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MIT, Boston College Refuse DMCA Subpoenas
phreakmonkey writes "Here's an interesting change of pace- According to today's Boston Globe, MIT and Boston College have both refused to turn over the identities of students to the RIAA under subpoenas. Citing failure of compliance with court rules and student privacy concerns, both colleges have refused to give out the names, addresses, or phone numbers of students based on their Kazaa screen names and IP addresses. I wonder how long the schools will be able to keep the RIAA's pack of lawyers at bay..."
More than simply the temporary blockade for the army of RIAA lawyers which that organization will refer to them as, these new subpoena challenges will hopefully catalyze a new set of appeals that finally lead to some kind of constitutionality ruling, by the Supreme court, about the controversial section of the DMCA which allows these privacy infringements, and consequently, about the heavily-industry-influenced DMCA as a whole...
I just hope they'll be able to stand up better in court than Verizon did.
This is a good start. I hope they stick to it. I am glad to know what Wired reported is true that MIT has one of the best privacy protection record among all the universities in America. I hope others follow their path.
- Jalil Vaidya
If there's one thing I can say about the colleges who did this, it's that I have respect for them. By not backing down and not giving into the demands of coporate america, they are setting a precedent for others, and are showing that we are not all going to bow to them. Respect.
Canadian Cynic, canadian politics is less boring than you
I'd be impressed if Harvard did it... I'm fairly certain that they have enough lawyers to defend against the likes of the RIAA :)
these guys can put up a good fight... It'll keep the second years busy anyway.
They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty nor security
What we really need is a renound LAW school to stand up to them.
That will provide results.
0110100100100000011000010110110100100000011000100
Interesting that the article mentions Dave Matthews and Radiohead since they both have always been in support of file-sharing...
Mike
Pardon the speculation, but maybe the reason they're dragging their feet is because the "student" is actually someone more closely related to the organization.
Imagine the turmoil to a school administrator, knowing their students' life savings are about to get sucked up by the RIAA for sharing a few songs.
I hope more colleges follow their lead.
The BC guy even said that once the subpoena was filed 'correctly' they would comply (not they have a choice, of course). But this is more of a procedural issue then anything else. Of course, it shows that they are not interested in simply handing over names and IP address without actually needing too.
I wish my school was more interested in protecting student rights. The University "Police" gladly assisted in a 'raid' on a couple student's dorm rooms, after checking their class schedule to see when they had class, and thus out of the room (which is a pretty big assumption, given the propensity to skip class around here... but it turned out to be true)
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
How is it privacy infringement? You're doing something illegal (copyright infringement), you are then caught, and you are then identified. Is their a reasonable expectation of privacy when transmitting your IP address to millions of other users when using Kaazaa? Hardly.
Good try, but try again!
Just kidding!
(not really)
...am too..really
shhh...not.
Would be sweet if the nerds down there would unleash some futuristic greedy-bastard-ass-kicking robots as a preemptive strike ;)
United States of America, good ol' backers of world peace.
Hrmmm. I hope the schools maintain their privacy (for privacy's sake not to protect piracy), but I fear that the RIAA will start to pressure the donors of these schools (where many $$'s for research and support come from).
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
Maybe there's more to their backbone than meets the eyes, it's not like their Bob State College in Kornfield Kounty...
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I remember people saying: "Just wait until a child of a senator gets busted downloading MP3's". This story tells us why this is not going to happen. They pay the exorbitant tuition not only for the name of the school but also for other services. Including a protection of privacy you would not get anywhere else. And that's why no senator kid is going to get busted sharing some thousand mp3's.
Couldn't the schools NAT some of the dorm IP space and not log the DHCP'd addresses? Granted many of these services don't work as well through a NAT'd IP.
Trolling is a art,
After reading this article, you can see that the schools will comply with the RIAA. The schools' problem is that they don't believe the subpoenas were correctly filed. They claim that they also had too little time to notify the students, which is required by some other federal laws.
So don't get your hopes up just yet. On the plus side, the RIAA said that they don't want to refile. So this may get interesting.
Of course, that was the same school that got me kicked out for sending a threatening *email* to someone. Not an actual threat, but an email interpretted to be a threat (it obviously wasn't). They're not much for rights, from my standpoint.
