Slashdot Mirror
Copyright Infringement In the News
Lots of newsbits about copyright infringement today - let's mash them all together with some egg whites and breadcrumbs and see what we get. marklyon writes "The DOJ announced that they are planning to prosecute filesharers under the The No Electronic Theft ("NET") Act. John Malcolm, a deputy assistant attorney general, made the pronouncement at the Progress and Freedom Foundation's annual technology and politics summit Tuesday. Cnet has extended coverage." Reader M_Talon writes "According to this article on ZDNET the RIAA is using one of the DMCA's more nasty clauses...the right to subpoena an ISP for a suspected pirate's personal information. They want to force Verizon to reveal the customer's information, and Verizon is refusing on the grounds that the pirated material isn't on their servers." Reader MattW writes "Apparently some theaters are consenting to run anti-piracy ads before movies. After all, these are not a bunch of fat cats we're talking about -- piracy now threatens the livelihood of the rank and file workers of Hollywood. After all, the movie studios are having a terrible year,
right?" Finally, the Washington Post (probably one of the last articles we post from their site, as they go registration-required) discovers spoofed files on Gnutella, and public radio is reporting that the RIAA will drop their suit against listen4ever.com, since it's, uh, gone.
Finally, the Washington Post (probably one of the last articles we post from their site, as they go registration-required)
Yeah, that sure stopped you from linking to the NY Times...
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Gone? or merely Slashdotted?
ps, fp
Am I the only one that sees the obvious connections between what the RIAA/MPAA are doing and the actions of Communist despots? They are using a government that has too much power over its citizens to crack down on them and "send them away" for "re-education."
For that matter, has anybody noticed how much Jack Valenti looks like Chairman Mao? Or how much Hillary Rosen looks like Josef Stalin?
I'm worried.
...if the value of the work exceeds $1,000. Violations are punishable by one year in prison, or if the value tops $2,500, "not more than five years" in prison.
I guess this means that we can copy Crossroads (Britney Spears movie).. no way that was worth $1000
If the RIAA keeps attacking ISPs like this, especially the big ones who are obviously resisting, it may be their demise. Sure, the RIAA has a lot of money, enough to buy people off and pass legislation but the amount of money they can devote to this pales in comparison to the amount of money the ISPs can spend.
Doesn't seem to stop Slashdot from continually posting links to the New York Times.
Brazil has decided you're cute.
RIAA=1984
All they're doing is making themselves look even more like the assholes they sure seem to be... Their whole way of dealing with file sharing will go down in history as one of the biggest P.R. debacles of all time. The really scary thing is that these are (suppositely) smart, educated people. Why then do they act like a bunch of scared school children then? I just don't get it. Will someone please explain it to me - like I was a six year old?
What about AOL? I know, I know... - how loosely do you really want to define "ISP", but certainly Time Warner would have something to say about that.
I don't mind registering for the Wash. Post (after all, it's local to me & my father worked as a press operator there for almost 30 years). However, apparently mozilla has a problem with the new format (even after registering, when going to some pages either you get a blank page or it continuously tries to connect). I wrote them - I received a reply that mozilla wasn't supported (changing the User-Agent in konqueror to IE allowed me access, and I pointed that out in my re-reply).
is usenet the solution to p2p networks? shhhh, but why aren't the RIAA and MPAA going after giganews, easynews, etc?
Anything you say will be held against you.
Great! The govment will shore haf to build mo prisons.
Now I can get a job there.
1. Don't distribute works you don't own the copyright for.
2. Don't distribute works whose total value is more than $999.99US
3. Don't distribute works whose total value is more than $999.99 US for more than 180 days.
The government kinda shot itself in the foot with this one. It will be damn hard to prove that you have distribute works for 180 days whose total value is more than $999.99US.
Burn Hollywood Burn
The last article from the Washington Post, because they are about to require registration??
Registration never stopped you from posting all the New York Times (Free Registration required blah blah blah.) articles. This, inspite of the fact that people were complaining heavily about it.
"The DOJ announced that they are planning to prosecute filesharers under the The No Electronic Theft ("NET") Act."
This bill is actually entitled Make'em Stop, Period--No Electronic Theft (MS.NET).
Finally, the Washington Post (probably one of the last articles we post from their site, as they go registration-required) Oh, right, because we all know that Slashdot never posts articles from The New York Times, which is also registration-required.
Do the obvious to e-mail me.
"The term "financial gain" includes receipt, or expectation of receipt, of anything of value, including the receipt of other copyrighted works." Personally I find that to be a little bizarre, How can haveing somebody elses comprighted works be of a financial value to me, there is not a legal way to profit from somebody elses copyright, so it sounds to me like the Music Industry wants to cry "because downloading an MP3 is a financial gain for me, it must be a loss for them."
Bork Bork Bork!!
Moo moo, buckaroo ! :-)
The majority of Americans want to free music. They want to share.
The majority of Americans do not see digital piracy as theft. The majority of Americans also do not see picking flowers at a public park as theft, or sneaking a grape at the supermarket. The majority of Americans drank alcohol before the legal age. Technically, we should all be in prison, but these minor crimes don't really hurt anybody, and so they are overlooked. Why, then, is the DOJ going after file sharers?
Isn't this a fucking democracy? Why is the majority submitting to laws made by the whims of the same companies that release O-Town records and other toxins into the environment? Why am I the only one sending daily letters to his Senator, that Clinton bitch, begging for support for our digital lifestyle?
I don't want to go to jail for pirating the new Pearl Jam or Queens of the Stone Age albums. I bought them anyway, but since I didn't clean them from my WinMX serving directory, i'm technically abetting piracy. This laxness could get me 5 years in a federal "pump me in the ass" prison, and that is wrong. I don't think I deserve it. I don't think my crime is that bad. I don't think that I'm depriving anyone of actual property or actual money they might have actually made, and I don't think the majority would argue with me.
So why are we letting it happen?
Hey freaks: now you're ju
This quote from the anti-piracy PSAs in movie theatres article is way to save the children for my taste:
"downloading movies instead of buying a ticket or a video would hurt the industry's behind-the-scenes workers, including makeup artists and custodians"
Now I am not advocating theft of their property - what I am upset about is the rampant attempts by media to skew your opinions on a subject with emotional connections. Iknow I know... its *always* been happening - but these days it is so much worse than it ever was before - as the causes that the media is used to convey information for are more and more plastic and manufactured.
the media is continually trying to sway public opinion through emotional manipulation. Putting you in a position where if you dont agree with the opinion or dont have the emotions they want you to then you're automatically a terrorist - or hate the children etc....
(I know I am not articulating this as well as I would like... but I think that you get the point) I am just so tired of the slant that is put on all the information out there. Is there no place that I can get information - generic and straight forward without the emotinal buzzwords and hyperbole??
"Apparently some theaters are consenting to run anti-piracy ads before movies."
My city's big theater already has a poster on their ticket booths saying 'Pirates Not Allowed...blah blah blah...MPAA' with a picture of a pirate.
Our plan is to go into the theater with a video camera and one of us dressed as a pirate and yell out "Arrr...thats discrimation".
Hehe...just something to do to toy with those coporate bitches.
forget it.
Was anyone else a little miffed at the chart to the right of the Washington Post article which seemed to imply that increasing blank CD sales were the cause of the leveling off of CD sales? Could it *possibly* be that blank CD sales rose so much higher because blank CD's were being sold at commodity prices? Now a good number of those blanks may very well have been for pirating, but I'll bet a good number of them were for software backups, saving personal photos, and other legitimate uses.
Music CD's, OTOH, have remained at the same stinking price (for the most part) for the last 5 years. Want to sell more of something when the demand/market share ISN'T increasing? Do you want to actually slow piracy? Charge a reasonable amount for a product that's in LESS demand! These guys just can't seem to understand that the CD buying market itself is not the same as it was 25 years ago -- thers is just too much supply for the demand.
Again, legislation being used in a way it was not intentionally ment to be used for.
When will that court case with the Supreme Court happen, that will nullify this law as unconstitutional and let us have our freedom of speech?
I know something is in the works with the ACLU and a college student who wants to crack encrypted web filters
My ignorance is a perfect shield against your logic.
Sounds like what Clinton would ask a female co-worker to do
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Hmmm, I hope someone puts it up on KaZaa or else I might never see it....
I know this has been pointed out before, but isn't the whole point that they go after copyright infringers and not the software makers that produce napster and kazaa?
Now, granted, they are doing both. But we can't bitch when the government is going to prosecute the people who are infringing on copyrights. Just because the RIAA is involved, and the term DMCA has been used, does not mean that what is going on is wrong. Say what you will about "but the RIAA is EVIL!", it doesn't make infridging on their copyrights right (as in anywhere close to legal), and they and the justice department has every right to take people who do to court.
Now, you may also have issues about current copyright law. Granted, it isn't very good, but if you want the copyright law changed then bitch about the copyright law to your congressmen or representative. Don't take a stand on this issue, as far as they are concerned everyone who trades music on the net is a criminal, and you can do nothing about that. Convince them that the copyright law is way to long, many of our problems would go away if we could reduce it to something sane like 10-15 years.
And for all of those "we'll make a better system based on trust to trade music files" but don't want to play the political game, you are idiots. Who do you think they are going to prosecute? You and everyone else who uses that system. The only fight we have is in politics, there is no technical solution to this problem. As much as you would like to think you'll win this battle whipping up some code in C, you are going to find there is nothing you can code that will keep the handcuffs off of your hands.
</rant>
" Chernin argued that piracy will not only hurt creators of original content but also consumers if movie studios lose so many ticket sales that they begin cutting expenses. He said online piracy does not seem to have the same stigma as shoplifting.
m l
Chernin also decried efforts to download copies of the latest Star Wars installment. About 10 million people tried to download "Star Wars: Episode II -- Attack of the Clones" and "Spider-Man" in the weekend after its release, and 4 million succeeded, he said. "
It just struck me as odd that the two movies the guy is talking about made just a little bit of money. from http://movies.yahoo.com/boxoffice-alltime/rank.ht
#5 Spider-Man $403,820,726
#13 Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones $298,843,836
where you can get arrested for listening to music.
Is it just me, or has this gone too far. It's time to break out some good old vigilateism on these control freaks. Time to organize.
Gee... Hollywood isn't having a terrible year this year because they release stuff like xXx and Spy Kids 2...nope... it has to be the media pirates...
At different points in the United States, the majority also thought that Women shouldn't be able to vote. Not too long later, a majority of the US thought that segregation was legal, and that discrimination was fine. However, the governemnt stepped in and determined that, in these cases (and many, many more) the majority of the US was wrong. We live in a democracy, but we are not ruled by a mob.
In other words, we listen to the majority but protect the individual from that same majority. We have copyright laws for a good reason, and they should be protected.
Moderation: Put your hand inside the puppet head!
In related news the RIAA has begun a lawsuit against anyone with the sensory organs known as 'ears' and the throat muscles and tissue responsible for sound creation (refered to herein in as the 'voice box').
This combination allows millions to 'listen' to any music and then replay it back by 'singing' the song. This will allow thousands to hear songs without purchasing them. The ramifications on the CD industry by these criminals is completely real, and must be stopped, according to the RIAA.
The lawsuit is believed to exclude deaf-mutes, though they are being examined for the ability to feel vibrations and possible replay them by tapping the rythm out on any surface available.
No Electronic Theft Act. Ok.
Here's the definition of theft:
\Theft\, n. [OE. thefte, AS. [thorn]i['e]f[eth]e, [thorn][=y]f[eth]e, [thorn]e['o]f[eth]e. See Thief.] 1. (Law) The act of stealing; specifically, the felonious taking and removing of personal property, with an intent to deprive the rightful owner of the same; larceny.
Note: To constitute theft there must be a taking without the owner's consent, and it must be unlawful or felonious; every part of the property stolen must be removed, however slightly, from its former position ; and it must be, at least momentarily, in the complete possession of the thief. See Larceny, and the Note under Robbery.
Emphasis mine. That should be easy; no file sharing programs remove files from RIAA hard drives. Problem solved!
Uniform enforcement, on the other hand, or even the widely-publicized appearance of uniform enforcement, brings the issues out of the geek ghetto to where the voting public confronts it.
Best thing that could happen would be for the RIAA to file criminal charges against Aunt Martha for letting her friends copy her Burl Ives recordings.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
Gnutella users, if you download a song and it is spoofed, PLEASE DELETE. This will minimize the problem. Also is there a way to block that ip address in future, and maybe create a master list of ips of spoofed files to post for everyone. On a sidenote, if the story is posted with registration, who cares who wrote it why dont you put the link to a sydicated http://www.msnbc.com/news/797030.asp?0dm=C15MT site.
Anyway, I think that they are using a wrong approach to tell people that software or any other piracy is a bad thing. Currently, it seems that they just wish to publish the capture of the big fished. What I suggest, is that they would nail a couple of "innocent" senior citizens with one pirate CD instead. Anyone, who is not nowadays thought as a pirate but still has one or two illegal copies will do. That should make people think.
Meanwhile, they should ofcourse nail the big ones too, but these joe average cases are the ones that should be passed to media, I think.
The most frightening thing about all of this is how the corporate copyright holders are redefining the definitions used in the laws.
It's obvious that these laws were passed with the intent of punishing people who copy and sell copyrighted material for financial gain, meaning money. But they are so scared by Peer to Peer sharing that they have simply redefined "financial gain" to cover any exchange of anything by anybody.
People have a deep urge to share. "I'll give you a copy of mine if you give me a copy of yours" is not motivated by financial gain.
But now a law that was designed to prosecute the guy who runs off a 1000 copies of Photoshop and sells them through the mail is being used to make a criminal out of me, my kids and virtually everybody I know.
Chernin argued that piracy will not only hurt creators of original content but also consumers if movie studios lose so many ticket sales that they begin cutting expenses.
