Slashdot Mirror
RIAA Wants Opt-In Filtering For Napster
"So who would decide what songs go on this 'opt-in' list? The copyright holder or the RIAA?
In other words, if I want to distribute a 3-hour recording of me gargling (to which I would own the copyright), would I be able to add it to the opt-in list? If so, what's stopping anyone adding in any old song into the list. If not, who would be responsible for listening to all the material that is submitted, and deciding whether or not it should be added?"
I bet the completely trustworthy, infallably charitable Music Industry would like to be the one making that decision. They know what's best, and how much it should cost (per listen, ideally). Conceding control of what's on people's hard drives to large businesses with vested interests in limited fair use (however you define it) seems like a bad idea.
- A.P.
--
* CmdrTaco is an idiot.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
This sounds very big brother-ish... only listen to the right music, go to the approved places, drive in gov't sanctioned cars.
Sure, I say this with sarcasm now, but even if They can't take away our physical rights, why not our electronic ones? Right now there is the possibility that Napster could turn into the only RIAA approved file sharing system right? And it'll only stock "approved" titles. So what makes you think that after a good relationship is established that gnutella etc aren't going to be what They start going after?
I hate to be a conspiricy theorist, but I appreciate my fair use rights as much as the next guy. Soon you won't be able to download non-sanctioned music, you'll have people monitoring what you watch on your HDTV, you won't be able to record it, and your HDTV won't really be under your control anymore anyway, as it's remote control capabilities allow Them to turn it off when They see fit. Oh, and those DVDs you purchased? Wanna watch them on a non-approved OS or using a non-licensed player? Sorry bub, no joy. Rip a CD to listen in an un-approved manner? Good luck!
Sarcasm now, but lets see what it's like in a few years.
I'm Slashdot User #580, who else?
I'm no kind of hero man. There are so many people out there who're just like me- turn away from the TV and commercial FM radio and you'll spot 'em all over the place. Maybe I'm just madder than most because I'm 32 and have spent _years_ learning about this stuff and learning how to do it myself instead of being a passive consumer person with a neat little role in society.
If you like what I have to say and want to cheer me up, then when I _do_ finish all this CD mastering and move over to Ampcast and start selling awesome CDs, buy some- I do enough very different sorts of music that probably there's something in there you'd like.
If you _really_ want to cheer me up, save your money and buy a guitar and start making your own damn art! -chris
Of course, my cowardly friend! I do both kinds of music- country _and_ western ;)
I DON'T HAVE FUCKING TIME TO PERSONALLY AUTHORISE EVERY LITTLE DOWNLOAD!
_Apologies_ to anyone who is offended by this strong language- but I am _very_ angry here. As copyright holder it is UP TO ME how I want to license my stuff. As it happens, I use the statement "All commercial rights reserved- noncommercial copying OKAY", because I fully intend to completely permit ALL FORMS of fair use copying and EVERY sort of copying and sharing and trading that doesn't actually involve someone charging people for my stuff. That is MY RIGHT under the law. _I!_ am the one who says what people can do with it.
Even _if_ the idea of this isn't 'submit your song to the RIAA to have Napster given permission to let YOU host it on YOUR computer only', even if the idea is that Napster keeps the records, I am really angry and finding this suggestion absolutely intolerable. As copyright holder _I_ have the right to authorise every listener I have to share my stuff on Napster. I've even asked people to do just this, repeatedly- I thought it would not only help me but would also add to the argument that Napster links to lots of different kinds of content.
I am not trying to get a free ride off the RIAA, okay? I'm not even _seeking_ fame and money and record contracts that are fair. I am perfectly content to do all the work for producing my own music, to seek out places like besonic and ampcast that aren't ripping me off, to accept that I may not sell zillions of CDs even once I finish the work of making them available from Ampcast. I'm not asking for help with all this, and I'm not getting any. I have to do it all myself and that suits me fine.
But I draw the line at having to be a _fucking_ performing rights organisation too, just because OTHER PEOPLE can't deal with the idea that people can exchange their artworks without paying. I am completely offended at this to the point that I begin to understand the feelings of some slashdotters and anarcholibertarians when confronted with unions: I am more socialist myself but here's a situation where I am forbidden to license my stuff under my own rules because that would mean people could legally share it on napster without my _personal_ authorisation. And I'm looking at a possible future where, every time some new sharing program or P2P thing comes around, I have to PERSONALLY go and give them an 'it's okay to share my music' before they're permitted. Goddammit, I write that on my CDs! I do not have TIME to piddle around being a performing rights organisation. The record companies have time and resources to do this kind of crap, and I do _not_.
And I am _pissed_ that they are even suggesting it. Sorry for all the strong language. I am _so_ pissed at this suggestion. I'm sorry, I put a great deal of effort into checking out the resources available to me (like ampcast, and for that matter CafePress) that let me offload some of the work in being an active, productive Internet artist and musician, and this ability is absolutely central to increasing the fluidity and efficiency of the Internet age and allowing people like me access to the world's commerce and media. It is _crucial_ that I am allowed to set my own terms on copyright and that this is _respected_: requiring me to authorise each new little P2P startup is refusing to honor the copyright licensing I already make that specifically authorizes noncommercial copying! I _must_ be allowed to authorise just-plain-listeners to share my stuff on P2P networks etc, do anything with it as long as it's noncommercial- because _I_ don't have the time to run around being a Publishing Rights Organisation and an IANAL and a publicist and an advertising flack and a suit. It's just not reasonable. Why the hell can't they at least let _me_ do my work and allow the random forces of the net to bring me whatever publicity or sales turn up? Why do they effectively plan to _force_ me to operate as a rights agent and individually authorize every little P2P thing that might turn up? I am so angry...
OK, that was messy and a lot of extrapolation but I've got a lot of work to do which these nice people at the RIAA are _not_ helping me do in any way shape or form, so I'd better go off and do it and hope other people can keep the RIAA from loading even _more_ compulsory work on me for the privilege of trying to distribute MY OWN music... I _so_ don't have the time to track down the relevant people and scream at them... if anyone wishes these views cleaned up for broader publication I'd be more than happy to do so and promise not to say F**K...
So don't go telling me corporations are evil. If anything's evil here, it's human nature -- the willing pursuit of personal wellbeing even in instances where such pursuit involves direct and willful harm to others. And I don't think you can do anything about that.
It's always bugged me that the heads of a corporation get to claim the value of the corporation as their own assets.
Erm. They can't. A significant part of it, maybe, depending on how much stock they own -- but actually claiming a company's assets as one's own is only possible in a sole proprietership, to a lesser extend in a partnership... absolutely not in a corporation.
Corporations are a useful thing - there are things you can ONLY do with lots of money. But corporations as people, that's a mechanism that doesn't need to be there, wasn't always there, and now serves primarily as a way for greedy assholes to increase the size of their dicks.
Not so. There's a very, very important reason corporations are considered people: If you're not a person, you can't sign contracts. Think about that for a moment.
In the case of a sole proprietership, for instance, the company cannot sign contracts -- though the owner (and his agents) can. The only thing is, it's the owner who is personally liable to these contracts, and not the company as a whole. The concept of corporation makes a distinction between the owner and the company -- and that's a Very Good Thing.
So Bill Gates can't spend the company's money, beyond what the board of directors authorizes. Control is already heavily delegated, flowing through people who eventually answer to, and can be kicked out by, the actual owners of stock. Hence, it's Not That Bad.
If you can voluntarily transfer money to other people, you can use it to influence their actions. It doesn't matter if you're legally a corporation or any other kind of entity. If you can have enough power over a business to run it effectively (resource allocation, hiring and firing, etc) then you have enough power to make people do things they otherwise wouldn't. If you have enough money to amass material wealth, you have enough money to control. I totally miss how removing one particular (useful) legal fiction makes money and power only useful for good -- or how it limits their ability to be misused to a greater extent than it constrains their availability for more proper purposes.
If you propose that somehow a change in the law will have an effect upon men's souls -- or that there is any way other than through instilling individual ethics to eliminate corruption and evil -- then I've little alternative but to brand you a hopeless idealist. If you believe that it's only through a few, specific, easily eliminated means that men do each other harm, you're more than a bit naive. There's no way to separate the power that corrupts from that which gets things done... and personally, I think that this power, on the whole, does more good than evil.
If you see means to fight specific abuses which can take place without infringing on productive uses or individual rights -- good! However, I'm more than a bit concerned when I see movements which wish to throw the baby -- the high standard of living we enjoy -- out with the bathwater.
The artists are only rarely the actual copyright holders. They can't opt in because of this.
That's what's so disingenuous about the RIAA's bleating about "artists' rights" in copyright discussions. The artists don't own the copyright.
Content can not remain in (1) forever.
That remains to be seen.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Actually, in the US it does. Don't you ever watch Law & Order?
"Hot lesbian witches! It's fucking genius!"
One advantage to an opt-in list could be with the filenames. An opt-in list based on filenames could make searches easier!
Ok, enough of the devil's advocate shit.
The only opt-in I want is for direct marketing. Opt-out means you have to maintain two lists and therefore more prone to error.
The biggest problem with Napster is the way the program builds the song list to share. It uses the file name. It should be using the ID3 tags. Of course the users would have to fill in those pesky little tag fields but Napster could refuse to share them unless it is filled out. At a very minimum it should be artist, song title, and album title.
Then to prevent mispellings intentional or not a spellchecker could be integrated for some kind of fuzzy blocking. I'd have to sit down and think how that would work but it would be a useful tool.
Don't get me wrong. The RIAA is evil. They don't give a rat's ass about the musicians. The care only about their control. Profit is secondary to these jerks.
"You'll get nothing, and you'll like it!"
I hope the RIAA wants to be the final arbitrator, and gets their wish, so long as they're required to listen to [all of] the submitted material.
If just one person submits a three-hour "techno-mix" of their daily gargling, they'll think they're dealing with a nut.
If two people submite their own three-hour techno-mix of gargling, they'll think it's an in-joke, and write 'em both off as wierdos.
If everyone who reads
It would count as a victory. For the good guys.
[Apologies to AG & _Alice's Restaurant_]
Pick One: http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~stremler/sigs/sigs.html (Note - disable Javascript first!)
You'll have to forgive the ./ zealots today... they have their tinfoil hats on a bit skewed.
Well it seems like they'd be able to distribute their music by granting Napster permission to do so.
i.e. the point of the opt-in list.
The RIAA's people (actually, label A&R personnel and record producers) already listen to unsigned bands. The only effect this has is (a) they can find bands to pick up, ply with $500,000 advances and transform into more commercial, mass-market incarnations, or (b) to find what the underground sound is so that they can produce a diluted, more marketable version that eclipses it (examples: old-school hip-hop -> Will Smith, industrial/goth -> NIN/Manson, Jesus and Mary Chain -> Garbage, Liz Phair -> Alanis Morisette (-> Jennifer Love Hewitt's foray into music))
Though blocking infringing uses takes precedence over allowing non-infringing uses. A system requiring each allowed MP3 to have written permission would make Napster impractical and unusable, but that is neither the RIAA's nor the court's problem.
RIAA's present business model has been ruled illegal. Whether they can find a legal business model or not is up to them.
That should of course say "Napster's present business model."
(Though hopefully the RIAA's business model may be ruled illegal soon as well; keep an eye out for Courtney Love vs. Universal Music.)
You can, its called 'Meta Moderation' and its displayed at the top of the main page, pretty clearly in view
I don't think even a vulture/buzzard would be able to safely digest one of those "lawyers"...
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
It's up to Napster to decide whether or not they want to do that. But it's not RIAA's place to do anything other than politely ask for it- they can only insist on blocking what is known to be the properties of the companies they represent. They can't "demand" anything other than that because they don't have a legal standing in that regard.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Capitalism is an economic system, not a government system (though we've gotten that very confused of late here in the US...)- and it's done very good by the people of the United States of America over the years. Socialism is another economic system. So's communism and marxism for that matter.
None of these are forms of governments as people mistake them for. Many of the communist countries have totalitarian or oligarchical regimes in charge of the government.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
It's supposed to place the burdens on the holder to prove that a violation has, in fact, occurred. Not the other way around. Many people need to scream "foul" right now over this.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Bill Gates' vast wealth exists mostly on paper. And there's more than one sense in which a cop may "get away with" violating someone's rights - in Bill Gates' case, I doubt a group of corrupt cops could get anywhere NEAR his fortified house to break and enter.
I can't think of too many people in history who've gotten insanely rich - rich enough to be above the harassment of a corrupt policeman, let's say - without the help of a giant artificial person (a corporation).
A subtle point being missed here is - yes, corporations are legally the equivalent of giant people with super powers. But behind every corporation there's usually a few REAL people operating the controls - they thus have access to all the super powers of the giant they control. It's always bugged me that the heads of a corporation get to claim the value of the corporation as their own assets.
