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Aimster Seeks Protection From RIAA Demands
LogicalRealism writes: "In a preemptive move to keep itself from sharing Napster's fate, Aimster has filed for a declaratory judgement to say that its service does not violate U.S. copyright law. The Recording Industry Association of America sent a letter to Aimster, requesting them to begin filtering the files shared on the service. Aimster contends that to filter files shared privately between its users would be inappropriate. C|Net has the story."
I find it extremely ironic that your login name is FreeUser.
Our entire economic system is based on a very simple premise: everyone has unlimited wants, but resources are not unlimited. Long ago, you would trade something you created or grew or whatever with someone else for something they created (or grew or whatever). Eventually currency was invented to replace this system for various reasons that you can read in any good history or basic economics textbook.
I think that the currency system obscures the idea that you aren't really buying things with money. You are buying things with the goods or services you provide to others and the money you received for those are only a unit conversion to make the transaction easier to calculate.
It would be nice if everyone could have everything they wanted without having to obtain the money used to purchase them. Unfortunately, the 'replicator' technology you talk about is quite a ways off, so this isn't going to happen anytime soon for physical goods.
But for non-physical data-based goods, the technology does exist. You can photocopy a book. You can copy a game. You can rip a cd. Does the ability to replicate non-physical goods make it right? Hardly. Since these goods are part of the collective goods and services in our economic system that is also comprised of non-replicatable physical goods, they must be treated the same.
If you steal a car from a dealer, you are not depriving the dealer of the original product. The dealer will still be able to drive to work, because it wasn't his car. You are depriving the dealer of the money he would have made had he been able to sell the car.
It is irrelevant whether or not you would have bought that car anyway. It is also irrelevant that in the case of copying music, the original good is still preserved. Depriving you of being able to have the good because you don't have the resources to buy it is a fundamental principle in the infinite want-limited resource concept.
If I was able to freely obtain everything I wanted but didn't have resources for, I wouldn't have much motivation to obtain the resources to purchase those things, would I?
I tire of the semantic games people play to justify the fact that they are breaking the law and obtaining goods without paying for them. The model is broke? You don't fix the model by circumventing the system. You encourage the model creators to change the model through other means.
In summary, I pay for the goods I consume. It isn't fair to me and the others who do the same for you to get 'Free Use' of the goods for which the rest of us do not.
This would be like the telephone company getting on the phone and listening to your phone calls so that when you read a copyrighted bedtime story to your daughter they can disconnect you for copyright violation. That's exactly what the RIAA wants to do. Cut off fair use communication between individuals unless we (or our communications provider) has paid their fee. Who needs the government when the media companies can tax us?
FreeUser, you have my permission to replicate my car anytime you want.
You must, however, agree to "look cool" driving it. No picking your nose or talking on your cellphone. 'k?
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Extra: RIAA calls for ISP-wide, packet-level filtering of copyrighted content.
Extra: RIAA calls for limited ban on transfer of encrypted data, citing "serious difficulties identifying pirates". RIAA lawyer Goethe Bigballs says the DMCA should be ammended to prohibit the use of encryption technology by individuals while affording conglomerates maximum protection under the law.
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
This is pretty funny.
Now...who wants to create a css plugin for my email client so I can use it to legitimately protect my copyrighted correspondence (say, samples of my bad poetry) to select friends? That way, I can legally have decss to UNencrypt my own messages. Or is there some rule that ONLY the MPAA can use CSS? W
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This is my SIG. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
I find it both amusing and profoundly irritating that Copyright Cartel Apologists continue to engage in their use of "newspeak" to promote their corporate agendas.
Copyright violation is not stealing. It is not theft. It is not piracy. It is copyright violation. Even a quick reading of the law, and of court decisions, makes this abundantly obvious to the most casual of observers. There is a reason for this, and I'll say it again (since there seem to be so many thick headed people who can't keep their terminology even remotely straight): copyright violation is not even remotely similiar to theft. Theft and stealing deny the victim the original product (it is "taken away" from the victim). If I steal a car, the owner will find themself walking (or hopping a cab) home after their visit to the local precinct to report the crime. If I replicate the car and drive off in the copy, the owner is denied nothing. Nor is the manufacturer. Yes, the manufacturer will scream that my unauthorized replication of the car has denied them much needed profits, profits based on a business model that predated widespread replicator use, but that is hardly theft. It is nothing more than sour grapes because their business model has become obsolete and they are either going to have to change those business models or look for another line of work.
