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RIAA Sues Backbone ISPs to Censor Website

Posted by michael on from the audacity-ever-increasing dept.

prostoalex writes "Music labels filed a lawsuit against major Internet service providers for not blocking access to Listen4Ever.com, music site located in China. The defendants in the suit include AT&T Broadband, Cable & Wireless USA, Sprint Corp., Advanced Network Services and UUNET Technologies." Wow.

12 of 846 comments (clear)

  1. listen4ever.com? by matthewn · · Score: 3, Informative

    Am I the only person who hadn't heard of this site till now? At any rate, I appreciate the big labels bringing it to my attention!

  2. Re:from the rabid-knee-jerk-reactions dept. by tim_maroney · · Score: 5, Informative

    If this suit passes in the favor of the RIAA, then you can kiss your fair use rights good-bye.

    Providing complete copies of copyrighted recordings is by no means fair use. Fair use would be providing short sections for critical discussion and analysis.

    Take a look at this excellent article on real threats to fair use. It defines fair use as follows: "If you are accused of infringing, you can make an argument that your use of the protected works is 'fair' because of some combination of these factors: The nature of the original work makes it important that it be publicly discussed; the nature of your use of it is important because of teaching, research, or commentary; you do not use very much of the original work; your use does not significantly affect the market for the original work." All of these four criteria fail in the case of pirated popular music.

    --
    Tim Maroney tim@maroney.org

  3. Re:Hard to say... by ajs · · Score: 3, Informative

    I get your point, but last I heard ISPs (be they retail or backbones) were not classified as common carriers by the FCC. Common carrier status is a major deal, and it's not all good for the carrier.

  4. whois record - Re:U.S. Domain name? by Malc · · Score: 3, Informative

    ~$ whois Listen4Ever.com

    Whois Server Version 1.3

    Domain names in the .com, .net, and .org domains can now be registered
    with many different competing registrars. Go to http://www.internic.net
    for detailed information.

    Domain Name: LISTEN4EVER.COM
    Registrar: MELBOURNE IT, LTD. D/B/A INTERNET NAMES WORLDWIDE
    Whois Server: whois.melbourneit.com
    Referral URL: http://www.melbourneit.com
    Name Server: DNS2.HICHINA.COM
    Name Server: DNS1.HICHINA.COM
    Updated Date: 08-jan-2002

    >>> Last update of whois database: Fri, 16 Aug 2002 17:02:01 EDT

    The Registry database contains ONLY .COM, .NET, .ORG, .EDU domains and
    Registrars.

    Found crsnic referral to whois.melbourneit.com.

    Domain Name.......... listen4ever.com
    Creation Date........ 2002-01-09
    Registration Date.... 2002-01-09
    Expiry Date.......... 2003-01-09
    Organisation Name.... Jun Sun
    Organisation Address. No.15 Xinghua yizhi road.
    Organisation Address.
    Organisation Address. tianjin
    Organisation Address. 300381
    Organisation Address. Tianjin
    Organisation Address. CHINA

    Admin Name........... kery crise
    Admin Address........ Rotterdam-Maasvlaktee Europaweg
    Admin Address........
    Admin Address........ Rotterdam
    Admin Address........ 223211
    Admin Address........ Rotterdam
    Admin Address........ CHINA
    Admin Email.......... yourlisten4ever@yahoo.com
    Admin Phone.......... (31)10-2217741
    Admin Fax............ 31)10-2217752

    Tech Name............ luo qiang qiang
    Tech Address......... Linguo beilu
    Tech Address.........
    Tech Address......... Lasa
    Tech Address......... 223211
    Tech Address......... Xizang
    Tech Address......... CHINA
    Tech Email........... sfp@eyou.com
    Tech Phone........... (86)0891-63322444
    Tech Fax............. (86)0891-63322444
    Name Server.......... dns1.hichina.com
    Name Server.......... dns2.hichina.com

  5. Don't Buy Music From These Labels by sessamoid · · Score: 3, Informative

    The RIAA member labels can be found here. Don't buy music from them. There are plenty of good independent labels with good artists that deserve your money. Don't give it to those RIAA shills.