Beneath the surface it's all still about people with money fetishes and a mean streak. But what the current legal definition of "corporation" provides, is a WAY-too-easy way for such people to acquire godlike powers. You can't eat people and absorb their strength, but you can buy corporations and add their powers (and wealth) to your own, removing a potential competitor in the process.
Corporations are a useful thing - there are things you can ONLY do with lots of money. But corporations as people, that's a mechanism that doesn't need to be there, wasn't always there, and now serves primarily as a way for greedy assholes to increase the size of their dicks.
Consider if you removed the "person" aspect from a corporation, and severely limited its rights to behave as a giant person. That is, restore the legal concept of a corporation to what it was 100 years ago. How much damage can a Bill Gates do, if he can only spend his own money, not that of the company? What if corporate mergers were a big deal again, not "oh we bought another one" like it is today? Corporations wield power over the marketplace - but if your power over that corporation is now INdirect, and you can't use their power as your own (to write company checks to bribe politicians for example), owning a corporation no longer grants you godlike power, so even if you're rich, you can't buy power! You can only buy material wealth (which is fine by me), and your "power" if any comes from your ability to personally convince people to see things your way.
Just a thought exercise, pay it no mind.
~ radiographite: art by john shepard
In addition, if the selection committee prevents bad music from appearing on napster, it will greatly increase the rate at which napster users find good, independent music.
Wow...
Now...I may get accused of flaming here, but aren't "good" and "bad" VERY subjective terms?
For example, I loathe country music. To me, it qualifies as "bad". Many of my friends share my view. Some don't. I also dislike music from the rap, "hip-hop", R&B and "popular" genres. I'd go so far as to rate these types of music as "bad". IMHO, of course.
Now, given that I have these views, were I selected to perform good/bad picks on various bits of music, that would weed a LOT of music out.
Is that fair? No. Those artists have a right to produce their music. Their fans have a right to listen to it. (no matter how "bad" *I* think it is) Imposing my preferences upon them would be wrong.
This goes the other way too. I would feel cheated if someone else imposed their musical preferences on me.
So...the question is - who gets to say what is "good" in your proposal - and why are they qualified to make those kinds of decisions for everyone? How will the balance be made between standard (RIAA approved) musical preferences and non-standard ones?
The RIAA actually pays the artist, napster hasn't even paid BMI or ASCAP fees. Look at what Dave Lowery (an actual artist) has to say about this very point in his Napster thoughts rant.
You are responsible for paying publishing fees for every single copy out there. Thus you need to track the number of times a track is downloaded and make a micropayment for each one. BMI and ASCAP will get into the act as soon as they realize how much revenue they can get out of P2P companies.
Oh, yeah, that Clinton administration was really on our side. Remember that Amicus brief on the behalf of the RIAA?
Gore lost. Get over it.
-- Ziggy Sig Sig
A pretty safe assumption to make, since it's an accurate rephrasing of how copyright works. If you create a song or a piece of code, it is copyrighted and you "own" the rights to dictate its use. Unless you specifically place it into the public domain, your copyright allows you to license that material as you see fit.
I must admit, though, I do not understand your assertion that the proposal makes any inferences regarding the longevity of copyrights.
Then they need to visit this website for proper instruction...
In other words, for Napster to distribute one of my spoken-word pieces, I'd have to tell Napster that it was okay to distribute it, exactly the same way I give permission to distribute my software by slapping a GPL on it. The presumption is that copyright exists and that people own their creations.
Having said that, I have severe misgivings about IP laws in general, but in this particular case, there doesn't appear to be anything questionable going on from a legal standpoint.
--
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
Oh and I bet all of the RIAA members websites never use YOUR email for more than YOU intended.
Keep the Classic Slashdot.
you mean like this ?
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Is there any other way of making money ? I think RIAA covered all...
This is absurd...
Perhaps part of the RIAA motive is to cause individuals trying to share copyrighted music to violate more laws (and thus raise the stakes for prosecution).
Now, instead of just being charged with unlawfull distribution of copyrighted works, you can be charged with something more serious, as you must claim to be the copyright holder to "opt in" with whoever controls the list (even if it is napster). This probably opens up significant new areas for prosecution, perhaps moving the offense from misdemeanor to felony.
Of course, none of this matters to the slashdot crowd, who always argues in favor of napster in terms of exclusively non infringing usage.
Bill
Mathematically impossible requirements are technically not against policy.
The RIAA, MPAA, proving they are morally bankrupt and have no intention of becoming fiscally so, are trying to set up cumbersome and expensive institutions (like the RIAA and MPAA?) which they would control and YOU would pay for.
That a lot of fuss for music that's so bad that the jingles in the elevators are more interesting than the radio and for movies, (I read that "The Sopranos" rated higher than the Oscars,) we don't want to watch being pimped along with nine dolar pop-corn.
Personally, my life is a lot more serene and calm since I started listening only to the sound of one hand clapping and watch iTunes spin its images on my wife's iMac, in utter silence.
Its captivating, free, fill my eyes and ears and disturbs nobody. I spend the money I save on my wife and my life.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Excellant points!
The constitution provides for copyrights for a limited time (so how does that match up with "lifetime of the author plus seventy years?), for the public benefit.
However, there's no statement anywhere in the constitution that says that if you are making money right now, then you have the absolute right to continue to make money, despite whatever may happen in the future. Most buggy-whip manufacturers from the preceding century found this out the hard way.
However, buggy whip manufacturers of this century (read: RIAA, MPAA) are screaming bloody murder. The frightening thing is that judges are listening to their sorry tales, and are making stupid decisions ("sorry, you may not link to that page!") for the sole benefit that these buggy-whip manufacturers continue to rake in their billions of unearned dollars.
--
"May I have ten thousand marbles, please?"
The RIAA represents five music publishers. They may sell the majority of all music recordings, but there are many other smaller publishers and self publishers.
The RIAA's idea is that you must get your music file onto their "approved" list before you can share it with anybody.
And, of course, the RIAA wouldn't want to provide such a service to their competitors for free, would they? That's right. This is just a simple, slimey trick that would allow the RIAA to extort money from ALL music distributors if they want their music on Napster.
So, the big companies get richer, and the smaller companies take it up the ***.
I guess the "government by the people, for the people, and of the people" is redefining the word "people" as multi-national corporations.
[sigh]
--
"May I have ten thousand marbles, please?"
It's not the government we need to fight, it's these companies
I don't know why but I'm remembering the preface to the game Frontier - Elite 2. There was a 'timeline' at the start of the game manual that talked about events that happened in the past of the game, but were obviously in future years.
One of the entries was, chillingly I think:
'First ever war between a government and a corporation 20xx' (I forget the year)
How long before corporations start becoming like 'countries' themselves and will arm themselves to protect their 'rights'. A somewhat scary thought.
Still, I hope it never comes to that.
I hope from what we saw of Rep. Boucher the other day that people with influence in the government can overturn this before it goes too far.
--
Delphis
Delphis
It would be trivial to implement and include in a napster application an automatic translation from names to numbers. Filtering becomes completely useless because only the numbers are stored in Napster.
True, but wasn't the RIAA founded specifically under an act of Congress that allowed this sort of thing? (mandatory copyright pooling and payment systems, that is).
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
and restraining piracy is NOT the same thing. Show me a law that says companies and individuals cannot band together to present a unified legal front. If RIAA were working together to, say, fix prices, then you might have an argument. But merely saying that because they're a combination of companies and doing something that you do not like is not enough.
How is this different from the current system, where anybody can have any mp3 on their system and make it available to other Napster users? Anybody can put up any mp3 on a web server, just like they put them up on Napster. We already have enough traceability for the RIAA to go after everyone who they think is violating their copyrights, they're just too lazy to track down and litigate against millions of people worldwide.
All of the RIAA's attempts thus far have been efforts to dodge their responsibilities under the law, which requires them to inform ISPs of potential violations, and only then to go after individuals for copyright violations. The bottom line is that the recording industry got to make the laws and they still don't want to play by them.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
Well, I'd love to be able to distribute anybody's music, and some part of me says it should be OK. I'm not sure it is really right to deprive an artist of income, but it doesn't sit well with me to thing that companies should be in control of it. Music and Business don't work well in the same sentence.
I've downloaded lots of stuff from Napster. Most of it was because I was too lazy to rip it from my own collection. There were two kinds of songs that I ripped from Napster:
1) The kind that I listened to, then bought the album.
2) The kind that I would not have bought, whether or not I got it from napster.
The third kind - The kind I would have bought, but didn't because I got it on Napster, doesn't exist for me. For the kind of people who buy CDs regularly, I don't think this exists. Anyway, back to the point.
Consider the following scenario:
This judgement passes. Non-RIAA bands are all that is on Napster. Napster becomes the source for all "non-commercial" music. Although it doesn't seem likely, it would be pretty interesting to have such an entity. Right now, it's so hard to see this working, but...
Imagine we went a step further. Since Napster would be totally in-the-clear, in terms of the law, there would be no reason to be afraid to get on. If Napster could compile ratings for bands, as well as associations: people who like band x like band y, and Band W sounds similar to band Z, you could have a very interesting, unbiased, recommendation system for listeners.
When I look at mp3.com's artists(of which I am one) and system, I see a big haystack. The best artists are the needles. Through the use of statistics and voluntary recommendations, I think the haystack could be turned into place where the music that is recommended is better than what you'll find on the MTVs of the world.(my farts sound better than what's on MTV).
More simply put, an unbiased, tracking, review, and recommendation system could allow you to get better yields with less effort(and cost) than the current system. The current system being personal recommendations and media hype.
I could see some advantages for indie bands who can't seem to make it through the RIAA gauntlet and come out heard.
rhadc
http://www.mp3.com/badboogaloo
An artist who -WANTS- his music traded on Napster.
It seems to me that they are just trying to make it so difficult that nobody will be able to follow their "approved" procedures. I can't see the feasability of them being the only "authoritative" party to release "approved" recordings.
This has just proven further to me that all that will happen is people will stop using Napster and start using another one client/network until such time as it gathers too much attention and becomes a target.
Case in point: OLGA... (Online Guitar Archive) It moves when it attracts too much attention. Though I haven't found the new site yet... 8^( Time to visit google.
Jethro
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
What about it? It wouldn't be effected by this, since RIAA's demand isn't being made on behalf of those copyright holders.
On the other hand, this would be a pretty good policy for dealing with non-RIAA stuff as well. Give Napster permission to index your stuff, and they can. Don't give permission, and they can't. I can't imagine any copyright holder objecting to people asking for permission, instead of just assuming that it was given.
(Except for that weird little presumption that indexing without permission is contributory infringement, this makes a lot of sense.)
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
There isn't a shred of a hint of a whiff of an iota of a suggestion in the BBC article that RIAA is asking for this.
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
And you could still do this, if Napster handles this right. The only difference is that when you release music, the files would be PGP-signed (or something like that) with a bit set that basically says, "I own the copyright to this music and authorize redistribution" or "I assert that this music is public domain", and Napster would have have your public key on file. Then, when they index a file that is signed by you, they see, "Yeah, we know this sig" and everything works.
This wouldn't be censorship. It would just be a matter of Napster covering their ass by only indexing files that somebody else has agreed to take responsibility for.
---
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Actually that would be the best thing the RIAA could do for the rest of us. If they do that, and prohibit you from letting Napster distribute your music even though you have a legal right to authorize Napster to distribute it... can you say "restraint of trade lawsuit"? I knew you could.
This is being guilty until proven innocent. Anyone who says this is fair to do in the name of copyright law has strayed from sanity.
Why should I have to be inconvenienced and manually tell Napster they can distribute my song when I didn't have to before? Just because RIAA owned music might be traded?
The RIAA, an organization with billions of dollars of available capital, has waged a well-funded war on any peer-to-peer file distribution network just because it might be used to distribute something they own. An end will only come when the recording industry is told that we as a people will not allow any corporation to stand in the way of innovation.
A victim of this copyright war is our personal freedoms. The RIAA has shown time and time again that they're perfectly willing to step all over the Home Recording Act if it protects their revenue stream. If the people do not act, these guidelines will only be a memory. All it takes for evil to succeed is for good people to do nothing.
This copyright inquisition will keep going on and on. The RIAA will literally never run out of money, and for that reason, they feel they can suppress anything they'd like by bombarding it with legislation. This is a real-world denial of service attack
Until we tell the RIAA that they are not allowed to continue this copyright inquisition festival, on it will go.
Stop the RIAA, now!
aÍÍ©ÍÌÍ£Ì'̽ͩÌÍzÍYÌÍÌY
you don't like Golden Throats? C'mon, you haven't lived until you've heard Leonard Nimoy sing CCR's great "Proud Mary" or William Shatner do "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds."
Just raise the taxes on crack.
Just raise the taxes on crack.