Knowing that they are massholes, they might be able hold them off for quite a while, a legal black hole if you will. Black holes, of course contain tons of Mass. I'm not sure if there is a connection here, but . . .
No offence to the "wonderful" folks from Mass of course, its just that tech support folks cringe when they hear the accent (or a 3 as the first digit in the zip code, but that's another story)
1q2w3e4r5t6y7u8i9o0pqawsedrftgthyjukilo;p'azsxdcf
The colleges are only refusing to comply on technical grounds: "MIT and Boston College yesterday said that they support the rights of copyright holders and would comply with any subpoena that addressed their concerns about the proper notification of students and was filed ''properly'' in US District Court in Massachusetts, not in Washington D.C"
Who wants to bet that if the RIAA files in Mass, then the colleges will quickly bow to the pressure rather than facing any kind of actual court sanctioning? These colleges are being heroes to their students without it costing them anything. The minute it costs something, they'll pony up any student information to avoid paying fines.
Why do I h8 apple?
It doesn't seem like the schools are necessarily interested in protecting the students as they are protecting themselves from later, procedural litigation, in the chance that a student sues the school.
MIT is less than anxious to turn over the name and address of the user robotrodney@KaZaA.
--
Use Vobbo for Video Blogs
In what I've read so far, the two Boston colleges refused the subpoenas based on (1) they were filed in a Washington DC court and served in Boston's district, and (2) the colleges were not given sufficient time to prepare the information before the stated due dates. Essentially, in order to comply with the suits, they would violate their own respective privacy policies. However, there was nothing stated that the respective colleges would not comply once the suits are resubmitted according to their guidelines...
Mod Points: Helping you keep your opinion to yourself.
This shouldn't be newsworthy material.
If the RIAA can't provide a good case, it's only natural that a college looks out for it's students.
How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
Yes. Thank you MIT, thank you BC.
:-) (lessig is in stanford though he could be good too...surely there are other people like him in the East Coast)
Do you think MA has better laws regarding these problems? After all it is one of the states that is most against the microsoft settlement (but that is unrelated, as it is the state attorney and not directly the state laws)
As some of the posts have said:
--if this goes far enough, they may get to a high court ruling
--some of the local law schools may be of help
yours ever, fz.
"I wonder how long the schools will be able to keep the RIAA's pack of lawyers at bay..."
I don't think it matters as much as the fact that they're standing up to this crap to begin with.
After I have received the wisdom of good teaching, I will untiringly teach all people. - The Teachings of Buddha
More like, "how long will the schools be able to justify spending thousands of dollars to protect the identities of students breaking the law."
Please help metamoderate.
And the RIAA will say "never mind" and drop it, if it looks to be heading that way. They have a bully mentality, and no stomach for a legal showdown at the OK Corral.
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
Let's name names. Who are the RIAA representatives and their lawyers? Where do THEY live? What's THEIR phone number? What's THEIR email address? (Come on, somebody's got to have this info)
And to think I bought music from their members!
Make sure you have a CD with Radiohead's ''Idioteque'' and Dave Matthews Band's ''Ants Marching'' when the RIAA eventually comes knocking.
All they can said is that user downloaded the songs, but downloading does not necessarily mean a crime. I have over 1000 CDs and mp3s for many of them. Many are for convenience, as it is easier to listen to a variety using mp3s, but the bulk were downloaded in advance of purchase and actually led me to buy the CD!
Imagine that!
Talk about burying the lede. The Boston Globe buried the most important issue in the last paragraph:
It is this issue that might make a difference. If the provision of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act for issuing subpoenas without judicial action is ruled unconstitutional, and the ruling is upheld, then the efforts of the RIAA will be stopped in their tracks until the law is rewritten.
The rest of the university objections amount to no more than a short-term fight over notice and venue:
Even if MIT is right, these are problems the RIAA can easily remedy. If the RIAA has to file the actions locally, instead of filing them all in Washington, D.C., it will. If the RIAA has to provide more time for notice, it will. Neither of these issues will halt the onslaught for long.
Only Women Bleed (Sex, Sharia remix)
but as MIT controls 18.0.0.0/8, they gave every dorm a class B. MIT students prefer the internet IPs, trust me.
