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Fast CD-R Drives Make For Twice the Piracy
Bowie J. Poag notes this Register story about an RIAA copyright infringement bust in New York. The RIAA claims the operation had the equivalent of 421 CD-burners, which, translated from RIAA-speak, means "156 CD-burners but some of them were fast". How they expect anyone to take their statistics seriously is beyond me.
...does that mean I have half a cd burner?
This is the equivilant of 40 first posts, isn't it?
So now we finally find out the problem---the RIAA can't count! :)
Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam
Interested in AI? MACR
If we pirate 1,000 songs but all of them were crap, we're innocent?
HIGH
that gave us 2002-1900 = 100th Anniversary of Quantum Physics
Fsck the millennium, we want it now.
Millennium Crisis Line: 0890 900 2000 [calls cost 50p/min]
Double the Speed, Double Your Burn?
Jesus Harold Christ on a Rubber crutch. This is getting outta control.
This is as bad when they catch some poor kid with a ound of weed and it becomes a major bust worth over "2,000,000" dollars.
156=421 due to speed times?
Anyway, I hope some of these were professional duplicators. They are cheap and fast. I cant imagine having to handload 156 burners.
Puto
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Or does this seem like a story about the RIAA acknowledging that people can copy cd's...with a cd-r?
My god the humanity! They'll be able to make their own cd's! Why wasn't this reported before.
This first post is being sent over a cable modem and is like 15 regular first posts!
Sex - Find It
not the individual consumers. Not that individual consumers are pirating cd's any less, but these are the guys you can catch outright without creating new laws that restrict our rights.
How they expect anyone to take their statistics seriously is beyond me.
Who, the RIAA's or The Register's?
(ba-dum-bum-cha!)
sin(6cos(r)+5A)
and 21% percent of people buy less music now they download.
;)
RIAA always forget to tell us that the other 79% buy more
That's what I'm using now, 4.7 gigs.... 20 minutes :-))))
;-)
Yap, bit off topic, just too enthousiastic about my recent toy I guess
By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco Posted: 14/12/2002 at 00:31 GMT
"Perhaps the truth is less interesting than the facts?" asked Amy Weiss, the RIAA's Senior Vice President of Communications recently in this email to The Register.
It's a question which has baffled many of our readers, and us too. Perhaps it's a kind of Zen koan, which needs to be repeated many times before making sense. If so, we can't report any success.
But the RIAA seems to be having a few problems with the facts itself.
Yesterday it issued a press release announcing a piracy bust in New York which unearthed 421 CD-R burners.
Only there weren't 421 burners, but "the equivalent of 421 burners."
In fact, there were just 156. How did the RIAA account for this discrepancy?
"There were only 156 actual burners, but some run at very high speeds: some as high as 40x. This is well above the average speed," was the official line yesterday.
Apparently another example of the Association's difficulty grappling with new technology. After the RIAA's website was hacked, with large sections rendered inaccessible, spokespersons explained the difficulties were due to a sudden upsurge in popularity.
Well, that's one way of putting it.
The other curious aspect of yesterday's release is the use of Secret Service agents in the bust. The Secret Service, we naively presumed, was employed to protect high-ranking elected officials.
Wholesale pirating and distribution is BAD. This is the kind of thing the RIAA SHOULD be pursuing and is the reason for them actually exsiting.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Is that like 'the equivalent of being pregnant'?
Either they're capable of writing CD-Rs, or they're not, sheesh.
It is mathematics like this that allow companies such as Worldcom and Enron to cook their books.
...All I can say is that my life is pretty strange...
So does this mean that if I pay twice as much as I should for a CD (as we all do with the industry's fixed pricing) that I've really bought the equivalent of two CD's?
Largest CD-R Manufacturing Operation In U.S. History, Major Blow To Piracy In Area
WASHINGTON (Dec. 11th) -- In what is the largest seizure ever of equipment used to pirate music onto blank CDs in the United States, the U.S. Secret Service, assisted by a team of investigators from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), on Monday morning raided a major music piracy operation in New York City, leading to the capture of 35,000 finished CD-Rs, 10,000 DVDs, the equivalent of 421 CD-R burners and the arrest of three individuals. This operation alone had the potential to cost the industry an estimated $90 million annually.
The raid, executed by a team of several Secret Service agents and RIAA investigators, was the culmination of a two-month joint investigation of a well-organized music piracy operation in Queens, located on 47-28 37th Street. This particular operation was the largest supplier of pirated music to individual vendors, retail locations, and distribution centers on Canal Street in Manhattan, churning out illegal product around the clock with an estimated capacity of at least six million pirated discs each year. Among the three individuals arrested was the leader of the operation. They now face charges of trafficking in counterfeit labels, criminal copyright infringement, and trademark counterfeiting.
"This is a major blow to the music pirates who were robbing record companies, artists, legitimate retailers and countless others in the industry of millions of hard-earned dollars," said Frank Creighton, Executive Vice President and Director of the RIAA's Anti-Piracy Unit. "This operation should pay further dividends because we have successfully struck at one of the major choke points for music piracy in the New York City area. I especially want to thank the work of the U.S. Secret Service who were invaluable partners in this effort."
Officials also seized eight Rimage Imprinters, one high-end color copier valued at $75,000, and other equipment and raw materials used in the manufacturing process. Approximately 25 percent of the product seized was Latin music.
From the article:
The other curious aspect of yesterday's release is the use of Secret Service agents in the bust. The Secret Service, we naively presumed, was employed to protect high-ranking elected officials[*]. Perhaps this is a further indication of who's really in charge.®
Uhh... no.. actually, the Secret Service was created to track down counterfeiters.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
What you are missing is that these silly statistics aren't designed for the general public--they are designed for POLITICIANS.
The **AA doesn't give a damn what the general public thinks--this is all PR for bought-and-paid-for politicians. The lobbyists will show up, wave around these silly statistics, flash some money and boom! suddenly there will be more laws/levies/taxes on recordable media faster than you can type 'cdrecord'.
Let's say the "average" is 24X... I have a 12X burner. I guess that means I have the equivalent of 0.5 burners... I'm not a threat! Yay!
The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.
--Aristotle
"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics."
;)
C'mon, such a huge percentage of all statistics out there are dubious. Did you really think the RIAA is above a little "data cooking"?
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
In accordance with the RIAA logic, I can now beat any speeding ticket by claiming to have the equivalent of more than one car! For example, if I were busted doing 60 in a 20, I can claim I have three cars. After all, it's 3x faster than the average driver travels through such a zone. Stands to reason that I simply have the equivalent of 3 cars driving at a legal speed and therefore I am innocent.
Yeah... I think that'll work...
Would someone PLEASE bust them for lying. I can't even consider this "spin doctoring." You can't make a claim with any amount of seriousness that a "fast" cd writer is the equivalent of two or more "average speed" drives. I can't decide which is worse: Scientology or the RIAA.
So now if I gnutella on a T3 am I suddenly stealing 28x the music because it's "really fast"?!
Just another sign of these idiots' attempts to ignore the progress of technology out of sheer stupidity and too much laziness to develop new business models that embrace it.
Ok, According to Pricewatch, the price difference between a 4x and 48x is $13.00. Who wouldn't buy a new 48x vs a 4x if they had the money?
...that I have precisely TWO 4x burners, for a total of 8x, so I must declare that I own "2/3 of a burner". Ahhahhah.
;)
But I use the Evil Commie P1-r4t OS Linux... maybe the RIAA will come get me for that one
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
I would think /.ers already knew our four letter friends (MPAA, RIAA, etc) lie through their teeth at every avaliable opportunity. They keep saying how p2p is running them into the ground (yet keep posting remarkable profits) and how nobody buys CDs anymore because of it (yet they manage to sell hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of carefully marketed trash from Dion and Spears).
The fact that they count funny when doing a "bust" of evil pirates is exactly what I'd expect. I'd be surprised if they came out with an announcement stating that
-- MG
RIAA says the damage could be as high as 90million.