    --
    "No, no, no. Don't tug on that. You never know what it might be attached to."
  6. Re:Crappy music jokes aside by 1010011010 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Yep. Maybe while we're in this legal atmosphere, we should get together and sue all the baby bells and long-distance carriers as well? Maybe we can shut down the internet and the phone system at the same time. Let's also sue the power companies, because they supply the electrons that make copyright infringement in the digital millenium possible.

    --
    Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
  7. User Agent Redirect on Listen4ever.com by ColaMan · · Score: 5, Informative

    It appears that they have a user-agent redirect setup to go to mp3mediaworld.com.

    Any IE derivative browser gets to listen4ever, anything else gets mp3mediaworld.com.

    Thanks to Ethereal and Mozilla's customisable user-agent setting, I can now actually get to the site in Mozilla and turn off those squillion pop-ups.

    Oh and a big thanks to the RIAA for letting us know about this site

    --

    You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
    There is a lot of hype here.
    1. Re:User Agent Redirect on Listen4ever.com by ColaMan · · Score: 3, Informative
      Put the proper settings down...

      Google is your friend.. but in cases like this, it's hard to find the right search terms... "user-agent mozilla" gets you close, but anyway, here's what you need.

      Put this in a file called "user.js" in your profiles directory (it should be in the same directory as "prefs.js")

      user_pref("general.useragent.override", "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.0; Windows 98; DigExt)");


      This will make IE-only sites believe that Mozilla is IE5.0

      When you want to download a song, you need to right-click and "save link target as..." otherwise (in my case, anyway) mozilla will download the file and try and run it in your mp3 player without prompting you to save to disk.
      --

      You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
      There is a lot of hype here.
  8. Re:Deep Pockets and Deeper Affiliations by NotoriousQ · · Score: 5, Informative

    Same with verizon....silent redirects to mp3mediaworld.com. Guess who seems to also be missing from the list of sued companies

    Funny though when I went to www.listen4ever.com/software.htm, there was no redirect.

    I will try to mod you up some more if I can, to get more people to notice.

    --
    badness 10000
  9. We need to support Candidates by Drew_Arrowood · · Score: 3, Informative
    who oppose the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. There is a viable candidate in my home district who has clearly come out against it. His name is Tripp Helms, and he is running in the 8th District of North Carolina for U.S. Congress. See his comments.

    He could sure use everyone's help.

  10. Re:How are ISPs violating copyright? by cthugha · · Score: 4, Informative

    You might want to check the links (including court papers currently filed) provided by the GrepLaw story on this topic. The suit is being brought under Title 17, Section 512(j) of the US Code, which explicitly gives the right to a plaintiff with standing to seek an injunction against an ISP or backbone provider to block a particular infringing site. I'm not sure whether the offending provision was inserted as part of the DMCA, but I suspect it was. I'm sure you can come to your own conclusions about the kinds of burdens that this provision could place upon backbone providers given the number of infringing sites out there.

  11. Things to do about RIAA... by tlambert · · Score: 5, Informative

    Rather than complaining, there are a number of things you can actually do about RIAA.

    The number one thing you can do is to get them legally disbanded (discorporated).

    The Government Giveth... The Government Can Damn Well Taketh Away.

    The Recording Industry Association of America is a California Corporation, corporate number C1858372.

    Contact CAlifornia Secretary of State Bill Jones, and request that their incorporation as a legal entity be terminated. Contact information follows...

    Mail or in person:
    California Secretary of State
    1500 11th Street
    Sacramento, California 95814

    Public Contact Phone Numbers:
    General Information - (916) 653-6814
    Corporations Unit & Branch Offices - (916) 657-5448
    Executive Office - (916) 653-7244
    Legislative & Constituent Services - (916) 653-6774
    Political Reform Division - (916) 653-6224

    Email:
    ConstituentAffairs@ss.ca.gov

    PS: For good measure:

    - Governor Gray Davis
    - State Capitol Building
    - Sacramento, CA 95814
    - Phone: 916-445-2841
    - Fax: 916-445-4633
    - governor@governor.ca.gov

    -- Terry