This path has already been traveled by Verizon, so unless BC and MIT have some new legal angle, they're just wasting their money on lawyer.
Vote for Pedro
Now things are getting interesting for the fact that now one set of lawyers (from Universities, etc.) are going to try to fend off the RIAA liars.
:)
2 55&mode=thread&tid=123&tid=141&tid=188&tid=99) . (In the process, they realized that students are poor.)
MIT and Boston College yesterday said that they support the rights of copyright holders and would comply with any subpoena that addressed their concerns about the proper notification of students and was filed ''properly'' in US District Court in Massachusetts, not in Washington D.C.
--->so RIAA will have to file cases in each and every city/town where univs. are?
''MIT of course has a policy of complying with lawfully issued subpoenas,'' the school's information services director, James Bruce, said in an e-mail statement. But Bruce said that MIT had been advised by counsel that the subpoena was not in compliance with court rules concerning the proper venue for such a filing and ''did not allow MIT time to send any notice as the law requires.''
I love this reasoning
The RIAA has not specifically said what damages it will seek. But under federal law, it can ask for $750 to $150,000 for each illegally shared song.
My take: students pay $ 750.Here's why:
1.The RIAA tried to sue the students in the past. 2.They took students' life-savings (http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/06/09/1311
3. Now they come up with a new plan:
Back to school specials: Students pay $ 750 per illegally shared song only!!
Having famous, reputable organizations defying the RIAA is very important, because it lends credibility to the fight against the music industry, which is crucial at this point.
Despite all this battling against the RIAA's lawsuits, though, it seems to me that the real issue here (which isn't being addressed) is not file sharing but everything the RIAA stands for and represents. Why isn't anyone attacking their price-fixing and essential monopoly of the industry? I know there was a lawsuit against them for the price-fixing, I believe, but I for one am not seeing any changes.
Obviously, I'm not the most informed on the details of the whole issue, but is it possible that the RIAA's big scare tactics and legal onslaught against file sharers is just to take peoples' eyes off of the real problem?
It's "effectively ok" to share metallica tunes because they're "effectively" worthless, anyway.
I am wondering if maybe there can be turnabout, and get the names addresses and phone numbers of the individuals of the RIAA, and maybe start doing some privacy infringement upon those that so dearly want to invade others privacy. I personally think that most colleges of that league can stand up to the assault from the RIAA, but I think the RIAA went after the larger institutes because of the Success so far afforded such reckless abandonment of privacy by other schools and companies that buckled under the pressure of RIAA's Weilding of the DCMA. Anyways it was just a thought.
If firefighters fight fire and crime fighters fight crime, what do Freedom fighters fight?
Instead of waiting for a case to make it to the supreme court, why not join an organization like the EFF and start writing letters to your senators now?
J
The universities that were mentioned are big schools. These big school produce graduates that move on to sucessful companies.
The reason why these unversities are blocking these requests is if these students are sued then when these student graduate - they will not sent money back to the unversities as an alumni.
Actually, Verizon is still traveling that road. They appealed again. RTFA
Exactly. I was in-house legal counsel at an educational institution for several years. We received subpoenas quite often and, given the stringent and sometimes apparently conflicting provisions of laws other than the subpoena laws, we were often forced to require the subpoenaing party to follow the subpoena laws quite strictly, so that we wouldn't get in trouble over other laws like FERPA. I know most of you slashdotters are not lawyers, but just remember, the law is a minefield, there are so many conflicting provisions and different parties' interests being protected, that it is easy to get tripped up procedurally. Any school in the middle of something like this has to tread carefully to protect its own interests. If they can protect the students while doing so, hey, icing on the cake, don't we feel good about ourselves? But that is quite reasonably not their primary interest or concern.
It seems to me that this is none other than pure bullying.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
What happens when we convince all of these poor students not to settle?
Can they defend pro-se, loose the case, declare bankruptcy, and leave the RIAA to pay its own lawyers for thousands of suits nationwide?
Trying to use sarcasm in text-based forums does not work.
I always thought Verizon was part of the Evil Empire...
On behalf of sane people everywhere, thank you Verizon!
