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Filesharing Up 10% After RIAA Threatens Users

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the strange-magic dept.

Moldy-Rutabaga writes "Technews says filesharing has gone up 10% on some sites such as Grokster since the Recording Industry Association of America's announcement on June 25 that it will start tracking down and suing users of file-sharing programs. Wayne Rosso, president of Grokster, commented 'even genocidal litigation can't stop file sharers'."

8 of 750 comments (clear)

  1. Anecdotal Evidence - not so good by afreniere · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I was speaking to a lay-person friend of mine last weekend, and he mentioned to me that he had heard about the threat of lawsuits, and decided to quickly install Bearshare, download all the songs he wanted and then uninstall it. Apparently at least some people are spooked.

    --
    G=C800:5
    1. Re:Anecdotal Evidence - not so good by Chiascuro · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Actually you are wrong. There are quite a few artists around who release music that can legally be shared and more than a few individuals who use the file sharing networks to publish their works and get some form of distribution. It's much easier to cut an MP3 and stick it on Kazaa than to get a record deal.

      --
      I am a bomb technician, if you see me running - try to keep up.
  2. How? by Tuffnut · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I'm just curious..

    How exactly do they go about finding these people? It's not like they openly give out their names on things like KaZaa?

    1. Re:How? by usotsuki · · Score: 5, Interesting

      They sue an IP address (no, I'm not kidding).

      -uso.

      --
      Dreams, dreams, don't doubt dreams, dreaming children's dreaming dreams. Sailor Moon SS
    2. Re:How? by C_To · · Score: 5, Interesting

      What happens if the invididual sharing the files in question is out of jurstidiction of the United States? As far as I know ISPs in Canada, Australia, England, won't give out user information without a court order. Since the DMCA or whatever law it is that allows the RIAA to get information from ISPs does not exist in these countries, these users don't have to worry (at least in theory).

      And even worse, what about those who have filenames that are similar but not exactly the same as commerical music? They're going to have to download every song they can to verify it, otherwise it will be tossed out of court (and on 56K, that can be hours if not days).

    3. Re:How? by koko775 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Get Peerguardian (windows program). It blocks IPs from RIAA, MPAA, and other IP ranges. It might not totally solve it, but I find that without fail, my IP is checked day after day, several times, by either or both the RIAA and the MPAA. I feel violated.

  3. Artists Against iTunes by pgrote · · Score: 5, Interesting

    And from the "they keep shooting themselves in the head" department, Metallica says no iTunes do to principles. :
    "Artists hold out on iTunes on principle
    Reuters News Service

    LOS ANGELES -- The Red Hot Chili Peppers and Metallica are refusing to make their music available as individual downloads on Apple Computer's iTunes online music store.

    That move comes in response to Apple's decision to allow users to buy single tracks and is intended to protect the future of the long-playing album, said Mark Reiter of Q Prime Management Co., which manages the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Metallica and several other artists.

    Green Day and Linkin Park, according to a source familiar with the situation, have also refused to make their songs available as individual downloads on the Apple service, which has sold over 5 million songs. "

    -- Hey .. I have a great idea. Let's tick off our customers. They want this, but let's not give it to them. In fact, let's prosecute them. Works for me.

    Idiots.

  4. Lazy RIAA by cervo · · Score: 5, Interesting

    "Weiss said the recording industry should lobby for special taxes on CD burners and Internet access as a way to recoup losses incurred from file sharing, an idea that Grokster's Rosso also supports."

    Yeah right, so you can't properly secure your own cd's or whatever, so go ahead and put a tax on internet access and cd burner's to make up losses because of your own incompetence. And as we all know, no one uses CD Burners for say....backups, or transferring legitimate files from one person to another. No one uses the internet to do do legitament things like research. So of course everyone should Pay the RIAA and help them. Never mind that if they really want to stop piracy they should be better protecting their own media.

    The worst thing is that the RIAA probably has enough influence in Washington to pull something like this off!! What's next, Microsoft builds an internet monitoring meter into windows to send usage statistics to the government so they can bill you monthly. Then Linux is outlawed for not having the US government metering package?