Well well. While the rest of us are cutting our expenses and companies are going bankrupt left and right, the darling movie industry can't seem to even comprehend the concept.
I'll start to feel sorry for the movie industry when they actually lose money for a few years in a row. Actually I won't feel sorry at all, I'll feel like the theory of evolution has just been validated.
If the film studios do have a downturn, they're more likely to blame it on pirates that the fact that they're shoveling more and more crap onto theater screens...
What's the ratio now, one good movie for every 37 cinema stinkers like "Crossroads," "Pluto Nash" or "Master of Disguise"?
RIAA: Care to explain how big radio (infinity, clear channel, emmmis, ect...) more or less forces you to pay them to play crap?
How could a firmly entrenched highly profitable business be so shortsided with radio deregulation that playlists would be decided a very select group of people?
If you want any more money from me, lower CD prices in half. A movie soundtrack should not cost the same as the DVD!
If individual labels had online stores that sold an album for like $10 or a single for $1, I'd buy.
You would save a lot of money in distribution costs. Also, youd save money if you didnt try to sue ISP's, computer programmers, power companies, universities, corporations, individuals, and every other person with an independent thought who doesnt like what you do.
Ever read a history book? A student of US history?
Know what happened with the stamp act? Britain decided to tax the writers, who organized a revolution. Live free of die! Remember the hideous tax on tea? Boston tea party! This is an American Tradition here! Be patriotic or suck it!
MPAA: I dont mind spending $6 dollars to go see a movie in a theater. I can download movies but the quality sucks. Id rather pay for good entertainment then sit on my ass working a computer trying to download a crappy divx release. Dont label me as a criminal when I pay to see movies, rent at least 20 movies a year, and buy a couple DVDs every year as well.
Jack Valenti: Retire dammit. No one likes you. You belong in an asylum.
Hilary Rosen: If big radio has blackmail on you, haha its your ass. Just dont try to take it out on us or else I wont pay for cds!
Give consumers what they want or else you dont have a business. Simple free market darwinism. Play by the rules fairly or do something else!
Youd probably make a very good asbestos laywer. Use your talents elsewhere
The RIAA has bludgeoned its way into a critical issue here. The subpoena provisions only apply to material covered by 17 US 512(c), material on a service provider's system or network at the direction of users. The question, then, is whether or not a system owned by the user of an ISP is on that ISP's network or not.
My take on it is that it's like the phone system; anything upstream of the NIB belongs to the phone company and is on their network, anything downstream is on the user's network. This works for DSL and dialup, and a similar line could be drawn for cable. Unfortunately, it's quite possible that a sufficently incentivized court could decide that by using an ISP, you are putting your computer on THEIR network, and thus 512(c) applies.
This would be very bad, not just because of the subpoena clause. This would allow 512(c) takedown notices of items stored on your own machine. Host your own website with material the RIAA doesn't like? If it's on YOUR network, 512(a) absolutely protects your ISP from any monetary liability regardless of any takedown notices, and against injunctions in most cases. They'd have to sue you directly to get results.
But if the courts rule that your website is on your ISPs network, they can send a 512(c)(3) takedown notice, and your ISP would have to either cut your website off immediately or risk liability.
When the corporations are the ones writing the laws... whats the point of following them?
Unfortunately, the government is now the enemy of the people, the only option is civil disobedience (that is, not changing the habits we have such as copying cd's for our own person use which used to be perfectly legal)
GoatPigSheep, the 3 most important food groups
The labels are also supporting a bill, now under consideration in Congress, that would make it legal to "impair the operation of peer-to-peer" networks, such as LimeWire. That could be done, for example, by overloading file-sharing services with so many requests that they slow to a crawl.
And does Congress realize that this will also affect everyone up and down the line, including the backbones, the ISPs, and other users on the same nodes in cable broadband systems?
Thus far, only halting, low-key steps have been taken to thwart mass copying. Just four titles, including an album by country singer Charley Pride, have been released in the United States with reconfigured coding intended to render them unplayable in computer hard drives, which is where most CD burning and uploading to Web sites takes place.
Now just how do you cram a CD into a hard drive? Wouldn't attempting to do this with any disc break it, rendering it unplayable? The Computer illiterate should not write articles about technology. I'll bet David Seagal is still looking for his "any" key.
That's Bigboo TAY! TAY!
For those that just want to avoid the p2p networks, and instead serve their collection to themselves and to their friends, I humbly offer my software Andromeda, which can be used to stream MP3's and other files. It runs on a web server with PHP or ASP, and works on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X. If you want to control your own media archive, it might do the trick.
Here's what I do: Bitty Browser & Andromeda
After all, these are not a bunch of fat cats we're talking about -- piracy now threatens the livelihood of the rank and file workers of Hollywood. After all, the movie studios are having a terrible year, right?
Yeah! After all, we ALL know that it's OK to steal from people if they have more money than you. The bastards!
If you're going to make a point about whether something is right or wrong, it doesn't help your case to bring out irrelevent facts about how rich someone is. Right is right, and wrong is wrong.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
"It seems Listen4ever has performed a disappearing act. If it stays offline, the RIAA will withdraw its suit later today."
I always thought a good Slashdotting would smack the RIAA in the eye, never thought it'd happen this way though.
2. by the reproduction or distribution, including by electronic means, during any 180-day period, of 1 or more copies or phonorecords of 1 or more copyrighted works, which have a total retail value of more than $1,000, shall be punished as provided under section 2319 of title 18...
:-P
As long as you don't distribute $1000 worth (whatever that means) of materials in a 180 day period, you're fine!
sudo eat my shorts
If I got some great job to where I could afford to live in a neighborhood that was only 'better' simply because it was more expensive and had plenty of serived landscaping, I wouldn't move there. Nope, I would fix up my house and save the rest of the money for education and vacations I guess. Even better, invest it somewhere smart.
Now I see/hear many attempting to pull at my heart strings about the money they feel they 'deserve'. Ummm, sorry... there have been entirely too many that deserve much much more than they give and you will not ever see them making 6 figures or more. How many fathers of 3 have been killed protecting the country, neighborhood, or family that you will never hear of? I hear 98 million is the cut off for being charged luxury taxes, to which is one of the big gripes the baseball players (as in a FUCKING GAME that kids play)... sorry, that was rude but I think well placed and meant as more of a enhancement.
Now here is what I don't get. It may sound like I would be for taking the money from this overpaid oxygen thieves, but nothing could be more wrong. If I were a herd mentallity sheep, that only parrotted rhetoric instead of applying critical thought and insight, much less paying attention to history then it would probably be very likely. My parents were farmers, my granparents were farmers and mine workers, on up the line. However, I have learned that oh-so-valuable lesson that says that you do not cut off your nose to spite your face. If these societal leeches are making this money through the voluntary contributions of others, then so be it. As long as I never am forced to pay (like taxes) then it is all good... if still very depressing as to modern societies priorities and values.
I don't plan to steal any music, movies or TV, or even sneak into any baseball games. However, I think that if I buy a movie, music, game, software, redbrick, hammer, gun, steak knife, red meat, etc. that it is MINE to do with how I will. If I want to turn around and sell it (for more or less) then that is my right (as in rights vs priveledges). However, I may give, sell, etc only that one, simple. Just as I would be accountable for taking the brick, knife, or gun and hurting someone, so must the manufacturers be responsible if I am using it in a perfectly normal/intended way and it 'goes off' and hurts someone. (meaning that the idiots that sue gun manufacturers are once again proving that our society has not eliminated but actively REVERSED social darwinism by rewarding the weak and stupid... with money and sympathy).
I think it is highly ironic (but not historically so) that these athletes, actors and musicians that pull in so much cash for things that in reality do nothing directly beneficial to our society (as opposed to saving lives, progressing innovation, producing merchandise, etc) are then often so quick to turn on the very system that grants them the ability to have such an unnatural high netting of 'worth'. They are the quickest to demand that more regulation be brought in for this or that (as long as it does not infringe on THEIR OWN PERSONAL desires). Also, why is it that they are so insistent on raping others of their hard earned money yet themselves live in such disgusting decadence. (these people have no problem with paying 5000 a week for makeovers or dogfood)
I just don't get it... hope I never do I think
I guess going after the WorldCom and Enron executives who
....
perpetrated massive fraud and theft on their shareholders,
employees, and customers is just too hard for the DOJ. It's
much easier to surf the internet for tunes, subpoena an ISP for
personal records (thereby avoiding doing any work), and bust a
14 year-old kid who can't afford a new CD since his Dad was
was swindled out of his job and pension by the economic
damage resulting from widespread, unprosecuted corporate fraud.
A troll?
Moderation in everything, including moderation.
Where does this guy get off quoting that 10 million people tried to download Episode two in the first weekend? That's a mighty bold statement. I'd like to see Chernin back it up with some facts or supporting evidence. How did he log or track all these attempts? How does he know that 4 million were successful.
It is in fact Some Wild Ass Guess (SWAG). He like the rest of the RIAA droids pull these numbers out of their ass and Congress is accepting them at face value. It's pure bull!
It's as ridiculous as it would be for Linus to stand up and say that 5 billion people attempted to install Linux and 3 billion were successful, making his operating system the most widely used in the world. How would he possibly know?
"All this smacks of desperation," says Eric Garland, president of BigChampagne, a company hired by major labels to measure online file-sharing traffic. "When you've got a consumer movement of this magnitude, when tens of millions of people say, 'I think CD copying is cool and I'm within my rights to do it,' it gets to the point where you have to say uncle and build a business model around it rather than fight it."
You'd think they'd get it eventually, but I guess some people never will.
I know everyone's got a point of view on this matter, ranging from "all information should be free at birth" to "all information should be controlled and tolled".
My view is best expressed by first clearing up the confusion about nomenclature.
"Copyright"
I think Fair Use includes the ability to make copies, so I don't buy Jack Valenti's argument that making a copy of a DVD is, or should be, illegal.
Also, there are too many cases where the free flow of information can be unduly inhibited by onerous technical burdens just to protect the current business models of RIAA and MPAA members.
I think they should rename the concept "CopyCharge".
Owners of the current copyrights should have the exclusive right to distribute for charge.
Of course that includes money. But also, in all fairness, I think it should include Napster-like barter exchanges where "if I give you access to X copyrighted material then you give me access to Y copyrighted material".
I think everyone should respect copyright ownership in that way.
Thus, I don't have any problems with them prosecuting people who actually distribute copies of material for compensation when they don't own the "copycharge" right.
I do have a problem with heavy handed tactics where the flow of all digital information is restricted just because of some lawbreakers. It's just like crowbars. Yes, they can be used as burglary tools, but they're also quite useful in many other circumstances.
Yes, please, by all means prosecute actual burglars. No, under no circumstances, should you outlaw tools. That's why I view NET as great, but other laws such as DMCA and CB.... as abominations.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
This isn't flamebait. I hate the RIAA/MPAA and will continue to do what I can to prevent them from castrating technology to the point where its just another content delivery system.
That being said, is prosectuting end users for copyright violation bad in itself?
The absurd technological measures that they are proposing to "protect" their content will have far reaching and long lasting implication on what we can do with our hardware (whether or not I ever load file sharing software or "consume" any of their content).
Prosecuting someone who shares a bunch of teeny-pop (who is probably a minor) seems to be a much less damaging use of their money.
I've never seen anything suck horse wang the way the RIAA does. damn.
--What, you ain't know about them country fried sessions?
So let me get this straight. Because they are supposedly losing money to file sharing (which lets say they are) they've had to ditch artists, slash budgets for tours and videos, and reissue music out of their back catalogues.
Now, consider the recent trends in music with many many really crappy bands being made by the record companies for the record companies (think N'Sync, Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, etc.) and also a number of not really all that good bands getting publicized to death. Now think about some of the music in their back catalogues (Pink Floyd, The Who, The Doors, Steve Miller Band, Santana, The Eagles, Billy Joel, Eric Clapton, Phil Collins, Bruce Springsteen, etc.. etc.. etc...).
Is the fact that people would rather buy good music than the crap the RIAA has been forcing down peoples' throats so surprising to the RIAA? Hell, if anything the supposed lost revenues seem to have made an improvement!
The Ten Commandments of the RIAA:
1. Thou shalt have no entertainment before me.
2. Thou shalt not make unto thee any device by which thou mighst render my copyright protection ineffective.
3. Thou shalt not take the name of Britney Spears in vain, for I will not hold him guiltless who disrespects her.
4. Honor Hilary Rosen and Jack Valenti, that thy days of entertaining thyself might be long and pleasurable.
5. Thou shalt not download MP3s.
6. Thou shalt pay inflated prices for thine CDs.
7. Thou shalt pay unto me a tax for the blank media which thou acquirest, compensating me for heathen pirates.
8. Thou shalst allow me to search thine computer at my fancy, to ensure that you are virgin from illicitude.
9. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's MP3 collection, lest ye be tempted to download MP3s from him.
10. Thou shalt not seek out alternatives to me, for I am the one true RIAA.
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
I can't believe it. If I go to a theater and plunk down 15 bucks (the price of a movie at the good theaters in my neck of the woods) and I see an anti-piracy I'd have to laugh my ass off. "Gee, I only just put money down to see the damn thing in theaters, what more do they want?"
"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
-Hoban Washburn
I get like 700MB+ of porn a *DAY* off usenet. I *DO NOT* want those dickheads shutting it down!
As long as the punishment from the DOJ is the same slap on the wrist ("Now don't you do it again!") they gave Microsoft...
four titles, including an album by country singer Charley Pride, have been released in the United States with reconfigured coding intended to render them unplayable in computer hard drives
That's because Michael doesn't take kindly to critisism and moderated all simmilar posts down immediately. However, everyone knows how salient these posts realy are and the other moderators have modded some of them back up.
Sounds like a conspiracy theory, I know. But, it has happened in the past and this is an obvious demonstration.