These are the same folks who've been saying, "We'll come up with a legit electonic music distribution mechanism, Real Soon Now," for, what, five years? How long do you think they'll take to approve opt-in requests?
They want digital music dead, so the only market that exists is the one they understand and control. If not dead, then delayed.
Stupid job ads, weird spam, occasional insight at
Wow. You really are amoral, aren't you?
Granted, idea four is a good one... an excellent one, really. But the rest?
Boycotts are often effective, but let's be honest... you didn't pay for your CDs to begin with, did you? It's pretty much given that people who buy CDs are buying more CDs, whereas people who don't still aren't.
As for advocating illegal 'hacktivism', that's just petulant and childish.
Shoplifting? Dumb answer. Ignore the morality (or lack thereof), and ask yourself this: if the CD is stolen from your local music store, who eats the cost? Certainly not the RIAA. That's right, the RIAA got paid before the wholesaler stage. That money is coming out of the retailer's pocket. All you're doing is stealing from the retailer.
It's not like file-sharing is going to get shut down. It would take a complete shutdown of the internet to accomplish that.
I don't agree with how the RIAA is doing everything, but cheap thuggery is cheap thuggery, no matter what your cause.
-- "You live and learn. Or you don't live long." -Heinlein
--
--
Mod up a post Rob doesn't like and you'll never mod again
So I guess that you people who write code for a living won't mind my WAREZter software.
You'll be able to opt out.
Sorry, but if something is copyrighted, you can't distribute it without consent.
I have to wonder, if their filtering was in place, then one of my own compositions was filtered out. I discovered this on the weekend when I connected my client, did a user search for myself, and found one of my songs missing in the list returned, this never used to be the case. I am not an RIAA artist. I gave no one any rights to my own music, in fact my music is copywritten under my own company.
Think about it, new music comes out all the time. And music like photographs are always copyright by the owner. If an artists wants their music to be distributed freely thats his/her perogative.
Its like this, if you want your code to be public you GPL it, if you want it encrypted you compile it.
There is no right to free music in this country..
Isn't there something to be said about knowing when to quit? or the old 'Sometimes you have to know how to choose your battles'? Why is napster still around?
Seriously, I don't mean to make it sound like they should just give up and die, but this is one battle that is just going to 1. cost them money (lawyers, bowing down to RIAA, etc) 2. time (which they could spend doing some new kind of distributed/freenet sort of thing) and 3. peace of mind, having to again bow down to the slightest whims from the lawyers of the other side and whatnot.
Maybe they're trying to prove a point, I don't know, but it seems to me that the point is moot or is being lost amidst the whole bowing down to do the RIAA's bidding. Sometimes a retreat, regroup, and reconsidering of tactics is better than a full frontal attack against a more massive enemy (RIAA lawyers and such).
------ Poo-tee-weet?
Indeed, Many times I have gone on napster to download either music which is in the public domain or else sound clips from tvs/movies. I don't know about this, but I'm fairly confident that the movie industry isn't going to go through and ok every single sound clip that is out there floating around napster. As a result, if I record something from say Pinky and the Brain, and then want to put it in my mp3 folder, no one else can access it. In addition what about works which no longer are copyrighted? This sounds totally illegal to me
Uh, the problem is, the RIAA would remind you that Happy Birthday is *still* under copyright after some 100 years, and would be illegal to share.
Yeah, that's what the constitution meant by a limited period of protection. That's the ticket.
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
> You can, its called 'Meta Moderation' and its
> displayed at the top of the main page, pretty
> clearly in view
Uh, DUH. That's what I was talking about. I was merely hoping that particular posting shows up in meta moderation.
And btw, the contraction of "it is" is spelled "it's", not "its."
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
You must know the moderator, because you're Trolling, if I ever saw it. That remark certainly didn't deserve a 4.
And to the point: Napster isn't eroding anyone's rights. Their business is not illegal. The constitution clearly lays out the right to trade creative works, specifically saying that there may be a very limited amount of time in which the works are protected from this -- to support the ARTIST, not the record companies and RIAA. Jefferson and Franklin, among others, expressed fear that this very thing would be happening, that lawyers and greedy buffoons would sell the idea that there is such a thing as owning ideas (they call it "intellectual property", an oxymoron).
You cannot own ideas. You cannot own a series of bits, no matter how unique. This is obvious to anyone who thinks enough about it. Copyright was supposed to exist for a short period to give artists more reason to create -- not to create property. You're telling me that if I know a song you wrote, you own the part of my brain that knows it? That's not only bullshit, that's tatamount to slavery.
The thing is, you know all this, and you're just saying the opposite to get us to flame you. My score for your post: 0. Troll and Flamebait.
I hope I get to moderate the moderator who gave you the "4. Interesting."
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
How about the assumption that Napster is no more liable for the content it serves than the city bus company is for the intent of the people who ride their busses?
Napster should be able to list any songs a user tells it (implicitly, by pointing Napster to them) are okay, unless specifically told otherwise.
Napster's users may be using Napster to commit illegal acts, but this is not Napster's fault. I suppose now we should sue GlobalSCAPE, the makers of CuteFTP because it allows users to commit illegal acts as well (or I suppose nobody trades warez by FTP, do they?).
_______
Scott Jones
Newscast Director / ABC19 WKPT
FC Closer
Close. So close. 53280 ($D020) is the border color. 53281-53284 ($D021-D024) control background colors 1-4, of which 2, 3, and 4 are only used in extended color mode, giving you 4 background colors for text in exchange for the upper 192 characters.
_______
Scott Jones
Newscast Director / ABC19 WKPT
FC Closer
This is true in (almost) every BASIC in existence:
PEEK(n) - A function which results in the contents of memory location n
POKE n,m - A statement which stores m inside the memory location n
And about those DATA statements? They were commonly used as a primitive way of loading machinge language programs into memory. Those statements can (usually) be translated back into assembly (albeit sans any labels) and deciphered with knowledge of the C64 and the 6510.
_______
Scott Jones
Newscast Director / ABC19 WKPT
FC Closer
Now RIAA has finally gotten it, and focuses on eliminating the old and useless rule "innocent until proven guilty". We all know that this is only a burden on modern society, and damaging to those that produce creative content. So RIAA wants to approve every song available? Will I have to register with RIAA, and have them check that my music is indeed not copyrighted? As free (and legal) music may make people choose this music instead of buying CDs, what is to stop RIAA from just taking VERY long to approve free tracks, so that the only music being distributed is through their channels? If they get this one, they might try to extend this opt-in system for ALL distribution of creative content. Ooh.. happy, happy, joy, joy.
If for no other reason, having opt-in only means that the RIAA doesn't have to do a damn thing except patrol napster occasionally and search for infringing material, at which point they can sue again because napster failed to filter it.
Napster simply isn't designed to run this way. MP3.COM is. Of course, if I remember correctly the RIAA doesn't care much for MP3.COM either.
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
Those music clubs (Columbia house in particular) only deal with old top 40 stuff. I lisetn to metal, and if I join a music club, I get to choose from Brian Adams and Pantera, which are not in any way things I want to hear.
I'd like to opt-in for the sharing of a file. The name of my file is:
pig_latin_metallica.mp3
Thank you,
Joe Ripper.
--- I still know what "POKE 53280,0" means ...
Isn't that the one that makes one of the Commodore PET's interface chips go ballistic and fry itself?
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
I'm not a big user of Napster except for the one area where RIAA can't claim damages; out of print recordings. There are tons of recordings that the record companies no longer print because the demand is deemed unprofitable. These recordings will disappear if opt-in filtering is allowed.
Perhaps this is a new business opportunity similar to how Rhino started, go around buying rights to out of print recordings that the record companies feel they've squeezed all the blood out of, and then start a download/subscription service for these recordings, with compensation to the artist. Perhaps we could eventually build a system where the bloodsucking middle men could be completely eliminated, and artists could receive more than the dollar per CD they receive now.
I would gladly pay a monthly or annual fee to get my hands on all the out of print stuff.
I'm still looking for the complete works of "Brain Ticket."
who really thinks that the Columbia would preserve the Public Domain license E. Power Biggs had on most of his recordings, now that he's dead and they're being recollected on CD??
None of my bands have ever been a part of the RIAA andhopefully never will. I wrote it. I recorded it.. I produced it. Not the RIAA. If any of these major "artists" would actually stand up for their rights we wouldn't be in this mess.
There is a reason for the ethics of indie lables and why they have always been and will always be around. Alot of these new "alternative" bands tout their indie and/or punk ethics but I have yet to see one follow through. The cash keeps coming in so it doesn't really affect them.
The RIAA is quickly becoming anticompetitive and monopolistic, and the current ways of combating them (nothing) have failed. Therefore I propose a more forceful, straightforward approach that everyone can take part in:
1. Keep trading MP3s. Try to fool the napster servers or use FTP like many people do. Gnutella and the like will eventually come but until then make sure that people don't forget that they can get music for free, they just might have to look around a little for it.
2. Don't buy CDs. Borrow them and burn them, bootleg concerts, just don't give any more money to the record companies. As a last resort, peel the security sticker off of CDs and shoplift them. If you want to give a donation to the band, mail them a check instead of buying their CD.
3. Declare war on the recording industry. DDoS their websites, break into their bank accounts, have some guy "accidentally" send a backhoe through their utility lines. Your life isn't easy, their lives shouldn't be either.
4. Lawsuits. If your garage band wants to share on Napster but RIAA won't let them, then RIAA is messing with your right to free speech and Napster's right to enable trading of free music. Send lawyers after them and make them feel what it's like to be on the business end of a lawsuit for a change.
That's enough malice for today, kids. Before you get started on your Tyler Durden-style homework assignment, remember to share the knowledge of MP3s with other people. A surprising amount of the population doesn't even know what they are. I taught my dad about them 6 months ago, and he hasn't been off his 56K since. Now go spread some havoc, and remember not to hold your molotov cocktail too long after you light it!
--
Win98 sux without these 1337 toolz !!
The RIAA probably sees this as an easy way to achieve two of its targets:-
1) To combat online piracy by allowing only approved music to be traded.
2) To curb the growing popularity of indie artists by allowing only artists on its payroll or those who are supported (and who support the RIAA) to come up and distribute music
Such a move - i.e a preview screening of all songs - would also allow the RIAA to spot up and coming artists early so that they can be brought under the RIAA's net.
This makes me wonder whether this could actually benefit indie and small artists in the long run by helping their music reach the ears of the big record companies early on so that they can have their big break.
--
Sue Napster? Hey, the Court has issued its injunction, and Napster has undertaken a good faith effort to comply, massively to Napster's detriment. RIAA wants more, and the more they ask for, the more they'll convince the judge that maybe she misjudged who are the guilty parties. We have already pushed the bounds of Contributory Infringement well beyond credulity. The 9th Circuit requires a scienter-based (knowledge-based) standard for the injunction. What does a right to censor titles have to do with that? Now, RIAA wants the right to affirmatively ce\nsor p2p protocols. Just plain silly, and the Court should see right through this.
now... if you could decipher the insane DATA statements at the end of C64 programs, i'd be impressed.
tagline
... hi bingo
No, it makes you a D.A. in Tex-ass 8-P
That's a joke, for the humor-impaired.
Boss of nothin. Big deal.
Son, go get daddy's hard plastic eyes.
Expanding a vast wasteland since 1996.
Put it even more simply; if we can all stuff our songs on web servers, who the hell needs Napster? The whole POINT is to turn our local hard drives into temporary servers and create an automatic index. The solution you propose reminds me of all the times my parents asked me to turn the music down, repeatedly, until I couldn't hear it with my ears pressed to the speaker. If you're going to insist the music can't be heard, just fucking turn it off and admit that's what you are doing.
No, I don't have any answers, either. This is going to get a lot more complicated before it gets better.
Boss of nothin. Big deal.
Son, go get daddy's hard plastic eyes.
Expanding a vast wasteland since 1996.
Content can fall into one of two categories:
1. Copyright
2. Public Domain
The RIAA plan does not account for works already in (2). Further, to paraphrase: "In the end, all works are Public Domain" - that is, Content can not remain in (1) forever. Thus, any proposal regarding "Opting In" would need to account for this.
Very good point about which/how many Copyrights apply. I think there was a recent article about this very issue biting the RIAA's plans at on-line music distribution. The Songwritters want to be compensated.
The problem is that this assumes that all content is copyrighted in the first place and that the copyright lasts to perpetuity. There should be no need to get permission to distribute works in the Public Domain, as no one "owns" the work.
The RIAA's behavior seems to indicate that they believe that Copyright lasts forever. This cannot be the case under the current Constitution.
I can just see the allowed song list now. It will be just like those ads on tv for collections of childrens' songs...Itsy Bitsy Spider and Casey Jones, etc. Napster could become the elevator music KING!!
is for Napster to no longer be Napster. And actually, I don't think the RIAA is the actual litigant in this case, just for accuracy's sake - it's the record comapines (except Bertelsmann) that comprise the RIAA.
