havent heard much discussed beyond this.
I use napster, and I pirate software, but I would never make such foolish arguments for such selfish reasons. I'm sick of these discussions about pirating and how stupid the RIAA is. Maybe the RIAA is stupid, but they have the law on their side. Why not discuss the merits of copyright law instead?
Even worse, if I want to be the 500th person to make their own recording of "Yesterday" by McCartney and distribute it via Napster I guess I'm screwed too.
Except this time it's by the publishers not the labels. Composers' and performers' rights organizations such as ASCAP, SESAC, and BMI in the US (along with a host of organizations in other countries) control cover rights, as a cover can be considered a "derivative work" and/or a "public performance" of a copyrighted work, and there is no longer a public domain to speak of.
All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?
OK, so Napster (and related services) will have to block RIAA-owned songs? And they plan to recognize those songs by name, and maybe (in the future) by some digital fingerprint? The solvent for this solution is obvious: encrypt everything you share, using some asymmetric algorithm. If someone wants to leech a song from your box, let them first get your key (from some keyserver, somewhere). Obfuscate the filenames. Whatever... This is just to say that the proposed method of keeping Napster/P2P RIAA-'clean' does not work. And I can not see how they can make it work either. The cat seems to be out of the bag, it has produced many litters, and its offspring now roam the planet in search for a home...
--frank[at]unternet.org
The reason the RIAA has been able to go after Napster, is because of the centralized root servers. Why not just move those servers out of the RIAA's reach?
They already have.
All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Isn't everyone always saying how napster can provide a legitimate service to swap non-commercial MP3's? If all the copyrighted MP3's are removed (yes it's going to be hard to do, but humor me here) then napster becomes 100% legitimate, and this whole mess can pass. Why people are so concerned with our "right" to download copyrighted music is way beyond me. No one here argues that windows should be free because we have linux. But when it comes to music, for some reason it should all be free. Can someone please help me understand that view?
I wonder if the encryption of the music will be client->client or if it will actually go through the nappy servers (I would think this would be way too much bandwidth). If it's client->client, someone could just figure out the login string, pay for an account, and release a client that can share "free" music. Anyone else using the service and this client would be able to "pollute" the environment with un-encrypted MP3S.
How about this: everyone knows that the formula is something like := md5(song_name XOR password)
mp3name
and the password is emailed around until "they" figure it out and then it changes.
Oh, and you have to scramble the song itself so that you have to know the password to hear it, so that "they" can't figure out what song it is unless they know the password.
Only 47,000 variations on this track, and 2.5 million songs to go.
I guess you've never heard of Soundex hashing. (Of course, PayNapster would use something more advanced, but this illustrates the point.) It would also have the side effect of keeping illegal (under US "derivative work" copyright law) cover songs off PayNapster.
All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?
NI started out on TVT Records, and TVT's partnering with Napster. There's a TVT logo on halo 2 (pretty hate machine).
Record labels' promises of fame and fortune are a nine inch nails - terrible lie.mp3All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Barry reiterated that Napster hopes to move to a membership-based service as soon as possible
:)
Mission accomplished! Everyone on Napster has a username and password
Some countries have traditionally scoffed at US intellectual property laws, and their doing so has been ignored with equal tradition.
So, why doesn't napster set a network up in one of these countries? BEYOND the reach of US civil law / international agreement?
- freddy@wissingfamily.com
"What, any files at all? How would you sell hard drives that are that crippled?"
If the ATA standard has CPRM built in and the content providers put enough pressure on hardware manufacturers to limit the market it doesn't really matter. Which is the crux of my argument.
"Or you mean files stored in a particular format? In that case you'd just use a different format. Once encrypted the hard drive can't possibly know what's in the file."
If the content producer/distributor only sells content in one format (say Windows Media Player) and it is illegal to break the encryption to put the content in another format then what?
To ordinary users, approx 50 million of them, Napster feels like it's almost completely anonymous. You make up a fake name and provide virtually no identifying information. Feeling like nobody knows who you are, it's pretty easy to stick those CD into the drive and rip them into MP3s, or at least share the MP3 files already downloaded.