These groups, I'm sure, don't use take into account "Opportunity cost". Just because I bought a pirated CD for $2 (or obtained it for free), doesn't mean I would also pay $20 for a legimate copy if no pirated copies existed.
I guess I have a better computer than I thought. All this time I thought I only had one burner, but it turns out that I have the equivelent of 10 burners! Sweet!
They have 800 CD burners, but most of them are slow.
Mode (3) smart-aleck mode. Press * to return to main menu.
I used to think that I only had one CD-RW drive, since only one CD/CD-R/CD-RW fits inside at any given time. Thanks to the RIAA, I now know that I really have at least 3 or 4 CD-RW Drives! This is the best news that I've heard all day! Thanks RIAA! Your "new math" is awesome!
I can't wait until next week, when my processor is so fast that Microsoft decides that my single processor is the "equivalent of a quad processor," so that I need Windows 2k Server instead of 2k Pro.
The stupidity of this amazes me.
"How they expect anyone to take their statistics seriously is beyond me."
What does the truth have to do with anything? The only people to fool are politicians, but corporations have no need to fool them. The languauge of politics is money. Corporations have it; politicians want it. Truth never enters the discussion.
At least not until the price of buying 421 CDs has come down to the price that 156 CDs would cost you retail right now.
As Benjamin Disraeli said, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics". We all know which kind were looking at here.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
"victimless crime"
"victimless crime"
"victimless crime"
As you should now be able to see, none of this applies to any of the CDs which were being burned at higher than average speed.
I used to bulls-eye womp-rats in my pants
Maybe the same thing will happen to the RIAA that happened to WorldCom and Enron.
I know this sounds redundant, but how did they get 421? If one CD-R drive is 40x, does it count as 40 CD-R drives? If they did it that way, then it would seem like most of the drives being used were fairly slow, because otherwise the number would have been higher. It was a professional pirating business, so I'm guessing many of the drives would have been at least 24x. If each drive is at least 24x, then 156*24 = 3744. With the numbers they gave (and the speed of a CD player counts as many times), the average CD-R speed is just over 2. But that seems hard to believe, because these are (were) professionals, and they would have had the money to get faster CD-R drives.
The only reason the RIAA published this number is to make the media grab it more. This is the same thing they did with "Everyone using Napster is pirating music", which wasn't exactly true (many were, but not all). The media ate up the RIAA's headline, and ignored the real truth behind it.
The automotive insurance companies must use the same "math", and since my car is so fast they are charging me like I have two (possible three :-) )...
...we would say they that it's the equivalent of 0.36 FAST CD-Rs.
Doesn't add up. RIAA's math skills should be used to power interstellar space ships.
0110100100100000011000010110110100100000011000100
Millions of C64 page requests flood the register article!
Keep your packets off my GNU/Girlfriend!
Glad we just had a threat about these new drives - do they count tripple?
Imagine how we can now imagine clusters of beowulf clusters of anything!
To the RIAA, the 'truth' is something that their PR department made up. It has no basis in reality what-so-ever. The 'truth' is something they want you to believe. They want you to believe that what happened happened as they said it did. The facts are what actually happened. They don't want you to believe those. The RIAA has a twisted view of reality, they see what they want to see. When something does not coincide with that vision, they warp the facts so that it will. This warping creates an end product that they call the 'truth'. Their PR department then goes about trying to persaude everyone that the 'truth' is correct, even when the facts do not agree with them.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
And if there were DVD-Rs there, did they count them in the CDR numbers?
Since DVD 18 can hold roughly 17 gigs, did they count that as 18+ burners?
When the RIAA reports these numbers, it makes me wonder how they do their taxes.
"Well, let's see. I gave a dollar to the kids in Ethiopia, and there are 3 million kids, so I'm going to write this off as the equivelent of 3 million dollars, because I don't know which kid is going to get it. Hmm, that sounds about right..."
to be exact, 91.73% of all statistics out there are dubious. Get your facts straight before posting! ;)
Click Here and let the Slashdotting Commence. Honestly, they should be Slashdotted every time we have to read their propaganda in a /. headline...
I have a Ferrari F40 so really I have 4 Ford Sedans.
According to the RIAA press release - in the footnote:
"The Recording Industry Association of America is the trade group that represents the U.S. recording industry."
Indeed. Well, their supporting facts to indicate that they represent the entirety of the recording industry includes this:
"RIAA® members create, manufacture and/or distribute approximately 90% of all legitimate sound recordings produced and sold in the United States."
So, you've heard it here, folks. 90% = 100%.
The proof of the corollary theorem, 1 = 2, is left as an exercise to the reader.
These kinds of busts of people who willfully infringe on copyright is the kind of activity that the RIAA should be using, instead of attempting to encumber everyone's computers, regardless of the guilt of the computer user.
When the HRAA (home recording rights act) was passed, it set a dangerous precedent of being presumed guilty. No matter how one wished to use home stereo equipment which can copy audio digitally, one was treated like a media pirate.
For example, when I was burning a CD of my own music (which I own the copyright on) two years ago, I was not allowed to make a digital copy of one of my songs to the new CD. What happened was that a flag saying the song was a copy was set; my CD recorder does not allow me to make digital copies of copies. It assumes that all such activity is piracy, even though I use this equipment to make copies of my own songs.
In addition, the CD player forces me to pay extra for CD blanks because it assumes that my activities are copyright infringment activities. In other words, I have to pay the media companies royalties for the privledge of copying my own music. Fortunatly , there is a bug in the firmware which allows me to work around this issue and use far more inexpensive "computer" CDR blanks.
The RIAA and MPAA are trying to cripple computers in a similar manner, which such abominations as the SSSCA. They should stop treating honest computer users like criminials and start persecuting people who willfully engage in piracy.
People who do not think piracy is a problem are mainly in the US, where it is not the kind of problem it is in other countries. In México, for example, one can hardly walk down a street in a shopping district without noticing stands where people sell burned copies of music CDs, complete with inkjet printouts of the cover art for the CD. These kinds of sales do hurt the profits of the RIAA. Obviously not to the extent that every person who buys a burned copy is someone who would have bought a legitimate copy otherwise, but certaintly to a lesser extent.
The people who willfully pirate music and movies need to be persecuted to the fullest extent of the law; I will go so far as to say that the law needs to be set up to make persecuting these people easier. But only the guilty should be punsished; methods for duplicating and distributing music and movies, which are very helpful for promoting independent artists, should not be crippled by the media companies.
- Sam
The secret to enjoying Slashdot is to realize that it should not be taken too seriously.
I thought this sort of math was only applied to drug busts.
"We estimate the marijuana had a street value of 4.5 million dollars."
(Yes, if you sold it one eighth at a time to desperate, confused rich people.)
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
A man who fucks for 15 minutes before delivering the cream to the woman, result in a baby.
Therefor, a man who fucks for 5 minutes before delivering the cream to the woman, must result in triplets.
Of course, we're just talking about successful cases here... and I don't want to think about the poor guys who comes after 30 seconds...
40 486SX 50 computers with 8 megabytes of memory each. Equivalent to a 2 Ghz system with 320 megabytes of memory, only asking $1000.
Is because they have the money and power to lobby lawmakers.
...my boss will be pleased to know that because my workstation has the fastest processor I am the most productive.
Those shifty-eyed salsa and tango dancers... the ruffles on those rumbero shirts must come in handy for stashing the goods.
You mean those there dang new-fangled gadgets ain't cup holders?? Well sheet! Here I just thought that 40x meant it could hold like, a 40 ounce Slurpee! Dang nabbit! I just loves mah AOL-Internet! Thank yew Al Gore!
The REAL jabber has the user id: 13196
What you do today will cost you a day of your life
Parent post is FUNNY, you jackasses.
Holy obfuscation Flying-Mammal-Man!
