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RIAA Chats With Song Swappers
einer writes "Orignally seen
on Drudge; in reaction to their recent loss in court, an IM was sent to 'hundreds of thousands' of grokster and Kazaa users by the RIAA warning that they were NOT anonymous and that they could face legal consequences if they did not stop sharing copyrighted material. The IM was sent to users hosting copyrighted songs for download. Is this a scare tactic or an honest attempt to reform the p2p user community, or both?"
Ok, so first they argue in court that there are no legit uses for these services. Then they use them themeselves. Are they not admiting to doing something that they would claim is not legal?
"It is not how things are in the world that is mystical, but that it exists." -Ludwig Wittgenstein
They claim the swapping of copywritten songs is illegal, using kazaa for chatting would be a perfectly legal way in RIAA's eyes.
Now corecion, and harrasing people after a judge said that what was going on wasn't illegal ? that is another matter
I'm not sure I get this... they say that there's no legit use for these programs, but they only send messages out to people who are "breaking the law." Not sure about this, but if they have to single out those people, doesn't that prove that there are legal and legit uses for these products?
I don't think I have a sig.
To vacillate or not to vacillate, that is the question... or is it?
Scare tactic. Next question please.
C - A language that combines the speed of assembly with the ease of use of assembly.
Hi CtC? /ignore RIAA
<user> Uh, no.
<RIAA> ASL plz
<user> get lost
<RIAA> plz talk 2 me!
<RIAA> plz talk 2 me!
<RIAA> plz talk 2 me!
<RIAA> plz talk 2 me!
<user> fsck off!
<RIAA> y r u so mean?
<RIAA> wats your name?
<user> damnit! leave me alone!
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
They simply cannot subpoena Grokster or KaZaA (thanks to the recent ruling) for users' names -- let alone actually find their e-mail address to send a nastier C&D 'letter'.
By doing this, the RIAA is basically admitting to the fact that they have lost their stranglehold on the music industry's implementation of non-DRM (or DRM lite) technology.
$DEITY bless $NATION
..this move of theirs will probably be effective with some people. It'll work for the same reason that the "buying marijuana fuels terrorism" ad campaign works, because the average person is dumb.
& I wish I knew the password to your heart . . . &
Me: "Man the desperate things you try... How does it feel to be obsolete? Artists don't need you anymore. Consumers don't need you anymore. I hear your industry fading. Better brush up on your customer service skills, your gonna need them in your new job at Mcdonalds. If they hire form scum sucking executive types. ah... I hear the clock... tick tick tick tick"
So, it would seem that we need a peer-to-peer service that is built with the following attributes:
-completely anonymous users, file transfers, hosts, etc.
-reliable and stable structure
-decentralized topology
-efficient data management
-and complete deniability (I didn't host that file, or I didn't download that file, as member's cant control content on the network)
Well, I don't work for FreeNet, or their developers, but I did have to read a paper on FreeNet for school, and FreeNet does do all that.
I guess it's time to make the switch to FreeNet.
The RIAA will continue the only possible strategy for prosecuting illegal music-swappers: hammer a few "extreme offenders" college students to set an example for the many.
IM warning notwithstanding, Joe Blow from Iowa who downloads a few Celine Dion songs has as good a chance of being prosecuted as he does replacing Rene Angelil. The RIAA must prosecute copyright violators individually, and out of necessity they will focus on the select few worst abusers, at least those who are easy targets.
The basis for the RIAA case against Verizon, as pointed out in the article, is that Verizon must release contact info for customers because the RIAA has no way to contact these customers without Verizon's help.
The Verizon lawyer just said: "Wait a minute. You just contacted millions of people."
Also, about "the messaging": it appears that the RIAA is "logging on" to popular file sharing services and using simple scripting to message users through the system. Kazaa provides this functionality.
See, the thing I don't understand, is that to do this sort of thing *legitimately* - that is, prove the user who they're messaging IS distributing copywrited content - the RIAA must log on, search, download, and play a potentially infringing file. Then, the RIAA has to send out the message.
No matter what the speed of the RIAA connection, something tells me that it's going to be very difficult for them to download millions of songs, check them by hand, and then send out messages - since it simply isn't possible. Perhaps they could hash files, sure, but they're STILL downloading thousands of songs. In other words, this is what this says: "I just used this file sharing service to illegally copy a song - and if I want to, I can sue you for it." In previous suits, the RIAA has said things to the tune of: "Since you didn't own copyright to this and my computer made a copy, regardless of whether or not I own copyright, the file isn't legally mine." Or, translation: "I committed a crime to prove your guilt."