As for FortKnox's complaints, he's experienced this many times before but, should expect such treatment since he trolls regularly.
if you distrube a 20$ CD, if 51 people download, that is 1020$. Yes, I know that is not how it is writtten, but that may be the interpretation. -Warped
One where the authorities are powerless to stop those things that they hate, and where they couldn't identify those using it?
I've been thinking about something like this, ever since reading William's Otherland. In it, there is a virtual reality network only accessible to the hackers of the world, by invitation only. Completely non-technical, not to mention VR, but it started me thinking about how you could go about something like this.
If you care to hear more about this, read my work in progress page about it...
WARNING: I do tend to rant a bit, so it's not exactly prim and proper.
There were already plenty of tools for enforcing copyrights. Why do we suddenly need a whole new raft of laws because of the Internet?
If the companies really want to go after major P2P nodes then they can do the legwork and file a civil lawsuit just like they did against the guy cranking out VHS tapes in his garage.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Just occurred to me the logical answer to that would be "They don't want you going to download the movie after you've seen it in theaters, like you did with Star Wars Episode 2." Well tough sh*t. They get my money once in theaters, and chances are good they'll get more from me when I buy the DVD. Anyway, my 2c... or 4c.
"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
-Hoban Washburn
This is a fat cat! ;-)
The ultimate goal is to retire the so-called "Red Book" CD standard that was developed in 1980 by Sony and Phillips, and which is embedded in nearly every recorded compact disc sold today.
I own a 200 disc DVD/CD changer made by Sony. I have nothing but good things to say about this product, as it plays CD, CD-Rs, and DVDs quite well. It has one minor issue though: it won't play anything but Red Book compliant CDs. For example, I have to burn copies of all the CDs I buy that use the new "Enhanced CD" format in order to use them in this player. The replacement cost for this product is US$800. The exact player I own is still for sale in the US. Anyone want to venture a guess as to whether Sony will be liable if they deliberately make this product obsolete and fail to warn potential consumers?
I have no incentive to replace this player if it is made obsolete by the RIAA. Whatever anti-piracy technology they create will be cracked and then I'd be forced to replace it again with the next anti-piracy-compliant music technology. No thanks.
It really takes this level of stupidity to wake up the idiot masses. When little Jimmy goes to the Pen for swapping Britney trash, Daddy Six-Pack gets pissed and vents on "Good Morning America".
Nothing is going to change for the better until a *LOT* of people get prosecuted. Then the sheeple start to ask is the DOJ might possibly have some better use for their time...
I would to remind everyone that it is the 10 year aniversary of Ruby Ridge. The U.S. Government can and will take your P2P software away if it wants and if you resist...you are dead!!!
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
Isnt reporting massive declines in sales, when in fact the opposite is true, isnt that Fraud? /inflating/ profits, instead of claiming to have lost money. But then, thay're claiming to have lost money in order to seek help from the government. That much is common too. I want to know what's being said by these guys when they're actually, directly, talking. We always hear it second-hand, them saying "We've lost money", but doesnt it tend to go first-hand- "We've lost money, here are figures from this year, and here is last year."
It may not seem like it at first, because usually when Fraud is tied with things like that, it is the companies
So I guess it just comes down to bad journalism. Not checking out the validity of your sources.
Right?
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
I honestly have to wonder whether the music industry paid to put propaganda on the front page of The Washington Post, because David Segal has been around long enough to know better than to write a piece like "A New Tactic in the Download War" (8/21/02).
Segal repeatedly points to falling sales of CDs and implies that piracy is the cause:
"The record labels have been spurred to action by figures they find terrifying: The number of 'units shipped' -- CDs sent to record stores or directly to consumers -- fell by more than 6 percent last year, and it's widely expected to fall 6 to 10 percent more by the end of 2002. Those drops are already hitting the industry hard. Labels are laying off employees, ditching artists, slashing budgets for tours and videos, and combing their back catalogues for reissues that cost almost nothing to release."
Yet he neglects to mention that every industry has been hit hard and is laying off people -- even the news media. If CD sales fell 6 percent last year, I'd say the music industry is doing extremely well, because the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell about 9 percent in that same period (including the post-9-11 recovery).
Segal goes on to say sales are "widely expected to fall 6 to 10 percent more by the end of 2002." Guess what? The Dow has fallen over 10 percent since the beginning of the year, on top of last year's 9 percent loss, and the economy is widely expected to get worse. Could it be that people are spending less money on trivial things like CDs because they have less money in their pockets? Or because their retirement savings have been wiped out? We would all like to be patriotic and buy an album a day, but one must have priorities. At least until CDs become edible and wholesome.
"There's evidence, though, that Americans are spending more time than ever listening to CDs," Segal continues.
What is Segal's evidence?
"Market surveys suggest that more blank CDs (CD-Rs) than recorded CDs are now sold in the United States."
Perhaps Segal could explain how an increase in CD-R sales constitutes evidence "that Americans are spending more time than ever listening to CDs."
CD-Rs are also facilitate fair-use activities. The 40-something who has just discovered CD-Rs decides to put his deteriorating record collection on CDs so he can listen to them for years to come. The 20-something creates a custom mix of his favorite songs from several CDs so he doesn't have to take his eyes off the road to change discs on his way to work.
CD-Rs are also used to archive data. We live in an age where the data repositories we depend on, from the computers in our homes to the physical documents in the World Trade Center, are no longer safe. They can disappear in an instant when anything from a software glitch to a terrorist attack occurs. It stands to reason that people look to the CD format to archive their tax documents, emails, family photos, scans of their kids' artwork and anything else that's important to them.
What mother couldn't turn up enough content to fill a spindle-full of CD-Rs a month? And as she realizes the potential for storing memories and documents, she begins to collect even more. She takes more digital photos and more video of her family. She starts scanning in old family photos and scanning the catalogues for a moderately-priced DVD-R burner because she needs more space.
CD-Rs are also quickly replacing the floppy disk. Floppy disks wear out, they are susceptible to magnetic fields, they don't mail very well, they're slow, and they only hold 1.4 megabytes of data. A DSL user can download 1.4 megabytes of data from the Internet faster than he can read 1.4 megabytes of data from his own floppy drive. CD-Rs will not wear out in your lifetime (unless you microwave them), they are impervious to magnetic fields, AOL has proven that you can transport them in many creative, inexpensive ways, they offer fast data transfer rates and they hold at least 650 megabytes of data. There is also evidence of a growing market for CD-Rs to be used as frisbees, travel mirrors, cetrifuge shrapnel and kid-safe Chinese throwing stars.
However, Segal's "evidence" proves nothing about American listening trends.
Segal also mentions the music industry's support of a bill that would make it legal to "impair the operation of peer-to-peer" networks and follows it up with a quote from RIAA chairwoman Hilary Rosen in which she announces that the industry has a "history" of being "generous with consumers," and that it is simply looking to enforce its existing rights.
Segal tries to present the appearance of a balanaced story by noting that the bill's "strategy has generated plenty of skepticism." This is true. However, the only skepticism he cites is the industry concern that "foolproof locks... don't exist in the digital realm."
He neglects to mention the larger concern: that the wording of the supported bill would make it legal for the music industry to attack any network it "suspects" may contain pirated files. It allows big business to engage in unrestrained vigilante justice on the digital frontier with the kind of attacks that have brought down major Internet services like Yahoo and ETrade in the past. These attacks are currently federal crimes, for good reason. The bill would give the music industry the legal authority to shut down any service on the Internet indefinitely, without a court order or subsequent review. The Washington Post may want to bear this in mind the next time it publishes an unfavorable review of a music album.
This shoddy journalism smacks of the kind of factually incorrect propaganda corporations distribute in their press releases.
Segal's article fits well with the music industry's propaganda campaign. At a time when the bill is being considered in Congress, a front-page story in the only Washington paper that ends up in every Congressman and Senator's office highlighting the alleged need for legislation to save the industry and combat lawlessness is worth its weight in gold.
I find it exceptionally difficult to believe that the music industry could "buy" this story. I also find it hard to believe that a seasoned reporter like Segal could be lazy enough to write this article and that a front-page story would not undergo the scrutiny necessary to uncover its deep holes and steep slant. The most plausible explanation I can find is that The Post is so genuinely concerned about the implications of the bill it wants to secure its place on the industry's alleged "generous" side.
Then I wanted to move some DVDs into a form I could actually watch on a plane (pda), cause my laptop screen is too big for cattle class and I find that even owning such a tool would make me a felon...
And now I reflect on how the DoJ wants to make these bold statements, but when it comes to protecting me from
1) having my software cracked and put up on a foreign site (along with a lot of other victims)
2) having my 401K raped (actually I don't invest in tech, but I still got nailed due to overall market misery)
they could care less about me or any other average citizen other than when some entrenched interest thinks we need to have something else taken away from us.
I come to the sad conclusion that the government that governs me does not in any way shape or form represent me or my interests. It's getting worse every day, and the common consensus at this time from the system to the average slashdot reader is that we're criminals, and anything done to us is perfectly fine, but anything we do is inherently bad.
Methinks the time for massive digital civil disobediance is upon us. Since we're all already guilty before the fact, since it's perfectly OK to assume we're bad and act accordingly with zero proof, who the hell wants to be hung for a sheep. Time to be a wolf, I say.
Prosecuting file sharers will definitely cause many to stop sharing. Why risk these ridiculous penalties. So, we can have off-shore servers; these will be cut off if things continue as they have. Other tech solutions can be legislated to death as well.
Most understand that it is the business model that is dying, not music (though some of the shit out there...). All businesses strive for a Monopoly. Most of the time they find it better to divide the territory among the survivors in an ologopoly. An ologopoly is much the same as a monopoly except to stay busy, the MBAs trade a few points of market share back and forth, and they wait patiently for the mistake that will crumble the other, so they can take credit and get a few million more options.
Seems like the real conflict is 'how does one achieve economy of scale without granting so much power to the faceless company that the customer becomes an afterthought to the real money made through manipulating the Stock market?'
Thoughts?
It would be good if the File Sharing software had a feature that allowed users to lookup who their representatives were and let them know how they voted on legislation that affected the P2P technology. The software should provide a brief summary of the legislation and how it would hurt what I'm currently doing.
If politicians get the idea that millions of people who use such software will know if their representatives are screwing them, it could be deterrent.
Maybe some sort of e-mail feature can be built in that allows you with the press of a button to send a message to your representative that you intend to vote against them in the next election if they vote to approve some legislation.
People will most likely not act on their threat, but politicians won't necessarily know that.
>The DOJ announced that they are planning to prosecute filesharers under the The No Electronic Theft ("NET") Act.
All the more reason for people to help the Freenet project by writing code for it. Freenet is designed to protect the identity of the people who make files available, the people who download them, and even the location of the servers the files are stored on.
From the bit on the anti-piracy warning:"These are people's livelihoods at stake. It's not just a bunch of fat-cat Hollywood people," Well it is fat-cats, but it isn't JUST fat-cats.
On a different note, I'm kinda sad the RIAA dropped it's suit against the ISPs. I was looking forward to finding out if AT&T would fight the RIAA if they thought they had to protect their common carrier status, and if the RIAA had bitten off more than it could chew. It could have been interesting. Then again, its more likely that AT&T would have just settled quietly, and that would have been sad.
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
Yeah, I was one of the "thieves" that downloaded Attack of the Clones the day after its release, denying the movie industry of its precious profits.
Oops! I forgot to mention that I waited in line 3 hours to see it on opening midnight, and that I saw it 3 more times, including once on a digital screen. That's $40 for tickets (NYC prices). Yeah, MPAA, that download was one hell of a "lost sale."
Let's get drunk and delete production data!
I like it much better when America caters to the special interests of Corporate America. At least the RIAA and MPAA have a voice. God bless America.
This post has gone form -1 to +5 and back TWICE, so far.
How many other posts have consumed this many mod points? Presently 13 mod points burned over a post that is definitely (Score: 3 Insightful)
There is a small but significant difference between stealing a car or grape and copying a cd causing a lost sale.
Difference:
Cars and grapes are physical products, they are (more or less) rare and you cause direct damage to the former owner of the grape or the car.
CDs and DVDs represent virtual goods, they are available in unlimited numbers (almost, as they need a physical representation i.e. acrylic in case of the cds). As this is not about plain old shoplifting of cds, you do not steal a physical object. You could cause (at max) one lost sale. You do not hurt anyones wallet, you just prevent someone from making money.
So you do not steal a thing, you are an obstacle in the way of the profit. Thats a big difference I think.
Preventing some company from making money is at the same level as loitering drunk before the supermarket begging for money - it scares the customers away or like protesting before the shell/ford/GM building demanding the end of SUVs and global warmth caused by CO2 - scares customers away.
So please don't be too serious about "stealing" when you mean "copying". you only affect potential sales, in the end its a lot like greenpeace does with car, fuel and fur sales. If they scare all the potential car buyers about the ecological desaster of SUVs, ford doesn't sell that much explorers, causing them to stumble over the R&D costs of it.
Can you lend me a mod point?
This guy wants the Government to tear up the US Constitution on his behalf, and he has the gall to call others "wholly amoral and self-serving"?
Check out the graph in the Washington Post story.
It's interesting the note the similarities between the number of "recorded CD's shipped" and the major economic indicators.
Given all the over-the-top histrionics about the RIAA, I'm a little surprised about not hearing much from people who actually make a living selling entertainment? Is the RIAA right? Is file sharing costing you money? Perhaps you make most of your money from concerts and clubs, and see file sharing as just one more way to get new fans? Or, maybe you make your money from CD sales, and see it as a real threat?
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
copyright laws don't fall into the category of laws you are describing (laws which were created to protect individuals from the majority mob).
Copyright laws were put in place purely and simply for the good of the public.