Only requirement for good karma: be pedantic as much and as often as possible.
Resistance is futile!
Does anyone have access to paperwork filed on behalf of the RIAA? What is the name of the person who filed it?
Upon reading the headline, i was so pround of my school [BC]. But after skimming the article there's very little that's surprising about what they're doing. BC is has some huge organizational problems, so if all of your ducks are not in a row they won't give you what you want. Once the lawyers jump through the proper hoops BC will fork over whatever they want. I imagine that BC didn't even know that they were making waves by 'protecting students', they just want the correct paperwork.
From the article: ...In a subpoena addressed to MIT, the association is demanding the name, address, and phone number of a student who used the nickname ''crazyface'' to download at least five songs, including Radiohead's ''Idioteque'' and Dave Matthews Band's ''Ants Marching.''...
So lets get this straight - the (alleged) student used the nickname "crazyface" to download "at least" 5 songs? How do they know this unless they were sharing the songs and monitoring who downloaded them in the first place? Does this mean that the RIAA were sharing songs on KaZaa??
If this is the case, are they also not liable under the DMCA?
Unlike the folks at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Slashdot/Jesse Jordan the guys at MIT & Boston City still have some sense then bending over backwards...hmmm..but then they are swapping music aren't they?
No point in screaming bloody murder but you don't have to play dumb either....
-- everyones not everybody and neither is everybody like everyone.
This is a very "special" piece of legislation that I suspect will be destroyed before too long, even given the current Supreme Court's tendencies to do what they want instead of what the Constitution demands.
See... if any copyright holder can issue any subpoena for any reason without a judge's support then...
hey... guess what...
Every paper I've ever written is copyrighted by me. I could register one/all of these, and then go off sending these subpoenas out at... everybody on the entire internet, and since no judge has to approve it, and the recipients are legally obligated to respond, I could build lists of persons names, addresses, telephone numbers, ISPs, and IP addresses...
now, dial-up users would change IPs frequently, but not broadband users.
Now, thanks to all the information I'll get from the ISPs I could even see where these users have been going on the internet. (if such logs are available -- and if not, well, then pretend that instead of me doing this its doubleclick, which has ads (and thus tracking) on more webpages than anyone could hope to ever count), and do all sorts of cool things: identity theft (ok, that would be illegal, but easy), very targetted marketing (very valuable -- go from what URLs surfed to stuff in your physical mail box) or just sell these lists to other companies who didn't want to go through the hassle of collecting the info, or any other number of things that would be bad.
So. Verizon, keep on appealling, I think you will win, and in the meanwhile know that we support your efforts!
Oh, and yay to the schools too, please continue to fight!
not only doign the supeona in the worng court jurisdiction but the following:
Most students in all major US colleges have what is call a online storage locker to store files and applicaitns they use every day..any student can load their sharing app onto a computer in a lab and run it in background..IP trace shows ip of lab but does not identify students as they do not login to use the computer lab..
only the stupid ones using it from dorm rooms are going to get caught..
info provided by former Boliermaker-Purdue University..
Don't Tread on OpenSource
[nt]
How could I say to men: "Speak louder, shout! For I am deaf!"? -Ludwig van Beethoven
And hey, I beat /. to the story!
I saw this in the Boston Globe early this morning. Hell.. Along with the IBM/Relocating workers story. Slashdot steals all their news eh?
Who else imagined the Star Wars space battle music when they read this? Yay for resisting invasions of privacy based on such thin evidence! Maybe the justice system won't crumble completely after all...
Democracy: two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for lunch
Liberty: a well armed sheep expressing his rights.
It looks like sheep have arisen. I for one...
I know the head of the MIT network. He is a VERY good tech guy with bonafide IETF credentials in security, and the legal aspects of security.
I used to love listening to him at lunch at conferences talking about the various legal troubles that MIT students would get into including the infamous bonsai kitten website rap. He talked about how a couple of armed Humane Society officers showed up in his office one day to demand he reviel what he knew about the students that put up the website.
His response was, "I can't tell you that, you have passed student privacy laws that prevent me from reveiling the students name". Officers left in a huff, but Jeff was right.