;-)
First, congrats to the RIAA for shutting down a real piracy operation. However, if they wanted to get the idea across without messing with the facts, why didn't they say something like "...able to churn out X CDs a day..."? They obviously went through the trouble of doing some sort of calculation to come with that 156 burners = 421 average burners, why not put it in real world terms? Shouldn't be too hard to come up with really big numbers like:
(x_burners)(average_CD_burnt_per_minute)*24*60
Lets say average_CD_burnt_per_minute (aka burn rate) of a 20x burner burning a 70-minute CD is:
20/70min = 0.286 CD/min
You have a fascility churning out:
156*0.286*24*60 = 64,247 CDs/day
Now isn't that a much more impressive number? (assuming I've got me numbers correct; my brain only half-works on Sundays, which is how I average more than a whole brain during the week
--The more you know, the less you know.
Since the RIAA is cracking down on piracy and scaring people into not making personal copies of their own CDs it stands to reason that this is cutting into the profits of CD Burner and Media producers. It seems to me (using the RIAA's own logic) that the RIAA should be charged a certain amount per CD/DVD they sell to give back to the Burner/Media producers to make up for the losses in revenue. But then again, I could be wrong.
Invalid Checksum. Retrying.
Mosr respected sir,
I trust by the grace of god that you are well, and would just like to point out that:
If it had been Nigerians doing the counterfeiting then it would only have been the equivalent of 419 (FOUR HUNDRED AND NINETEEN) CD BURNERS.
I trust that you will keep this information a secret between us,
Most respectfully,
GENERAL EATSALOTA MONKEYSHIT
The petroleum and auto industries are sueing Autozone for selling octane boosting products as it is a means of circumventing fuel milage controls implemented in their products.
An unnamed spokesman for the RIAA stated "Sure, they had 156 drives, but since we put less than 30 minutes of music on a piece of media that can hold 64 or more, we were able to calculate that these devices were able to pirate at an effective rate of 421 drives."
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Who cares how many burners they actually had? What does it matter which law enforcment agency they used? Its kind of annoying that everyone blindly hates the RIAA. True they are money grubbing capitalists however in America everyone is. This huge industry is seeing its profits slowly crumble because the general public can easily steal from them. Sorry this is slightly off the subject I just wanted it to get off my chest. And by the way I'm a huge hipocrite, I use file sharing to get everything but at least I admit its wrong.
Fast Federal Court and I.T.C. updates
He can run MUCH faster than I can, so...
by their logic he must be 3 people.
They really don't need to spend so much on anti-piracy snake-oil, raids and expensive court cases. I have a very simple way to stop CD piracy once and for all and am willing to share it with the world:
Charge 5 quid (or dollars) a CD; no one will bother ripping them off. Not only will this stop the "piracy problem", it will actually increase profits.
the equivalent of 421 times? After all, some connections are faster than others.
I use Macs to up my productivity, so up yours Microsoft!
Does this mean if I play a CD at 40x and take the time played and multiply it by the speed and if I played it long enough, would then the copyright of the CD become public domain?
If what you are reading sounds funny, or sarcastic, lame, or stupid
it is because it is supposed to be. just laugh
The mean speed for the burners was exactly: 2.698717949x The highest number of 40x processers they could have was: 10.525The secret service was founded in 1865 in order to combat counterfeiting, before the FBI was founded The secret sevice's presidential protection role was formalized in 1913.
You may not agree with what I'm saying but I'll kill you for my right to say it
If a fast burner counts double then does a slow burner count at half?
How slow should I burn my music so the RIAA officially doesn't mind?
Maybe we are just not understanding the RIAA. I think they should post on there website acceptable burning speeds. Then we could all get along.
LESSON 1
156 = 421 for extremely large values of 156...
From http://www.secretservice.gov/mission.shtml
I don't see anything there about IP law, Fraudulent CD's, or other Piracy or theft laws. The Secret Service protects the president, and investigates Counterfeit CURRENCY, Securities Fraud, Bank Fraud, and other Financial Crime Thats why they are part of the Department of the TREASURY
So what were they doing at RIAA's latest Bust exactly? Though the Register did get the SS's role wrong, they were right in presuming that they really shouldn't have been part of this bust.
sheer stupidity and too much laziness to develop new business models that embrace it.
Okay, you've got me interested. Please explain your ideas regarding a business model surrounding the new idea that "all digital media is uncontrollable".
Does that mean your Ferrari breaks down 8 times more often?
Ok look given 156 cd burners they gave some answer above 400. Well
4*156=624
2*156=312
3*156=468
That's assuming the average speed is 2, 3 or 4.
When you mix 40 speeds in there
Lets say they all are 4 speeds except for 10 of the drives which are forty speed:
6.3 speed is the average for the cdrom
I don't know how they get these numbers. If I was going to lie like they were I'd say
40*156=6240 cd burners!
Jeeze if your going to lie do it well!
The Register, yet again, demonstrates they are utterly clueless about what they report. Of course the Secret Service was involved. It was a criminal case - over $1000 in infringement was involved, and it was for commercial gain (either being enough) - and the Secret Service has the primary jurisdiction in the US for crimes committed with computers.
Why I bother to read anything from rags like The Register is beyond me.
Well, I calculated the mean speed of the burners they were using to be exactly 2.698717949x, so you're probably over the RIAA threshold. Wait... Do you hear sirens?
You may not agree with what I'm saying but I'll kill you for my right to say it
RIAA == Redundant Idiots Against Anyone.
Even though the RIAA takes a good chunk of the money, SOME of it does trickle down to the bands. No crime is victimless. I think you just discovered free thinking but got it all wrong.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
The Secret Service, we naively presumed, was employed to protect high-ranking elected officials.
This is the big problem with Federal law enforcement -- there's so many different law enforcement arms, and few of them like to cooperate with the others. I heard on NPR that they want to form yet another to combat terrorism! Why not have:
(1) FBI -- Enforce federal criminal statutes, including counterfeiting and narcotics, as well as felon apprehension. This gets rid of the DEA, the non-protective Secret Service roles and the Marshalls Service. Essentially focuses on criminal acts comitted in the United States.
(2) Homeland security. Immigration, border security, customs, counter-terrorism, counter-espionage and government protection, including Presidential Security. Eliminates border patrol, customs service, and the rest of the Secret Service function. Essentially focuses on crimes involving extra-national activities and government security.
The constitutional standards for (1), which would mostly involve US citizens, could then be kept higher without a risk to national security.
I wonder what the SI unit of a CDRW is? Is my $75 40x really worth 2.7 $40 16x CDRWs? If so, could I sell my drive as 2.7 drives on eBay and get $108?
I don't understand why they felt the need to inflat an already large figure. Even 156 drives is a freaking large amount of drives.
I'm surprise that the RIAA hasnt claim radio and public library are a breeding ground for prirating music.
They mean the big CD-R machines, that hold like 8 blanks...and burn them all at once...
A small collection of rather interesting quotes, taken from the RIAA's press release & the Register article...
.. the U.S. Secret Service, assisted by a team of investigators from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), on Monday morning raided a major music piracy operation in New York City, leading to the capture [...] of 421 CD-R burners [...].
---
"There were only 156 actual burners, but some run at very high speeds: some as high as 40x. This is well above the average speed," was the official line yesterday.
The Secret Service, we naively presumed, was employed to protect high-ranking elected officials.
"Perhaps the truth is less interesting than the facts?" asked Amy Weiss, the RIAA's Senior VP of Communications.
"...leading to the capture of 35,000 finished CD-Rs..."
421 burners = 156 fast burners
35,000 finished cd-r's = a 10-pack of rewritables
...hand out lots of money. That gets them taken seriously by anyone who matters: legislators.
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
the Brazilian national soccer team has been retroactively disqualified from the World Cup finals, after reports surfaced that they had the equivalent of twelve players on the field during the match, instead of the regular eleven.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
does MP3/P2P equal (1.5M)/P ?
These are the same "statisticians" who think that the continual seizing of multimillions of dollars worth of drugs ("street value" of course) equates somehow to "winning the war on drugs." The RIAA's logic assumes that there is an infinite demand for pirated CDs and that, therefore, any increase in speed of reproduction equates to an increase in sales. No wonder, is it not, that they can't wrap their brains around the idea of increased sales through increased exposure? These characters cannot grasp the very simplest concepts of economics. Would anyone wish to speculate on whether this results from a perspective hatched in the very nest of monopoly conditions?