Lord Macaulay, in his famous 1841 speech before the house of commons, succinctly summarized the reasoning behind copyright laws in the English speaking world:
The advantages arising from a system of copyright are obvious. It is desirable that we should have a supply of good books; we cannot have such a supply unless men of letters are liberally remunerated; and the least objectionable way of remunerating them is by means of copyright.
The preamble of Article 1, Section 8 of the US constitution also states the purpose of the copyright and patent powers (if not their scope):
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
Copyright does not protect authors, it creates a bargain between the public and authors whereby the public refrains for a period from unlicensed copying his works in return for his producing those works. The idea of natural rights to intellectual property have been around for some time, but they are not the basis of copyright, nor have they ever carried much weight until now.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Right, so this goes on when I see the movie ad (SIM0NE) on slashdot today...
Lets not forget to put a link to the RIAA Website, wouldn't want them to miss out on a good Slashdotting.
Red Hat's next distribution will probably be available in a month or two. So this is as good a time as any to ask everyone to make the ISOs available on as many file sharing networks as possible.
I had put up 7.3 on Gnutella with limitied success. A few people downloaded some chunks.
If RH 8.0 (or whatever) gets spread around, not only will we have saved the mirrors from several days of hell, but also demonstrated very clearly a legitimate use for these networks.
Thank you for your support.
"The cost of freedom is eternal vigilance." -Thomas Jefferson
If one of my friends wants to buy a new SUV from Ford and I manage to make him believe that these SUVs do horrors to our environment and he buys a Bike instead,
I hope this shows, that your point is moot.
Can you lend me a mod point?
Speaking of lists....
So many people talk about "I'm never buying another CD until this crap stops", but I have yet to see the internet being used for a higher-purpose:
Making lists of both record publishers who pay into RIAA, and record publishers who do not. I probably wouldn't stop purchasing CDs from Sony Discos or BMG, but I would certainly give more weight to Joe's Record Maker records if I knew that Joe's record sales didn't buy protection from the RIAA. After all, RIAA is nothing really different from OPEC -- a seller's syndicate, not a government demanded tax, like some states have for insurance.
What happens when someone finally builds a machine that allows you to duplicate simple objects?
We will we not allow a device this fantastic to exist?
That would suck.
MjM
I never mod down...
XKCD:Xeric Knowledge Comically Dispen
I love the way the RIAA think that every song shared by P2P is a lost sale.
LOL!
So I read that the music companies are now pumping out faulty versions of popular file sharing tracks to consume people's bandwidth. This kind of simple technological sabotage has a limited shelf life and an air of desperation about it. The street finds its own solutions, as the cyberpunks are wont to say, and within a short space of time I expect to see a new generation of file sharing applications emerge that have the notion of weighted trust built into them. Something like EBay's trust system combined with a "PageRank"-like weighting, but anonymous, and based on community "votes" for the legitimacy (or not) of checksum-verified, datestamped tracks. Perhaps using public keys created exclusively for that purpose. All the required technology bits and pieces are already out there so it's just a matter of time.
Da Blog
I wish there was some kind of P2P network to only offer legal content, so that I'd be able to stay away from the crud promoted by the RIAA and its partners. Imagine being able to download gigabytes of completely legal music, which is already available out there but not so easy to find - or tell apart from the mainstream music. If you have a thousand hours of music, are you still really compelled to buy Britney's latest?
If there is ONE person that has downloaded a song without paying for it, the industry has been damaged by EXACTLY that one song. QED.
I phrased this wrong. I should have said:
If there is ONE person that has downloaded a song without paying for it that would have bought it if they hadn't been able to download it, the industry has been damaged by EXACTLY that one song. QED.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
While you make some good points, there is one significant change that we've not evaluated in depth yet.
By the DOJ trying to apply the NET law, the cost of protecting the copyrights is being shifted from the copyright holders to the Federal government, i.e. to the taxpayers. In contrast, a trademark infringement case requires the trademark holder to file suit and press for action. There is a significant difference between a civil violation and a criminal offense.
Apparently, this is justified by the 'vital' role IP play in the US economy. An interesting question to consider is: WHY is the copyright holders is such a privileged positions vis-a-vis the other IP holders? Does the FBI help Coca Cola protect its brand? Does the DOJ investigate patent infrinements??
Napster obviously killed the RIAA. They barely had enough money to pay mobs of lawyers to sue people. Forget the fact that year after napster was shut down that record sales was lower than any of the years while napster was in use. I believe I saw this in some infoporn. And liebowitz says that file sharing could be good for the music industry
I Personally mis napster, it was so much easier to actually get what you wanted than using gnutella, and I don't dare install kazaa. Obviously record sales must be hurting even more now to pay for all of the politicians they are buying off.
Sure piracy is bad. But I've never heard of an industry attacking it's customers. The RIAA might suggest that they're attack the people who aren't paying, while in reality somebody has to be buying the CDs to rip them. I believe It's not like the music companies are an oligopaly so there's plenty of good old competition there.
How long will it be before these dinsaurs go extinct?
i could not think of anything clever.
According to this BBC News article "The average (increase in box office recipts) across 21 European countries was 76%".
Are they saying that sharing copyrighted files in the US is *THAT* bad?
Or are they just FUD dumping
The significance didn't sink in the first time I read it. : "permits a copyright owner to send a subpoena ordering a 'service provider' to turn over information about a subscriber. It is not necessary to file a lawsuit to take advantage of the DMCA's expedited subpoena process. "
I wonder what the requirements are to use this expedited subpoena. I suppose it is written so that only large corporations may take advantage of it. But if it isn't, imagine being able to go to an ISP and say "I think this guy at your IP address is breaking my copyright and I need to know who he is." the next time some llama stabs you in the back or rips you off in Everquest or whatever. Boy, that is a law that sure is written to be abused.
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
Most industries outside of entertainment don't have "stars" who draw vast numbers of people through name alone, and expect similarly vast amounts of money. If Scott McNealy left Sun, most of Sun's major customers would probably still trust the hardware, software and services... but adding a Tom "You filthy man-animal" Cruise or a Denzel "Yes, black males CAN get an Best Actor after all, if a bit later than deserved" Washington to a movie will probably raise audience interest /a lot/. Heh. Would Brittney (sp?) Spears sell music (an audio form...) if it weren't for her videos and her appearance?
If memory serves, Matt LeBlanc was quoted in a recent _Newsweek_ (Perspectives section, they weren't the original recipients) to the effect that "if you can get a raise and you don't, you're stupid". Stars currently can and do get massive amounts of money. Perhaps they're going to have to be weaned off their massive pay... probably not before they stop being worshipped by the masses, however.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Perhaps the NET Act will increase the prices for CDs.
First, to protect users from the NET Act, Kazaa et al. upgrade with the feature to count the running cost of uploads within the past 180 days. This would be calculated based on the then-current value of the products as uploaded. Once the total cost approaches the lowest threshold ($1000), uploads are stopped until enough time passes so that the past-180-day upload cost drops below danger level.
Second - in response - the record companies raise the prices of CDs in an attempt to circumvent this work-around?
Bezuwork's Friend
You hit the nail on the head. "No, we can't be expected to minimize costs to improve profits! You should pay us more!" Telling statement on their part.
Of course they are... we're boycotting them.
Lusers.
How come a coke cost over $5.00 at my movie threater anyways? What a rip!
If it were clean water, or clean air, or something else necessary for decent living, I would be upset. Given that it is awful music and awful films, I'm not.
I've given up on mass media. I buy some CDs, but only old ones (e.g., Crosby Stills, Nash and Young). I gave up on video when I moved from the US to the UK.(I found out that I couldn't watch a video my brother in the US sent to me on VCRs here.) I won't do DVD as I don't like the arrangements. However, I do buy books. About 800 USD a year worth. We have a TV, but it is used only about 3 hours a week.
Best Wishes,
Bob
What I never understood is what gives musicians and actors the right to millions of dollars? What gives corporations the right to all this money? Last time I checked actors and musicians were just like you and I. So what if their works are heard and seen around the world, guess what, more than one programmer has a made a piece of software that has been used worldwide, but he gets very little for it. Being famous doesn't entitle these people to oodles and oodles of money. And the RIAA shouldn't get shitloads of money either. Every industry deals with piracy and counterfeiting. There are sweatshops that make imitation designer clothes. Do they often get shut down? No. Do the people that purchase these fake clothes get arrested? No. Then why is it when one person downloads something that can be heard on a free source such as the radio, gets in some serious trouble. Like an earlier poster said how fucked are our laws when we can get 5 years in jail for downloading some music or a movie but if you kill somebody unintentionally you only get 2 or 3 years? That truly is fucked.
I'm all for fair use...make a copy of a CD for my family, etc... but the fact is downloading every movie available on kazaa (and in turn re-serving them up for others to download) can hardly be considered anything but piracy.
Most of the arguments I see on slashdot are rationalizations of why it is okay to steal music, software, etc...
Maybe instead of spending $400 every 2 weeks for the baddest mofo video card, you buy the stuff you are ripping off, and then copyright holders would back off their crazy countermeasures b/c there's no need.
Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. I've downloaded music off the net just like most everybody else...but i'm not gonna complain when it's not possible to do something I really didn't have the right to in the first place.
stop whining!
Below is the text pira^H^H^copi^H^H^ "Quoted" from the riaa.org site.
," the reporter observes, "though some factions of the industry see price resistance -- CD prices are relatively low and home videos rentals are still a bargain -- consumers don't seem to balk at the rising price of fun in this strong, family-friendly economy." The prices of other forms of entertainment have risen, on average, more rapidly than has music or consumer prices, with most admission prices for other forms of entertainment having increased more than 90% between 1983 and 1996.
While I read this (twice), I still don't know what makes up the cost of a CD. It's aparently quite complicated. Some make money, some lose money.
Producing the media dropped in cost, the CPI rose.
Artists take days, weeks, months, even years to develope albums.
Also while I was reading, the voices in my head went silent for a moment.
Then I thought I heard a chorus of "*Cough, cough,(bullshit) cough, cough*".
My head hurts, I'm goin' for a beer.
From the site:
A typical music fan who buys a CD might use that CD at home, take that CD in the car, make a tape of that CD, - or using it as part of a compilation, play that CD with friends and for friends, and keep that CD for many years. That's probably why most consumers, when asked, describe CDs as a good value. At the same time, when asked directly whether CDs cost too much, some consumers will say yes! Why the contradiction? Because some consumers don't understand why the sales tag on a CD is so much higher than the cost of producing the actual physical disc, a cost, which in fact, has decreased over the years.
While the RIAA does not collect information on the specific costs that make up the price of a CD, there are many factors that go into the overall cost of a CD -- and the plastic it's pressed on, is among the least significant. CD manufacturing costs may be lower, but it takes more money than ever before to put out a new recording.
Of course, the most important component of a CD is the artist's effort in developing that music. Artists spend a large portion of their creative energy on writing song lyrics and composing music or working with producers and A&R executives to find great songs from great writers. This task can take weeks, months, or even years. The creative ability of these artists to produce the music we love, combined with the time and energy they spend throughout that process is in itself priceless. But while the creative process is priceless, it must be compensated. Artists receive royalties on each recording, which vary according to their contract, and the songwriter gets royalties too. In addition, the label incurs additional costs in finding and signing new artists.
Once an artist or group has songs composed, they must then go into the studio and begin recording. The costs of recording this work, including recording studio fees, studio musicians, sound engineers, producers and others, all must be recovered by the cost of the CD.
Then come marketing and promotion costs -- perhaps the most expensive part of the music business today. They include increasingly expensive video clips, public relations, tour support, marketing campaigns, and promotion to get the songs played on the radio. For example, when you hear a song played on the radio -- that didn't just happen! Labels make investments in artists by paying for both the production and the promotion of the album, and promotion is very expensive. New technology such as the Internet offers new ways for artists to reach music fans, but it still requires that some entity, whether it is a traditional label or another kind of company, market and promote that artist so that fans are aware of new releases.
For every album released in a given year, a marketing strategy was developed to make that album stand out among the other releases that hit the market that year. Art must be designed for the CD box, and promotional materials (posters, store displays and music videos) developed and produced. For many artists, a costly concert tour is essential to promote their recordings.
Another factor commonly overlooked in assessing CD prices is to assume that all CDs are equally profitable. In fact, the vast majority is never profitable. Each year, of the approximately 27,000 new releases that hit the market, the major labels release about 7,000 new CD titles and after production, recording, promotion and distribution costs, most never sell enough to recover these costs, let alone make a profit. In the end, less than 10% are profitable, and in effect, it's these recordings that finance all the rest.
Clearly there are many costs associated with producing a CD, and despite these costs the price of recorded music to consumers has fallen dramatically since CDs were first introduced in 1983. Between 1983 and 1996, the average price of a CD fell by more than 40%. Over this same period of time, consumer prices (measured by the Consumer Price Index, or CPI) rose nearly 60%. If CD prices had risen at the same rate as consumer prices over this period, the average retail price of a CD in 1996 would have been $33.86 instead of $12.75. While the price of CDs has fallen, the amount of music provided on a typical CD has increased substantially, along with higher quality in terms of fidelity, durability, ease of use, and range of choices, including multi-media material, such as music videos, interviews and discographies. Content of this type often requires considerable production expense and adds a whole new dimension that goes beyond conventional audio.
In contrast, CD prices are low compared to other forms of entertainment and one of the few entertainment units to decrease in price, even though production, marketing and distribution costs have increased. In a USA Today article entitled, "Spending a Fortune for Fun: The cost of entertainment is rising along with our willingness to pay it
By all measures, when you consider how long people have the music and how often they can go back and get "re-entertained" CDs truly are an incredible value for the money.
Perhaps the checksums of files could become an integral part of gnutella, so that spoofed files show up as "different" even though the filesize is the same. But, I guess then clients would be hacked to provide spoofed checksums, so then the clients would need to be checksummed... :^)
Slashdot's first reaction to VMware
Finally, the Washington Post (probably one of the last articles we post from their site, as they go registration-required)
Oh my god, what a bunch of babies. Registration required? Asks you your DOB (I put in 20 years before my true DOB) your sex (I put in F, I am actually M) and your zip code (my entry was totally fictional). Took all of ten seconds.