I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them
The Department of Education Website has a nice primer on the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) (20 U.S.C. 1232g; 34 CFR Part 99), a Federal law that protects the privacy of student education records.
I should note there are exceptions listed:
* School officials with legitimate educational interest;
* Other schools to which a student is transferring;
* Specified officials for audit or evaluation purposes;
* Appropriate parties in connection with financial aid to a student;
* Organizations conducting certain studies for or on behalf of the school;
* Accrediting organizations;
* To comply with a judicial order or lawfully issued subpoena;
* Appropriate officials in cases of health and safety emergencies; and
* State and local authorities, within a juvenile justice system, pursuant to specific State law.
Interesting they allow "judicial order or lawfully issue subpoena"
If MIT gave out the names of all the students using Kazaa, they would loose two thirds of their student body!
--The oh so nervis one
(It's a joke ... laugh).
"And a voice was screaming: 'Holy Jesus! What are these goddamn animals?'" - HST
Put some of your own copyrighted work on Kazaa and allow only RIAA IPs to access it (remember how some versions of Kazaa are trying to block ranges of IP addresses used by the RIAA? Well, reverse that). If they download anything, hit them with a subpoena yourself -- remember, no judge's signature is needed any more!
(It's tempting to name your own copyrighted files after the ones the RIAA has been targeting -- songs by popular artists. I don't know if this would nix the deal...)
40 million P2P users could subpoena the heck out of the RIAA, and think of the legal penalties they'd be accruing... $150k per file or whatnot...
download at least five songs, including Radiohead's ''Idioteque'' and Dave Matthews Band's ''Ants Marching.''
Bite me I own the CD's but don't understand how to make my MP3's. Someone did it for me though.
What would they say to that?
-- taking over the world, we are.
How are they choosing the users that get procescuted? It seems hard to believe that only 'about' three students at Boston College were sharing music on Kazaa. Are they simply targeting certain users in order to threaten the rest or are they only able to capture a few users?
I echo the question, "How are they discovering the IP's?" and "How are they proving that the users didn't own the music to begin with?"
If they are only targeting people who downloaded '5 songs', they're probably targeting the wrong audience.
Sony and the RIAA pulled this on me and my (old) school 5 years ago when I was a freshman undergrad and had an FTP site serving MP3's advertised through IRC chatrooms. This was back in the days before it was socially acceptable or at least popular to do these things, right before napster got big. My school threw the book at me, cutting me off from internet access for a semester ( a *HUGE* blow to a freshman CS major) and giving me disciplinary probation for a year. Guys on my floor would get caught smoking weed and get a mere slap on the wrists. But, what they did do for me was the same thing- promised to not release my name, or any personal information about me, essentially washing my hands of the situation (well except for that whole explaining to the parents as to why I am on disciplinary probation).
Isn't one of the main arguments of most file sharers: "I can't afford to buy it all, so I check out the stuff and then buy the best of it, that I can actually afford." ??
At least this has been an excuse for software piracy or filesharing or whatever.
I'm not against filesharing.
I'm just saying: Most people in MIT pay quite a lot for their ability to study there. And quite some of those can actually afford this without a really big problem.
Are those prominent filesharers now in danger of being sued actually those few that cannot afford to buy CDs, DVDs etc., or is it more likely, that there are some among them, that could afford to buy.
Why don't they?
Perhaps they do, as suggested by many statistics, and really buy a lot of music.
Perhaps they don't. But why collect JUNK ("I wouldn't pay for it" is my definition of junk), share it, and risk being sued?
Is this some "mine is bigger than yours" phenomenon?
To hell with the RIAA, an illegal trust that needs to be busted, and all the corporate coke snorters at RIAA affiliated labels. Boycott them. Don't Buy CDs.
The Uncoveror: It's the real news.
What a great legal system we have here!
Look at my karma - I'm bad, just like Michael Jackson!
Education institutions, on the other hand, have previously existing restrictions on handling and protecting student records as defined by FERPA. As the article states, MIT expresses willingness to comply with properly issued subpoenas. Essentially, these institutions are asking the courts to establish which law has primacy, FERPA or DMCA, because the current situation potentially leaves them open to lawsuits brought by students over violation of privacy as outlined in FERPA if they comply with the DMCA-based information requests.