Is it just me, or do the record companies and the courts still not understand what Napster is? Napster does not now and never has stored a single copyright-infringing work on any server. They have never transferred copyright-infringing material through their network. All they've ever done is list what people have on their hard drives available for other people to transfer.
There is no way of creating an opt-in list in this scenario that's any better than the blocking filter they're already trying to use. Napster doesn't have a database of file signatures to block/allow - because they never receive a copy of the song - and filenames are useless for filtering/allowing, as we've already seen.
All the record companies want is to continually raise the bar of compliance until Napster finally concedes "We can't comply with this!" and the court shuts them down. It wouldn't matter if Napster successfully complied with every court order that gets cooked up - the record companies will still claim non-compliance.
Right...
Well, isn't Napster technically a "carrier", not really doing any distribution itself, and cannot be held responsible for what goes over it. If I find something I wrote on the internet, do I sue "the internet"? Or the ISP that hosts the content? Or the country the ISP is in? Most probably I go after the *person* who infringed on the copyright, not the medium itself.
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Exactly how does one ensure that the person claiming to be the copyright holder is such? How does one account for works in the public domain, not uploaded by their authors?
If I perform PD music, I don't want Napster Inc. bothering me just because a lot of my fans want to trade it over Napster -- what if I refuse?
--------
Genius dies of the same blow that destroys liberty.
Bullcrap.
I've written two songs that are primarily distributed by Napster. I don't care to receive anything for them, and I never will. They're basically in the public domain.
So now what? Do I have to REGISTER with somebody to allow my songs to be distributed by Napster?
That's completely fascist.
FREEDOM IS THE DEFAULT.
-- Mojo Tooth : exploring our world as only an idiot can.
Well, perhaps that's a bit of an overstatement, but, for how much longer?
From their website:
"One out of every ten radio stations across the United States broadcasts under the Clear Channel's banner and the company's approximate 1,170 stations bill a full 20% of total industry revenue. No one is bigger, better or more intense than Clear Channel Radio"
These guys mean to take it all.
Bang the head that doesn't bang!
Dutch national radio does the same, they play MP3s downloaded from Napster (after which they pay the rights for airing the music, so it's legal for them)
what an opt-in list will do to napster will be the following:
-restrict the audience, as music from other countries will probably not be included in the list. If they are, it will slow the appearance of such music, making napster useless outside the US and canada
-No more things like 'Jelle', which started out as a parody on eminem's 'Stan' on Napster and was later released on some record-label(a lawsuit helped to give it publicity). So much for free music.
an opt-in list will be the final straw that makes napster useless.
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
"When you pirate MP3s, you're downloading COMMUNISM!"
No, but it could make you guilty of conspiracy to commit murder or possibly solicitation of ilegal activities. -Joe
For every story of someone who's bought more music because of MP3 sharing, there's ten stories of someone who's tired of paying too much money for too much fluff, and opts to pick up the single or the album in the traditional, downloadable, five-fingered way. The recording industry is right to be paranoid about this.
... is that it's not the government, it's multi-national conglomerates. In this case it's the RIAA, but if you look at the trends, every industry has blood on its hands when it comes to personal freedoms.
It's not the government we need to fight, it's these companies, and this requires significantly more clue on the part of our representatives in government.
yours,
yours,
kbs
Bare with me a minute here.. Let me make sure I have the facts straight:
1. A college kid creates napster, and it starts getting some underground attention.
2. Napster gains immense popularity across the world
3. While gaining popularity, literally millions of copyrighted mp3's are being shared between millions of Napster users
4. The RIAA takes notice, and slams a suit on Napster (since they obviously own all copyrighted work that lives on Napster)
5. Napster and Bertelsmann make an alliance. Wouldn't ya know? Bertelsmann is one of the biggest labels behind the RIAA.
6. So, now that Bertelsmann practically owns Napster, and the RIAA has a big-time suit nipin' Napster in the butt, they're turning Napster into RIAAp$ter.
As much as I hate these turns of events, it seems like the RIAA had this planned out all along. Maybe they've had the better of the Napster Community?
-------------------
arcane for life
Wasn't the lawsuit about keep a list of copywrited names? I agree bands do have a copywrite to their song titles/band names but they don't have a copywrite to ritneyBay pearsSay. Anyway I'll just use napigator napster is pretty much dead right now anyway. There are plenty of napigator servers out there still serving up tons of good song names for me to search through.
I wonder what RIAA will try next? They'll probably try and take down "buy" or "amazon" for listing cd's on their site.
I feel dirty now.
-----------------------
Nicotine free Amish .sig.
I make my music available over Napster. No record companies, just sharing with interested individuals. This is an entirely legal use of Napster that would be quashed by this action. How do I go about "registering" my files as freely available. I'd much rather just make them freely available.
I also use Napster to find the things I can't get in record stores. Live stuff, music out of print, music that was never "officially" released. The majority of it not available for sale through any venue. Where's the stealing there? These songs also would beco0me unavailable to me through Napster.
Back to IRC......just like the old days I suppose, before all the silly kids jumped on the bandwagon.
"Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality." -- Dalai Lama
This would involve putting into place some kind of controlling body to stop any Joe from saying, "Yeah, I'm Bono, it's ok to put 'All I Want Is You' on Napster." How would they go about confirming that a track that I've written is really being represented by me? It could turn into an interesting registration system, or it could be a free for all.\
"Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality." -- Dalai Lama
what is so complicated? well how about this....
what if i record a song and name it 'asdfasdf' by 'lkjljljj' and share it, saying it's mine.
and give everyone i know the program to decode by song and artist names - revealing that it is in fact 'enter sandman' by 'metallica'. how are you going to check? obviously not by file name as all these scrambling systems have been set up. the only other way is to listen to the sound file and compare it to a base, allowing for degradation
filtering napster on 'opt-in' is almost impossible. we won't trust the riaa to approve songs that should be approved. they won't trust us to not submit songs that shouldn't get approved.
It might be restraint of trade, but it's sure as hell prior restraint on Napster's freedom of speech (if a company can have such.. no wait, companies are PEOPLE thanks to our fscked up court system).
Sure Napster might violate copyright, but that's no reason to have to the RIAA decide what they can and can't say ahead of time. Does the RIAA REALIZE that every one of Napster's millions of users now HATES them with a vengence? Talk about pissing off your customers.
"There are laws that enslave men, and laws that set them free. " - Sean Connery as King Arthur
THis sounds like they're trying to turn Napster in to a P2P version of mp3.com. I don't see a problem with that as long as they can find a way to accept submissions without RIAA having to OK each one. I don't think that'll be a problem because it's already being done at mp3.com. Of course, there will be people who try to do things like the suggested "my new band Etallica..." post, but then the problem is 100% with the user mis-representing themselves, and that's who the lawsuit should be against.
-
Addlepated - punk & metal
/* Copyright RIAA, forever and ever, so don't even THINK about
/* making use of this. It's OURS, understand?
#import All_Frank Wojnarowski_Polka_Music
#import Survivor_Eye_of_the_Tiger
#import Everything_by_Liberace
#import Engelbert_Humperdinck_sings_Janis_Joplin
#import Golden_Throats_Volume_1
public static void main() {
System.out.println("Thank you for using Napster - now with only 15 days to live!");
}
...a possibility to make opt-in filtering much easier would be to sign some sort of agreement with the CDDB people for the use of their database as a method of retrieving song names, so that songs with a filename matching a song name in the CDDB would be allowed.
I've about had it with these hypocrites. Now they're trying to tell me I can't use an online distribution channel because my songs aren't on their approved list. Note this includes having my songs jump from one service to another, which increases the distribution for me. Essentially I have to constantly search the net for every sharing service to inform them that they can distribute because if I don't they'll get sued by the RIAA, a group I don't belong to.
WHAT THE FUCK?!
I used to think the worst thing they did was to put people in debt to them and then call their work work for hire. I mean when was the last time you went for a job and you were in debt to the employer if you left?
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
Well, that's a matter of some debate amongst the posters here, but I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest:
C) The Copyright Holder
In many cases, this is going to be A) The Record Company, but there are some savvy B) Artists who have held on to their own copyright, not to mention all the little independent bands who haven't yet had a chance to sign away their copyright.
Arg, that poke statement gave me a bad flashback to the days when I wrote assembly instructions on a piece of paper, converted them into base 10 and them wrote a small basic program to poke the values into memory. I couldn't afford a visual assembly editor back then.
I'm pretty sure the statement in question changes the background color on a commodore64 to black. But since my systems guide is sitting in a box in the basement of my parents house in texas I'm not really sure...
Peace, or Not?
IANAL... blah..blah...
If the RIAA makes the allowed somgs list, then they are, indirectly, claiming copyright on all songs that should be allowed but are left out. They can be seriously busted for this since they have no claim to the song. Go ahead, RIAA... but you may see yourself in court, this time from behind the defendant's table.
no way. this is the united states, we always err on the side of freedom of speech. to default to silence would be a turning point in this debate.
this would be my concern. there are quite a few of my mixes and tracks up on Napster, and i love that they're being distributed. the problem is that people rename the MP3s all the time, perhaps to fit into their naming convention on their disk, or to a name that's more descriptive to them.
i see these variations all the time, and up until now it hasn't really been a problem (in fact, it usually means more people start finding the mixes under these slightly different file names). now i have to write to Napster every time somebody renames one of my tracks? give me a break! the RIAA are going to have to realize that they're not the only people out there distributing music, and they're certainly not the people distributing good music. but i always believed the whole Napster issue was more about music distribution than copyright infringement.
- j
PEEK and POKE is *not* stack manipulation instructions. They are used to like pointers in C to PEEK at memory (read bytes in memory) and POKE at the memory (put some data at a given address).
The DATA statements are a used as *very* simple form of database table (think of a static, forward only cursor (recordset) in a real database).
http://www.millnet.se/ GO/U d- s+:+ a C++ UL++++ P- L+++ E W+++ N+ w++ M-- PE+ t+ X++
With a corrupt judiciary, most anything is possible.
Edith Keeler Must Die
I believe that it would be fair to say that most of the people reading this site know a lot more about coding, hardware, and the internet then the laws of the US and other counrties.
Also from what I've seen the RIAA's main problem is that they are clinging to a business model that never was intended for the digital age, where production costs 99% and copying/distribution costs 1%.
Someone pointed out the Pandora's Box of free music on the radio versus free music on the internet (from the consumer perspective).
With these thoughts in mind, why don't we, as a community start a project aimed at distributing media. This could become another aspect of the internet. (The web isn't every thing; there's email, IMing, Usenet, etc.) This project could become another service like the web. Have it be in many respects like Gnutella. However, I've read a number of reports on the failings of Gnutella. We've seen with Napster what can happen to a centrally located service. With enough people contributing (and I'm sure this is a project that would see high user particpation) I believe that we could come up with an enitirely distributed network, that works reliably for the distribution of media, be it art, music, or videos.
I guess what I'm suggesting is to create a distributed service that combines the best elements of Napster, Scour, Gnutella and FreeNet.
There would be many implications for this service legally, however, I believe that a service such as this, that cannot be sued out of existance, would force law to change in a manner consitant with what the consumer wants and is entitled too, as well as what the companies/artists want and what they are entitled too.
(I've heard very few people say, "Hey, let's use Napster, so we can rip off the artists!", whereas I've heard many people complain about how much CDs cost, and why the price keeps on increasing, without any improvement in the product.)
Michael Scanlon
mandos_17 at yahoo dot com
It's YOU who want your music on the system - they don't even know, or care, you exist. You have to pay a fee get your music on the system! Be lucky it's not a monthly fee, or per downloaded usage!
Dirk
Radio broadcasters PAY copyright holders royalties in order to play their music.
Since virtually all artists sign over their copyrights to the recording companies, radio broadcasters are paying the companies that make up the RIAA.
I would not dispute that radio is not free. However, it seems rather trivial that I may listen to, and record, any song played on the airways, and play it back at my leisure (protected by the fourth amendment).
It is a great scam too. The best form of advertising possible is air play, and the recording companies get paid on a per play basis for this advertising.
Remember the last court order Napster was ordered to take their service down completely. It was then that napster said oh wait we'll put up filters if we can stay open. The courts have already decided that the non-infinging uses of Napster are expendable.
The injunction against the last court order basically said that the court order had to allow for non-infringing uses of Napster - hence the revised court order which said Napster had to block identified copyrighted material from the plaintiffs. Any decision by this court will be reasonably bound by the appeals court to allow for non-infringing uses. To allow blocking of non-infringing uses is akin to saying you cannot host a web site in which people freely exchange free information.
The court has an obligation to ALLOW non-infringing uses of Napster that will prevent this from happening. You have to identify infringing uses, and block them. Not block everything, and then decide what is non-infringing and allow it.