That's it, I'm moving to a remote wilderness location with a satellite dish. They'll have to pry my mp3's from my cold, dead fingers!!
I remember about five years ago, I was totally done with music. Tired of paying for CD's that had just 1 or 2 songs I liked and hoping in vain I might enjoy other songs on the albums. I was finished with it, totally disinterested in music. Then someone showed me some MP3's, and I downloaded a bunch of them, starting to listen to music again. Re-visiting old songs, and trying out new music. Eventually, I actually bought a new CD! Imagine that!
I also remember when a techie at work showed me downloaded movies for the first time. He showed me a movie that would not be in the theaters for another month, American Pie. I never would have even heard of the movie, or seen any of it, if it weren't for the movie download. I ended up renting it on DVD and eventually buying it. More money for the movie industry it would have never seen without these "illicit" downloads.
Now, maybe I am in the minority with all this, but somehow I think not. I figure there are others that were on the edge of being done with music that were re-introduced to it as a result of all these internet technologies. I would be much more likely to make a CD or DVD purchase in the future as a result of these technologies, not less likely. How is that a bad thing?
I think the Music and Movie industries are missing the boat with their endless lawsuits. To borrow w/o permission from a copyrighted movie, "the more they tighten their grip, the more servers will slip through their fingers." At any rate, they should be finding ways to offer the services people obviously want for a small fee. That is the best way to control it and put the "illicit" rebels out of business.
This issue reminds me of what I have read about prohibition. The government passed laws to prohibit the sale of alcohol, but the people wanted it so much that eventually the laws were repealed.
P.S. Sorry for the Anon post, Slashdot said it would mail me a password but it did not. Twice!
Would it have hurt that marketing MORON so much to have simply said: "Kids are listening to music".
Marketing people should all be rounded up and shot.
So then by your reasons women before suffrage, and minorities before the civil rights movement are just as underprivilaged and unrepresented in Congress as the corporations represented by the RIAA and MPAA are today?
Riiiiight.
Starting Jan 1, 2003 for three months, 90 days. Give up buying all entertainment media.
I know this was tried with gasoline a few months back. Yet we need gasoline to work. We don't need entertainment. It's a luxury.
If you want to support an artist go to a concert, see a play, or read a few books.
Let's kill their profit margin and see what happens...hit where it hurts...the pocket book.
They want control of all media let's see what happens to all the lawyers when the bank runs dry for a quarter.
Just a thought.
exactly. right is right, wrong is wrong.
let's punish the music industry for stealing the artist's money...
let's punish the theaters for stealing our money claiming we are paying to see the movie. if that were true, why would they make us watch all those ads before the movie?
let's punish those who become rich off other people's work. they don't earn the money, they indirectly steal it out of the working man's pocket.
or... let's just sit here, throw our lives away in low paying jobs, and feed the fat.
-judging another only defines yourself
I would like to read more about this. Dat shit iz crazee!!!!
let's punish the music industry for stealing the artist's money...
Absolutely nothing is stolen from the artist. Nobody puts a gun to their head to sign a contract. Nothing stops them from starting their own record company.
let's punish the theaters for stealing our money claiming we are paying to see the movie. if that were true, why would they make us watch all those ads before the movie?
Because the ads subsidize the ticket price. Or maybe you can tell me exactly where you were promised that you would see no ads? If there were no ads, there would be higher ticket prices.
let's punish those who become rich off other people's work. they don't earn the money, they indirectly steal it out of the working man's pocket.
Guess what? Contrary to popular belief, it's the organizers of society who are the most valuable in society, not the "workers". If you didn't have the people who organized record companies, artists would sit around all day playing their guitar and bedding chicks at night, and you would never hear them. You think the average artist has the skill to put together a mass distribution mechanism? Ha! fat chance based on the artists I know.
or... let's just sit here, throw our lives away in low paying jobs, and feed the fat.
People are paid EXACTLY what they are monetarily worth. And that's based on supply and demand. Always has, always will. If you want more money, then be more in demand, or in shorter supply. Or not. It's up to you, but don't whine because some people are more monetarily valuable than you.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
If they take away ripped movies, then we need to push a law to prosecute the Entertainment industry for producing terrible movies that we paid to see.
I download Theater Screen rips but guess what? I NEVER WATCH EM'! Why? they SUCK! The only thing they have made me do is want to see the flick on cable when it comes out.
I download gigz of warez, but guess what? I burn them to CD and I NEVER USE THEM! Most of the programs are redundantly useless anyway. Games haven't really changed in the past 10 years.
We need a law to sue a record company when I am forced to hear a song I hate - that's the real crime - like second hand smoke.
My point is that it goes both ways. Would the Dead have been as huge a success without the free bootlegging? NO! their albums all SUCK.
Yes it is.
Watching Cowboy Bebop in my jammies, eating a bowl of Shreddies.
Travis Daub notes of his download of Moby's "We are all made of Stars" "It was just 20 seconds of the song, repeated over and over," (from the Wash Post article)
Actually, that's the whole song.
"
people they come together
people they fall apart
no one can stop us now
'cause we are all made of stars
"
Repeat as desired...
What? I cannot distribute works I own? As in owning the actual copyright like the guy said? That is crap-- you do not know what you are talking about. The entire purpose of copyright law is to entitle the copyright owner to control the distribution of his/her works. A person that owns the copyright to a work is free to distribute that work or tell others they are allowed to distribute the work.
If I create a song or movie, it is perfectly legal for me to distribute it on a p2p network--just like it is legal for me to distribute it via the web, a CD, a CD-ROM disk, a DVD disk, or even written on my underpants. Next you'll be saying I can't write something down and "distribute" the note to a friend because that note is automaticly copyrighted under the Berne Convention.
That CD prices aren't determined by the normal laws of a free market. If you take something like, say, computers where more or less one is an acceptable substitute for another than yes, the price will find it's ideal point. The problem is that CDs do not compete with eachother since each offers a unique experience (well ok, that's debatable with pop music). At any rate it is possable, and I would even say likely that the rcodrd companies are NOT charging the ideal amount of money. I believe that if they dropped the price, they would start selling enough more as to make more money (remember the whole elasticity of demand curves from econ 101).
Labels claim that sales of CD-Rs spike during the same week a major new release hits stores -- a sign that people are buying, say, the new Bruce Springsteen CD and making free copies of it for their friends.
Ok Washington Post you have this claim and it's easy enough to confirm this. Isn't it?
All we ever hear is the labels claim this or that. The other side claims the opposite.
What is the truth here?
I think given that he's careful enough to only entrust his personal info to a couple of sites, one of those sites is highly unlikely to be Microsoft's.
It doesn't matter what you can afford. Having a CD is not a Right, nor a Necessity. If you can't afford what the market demands for a product, you don't automatically gain the right to steal it. Breaking the law is breaking the law. If you don't like IP laws, get them changed.
-c
I have discovered a truly remarkable proof which this margin is too small to contain.
Sheesh...
________________
All my sig are fjdklafjkldafjkldafdaklf
If I can get a patent on spoofing files. Fighting fire with fire...
ato
No one will care until this whole mess is left, wheezing, flayed and bleeding, on everyone's front steps. No mother will care until her son is dragged to jail for downloading a CD.
If these folks want to get hard and dirty, we'll see if they survive the Gotterdammerung they kick up. Let's have them get all jokey-pseudo-government on us, and see how far it gets them.
In the meanwhile, please carry on as you always have. That, at base, is its own justification.
What we call folk wisdom is often no more than a kind of expedient stupidity.-Edward Abbey
Because the movie theater has a monopoly on the price of the Coke (and the popcorn).
;)
Wouldn't it be fun if that monopoly was broken, and popcorn and soda vendors were allowed to sell their wares at the front of the movie theater?
And thats why Audio CD sales have been slumping! They need to fight the progress of what we're used to on DVDs. For $15-20 I can buy a fully loaded movie + soundtrack .. Or.. I can buy the soundtrack on audio cd for $18! Hard choice? Who the HELL buys audio cds anymore? hell, I just buy the DVD concerts and video collections for $10 on DVD now! F*ck audio CDs and the RIAA! They need to GET IN TOUCH and lower their prices to $5 bux to COMPETE.
I happen to be one of those who believe that sharing music is not 'theft' because it doesn't deprive _anyone_ of their ability to possess (listen to, enjoy, etc.) said music. It's only theft if you take something _away_, not merely copy it.
Still, I find it very interesting that those of us here on the 'dot make such an effort to make the above argument, over and over, with regards to music, but that there's not nearly so much springing to the defense when it's about software piracy.
Why is that? Is it because many of us code for a living and actually like the high salaries that come with employment as software creators?
Could be, but a more likely reason is the high percentage of Free Software-heads that hang out here - the reasoning being along the lines of "why would you pirate a bunch of proprietary crap when you can d/l for free far superior Free software?".
My point is, why isn't there a large percentage of posters here saying "this is irrelevant to me, I only have Free (as in speech) Music on my drive" in the same way that folks are only to happy to point out that their boxen are 100% M$-free?
My own theory is that it's due to the lack of Free Music available - there certainly is some, but it's a drop in the bucket compared to the overall supply. One could argue that it's not always the best quality stuff, either...
What's the solution then? Maybe it's time for some serious advocacy, perhaps? Convincing your friends who play in a band to release their stuff under some sort of free license? Maybe we could take a collection to support artists who take this bold step? I know I'd rather give $20 to such a fund (per month!) than pay $18 for a single crappy CD (of which cents go to the artist of course). Call it "aggregated patronage" - if enough of us did that we could support a thriving bullshit-free music scene...
I for one would love to say "I may have 10,000 songs on my drive, but the entire collection is 100% RIAA-free..."
How convenient it is to look on the past and shame people for the way things were. Slavery wasn't anything new, nor was misogyny, nor was segregation. There's still a caste system in many parts of the world.
None of these things were changed until a majority decided that they were wrong. It took a majority to decide to grant women the vote. It took a majority to pass the Civil Rights Acts of the 1960's.
Individuals are not to be 'protected' by copyright laws; they are to be rewarded for contributing to the public good. What individual is protected by having the image of a cartoon mouse still under copyright? Only if you believe in the legal fallacy of the 'corporation as a person' can you infer this.
Given that your username begins with 'Marx' (which I assume is reference to Karl Marx, but if not, skip this sentence) I find that possibility... amusing.
Yes, I'm sure that some human being somewhere has been protected by copyright. But how is it not tyrannical to remove the rights of millions for that one, heretofore nonexistant, individual?
With the exceptions of Dr. Dre (who is more a representative of the recording industry than an artist. Has he done an album since "The Chronic"?) and Metallica (who have unusual contracts, in that they own much of their own work), most artists seem to favor at least sampling of their works.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
What is something horrible happened, if someone *gasp* wrote a virus to infect a computer... a virus that shared all .mp3 files on a port on the P2P network.
RIAA: We want to bust you for sharing your Meatloaf(TM) "Bat Out Of Hell(TM)" song.
YOU: I was infected with the Windows.P2P.FluffyBunny.Share virus, not my fault.
It is NOT A LAW that you MUST HAVE ANTIVIRUS RUNNING! With this virus running around, you are now a VICTIM. Any thoughts? Proggies, talk to me!
This issue could have been put to rest a long time ago, but lately, I've been thinking that somehow, both sides enjoy this sordid, mutually dysfunctional association. On one hand, you have the RIAA, which repeatedly cries fowl in response to consumers who steal their content. They seek increasingly repressive laws that govern how, how often, and at what cost, we can listen to or watch our chosen entertainment. On the other hand, we have the consumers who repeatedly justify their acts of theft, citing unreasonable practices by the RIAA with respect to quality, price, and control. Yet, the consumers continue to unload huge piles of money into the pockets of the very corporations they criticize.
When are consumers going to realize that the only real control they can exercise over the RIAA will come through heir ability to shove their wallet back into their pocket the next time they're thinking about forking over their hard-earned money to buy a CD, DVD, or video? Stealing does nothing to solve the problem - it only makes things worse. As long people continue to engage in copyright infringement (theft of content), the RIAA can justify its actions (whether these actions are reasonable is another question altogether). Consumers can speak much more loudly and much more clearly if they ditch this crack habit, tell the RIAA to keep their content, and either save their money, or spend it on something with a greater ROI.
Perhaps what thay have been deprived of is the right to absolute control over the way the products of their imagination may be consumed. While I think reasonable copyright laws should protect an artist's right to some control over distribution, that isn't what current laws do at all, and these people (whose actual connection to the work is little more than a contractual fiction), are pushing for even more abusive laws. The right they claim to be deprived of is not their right at all, at least not in a society with reasonable interpretations of intellectual property, which perhaps ours is not.
<RANT TYPE="wild offtopic pseudo-psychoanalytical speculation">
</RANT>On another note, the **AA can't have it both ways in their interpretation of what "theft" is. Either I am buying the DVD or I am buying the "right to watch it." If I am not buying a DVD but only buying the right to watch it (in a certain techno/social context - but let's leave that discussion aside for the moment), then when a thief steals the DVD I should get it replaced free, right? The usual argument in response is that the copyright owner should not bear the cost of theft against me. But the thief only stole the actual DVD, not the right to watch it! As far as the law is concerned, at least as they interpret it, the thief's viewing the actual DVD is still illegal, and mine viewing a "pirated" copy is entirely legal, since I have purchased from the media company the right to watch that movie.
This is going to be one great show to watch. I mean, if they'd JUST MADE A DEAL WITH NAPSTER, they might've had a chance. I mean, jeez:
We'll run unauthorized programs.
We'll use FTP.
We'll hide our IPs.