__
Hollywood, Television, has become the dream machine. We need to take that back; each of us is a Dream Machine
RTFA! It clearly states that the only reason MIT and BC haven't given out the info is because the RIAA filed the subpoenas in Washington DC and not Boston, and that they were not given enough time to properly notify the students. As soon as that happens they will happily comply. This is only a technicality. So everyone stop talking about MIT and BC "standing up to the RIAA" because they're not.
This is what every college and ISP should do. Even if they are filed correctly colleges and ISPs should appeal it. Then after 6 or so months of firguring out if they actualy have no choice and have to give the information, the colleges and ISP can simple say that they do not keep back logs from that far back.... muwahahahaahaaaaaa!
Why fight on principle and lose when you can win on a technicality?
Quick: Delete the logs!@)@)!
Remember that you are unique, just like everybody else.
Some of us just live here because that's where we found gainful employment!
And, if I may say so, worse than a tech support person getting a call from a masshole, is me calling tech support and hearing a masshole on the other end of the line.
"Let me pull up your recahd from the daterbase..."
More than simply the temporary blockade for the army of RIAA lawyers which that organization will refer to them as
Considering MIT has a 5 billion dollar endowment, I doubt very much that the RIAA will be able to outspend them. Besides which, after a while you start getting diminishing returns when hiring lawyers; once you have a large legal team working fulltime on a case, throwing money at them doesn't do anything.
That's basically true of most legal questions. For instance, the applicability of the Second Amendment to gun-issues is quite rare. The reason is that as soon as either side tries to push for a definitive ruling, it's going to go to the Supreme Court, and once there it's a crapshoot as to how they'll rule. As a result, the Second Amendment is almost never brought up in court by either side (though they may bring it up outside the courtroom).
CNN Article
The problem is that laws aren't ruled unconstitutional on a weekly basis. By the time the Supreme Court might hand down a decision, how many college students will have been forced to declare bankruptcy and possibly drop out of college due to the RIAA?
if they are under the RIAA they more than likely down own their studio records or have the right to allow people to swap them.
they do have the right to allow concert recordings to be swapped and that is what they are in favor of.
MARIJUANA, SHROOMS, X: ONLINE?! - E
The new radiohead CD can't be played on a computer. You have to play it in a specific player that you have to register with your a registration number that comes with the CD. "Hail the Thief" Indeed.
Student goes to class only to come back to find his computer, some financial documents, and their booze replaced with a copy of a warrant.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Umm, did you guys or /. authors even read the article, they didnt say they'd really challenge it :
:-(
tooth and claw, they just refused the current subpoenas. I quote
"MIT and Boston College yesterday said that they support the rights of copyright holders and would comply with any subpoena that addressed their
concerns about the proper notification of students and was filed ''properly'' in US District Court in Massachusetts, not in Washington D.C."
So the RIAA will just get a 'proper' subpoena.
Help pay for my wedding! Go to my kickass website
I knew the DMCA was designed to give the companies that bought the votes ridiculous powers, but this is beyond scary:
Under a provision of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, passed by Congress to combat music piracy, music companies may issue the subpoenas without a judge's approval.
Private companies can issue subpoenas!!
Doesn't that violate the Constitutionally guaraneed right to Due Process?
We likely agree:
Instant gratification is sweet.
Free is nice.
Computers make it awfully convenient.
But the RIAA has these smaller companies searching the P2P networks for people who are sharing copyrighted materials. When they find a stash of material that is copyrighted by one of their clients, action is taken.
(We'll assume that they're not finding white noise labeled as metallica songs.)
So when they find the copyright violater/sharer, confirm it (how else are they going to get a subpeona unless it's verifiable?), and follow these legal channels, why are they in the wrong?
We can all claim that people want to sample the music before they buy it and all, but to do that, someone has to share it. Their motives are not always going to be as pure.
This is not flamebait. I am still genuinely confused about why everyone assumes the RIAA is so evil. We can agree that their business decisions are not always appealing to the consumer, but still...
I had a sucky sig.
Since when did schools give every student in the dorm a static, externally addressable IP? I guess they never heard of a router or firewall.