Of course they will use their existing capital to buy legislation from congress to protect their business model, just as the existing Copyright Cartels have done now that widespread information replicators (read: computers) are in use. And of course our congress, which routinely sells itself to anyone with cash like cheap whores, will readily oblige.
That changes nothing. Copyright violation is indeed a crime (and a rather synthetic one at that), with its own definitions, and its own set of punishments (which don't really resemble the definitions or punishments of theft at all, much less piracy on the high seas). I'm sure that once nano technology allows widespread replication of material goods, providing the promise of prosperity for every human being on the planet, these same "intellectual" property laws will be used to keep the masses impoverished and beholden to an oligarchy of outdated corporations, exactly as they are doing to our artistic culture today.
Even then, by no rational defintion, will unauthorized replication be even remotely akin to theft, just as copyright violation has nothing whatsoever to do with stealing or piracy, except in the minds of those whose limited imaginations and limitless greed compell them to do all they can to keep the (western) world in a state of cultural impoverishment.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Refusing taxation without representation is wrong because it denies the king the money he would've gotten had you given it to him.
That statement is just as stupidly circular as the one you just made about the car dealer.
If you had made some mention of the car designer, and how the car designer had now spent all that time designing and building this new car and didn't get a dime because everybody just replicated it, you'd have something.
But, that argument doesn't really help RIAA all that much because they're the car dealer, not the car designer.
The solution to this mess is for the car designer to refuse to design a car unless she gets money for it. If car designers all over consistently did this, some system would arise by which they would be compensated for designing cars, at least, if people wanted new car designs.
Copyright and patent law are currently the tools we use to accomplish this. They are based on tying the design cost into the cost of replication. They are predicated on the idea that replication facilities are expensive. They are becoming obsolete for larger and larger swaths of goods that are currently sold.
Attempting to keep them around seems to me to be like making sure that horse-drawn buggies still have the undisputed right-of-way on all roads and to insist that cars not go above 15 MPH. Technology has changed. The law is obsolete. It's time to move on and find something better.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Napster's main downfall was making itself incorporated, and therefore starting an actual company. If it was just non-profit software, the RIAA wouldn't have had much of a case. But creating an actual company that revolved around "file sharing" was a big mistake. Hopefully Aimster will learn from this.
No, there is no price-point at which "piracy" will stop. If the RIAA came to my house with 100,000 CDs and gave them to me for free, I'd say thank you and then go back to using Gnutella. Why?
Because, I don't *want* to pirate music. I want to listen to things I've never heard before. I want to experience the convinience of thinking of a song, typing in a keyword or two, waiting a few moments and then playing it.
The RIAA and it's members DO NOT SELL THIS. They sell CDs. CDs are cool, and from time to time I buy them (usually based on what I hear through downloaded music).
Here's the key: there's a service that I want, and no one provides it. There is no price point at which CDs become that service.
The RIAA members do not want to provide this service because a) it's difficult to guarantee returns and b) it removes the push-model from the equation. What does this mean? Right now, when Sony wants to sell a new artist, they go through a very well defined process to make it popular. If people were just downloading whatever they wanted based on either random or non-RIAA-member-supplied criteria, they would not be able to control "the next big thing".
This would be tragic for Sony, etc. They would have to provide HIGH QUALITY MUSIC and support their artists much more. If you've ever worked in an industry where channels are more important than content (e.g. the Internet), you will understand why the RIAA is so scared that they would make enemies like their customers, Princeton, the EFF and Stanford....
Certainly not according to the Northern District Court of California and the 9th Circuit, who rejected this argument in Napster. In particular, the Courts read the rest of the statute, which they held excludes the use of a computer as a "recording device."
The AHRA argument was always Napster's weakest argument, even when used to justify personal use of the recordings and time sharing. There is further substantial authority that while AHRA provides for personal household use, it does not permit limitless sharing (distribution) of personal recordings with third parties.
This is the tactical downside of sending demand letters. Depending how the letter is worded (and RIAA has been going more for subjective effect on the subject than legal benefit, based on the letters posted to the net), the letter doesn't create any meaningful downside for the prospective defendant, while giving the defendant options he didn't have before.