Hic iacet Arthurus, rex quondam rexque futurus.
In Soviet Russia, twice the piracy makes for fast CD-R drives !!!
And those three individuals were actually fifty four guys but they have rights equivalent of three normal citizens.
Gentlemen, you can't fight in here, this is the War Room!
The RIAA will use anything to say someone is pirating, i bet you in a year or so, they will try to remove the "fair use" stipulation in the DMCA. Which is a bunch of crap. Hey Hillary Rosen: I am not buying CD"s because none of the Music I want to buy is worth paying your high prices. Plus none of the artists I listen to are members of the RIAA and Neither are their Labels, I am sorry if I am cutting into your Corporate Pay check, but if you had music worth listening to, maybe then I will buy CD's/
---
The important difference with these guys is that they are pirating music to make money off of it. Consumers who make copies and distribute them are doing it for free. Actually, more acurately, consumers are PAYING to pirate the music since they have to have a broadband connection to be able to do it, a decent CD ripper/burner, etc.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
The RIAA press release says "The raid, executed by a team of several Secret Service agents and RIAA investigators ...". IANAL but warrants do not entitle anyone but law enforcement to enter private property and certainly do not allow private persons to take part in a law enforcement action.
"the equivalent of 421 CD-burners"
Obviously they mean "CD-burners of which the total speed equals that of 421 single-speed burners".
Or about 9 48-speed burners..
Hey, I've got that at home!
Since when can any sort of logic be applied to five main companies controlling 99% of music media?
Since when should any sort of technology appreciate in value?
If the RIAA could, they would charge everyone in the US royalties for owning radios, computers, cd players, etc. Then, they would charge us royalties per media that we buy regardless of our intentions. Then, they would charge the radio stations, webcasters, and other providers a royalty for playing their crap. Then, they would charge everyone subscriptions to download crippled music that can only be played four times. Then, they would enact a new law that does not allow anyone without their permission record any form of music. Then, they would make books illegal. Then, they would gouge out our eyes so that we could only listen to their music as entertainment.
As far as I'm concerned, I pay a royalty when I buy blank music cds - so anything I put on them is already paid for. They can't charge me twice for their music. So what if I decide to put all 74min of good music that came out in the past 3 years on one cd? I paid the royalty for it.
I just wish there were more piracy rings like that one and I wish music piracy was more rampant. Phase out the big media companies and start requiring talent to build you up.
I could care less about the big pockets of a corporation that puts 'Enact new laws.' as part of their strategy. I love capitalism. This, however, is not capitalism; it is extortion of every person that has ever decided to like a band.
--- We need more Ron Paul!
> ...the RIAA works to protect intellectual property
> rights worldwide and the First Amendment rights of
> artists...
Note: This doesn't mean that the RIAA works to protect the intellectual property rights of artists. Only their first ammendment rights (or, in other words, the ability of their companies to sell the stuff). It does, however, 'works to protect' the intellectual property rights of its member companies.
Its very nice of them to put the 'artists' phrase in there, but what they do isn't about the artists.
All in all, this is a good press release. It erodes the credibility of past RIAA claims (which were suspect to begin with) and future RIAA claims.
> Contact: 202.775.0101
That number is disconnected. Nice to see that they stand behind their words.
Ahh, but you are missing the main point, which is to confuse "national security" and "criminal investigations" to the point that the constitution doesn't matter anymore.
Where can I get one of these 2.6987179487179489 X CD burners?
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our American dead!
Making lots of pirated CDs with CDR drives (and, we presume, computers) sounds suspiciously like a subset of computer fraud to me!
0 1 - just my two bits
What really annoyed me about this article though was this comment, "The other curious aspect of yesterday's release is the use of Secret Service agents in the bust. The Secret Service, we naively presumed, was employed to protect high-ranking elected officials[*]. Perhaps this is a further indication of who's really in charge.®"
What the fuck's up with that? Is the author so stupid they couldn't be bothered to check out the The United States Secret Service? A quick check of their Mission Statement would have revealed this little tidbit of information making their comment childish and unnecessary.
I'd say that copyright violations on this mass scale fall well within the jurisdiction of their powers.
Hilary Rosen is the equivalent of 22 regular greedy corporate whores
Is 16x according to my estimates. So I guess my 32x burner is actually 2* burners?
"Approximately 25 percent of the product seized was Latin music."
I don't get it is latin music worth 2.5 times as much as other types of music? who really cares if it was 25% latin music that just means that 75% of it was other types of music.
I can't decide which is worse: Scientology or the RIAA.
Like there is any difference!
Seriously? So maybe the RIAA and their SS chums have a way of prioritizing the crooks. But still, are you seriously saying that a high-speed burner is equivalent to 2.5 burners, or some such B.S. It still takes someone to load the tray, close, hit "record", unload. That part doesn't change no matter how fast you can burn.
The RIAA is trying to cut down on legal use of their disks. Congrats on their big bust, but can't they just tell the truth?
By the RIAA's standards, premature ejaculators have more sex.
...at midway through a burn, is your cd half empty or half full? If you are burning it in an empty house, and the burn hoses up, and you scream, does anybody hear? Honestly, I think those RIAA folks are doing the more of the good drugs their talent does.
This would be a really good thing IMHO. The big problem would come when those in the whitehouse and congress pass new arbitrary laws with little basis in the real world. You see, they would be forced to either specify that the FBI enforce a law, or appropreate $$ and ask the states to enforce it (remember, they can't order the states to comply with any law that costs the state money. They can only offer to pay the states to enforce it). They will no longer be able to just say "Federal Law Enforcement" and figure out whos mess it is later. So while I agree this would be a very good solution, its not one we will ever see.
1x should be fast enough for anyone thats not a criminal. That being the case they actually had the equivalent of 6240 burners. Even though they may have only had 156 burners, they had some super fast ones, like 4x, 16x, and even some 24x, which are only used by criminals. These people should be given the death penalty for this atrocity to the human race.
Note: I am joking. Anyone who believes this crap should not be allowed to waste anymore oxygen. I would just like to add that in Soviet Russia these would be burning you.
"I can't drive 55. It only goes 38."
...whether they can convince a courtroom that their "calculations" have legal bearing.
I mean, given their silly 32 min CD figure or whatever for an average CD, can they say that every 32 minutes of audio counts as one CD? Can they use this 421 figure in description of the size of the operation in the courtroom?
If so, we could be looking at a ridiculous quasi-legal penalty multiplier.
Imagine if a p2p user was charged with piracy, and because the industry standard for figuring out how many minutes is on your portable device is 64kb/s mp3, so that's a certain (small) amount of data per minute, so take inventory of how much data is compressed audio/64kb, then apply the "32 minutes of audio == CD" rule, and charge you with piracy of CDs in that penalty range regardless of how many actual songs/CDs you've got.
If you've got a few gigs of mp3s, that could get ugly.
vk.
...the equivalent of .6 penises.
You know where you are? You're in the $PATH, baby. You're gonna get executed!
Hey everyone hit reload and we can DDOS the RIAA. Join me it will be fun
As they were selling them cheap, lets assume around 1/3 of retail ($5~$7), and, using RIAA math you get to only 21,415.6 cds a day.
If you also consider they probably worked 8 hrs a day (unless it was also a sweat shop, or had shifts
When compared to RIAA's 465 burners you only have a rate of 15cds/day/burner which is not impressive at all
It's not much of a professional system they busted if there using cdrw drives, This copy of X legit? then erm why's the CD green?
:)
It sounds to me these guys are probably on the amateur scale really, dodgy copys of things at the local market next to the Daracel battries
The above was funny, not a troll.
Just more proof that moderation is broken.
And no, I'm not the person who posted the above for the cynical jackasses among you.
It was *funny*! LAUGH!
So who's the victim when it comes to the possesion of cannabis?