I'm pretty sure that isn't legal.
From the Kazaa terms and conditions :
You agree not to use the Software to:
2.1 Transmit or communicate any data that is unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, invasive
of another's privacy, hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise
objectionable.
Isnt that basis enough to sue the RIAA ?
Siggy Say, Siggy Do
Everyone should remember that repeated threats of legal action qualify as battery... If RIAA oversteps their bounds here, there could be a nice big class-action lawsuit over it.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
from the article: '"Way to go, RIAA. Sue and threaten the public, your customers. I think I'll go and download," one posting on Yahoo said.'
This is not the answer. I'm not saying that the RIAA is right in claiming that the MASSIVE amount of pirating is hurting their business, but if this is the response we all start taking eventually it will. We do have to realize that it is the recording industry that signs artists, produces and records their work, and markets them to a vast audience. In a round about way, pirating music is eventually going to end up hurting us. I'm not exempt, nor do I plan to stop downloading free music period, but we can't just fight back by stealing more music. IF we continue to ramp up our efforts in a big "fuck you" to the RIAA and recording industry we'll end up with a world FULL or DRM and Longhorn/Itanium like shit. I, for one, shiver at that thought.
from the articel: 'The RIAA argued that Verizon is obligated under the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act to help the music industry protect its copyrights. Verizon says it is willing to help, but argued that the law only applies to Web pages stored on its computers, not traffic on the "peer-to-peer" networks that merely travel across its wires.'
Here we see the DMCA being wielded again. We have to face it, the law is here now and they're going to use it. We have a couple of choices: accept it and learn to play by the rules it outlines, or band together (there's a hell of a lot of people that read Slashdot) and strike it down, or AT LEAST reform it. The DMCA is pure evil and until we change or destroy it we're not going to make any progress in regards to the current state of affairs. It was a way of treating a symptom (like so many things in America) and NOT a solution to the problem. BUT all of us bitching about it online and on Slashdot DOES NOTHING. We have to take action on this.
"I think a small number of users will be deterred by this effort. It's not going to come as a surprise to them the RIAA finds it unlawful," said Jonathan Band, a copyright lawyer for Morrison & Foerster.
I have a fifteen year old sister. Think about it, these kids start getting online around 10-12 and all they've EVER known is FREE MUSIC. Most of them don't know or even consider that it IS stealing. DON'T STEAL MUSIC was part of the message sent buy the RIAA (Apple is still innovating the industry, in more ways than one. Remember when the iPod first came out....) and this is something we should really think about. Are we justified in demanding lower prices? Yes. How about calling foul on the DMCA? Yes. Figuring out a new model that is beneficial to artists, consumers, and the corporations providing the content? Yes. As the law stands though, downloading music from p2p IS ILLEGAL. Are we justified in stealing? No.
Look at the new service from Apple, iTunes Music Store. I don't think Apple got it 100% correct but they've come a HELL of a lot closer than anyone else so far. Unlimited burns of tracks to CD, burn a playlist 10 times, register 3 Macs to play purchased files and be able to change which 3 Macs you have registered, unlimited ability to put your music on as many iPods as you like, and Rendezvous streaming of your entire library both on your network and across the internet. I feel the price points are pretty damn close to right....and maybe we'll see them get a little better.
I don't know exactly what point I'm trying to make but it just seems like we're all screaming "foul" on this and maybe we should re-examine the whole situation. Escalating this to an epic battle of theft, rights infringement, lawsuit, counter lawsuit, destruction of an industry just doesn't seem like the only option.
The Slashdot community could have a lot of power and a lot of voice if we could agree on something that was fair to BOTH sides and then get out in the real world and make that voice heard.
" out of curiosity, could they be prosecuted under any spam laws?"
Sure, and 20 years later, after costing the public $50million in legal fees, the RIAA will finally win one of their 10 appeals and we'll be right back where we started. When you ask a question like that, you need to qualify it.
To me, it's the same as someone asking, "Can't Microsoft be prosecuted for illegally maintaining a monopoly?".
Massive multinational conglomerates have outgrown our justice system. Simply put, they're bigger than we, the people, could ever hope to be.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
You are participating in the piracy of copyrighted materials. You are not anonymous, and further violations can result in legal action being taken.
<l4m0rman2000X> omg wtf
<RIAA> Please remove all copyrighted material from your shared folder and refrain from downloading copyrighted material in the future.
