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Grokster's President Talks About Court Win
An anonymous reader writes "Now that the Morpheus/Grokster trial is over, the heads of the various P2P services are hoisting their glasses in triumph. Ciarán Tannam interviews Grokster President Wayne Rosso to get his two cents on the verdict. Xolox also applauded the ruling and posted this release. Of course, it aint over yet as the RIAA has vowed appeal."
When I saw "Vowed appeal" I was expecting to see "Vowed REVENGE!"
"What the Fsck do you think you are doing!?"
HA! HA!
given that the labels are starting to play smart like the apple music service, i dont see this as lasting very long. expect a court to squash this decision soon.
face it people, the best justification for free mp3 sharing was that there was no alternative. people said they would pay if they could.. if it was reasonable.. well no it is and you can.
I expect the MPAA and RIAA to win this one
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
Maybe Napster should come back and sue all these *ster names. Its like everywhere I go there is something.. for an example roogl--err i mean, feedster. What has happen to creativity..
I've left to find myself. If you happen to see me, please, keep me there until I return.
But I figure this will end up like the MPAA vs. VCR. Fight the technology tooth and nail until you realize it's another way of getting fistfuls of cash shoved in your general direction.
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
And it appears with their recent activity (which compromises a trial) they are going to start this on a larger scale.
;-)
I apologize for sounding selfish and I hope those who will bear the brunt of these lawsuits will forgive me. I must say that this is indeed a good thing. There will be an initial sacrifice on the part of The People in this case, but the long term result will be positive.
This eliminates the single point of failure we've seen with Napster. If these guys are forced to go after the users, it will take them a lot longer to accomplish their goals. Instead of taking a sledge hammer to a P2P network, they will be forced to chizel away, one scrape at a time. But there's still more.
The RIAA/MPAA/IP-Obsessed-Co. will spend bundles of money on these lawsuits. It is not cheap if you're the plaintiff. This increase in their costs will cause them to raise the prices of their product. Consumers will note this increase and more will resort to piracy. It's a feedback loop.
On top of that, the more frivilous lawsuits they engage in, the less favor they will hold with the courts. Like it or not, a judge's decision is influenced by his personal feelings. If you piss off the judge, expect him less likely to rule in your favor unless the letter of the law absolutely dictates it. Otherwise, many things are up to her interpretation. The more of a fuss the RI/MPAA make, they will be perceived more and more as a nuisance.
Of course, I could be totally wrong on this.
Join Tor today!
I can tell the RIAA is on the side of the little guy. They're going out there and suing the tar out of those evil P2P guys.
'Cuz no little guy would ever use P2P to promote their art.
Not me, not Anything Box, and certainly not any other artist truly making new and original art. See... without the RIAA, nothing would ever get created. This is the true artistic genius of the world: Hillary Rosen and her copyright-legislation-writing hands.
fifth sigma, inc.
... to see a bully (RIAA) to get handed a defeat. While it is terrorizing College students @ MIT threatening them with multibillion dollar lawsuits, I am glad to see it lose a court case that it might have had a chance at winning (even morally).
Secondary to that I am also happy to see my favorite networks stay alive and running.
Mac os X, Beautiful, elegant, Unix. Need I say more?
The RIAA should focus their attention on concerts and other activities where they present their artists. The recording industry is going to dimish much much more before it stabilizes. There's too much opprotunity for people and hackers to circumvent what ever technology they throw at us. But if they concentrated on doing very well done public events, they could smash whatever level of income they made before with records. As it is now, concerts are no where near the potential they hold. And wouldn't it be nice of them to release onto P2P networks songs so they could advertise their artist in the public forum? Even if they release 96kps ripped songs, I think it would do more to spread their coverage than it is to attack the networks. The last time I was on Kazaa, there were 4.4 million people on! That kind of potential audience can only be rivalled by television (and soon it will even eclipse that). All they have done is hurt their image time and time again. I have NO sympathy for them at all. Fat Cats looking to become fatter.
grok /grok/, var. /grohk/ vt. [from the novel "Stranger in a Strange Land", by Robert A. Heinlein, where it is a Martian word meaning literally `to drink' and metaphorically `to be one with'] The emphatic form is `grok in fullness'. 1. To understand, usually in a global sense. Connotes intimate and exhaustive knowledge. Contrast zen, which is similar supernal understanding experienced as a single brief flash. See also glark. 2. Used of programs, may connote merely sufficient understanding. "Almost all C compilers grok the void type these days."
http://info.astrian.net/jargon/terms/g/grok.html
...people should be donating to Freenet right now - it is the only P2P application that provides protection for its users.
The collective P2P community is letting out a silent, but very noticable "neer, neer!" to the RIAA.
SecondPageMedia - Wha
I've been analyzing the situation for some time now myself. I've come to the conclusion that what's good for the stockholders is not necessarily what's good for the company.
Which is why I think that AMD might really beat Intel after all. I've used Intel processors in the past, because they were available in my area before Athlons. However having tried both I really prefer to stick with AMD at this point.