We'll encrypt.
We'll use email.
We'll burn CD-Rs for our friends.
We'll burn DVD-Rs for our good friends.
We'll run private servers.
We'll run a different OS.
We'll hack our device's BIOS.
We'll add a mod chip.
We'll buy unlocked hardware.
We'll build our own hardware.
We'll publish the source code.
...I took to playing the drums. Don't like commercial software?...write your own code. Don't like commercialized schlock albums?...make your own music.
Or do all of the above from elsewhere in the world until the Americans sort their mess up.
I believe Joe and Mary GeneralPublic will be very angry when straight-A Johnny GeneralPublic II gets ten years in jail for sharing those N'Sync songs. Joe and Mary might even consider start voting, and in anti-RIAA candidates.
Didja hear about the new pirate movie?... Its rated Aar. A pirate walks into a bar and theres a steering column protruding from his fly, when the bartender asked him about it he replied "Yar, it's driving me nuts!"
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
If you folks are so pissed off by this sort of thing, why do you still buy RIAA CD's, MPAA DVD's, and go see the 'hot' movies in the theaters? And why the heck is Slashdot running an ad for that "S1m0ne" movie or whatever it's called? Boycott these bastards, spread the word, and call / write your legislators. Complaining does absolutely nothing.
Money, as a means of exchange, has stayed around for a very long time. Do you really expect the entertainment industry would continue if they couldn't make any money? If you think successful artists don't like all that money coming in, dream on....
All this self-serving noise about the so-called "right" to steal copywritten material is only going to prompt more legal restrictions on the Internet.
So, thanks a lot, guys, for messing it up for everyone just because your selfish.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Did anyone need to be told that the Boston Consulting Group was a consulting firm?
Yup: I'm another one of those walking contradictions who downloaded and watched AOTC and then proceeded to go down to the movie theater and buy a ticket. Makes ya think about all that "lost revenue".
the govt. is really thinking= gee, we are too stupid to catch Ousama Bin Lain and his terrorist network, so lets just prosecute a bunch of teenagers for downloading mp3s off the internet, and every bored middle-aged man for downloading p0rn...
there is something wrong with this picture and it is not my bad grammer and mis-spelled words...
oh god you are a sick devious genious. but how would this virus know what songs you were looking for?
good idea, and if this vurus really does nothing but share mp3s i will reinstall windows just so i can run it ...ROFLMAO...
Uhhh ... pad're , just who is the WE in "... we listen ..." Is this the same WE as in WEstalin or WEmao OR WEadolph ?? Or is it only the WE in a buncha Texazz/Hollyweird business brownshirts. Better track down that WE cause damned-straight in-a-donut that WE ain't THEE.
..lets sue the phone company because I called someone that had in their answering machine some copyrighted song.
And it could be argued that this is what is driving the thorn in the media industry's side - the Black Market. Inflated prices, questionable quality, hobbled products, and antiquated marketing and distribution methods are just some of the issues that have created a rich environment for copyright violation and even actual commercial trade in counterfeit / pirated products.
The RIAA and MPAA may not like the market conditions before them... but additional legal action will not make it go away. Over the last decade (or two), the environment has changed. If they are truely suffering - and let's not forget that is highly suspect - it is their own failure to the market.
Of course... this completely ignores other issues. Perhapse the real issue is not the market but control. But that's an entirely different topic.
NET only includes electronic 'theft'. Is this because they wanted to use the word 'electronic', so they could make the cool name 'NET'? What about fibre-optics - if i transferr data through a fibre optic cable then thats isolating the 2 electronic circuits...
Why is copying bits considered theft?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
From the title of the ZDNet article. "RIAA asks court to expose pirate"
So what, theft AND indecent exposure?
What if I write a program which I offer to sell at $1,000,000 and put it on my gnutella server for download by members of my company. The file is called metallica.mp3. If RIAA downloads it from me, can I have them jailed?
I'm suprised they didn't link to this article:
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-954651.html
"The vast potential of broadband has so far benefited nobody as clearly as it's benefited downloaders of pornography and pirates of digital content"
Chernin, the president of the owner of the Fox corporation, decries the Net's lack of morals. Isn't that delicious?
"The truth is that anyone unwilling to condemn outright theft by digital means is either amoral or wholly self-serving."
Irony meter going off the scale!
Make no mistake about it, this is a culture war with trillions of dollars at stake. It is becoming more and more clear that Hollywood isn't just being greedy, they actively hate and fear the Internet. They would destroy everything we have built rather than adapt to reality.
those that do not adapt to their new enviroment will die, this is a law of nature that can never be un-legislated...
expect similarly vast amounts of money. If Scott McNealy left Sun, most of Sun's major customers would probably still trust the hardware, software and services
Then maybe the Sun stockholders should fire him or reduce his pay from the 3-5 million dollars hes getting per year.
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So.... Junior posts to KaZaa, and Daddy's home computer is seized and torched? Oh, that's nice.
The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach
One of the few sensible posts about this issue in a long time (and that includes mine).
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
But what if the evil MPAA put out another Lord Of The Rings/Star Wars/Star Trek sequel? What then? Do you expect us to sit idly by and not give them our $8.50?
You are denying artists the right to earn a living. There's no precedent that all creative people are willing to work for free. While we're at it, who's going to pay for all the infrastrucuture that's distributing all this free, utopian, art? Who's going to pay the actors? The stage crew? Who's going to build the theaters? Who's going to pay for the paper used to print books? Who's going make musical instruments?
The open source analogy doesn't wash, either. The open source movement wouldn't exist without a commercial OS called Unix. Torvalds wrote one kernel for one OS, and he followed the path set by Unix. The BSD's are derived from Unix code that someone was paid to write. The Gnu folks have contributed most of the other core pieces, a gret part of it written before Linux appeared on the scene. That doesn't bode well ss a model for a wide and varied range of artistic efforts. There's been very little innovative software coming out of open source. Yes, the concept is innovative, but most of the software is derivative. And, none of that was possible without an Internet that someone else pays for.
While I think you have a naive and unsophisticated notion of what it means to be a professional creative person (it means earning a living selling your art), eventually the law will change to accommodate itself to new technology. In the meantime, the law is the law, and possessing technology that enables you to do something doesn't always make it legal.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
---I have a completely different take from all the responses I have read so far. I do NOT think these new laws have ANYTHING to do with music royalties. I think-believe rather strongly in fact-that it's a misdirection, done on purpose, although 99.999% of the people will think it's all about music and money. The RIAA doesn't believe that, it's ludicrous on the face of it, they know, anyone can see it. The politicians know it as well. All they want is for you to be fixated on that aspect of it, to not see the man behind the curtain. The VCR has not killed hollywood. I distinctly remember real time they said it would, same with cassette recorders, and reel to reel, which was my first usage of electronic copying as a teenager. Lies then, lies now, so what's the real reason for the big push now?
/.'ers here have similar stories with music or movie or other industry or political fatcats, ie, it's just reality.
-We live in a corporo/fascistic state. It is neither a constitutional representative republic, nor a democracy. Those concepts are academic illusions now. It has some vague elements of socialism, but from the "skimming" that goes on with the entrenched bureaucracy and the profits made by the government sub contractors and string pullers, it is at best akin to a mafia protection and fencing operation. They have "enforcers" as well, the "justice system", mercenaries -the police and prosecutors and judges, etc. total bought and paid for "hired guns", the "muscle" to keep the racket going for the ultra privleged class.
The internet, with privacy and instant information sharing, is needed by this mafia organization to function. Unfortunately for them, their victims make use of this new technology as well, they have started to become non-victims, and are getting too hip, too fast, too sophisticated in their use of this wonderful medium and technology, something the fascists have always had almost complete control over. Something that now thoroughly annoys them to no end because they lost some of that control.
All nations now are scrambling to restrict, monitor, censor, etc, the net. They arrive at different points at different times, but that is the gestalt of mostly governments efforts currently, to try and put the internet freedom jenni back in the bottle as best as possible, and they are slowly suceeding, too, no matter what a lot might say.
They cannot maintain their enforced illusion of an honest government and just outright ban the internet, but what they can do is to use technology to completely control it. Unfortunately, too many greedy jerk geeks will work for them to this end, but every civilisation has it's quislings, yes? And this goes along with the other citizen controls they are planning, constant GPS tracking, the soon to come universal ID and implantable microchip, etc. the flying cop hover drone thing, seen that one yet? they have lotsa fascist toys they plan on using, real, real soon.
Peer to peer private networks are the most dangerous for them, because of the ease of setup and use of the servers and clients, ie, it only takes a few moments to be sharing information with most anyone. Government and the corporo fascistic controllers-the REAL government- have a hard time with this, they need to be able to monitor and control it, but they need a REASON for public consumption, to maintain their propoganda edge.
If you notice, the "music industry" corporate heads are also part of the "above the law" class. We have the so called "war on drugs". Well, any cop could walk into any music industry main office and find all the drugs they want, yet they don't get busted. I have seen personally after a rather large concert by a well known very large old english band,(oldest and biggest) while the cash proceeds (not an insignificant sum) being tallied, several "off duty" cops with machine guns and pistols "standing guard" while these music/concert execs counted and bagged the cash, snorting and toking the entire time. They are hypocritical lying fascists, the cops and their suited superiors are mercenaries, the system is hypocritical. This is just a gimmee. I am sure that many
Firearms. Most movie and music industry heads are some of the more rabid "public" anti gunners out there, yet they have armed private security, etc. The same with the bulk of the politicians. They are fascists, liars. These are the "above the law" class. Laws are merely orders they give YOU, they do not apply to them, and they never will, so no sense losing sleep over that fact. Jack Valenti probably knows more industry execs who are potential drug dealing and money laundering felons, and more "artistes" who are potential felons, then there are "music pirates" reading this, yet he is not dropping a dime on them, is he?
OK, my point. these fascists, the corporate heads and the politicians, need and want a lot more spyware and intrusional ability and "force of law" to get inside peoples machines, either remotely, or by physically seizing the machines on some pretext.
Enter this almost universal phenomena of sharing images, sounds, code, etc. With the stroke of a pen, you now have lost the ability to be secure in your home on your box, most legally. All they need is a suspicion to examione your property. "You are with us, or a terrorist", remember this famous statement? Demonization is a time honored fascist technique. You cease to become human, you are now a "dirty jew", a "nigger", a "yellow jap", a "raghead", or.... a "thieving pirate".
A suspicion, or what they say or call is a suspicion. An "anonymous tipster". A "concerned neighbor". "suspicious activity, apparently large amounts of data going out" Whatever the hell they want to call it, it's "enough" now.
If they can't do it remotely, they will pay you a personal visit, where anyone's 1337|\/355 becomes moot as several large men beat you up and haul you away, if they choose too, and you will never know until it's "too late".
The bulk of the internet using public is now a potential "criminal". The "official" government can so far only go to a limited degree, but with the new "anti terrorism" laws, and now the "anti piracy" laws, they are saying that for all practical purposes, they now own your boxen, and there isn't anything you can do about it, legally. Try to circumvent these laws, you are now breaking more laws. Fully expect encryption without giving up the keys to become illegal, same as it is in england. Hiding "evidence" is considered another crime. See how it works?
Just watch as the net gradually goes away as we know it now, and it won't take very long. This is-we are in- the final stages of the over all fascist take over, they are just tying up loose ends now, "open" internet being one of the more important ones.
The music and video "piracy" angle is a trojan horse, a backdoor, albeit a very convenient one, IMO. I have been watching this slowly happen over the last 35 years or better, it's been very slow but steady. We have become the victims of a very slow coup-a takeover-and this is just another one of their steps they have taken.
In years past it was hard to share information. Radio and TV was too expensive, vanity publishing books and magazines was ridiculously expensive,BUT, the internet completely broke the back of governmental information command and control, and they need to grab it back as soon as possible. They screwed up bad letting the net go "outside", now they are correcting that screw up.
Be pissed about your music if you want, it's an OK place to start an awareness curve, but don't lose sight of the larger picture, it's even more important.
I'll admit I'd probably still DL music even if a CD cost $5, the nearest music store is 20mins away....my computer is right in front of me. Thats why the RIAA has to embrace the internet. If they did find a way to prevent music swapping and I couldn't DL music, by the time I got to the mall I'd forget all about buying a cd.
If I believe a software company has used my copyrighted work can I attack their server to slow it down? Denial of service time with the law behind me?
Write some software, copyright it and attack whoever is in your sights. Then you can LEGALLY attack whomever you choose without going to court.
Me thinks they opening a can of Vipers.
The weathers here - Wish you were beautiful
> When are consumers going to realize ...
When they stop thinking of themselves merely as consumers.
See this?
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I just gave you "The Finger"
I assert ownership of all trademarks and copyrights on this page.
Maybe people can spread the word about these acts... I'm personally outraged. I won't go to the theaters any more, nor will I endorse any new CD's by my purchase. And you know what? Renting movies is a thing of the past, too. One can live without them -- and it might just send a signal.
According to this article, MLB is continuing to alienate fans, this time by threatending fan-run websites: "On July 5, a letter from Major League Baseball's legal department arrived, telling [the webmaster of a site devoted to the Houston Astros] he was in copyright violation. He had run photographs of players in Astros uniforms."
While your little plan may be amusing, it is counter-productive. Next time an activist speaks out against copyright legislation, people will associate that activist with the 'pirates' who tried to get into a theater. People will then summarily disregard everything that activist has to say.
It seems logical that if people were to conduct a significant boycott of all music purchases and continue to do so until riaa ceases this absurd and abusive manipulation of law and technology, they would have no choice but to cave. People seem to forget that they have the only thing riaa wants--money. Stop giving them money and they'll meet whatever demands we ask to get the income flowing again.