Burning a CD on a 48X takes 2 mins 30 seconds, versus 3 mins on a 24X one... The truth is : RIAA seized the equivalent of 187 CD burners!
"Some of them were real fast, mister, they could burn a billion cd's a minute! And they were big and scary, and had an eyepatch and a hook for a hand...."
3) They believe the public is too stupid to understand (or care about) a useful metric. Given their behavior so far, I think it's the most likely scenario.
The **AA doesn't give a damn what the general public thinks--this is all PR for bought-and-paid-for politicians. The lobbyists will show up, wave around these silly statistics, flash some money and boom! suddenly there will be more laws/levies/taxes on recordable media faster than you can type 'cdrecord'
Hmm... Now let's try this: *clickety-click* c-d-r-c-^H-e-c-o... d'oh!
Excellence: Moderate (mostly affected by comments on your karma)
since the equivilent of 10 men killed a bunch of people.
translation:
some serial killer beat to death a bunch of people in a realy quick mannor.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
It's sort of like a monopoly, it works fine untill they do something wrong - then you're screwed. No thanks, I'd rather have them having to argue with each other, and get caught up in turf wars and duplicated data.
I'm Rick James with mod points biatch!
I know everyone hates statistics, but that's not really the issue here -- it's basic arithmetic. I mean, they can't add and multiply properly, either by accident or design, but as soon as they're caught at it they undermine their already limited credibility.
:)
... anyone have a cite? The biggest problem is estimating the returns from schemes that have never been tried. In other words -- statistics and, worse, speculation.
This reminds me of virtually any tax debate in Congress, excpet there it is at least partly statistics -- trying to extrapolate from known values and economic relationships to determine future revenue. WIth the RIAA, at least in the present example, we see simple nonsense. Of course, this sould be the work of the PR people, a group not known for math skills.
As for "the idea of increased sales through increased exposure" that's a matter for speculation, and a decision I feel that is wholly up to sellers to determine, not the consumer. I imagine the relationship of publicity (earned at the sacrifice of some profits) to ultimate profits (the number they really care about -- not sales) is a curve of some sort, with diminishing returns beyond a certain point of giveaway music. More efficient piracy will not advance the game, rather it may give the beneficiaries an added sense of entitlement, and reduced obligation to pay the big bad record labels for anything. This is not so much civil disobedience as yielding to temptation while feeling justified for just desserts or educating the greedbags.
On the publicity point, recall that Napster and P2P are pull not push mechanisms; you have to request what you want, thus you already know something about it and probably like it. This is less likely to spur sales than push, where the studios would promote music that is not yet established, and which they believe need promotion.
Someone MUST have done a decent study of this question
As an ethical matter marketing should be left to the sellers, with input from consumers but not pressure in the form of piracy. They have a right to be stupid; we do not have a right to coerce. If I were the seller, losing music to piracy would not immediately dispose me to start giving "samples" away for free -- I might go the RIAA route, even if it were illogical. Psychologically, it has to be a decision they feel they made on their own, or that upstarts demonstrate to be viable. Also, if the sellers can make more money not giving out free music, I can't blame them for a second.
I personally have in my possesion exactly zero copyrighted works that I have not legitimately purchased. The sooner we can all claim this, the sooner our arguments against such travestys such as the DMCA will be strengthened.
Martin Brooks / Slayer99 #linux / UIN 2178117
They had some older burners and bought new as new technology came out? Wow, you could almost make that into a business model!
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
Just recently I saw ads in a newspaper for [I think] Curry's [the electrical retailer here in the UK] selling digital cameras.
Naturally one important figure when buying one, is the resolution; how many mega-pixels has it got and at what price?
Currys/Dixons are now selling their digital cameras saying "3.1 megapixel equivalent" and the like!
I resolved if I ever go into a Curry's to make a big fuss, call for the manager and LOUDLY say things about defrauding customers.
Fuck knows what they're exactly talking about, but they're definitely trying to make out lesser cameras to be more.
Simple attempt at duping less savvy camera buyers.
Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility. - Ambrose Bierce
Hilary Rosen? Is that you?
Where's a good cream pie when you need one...
All I want is a kind word, a warm bed and unlimited power.
Think about it: to run 156 ?really fast? burners the limiting factor is going to be the shuffle ? remember the floppy shuffle back in the 80s. I would accept their numbers if they also had monkeys with six arms.
However, that is no excuse for lying about the actual numbers. "156 CD burners" are "156 CD burners", no ifs or buts. Since most people use high-speed burners already, that's what they will assume a "CD burner" refers to, and inflating the numbers is seriously misleading.
What would be legitimate would be a number like "156 CD burners, capable of producing 25000 counterfeit CDs a day".
Wow! 140 burners = 500+? Does this math go further? Is the gig of ram I have only actually 20 megs? How about my 120 gig HDD? I guess that's actually just a 3 1/4" diskette... No wonder the RIAA claims they lose 400 million every year from mp3's. Each song they have actually equals 5 songs! Got damn, there must be thousands of BSB songs by now then!
Defender of Microsoft and Communism!!!
Here's the deal: every record label is a member of the RIAA. So, every time you buy a compact disc, you are giving money to the RIAA. The ONLY solution is to NEVER BUY CD'S again. Share all your music with everyone. But since you are all a bunch of pussies, it's never going to happen and the RIAA is going to fuck you over again and again.
Sorry for the languge, but it's the truth.
Based the their use of equivalence.
The average home with a GameCube/XBox, P4 PC, VCR, DVD player and PDA has more computing power that all the fighters on an aircraft carrier, with enough left over to wage a little cyberwarfare. I guess we should have all of our computing and entertainment equipment licensed and regulated. Oops, I forgot I was taking about the RIAA.
I plead guilty. I have the equivalent of two CD burners.
Donate background CPU time to fight cancer.
They just read the numbers and multiplied them.. 24 X 2 X .... = 421
What luck for rulers, that men do not think. - Adolph Hitler
They could produce 6 million discs/year. This will cost the industry $90 million/year.
Now, simple calculations tells you, that the industry is making a profit of $15 of every CD/DVD sold. And since a DVD burner is 2 speed, and a CD burner 40 speed, there are sold 20 times more CDs than DVDs.
Well, Amazon.com is selling new CDs for $13 a piece. Assuming 100% of this is profit, there is $2 left over on each CD towards the profit on the DVD. So the profit on a DVD must be $40. How can they then sell it for $20 ?
Sorry, but I would seriously question any damages the RIAA would want covered. Including proof that the teenagers buying their crap have enough money to buy these CDs at full price in the stores.
honestly, it doesn't matter how many cd burners they have, what matters is how many cds they can produce. i dont get why they would try to make it seem like there were so many burners when they say exactly how many they estimate they could produce. If they have 1000 1x burners, would they say thats only really equivalent to about 50 "normal" burners? somehow i think not.
:)
btw, what is the burner equivalent of an actual pressing machine?
So if you fired the President of the RIAA, would that be like firing a 1000 stupid employees?
Outdoor digital photography, mostly in New Engl
can someone enlighten me as to what the "average speed" is? I was unaware there was an "average speed" either you have a 12x or a 16x or a 48x is there an "average speed" give me a break. I own several 48x burners and several 4x burners. so, the average being 20x is what... 1 burner? or 10 burners? bah... RIAA discusts me.
You said it your self, "They are officialy under the treasury department" and because the group was making money through sales or they used bandwidth, or equipment (Read: the internet) that was not theirs the secrets service is obligated to stop any organization that creats or loses money from the federal distrobution (Fed banks and presses).
1 high speed photocopier is the equivalent of 10 Gutenberg printing presses.