Basically, a long long time ago, the RIAA opened a really bad Pandora's box called radio. In this scheme, the radio stations pay the RIAA to play music, and the consumer gets music for free. Well, it is only a small leap in the consumer's mind from free music over the radio to free music on demand via Napster.
If it were not for free music to the consumer, the RIAA would be nearly worthless. That is their dominant form of advertising - radio, MTV, et al. Now they have to sleep in the bed they made.
Couldn't they also demand that spam should be opt-in as well? It seems only fair...
I suffer from attention surplus disorder.
Given past outcomes when artists tried to offer their music for free (Chuck D did this, and didn't the record company threaten to sue?), I'm guessing it stays off Napster in such a case. Big surprise. I guess this is just the 3537th piece of proof that this isn't about artists' rights at all, not even a little, but completely and solely about lining the RIAA's pockets. Of course, we all knew that already, didn't we?
-brennan
Illegal restraint of trade is generally something a company does on its own, not something a company gets a court to do.
It might not be viewed as illegal restraint of trade at the time of the courts ruling or the court might not be able to fully anticipate all the consequences of its verdict.
This is not illegal restraint of trade, because a) it hasn't friggin' happened yet, it's only that RIAA has asked a court to order it
So, if it hasn't happened yet we're not allowed to complain? Hope you enjoy your Copyright protected CD's
, and b) even if it did happen, something ordered by a court is assumed to be legal unless it's overturned, and even if it is it's ultimately the court's fault, and not the petitioner.
Remember the DMCA? Only in a perfect world legal equals moral. So even if they might be able to slip it through some legal crackhole, that doesn't make it right and approaching this from the point of view that everyone is reponsible for (at least) their own actions, that makes them 'the bad guyes' in my book.
If I ask a court to kill my neighbor, that in itself does not make me a murderer.
Yes, it does. I don't care about the legal gibberish, but if you consciously direct your actions to result in the death of another person, we're talking murder. Nothing more, nothing less.
Next time your knee jerks, don't let it hit you in the head and cause brain damage.
Too late...
If there is hope, it lies in the trolls.
My point was that if I can, in any way, get something added to the list, so that I can distribute it, then nothing changes. Its right back to where it was, they are back to playing "Whack a mole" with the songs (which is what they are trying to stop with this "opt-in list")
As soon as they challenge it and change it, nother one pops up. Then another, then another. Ie, they are back to exactly the same problem that they have now.
--Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
I was commenting on the problem and the solution.
I am not playing any cat and mouse game. I have used napster once or twice. If it blinked out of existance tomorow, my life would be totally unaffected (except for less arguments to make on slashdot).
What I am saying is that what the RIAA wants is impossible. Either they assert total control by single authoritative control over this list - thus making napster useless and causing people to migrate elsewhere (and having the cat and moyse start all over again - I recomend freenet myself)
their other option is to allow decentralised control (ie napster controls the list, and anyone can add stuff to the list). Then the cat and mouse continues - this time on napster.
This is not perpetuating a myth...this is simple reality. This IS the situation.
Peer to Peer file sharing and copyright enforcement are essentially musutally exclusive. You can't have both and have a useful system.
The main problem with napster is that they left themselves open by being centrilized and having the ability to kick people off.
If people really want file sharing...then they really want freenet.
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
You rmissing the point.
They are arguing for the ability to say "Only approved mp3s can be distributed".
This brings up the question of "Who can aprove"?
There is no magic wand that you can wave over an mp3 and determine the copyright holder of the music. For all Napster knows, thats 3 hours of my neibor gargling that I bootlegged and am distributing without permission.
If the average user can "aprove" something, then they can aprove anything. I can rename Metalica's "For who the bell tolls" to "Music by steve" and say "Hey I am the copyright holder of this, aprove it".
In which case, they again have no control, and everything reverts to buisness as usual.
If only the RIAA and big wigs like them can make aprovals, then anyone who DOES make hom emusic, or other audio (like 3 hgours of gagling) is screwed.
Basically... these restrictions can either be pointless (ie anyone can aprove) or, they have to screw over the very people that Napster was intended to help (at least in part)
Sounds to me like a setup for a circular argument actually... impose restrictions so that only aproved music, by the RIAA can be distribiuted. Then they can claim that nothing is aproved, and since only they can aprove, any argument that napster is used by independant artists is untrue, since they are now barred by napster... so napster is just a medium for copyright infringement with no value to independant artists.
--Steve
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
does this mean that everyone ripping approved songs is going to have to learn to spell things the same way?
"I don't need a compass to tell me which way the wind shines." - Mr. Furious, Mystery Men
--
Free Mac Mini
What about their rights? What about the law that says you can't copy stuff without the copyright owners consent?
--
Free Mac Mini
Just because they lack the resources doesn't mean anything. People declair bankruptcy every day, businesses close up all the time because they lost a legal fight and couldn't pay the fine/comply with the law.
--
Free Mac Mini
I'm assuming that the copyright holder of the music is to contact napster and then opt in themselves. Most music will be owned by RIAA (per the artists record contract). Anything else (stuff I recorded in my garage) will have to have the permission of me. So I send that permission to Napster and all is well.
Doesn't sound like that bad of a deal to me. Who knows, there might be non-signed bands that don't wait their music on napster and don't have the money/time/resources to sue people trading their copyrighted works without their permission.
--
Free Mac Mini
So when I submit some obscure electronica song, and tell them that it is my own work (when it really isn't) and ask them to submit it, how will they know if it is really mine? What do they do play it for all of their friends and see if anyone recognizes it? I don't see how this could possibly work. Or else, what happens when some random dude says, "Hi I'm Lars from Metallica, I'd like to give away 'Unforgiven'" How do they know if its Lars or not.
OK, Let me submit the list of 2000 mp3's I have with slightly different filenames for approved use.
Napster is just an indexing system... That's all they are. They provide a service that catalogs and indexes files.
Are we really going to start riding laws about how to index data?
--
Need ecommerce that doesn't suck? FoxyCart is for you.
I agree totally. The RIAA is getting way to big for it's britches. Couple this story with the onw earlier about a rip-proof cd... The RIAA is squashing rights all over the place. It's getting a little sickening. The most effective protest that I can think of of the RIAA would be a boycott, but I'm fairly certain that it would be next to impossible to get a large enough group to avoid buying cd's for any duration of time.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
I'm sure the RIAA would want jurisdiction over the opt in decision, thereby also giving them control over independent artists who want to use their talent to make money for themselves instead of paying the music industry to do it for them.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
The duration of the life of the known universe could be considered a 'limited' time, too. Unless governments stop bending everytime the corporate puppet WIPO wants it, we're clearly headed that way.
I used up all my sick days, so I'm calling in dead.
...since obviously every unsigned artist in the world is recognized by the music industry... oh wait.
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
--Fesh
--Fesh
Kill -9 'em all, let root@localhost sort 'em out.
Copyright (C) 2001 David Farley, d-farley@ibiblio.org
http://ibiblio.org/Dave/drfun.html
This cartoon is made available on the Internet for personal viewing only. Opinions expressed herein are solely those of the author.
Er, what, exactly, does that copyright notice mean? Can I not show it to a group? I find it interesting that there would be such a draconian restriction on a cartoon with such a topic.
Jordan Bettis
``Wherever you go, there's another stupid sigfile quote.''Unless governments stop bending everytime the corporate puppet WIPO wants it, we're clearly headed that way.
WIPO. Hmmm. Sounds like a brand of toilet paper. Maybe that's why government won't stop bending.
Those who would give up liberty in exchange for security and DRM should switch to Microsoft Palladium!
Infinity minus one day is still infinity. Yes, I know some higher-up said that that would be a constitutional limited time, but he's made fun of in every copyright class in existence.
Then.. Since Guns facilitate thefts, the gun manufacturers are accessories to the crime.. Ford/Chevy/Toyota/etc. are responsible for theives leaving crime scenes are should be prosecuted as accessories ?
UPS Sucks
This is a case were we as consumers need to be careful and just not buy RIAA albums, stick with BMI and show the RIAA that being an ass won't make them money.
"You can now flame me, I am full of love,"
I'm afraid that the US constitution doesn't cover copyright. That is just a normal law sorry. It may well be that the law says for a "limited time" but that can always change.
"You can now flame me, I am full of love,"
Ok, I submit that I made a mistake :) Upon my second reading tonight of the constitution I find that there is allowance to congress to make laws of copyright for limited time.
"You can now flame me, I am full of love,"
And is there anyone that doesn't think the RIAA would put its slowest, most detail-oriented people on the queue for submissions. Every cover band will be tossed off for not having permission to record...every bootleg will be yanked...anything with even the slightest hint of copyright will be yanked.
Oh, and just like Yahoo! and the other search engines, I'm sure the queue will have several months backup... it'll be just like ordering from a record club like BMG or Columbia House. Everything will be nice and delayed while the record companies figure out how to maximize their profits... and minimize everyone else's rights.
==
Is there a world outside the US?
Screw the RIAA. They're messing with me now.
.. the list of 'approved' titles is going to be *short*. It sure will be if the RIAA gets to decide what can and cannot be listed .. if you're bypassing the RIAA by (gasp) distributing your tunes directly to the public, RIAA just cut off your distribution system. Sorry.
..
Yes, in that scenario, it would be restraint of trade, because it would give RIAA monopoly control of recorded music distribution and freeze out all their competitors. Can't let you publish that, sorry, y'know, union rules and all that. If the *copyright holders* can opt in, then this scheme has a fighting chance of being fair, but don't hold your breath
73 de N5VB (ex-KD5BIV) AR SK
Sounds like RIAA is saying. "Look how much trouble they're having filtering out copy written songs! Let's make them filter in songs and nothing will get through." The only thing you'll find on Napster then would be Happy Birthday.
So every little indie band around the world has to somehow opt-in to the RIAA?
I'm rambling, stop me now. Damn, VBScript why doesn't 1 = 1?
Oliver's army is here to stay Oliver's army are on their way And I would rather be anywhere else But here today
the sherman act is one of the worst cases of lawmaking in american history!
Crud. Then I'll have Elton John after my ass.
Nobody wants that.
If the RIAA is saying they want the right to restrict the distribution of my music, then they are surely implicitly creating a contract between me and them. And this would imply that they should pay me for the rights to my music.
I like this idea. Go for it, RIAA, and give me all your money!
Tux Games. Your complete source for native Linux games.
Either you have lots of inside information, or your choc full of BS. Hmm. Not hard to tell this one.
Maybe it's neither, AC.
As reported on Salon (and other outlets):
... are improving their experience by providing information about their tastes without linking ... to a name or address or other sensitive data that might endanger them (especially since they are exchanging pirated music)," wrote Parker in one exchange.
... and that "Napster virtually guarantees you'll find the music you want, when you want it and you can forget about wading through page after page of unknown artists."
"Users
Napster's online promotional pitches from the early days (i.e. fall of '99) should also be of interest
I stand by my opinion that another generic file swapping service (or even a mp3 swapping service) would stand a better chance of surviving the legal challenges. The way Napster technically works is nearly perfect for this sort of defense, but it appears that they shot themselves in the foot with internal e-mail.
If gun manufacturers ever hand over e-mail between senior management discussing their campaign to increase crime, then they'll have the same liability problem.
The problem with claiming that Napster is a common carrier and it wasn't built just to support copyright infringement is that they did intend for it to be used to swap infringing works. They discussed this in e-mail and even gloated about how they would put the record companies out of business.
Actually in my experience, most napster users don't have a clue who the RIAA is, much less hate them. Many don't even realize most of the music on there is/was illegally distributed.
--
The RIAA members hold copyrights over the RECORDINGS of the songs. The songwriters that put pencil to staff and put notes on paper own the copyright to the MUSIC.
That's why ASCAP and BMI go to the authors of the songs, not the recording companies.
As long as you pay your ASCAP and BMI for the songs you record, please feel free to cover popular songs and put them up for download. The RIAA has no control over that.
RIAA Doesn't want it's own music put on Napster. RIAA then controls an opt-in filter. Hence, nobody else's music gets to be on Napster... Thus, no music on Napster... hmm... "We can't win in court, so we'll have to cut off their supplies"...
--You will rephrase your request for me to go to hell. Goto statements are not acceptable programming constructs
That we do away with all patent and copyright attorneys. The resulting anarchy couldn't be any worse than this!
IANAL... But I play one on
There are a couple of options here. One is that you could do some sort of interesting form of diff-for-mp3's where your app would be able to check wave forms and such. After all, rips of songs from CD's are different: file size, encoder-used produces different files, different sampling rates, etc., etc.
Are there apps out there that can take two sound files, compare them (even at different sampling rates and "bit" (192, 168, etc.)), and determine whether they are the same?
It would be cool to see something like this happen.
--
They're only cutting one head off the hydra. This really is not worth worrying about.