Aimster is, in effect, suing on the letter, saying it has created doubt as to the rights of the parties. Had RIAA sued, rather than sending a demand letter, it could have chosen its forum and venue, perhaps bringing the suit in the 9th Circuit -- and thereby getting all the benefit of the 9th Circuit Napster Opinion.
Because Aimster gets to pick the venue, this action is brought in New York, in the Second Circuit, and thus giving the P2P folks a second "byte" at the apple, getting to argue the Napster case pretty much afresh, perhaps obtaining a different result from the Second Circuit.
And the conflict between the Circuits would be a basis for review by the Supreme Court, so that the Court can ultimately determine whether it meant what it said in the Sony Betamax case.
But... but... that's not what it said in yesterday's Hilary Rosen interview:
Surely you don't think Hilary would lie to us..../.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
Creating a CD is almost 400% lower than making a cassette yet CD's are more expensive for some unknown reason.
Piracy is and will always be around, and personally I think it adds fuel to RIAA's arguments. Burning an MP3 is not similar to piracy since you obviously have to purchase the CD in the first place. Trading an MP3 is no different than recording something off a cassette and giving it to your friend, and all studies done have shown the majority of MP3 downloaders end up purchasing the music if they like it.
RIAA Sucks started to look hopeful in their presentations of how irrate RIAA really is althouh it isn't updated much. So you may want to check there.
Understandably also one should realize that the RIAA is a business as is any other, and anyone with the right frame of mind would do all they can to protect their finances. Sure they run around bullying people, but many people have become hip to their game, and its only a matter of time before many artists look at the facts behind MP3 swapping. It does not hurt their revenue, in fact it helps it. But when you have the marketing and money to stand behind, you can get away with murder. And thats what the RIAA is doing with their lawsuits.
Its a dirty game but someone always has to play it. RIAA is nothing without the artists, and its some of those same artists who set RIAA off in the first place. Until those same artists see the realities behind people swapping music, who account for a large amount of their salaries, the RIAA will always look morally right on paper to those who don't see the underlying factors.
blackbox themes
Want Root?
Wouldn't the dominance and near-panic of the RIAA & members be a good indication that the industry is controlled by a 1900's distribution model that is about to fail?
Living (and becoming actively involved) in the agricultural midwest US, I've been able to experience a similar distribution model that places too much emphasis on the middle, and devalues the endpoints.
Corn, bean, cattle, hogs and other growers are being pounded by lower and lower prices for their product in spite of significantly increasing costs (fuel, fertilizer, seeds, etc.). Yet you've got middlemen making larger and larger profits.
Obviously, raising or growing a commodity isn't a great strategy when you want to protect the price of your product. There, ag producers and music artists are different.
But the limited distribution options available to artists, including the power of the labels to determine what artist is good and what artist isn't deserving of distribution, mimics a commodity model; e.g. "we'll take x% of all sales off the top, another x% goes for manufacturing, another x% for the retailer, which leaves you with y%. Take it or leave it."
Given limited labels and similar arrangements offered throughout the recording industry, the effect is quite similar (except for the very top artists who can demonstrate existing demand for their own product and renegotiate their contracts).
Just as the telecom world has moved away from centralized switching to edge switching, and our wholesale / carrier sales models are finding new decentralized exchanges, I'd have to believe the same dynamic will affect ag and entertainment markets. Any signs that MP3.com and other infant artist exchanges are having a positive effect?
*scoove*
I find a lot of irony in what's going on right now, because the RIAA doesn't even realize what they're doing to their profit base. Remember four or five years ago when the music industry was in big trouble? The old folks had finally replaced their records with CD's and Alternative was dying a slow painful death, leaving the industry totally hanging with low low low profits. There was a big hubbub about electronic music being the savior of the industry (hence the coining of that sick term "electronica") but it never really happened.
Now profits are way up and the industry is fat and happy. Except for those MP3's! Well... what changed in the time from low profits to high profits? MP3's. Napster let people download all those songs the industry was pushing by the pop groups that are driving profits now. It wasn't MTV driving the industry so much anymore (or at least being the final word in what CDs to buy) but after people heard something on TRL they were able to download it and then go buy the album. This might all sound obvious to us, but it should be obvious to them too! All they have to do is take a look at their balance sheets from the past five years.