In other words, what the fuck did your comment have to do with Grokster??
This weekend, the RIAA began using the IM feature of most p2p clients to mass instant message users and threaten individual lawsuits. It seems to me that this is a violation of the programs' Terms of Service (most say that their services are for noncommercial use only). I wonder if the p2p companies can sue the RIAA for this?
The president says, "Yes, now what?"
Oh, just the small detail that the evil entity hasn't been defeated yet and is now heading straight for Earth at a somewhat excessive speed. And you know what? I think the EVIL in that movie symbolized the RIAA. The Fifth Element symbolized freedom. And the whole This is a police alert; Put your hands in the yellow circles. thing symbolized the way WE are gonna live if things don't change... in apartments that look like some Industrial Zone in Doom II, with yellow circles and KEEP CLEAR painted on your wall, and police will look inside your apartment anytime they want and snatch you away in a body bag if someone so much as accuses you of a crime. Only in our REAL future, there won't be any Fifth Element to come along and rescue us. That's how things will be if organizations like the RIAA have their way. See my other posts about sheep, et cetera. It's just like the title of my post says...
that last line "vowed appeal" mustve gotten someone mad enough to hack their website but wait... i think this has been happening already
AOL [yes I use AOL, bite my shiny white arse] has a survey it's users can participate in, on it's internal homepage thing.
Here are the questions and results, as of just now:
Do you think online music trading is wrong?
84% No, it's the CD prices that should be illegal - 204,896
16% Yes, stealing is illegal, period - 39,978
Total votes: 244,874
What would most effectively curb music piracy?
54% Lower CD prices - 135,991
33% Nothing, it's too late - 82,687
6% Better pay services - 15,809
6% Threat of prosecution - 15,411
Total votes: 249,898
You'd think someone at AOL-TW would take note of this, since they're the ones asking.
(As well as which of their members voted for what and may require "further investigation" as a result.)
Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility. - Ambrose Bierce
that the fundamental problem with the recording industry is that they don't serve a purpose in the internet era(this being a few years ahead since most people still hear new music on the radio). Their other major problem is that they are trying to collect money from artists works without paying the artists. They have to walk a fine line between wooing the artists and stealing their work while wooing the fans and stealing their money. You know a business model isn't really solid when the sellers have to use the courts to collect their money. Nobody needs to legislate toilet paper(follow obligator links to toilet paper cases)
My Blog
Actually, I hope the rights are just GIVEN back to their rightful owners: the artists that made them!
Great news on this recent verdict. What I'm wondering is when users all stop buying CDs and switch over to the Apple Music Store, will the RIAA still try to claim that CD sales are down due to illegal music sharing?
Let's get ONE thing perfectly straight here ... there WAS no trial! Grokster won it's case on a Motion for Summary Judgment. Basically, the court looked at the evidence submitted by the parties (who BOTH moved for summary judgment) and said "there are NO material facts in dispute, the only questions to be decided are questions of law, therefore, I can decide this suit WITHOUT a trial.
... Napster DID have control over their network and they COULD ban users engaged in copyright infringement. It is a matter of FACT that Napster turned a blind eye to rampant copyright infringement on their network when they had a (rather blunt-object sort of) means to control it.
... (cf, e.g., Linus Torvalds, Alan Cox, Larry Wall, many sci-fi fanfic authors). P2P means that people don't have to maintain crappy geocities websites to distribute their creative works for free if that's what floats their boat.
Why is this distinction important, you ask? The lawsuit was in FEDERAL court. The federal courts of appeal in the US are VERY deferential to the District Courts in deciding whether a summary judgment was the proper way to dispose of a case. The Court of Appeals will start from a presumption that the judge was RIGHT and the burden will be on the RIAA to prove that the judge was wrong on the LAW he followed in deciding the case. The burden is on the RIAA to show that the judge's decision was "arbitrary, capricious and contrary to the rule of law." This is an EXTREMELY heavy burden on an appellant, especially since the district judge's "Memorandum and Order" appears to be WELL supported by U.S. Supreme Court case law.
<rant>
To state the matter bluntly, the RIAA has throw a punch and drawn back a bloody stump for their effort. The fact that this has occurred in the entertainment industry's own back yard means that this case, when it is affirmed by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, will establish a VERY important precedent (I would estimate that it will be at LEAST as important as the Betamax case) with regard to whether a technology should be suppressed because it CAN be used for copyright infringement. Napster was correct
Grokster, KaZAa, LimeWire, gnutella, etc., are the opening efforts at a very promising internet technology. P2P promises to make the distribution of FLOSS and independently published literature and art a routine matter. It is true that you can't make a profit on your work if you share it by P2P, but true artists often work for the love of the art
It is now and always HAS been my postition that I support strong copyright protection. After all, that's what keeps free (libre) software free. The FSF ACTIVELY enforces the copyrights assigned to it by various FLOSS authors.