Photocopier owners to be investigated for fraud, and will be charged with illicitly copying 1 book every 2 minutes the machine has been in operation.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
the average speed of a scan, [www.scan.co.uk] cd writer is ~43x.
too bad everyone here agrees with you already, and if they don't, their a %90 likely to be a troll. Good words, but put 'em somewhere were normal people will read them. Post that somewhere were people still undecided will see that downloading a few songs of win MX or KazaA won't cause the end of the world. Because, right now, public opinion on filesharing is starting to change on the non-tech sector of the public. The techies will never give in, but they don't need to. half of america doesn't know two things about computers, ever downloaded mp3's and generaly believes what the voice on the TV says, opinions and all. Popular opinion, like fads in music, can easily be manipulated, especially by a company that already OWNS the media industry.
EXAMPLE:
Surgio from system of a down was on k-rock(92.3 NYC), about 2 weeks ago. One of the DJs asked him what he though about their new album being leaked to the internet early. Surgio promply responded, "Well, there is nothing wrong with downloading mp3s from the internet..." This and comming on the heals of many other artists ralying to save napster last year( or was it two years, cannot remeber). This shows just how much the artists are hurting by this. Remeber for every album you buy at $18, the artist makes an average of 7 cents($0.07).
(PLEASE HOLD ALL COMMENTS ABOUT SOAD, THIS IS JUST AN EXAMPLE)
I don't own any cd bought or burned... I listen to all my music on music choice via cable or the radio...
We want some answers and all that we get
Some kind of shit about a terrorist threat
- Ministry
"this was an actualy piracy operation"
No, it was a counterfeiting operation. Counterfeiting is the reproduction of copy protected designs for illicit sale.
RIAA doesn't like to use the word counterfeiting, because the only type of thing worth counterfeiting is hard to obtain (official papers, Picassos, Bugattis) or something with a high cost:resale ratio (Rolex, Chanel, CD, DVD, banknotes).
Normally the high resale in the latter category is justified by the protected design because the cachet and market demand for the product is assisted by the artifically high price. Perfume manufacturers used this argument to prevent grey imports of their products into UK by supermarkets for sale at a lower than usual price.
Now, of course, there's no cachet to a CD/DVD sale. The product owner wants to sell as many as possible, and a high sales volume does not diminish the product's appeal to the next purchaser. In fact the self-advertisement due to popularity is a key sales tool, like for books. So RIAA avoids the word 'counterfeit' to avoid answering the question of why the products they represent of priced so high.
If the RIAA fudged the numbers on the count of burners seized, they could very well have fudged the numbers on the seized media count.
Perhaps the "35,000" CD's that were recovered were really 32,500 700MB CD's, but since they have a greater capacity, they "qualify" as being 35,000 650MB CD's.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I think a new, relative form of measurement is great (obviously 421 and 156 are the same thing when counting CD writers). I mean, the standard numbering systems don't work well because they are too precise and everybody splits hairs over the minutest details. If everybody wasn't so anal about numbers then we wouldn't have half the problems we have now with cooking the books. And students could get "mostly right" math answers which would mean better marks and therefore a better self-esteem. Yes, math needs to be tamed and the RIAA is definitely leading the way. I wonder if they take of their accounting with the same system.
I think it's interesting to note the effect of their using 421 for the cd burner count instead of the lower number. That creates sensationalism about large scale piracy operations, shocking the public with inflated numbers to show just how powerful these operations are.
Consider the effect if they had used the real number, and even exaggerate it by imagining them using smaller numbers to represent the real 156, while keeping the output the same. Then they could have raised flags and outcry about the impact of a single burner and what kind of damage a single user can do. Then they would blindly extrapolate, multiplying the average output for one of these 156 burners by the population of burners in the US. Then they would have a grasp on the <quote fingers>true</qf> amount of piracy going on and could pursue their dream: crippling legislation...
Whoever made the comment simply didn't read.
Origially, the bootnote made some remark about the RIAA and the government. They since changed it to a clarification about the Secret Service's role. You obviously got the later version.
Hey, do you think we could get the NRA onside in fighting the RIAA? That would be brilliant!
I did a little math here and discovered that if each burner (you know, the real ones) burned 8 cd's each hour for 8 hours each day (amounting to about 10000 cd's per day) for 365 days a year, and were sold to someone who otherwise would have purchased a proper one at $25-, this would indeed amount to $90 million. Of course, in the real world that would never have happened. They certainly have a way with numbers.
The disk is twice as large as it needs to be
Try to actually read the article next time.
"Finished" == burned (presumably with pirated music/movies)
If CD's cost half as much, I would buy 10x as many, seriously, why the hell do they still cost so much?
Whom is the audience for this post? Those who believe in "Fair Use" as defined under the law. Not Fair Use as "I want everything to be free, and damn the consequences to everyone else".
First a clear explanation of copyright
CAFE at the EFF
Note what it doesn't say as well as what it does.
Here as well is a "balanced" look at what's being fought for, for both sides.
A summation of positions
Note in all the above the author isn't being denied his rights, and the consumer isn't his.
Personal Computer Software Copyright Violation: An Unobtrusive Analysis of Internet Software Piracy
Looking at the "piracy" phenomena from the sociologist perspective.
White collar crime increasing
Of which copyright theft is.
The Digital Challenge to Intellectual Property Rights
Note this part of the above "To an economist, assets are valuable not because they merely exist, but because they can be bought and sold and traded.". Note to people who argue that the copyright holder has the original even if you make an exact copy are missing the point. Existance isn't enough.
. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
Technology, Intellectual Property,and the Operation of Information Markets
There is more for such a complicated topic with far reaching consequences. Which I intend to expand upon latter.
I don't expect anyone to read this, partically because the battle lines have already been drawn. US vs THEM, and when that's done. Proper discussion is very hard.
Also remember that on BOTH sides there are those factions that seek only their own ends and "Fair Use" really isn't one of them.
Maybe they should just read the story above this one. It seems boy-bands have lost their popularity (thank god). Maybe that would account for their 7% decline (yeah, right!) in sales they've been seeing.
"On a scale from 1 to 10, people are stupid"
At least now we know where all those drugs confiscated during your war on drugs(tm) go.
I hope they don't count my extra half CD burner against me...
Someone set us up the bomb, so shine we are!
Approximately 25 percent of the product seized was Latin music.
Odd, I thought Latin was a dead language.
I've had it with their overpriced CDs and the crap they keep putting out. The last four CDs I bought (by bands I liked in the past) just absolutely sucked. What a waste of my money.
So now I am going to do the ethical thing (ethical to my wallet) and download via P2P to evaluate their latest crap before I fork over any money.
"You're not getting older, the music really does suck"
Pirates bust the RIAA
You stand as someone who's really in need of upgrading his system.
... commercial CD stamping equipment used in Southeast Asia to pirate CD's from remade master stampers. Those have to be a whole-lot-o RIAA CD equivalents.
- Tjp
I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!
Good thing I've just got a built-in wireless card, and listen to stuff stored on other people's computers. If they bust down my door, no matter how much illegally copied music I've listened to, I've got the equivalent of zero CD burners!
(If nothing else, saying "I've got the equivalent of zero CD burners" will sound good in court, or if I'm trying to find a lawyer.)
RIAA monopoly prices support YOUR CD purchases
congrats on the constructive first comment: "raaaaaaa" (r*1+a*7 important?) whoever you are. Is your choice of a crazymans non-word the bi-product of your twisted genius? or perhaps you were just over-exitedly typing in the mad rush to FP....
anyways I like your style - why not register/login and be my first friend in this: my exiting new guise.... "jumbie"
Quit Slashdot Today!
I've got an 8x burner and on 8x it only makes coasters. If I want to burn cd's reliably I have to do it at 4x. How many yahoos buy 52x drives and can really use them at 4x?
In other news:
sadam hussein reports 40,000 tanks on the iraqi border.
u.s. intelligence reports only 39
sadam has responded: "but they were really fast!!!...and very powerful!!!"
(that stupid bitch at the riaa needs to be soundly spanked)
Oh dear oh dear,
I havent laughed so much for a long time,
but thanks RIAA, even you do have a purpose in in world.
DO NOT PANIC
IMHO you should have used this link
Wow, imagine getting this together on a beowulf cluster!
This sig no verb.
