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ISP Bans RIAA to Protect Its Customers
fader writes "Information Wave Technologies, a northeastern (US) ISP has announced that "it will actively deny the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) from accessing the contents of its network". Apparently this is in response to the RIAA (and MPAA, but they don't seem to be blocking them yet) plan to actively attack P2P users. All I can say is, you go, guys! I hope more ISPs will follow their lead."
I'm curious what illegal things they have done? They maintain a private network and can give access to it to whomever they please, and most certainly do not have to allow another private entity access to it. Exceptions are in the case of a warrant for one of their customers where the FBI needs the equiv of a wiretap or something, but those are limited cases. I can't demand that AOL give me access to their mail server if I am not one of their customers, and this ISP can deny any incoming traffic they wish as long as doing so does not violate their contract with their customers.
What?
They are going to actively search&seek out the RIAA drones!
Yes, but even better, they blacklist the RIAA drones. Now, if they would distribute that list, and if others would be able to add to it, we could basically kill off their intrusion into our computers. I really don't like the idea of big brother/ big business snooping through my stuff. And i don't think you do either. Regulators!!! Mount up!
I'm not so sure about that. Since their network is a private one, they certainly have the right to blacklist anybody they want. Should they share that list with other ISPs, there may be some problems. But setting up their own list is not illegal. Furthermore, should they see this thing out, they may eventually have more business than they can even handle.
RIAA may be able to take them to court, but it would probably be worth the $$$ to fend them off.
GreyPoopon
--
Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
That depends. If you just want to be able to leech away on any and all music, then it's not worth it.
If you just want your fair use, the RIAA off our backs and just want to use the network to discover new music that was put there by the artists themselvs, then it certainly IS worth it.
They're not putting up fake files of legal music, just fake files of illegal music. And that is quite fair in my humble oppinion.
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
If you can do it to them, they can do it to you. Pretty difficult to argue otherwise.
An ISP that blocks or restricts RIAA use of the net is legitimizing the practice they purport to oppose. This is not the way to fight this particular battle.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
While this sounds nice and all. Blindly blocking network blocks can be a bad idea. I'm sure if the information on what IP blocks the RIAA uses to scan networks got out. Several people would just add those blocks to their firewalls and forget about it. Then later when the RIAA retaliates by changing their provider or getting new IP blocks and giving back their old ones, everyone would end up blocking someone having nothing to do with the RIAA. We have to fight them on the legal front, not the technological one.
It seems like it would be a good idea to implement this as distributed honeypots instead of one on ISP's network. Otherwise, what would stop the RIAA attack drones/bots from just blacklisting the blacklist and ignoring the honeypot.
riaa@informationwave.net
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Yeah, but by doing this, are they risking their status as a common carrier?
When the RIAA comes and demands they cut off access to warez.org, they'll be in less of a position to say they can't/don't do content-based filtering. In for a penny, in for a pound; this may be shooting themselves in the foot.
not so fast.
You must also deal with the RIAA's member companies, not just RIAA itself. It is technically the labels who own the copyrights and would be the ones to "enforce" those copyrights by hacking. Also, not all of the member companies are in favor of hacking consumer systems -- for example, AOL/TW & child company Warner Music are opposed to it.
The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
That's the problem with the media conglamerates.
Consumer: "I bought this CD/DVD, so I should be able to do with it as I want."
MC: "No, you only paid to be allowed to listen/watch it under certain circumstances."
Consumer: "Okay. Now my CD/DVD is scratched beyond use. I want a new one."
MC: "Can't do that. You only get that one copy. You have to be carefull with your own stuff. It's not our responsibility."
Personally I'd like to get a VERY thorough rewrite of the copyright laws that affect _me_ meaning Denmark and the EU, but I'd also like a global and FAIR set of copyright laws.
Not just fair to me as a consumer, but also fair to the copyright holders. As it is now (at least in Denmark) it is seriously borked, giving consumers rights that are in no way fair, and removing rights that ARE fair.
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
Conversely why can't people just not steal the mp3's?
Because the RIAA refuses to sell them in a way that encourages people to pay for them: High quality files in a DRM-free format, at a price so cheap per song that people would rather pay it to get a file of guaranteed high quality than waste the time trying to find a perfectly-ripped, glitch-free copy somewhere for free. Do you know how many times I've had to keep re-downloading songs from Gnutella because they're cut off at the end or have glitches in the middle from the CD skipping when the song was ripped? It's not a fun thing to do with a speedy broadband connection, much less the dialup connection that the majority of people still use.
If the RIAA charged, say, 5 to 25 cents per song, or a more expensive x dollars-per-month all-you-can-download plan, with NO DRM CRAP, they would make a killing. Why don't they?