<l4m0rman2000X> gimme the new limp bizkit faggot
<l4m0rman2000X> fuck u
<RIAA> I am attempting to converse in a civil manner. You have been given a warning to cease your illegal activities. Failure to do so could result in legal action being taken.
<l4m0rman2000X> shut up b4 i ddos u!!!!!1 take ur jewish lawyer crp back 2 israel!!!!1
*** Quits: l4m0rman2000X (Leaving)
Respectfully, I don't think the RIAA looks upon the mass of file sharers as a community. No one I know who shares considers themselves part of a community. Besides, that kind of approach would make the RIAA look soft. They don't want to reform anyone, I don't think. They just want them to stop and will send lawyers if their demands aren't met. The infringers are seen as nothing more complex than an army of shameless theives.
Personally I spend money on music pretty regularly. I go see a lot of bands live, maybe buy a t-shirt, buy cds straight from the bands, etc...
I really don't see the problem with the RIAA trying to limit piracy, it's their tactics that suck. Kazaa for example has a lot of stuff traded on it that has absolutely nothing to do with the RIAA, yet they try to shut the whole thing down, and they're terrible hyocrites and can't see that they need to change their business model. I hardly even use cds anymore, and if I do they're mp3 cds. I have the means to use more convenient methods than having hundreds of cds laying around (and I HAVE hundreds, legally bought over the years.. not many from recent years, but hundreds nonetheless) so why the hell should I stick to overpriced media in a format I don't even like anymore?
They don't get with the times... people adapt, they're not. Tough shit if nobody wants to do business with the RIAA anymore. You might as well sue me if I grow food in my garden because I've decided it's nicer than paying for all my food already pre-grown. Not the same thing, sure, but it's a similar situation...
Of course I'm preaching to the choir here.
I think pay music can and should exist. They're obviously not learning how to SELL it though. Update the business model, get with the times, stop screwing over the bands (I won't get into that here, but they certainly do), and realise that most people don't want to spend nearly $20 for an hour's worth of content when there's so many hours of content out there to listen to.
Support your favorite bands by seeing them live. You'll probably even discover a lot of new music that way too.
...but maybe if the RIAA spent more time producing products people wanted to purchase and less time alienating their users they wouldn't have this problem!
Justin Timberlake, Christina Agularia, Kelly Clarkson, 50 Cent, and Linkin Park are being shoved down the throats of their listeners with their preprocessed, $18 garbage, its no goddamned wonder CD sales are down! In one quick swoop, Napster made available all of the "good" music people want to hear AND made the CD format obsolete.
I'm sorry, but I believe it's time for the RIAA to buckle down and try and change their business model if they want to stick around.
"In a Democracy, people get the kind of government they deserve." -Winston Churchill
I don't know about you... but I have a wireless basestation.... no password... soooooo I suppose someone else from my IP MUST have been d/ling all the copywritten stuff... I just use KAZAA for the *significant* non-infringing uses... /Sounds like reasonable doubt to me...
Hi there
I am from Cape Town, South Africa and I personally think one of the many reasons why people p2p for music is because of the price of CDs nowadays. Here, we are paying about R130-R150 a CD which averages about $17. It may not sound much for the Americans out there, but for us here in SA, it is a lot of money to spend on a CD.
Compare to a Large McDonalds Big Mac meal, fries and a Coke for R22.
Many people out there would rather own the original CD because of the quality advantage and CD sleeve, etc, but people are only prepared to pay for CDs rather than to p2p if they were cheaper. Doesn't the RIAA realise this? Don't they think that if they had to bring the price down by 50% or so that they would sell more CDs, and so in turn make more money?
But nowadays commerce doesn't think like this. For example, bring the price of plasma television screens down by a huge amount and BELIEVE ME, people will storm each and every Circuit City, Best Buy, etc and buy them.
I would love to hear your comments on this.
Thanks
-completely anonymous users, file transfers, hosts, etc.
Freenet is still suseptable to a man-in-the-middle attack. Your ISP could log everything you insert. Also, it won't protect you from your own software. For example if you publish a word document with your name and LAN address embedded in it, you've pretty much given up your privacy.
I find it even more amusing that the RIAA has replaced their people with bots. Heres why:
We all claim the RIAA mainly is a representative for music-distributers that are no longer necasery. And then they start doing their dirty work (which is all they do, apperantly) with bots!