So what is it that the RIAA has decided to do with those monster profits? Go after Napster and its clones! Yeah, great businessmen they are! Shortsighted and so greedy they'll drop $5 to snatch one that fell.
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
Since, RIAA seems to be going after the medium of transmission instead of the messenger does this mean they could sure the US Postal Service because I am sure there are millions of people sending CDs which may or may not contain licensed copyright information.
People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them
Yes, it is, under the Audio Home Recording Act. (At least in the US.) Section 1008 explicitly made personal, noncommercial recording legal:
No action may be brought under this title alleging infringement of copyright based on the noncommercial use by a consumer of a digital audio recording device or a digital audio recording medium for making digital musical recordings.
The music industry seems to have *always* been immune to price competition, and now they whine and complain when their distribution model changes. Yet companies across this nation have to change and adjust when other market changes occur. However these music people just whine, complain and get congress to act on their behalf. What's going on here?
Why don't all businesses get *special* protections from the government? Pehaps you only get the special attention when you have lots of money to peddle influence, money from CD overcharges.
Seriously, though, if her dad knew that Aimster's users are (with all respect to Slashdot readers) probably all obsessive losers with poor hygeine, he probably wouldn't have done this. If he did know that and still pimped her out, I think he can be brought up on child abuse charges. Aimster users are even worse than the average geek... after all, they're willing to break the law to get access to AOL services. That's like stealing Richard Simmons videos because you can't get enough sweatin' to the oldies!
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I like to watch.
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I like to watch.
I think Aimster has a much better chance of falling under fair use than napster does. If it's fair use to share a recording with a few of your friends (and not everyone in the world as is the case with napster) then why should it not be fair use if it's done on-line? Basically, it's been accepted that people will share recordings among their friends... and I don't see the RIAA trying to crack down on that... why should it be different just because it's on-line? Small scale sharing among friends has always happened. It happened long before mp3s or even cds... it's probably not worth the RIAA's time or money to try to stop it (because it will just go on off-line instead of on-line). Unless Aimster becomes the next napster somehow (i.e. maybe by everyone on aimster putting everyone else on their buddy list), then it's probably not a problem for the RIAA (I doubt it will effect their bottom line in any significant way).
Ben
This is a great point -- the idea that 'copyright violation' is 'copyright violation'. Nothing more, nothing less. This is usually lost on Slashdot readers.
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The problem with much of the rhetoric -- especially here on Slashdot -- is that people *always* resort to a metaphor to explain their point.
"Look, for the last time, it's like this. It's like if someone broke into your house, took your stuff, and then thumbed their nose at you. Nyaaa, nyaaa."
Or:
"Look, why can't you Slashdot readers understand? I'll attempt to explain it one more time. It's like this. It's like leaving the locks on doors open. And then advertising in a newspaper that your door locks are open."
This is the common way of framing an argument on Slashdot. You -- the authority -- attempt (for the last time) to explain the thing -- the *actual* thing -- to the proletariat in an attempt (one last time!) to force them to 'get a clue.'
But you (the obvious authority even though you are NAL, not a doctor, not a teacher, not a CEO, not a bum, not a rich man, not a poor woman, not part of the company in question, not a microsoft employee, not Richard Stallman, not a programmer, not an accountant, not a student, not a Perl advocate, not a techie, not a liberal arts graduate, not acquainted with the classics, not a fan of Shakespeare, not an admirer of Jon Katz, not an executive, and not a Napster user) never explain the thing itself.
You explain what the thing is *like*. You always explain that the thing-in-itself is *like* something else. Always. It never fails.
"Look. For the last fucking time. I'm going to explain it to the clueless Slashdot readers and maybe Katz will get a clue, too. It's like buying a car and then the car dealer forcing you every year to buy an upgrade."
Now don't get me wrong. Opinions are a good thing. (And yes, they are like assholes. But that's an old joke.) I'm glad everyone has opinions. And I'm glad, too, that here on Slashdot most posters are the first to *defend* an opinion if it gets attacked.
(See, even I'm falling into my own Slashdot fallacy -- establishing my authority in order to give readers (who probably aren't reading this entire post anyway) a clue ("Once and for all! For chrissake!").