They're greedy.
They like the profit margins they maintain with their extortionate CD pricing.
They're cheap.
The startup costs for their own MP3 server farm would be pretty hefty, and that's money that (in their eyes) would be better put to use stuffing Hilary's couch cushions and mattress, and buying laws that prop up their existing business model.
They're lazy.
They don't want to have to strive to create more high-quality content. By only selling album-length CDs (the purchasable single as we know it is being killed off), they can effectively force you to pay $20 for that one song you like, because the other eleven on the CD make you bleed from the ears because they're so terrible. In all my years of CD buying (pre-Napster, of course), I can still have enough fingers to count the number of CDs I have where I love every single track on them. I could have a nasty accident with a bandsaw and that would still be true.
They're stupid.
They just can't see that if they sell something cheaply enough and without onerous restrictions, people won't be motivated to steal it. Every time they come close to this idea, the services they launch are too expensive and/or use some proprietary file format locked down six ways from Sunday, or have other consumer-hostile aspects.
~Philly
An ISP that blocks or restricts RIAA use of the net is legitimizing the practice they purport to oppose. This is not the way to fight this particular battle.
... if they do not, they are likely to see the underlying reason for why people are willing to pay for internet access go away, and with it their entire market dry up to virtually nothing.
Nonsense. They are restricting system crackers from attacking their networks, and their customers. This is a longstanding policy for most ISPs, who blacklist SPAMmers and other neferious crackers who are looking to steal information (e.g. credit cards) or damage people's systems out of pure maliciousness.
The RIAA has chosen to become one of the above, and announced their intention to do so publicly. The ISP is responding in a responsible manner, both in terms of immediate security and in terms of long-term economic viability.
Think about it. If the RIAA and the MPAA are allowed to crack, and possibly destroy machines on the internet, or succeed in their more modest objective of turning the internet from an interactive publishing medium everyone can be hard on into a more-or-less one way, glorified interactive shopping network channel, how many people are going to be willing to spend $40/month or more for access?
Virtually no one, which means all of the ISPs in question essentially go out of business, or become a niche market. Either way, they lose.
AOL, Sprint, AT&T, and other large broadband players had better stand up to this as well
That would serve the purposes of the MPAA, the RIAA, and other copyright cartels, but it would be devistating to the tech industry, the internet, and very directly to the ISPs in question.
It looks like one ISP has actually thought the consiquences through, and chosen the best alternative for dealing with it. I suspect any ISPs capable of reading the writing on the wall, and interested in projected earnings beyond the next couple of quarters, will likely reach similar conclusions.
Perhaps not AOL, which has come to be dominated by their media-cartel half, Time-Warner, but certainly AT&T and others should seriously be considering similiar measures to protect their networks, their customers, and ultimately their business.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
I want no one and no corp deciding what should be accessed across their backbones/routers/etc.
The highlighting was mine but goes to show that the ISPs own the equipment. Their network is theirs to do as they see fit. Would you want the federal government telling you that you were not allowed to block IP addresses from accessing your network? If you don't like the ISP's policies, use a different ISP.
Your argument reminds me of the spammers who accuse ISPs of censoring them and limiting their free speech.
Censorship is when the government limits what you can see and read. It's not when a private ISP makes a business decision to block IP addresses.
For a less abstract analogy, I know that my television has been stolen from me. I don't know who, but I know it had to be someone in my neighborhood. Using the RIAA as a model, I should be able to go into each of my neighbor's houses to look for this television, without their permission. And if I have a strong suspicion that I have found the violator, I am allowed to destroy the house. That's basically what the RIAA wants.
Actually it's even better. You still have your television, they just built one identical to yours,
no wait, they built one that looks and sounds almost exactly like your TV, only smaller.
Actually this is where capitalism doesn't work, and why we need government regulation. You're assuming an educated consumer. You're assuming a consumer that isn't apathetic about said issues. This consumer is the exception but not the rule in the USA, which is why the general quality of products has severly decreased over the last few decades while the costs of said products have increased (inflation accounted for). Finally, you have this new concept of an Ogopoly(sp?). This concept is almost proven within large industries where although there is no monopoly, you have duopolies or more. For example, who cares if ATT limits your usage to essentially web surfing and email? So you switch! Switch to who? Qwest DSL who does the same thing (for example)? Competition is great, but it doesn't always work when you have a few megacorporations following each others suit. Finally, the entire captilistic model puts the maximization of corporate profits above all other priorities. Long are the days where you have a business passionate about making a quality product while making a humble profit. Profiting isn't bad, but business in America is summed up as the following: Maximize profit at the expense of your employee's (compensation, etc.), customers, and product quality. It's true that competition keeps this in check, but only to an extent.
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips
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