Actually that is a good idea, except that the secret service should stick around as an elite organization, since you would want a separate branch handling presidential detail and stuff like corruption in the FBI. If you let the Secret Serivce stay, then you have to let the run counterfitting, since that was their original purpose.
But other than that, i would like to see the FBI run civil law enforcement, and a (new?) branch of the military that would manage our "international security" like border control, etc.
The DEA, ATF, INS etc all seem like one more layer of bureaucracy. Keeping the secret service around makes sense, but the rest are really a duplication of effort.
----- Question authority, but not ours. Hate the man, but we're not him.
Woof!
(I know. It's bad. I'm sorry.)
Ed R.Zahurak
You know, oblivion keeps looking better every day.
So many agencies.... so few terrorists!
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
I am OUTRAGED by this garbage. Seriously, I am completely and utterly disgusted with the kind of trash that these organizations have done to our country, from both a political and technological perspective. It's as if they are trying to take away all of the consumer's rights so that in the future, the big multinational conglomerates that produce EVERYTHING we use will basically DICTATE to us what we can do with their products, when, where, how and why. Consider the old story, about a year ago, maybe, of these "smart" chips that would cause small household appliances, such as toasters, to permanently stop functioning if taken outside of a specified region. How convenient. Or how about those printer ink cartridges that refuse to work after their "expiration" date has passed? Or all the garbage "technologies" put into software, music and movies to make them refuse to work unless conditions are as dictated by the producer. What happened to the days when some jack ass's copyright actually EXPIRED after a REASONABLE length of time? Does an electrician who wired a light switch get royalties every time that light switch is flipped? Does a contractor who installs a door get royalties every time that door is opened or closed? Does your locksmith get to decide who you have the priveledge of inviting to your house? And must you pay your locksmith for that SERVICE? NO!!! That's why electricians, contractors, locksmiths, and EVERYBODY ELSE who makes tangible products must CONTINUOUSLY perform their job, or they will not have income. Is that so difficult? Do you hear any electricians complaining that they have too much work? Would it be a worldwide disaster if so-called alleged "content providers" (the people who produce the utter GARBAGE we call movies, music and software) had to continuously make new work to earn a living? So-called "piracy" is a fact of life in these profession, similar to the fact that an electrician's work lasts a good 20 years.
The RIAA is a piece of SHIT.
The MPAA is a piece of SHIT.
Microsoft is a piece of SHIT.
If the above three organizations were forced to close and all the people working for those organizations were on the street begging for beer money, the world would be a MUCH better place.
I want to upgrade my system, I really do.
I have submitted all the necessary paperwork.
But I am still awaiting a decision by both Micro$oft and the RIAA about wether my choices in components are approved of.
Wouldn't want to get sued you know.
Boy, I remember the days when you could upgrade your system and put any damn thing you wanted inside that beige box. I remember them like it was yesterday. They were good days, full of blue skies, warm mornings and good sex.
Yep them were the days.
For the 5304th time, the RIAA does not have to convince anyone of the veracity of their statistics, because they're all for show. They produce that stuff just for publication, so they'll have something to point to when they cry foul to their pet Congressmen, who of course will never fact-check so long as he or she receives a fat-check.
/. mainstay of repetitive, useless bitching?
They don't care about geeks on blogs calling shenanigans. Yes, the RIAA is full of shit. This was absolutely confirmed with the AHRA. Continually producing evidence that they are, in fact, full of shit is not useful here, where everyone already knows this and has likely known it for a decade. What's the point, outside of generating 5 pages of the same comments that are always generated whenever a RIAA/MPAA stupidity/corruption-expose is posted here? We don't need the rules of the game defined for us yet again, we don't need motivation to be anti-RIAA, we need solutions as to how to stop these criminals from illicitly changing laws to favor them. How about some articles dealing with that, as opposed to the
Look how stupid the RIAA is! Obviously, they really, genuinely believe every deliberately crafted word in every one of their press releases... It couldn't possibly be propaganda... No, I think it's safe to say that with all of their billions of dollars, they still can't hire anyone who actually understands the issues, so I'm going to mock them for their stupidity, and go download a bunch of illegal music to which fair use does not apply by any stretch of the imagination... But it's okay, because the RIAA is so stupid!
The RIAA are looking for your feedback! Let them know how much you support them in their times of need! You too can congratulate them on their enlightend actions and opinions on their feedback page
Quick, someone get the name and address of everyone who's ever worked for the RIAA and post it to Slashdot!
of piracy operation that they SHOULD be worried
about
their terrible statistical lies aside ... this was a group of people not downloading the music for personal consumption but to re-sell to stores and consumers
the guys who were running that show were real organized criminals and they should be put away ... i'm all for taking out the big fish
As long as the RIAA paid, or rather the Secret Service charged the RIAA for full cost recovery, which would have to be more than what a high ranking lawyer would charge - right.
This assumes that the first two priorities are satisfied, because the implication is very unprofessional - namely that busting pirates has a higher priority than amti-terozism. They could be scouring flight bookings for baddies- but not today - 10 resources are booked on a junket - arguably putting lives at risk.
This is a civil matter, and an anton pillar order makes this unnecessary unless cost plus rates were charged Now their annual report will imply they have NOT discharged their two prime duties fully and effectivitely. Talk about easily distracted.
...kill people.
People kill people.
Updated According to the blurb for Six Steps to Spiritual Revival , the Christian Coalition's Pat Robertson "reveals an amazing Scriptural pattern". But there's a pretty amazing pattern emerging amongst buyers of his book on Amazon.com.
Head over to this link and see if there's anything unusual. Or click to enlarge the screenshot, captured earlier today.
Yes, it appears that his readership includes a constituency that would make him blanche.
Scrolling down, you can see that a number of users have recommended The Ultimate Guide to Anal Sex for Men in addition to, or as an alternative to Robertson's tome.
Robertson has fulminated against homosexuality many times, equating it to Satanism.
Personalization gone mad? asks net privacy specialist Richard M Smith - who we thank for bringing this to our attention. No, more likely a hack, he explains.
"Someone just got friends to visit the Web pages for the two books a bunch of times. Since the Robertson book hasn't sold very well, Amazon relies on page hits for recommendations and not book purchases."
However the online retailer only has itself to blame for the increasingly surreal " Customers who wear clothes also shop for:" recommendations... which in this case includes Clean Underwear (again!) and "Cheetah Print Slippers".
Amazon.com certainly does move in mysterious ways.®
Update: Remarkably, Amazon.com had removed the Customers who shopped for this item also shopped for... entry within ten minutes of the publication of this story. Since then the other recommendations have changed a number of times, as Amazon.com users make their way to inspect the page. Real-time vox pop?
Surely unrelated stories
Henry Raddick: man of letters - Amazon star [+ NPR interview]
Lloyd Webber hoaxer unmasked
"I am not Henry Raddick!" - HRH Prince of Wales [official denial]
I only do half the time?
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
Is not the mistake. But the covering up and refusal to admit it.
It's one thing if they admitted they made a mistake and it was actually 156 drives. But they actually try to weasel it as being equivalent to 421 drives.
That gives you an insight on what sort of people are in control at the RIAA.
In the settlement of a class action suit against the RIAA for violations of the RICO Act, it was ruled that the effectiveness of their monopolistic practices made them the equivalent of 12 billion criminals. Sentencing is rumored to include requiring the RIAA to engage in distributing free music as a public service for an infinite duration.
Ooo, and cars, don't forget cars - after all, it's possible to commit a crime with a car. Add baseball bats to your list too. And chainsaws. And axes. And duct tape. And knives. And pencils. And hammers. And piano wire. And cement. And syringes. And ...
Guns don't kill people any more than spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.
Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
The Register article seems to mock the Secret Service as being the outfit that only protects high-ranking officials. That is quite untrue. The primary mission of the USSS was originally to suppress counterfeiting operations, and only adopted the protection of the White House staff after the 1901 McKinley assassination. So while the USSS is most famous for protecting the President at all costs(tm), they still play major roles in uncovering counterfeiting rings (if selling The Two Towers "DVD" 1 month before the actual release of the movie isn't counterfeiting, I don't know what is). Sounds like the Brits need to do their homework (e.g. visit http://www.ustreas.gov/usss/index.shtml)
How do you know?
