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EMI and Sony Lose Lawsuit Over Crippled Music Disks
neves writes "A brazilian consumer has sued EMI and Sony, and won! The reason was a copy protection technology in the best seller album "Tribalistas" that didn't play in his car. You can read about it in Folha de São Paulo (babelfish translation here), brazilian biggest newspaper. They must be very afraid, since EMI vice-president defended the company himself in a lawsuit involving less than US$ 350,00. A more detailed report is in my music site Agenda do Samba & Choro (babelfish here), where we release some of the lawsuit files to make it easier for others to sue them. Since last year, we are calling for a boycott (babelfish) of copy protected albums. The companies appealed, and said that they will take the case to the Supreme Court, because it is a 'question of principles'. The consumer is sueing them again, because all new EMI albums in Brazil are being released with copy protection and won't work in his car."
Yeah, but if selling these defective CDs becomes illegal in Brazil, USians could always import all their music from there if they want to be guaranteed error-free CDs.
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
Thank God someone had the initiative to actually do something about this! My only contribution has been to vote with my wallet, not purchasing any music that comes in a crippled format and encourage others to do the same. As much as I hate the "just sue them" philosophy, it seems to have worked in this case. Perhaps the time has come for us to vote with our lawyers rather than our wallets.
I hope it does go to the supreme court so we can get rid of these CDs that infringe on my rights.
I would be interested in knowing as to what the logical reasoning and the legal framework of the case was.
Was the winning based on something substantial, or could it be just overcome by the CD producer putting up a disclaimer sticker on the CD saying the "this might not work on certain devices." Basically the intention is to understand the depth of the victory.
Could somebody help with some links or any more info??
To see a world in a grain of sand, and then to step back and see the beach where the sand lies
I said it before, and I'll say it again - there's nothing wrong with copy-protected CDs - as long as they're clearly labeled as such. Label them and let the consumers decide, I say. Cases like this should really fall under false-advertising precedents.
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Well you have to remember
When the consumer sues its Extortion.
When the RIAA sues its protecting your property rights
Pretty sure that in US terms it would be 350.00, but it's not a typo. Sound odd?
In a lot of countries they reverse the roles of the comma and the period in numbers. Confused the hell out of me when I first saw it, but it's true. $350,000.00 is written $350.000,00 for instance. Disturbing, isn't it?
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All CD's I want to buy I take them to the cashier. Then I check if they have the mention "CD Audio" and if not or if it says "wont play on PC" I leave them there with the comment that those don't work on my system and that I'll download them as MP3 from the Internet instead :-)
Shop will have to put them back themselves. It's their fault if they sell faulty items.
Atari rules... ermm... ruled.
I went along to a show last week, where the artist was performing songs off his latest, copy-protected CD. After the show, there was a stall selling his CDs at the back, so went back to check it out.
Sure enough, out he came to sign copies of his CD for those who were going to buy a copy. I worked my way to the front with a copy of his CD in hand, and handed it over. I pointed out the copy protection notice, then said "although I really liked your show and your new stuff, I'm not going to buy a copy of your CD since I can't play it on my PC or in my car".
He looked a bit shocked, and asked what I was talking about. I said that the copy protection would prevent me from playing the CD on my PC or in my car, and that since that was where I listen to music 99% of the time, his CD wouldn't be much use to me. I handed him one of my business cards and told him to call me if he wanted to talk about it further - there was a bunch of people behind me waiting for their CDs to be signed...
I got the impression that he either didn't know his CD was released copy protected, that he wasn't sure what copy protection actually meant for a CD, or that he was surprised that someone like me (a 40 year old, normal looking guy, not an obviously raving half-wit) would confront him with something like this after his show.
I also got the impression that he was going to look into it further - he's a 40ish guy also, with a fairly niche appeal and presumably wife/kids/mortgage etc. like the rest of us. He probably didn't like hearing a fan tell him people couldn't play his music in the car or at their PC.
I'll check out his CD in the stores again in another month or so to see if it's had the copy protection removed.
I don't speak Portuges so I'm at a loss as to explain this en detail but it reminds me of other renaming of that "USA" moniker I've seen (like VSA, amiland,..) which I tend to explain as the expression of the speaker's/writer's enstrangement towards the militar/political/economical conduct of said country by writing its trademark in a strange way.
Call it an linguistic attempt of anti-propaganda.
605413? Yes, it's a prime.
It seems to be the developing countries that "get it" and make legislative and legal decisions which are in the interests of the public at large, as opposed to multinational cartels. What we really need is for many such countries to pull together and speak with one voice when it comes to international trade. Our system will only be fixed when you get a lot of people really pissed off. If the RIAA runs around suing college kids for astronomical sums of money, and enough people get stuck with CDs that won't play, then it will raise the visibility level enough to get this on the front burner.
