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Internal MP3 Server? 1 Million Dollars Please
nkruse pointed out that our pals as the RIAA are breaking new ground. According to this Reuters Article, the RIAA has succeeded in collecting 1 million US dollars from Arizona based Integrated Information Systems. IIS apparently had a corporate MP3 repository on it's network. This is the first time I've heard about the RIAA doing this kind of thing. Looks like they're taking a page from the BSA handbook.
This isn't all that different from what the various (c) organizations have been doing for some time. Most infamous was the 1996 effort by BMI/ASCAP to slap fines on the Girl Scouts for singing copyrighted songs around the fireplace -- an effort that backfired in terms of the PR (and led Congress to specifically exempt the Boy / Girl Scouts).
(This article at GigaLaw provides some useful background).
I've heard IP attorneys compare these guys to the Mafia -- they basically go around extorting companies to pay them hush money and keep their attack dogs at bay. For large companies, the price of buying them off is cheaper than the price of hiring defense attorneys.
http://www.riaa.com/PR_Story.cfm?id=505
The RIAA's News section is definitely worth a look, in a know-your-enemy sense.
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
I'll be the first one to line up against the heavy-handed tactics of the RIAA, but I think we should pick our battles, folks. Does anyone complain when the local sports bar licenses pay-per-view broadcasts, or when the proverbial dance hall pays licensing fees for music?
Yet here, its not even clear that anyone actually bought the damn CDs in the first place. We've reached a point where we're so aggravated about the stranglehold that Hollywood and the labels have that at first utterance of mp3 we're spouting the same old 'information-wants-to-be-free' rhetoric.
Those "antiquated" ideas of copyright ownership were a contract between creators and the public that worked since the Statute of Anne. Calling them "antiquated" just plays into the hands of the content-producers who would just as happily grind us inexorably toward pay-per-use purgatory.
Copyright worked. The DMCA doesn't. Confusing the two is like confusing pedophilia with Catholicism.
It may be cold, but at least it's clear.
Now not only are software companies allowed to come into your business and snoop around for no reason, the RIAA is allowed to come in as well?
They're not. Especially since they're not law enforcement. If the BSA or the RIAA shows up at your door, turn them away. They can't do a damn thing about it without law enforcement present AND a search warrant, which you are entitled to look at (so if the cops do accompany them, simply ask to see the search warrant).
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
This fine is preposterous.
I worked for starcd which recognises music from the radio. We got a quote to buy every album that a song had been played from on the radio in the last five years five or more times. It was just over $100k.
How can they possible justify a settlement of this size. This is the most unvelievable abuse the RIAA has demonstrated of it's corporate massivity. I have an mp3 repository, and I own every CD that I have a recording of. I would like someone to explain to me how this doesn't constitute fair use?
I bet they only settled because RIAA is too large to fight. So much for the American justice system.
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Everyone is living in a personal delusion, just some are more delusional than others.
No, you can play music on a speaker as long as the general public can't hear it. For example I can park my car and crank up the music for my friends to hear, even when we're out of the car. I can also play music at work without using headphones, and I can turn it up loud enough for the person next to me to hear it, but if I worked in a supermarket that would be a no-no.
Send lawyers, guns, and money!
To follow up on the replies -- if the company owns the equipment a song is being played on, and other employees are listening in, it's considered a public performance. It's also technically illegal for a company to have a radio playing for the employees or the customers to listen. When those listening with you are your friends in a social atmosphere it's different; but a workplace or commercial establishment is considered a public venue.
:-P
The hills are alive, with the sound of MUZAK.
No, wrong.
If you are listening to music on the street or in the office and people overhear it, no infringement. If you rent a flick and invite 20 people over to watch it, that's not infringement.
If you charge people for the above, that is infringement.
If you disseminate the material, ala storing MP3s on a server, or display a movie in a public venue like the side of a building or in Central Park, then you are infringing.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
No, all of your examples are considering private. If you charged for admission then you get into the realm of public performance.
If you set up in Central Park and played a bunch of music on a big rig (something more than just a boombox that someone may overhear) and then show a couple of movies from a projector on a bed sheet, that is a public performance.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
The radio example came up a number of years ago in Australia. Most commercial radio stations got all thing about it and started prosecuting the local hairdresser's. From memory, one radio station declared that it encouraged people to tune into it at work and turn it up for everyone to hear. That soon put everything in perspective.
Should I have to pay (even) more for a CD because my friends didn't technically purchase a license to listen to the music?
According to the xxAA, yes. Feel free to replace "xx" with "RI" and you have the music mafia. Or replace "xx" with "MP" and "music" with "movie" and you have the movie mafia. Either way, the answer stays the same. DIVX (not the codec) was the MPAA's dream. Pay for the movie every time you watch it. If you want to watch it at a friend's place, pay for it again. If you want to watch it upstairs, pay for it again.
The RIAA is trying to do that exact same thing with music. I hope that it will fail as badly and that someone (anyone) pimp slaps some sense into them. If not, I'll switch to classical music. I'll have an easier time adjusting my taste in music than adjusting to the "pay-to-play" model the xxAA is trying to force down our throats.
The law seems to be different in Australia. It's not the radio station who prosecutes; most radio stations would love to be played in public places. It's that much more exposure their advertising and their station gets. But the stations' licenses are for private use only, and if it's played in a public place without special arrangements, the record labels get huffy.
That's why companies like Muzak have sprung up, with public performance licensing. Even MP3.com has gotten into the act, with audio streams meant for business use -- and the service is NOT free.