Peer-to-Peer Copyright Issues

JimCYL writes "Fred von Lohmann, Attorney and visiting researcher at the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, recently posted this article on the Electronic Frontier Foundation (www.eff.org) website. It's part crash course on copyright, part guidebook on how not to have your P2P file sharing service sued. All in all, very interesting for those of us who are interested in copyrights in cyberspace." Very informative and very well-written - this is one to bookmark, especially if you plan to do any development on a P2P application.

Comments

Napster vs. Betamax

[micromoog]

I found the references to the Betamax case very interesting ("Capable of substantial noninfringing uses" section). Obviously, Betamax and Napster both are "capable of substantial noninfringing uses", but the key difference seems to be that VCR's are seen as "tools designed for substantial noninfringing uses", and Napster is seen (by the courts at least) as a "tool designed for substantial copyright infringement".

Bottom line is, if your product or service is used primarily for copyright infringement, and everyone knows it, you're screwed.

Good read

[Prophet of Doom]

This was a decent explanation of how copyright law is currently being interpreted but one should always keep in mind that these are just the opinions of one lawyer and might not necessarily hold up once they reach the courts. These might make good guidelines to follow in the event you want to test the legal waters but don't count on them keeping you a free man (or at least a financially solvent one). In particular I would advise staying away from the "Substantial non-infringing use" defense as it is disappearing quickly, even in the non electronic realm.

In the event you would like to read the text of any of the laws relating to copyright or the DMCA, take a look here. I teach a class on copyright law, particularly as it relates to new technology.

The real problem is

[BeerSlurpy]

The real problem with P2P these days isn't that P2P services or programs are breaking the law, its that the record companies have the ability to force rewriting and reinterpretation of the law in their favor, regardless of what steps programmers and p2p providers take. Even the strongest good-faith legal defence is powerless against a system that is completely biased and corrupt.

RIAA and MPAA pushed through DMCA once and they could push through more stuff in the future. The courts have pushed through bogus definitions of contributory infringement, bogus definitions of "financial gain" and completely ignored the betamax and rio cases. They also completely ignored AHRA and fair use. Why? Because the law doesnt pay you to interpret it correctly. The RIAA pays you to interpret it correctly. Well, as correctly as serves their interests.

The solution is not "obey the law." We have seen that is not possible to obey the law if you are a potential threat to the record companies. The law is twisted to make you guilty and remove you as a threat. The solution is either to

-ignore the law: use all the technological measures available to you to hide from the RIAA and from any enforcement agencies (goverment or otherwise) that they employ. Deal only with trusted pirate entities and be careful about what you do.

-change the law: this will be difficult. One way to change the law is to give congress more money than RIAA and MPAA do. This is not likely to be a trivial matter to accomplish. Another way is to start voting congressmen out of office who voted for things like DMCA. However, most of the voting public is completely ignorant of technical issues.

-have a bloody revolution: record company tyranny isnt really a good enough reason to break out the guns. Give it time. Just hope that you still have the right to own guns by that time.

Finally! A lawyer, and some reasonable arguements!

[JWhitlock]

I am thrilled that a lawyer finally put in his two cents, and that the article was well-written and researched. At the end, he even defines IAAL and IANAL, and mentions SlashDot. Someone with a real, expert opininon!

File sharing is here to stay, including sharing music, movies, etc. Those that create the systems will be under constant legal attack until either the law changes or a legally defensible system is created.

This article draws a huge grey line between legal and illegal systems, and Naspter is clearly on the illegal side, and in a lot of trouble. If you disagree, read the article, and then come back and argue.

There is room on the legal side, however. The best news is, the most legal software would be anarchist open-source free software! Microsoft will never make it!

This may be the dividing line between Linux and Microsoft - Microsoft's product would be popular, legal, but limited, while the Linux equvalent would be geeky, illegal but unenforcable, and unlimited. Perhaps even a legal, open-source version could be created, to meet the criteria halfway.

Good news and bad news. Good news, more people will try Linux to satisfy their Napster desires. Bad news, Linux will get a further reputation as a haven for pirates and hackers (hackers in the media sense).

We all have a good idea of what the Microsoft solution will be: Encryption and copy protection enforced at the operating system level, designed to fit the desires of the RIAA. We should try to beat them to the punch, creating a legal system that allows some freedoms, rather than the anarchist systems proposed elsewhere.