They have thus proven our claim is correct, by employing technology to do their work, instead of doing it themselves :)
Oh. And this is meant to be moderated funny, not insightfull, if anyone cares to spend modarator points on such a lousy post.
Not Buzzword 2.0 compliant. Please speak english.
I shudder to think on what legal basis the RIAA could be prohibited from doing this. If anything like that existed, it would probably be sweeping and be a threat to P2P and IM in general. However, the creator of the P2P software might be able to do something if it bugs enough users.
If you aren't offering copyrighted songs and they still keep bothering you, maybe you can sue them for some kind of harrassment. If you are offering copyrighted songs, just live with it, or, alternatively, perhaps you should just stop.
Yep, we're trying to build a P2P app that uses spoofed UDP source addresses. It works, but it's only in very basic alpha at the mo. It uses anonymous broadcasts to perform the queries. The main problem is the file transfer - it is hard to do flow control if you can't talk directly to the remote host. Have a look - http://udpp2p.sourceforge.net/ - if you think you can help, we'd be grateful.
Get your own free personal location tracker
OK, I have to play devil's advocate here.
I am no fan of the RIAA. But the reactions here are surprisingly hostile for what they're doing. If I'm reading this article correctly, they're sending instant messages to people who are offering files to upload (based on song titles), warning them about their traceability and legal liability.
So what?
This is rotten behavior but it is an improvement. Remember, these are people who would much rather communicate with you via certified mail on legal letterhead. If I get an instant message on Kazaa I don't start pacing around in a sweat wondering if I should contact a lawyer.
Presumably, anyone using Kazaa for non-infringing uses shouldn't get one of these instant messages anyway (unless the RIAA is lying about examining song titles first, or there's a name collision with a copyrighted work in a user's upload directory). Running a file sharing node doesn't expose you to liability unless you've got copyrighted stuff on it. We always emphasize how file sharing networks have non-infringing uses. I don't see how this would have a chilling effect on such use unless the messages are sent to people in error, are used for DoS attacks, or are indiscriminately sent to all users of the network whether their node contains copyrighted content or not.
Frankly I would almost give them points for cleverness. Compared to their typical antics this is quite tame. It will probably be more effective for them, too. Most people probably don't care enough about file sharing to risk liability, and it's only natural for the average user to presume his own anonymity on Kazaa. In fact I bet most people who use Kazaa aren't even conscious of the fact that their IP is exposed and traceable to them, and might very well stop using Kazaa once they realize it. The message is clearly targeted at such people. The RIAA might just effect a greater dent in file sharing with this stupid instant messaging than they have so far with all their lawyers, lobbyists, and hired network saboteurs. If so, we should only hope the lesson sinks into their thick heads. This is the best behavior we can realistically expect from them. They don't understand anything but threats and intimidation. Let's all hope they stick to instant messaging.
Yes they're corporate vultures, cultural parasites, etc., and this is clearly an act of a desperate industry that just lost a huge court case and has sunk to the point of threatening individual file traders, but the shrill tone and accusations of hypocrisy is a bit much for what they're doing here. It's a frigging instant message. What do you expect from the RIAA, a love letter? You should already be aware of the risks you're taking. If you didn't know before, now you do. Just click OK and keep downloading.
RIAA> We've noticed that you host copyrighted material on your PC. You are not anonymous. Please cease and desist.
Eliza> What makes you think You are not anonymous?
RIAA> Eh?
Eliza> Please go on.
RIAA> Are you kidding me?
Elia> Has it something to do with your childhood?
RIAA> Oh.. now as you said that I recall my parents being very cruel to me. They refused to buy me a Walkman for my 13th birthday..
Lisp is the Tengwar of programming languages.
Why do you think we have such corporate sponsored pop-music travesties such as Britney "Pepsi" Spears? Because people actually buy their garbage! With file-sharing only the strong will survive, and the RIAA and Music labels cannot continue to put one or two good songs on a CD with 16-17 "filler tracks" and make billions. The crap will not get listened to. People will download and burn only the good stuff and this will force the no-talent pop-stars on the shortbus back to Creative Inspiration special education school.
If you want people to pay 15 bucks for a CD you had damn well better put $15 worth of decent music on it. In the end we must realise that we have created this monster. We, the consumers, financed and permitted these people to build this empire and in the end we can only strive to take back what we have allowed them to annex from us. filesharing is one way of telling these people that enough is enough.