When payment is required, all the comforting anonimity goes away. You'll have to send money, probably with your credit card. You'll almost certainly have to provide your address, since they'll want to do address verification. Now they know who a particular user is. Even if they are able to know user's true identity today, to the millions of Napster users with files in their share folder, it "feels" like nobody can tell who you are. It feels like the worst that could happen by sharing that Metallica song is getting your (free and anonymous) account terminated, and you'd just sign up for another one. It "feels" like nobody could ever trace it back to you and threaten you with legal action. To the millions of Napster users today, it feel like it's completely impossible for the cops/lawyers to ever know it was you. It seems completely free of any risk of ever getting "caught".
It's hard to imagine that such a large number of people will rip CDs or share files that they know are copyrighted, when they've provided their name, home address, credit card number, and maybe even their phone number. My prediction is that the loss of the comfortable anonymous atmosphere will be the death of Napster, not the money itself or annoying copy restrictions. Those just won't matter if the service lacks the right atmosphere that appeals to the sharing (aka pirating) mentalitiy, and that critical atmosphere is (seemingly) anonymous access.
PJRC: Electronic Projects, 8051 Microcontroller Tools
I can only assume that every time napster gets nuked on your machine, you can throw away ALL the songs you downloaded because they won't play. I think that sux.
"You can now flame me, I am full of love,"
I really don't see what Napster would offer to paying customers. I mean they plan to charge you to download songs that are stored on other users' computers, using other users' bandwidth, and perform their encryption using users' cpu time.
If it costs me nothing to download a song, then I don't mind allowing people to download songs from me - a mutually beneficial thing. But why should I upload a song to someone else just so Napster can make money off it.
It sounds like a raw deal to me.
- Under legal pressure, Napster implements subscription fees, anti-RIAA-copying measures, etc., etc.
- All the users say "Damn, Napster sucks now."
- The few clueful users who know about using a Napster client with Napigator and OpenNAP tell their friends about it, and the word spreads quickly.
- The RIAA tries to sue, but realizes that since all the technologies they're trying to control are open-source, stopping every service provider is a nearby impossible demand.
- The RIAA is crushed under the weight of its litigation staff, and ceases to be. The end.
The RIAA might have done better to be a little friendly to Napster and just try to control it. There's going to be a day when they miss having one central enemy to push around.Do domain names matter?
I think the point is to steer the more law abiding folks in the right direction. It's pretty hard to stop the hardened criminals. (and indeed, the ends would not justify the means)
Remember we are taking about things napster may do, because they are enforced to do. So if the RIAA will force them to use for example audio fingerprinting, they can also enforce them to not accept files "which do not make sense". By doing some short analysis you can find out, if a file is actual music or only crypted data.
You'll get nothing useful. The Secure Audio Path (available in Windows ME and Windows XP) won't play through unsigned drivers, signed drivers turn off digital outputs when Secure Audio Path is open, and some labels may require Secure Audio Path for playback. You'll have to use analog, but with a good setup, analog doesn't suck as much as the sheeple think it does.
All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Slashdot actually mirrored something!
How would you decrypt the names ? If you couldn't do this, it would be useless. The problem is, how could you allow joe bloggs to do it without allowing Napster inc. to do the same ?
Trent ditched TVT. The last official NIN album to bear the TVT logo was Further Down the Spiral. Now, his official publisher is Nothing/Interscope.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Hey, maybe the RIAA could use CDDB to do that!
Oh, wait a minute, they refuse to use anything associated with mp3. Too bad, they'll have to toil for years then.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Isn't everyone always saying how napster can provide a legitimate service to swap non-commercial MP3's?
If you want people to hear your non-commercial MP3s, get hosted. I helped my brother's metal band get on MP3.com. The high-powered MP3.com servers and connection are much more reliable than the 56K modem of some Napster user in Zimbabwe.
All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?
- user opens 'obfuscate' client, types in title and performer name: Enter Sandman, Metallica.
- client server exchange
- 'obfuscate' client returns the obfuscated name: '12f64723ff.mp3'
- user uses Napster to search for '12f64723ff.mp3'
- user renames to whatever he likes
For the absolutely paranoid, the following steps could be taken to disallow 'abuse' by big labels:It would be possible to map part of the renaming scheme and ban certain files but if the implementation is done right, it would be too difficult to do on a massive scale.
Comments?Going to subscription based would've been enough of a viability challenge. Most people will already forget Napster when that happens, but I hope that some would stay, and it might well both become profitable as well as still be an enjoyable experience.