--
NO TOUCH MONKEY!
hey it's simple, if the recording industry doesn't want us to have the ability to record and copy cd quality music then then they should start making records again or perhaps 8 tracks... I guess then all we would have would be analog recordings. Oh well jus my 2 cents worth.
flinging poop since 1969
MG
Randomly distributing Karma whenever possible.
RIAA approved file list in XML format. Intercepted in a SOAP transaction to Napster last night by an anonymous hacker:
<?xml>
<RIAA_APPROVED_FILE_LIST>
</RIAA_APPROVED_FILE_LIST>
Waltz, nymph, for quick jigs vex Bud.
The RIAA wanted this kind of a system last summer, back when Napster was arguing that it would not be able to effectively filter songs without completely shutting down the service. The filters that are already in place have so far proven Napster correct; people are either getting around the filters or not using Napster anymore. As I wrote in September, if I were a more cynical person, I would think that this move by the RIAA is intended to hurt Napster and independent artists and not to protect copyrights. Actually, I am a more cynical person, and "protecting copyright" at the expense of someone else's rights is like preventing automobile accidents by forcibly shutting down all roads.
Does anyone care about Napster anymore? I mean seriously, for a tech-minded reader of Slashdot like you and me, news about new Napster filters is like news about buggy whip trade restrictions.
What about all the music out there that is NOT controlled by the RIAA?
Since when does the RIAA speak for artists OUTSIDE of the US?
I am become Troll, destroyer of threads
It's not foolproof, anyhow. Just rename a Metallica song to one of the approved titles [watch for id3 tags], and the poor aforementioned volunteer with no life will have wasted their time.
--
After all, Steve Jobs is CEO of Apple, who are heading up the Rip. Mix. Burn. of iTunes and the DVD-R burning of iDVD and DVD Pro.
Steve Jobs is also CEO of Pixar, who last I knew, were in bed with Disney and members of MPAA, and makers of DVDs that require DeCSS to view on Linux.
So Jobs is having it both ways, he's selling the machines that enable fair use / copyright violation, and producing some of the material that gets reproduced through fair use and copyright violation.
I know this was primarily about Napster, but I couldn't resist bringing this issue up. It might have been more relevant if Apple owned a record company, but the iDVD- Pixar parallel is close enough, especially with the existance of iTunes.
A host is a host from coast to coast, but no one uses a host that's close
According to the article:
The RIAA has asked the court to order Napster to use a "filter in" method, which would allow songs that Napster is authorised to distribute to be placed on its system, rather than blocking the swapping of copyrighted music placed on its service.
So then, it looks to me like the judge in charge of the case, will have to go through the files one by one and approve them for Napster.
Oh joy.
Of course, you could always create a bunch of junk with the new and approved "legal" names. There are so many ways for this to go wrong.
but the RIAA is training people wonderfully well to treat the RIAA like the "Plague of the Month Club."
this must thrill them no end.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Now this may seem like a fine rule to have on a firewall, this is the last thing I want on our law books. I've always been under the impression that US law is run on the principles of "that which is not explicitly forbidden is allowed" and "innocent until proven guilty." Not only is opt-in filtering a stupid idea, it also shifts the burden of proof to the defendant...which is stupid on an entirely new level.
But admitedly, if I was the RIAA, I'd probably be squeezing for all it's worth right now, too.
The RIAA must buy out the internet.
This is the only reasonable solution.
--
Accountability on the heads of the powerful.
Power in the hands of the accountable.
Amen! I think from now on, all Slashdot readers should restrict their commentary to the actual subject at hand and should adamantly refuse to speculate on the potential consequences of an action or to provide arguments for or against a later decision based on that action.
Thus, I will provide the following "safe" topics of discussion:
I, of course, will be anxiously awaiting the Slashdot story "Judge Deliberates On Previously Mentioned RIAA Request", so that people can finally post about such interesting topics as the potential restraint of trade.
The one tiny problem is that RMS, who I had always pegged as being overly idealistic to the extreme, failed to place his song under the GPL. Instead, you're only allowed verbatim copying and distribution of the original article linked above (with no mention of whether or not you may produce recordings of the song, provided that you make the original sheet music still available).
So, instead, I offer the following (admittedly imperfect) lyrics distributed under the LGPL (for convenient mixing with commercial songs). If you have a problem with them, you're more than welcome to fork-and-fix.
LameAnti-RIAASong, v0.1 (Proof-of-concept prototype)
Contributors: Cameron Perkins, DeAnna Janecek, Stevie Strickland
We don't like all this opt-in stuff.
It speaks of serious collusion.
There's more to music than comercial fluff,
Hillary Rosen is suffering from delusion.
This song is just a half-assed protest,
it may not become a geek war cry.
But putting aside all bits of jest,
at least we did something to try.
Thanks to the Supreme Court decision
in Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc.
we can create a spoof full of derision
and stuff the cease-and-desist down the sink:
All our music fades to grey,
getting further from us every day,
as the RIAA marches on,
soon the music might as well be gone *insert guitar riff here*
The RIAA attempts once more,
to prepare for this copyright war
and if we don't settle the score
they'll continue suing forever more...
(Quoth Lars Ulrich, "...ever more.")
Mary Bono believed, like her husband, that copyright should last forever. It was Jack Valenti (MPAA) who said that making it forever minus one day would change an Unconstitutional length of time into one that did have limits. I, personally, think copyrights should last the same amount of time as patents. Essentially, they're the same thing, protection for creators.
Don't just complain - DO something about it!
All content IS copyrighted in the first place - read the current copyright act (if you have a strong stomach.) Very, very little recorded material is in the Public Domain since, if it were recorded after 1923 it has an automatic copyright lasting an absolute minimum of 70 years and, more likely with music, for 95 years. Congress has been systematically lengthening copyright term limits since 1909. Every time one limit is almost over, they tack more time onto it - a perpetual copyright handed out piecemeal. For more information check out my copyright website at http://limitingcopyright.com -- a lot of good links to important articles.
Don't just complain - DO something about it!
That's an easy one to answer. The record company owns the music in almost every case. So, the record company will be the one to decide where that music goes, when, and how.
These arragant parasitic bastards should be closed down. They are just screwing with the general public's interests.
I expect this has nothing to do with the effectiveness of Napster's filtering but more to do with the realisation that even though their action has limited Napster's popularity there is still a lot of stuff out their that is outside the direct control of the RIAA.
Further their current action hasn't yet managed to put Napster out of business which means when they develop their own file sharing software they're still going to have to compete with Napster. The RIAA should really be required to shed more light on it's motives and make commitments that it is not trying to create a lot of FUD so that it can step into the same position in the future. It's one thing to prtotect one's legal copyright but these guys really seem to be in a conflict of interest situation here and they need to be required to make greater disclosure of their intended future actions. Further if, in the future, hindsight shows that they have not been truthful in their actual intent then they should be charged with contempt and crucified.
This is one area in which I hope Napster and other anti RIAA parties have some seriously restrictive patents in place so that these bastards can't just wipe out a company so that they can effectively steal it's business.
Aren't the RIAA really doing the same thing that Microsoft was being grilled for doing ?
Please show me where I said that.
Never take moderation advice from sigs, including this one.
This is not illegal restraint of trade, because a) it hasn't friggin' happened yet, it's only that RIAA has asked a court to order it, and b) even if it did happen, something ordered by a court is assumed to be legal unless it's overturned, and even if it is it's ultimately the court's fault, and not the petitioner.
If I ask a court to kill my neighbor, that in itself does not make me a murderer.
Next time your knee jerks, don't let it hit you in the head and cause brain damage.
Never take moderation advice from sigs, including this one.
The RIAA should just drop the Napster lawsuit and get into biotechnology. That way they can replace our ears with digital devices that will automatically bill our credit card whenever we hear one of their copyrighted songs. Then it doesn't matter if you overheard somebody's radio on the street, the poverty stricken RIAA gets their fair share.
Yes, but the Sherman Act prohibits agreements, combinations, and conspiracies in restraint of trade. RIAA is a combination of companies looking to restrain trade. 'Nuff said.
sulli
RTFJ.
If the RIAA wants to block sharing of everything except - what? approved non RIAA music? this sounds to me like illegal restraint of trade. Where's the Antitrust Division when we need it?
sulli
RTFJ.
. . .
As a musician I find this very hard to believe and if such a decision could be made, as to allow a body to govern what is allowed instead of what is not allowed, is a very fundamental distinction that will indicate the direction that online civil liberties are taking.
I, for one, have been pleased with Napster's current filtering system. It has allowed more people to find and download our own music, which is free of copyright, recorded and distributed from our basement, for the love of music.
I understand that napster did take advantage of file sharing using material that was not ours to share ( I will take part of the blame, having been an avid napster user some time ago) yet the way this has been delt with has shown, more clearly than ever, that democracy can be bought and that music is no less of an industry than porn, or investing, with no thought to the beauty of the artform. What we need is very clear assessment of social values, what matters, what doesn't, as well as whose responsibility it is to decided such matters.
In fact, this has always been the issue and I don't think we can solve it now, but it's painful to see how the "little guys" always take one for the team while the big guys continue their rape of anything that can be controlled by the almighty dollar.
yoink
I have to agree -- this request seems like an effort by the RIAA to generate some attention in the run-up to the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing next week. It seems pretty clearly to be in violation of what the 9th Circuit ordered Judge Patel to do. She'll toss it on its butt. However: The RIAA's _other_ request -- for "technological blocking measures" -- that may get somewhere....
-- Rick G. Karr Cultural Correspondent, National Public Radio +1 212/878-1445
Enough said
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
imesh works for me.....haven't used Napster in 1/2 a year...
Jaysyn
There is a war going on for your mind.
Great now my computer can become a distribution point for the latest "singles". And I have to pay for it soon? Ummmmm. no thanks.
The DMCA has a provision to allow a copyright holder to demand the removal of copyrighted work. The copyright holder has to identify the work, and where it is being made available before it can be removed.
The judge can't go beyond this; it's not the law. The RIAA must continue to identify each indivual song.
This will not go far.
I work at a modest college radio station and we have a fairly large collection of CDs, vinyls and 7 inches. Despite our amassment music we do not have some albums. For the last couple of months, our solution has been to use Napster to download and then play the songs over the air; a supplement for the music we don't have. And it has been working very well.
We delete the MP3's after our shows - we only have a finite amount of space after all. There's no stealing here. If anything, we are helping promote the bands by playing the music we love so much.
I guess it's an interesting case in which we are using Napster, but the end results is good for the bands, RIAA and the people who are listening to our shows.
It'll just be harder to play some music or fill requests for music which I haven't gotten around to buying or which the station doesn't have in it's library. Oh well! We lived before Napster and we will live after. But some things just made life a bit easier.
What the fuck more does the RIAA want ?
Copyrighted music filtering, served medium rare on a damnd platinum platter ?
You give these fucks an inch and they want two whole miles for it..
They should re-check their sales losses stats for 2000.. As Slashdot calculated and posted it was only a 1% sales lost last year..
Its gunna be really funny one day, when some idiot is gunna be trying to shove it up thier asses for a revoloution they're trying to cause.
"He Who Laughs Last, Is Just A Hand In The Bush" - Ozzy Osbourne
This seems a bit odd to me...
With the new filter, won't it limit legal music?
It seems that they want only approved songs on Napster now...
If they weasel their way through this one, it will block out a major port for artists who legally put their music on the net.
And even if the boycott did work they would just blame the reduced sales on napster, they win either way.
Slashdot: Proof that a million monkeys at a million typewriters can create a masterpiece
This all fits into the RIAA's master plan, though I didn't think they'd make it so obvious this early. The real threat to the RIAA from Napster is not losing money from pirating, it's losing money from the artist when the artist realizes they DON'T need the RIAA to distribute their music anymore. What the RIAA is attempting to do is prevent ANY artist from throwing off the shackles and distributing music themselves. With the RIAA-approved list, this won't happen. Or it won't happen as easily. This is scary. The RIAA would now seem to have the power to restrict peoples free speech.
If bands release their music for free on Napster, and radio stations play that music for free on the air, the artists will still get exposure, and they'll still go on tour, and they'll still make money from concerts, and they'll still have fans. What they won't have is the RIAA Albatross around their necks. That's what the RIAA is afraid of. That's why they're doing this.
"And what about all the people that don't want their songs on napster and want to sell it/distribute it another way?"
well, if those bands don't want their music copied, then they should write in to napster and say so. It's that simple! If I don't want my music shared, I'll write to napster and give them a list of songs to block. Is that so hard? And yes, freedom is the default.
The problem here is that napster is an outstanding distribution medium. The RIAA realizes this and doesn't want any other (non riaa) artists to use this medium to distribute their own works. The RIAA wants to control the very method of music distribution. They don't want people listening to music that they did not distribute.