I establish my authority -- which may or may not be valid -- by attempting to make a sweeping generalization about how most Slashdot posters -- including myself, in this very post -- frame arguments. The implied idea is that it's wrong -- it's wrong to use this method to frame an argument -- not only because it's tried and true but because it's sloppy logic and even sloppier writing. So what's the right way? That's the question. Good, persusavie rhetoric is a difficult thing. But I digress
But what if thing is not *like* something else? What if copyright violation is just, um, copyright violation?
If it's not theft, not murder, not rape, not like stealing from an empty house, not like an operating system, not like driving a car you haven't paid for -- then what is *it*?
Could it be, finally, that it's -- undiluted and undiminshed -- 'copyright violation?'
Is it even possible that a thing is just a thing? That everytime we use a metaphor to describe what it is we're actually describing more of what it's not and thereby diluting (precariously) what it is?
(And why -- especially with computers -- do we routinely resort to (imperfect) metaphors that are *not* grounded in computers?)
And finally: is it not the *difference* between the thing and the metaphor that describes the thing what really matters?
This difference -- that bridge between thing and metaphorical thing created by the metaphor of the thing -- is where (IMHO) the real *information* resides.
Industry collusion==monopoly. Commonly prosecuted for its use in price fixing. Which I should add these companies were penalized for. Also accord to the same anti-trust laws, if this monopoly uses its copywrite(another monopoly) unfairly, it looses it. It's not stealing music anymore, all the labels songs are now public domain.
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Their argument seems to be that, just as you can't bust down the door of a suspected CD pirate without a warrant (and therefore probable cause), then Aimster shouldn't be forced to monitor its users--only specific users in response to a proper search warrant.
If they're successful, this could be a wonderful precedent for digital privacy.
I'll admit that I've never used Aimster, but what differentiates it from a Napster clone (which doesn't appear to be an ISP in any sense of the term I've ever seen)? It just looks like a chat service / P2P distribution network. By that logic, ICQ is an ISP, too.
Or am I just missing something (always a possibility... it IS 1:15AM, after all)
-Corvidae
The way I see this whole story of mass P2P music sharing, Napster didn't mark the end of freedom, or speech, with regards to copyrights on digital media, but rather, it was the first in what looks to become a long honing process of the so far relatively new and immature P2P model (at least in the way of public adoption). The next few years may likely see more than one P2P model spring up, become quashed by the army of goons that is the RIAA, only to spawn the next generation, which will seek to find a yet finer and more subtle gap between copyright law on one hand, and maintaining a convenient and feasible P2P model on the other. That is, if napster was too broad and explicit and rough around the edges in its attempt to ultimately serve as a base (no reference to zig launching) for music trading, then the subsequent next few will refine their way around the different legislation till a final middle ground will have been reached.
The most obvious obstacles that'll prove to be a hindrance to the whole process are :
1. For a particular model to work, no matter how much technological prowess it may boast, it won't get anywhere without mass adoption;
2. The model that will eventually attract the necessary attention to make it workable will also attract the attention of the aforementioned goons;
...and so continues the vicious circle, henceforth into oblivion (er.. yeah).
Ok so this is all speculation, but in spite of the numerous predictions of doom and gloom for Our Rights Online(tm) in the future, I think this will all have to sort itself out, such as has happened time after time in the past (albeit in a slightly different context this time, now that it's all a matter of 0s and 1s and fuzzy distinctions thereof).
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Revolutionaries, schmevolutionaries..what are they going to revolt against when anarchy becomes regime du jour?
The thing that gets me is it's not possible to copyright a song title.
How do they propose to block people from downloading artists who want their music blocked while accommodating the artists who want people to share their music?
I know this is beating a dead horse but it's just another example of how the artists are not the ones being serviced here. On the other hand, maybe the industry is just doing it's best to control a situation that is pretty clearly out of control.
The thing that really sucks is that for many, the choice is to sell out to the suits, or not be heard.
How many of you have made any kind of effort to support a local musician, painter, poet or fire eater? In my area, unless you band is playing Steve Miller covers, your gig is going to be in a coffee house to 6 people. I am not saying it's impossible to make a living soing such gigs, but, it's pretty hard.