I am now off to download all of Madonna's work just for the hell of it. In the end she, and the greedy alcoholic neanderthals of Metallica have shown us the depths of greed that a person can sink to once you give them a taste for money and popularity.
They are right, of course. Which is precisely why you should all use Freenet which IS anonymous, totally distributed, and has a much better distribution model in that popular content is automatically cached all over the net and all downloads are automatically "swarmed" so you don't get stuck downloading Madonna's music off of someones 56k modem. Using 60 download threads I can consistantly get 90k/s on recently inserted files, no matter what the connection speed of the person who made them available.
Since 1992, the U.S. Government has collected a tax on all digital audio recorders and blank digital audio media manufactured in or imported into the US, and gives the money directly to the RIAA companies, which is distributed as royalties to recording artists, copyright owners, music publishers, and music writers:
In exchange for those royalties, a special exemption to the copyright law was made for the specific case of audio recordings, and as a result *all* noncommercial copying of musical recordings by consumers is now legal in the US, regardless of media:
The intent of Congress was clear when this law was passed (http://www.cni.org/Hforums/cni-copyright/1993-01From House Report No. 102-873(I), September 17, 1992:
From House Report No. 102-780(I), August 4, 1992: Therefore, when you copy an MP3 the royalties have already been paid for with tax dollars in accordance with the law. If you are a musician whose recordings are publicly distributed, then you are entitled to your share of these royalties by filing a claim under Section 1006 (http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/1006.html)Napster tried to use this law to defend their case, and the court ruled this law did not apply to them because they are a commercial company. But as a consumer it seems to me you are perfectly within your rights when you make a copy for noncommercial private use.
coldcity
code, life, art
Most of the marijuana I get seems to come from British Columbia these days. As we all know the Al-Canuck and Hoser-amas cartels are notorious terrorist groups funded through Molson and the Canadian Snack-Food Industry.
-- thinkyhead software and media
A copyright is any of the exclusive rights granted to the author of a work under the Berne Convention, or under local copyright laws, such as USC Title 17 for those of us in the US. These exclusive rights can be transferred, as occurs with Copyright Assignment to the Free Software Foundation, but even such a transfer isn't the copyright itself, but a transfer of ownership of copyright.
The GPL not a copyright, it is a license, and a non-exclusive one at that. A person who makes use of the GPL to redistribute or modify software doesn't have a copyright for the software, they have permission from the copyright holder to do certain things under certain conditions. The GPL makes use of copyright law, but that doesn't make it a copyright.
Music licensing is more complicated. Sometimes a license is given to redistribute a work, or to use a sample in a recording; sometimes music is licensed en masse . Sometimes copyright is assigned to various parties, sometimes it isn't, sometimes it is assumed as part of a "work-for-hire" contract. Sometimes the copyright is split, the songwriter having copyrights for the lyrics, the band having copyrights for the score, the producer having copyrights for the studio recording, and these can get licensed in whatever ways. But, again, the license is not the copyright.
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, the above should not be interpreted as legal advice. Determining which parties own which copyrights can be a complicated issue demanding professional legal help.
----
Open mind, insert foot.
What part of P2P makes the industry obsolete exactly? Just because P2P makes possible blatant violation of copyright that was previously much harder does not make the industry any less necessary. What you are trying to imply is sort of like arguing that because I can steal from, say, Nordstrom's that clothing retailers are no longer necessary. Even if we completely ignore the (misleading) distinction between these two forms of theft, you're taking still does not answer the tough questions, namely, what is going to secure the continued production by the originators (read: artists or clothing makers) or what is going to replace the marketing and publicity function that both you and the artist ultimately depend on.
I have no problem if you wish to completely cut RIAA out of the loop. However, the fact of the matter is that you're not. You're trying to have your cake and eat it too--you want to enjoy the services without paying for them. You're taking music for which RIAA owns the copyright, which they own because they perform a multitude of functions and which is the reason why you're downloading the music in the first place. If you want to do P2P and claim that neither you nor the artist "need" RIAA, then do it without misappropriating copyrighted material.
You guys assert that P2P can somehow replace the current function of RIAA. Maybe, but probably not in the form that it exists today on Kazaa and numerous other networks, and you certainly have not demonstrated it. P2P has been around for a couple years now and yet you'd be hard pressed to point to a single major artist that can really credit their success to these services. Record sales may be slumping today, but up and coming artists are still signing with major record labels by and large, despite the existance of the P2P that you claim makes the industry irrelevant. The proof is in the pudding, or should I say...NOT?