With this new opt method, only approved titles will be allowed to be given away. This is different than the riaa having to give a list of music it wants denied on default allow system. The RIAA wants a default deny system and now wants to give the tiny allow list to napster. If the RIAA is deciding what goes onto napster, then what about independent artists. Will they be blocked from distribution because the RIAA controls the allow list? Sorry, but that is restraint of trade and that is illegal.
Furthermore, there are titles that I've found on Napster which are impossible to find in any music store. Hence, the CD's are out of print and they can't be losing money on sales due to downloading. In other words, those CD's are not sold anymore so what the hell am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to not download it and let the songs be locked in plastic encased aluminum substrate in some guys garage because that's just the way it's supposed to be?
This is the sad part of it all, the RIAA can take the CD out of production, leave us high and dry, and because the copyright lasts 90 years we are never supposed to listen to it again even if the CD went out of print back in 1988. I'm sorry, but that is bullshit and it is the prostitution of art as we know it. As far as I'm concerned, there is a lack of good music these days and I rarely buy CD's anymore. I download songs that I would have bought in CD form, but the CD is impossible to find and possibly out of print.
Now, I have no problem with artists getting paid. I have no problem with the RIAA getting paid. I buy CD's, everyone I know buys CD's. I do have a problem with 10+ year old music that is out of print not being put on napster anymore. Obviously, it is not a money maker so what's it to them. I have a problem with the RIAA wanting to crush every known method of music distribution so they can maintain a monopoly. Another problem I have with the RIAA is that they are completely unfair and unyielding. If they had an ounce of fairness in them, I would not be typing this right now.
We all know that the RIAA(and alike) will not be happy until Napster is rendered useless.
They have gotten in a fight that they can see that they can win so why stop until the enemy lies bleeding and dying on the ground.
--------
Ok, so say I write and record a song called "My_Own_Song", and register that with me as the copyright-holder, quite legally, and start distributing it as "My_Own_Song.mp3", and then _you_ start distibuting "For whom the bell tolls" under the filename "My_Own_Song.mp3"! - Then what? When the big guys find out about this they'll sue _my_ pants off, right?
and all other authority figures.
Did you ever notice, how in the end, the kids defer to the authoritu figures, ie. the local Sheriff?
If Scooby Doo was being written today, Metallica would guest star. I can even see it.
Opening scene, the Mystery Van drives by a broken down Ford Econoliner, with a bunch of longhair's peering at the engine. They stop.
Shaggy: Zoiks! It's Metallica!
Thelma: Metallica? You're famous rock stars, why are you stranded on the side of the road?
Lars: Yes, we're famous, but we're broke. Somehow, we're not getting royalties any more.
Fred: This sounds like a mystery!
This is freakin insane.
.MP3 limit on its file sharing, and just allows GLOBAL file sharing of any files. Then it would be just as accessable as ANY public FTP.
For the RIAA to tell Napster which files its "Allowed To Send" is like mIRC also being hardcoded to only allow 'Blessed' files to be sent. Same thing for Outlook, Hotmail, AIM, ICQ, FTP Clients, ect., ect. The list goes on.
This can all be avoided if Napster just REMOVES the
It would be insane for the RIAA to tell a college student, "Sorry, you cannot get your term paper from your home computer because its not an 'Allowed' File.
1984 here we come...
Equal treatment across all the boards!
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
My new band Etallica just released an album "Nd Ustice Or LL" which we will promptly be submitting for approval.
Burn Hollywood Burn
RIAA Wants Opt-In Filtering For Napster (Score:5, Funny as hell, but completely clueless!)
If an unsigned band can become a success just by putting their music online, then how does the recording industry continue to exist?
---
where there's fish, there's cats
well, if the RIAA wants to implement this, then NAPSTER might as well host on their servers all the MP3's it's allowed to 'distribute'. in fact, if NAPSTER currently operated this way, then i can understand the RIAA's point about all this.
gol
Wouldn't it be great if a good percentage of RIAA artists opted in?
Won't happen ("if you EVER want to record in this town againn..." syndrome), but hey... one can hope right?
end communication
i wonder exactly how this scheme will be implemented. will the list simply look at filenames? If I were to rename "KingNothing.mp3" as "HapyBirthday.mp3" would it find its way onto the network? Oh, right, Happy B-Day is still copyrighted. Then, say I named it "StarSpangledBanner.mp3." Would it then be allowed? Maybe they examine the actual sound data. This is doomed to failure. Knowing the RIAA this is a sinister ploy to destroy our music-napping toy.
# cat /etc/free-riaa-approved-songs.txt
#
-Andy Schmitt
There's no sig like this sig anywhere near this sig, so this must be the sig.
You know.. I've been thinking. Every other day we have some stupid Patent, or lawsuit or whatever going on that has the slashdot community up in arms. And everyday we all post our feelings on the issues hear on slashdot for all the other angry slashdotters to read. I propose a new solution. Don't post to slashdot and repeat how we all already feel. Instead send a letter to congressmen (You'll have to handwrite it since they don't use email anymore, way to listen to you constiuents.) and let them know how we feel.
Of course if they get to much snail mail they might stop reading that too.
But we're still supposed to have a say here in america. And maybe if we start making ourselves heard we can have a voice without having to have a revolution.
I'm 22 right now. I shudder to think what the world will be like when I'm 80 if this insanity of restrictions and capitilism continues. Someday I may not be able to walk down the street cause the patent office awarded some idiot the rights to the iudea of push a rubber sole against a block of concrete.
-------------
What luck for the leaders that men do not think - Hitler
click here
(Rudy Park is a mildly amusing cartoon in Infoworld magazine)
Nope.
NOT Everybody here on this site is part of the "big is bad" movement where it comes to Microsoft (or anything else).
Try harder next time.
Abuse of power is what most people seem to be against, and coincidentally the "Big Bad" players like Microsoft, RIAA, and MPAA are overextending their reach... [insert obnoxious fair use/security/DMCA/DeCSS code/whatever rant here].
Failure is not an option.
Actually, I need big-money-corporate players.
I whore myself out. I put in an 8 hour day, and get a 40hr paycheck at the end of the week. I give 28% to my Pimp, the ostentatious US Government, and I keep the rest.
I'd write a lovely haiku about it, but I'm busy giving my john a work down.
Failure is not an option.
So let me get this straight. The RIAA wants to put huge barriers in the way of the legal use of napster, effectively eliminating it. Then the only use of napster will either be illegal - and they'll then get it shut down, or non-existant - and they won't have to worry. Why am I not surprised?
That the RIAA is a hypocritical money-grubbing corporate intrest group is pretty much beyond doubt, but I think they are beginning to harm their own credibility in the courts and elsewhere.
Opt in would be disasterous-- it would add a much greater load to the administration of services like Napster, and could therefore financially cripple it.
If I had anything to say to them right now, it would be, don't do it. This type of position will only hurt them when the publishing houses sue their members!
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
I agree that this type of system could be abused by the RIAA to prevent independent artists from putting their music on napster. In fact, let me be the first to say, "those bitch-ass motherfuckers." But really, when you get down to it, only about 0.1% of all music is really any good anyways. Through a formal submission process whereby RIAA officials would be forced to listen to all submissions, they would have no choice but to hear the good independent music, and likely discover it that way. Used correctly, this could transform napster from a worthless file-sharing e-commerce ripoff to the principle vehicle whereby independent artists are signed, promoted, and distributed. In addition, if the selection committee prevents bad music from appearing on napster, it will greatly increase the rate at which napster users find good, independent music.
---
Know someone who is stealing cable? Report them!
>>Napster and RIAA both operate on one principal, and that is GREED.
Pardon me, but I don't see how that can be said about Napster. I dowloaded it for free and have used it several times (both directions) and have never paid, nor have I even been asked to pay, one red cent. The proposed access fee was implemented only in response to the RIAA threats.
Naptser's business is illegal. They are guilty of the same crime here as the RIAA. Neither of which cares about the artists involved. Both are overly concerned with their pocketbooks.
they don't give a rats ass about the "Artist", and they certainly don't give a rats ass about you either, unless of course you support their view.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
The problem here is that there is no law allowing for you or another company to aid another in breaking the law.
It is not legal to assist others in violating the law.
If there were indexing new music that was specifically offered up for review and download then they would have the law on their side. However they are making indexes of copyrighted music and then on top of that providing the software which facilitates the transfer of that music.
Actually, I think they could have escaped most harm if their software did not actually do the upload/download.... (instead it would require the host to be running a third-party ftp server)
That would have really put the RIAA up the river without a paddle.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Napster could have really put the RIAA into a fix if they had taken care not to do one thing.
Their error was that they provided both the indexing software and the software to push/pull the actual music.
Now, if there were solely an indexing system, telling you were to get the music, I think it would be very hard for a court to nail them. However, Napster went one step too far..
They continue to go to far even now, claiming rights while at the same time abusing ours.
I love the idea of being able to get music off the internet, I just don't have a problem with paying a reasonable fee. However, if I pay a fee I expect a good product. This means professionally ripped and packaged music.. no downloading someone's crap 48bit mono rip.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Damn it. I actually believe one thing about what the RIAA is alluding too, and that is that Napster is doing their damndest to not do what they know their supposed to do.
They simply are going to act like spoiled little children and keep yelling "NO" and name calling the RIAA. They aren't fighting for me or anyone elses rights. They are fighting to keep their stock value and their salaries. They are damn willing to use the users of their service as cannon fodder in their attempt to stay in an illegal business.
So what happens, the RIAA keeps dragging them into court, and popping out new ideas to screw over the rest of us. Unfortunately everyone damn twit jumps on them instead of facing the fact that is is BOTH the RIAA and Napster that are quickly eroding our rights.
Napster and RIAA both operate on one principal, and that is GREED. The only difference between the two is which came first.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
My question is who gets to choose whether music will be available or not:
A) The Record Company
B) The Artist
An Artist like the Dave Matthews Band, Madonna, Courtney Love, Fred Durst, and many more have voiced their approval of Napster, but they are all under contract with RIAA member companies.
Will their music be available?
>>Even if they shut Napster down, their campaign to curb the flow of information in an internet age will only be futile. Mark my words. Wow, your really sticking your neck out on this one...
Where does the RIAA get off thinking they should be the sole aribter of what it's OK to distribute?
This just gives me that much more motivation to continue my payware music boycott - only pirated music for me until the big record companies back off on content control and actually start paying the artists instead of screwing them.
OK,
- B
--
http://www.bradheintz.com/
- updated
How dumb of the RIAA not to have asked for that in the first place?
Even with the current filters applied, there is too many holes, and lots of leakage. They should have configured it like a firewall in the first place. Block all, then allow only these tunes.
The fewer songs you have in napster that meet the filter the better your collection. I personally have none which will ever be filtered.(Cause I wrote the shit myself)
Anyone pissed off with filters or no filters should shutup and a song about it instead...
That was afterall what napster originally claimed was the business model (even if that it is a lie)
Commcerial Music is heavily over-rated and should be allowed to die. Lets start a trend of encouraging people to support ONLY non-RIAA music.
Fuck 'em, man!
The RIAA spends all their time bitching and moaning about napster, and yet can't seem to do anything effective about it.
Get all those record companies together AND BUY NAPSTER. I wouldn't support this, but from the RIAA point-0f-view, it would make sense.
-MR
-Michael Roy Some people are like Slinkies. Not really useful, but you can't help smiling when you see one tumble down
RIAA can read the list and dispute my ownership of those titles where they have have a valid copyright. I'm sure Napster will cheerfully remove any disputed titles where RIAA can prove ownership. Of course any new song titles are a violation of my copyright, since I thought of it first, and the proof is that it's on my list!
If the RIAA gets to decide what songs get to be distributed, they come one step closer to rebuilding thier fallen monopoly on mass distrbution of music and media.
artists with out RIAA recognition (which grow by the truckloads thanks to home recording software and such) will get pushed off to the side as so much rubish, so they wont be competition for the RIAA pop music slush.
Thank the fates that I know that the RIAA will never completly succeed in recreating their previous monoploy just do to the simple saying:
The bigger the wall, the more cracks in it.
the harder they try and squash the people trading the music, the more people they will have to squash (nothing draws a crowd like a crowd), and the more creative those people will get.
people should pay for the music they listen too, but people should also be able to do what they want with what they pay for.
"Consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds" - RWE
You know what, this fucking sucks. I have no idea why people did not predict this in advance.
Napster was a wonderful, democratic thing. you could put anything on it you wanted, which meant people were listening to home grown good music and brilliant DJs who produced on their computers instead of Britney Spears. The Britney was a second-order effect of the Napster phenomenon, whose purpose was the creation of a huge music bazaar.
Music swapping (not napster in specific) revolutionized my own taste in music. I was finding archival jazz, the latest electronica from around the world, Japanese girls singing bossa nova tunes over perfect retro backgrounds..instead of all the crap on the stupid radio and at Tower Records.