Now this announcement comes and for the first time ever I'm really starting to worry about Napster's future. Everyone wants real MP3s and the flexibility that comes with them. Computer users may already be beaten into submission when it comes to dealing with copy protection (insert your cd now) but it won't fly that easily in the audio world. This kills any intention I had of joining their service.
Worst is the record companies will claim 'Look, we tried to sell music online, and it didn't work'. Not surprising when what you buy online comes with restrictions that aren't present in other media.
Hm!
;-)
*fumes.*
BRx
Life after capitalism? The participatory economics project
Don't take this too easy. Of course the RIAA will not be able to identify their songs on a name base, this will not work reliable. But audio fingerprinting techniques are on the way, and that might really work...
With everything that is going on, if such at thing does not it exist, it is something that should. And it represents a wonderful opportunity.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
From what I understand, record sales actually increased EVEN with Napster "ripping" them off. My group figures that the Napster allowed people to hear what they wanted, and then bought CDs with the tracks they previewed.
Some people that never buy CDs will also not pay for a subscription, that will not affect sales, but not allowing previewing, I believe that will hurt.
Johnny
(I would gladly bet YOUR life on my ideas)
It's fairly obvious that only Napster will play back the encrypted mp3s. Sucks to be winamp. And of COURSE there will be no way to play these on alternate OS's....
I truly hate this attitude. I'm constantly listening to people say things to the effect of "It's illegal technically, but everyone does it" or... "I only do it because cd prices are too high"
I just do not get it. Safety in numbers? This must be the same attitude taken by murders in the city...."Well, I know its illegal to shoot that guy, but all my gang member friends are shooting people, what are the police gonna do, arrest us all?" And no...im not saying that downloading from Napster is like Murder.
Im saying im sick of people with that attitude toward ANYTHING. Be it shoplifting, or downloading music. Im just sick of this Attitude where people DESERVE whatever they want for free.
Come on. I buy my cds, I think the cd prices are a bit high, but not unreasonable. If they were un reasonable I would not purchase them. And I wouldn't steal them.
This rant went a little longer than I intended. Sorry about that.
It's called a 'record player'. See, it's like a CD player, but with a 'needle' instead of a laser. This needle thing then moves around the record (which is a circular black object) in a 'groove' which has 'bumps'. It's in these bumps that the song is stored, in analog form.
I wholeheartedly agree with this tactic to stop the RIAA's madness, and I'm changing over most of my music from CDs to this technology.
It's taking longer than I expected, though. I've purchased most of my Bee Gee's albums in this new format, but little else in my CD collection. I just can't find any of them. It's probably because of the relative youth of the technology.
Being an early adopter is hard sometimes.
--Psi
Max, in America, it's customary to drive on the right.
To mark a file as freely distributable, an artist would have to sign it with a digital certificate and indicate what kinds of right he would like to grant.
OK, I'll be sure to sign all the MP3s I have as freely distributable. Of course, I didn't actually create those MP3s, but how is Napster supposed to know?
I agree that most napster users will move to other apps to get their free music fix. But what if the hard drives and other storage mediums don't allow files to be stored that aren't signed with some sort of industry certificate?
:http://www.toad.com/gnu/whatswrong.html or Microsoft's DRM built into XP/Whistler.
I'm talking about things John Gilmore's article
Doesn't matter if I have the right to do such things if the hardware industry doesn't allow the market to have such things. I'd hate to have to go the China to get such things (and unlikely in the near future given their pending WTO membership status).
A recipe for sticking it to the man:
Combine righteous hacker outrage with cheap amateur satellites and mix in an open sharing standard that already has the critical mass needed.
Bake for a few weeks, and voila. File sharing for all, without the overhead of legislation.
"The genes are the master programmers, and they are programming for their lives" - Richard Dawkins
There are just zillions and zillions of different songs with the same name. And if tomorrow I want to write and record my own song with the same name and distribute it via Napster then I'm screwed. 2.5 million songs must almost exhaust the possible name space of possible titles.
Even worse, if I want to be the 500th person to make their own recording of "Yesterday" by McCartney and distribute it via Napster I guess I'm screwed too.
Silly silly courts. Silly silly RIAA.