Why the HELL isn't Hollywood willing to do the same when their copyrights are MUCH more valuable, from a financial point of view? One possibility is is that these highly profitable companies who, collectively, have more money than Bill Gates, would rather spend that money buying legislators who will pass laws shifting the cost of enforcing their property rights to the general public than spend it directly on legal fees (which are recoverable under copyright law).
A darker thought is that they want criminal penalties attached to any and ALL forms of copyright infringement fot the purpose of invoking the legal doctrin of "liability per se", which would award them a damned near automatic judgment against anyone convicted of a criminal copyright infringement, whether that is shipping MILLIONS of pirated CDs a week from your warehouse in Hong Kong or sharing a ripped mp3 file of a copyrighted work out to the internet.
The media conglomerates want to stomp out peer-to-peer because it threatens their stranglehold on the distribution of entertainment. More
utter rubbish
...this could just be a dastardly plot to lure all of those P2P execs in one building...then BAM! 'Accident' involves gas leak mixed with suspicious DRM-compatible audio equipment.
That doesn't sound right to me. They didn't completely answer the question: what discovery services do they use? Every P2P Servent has discovery services. Kazaa has a bootstrap server, Gnutella/Gnutella2 (Shareaza, Gnucleus etc.) has GWebCache... what does Grokster have? I seriously can't think of another way to obtain a list of "Supernodes"/"Hubs"/"Ultrapeers" other than a centralized location. Well, maybe port scanning a range of IP's to see if they're running Grokster and know of any Supernodes, but I don't think they'd do that...
It just seems like they were avoiding that question, trying to get Grokster "unaffiliated" with anything "central". Because "central" = easy to shut down.
Frankly, I really don't care what happens to Grokster. Grokster isn't in for it for the evolution of P2P technology, but rather money. Hell, they didn't even really code Grokster, they just license other P2P clients from other companies which were created from other companies. All they do then is create cute GUI layer then stuff it to oblivion with Spyware and other ads which yield them, apprently, "millions".
What I think won this case was their defense that P2P can be used for "good things". They probably use Gnutella as a prime example, where the network is free, open and decentralized. FastTrack (the network Grokster is modeled after) is none of those. IMO, it's a three strikes your out philosophy. Is your closed source? Strike. (Okay, you can get away with that one) Is your client network closed? Strike. Do you earn profit? Strike. Grokster is outa' here.
I partially agree. But, unfortunately, the logical conclusion of your argument is that we must put up with whatever the big labels throw at us, at whatever price they decide on. And many of us who 'live in front of our computers' think that sucks.
We don't deny that it's important that media is made available to the general public, the crap screened out, etc. We just think there must be a *much* better way of doing it than the status quo. Personally, I advocate the illegal pirating of material. People who 'boycott' the market are, as you said, powerless. But, like it or lump it, piracy is the only way you're gonna make a dent in outdated views, because people can both experience the media they want to, *and* not pay these companies their unreasonable excess, at the same time. Call me a criminal parasitic asshole, but you give me a better way to effect change (because we do WANT change).
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
"Grokster does not operate a Supernode server or a server with IP addresses or any type of server that interfaces in any way with the operation of Grokster or FastTrack with the exception of ad serving via the Start page."
Do Grokster client have to route through the ad server before being allowed to operate normally? If so, then Grokster will lose the appeal as this is a central point of control. This will also demonstrate that, since the Grokster execs know that its service is being used to extensive copyright violations, the service operators can control who is allowed to use the service and eliminate those who violate copyrights.
If the clients are not required to pull ads for the normal course of operation, then the above doesn't apply. However (and I admittedly know nothing about Grokster), if Grokster is a for-profit company and makes money by selling ad space to users, and since the Grokster clients are closed source, I can't help but think that Grokster operates by requiring users to pull down ads from a central server in order to operate correctly.
Of course, the ad and spyware servers may not be hard coded in as a requirement for the P2P software to operate, and the P2P software may merely assume that the ad and spyware servers will not be firewalled off or otherwise blocked. If the operation of the software depends upon the ad and spyware servers being operational, then Grokster has already lost the appeal and will be guilty of contributory infringement just like Napster.
No, the 9th has had more verdicts overturned than any other court in the land.
Difference.
Look at a map of the Circuit Courts of Appeals and draw some conclusions.
The 9th Circuit Court is VAST. It includes more states than any other Circuit. These states represent a not insubstantial portion of the population of the US.
I'm not saying the 9th doesn't have problems. It is unquestionably the most liberal Circut in the country. Sandra Day O'Connor has, on more than one occasion, recomended that the 9th hear cases more often with its full 11 judge pannel in attendance instead of relying on the smaller pannels of 3 judges that handed down the Pledge of Alegiance decision that was so unpopular.
On a side note, the legal reasoning behind the Pledge case was rock solid. You don't have to agree with it moraly or religiously, but from a legal standpoint the 9th did an excelent job defending their position.
Killfile(TGK)
No trees were killed in the creation of this post. However, many electrons were inconvenienced.