It seems clear from the success of Napster and similar services that people do want to copy files and music. The RIAA doesn't. Why should we listen to the opinions of the RIAA, but not the consumer? Surely we should have rights to copy as well.
Shoot, we should start sharing a bunch of text files containing 1,000,000 millions lines of "The RIAA are a bunch of morons" (with some sort of binary scrambled encryption), add an .mp3 extension and put Metallica somewhere in the title, and start sharing it through the service widespread.
When these guys inevitably reach the courtroom, they bring in their expert computer witness...
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Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...
You don't think intentionally breaking a law that is unjust as a protest is justified? Haven't you ever heard of passive resistance? Have you never heard of this era called the 60's? How do you think any controversial court case is started? By breaking a law that the defendant thought was unjust.
I mentioned in a K5 post here what I think of the RIAA.
The same ideas still stand.
The RIAA are a bunch of thieving jerks. They long had the excuse that they're the champions of the artists. Now, when online music distribution threatens to render their business model obsolete they show their true colors. They attempt to destroy this amazing new channel of music distribution rather than lose profits. They have declared that their profit is more important than the artists' profit. It's time they learned otherwise.
Keep copying the mp3's. And if you feel the artists deserve remuneration for their work, by all means mail them a check.
-Kasreyn
Kasreyn: Cheerfully playing the part of Devil's Advocate to hairtrigger
No single entity wins in this case, though one could argue that the RIAA does they had the opportunity to cash in (which is not what they're really after) on Napster and yet chose to squander that chance. The RIAA values control over money, well folks it's too late filesharing is not going to go away no matter what you do. You should have taken the money. Now you'll have a greater problem un-sanctioned un-controlable individuals sharing files. I'd wager to guess that when people involved with the riaa go home they fire up napster to check out $one_hit_wonder instead of buying a $16 album with one good song on it. You can't stop stuff like aimster, gnutella etc, unless you plan on wasting money knocking on doors across the country.
Story w/out annoying Flash ad here.
/.ers (asked w/ no fear now that I know that 95% of you are also male)?
Wired also has the story.
I love the preemptive strike (although I worry about Boies' track record as of late), but what I love the most is how one of the founders pimps out his 16 year old daughter! She is cute though...what do you think
Hey, I'm doing a research project on this very sort of thing! Actually, it's mostly on the RIAA itself and how it's hypocritical and all that other nifty stuff. If anyone knows any sites that have good (factual, un-flameage) RIAA-bashing stuff, I'd greatly appreciate it :)
Anyway, my view is that the RIAA is a Bad Thing and should be broken up to some extent. I mean, look at the cd prices in, say, Hong Kong. They're really low. Do you know why? Because they have a huge black market! The local vendors (would be Tower/Wherehouse/Sam Goody in the US) are forced to lower their prices to compete with the black market, and people get less screwed over! (It costs pennies to make cds, more to do advertising and stuff, but it does NOT account for the $18-20 cds some places sell). Anyway, that's my view. Respond! I commandith thee!
To smash a single atom, all mankind was intent / Now any day the atom may return the compliment
The RIAA may be succesful in destroying Napster, but it's going to be great when they go after the Gnutella network. Who are they going to sue then? Isps aren't going to block Gnutella traffic, and even if they did, encrypted versions of it could be just around the corner. Gnutella networks have already risen to very usable levels thanks to Limewire and Bearshare's methods of blocking out abusers of the system, and encouragement of good behavior. Plus these programs get even easier to use every time they come out. The RIAA is looking to be in big trouble, not to mention the MPAA. (go 2600, win that damn appeal)
Most of the arguments I've been hearing center on copyright issues -- who owns the rights, fair use, etc. But there may be an angle here that could blow the RIAA and others right out of the water... Isn't it illegal to intercept and/or interfere with private wire/wireless communications unless you have a court order to do so? It seems to me that whether you're using Napster or Aimster or Gnutella -- whatever -- you are communicating over telephone lines (in whole or part) and should therefore be protected by federal wiretap laws. Snooping on a private communication or otherwise interfering with that communication should only be permitted by law enforcement and only when there is a court order to permit it. And to get a court order, don't you need to be able to prove that there is a reasonable suspicion of wrong-doing? Maybe someone should try to bring charges against the RIAA for illegal wiretapping.