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Singing Cow To Attack CBDTPA
karmawarrior writes "Gateway is launching an advertising campaign against Senator Holling's CBDTPA bill, which, apparently will include its cow mascot encouraging computer users to legally download MP3s and burn their own CDs." Wired also has a story; see Gateway's website for more, as Gateway takes a page from Apple's "Rip-Mix-Burn" playbook.
The Hollings bill has drawn the support of major recording companies, who believe fast Internet connections and an array of digital devices such as MP3 players and CD burners, as well as Napster and other file-sharing services, were partly responsible for a decline in album sales last year
Didn't sales go up when napster started and then descreased when RIAA went and shutdown napster?
Hell I know people who used to get Mp3's so they could decide whether to buy an album who now just get them to piss off RIAA.
--"Karma is justice without the satisfaction"
Basically, both sides are rallying around a cause in order to drum up support. The recording industry is chanting, "The artists! The artists!" At the same time, tech seems to be saying, "The consumer! The consumer!" But in the end, everyone's just looking out for their own threatened business model.
Following the RIAA's logic, I guess car companies that advertise their wares are really encouraging the breaking of speed limits, reckless driving, and driving too fast for conditions when they show advertisements with the disclaimer "professional driver on closed course".
Do insurance companies then complain that auto manufacturers are behaving irresponsibly? No.
Should the RIAA be complaining about Gateway's ads? No.
I went to the city because I wished to live without deliberation.
Apart from saying they support your right to mix-rip'n'burn, this doesn't really take issue against the CPDB... CPTDB... Bad Law Thingy(TM). (Maybe because it's so hard to remember the acronym, especially since they keep changing it)
This ad doesn't go far enough, or bring home the true horribleness of the law. We need shock tactics, like those highway-safety ads. I want to see the cow standing in the middle of the highway with a big placard, screaming "The CBDTPA SUUUUUCKS!" and then getting run down by a Disney truck, preferably driven by a Senator Hollings impostor.
anyone catch the link in one of the info windows to emusic?
apparently this is one of gateways 'partners' and a 'good place to download music legally' or something like that.
anyone know anything about them?
Where interests coincide, support. Where conflict, oppose. It's very simple. There are no "good guys" and "bad guys", just different people and groups of people with varied agendas. They do not have to be exactly like you, and insisting that unless they tow your line all the way down the line they are enemies is rather childish.
Hell, I've got about zero respect for Gateway products. They have effectively filled the consumer space crappy OEM PC manufacturer vacated by Packard Bell. But, at least they realize that stringent hardware requirements mandated by the government are not in their best interests. As this conicides with mine, yeah I'll support them by pointing out the issues they are bringing to light to the less tech-savvy. Doesn't mean I'll be recommending their products any time soon.
Because the CBDTPA (is that right?) intends to stop ANY copying, even copying which under fair use precedent would be allowable. That means NO RIPPING, for _any_ reason - even if you just want to load up you computer or MP3 jukebox for some long-play action.
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
Gateway is a struggling PC manufacturer. Why can't a few tech companies with deeper pockets spend money for this quest? I admire what they're doing, hopefully people buy a Cow next time they're buying a pre-built box so their $$ isn't spent without a return.
Because, it isn't primarily about privacy or Free Speech. It's about the doctrine of Fair Use (17 USC 107) and the doctrine of First Sale (the notion that once something has been sold, the buyer can do as he pleases with the bought item.)
Gateway wants to retain the freedom to manufacture computers as it pleases. It sees this as potentially hurting their sales when buyers no longer want computers that restrict a buyer's possible uses for the machine.
Buyers are the prize in one sense, but the greater prize is "who gets to keep and protect their business model" - the content companies, or the computer companies--
The Car doesn't have free will to stop running reliably if it doesn't like the divorcee who wins custody. The Buyer does.
is the broad adoption of Jack Valenti's misnomer "piracy" to denote "unauthorized copying." It's an improper usage of an emotionally loaded word and it unfairly biases the audience, albeit in a subtle way, every time it's used, even by journalists and others in support of Fair Use. It's like the popular but WRONG equation of "hacker" with "cracker" - which is also gleefully promoted by all those authoritarian a**holes who would like nothing better than to enslave us all to the RIAA and MPAA.
Real "piracy" is rape, pillage, and murder on the high seas or some remote godforsaken mountain pass or desert wadi. It still happens in the seas around Indonesia and Malaysia, and in the Caribbean, and it still happens on land in places like Africa and continental Asia. To equate sampling a piece of music by MP3 prior to deciding to purchase it with "piracy" is all so over-the-top hysterical that it would be merely comical if it hadn't gotten widespread currency.
Jack Valenti and Hillary Rosen should have their mouths washed out with soap for hammering on this to the point that even their opponents adopted their skewed language.
"If only the music industry would devote a little bit of millions of dollars they're spending on lawyers and buying senators to update their distribution model into the 21st century... but that wouldn't let them fuck the artists as much would it?"
nuff said.
Is there anything more damning to this bill than the fact that now we are seeing political commercials from corporate entities on both sides of the issue?
When this is the case, clearly the issue is not one of laws, and the government should not be involved.
He looked at me and said, "Kid, we don't like your kind, and we're gonna send your fingerprints off to Washington."
i believe its more or less just a marketing gimmick, than a voice of reason.
though they would have you believe otherwise.
gateway only gives a damn cause it might affect their sales on this particular computer model.
the only fact is that everything is an opinion
I don't mean to resort to typical Microsoft bashing, but I seriously doubt that Microsoft is going to fight DRM for those reasons. Instead, I think that they'll fight DRM as a government-mandated issue, all the while working on their own Windows-integrated DRM scheme which they'll then license to major media conglomerates.
If they can pull it off, it's a Win-Win for Microsoft: No government interference on DRM and a near-instant monopoly on DRM due to buy-in from the major content providers.
Slashdot comments... splitting hairs since 1997.
More importantly, where does the RIAA get off on expecting other companies to spend money to solve the RIAA's piracy problem? If a company sells products that allow consumers to partake in legal activities, why shouldn't that company be able to advertise those products? More importantly, why does the RIAA seem to think that they should be able to prevent that?
"If only they would devote a little bit of the millions of dollars they're spending on this ad campaign to help stop illegal downloading ... but that wouldn't help them sell more CD burners, would it," said Hilary Rosen, CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America.
Now let me get this straight? The RIAA, MPAA and others (through the Disney Senator) want to take away many of the rights that hardware manufacturers have in building their systems. And now they want these same companies to spend money to help keep the horrible music system in place? At least movie stars make money. 99% of artist's don't. Read This article [Salon.com] by Courtney Love if you want to know why I personally don't like the RIAA.
I applaud Gateway for this, and I really hope that this helps bring them from the brink of going out of buisness. I plan on supporting them through corporate purchases (which I oversee). I hope supporting companies who endorse (publically) our ideals will win in the long run
Blah Blah Blah.
www.eFax.com are spammers
This is a VERY bright move by Gateway. They wish to establish in the minds of the customer a direct association between their brand-name and a large amount of the usage that Joe Public has for PCs.
At the same time they are implying, "Buy us before it is too late."
The fact that they may actually prevent poor legislation being inacted is waaay down the list of benefits they get from this.
StrutterX