Yes, I realize it is difficult to motivate people into such activism, but geez, how much freedom and fair use will be taken away from us before we finally get fed up with this shite? I stopped buying CDs about 2 years ago and wrote emails to riaa clearly expressing my action and why I was doing it. Am I alone in this?
I don't know about any of you, but I have 5 workstations and one server on my home network and only one of the workstations and the server is used by me. How the hell is the DOJ going to figure out which one of us is illegally trading songs? I sure as hell don't want to be held liable for my brother's song swapping or my Dad's movie downloading, or whatever else anyone in this house downloads. I don't log my family's net activity nor will I do so. Since it is illegal to prosecute criminally on the basis of who owns the account what can they do to find out who on my network is actually doing the swapping? I think it's time they realize this isn't going to fix things at all. They're just going to crowd the prisons even more and when 1/3 of America's population is in prison maybe they'll discover that it was a pretty shitty law they wrote in the first place. On a side note I thought it was kind of funny how they simply crossed out that part about "for fiancial gain" from the act. Isn't that kind of taking away the original purpose of copyright law in the first place?
I'm seriously considering proxying my house's Internet connection through some Iranian, Cuban, Russian, or Korean server just to spite the losers at the DOJ. It's pretty bad when Cuba, Iran, Korea, and Russia have less restrictive laws regarding Internet use than the US does. China too I might add.
Not all property is physical
It should be, otherwise it is unnatural and is at odds with personal liberty. What if some alien from Andromeda suddenly shows up and arrests everybody on earth for infringing on their intellectual property? We'd be royally pissed and we'd kick its freaking arse back to its home planet!
Let's face it, if you cannot put a fence around it or put chains on it, it does not belong to you. Makes no difference whether it is ideas, writings, software, movies, music or what have you. Once you've released it, like the air, it belongs to nobody and everybody.
The point is this: If the entertainment industry (and book authors, screenwriters, artists, inventors, etc...) don't want to see their work copied by others, they should not release it to the public in a form that can be copied. They should release their work only in closed theaters, concert halls, and other private venues. Inventors should keep their ideas secret or be the first to exploit it.
Don't trample on our personal freedom with your fascist, selfish and anti-social intellectual property laws. After all we benefit freely from the ideas and inventions of others. Let's put some back for a change.
Don't distribute works you don't own the copyright for.
How is it possible to write a song without infringing on an existing copyright? There exist fewer than 50,000 possible melodies in the Western musical scale. So how do I check that the song I just wrote isn't "substantially similar" to some song that was played on the radio 10 years ago?
Will I retire or break 10K?
If I create a song or movie, it is perfectly legal for me to distribute it on a p2p network
Not necessarily. If a song you wrote is "substantially similar" to an existing song, the copyright owner of the existing song may have grounds for legal action. How does a fellow make sure that the melodies in your song aren't the same as any other song released in the last 95 years?
Will I retire or break 10K?
I think you are confusing recordings with artists. Artists have been making a good living for thousands of years, but copyright law is (I think, correct me) less than 200 years old. You see, people could videotape a play and give that tape away for free. But people will still go to see the show and the stage crew will still get paid. The theater is a compeling and better product than the tape, so I pay a premium for it, but the price is in line with the demand
I think most people are not upset with the idea of copyright law, but the pigheaded refusal of the industry to get with the times. They refuse to see the internet as the collosal oppurtunity it is. (who else has a product they can actually DELIVER over the internet? The internet is the greatest enabler of the recording industry since the phonograph) Instead they just see it as a threat to the old way of doing business. Instead of adapting they litigate and legislate the future away.
Sig removed because it was obnoxious
The copyright on the song "Happy Birthday" is owned by Warner-Chappell, the music publishing division of AOL Time Warner. Because the song was first published on or after January 1, 1923, it falls under perpetual copyright on the installment plan (19-year extension in 1978, 20-year extension in 1998, who knows what in 2018).
[ Read More ]
Will I retire or break 10K?
from Conan The Barbarian, truly a modern classic..
"Ho Daji, we win again.."
I wish there was some kind of P2P network to only offer legal content
Performers not supported by RIAA labels do not have access to RIAA A&R and thus do not have access to songwriters. They must write their own songs. But problem: Just about all possible melodies are taken. So how again can such "legal content" exist?
Will I retire or break 10K?
Then come marketing and promotion costs -- perhaps the most expensive part of the music business today. They include increasingly expensive video clips, public relations, tour support, marketing campaigns, and promotion to get the songs played on the radio. For example, when you hear a song played on the radio -- that didn't just happen! Labels make investments in artists by paying for both the production and the promotion of the album, and promotion is very expensive. New technology such as the Internet offers new ways for artists to reach music fans, but it still requires that some entity, whether it is a traditional label or another kind of company, market and promote that artist so that fans are aware of new releases.
Hmmmm. Two ways for the public to hear the music for free. P2P sharing or this very expensive promotion to get the songs played on the radio. Seems like maybe RIAA is complaining about being squeezed out of a very lucrative racket.
You don't think copyrights should last 90 years. Okay. What would be a more reasonable tenure? Is one year not enough? Fifty years too much? Why? I will be fascinated to read your rationale.
How about fourteen years to start, and the option of renewing for another fourteen, as specified by the Copyright Act of 1790? If anything, the term should be shorter today, since advances in transportation and communication make dissemination of a work much, much faster, but 28 years would be a huge improvement over life+70. Copyright exists to entice us artists to contribute to the public domain, not so our grandkids can collect royalty checks long after we're gone.
Well now aint that about a bitch.
The RIAA threaten to sue, the net goes mobile, and life goes on so does that meen if I host a site that says f the riaa and then alias it to another remove the original sight name retaining meta tags to snag google seakers they can't sue?
Great dinamic net names ASP database here I cum!
Let me get this straight, our Justice Department -- the same one that is 'disappearing' citizens and non-citizens accused of terrorism -- is now going to give jail time to citizens who download mp3 files? They should get a life.
With about half the evening news dedicated to child-napping/killing, the other half to The War On Terror & Iraq, and the third half to Brittany (they compress the news where I live to fit more junk into less time!), we now want to waste police and court resources on putting kids in jail for five years for downloading pirated music files.
Sheesh, any bet the Enron/Worlcom/Arthur Anderson/Adelphia execs don't get five years for ripping off the public of several $billion, and putting tens of thousands out of work ?!
Vote 'em out. If you live in the US and don't vote, give it a try. Maybe by the time we're Bush's age the government will have a few more people in it who understand both technology and the monopoly rip off that is going on. At least it's something to wish for.
...and public radio is reporting that the RIAA will drop their suit against listen4ever.com, since it's, uh, gone.
Well, of course it's gone. It appeared on Slashdot's front page, didn't it?
I doubt, therefore I may be.
The RIAA doesn't get excited if you tape off the radio. The reason is that if you like the song, you'll buy the CD so you can hear every nuance on your stereo system.
MP3s have been shown to be similarly effective promotional tools. (I'm working with an indie artist, and we will be distributing MP3s in as many directions as the RIAA has left to us.
CDs are the product, NOT MP3s and not tracks played on FM Radio.
People will not buy a record without hearing at least some of the songs on it.
People will pay for full quality. For lower quality just good enough to tell if it's worth buying, the MP3 or FM radio song is perfect.
To expect us to pay for either the MP3 or the FM tune is to expect us to pay the musician or label's promotional costs upfront even if we don't know if it's worth buying or not.
The record industry's objection to MP3 as a promotional tool is that anybody can play.
Sony can upload MP3 to a P2P network or an Internet radio station for $0.00, and if people like it, they'll buy it. They have absolutely no problem with this.
I can do the same, and their knowing that is why they're trying to unplug every method of getting music to the public via the Net they don't have monopoly control over.
This isn't about piracy.
Would you pay to hear music on FM radio? Is a 128K MP3 worth the same as an uncompressed CD audio track? Neither will I. Does RIAA really think 128K MP3 audio is a real product they can make money off? If they did, they would have done a far better job with their industry MP3 distribution.
While making money off MP3s isn't impossible, the people who do this must remember that the service is NOT about selling MP3s, it's about selling access to pre-sorted / pre-classified tracks so the user can get a chance to sample the kind of music she likes before buying the album, and without spending hours every day trying to find a band that plays the kind of music she likes.
The best solution to the problem would be to create new law that provides for mandatory licensing of the sort that exists for broadcast radio for MP3s(or OGG or whatever) with quality compable to that of FM radio, with anyone broadcasting it paying the same royalties as is paid for use of FM. What an Internet broadcaster would be paying for is a stock in trade, while each song is without commercial value in and of itself, a collection big enough to make 24/7/365 streaming reasonable means that you can get a listening audience, which is of commercial value. Of course, the major Internet Radio stations were already doing this. The idea here is to provide a legal shelter for broadcasters. Protecting an RIAA label monopoly on access to the public is not a proper objective of public policy to anybody buy the Congress-shitbags 0wn3d by the major labels...
Go to 256K MP3 and one has something almost indistinguishable from the original, which means one is selling a musician's stock in trade, to do that without the owner's consent is piracy.
The whines about MP3 piracy causing losses to major record labels are about using the Feds to enforce a monopoly over what we are allowed to hear.
If YOU join in the whining, you're what Lenin called a "useful idiot", carrying the can for organizations who are neither your friends nor that of musicians.
Tech Public Policy stuff
For those Californians out there, recall that Senator Feinstein was among the signatories on the letter alluded to in the article as "pressure on the DOJ from Congress" to do this.
- bayle
Well, kinda... Each article can only be about 500KB... But a good news client will shield you from that detail. Your posting software breaks up a larger file into properly named pieces. It's commonplace to see 20MB multipart posts, where the news clients in common use will just handle the whole thing as a unit. It is possible to do this with an arbitrary size post but if a single part is missing it creates a problem. What's more typical for large posts like CD images is to break it into ~20MB pieces then post the pieces together with some error correcting code pieces. 700MB disk images are all over the place on Usenet by using these methods.
OK, so you say you want only information and no hyperbole or buzzwords. I'll buy that, but I'll bet that few people would listen. When you get down to it, just about any argument at all that is aimed at getting the attention of a large segment of the population is about buzzwords today. That should include the arguments of the anti-RIAA people as well.
It's all fine if the Future of Music Coalition, and whatnot (including us on Slashdot) talk privately on their mailing lists and websites about the evils of how the RIAA is screwing artists, and if the RAC (Recording Artists Coalition) tries to sue the RIAA for union protection. In fact it's good. But the fact is that not many people will hear about it. We're all preaching to the choir here.
On one hand, there are the artists who are getting screwed by contract practices. On the other are consumers who are being denied fair use, computer and device manufacturers whose products are being threatened, and ISPs whose are being subpoenaed. The RAC, disaffected consumers, and the like have a good argument on their side, but they lack a large warchest of cash (on the scale that the RIAA and Big-5 have). The device manufacturers and ISPs on the other hand have the money. What I believe must happen is for these two parts of the debate to merge, which I don't see happening yet.
Once they do, the next step will be to get the message out. The only truly effective way of doing this I see is through television advertising, exactly as you are seeing anti-smoking ads by groups such as TheTruth.com and the PSA they have been airing since the tobacco settlement. (The other possibility is massive newpaper letter-writing campaigns, which will only be partially effective, IMO) Only then will a large enough group of people start to be informed and agitated about what the record companies are really doing, and will enough people start to realize what "DRM" really means.
On the CNI (Coalition for Networked Information) copyright list recently, there has been some talk of referring to "copymonopoly" instead of "copyright". The reason given is that it has more emotional impact and is more likely to get people's attention. Also thrown around has been the slogan, "DRM is theft."
Talking (or shouting) in ivory towers, complaining about the undue influence of money in the process, and complaining that the RIAA is using unfair emotional arguments to appeal to the great unwashed is okay, but we aren't going to reach that great unwashed unless we learn to harness those same emotional arguments. Call it fighting fire with fire if you will, but sometimes you have to burn a fire-ring to contain a raging inferno.
I'm sure I'll have both the RIAA and the FBI/CIA/NSA on my ass for saying this, but really I didn't know any of the people in the WTC, but I wish they were all still alive.
On the other hand watching a couple of planes crash into the RIAA headquarters would be pretty sweet.
Now, in case you are going to arrest me for this, first of all, F- YOU. Secondly, in this hypothetical jee wouldn't it be nice sort of thought, you don't know, I could be imaging that the planes crash into the RIAA at night so no one dies.
There, now you have the WTC saved, and the RIAA detroyed, but no one dead. You can't very well arrest me for that, can you. HAHA.
It's gone too far about 2 years ago. It's only going to get worse, and the stakes are higher. Today it's music. Tomorrow it's genes and protein sequences.
I'm scared, and I'm willing to fight and die for my freedom and my country (the REAL USA, not this new f-ed up sell out country posing as the USA).
Nobody should ever be forced to pay for something that involves no human work, or is a limited ressource in some other way.
If I can get a copy of a work through the internet and there are no costs associated with me getting it, then it should be free. That is the fair and efficient way to organize society.
If musical instruments could be copied without any costs, don't you think they should be free?
That would be great.
What do you mean that somebody else pays for my internet use?
Yes, it does make me very sick to hear the price of a CD being justified because the record companies pay money to get their songs on the radio.
That is your own fucking problem you bunch of retarded, money sucking, corrupt leeches!
Once they name the "pirate",they will have to name exactly what was "stolen".
You can't prosecute someone without defining exactly what you are prosecuting them for.So they will have to declare the song names and artists the person is being accused of stealing from.
This is good because now any artist whose work is named in a prosecution or lawsuit, won't be able to get away from the question of how do they feel about filesharing.
Everyone will want to know,and a half-assed run around statement issued through thier press agent or attourney isn't going to cut it.
A point blank question will have to be faced courageously by an honest answer or their career is over.
Read the comment about monopoly......
Lets say I'm the worlds best drain cleaner, i can clean drains like no-one else and enjoy it.