I am strongly in favour of globalization, but it must be done with the interests of the public, instead of large vested interests. That means doing away with crap such as region coded DVDs and damaging tariffs. I should be able to travel whatever products I choose from anywhere I want, excepting only really offensive stuff like narcotics and weaponry.
My rights don't need management.
Actually there IS something wrong with this. Making a CD 'Copy Protected' this way is essentially the equivalent of digitally 'scratching' some or all areas of the CD -right- up to the point that another light scratch will make most CD players start to skip. Computers and computer-like devices will start to choke earlier (which is the point, I suppose) but 'real' audio players can't read the audio properly either and GUESS (often not exactly correctly) what the audio should be. This definately causes audible differences between the source recording and what will come out of your CD player. (high-frequency nuances will be the first to go since CD players do the audio equivalent of 'smoothing' or 'blurring') And, as said, CD's have always been advertised as being (somewhat) scratch resistant, the media that will last a lifetime! Won't you be surprised when you leave your CD out-of-the-box on the table once and pick it up carelessly. How Ironic that after a year the copy you nabbed off this week's napster clone and burned to CD could sound a lot better than an 'original'. Anyway, copy protection clearly violates a few Dutch laws that state (essentially) that buying something is entering into a contract with fair expectations. Non-technical minded people do not expect a CD to be mutilated and not damage resistant when they buy them. Since that is what record companies do not tell you. I hope that a lot of people will take legal action here.
What most people don't realize is the different reality that Brazil represents. Down here you better take care and protect your own business and interests, there's a lack of the sense of community, people and government are not part of each other and even the people side is formed of independent slices who live very different lifes almost like in parallel universes. Wages have no relation what so ever to taxes or the general cost of living, gasoline for instance is something that Brazil produces 80%+ of it's internal demand, yet it the government charges it's own people about DOUBLE the price you would pay in the US. Add to that the fact that the minimum wage is the amount which the majority of Brazilians have to live off is equivalent to about 1/10th of the American $5 / hour. Regarding the music industry, in Brazil over 70% of all CDs sold are PIRATED COPIES mostly found at street vendors or even at some very well known shopping malls. The situation is so out of control that is becoming somewhat difficult to find a music retailer like was so common in the 80's - early 90's. You can buy ANY CD down here for R$5.00 or about $1.75 US Dollars, that includes Brazilian and international music discs and any software or movie you can think of. That's all available in every street corner of all the major cities. Imagine that, it beats all the golden arches and 7 elevens put together. Now if you take that into consideration you might start to appreciate why artist and music labels down here are even considering that route. I DON'T think copy protection is the answer and I am not preaching for it, I just want to make sure some of you out there hear the other side of the story and become aware of that fact that we are talking about a country were every citizen and company are left to fend for themselves. Brazilian laws should not affect American justice and if it ever does you will all be in deeeeeeeeep 5H1T Sorry for the rant and the bad grammar.
First for those which do not know, "que choisir" is a consummer protection association (a non governemental one), a bit like EFF. They argue that this belong to "hidden default" since the consummer aren't warned that those CD do not play everywhere like in car CD, and they were comercialised with the company [b]*KNOWING*[/b] that they would not work everwhere. Second they argue that there is already an anti piracy tax on DVD and CD and thus there is a contradiction between this [protection] and the antipiracy tax. And this contradict the right of consummer to make backup (this is apparently a right in France?). I hope they win, because this would mean one would have to disappear at least in france :).
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> Venal States of America
For example, though in the context I found the use of VSA it merely translated the acronym from Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika.
605413? Yes, it's a prime.
As the texts are in french, here are the interesting points about this story :
...
1. There are not one but MULTIPLE lawsuits on that matter in France. The lawsuit ruled this june was brought by the "Consommation Logement et Cadre de Vie" (CCLV) association against EMI. There are pending lawsuits against sony and BMG. Then there is another french consumers association ("UFC Que Choisir") who sued EMI France, Warner France, Universal Pictures Video, Fnac and Auchan (the two latter are distributors).
2. The court just tested CDs of ONE artist and constated they could not be READ by some devices although the system was stated to prevent COPY.
3. The ruling stated that EMI had one month to put a label on that CD stating : "Warning, this CD cannot be read on every reader or autoradio".
4. EMI appealed.
5. the judgement is on this site.
6. Another article about the situation in Belgium where I read that an asshole from IFPI says "there is only 4 to 8 complains for 10 thousand CD" so it is not a problem. Lawsuit coming
Men are born ignorant, not stupid; they are made stupid by education. Bertrand Russel