If the recording company thinks that they can turn Napster into its second order effect- basically, a huge Tower Records store set up in your computer- its head is up its asshole, which we all know is even bigger than the goatse.cx man's!
Goat sex free since 2001
The court has an obligation to ALLOW non-infringing uses of Napster that will prevent this from happening. You have to identify infringing uses, and block them. Not block everything, and then decide what is non-infringing and allow it.
Remember the last court order Napster was ordered to take their service down completely. It was then that napster said oh wait we'll put up filters if we can stay open. The courts have already decided that the non-infinging uses of Napster are expendable.
Don't sign your rights over to a Big Recording Company for little or nothing? Performing for the love of the art, rather than filling the Big Recording Company's Bank Accounts? How bout we break your fingers then?
It's a lost cause! Eventually everything will be shared over a true p2p network, one that really works at least. The RIAA should use centralized file sharing providers as a tool for information collection. They should try to get file sharing systems to provide them with info about what people are downloading (what's hot). That would really help the record companies in determining what they should be marketing. Maybe then, we won't have so much crap being played on commercial radio and music video channels. If I were a record company I would definatly be more willing to dish out the cash to produce a video for an artist that is frequently shared via a centralized file sharing system. I refuse to use the term "napster" here because although it is a cool concept, napster, as a piece of software really sux!
I am living up in canada. Now a friend here is part of a small band, he is maing a little money playing in bar,s and stough. He has been using napster to distribute his music. Free for the taking. Now the RIAA again comes in and if they get there wish, my friend might not be able to distribute his songs online through napster. This to me is will to say the least ilegial, controling the method of distribution of music. even tho my friend is not i the states, the RIAA wil beable to control one of the methods he uses to distribute music. How do we say "monolopy" my 2 cents, plus 2 more
So in order to put an mp3 of *anything* on Napster, you'd have to register it with RIAA first?! So much for a free-wheeling net. That'll be the death of Napster certainly! Napster-served, RIAA-approved!
-- "Sucks to your ass-mar"
check them out at http://flipr.com Yes, I work for them, sue me.
It's at olga.net currently, and now even the new stuff is searchable.
The opt in filter is not going to fly. The DMCA makes it quite clear that the copyright owner has to raise the objection.
Back when the discussion was all about the Betamax case folk were pretending that the DMCA did not exist and the supreme court's 30 year old ruling was the only relevant law. So it is ironic that we are now looking for the DMCA safe harbor.
I don't think we can take the claims of either side seriusly. Napster is clearly flat out lying when they say they can't make the filter work better. The RIAA are clearly not doing all they can to help Napster make the filter work.
I don't think the RIAA lawyers are particularly competent tactically. They are trying to kill Napster with a preliminary injunction, this is not going to fly because the Appeals court want to make sure that the case is open long enough for them to make their own pronouncements on what is likely to be a landmark copyright decision. Instead of asking for the 'shutdown' notice in the first place they should have asked for the filtering.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
For the record labels to survive music must continue to be distributed in physical media. Otherwise there will be a conflict as the record labels and broadcast media compete against each other since the broadcast media believe that the non-physical distribution chain belongs to them.
What is happening is that the balance of power is tipping sigificantly back in favor of the artists and their managers.
Napster is like one of the pieces of France that battles were fought over in the first world war. Ultimately it does not really matter which side captures the village in question, it is the cost that the battle exacts on the participants.
I believe that the RIAA is fighting a futile battle, not because they will lose the battle but because they have already lost the war.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
gnutella!!
My server
and if the RIAA gets to control the opt-in list (they'd have to - otherwise, anyone could add their songs to the list) why wouldn't the RIAA say, "I'm sorry, you can't be on the list since you dont pay us anything"? Why not just give napster to the #^%&$ RIAA and move on to gnutella / freenet / openNap?
My server
it is so much easier to just say "you are not allowed to do anything" than to say "you can do everything except ....".
providing a constantly updated list of stuff for the "except" list is a lot of work. The RIAA doesn't want to do any work. they just want to have the courts say Napster is bad and then have a way where they don't have to do anything at all.
The RIAA hates napster. They hate spending any any time, effort, resources in dealing with the "problem". If they can just make it go away and never have to do anything more about, the happier they are. I can only imagine, if the current situation got changed to an "opt-in" list, how easy it would be to get a title put onto this list... oh yeah, let's not forget, those "fair use" and "legitimate users" arguments are pretty damning just by themselves.
Well, considering that the record companies (rather than the artists) are frequently the copyright holders of their artists' music, it stands to reason that copyright holders will have the final sayso in matters of Napster distribution.
Looks like you can still distribute your 3-hour gargling, man.
Dancin Santa
Sure, that's what Napster claimed in court. However, they are still serving as a means of distributing copyrighted music (only with mangled names). The RIAA is saying that if you want to distribute those songs, you'd better get the artists' permission first. Hence the opt-in scheme.
As for getting on the list, I didn't see anywhere in the article that the RIAA controls this list except by means of having it publicly available and challenging it when they notice an infringement on their copyrights. You will have that power too if you notice one of your songs being copied against your copyright. Not that your caterwauling is going to be in demand...
Dancin Santa
I know when you're sleeping, I know when you're awake...
If you are correct, then I admit less than full knowledge of the song coverage issue.
If you are not correct, I'll continue to pontificate as if I were correct.
Dancin Santa
I thought that POKE was an AppleBasic command. I remember using 'POKE' somenumber to clear the screen on my Apple IIc (which I still have. Gotta get it out sometime and play with it. Have no software for it though. The IIc doesn't come with an OS or anything, just Basic in ROM).
C Pungent
No, it's "All your musics are belong to us"
I'm glad I chose not to go to the Colorado School of Paperwork.
I am for the complete Trantorization of Earth.
It sounds to me like the RIAA wants to be the Napster Executive board so they can make all the decisions. They want a scenario where they, the RIAA, gets to decide what the company does and how they do it. When they have found a way to surpress the whole idea structure that Napster and other(better) p2p packages are built on(swapping files) they then pass it along to the hirelings, aka Napster and its employees, to implement. Does this sound to you like what the RIAA is trying to accomplish through all these court procedings?
-Life is a Journey, --Not a Guided Tour! ---Trust me, I've already looked for the guide book.
i think that's why they're asking the courts to do it; they wouldn't be able to legally do it any other way.
[insert humourous sig here]
And besides, how would they be able to verify that the opt-in was valid? Would only the RIAA be able to say what can be served? The way the RIAA is pushing this and trying to control Napster from every angle, they might as well buy the bloody company.
-- Nerds on toast in the new millenium
The RIAA should just cut to the chase and start recording every sound emitted in the US and Europe and copyrighting it all.. That must be stage II of the master plan for world domination.
Brant
Brant
Argle. Bargle.
it would just have to check submitted songs to make sure they're not on the disapproved list.
So if you said "I'd like to submit the song 'Happy Fun Band - Dumb Song.mp3' to be put on the approval list" Napster would approve it. And if you said "I'd like to submit the song 'aMetallica - aDisappear.mp3'" Napster would tell you to piss off.
It would certainly be easier for them to filter individual requests than to try to run searches on every song every time a user logs in. And once they get the subscription service going, it's easy for them to add all the BMG tunes.
--
Assume that there are valid arguments against your position.
Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.
- Nietzsche
Also, what about Freedom of Speech???
What they propose is that we ask for permission to publish something. They decide whether or not it will be published.
I say to hell with them.
Even if they shut Napster down, their campaign to curb the flow of information in an internet age will only be futile. Mark my words.
... but colud they think : All the Music Belong to Us? (Us = RIAA) =o?
Getting rid of Napster does mean getting rid of people copying music. People have been doing that as long as it was technically possible. Because of the enormous amount of people interested in copying music, all copy/crack protections will be overcome within days.
Instead, by making Napster a 'bad' way to distribute music, all that happens is that people go elsewhere for their stuff. Usually these alternatives (gnutella, sharesniffer) are much easier for script kiddies to attack (especially those that use M$ shared folder tech).
So, all that happens by banning or harrassing napster is that general computer security goes down.
If an experiment works, something has gone wrong.
I though the whole deal of Napster was to copy 'copyright-free' material. At least I can remember that that is what they claimed in court. How is the RIAA ever going to make a list of non-copyrighted material if that exactly covers the material that is not in any list? Am I supposed to register my home-made music with the RIAA or something? Clearly they did not think this through...
If an experiment works, something has gone wrong.
So they're saying that I can't distribute my OWN songs that I have written and recorded myself without their PERMISSION?! I AM the copyright holder, and that's the only permission you should need! The last thing I want is the bloody RIAA getting involved with my music.
I'm still waiting on that tax on oxygen...
Obviously the RIAA knows that Napster doesn't hurt them... and they just like Napster see the financial prospects of the service. I think that all the law suits and everything were just the RIAA's attempts at getting themselves a nice piece of Napster for themselves. Now, they're trying to get total control over what songs can be distributed. Sounds plausible. Personally, I think it's becoming a bit too similar to mp3.com.
Cute. But "trade" doesn't refer to illegal trading of things like stolen property, cocain, child porno, etc.
All of that has changed now. We are currently facing a new era, one that we have faced before. Each time something new, innovative, and consumer-likable has occurred, corporations have fought it. So what do we do now? If you are truly so riled up about this, get out there and fight. Write your legislators, sign petitions, boycott, do whatever you can to let the RIAA and the government know that we are not going to allow our digital rights to be stolen away from us. People have become so lazy that they no longer fight for what is right. The American Revolution was not fought by a bunch of guys sitting on their posteriors! It was fought by patriots, war heroes, soldiers, the common man willing to stand up and unite with his neighbors for what he knew to be right.
We will not fall silent, we will not fall by the wayside, we will not be distracted, we will fight for our rights, digital, physical, political, mental, spiritual.
~ Sera
"People who play with hazardous materials often die." Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
Let me get this straight. I record a song with my imaginary band, and cut an independent CD. Now this CD, like so many other independent releases, flops. So I say to hell with it and put it up on Napster. Is the RIAA saying that I need their approval that my song isn't one of theirs before it can be shared? Between this and the "copy-proof" cd's, they have just gone too damn far. I'm boycotting them from this point forward. Nothing but Dead, Phish, Black Crowes, Allmans and other live bootlegs. Who needs the corporate money-whores anyway.
Where's my lobbyist? Right here.
The record industry would then be able to not only determine whether there were any illegal copies of their works on individual computers, but be able to place songs users should be listening to onto their machines.
The Orifister(TM): "Playing the Songs You Should Hear, When We Want You To Listen.®"
[Insert the usual disclaimer here]
Actually, no. In fact, ASCAP (a payment clearinghouse for the record industry) was once sued under the antitrust laws.
But where is the music actually entering Napster? They don't actually host the files, so the only way this would work is if the files trying to be shared were prevented from entering it's 'locator database' or however it says where the songs are. Oh well, I sent the RIAA a few reasons why some of their plans won't really work..
So, what about music that I make on my computer or record on my tape recorder & put on napster(remember the apple iTunes ads).... do "mere mortals" get to decide upon their own home brand of music as being acceptable or does the RIAA want to control what music we create on our home computers????
===> An eye for an eye makes everyone blind - MG
I think this is not one of the RIAA's major problems- now that napster has been filtered many more people are looking towards gnutella technology and programs like Lime Wire, Bear Share, Gnut, and many others to trade their songs. While it maybe easy to stop napster and other similiar companies, it is virtually impossible to stop people from using these peer to peer file trading programs... Good luck RIAA!
By listening to any submissions to the approved list, they could screen out any duplicate posts of NSYNC, but would the music-illiterate staffers hired to listen to mp3s all day know Shellac, or June of 44 if they heard it? Probably not. This means that smaller artists are going to be pirated much more frequently. Good for morally bankrupt indie rock fans, bad for indie rock.
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
I can think of two things to save Napster... OpenNap and Napigator
you know 'innocent until proven guilty'? this proposal has got things bass-ackwards. This assumes that the files are illegal before they are out there for the public. any court that claims to uphold the constitution would not go in for this idea. that's that. maybe I'm naive, but i'm not too worried about this happening. it sets a dangerous precedent.
Have you noticed how once the RIAA has gotten it's way it continues to try to get concessions from anyone it can. Today I found out that a 1976 law grants the RIAA a roality of 2% for every peice of recordable media sold and devices to record on. It says the manafacturer pays the bill but it's always passed on to the consumers. It now seems that the RIAA is doing more damage to the music users than microsoft has done to computer users. I had the vage recollection of anti-trust laws. Correct me if I'm wrong but dosent the RIAA MPAA and other groups act like a trust. Okay I'm done raving.
if you think about it, it's almost like they ask us to burn copies. first they give us software that lets us rip data then they give us hardware and software to copy it. it's like video tapes, we can copy it if we have 2 vcrs, and the tape. anyone can do what they want, say what they want but there will always be a workaround.