What would happen if IP laws did not exist is probably more like this...
Firstly, academic research would all but stop, because the only product it produces is information, and the value of that information is drastically reduced. Consequently the funding would rapidly dry up. The picture would probably be much the same in both universities and industry, for the same reasons.
As a direct result of lack of research, medical science would grind to a halt. One of the single biggest turnover markets in the world is medical research, but the reason is that doing that research costs a lot of money. If the people investing that money have no guarantee that they'll see a return on investment, they'll get out of the market. They may be greedy -- although for all the high prices they charge, they do spend a fortune developing the good stuff in the first place, and write off several more fortunes on all the ideas that don't work out first -- but they're not stupid.
Along similar lines, say goodbye to any hopes for faster, more efficient transport infrastructure any time in the near future. Car manufacturers are currently throwing staggering amounts of money into R&D for things like fuel cell cars. Potentially, they solve the environmental problems of automobiles once and for all, which I hope you'll agree is a goal worth aiming for, but without the knowledge that they'll be the only ones who can produce cars based on the tech they develop, at least for a while, they have no reason to invest in it only to see their competitors rip off the end results within months.
This same picture repeats itself all over the world. IP is not just about music, or software, though obviously both of those things are information-based and have the same driving economics behind them. Personally, for all we knock modern software, I'm quite glad we've seen the improvements we have over the last fifty years. And where did those improvements come from? R&D, of course.
Now, if the cost of maintaining the incentives to research and develop is having intellectual property, and convincing a load of idealistic script kiddies that they can't have everything for free just because they want it, then as far as I'm concerned, so be it. You don't go driving through the streets like a maniac just because your car can do 90, because there are serious consequences, and people understand that. The irresponsible few who do it anyway are, rightly, treated as criminals and dealt with accordingly. It's about time the current teen/20something generation understood that there will be consequences to their wholesale ripping of music and software as well, and accepted the corresponding moral responsibility to work inside the rules.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
The point they missed is that the RIAA member companies published the equivalent of 5 good records in 2002. How they can miss the other point that more music and old fashioned sales channels doesn't mean better music and more revenue is beyond me.
"How they expect anyone to take their statistics seriously is beyond me."
I'm sure it is beyond you.
Whats really funny is the mental image I get when I see the guy at the RIAA tasked with going though all the CDRS and coming up with this number. "Ok Bob. As our main tech tech guru, your job is catalog the make and model of all of these CDRs, noting the speed of each CDR. Also, remember last weeks meeting...some CDRs are acually MORE than 1 CDR." "Uhhh, heheh heheh heheheh hehehhe. Yeah." "Great Bob, now who's my little tech guy?" "Uhh, me? hehe hehehhe hehehh" "You didn't tell anyone about last night did you?" "Uhh hehe, hhehehe hehe, no"
Who is fighting hardest for copyright protection? Musicians, artists and writers, or record companies, film studios and publishers?
Are the creations of pre-copyright musicians, artists and writers, like Mozart, Rembrandt or Shakespeare, worse than the work of modern-day creatives who need only write one hit and can sit back and rake in the money for the rest of their lives?
What is most depressing is that people have swallowed the corporate line that anyone who creates anything popular has the automatic right to become a millionaire.
I'm not denying that musicians shouldn't be paid for what they do. I do pay them -- I go to live concerts. That's all musicians had to live on until a hundred years ago, and there was no shortage of music before then.
I'm not denying that actors shouldn't be paid for their work -- I go to the theatre and to the cinema. That's all the movie and theatre industry had to live on until VCRs were invented in the 1970s, and there was no shortage of good plays or movies before then.
Extending copyright as restricively as is being done today does not protect artists or incentivise them to create. It encourages them to sign up with big record/movie companies who can guarantee them a lifetime of riches in return for very little effort.
Imagine if comedians copyrighted all their jokes. Would the world be a funnier place?
The author of this post asserts his moral rights.
Marijuana... that's an asset forfeiture.
Pirated CDs... that's an asset forfeiture.
Stolen cable... that's an asset forfeiture.
Immigration violation... that's an asset forfeiture.
Helping the terrorists... that's DEFINITELY an asset forfeiture.
Isn't this shit what we fought England over, 225 years ago? My christ, the terrorists HAVE won.
-Hentai [in vita non pacem est]
If I remember my capitalism theory, all that demand should start driving supply real soon now.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
On which 50 + 1 - 1 = 49 (until it was obfuscated).
And how many new Slashdot stories were there last month? Sorry, I meant "the equivelant of" new stories, once you've subtracted the duplicates.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Are you sure we shouldn't just have one: The United States Police Force, and then build a big wall around NYC? Oh, wait....
If you use your Ferrari to rob a bank, then the RIAA will claim that you actually robbed 4 banks.
A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing -- Emo Phillips
There's no reason that an elite Presidential Protection group in "Homeland Security" could be formed. They could at least have better coordination and intelligence with the other homeland security branches.
Each of the internal and external security branches could have a special group designed for investigating the other when needed.
How much does a 421x speed burner cost? I want one!
All it says is: 421 (equivalent) burners were discovered. We are almost at a stage where possessing a cd-burner is outlawed--because it can be used to commit a "crime"... While possession of guns remains legal.
;- )
That's insane logic dude, everyone knows you can't copy a CD with a gun! Use your head!
You can't take the sky from me...
Where did the number 156 come from? I didn't see it in the article.
Maybe they counted DVD burners in there also, and came up with the number by the amount of data each could burn.
Ravi
When the axe came to the forest, the trees said, "Look out - the handle was once one of us."
Amsuing how the register turns a legitimate copyright bust into anti-RIAA diatribe. Thank you for ever present spin on copyright issues. The fact that this crap made slashdot shows that slashdot moderators are just as guilty.
Vote for Pedro
as the AC replied to your comment (here), what you coined "actualy piracy [sic]" is more appropriately called "counterfeiting."
i found offense in what this slashdot article did; if one were to look at the RIIA story really said, you would see that that statistic was peripheral. more important was the nature of these illicit products: they were fraudulent. according to the RIAA, "officials also seized eight Rimage Imprinters, one high-end color copier valued at $75,000, and other equipment and raw materials used in the manufacturing process."
NOBODY HERE HAS MENTIONED THE REAL PROBLEM HERE!
the problem with this article is twofold:
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
shouldn't the RIAA be forced to post "lost sales" adjusted for PRICE FIXING?
Wouldn't their numbers drop dramatically if suddenly they had to count a CD as being $5, and not the price fixed $15?
All your CDs are belong to us
Maybe RIAA,does such a good job for ANerica that people on the rest of the world will start listening non-american music (There's plenty of it, good quality too, I assure) I thing US end up loosing in the end.
Just my 2 cents
Ha!
By their logic, people would have used 421 burners to copy 350 CDs. That's less than 1 CD per burner.
1) Some burners are faster than others and thus count as multiple burners. (156 burners == 421 burners)
2) For every good track, there are probably 100 bad tracks, so 35,000 CD-Rs is really the equivalent of 350 CDs.
Um.
When I see, "50 CDRs for $20" at Best Buy, with a, "Get $15 back!" sticker on the package, it makes me wonder where the hell you are.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
An American scientist once visited the offices of the great Nobel prize
winning physicist, Niels Bohr, in Copenhagen. He was amazed to find that
over Bohr's desk was a horseshoe, securely nailed to the wall, with the
open end up in the approved manner (so it would catch the good luck and not
let it spill out). The American said with a nervous laugh,
"Surely you don't believe the horseshoe will bring you good luck,
do you, Professor Bohr? After all, as a scientist --"
Bohr chuckled.
"I believe no such thing, my good friend. Not at all. I am
scarcely likely to believe in such foolish nonsense. However, I am told
that a horseshoe will bring you good luck whether you believe in it or not."
- this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...