All the local (100miles around) drains are owned by a big company that requires I sign my soul over if I wan't a job.
Now I could setup my own drain company, but I'm good at cleaning drains, not running companies.
I could work for the independant drain company that works a couple of blocks but I think I'm much better than that.(I'm the best drain cleaner in the world).
So my choices are,
Move away to somewhere where the big drain company has no nasty clauses.
Work for the big drain company and sell my soul
Work for the small drain company and not get the recognission I deserve.
Get a different job and be unhappy for the rest of my life.
Which one would you pick?
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Mail? Put "slashdot" in the subject to pass the spam filters.
You were violating the copyright of the copyright holder.
As long as people do not understand the difference there is little hope to stop this monumental mess.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
I suppose I might be in the minority with my point of view, but here's my take on the whole situation:
Just like many others, I've downloaded MP3s. And as long as the government was going to do nothing about it, I planned to keep doing it. But the entire time I was downloading, I said to myself, "I'm on borrowed time. This is not legal. Once the goverment gets their act together and starts to clamp down on these activities, that's it for me."
Well folks, that's it for me. I might still download here and there, but the going-on-whatever-P2P-software-and-download-like-c razy days are over for me. It's simply just not worth the risk. And there is a risk -- it's no different than everybody driving 80MPH on a highway with a speed limit of 65MPH. We all know what we are doing is against the law; it's just a matter of enforcement. If the cops suddenly said, "We are pulling over every single person we can going over the speed limit from now on," and they actually do that (i.e., every highway you go on, you see tons of people pulled over), would you continue to drive 80MPH? Or would you go 65?
And we're not just talking about a traffic ticket here. The first person they get will be nailed to the wall and made into an example. I don't know about you, but I'd rather not be that person. The reward no longer outweighs the risk. I'll wait until the CD comes out in BMG and buy it for $5. (For all those people who say CDs cost too much, sign up with BMG. I've signed up as a new member there like 15 times, and after the 12-for-1 deal, the CDs average out to $5, which is the right price for me.)
If we all want to *really* make a difference, i.e., want to keep downloading copyrighted material at no cost but bandwidth, then somebody needs to set up some kind of a movement where everyone who wants to download will sign up and keep downloading, regardless of the consequences. We need people to give up their livelihood for this right (i.e., face possible jail time). It'd be a cause, and this will be a form of civil disobedience.
Personally, I hope this will happen. I hope the government ends up arresting a couple of college kids and the whole country goes into civil disobedience mode. People of my generation (children of the 80s and beyond) have had no real cause to deal with -- no Vietnam, no WW2, etc. Perhaps this is our cause...
The current situation with entertainment companies reminds me of where we were with the beer industry not so long ago. For those who don't remember, consolidation in the brewing industry had crowded out everyone but Anheuser Busch (Bud), Miller, Pabst, and a few smaller ones, all serving up more or less identical, watery swill. Kind of like the music you hear on the radio these days.
Then during the Carter administration, home brewing was determined to be legal. Beer drinkers who weren't satisfied with the crap put out by the beer companies made their own. Some of these guys turned their hobbies into businesses. So where are we now? Yes, the big beer companies have gotten even bigger... but almost every city in the US you can get Sam Adams, Sierra Nevada, Pete's Wicked Ale, Anchor Steam, and others. Smaller regional breweries have also sprung up like mushrooms after a rain. In other words, reasonable choice has returned to the market.
Knowing this, what do we do? Here's the answer: Kill your radio. Just say no to the big entertainment companies - make your own entertainment. If you have no musical or acting talent of your own, cultivate friends who do.
The big entertainment companies can only have power over us if we let them.
Sean
Here's a case for the DoJ to sort out. Lets say I have a 100 Disc CXD Jukebox, connected to my stereo. lets also say I rip those 100 CD's to MP'3s on one of my PC's so that I can easily transfer them to portbale devices. (As far as I can tell I DO have legal right to do this.) Now 2 scenarios - 1) the RIAA hacks into my PC (protected by the feds - of course) and sees a large volume of Mp3's. They IMPLY to the DoJ that I am a pirate. Now I have legal fees up the wazoo to defend myself for doing something that is my legal right. 2) Someone hacks into my PC and downloads stuff from my mp3 library. I'm NOT sharing - I've been hacked - which will soon be impossible to prosecute against thanks to the geniuses in Congress getting kickbacks from RIAA - and RIAA decides to prosecute me for file sharing and piracy. Does ANYONE think RIAA's lawyers will give a damn that I didnt share these files? Or that I didn't have a p2p server or client on my PC? hmm lets see - RIAA can pay $100k to its attorneys to harass me on my 50k/year salary off which I have to live then suddenly pay an attorney. So here I am, a average guy who likes music, and gets fucked, with no intention of sharing. Now nice. I suppose I should just walk around with a jar of Vaseline in case I breathe wrong on someone who is a part of RIAA.
"He who writes the code chooses the license."
Don't like the prices that RIAA members charge? Then listen to music that doesn't come from the RIAA. Support bands that aren't signed with the RIAA. Quit drooling over MPAA movies. Let's do to the RIAA and MPAA what Stallman and Torvalds and a legion of free software people are doing to Microsoft.
I think that the government should intervene before this line...
'People perceive that the recording studios are the only way to make it in the music industry.'
Theres a couple of ways they could do this,
1: Teach all kids to think of everyone as a lieing cheating bastard until they can proven otherwise.
2: Have a general morality schooling.
the problem is that no one would go for 1 and it's just stupid the problem with 2 is that the powermongers would impose there 'truth justice and the american way'(sic)'sudo christian' morality on everyone which is what the caused the 'when I grow up I'm going to be a big holywood star' problem in the first palce.
The only thing that can be done is to bring up your kids in a liberal way and try to inform evryone about what's going on, though taking away the morphine drip might be a tricky thing to do?
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Since you and all your friends can go to the library and check out a book as many times as you want, for free, and pass it around, for free, and read it at home, and discuss it for free, etc., without the author or publishing house getting anything from this whole exchange except a fraction of the original sale of the book, I guess I would like to hear a better justification of how all us poor dumb consumers are thieves when it comes to MP3s, but not books.
"Stop throwing the Constitution in my face, it's just a goddamned piece of paper!" - George W. Bush Nov. 2005
how about a national/world wide geek strike for a week or so, no tech-support, no data friggers making sure you bank details go through etc....
geeks now control and run more of the world than most people imagine.
I know what you're saying, but I don't think it's the government's place. I think it's the responsibility of parents to teach their kids good values and what is truly worthwhile in life, but that's another discussion, and it's more about methodology than anything else.
I definitely think the flip side is also true. The RIAA has no business attempting to legislate its business plan into law. The world has always changed, and technology has always mad some business plans obsolete. The law was not made to "fix" that.
That's like saying all possible DNA sequences have been created. IDIC: Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations.
In melodies, there is not an infinite sequence of notes to choose from. Had you read the article I linked to, you would have discovered that a songwriter can get taken to court for matching four notes of an existing melody, which is fewer than infinity.
No, the real problem is that music artists are getting lazier and less creative.
I have written software to test that hypothesis, by generating random sequences of note intervals, and you know what they sounded like? Copyrighted pop songs from the 1950s through the 1990s.
Will I retire or break 10K?
I agree,
... provide one hell of a big morphine drip.
'The RIAA has no business attempting to legislate its business plan into law.'
A reasonable amount of the government is 'owned' by the RIAA/MPAA/(insert any big multi national or organisation), they are the law.
And then there's that morphine drip problem, look at all those happy numb-braied people wandering around, there great I haven't seen a bit riot/strike for ages no government wants the people to interfere with what there doing(there jobs are at steak!) and the RIAA/MPAA
Please take the comment with a pinch of salt I couldn't think of any non imotive language!
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
>> f I can get a copy of a work through the internet and there are no costs associated with me getting it, then it should be free. That is the fair and efficient way to organize society.
If a create my own CD and give it away free on the Internet as the sole means of distribution, how am I supposed to recoup my costs and make a profit?
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
And a good communist always bases his arguments on class warfare!
It's just best to place michael in the "No, I don't ever want to see articles from this moron" group.
From now on, I will "encode" the real filenames of all my files using a cipher that uses song titles from RIAA protected artists.
As a result, when I put my perfectly legal files up for sharing, the RIAA lawyers will undoubtedly see them and try to sue me for copyright violation.
It seems like I could then turn around and sue them for attempting to bypass my copy-protection by reading the filenames (which are my chosen cipher) -- using the DMCA, as well as wrongful prosecution, since my files are NOT illegal warez.
We are brought up to be consumers, through exposure all of our lives to countless hours of advertisements. By lowering the costs of consumption (ie downloading mp3s for nearly free) , we are fulfilling our hollywood/mass media mandated destiny to consume more while lowering costs. In other words, we are becoming more efficient consumers. Is this not what Hollywood wants? For us to consume more? Its not our problem that our consumption without compensation leads to their bankruptcy. We are only doing what they programmed us to do.
That is true, but we still want to hear our band's new songs
The ability to hear your band's new songs is trivial considering the overall ramifications - your favorite bands are as much a part of the problem as the RIAA itself. The whole system is a morass of mutually-dependent dysfunction.
I'm not going to stop listening to ALL my favorite bands to get this done. Asking the world to do that is pretty ridiculous.
I'm not suggesting that anyone stop listening to their favorite bands, but I am suggesting that they stop buying (and stealing) any future releases until the RIAA adopts a more consumer-friendly way of doing business. What's rediculous is the notion that people can't muster enough self-discipline to do this for the short period of time it might take to manifest some real change. Gotta have that crack, I guess.
You're comparing apples to oranges. The act of borrowing (from the library or a friend) and the act of acquiring (legitimate purchase or theft) are completely different. After all is said and done, there is still just one copy of the book, and the book, along with any intrinsic value, remains with the book. The only way you can equate your example with the current practice of stealing digital content, is if everyone who read the book, copied it. In all seriousness, how often do you think this happens?
The point isn't about whether downloading a CD is right
or wrong: it's about which "crime" you want the DOJ to spend
your tax dollars on during investigation and prosecution.
Moderation in everything, including moderation.
Really needs to be repealed.
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Your profit is not important. What is important is that good new music will be created. If an end to copyright, causes that to stop, then we will have to use another way to encourage music production, maybe taxfunded.
But in my opinion it is clear that payment for creating the music needs to be separated from the distribution. To ensure that as many people as possible benefit from the works.
Yeah, and the EPA can put you in jail because you emit too much carbon dioxide. Countless companies can sue you because just by sending that message to slashdot, you infringed upon hundreds of patents--many of them invalid.
If you are forced to settle a frivolous lawsuit because you do not have the money to defend yourself in court, <cliche>then the IP terrorists have already won.</cliche>
Yes, there are some stupid judges out there
Not only are copyright owners able to shop for a favorable judge, but other judges often have to follow their precedent under the rules of the common law.
If you are so worried about this issue, then why don't you start your own organization. You can call it "Falsely Usurped Copyright Musician Endowment." ;-)
I wonder if the EFF could help out on this.
I also noticed you conveniently cut off my sentance at p2p. The other methods of delivery I mentioned would still have the same risk.
I understand that. I cut off the sentence after the first method you happened to mention. Had you mentioned MP3.com first, I would have cut it off after that.
Should the public get wind of such crap
The American public gets much of its news from television, and all of the major for-profit broadcast television networks except for NBC are owned by motion picture studios, who do not wish to inform the public of the expansions of their monopolies. (AOL owns CNN, the WB Network, and Warner Bros. Pictures; Viacom owns CBS, UPN, and Paramount Pictures; Disney owns ABC and Touchstone Pictures; News Corp. owns Fox Network, Fox News Channel, and Fox Searchlight Pictures. NBC's news operation is a joint venture with Microsoft Corporation.) Note that they ran no stories when the Bono Act or the DMCA was passed.
And your sig about "an 800 pound cartoon elephant" applies beautifully to the asymmetry of power between big corporate copyright owning plaintiffs and small individual coincidentally infringing defendants.
Will I retire or break 10K?
The placement and content of your post certainly indicated that the anon. cowturd was right in saying people don't own the copyright to works they create. Maybe you should take a look at the Copyright Office's website
That wasn't exactly what I meant. What I meant was that a person may not own the copyright to a work he claims to have created because he did not actually create the entire work; he copied substantial portions (four notes) from another work. I don't want to leave plaintiffs any room to maneuver because I don't have any money for legal representation.
and getting Nazi laws passed
What's a "Nazi law"? There are no National Socialists in the U.S. House or the U.S. Senate.
absurd little technicalities that were used 80 years ago.
But has Congress repealed such technicalities, such as four notes equaling substantial copying? If not, the precedent remains on the case-law books.
Will I retire or break 10K?
What nobody is discussing is how Palladium and Senator Hollings' CBDTPA legislation are going to complete the end-run on fair-use - forcing consumers to consume "content" only when and how content creators and technology companies dictate. You thought the RIAA was bad, watch when they get in bed with Microsoft.
"All your digital media devices are belong to us."
A thought - if you take the compensation that all the essential people - singers, musicians, engineers and producers - involved in the creation of the average moderately successful (btw. 200,000 and 1,000,000 copies sold) music album currently receive, multiply it by 2 or 3, added the cost of manufacturing the physical CD, what do you think those CDs would cost? $12? $10? Incredibly, they'd cost between $3 and $7.
So what is the difference between this entirely reasonable price and the highway robbery exacted from you in your local Tower or Virgin? The answer is in the bloated structure of an industry in severe need of reinvention and why both the industry's suppliers (artists) and consumers (the artist's fans) are giving the industry hell. The DOJ's long screws aren't going to change the fundamental economic reality that the industry needs to drastically change it's pricing and packaging choices and compensate artists more equitably.
More info, see musicindustrylaw.com and
http://musicindustrylaw.com/musictechlaw.html in particular.