I think that Boston globe mixed up downloading and uploading. My impression is that RIAA can only really track users that are actively sharing files and only after a requesting that file and successfully downloading at least parts of it can they conclude that the person in other end is engaging in copyright infringing activities.
Now, being an MIT student I've heard of people who had been sharing files and were contacted by the IT department and asked to stop doing so (or they'd cut them off). They don't really care about downloading but uploading is bad. Generally they can only detect major bandwidth hoggers (of course easier to notice upstream peaks) so it might be a case of just some isolated kazaa-client used by a summer school student (not regular mit material) who was dum enough to not switch sharing off.
MIT's network btw. is completely open to the internet. Each dorm room computer is hooked directly on net without any firewalls. Students can get their own static ip addresses and dns entries in the form whatever.mit.edu. You can also use dhcp around campus and I'll bet that none of the addresses are logged. Alternatively you could also just pick an address in the right subnetwork and hope that nobody else is using it (not a good idea, unless you know what you're doing - any problems could get your net access revoked).
After some deliberation MIT could also say: sorry, ip address 1.2.3.4 was dynamically allocated and we don't hold records of the dynamic allocations. Better luck next time. Then again, the above is mostly just my impressions and I could be wrong in some of them.
Under a provision of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, passed by Congress to combat music piracy, music companies may issue the subpoenas without a judge's approval.
Far out. Anyone know exactly what the provision entails?
:wq
I asked on another discussion, but no one seemed to want to tell me. I know this is off-topic, I'm just kind of interested to know. Could anybody tell me? Tell me what SCO stands for? Thanks.
Dude. You have more commas in that run-on than most of us have comments about SCO/Clippy/Bob/etc.
;)
I mean, what's really the problem with killing everyone in the RIAA. Not me personally doing it, but maybe someone that doesn't care anymore. Then after everyone in the current RIAA is dead, we(again not me) make sure to kill anyone that tries to join or start something similar. Would that make it so /. posts stories about Gerbil powered Apache servers again?
I really hate Dan Patrick.
Then maybe I'd start believing all thier talk about "backbone".
Read, L
While these schools are willing to turn over the information provided that the RIAA cooperates on their terms, this is still a great deal more of a fight than other schools put up. One of the worst of which is Washington State University. At WSU, we are required to turn over any and all information requested by the MPAA or RIAA without any court orders required. A rep will call us up and demand all information about whomever was using a certain IP at a certain time, and the school WILL comply. As a member of the IT dept, failure to surrender the info will result in my immediate firing. No checks are in place either. Simply call up the IT dept, ask to speak to the director, tell them you are from the MPAA/RIAA, and then request information about a student. Poof! You've got it, no questions asked.
Funny how schools will insist that they cannot divulge any information about their students, and then do the complete opposite as soon as the RIAA/MPAA comes knocking.
...I must say your argument is utter hogwash. It is merely the "if you have nothing to hide, why do you care about privacy" strawman dressed up in different clothes.
How is it privacy infringement? You're doing something illegal (copyright infringement), you are then caught, and you are then identified. Is their a reasonable expectation of privacy when transmitting your IP address to millions of other users when using Kaazaa? Hardly.
How is it privacy infringement? You're doing something illegal (conducting illegal business on the telephone), you are then caught, and you are then identified. Is their [sic] a reasonable expectation of privacy when you are talking on the telephone on a switchboard of millions of other citizens while talking? Hardly.
One reasonably expects one's communications to be private, whether it is by mail, telephone, or internet. Even large private meetings (private business teleconferences, etc.) have a reasonable expectation of privacy. The internet is really no different, and were lawmakers and the law at all sane ISPs would have the same common carrier status afforded the Bells.
You want to arrest someone for doing something illegal on the internet? Fine. Get your subpeana, go through the standard wiretapping process (complete with court order, etc.) and then invade someone's privacy as part of an official investigation by law enforcement who are held accountable to the public.
Do not allow private corporations and their lawyers to simply invade one's electronic home and communications at will, bypassing the entire intent and letter of the reasonable search and seizure clause of the constitution, and accountable only to their own shareholders. Or, if you do advocate such obscenely undemocratic violations of people's basic civil rights to due process and privacy, do not expect any legitimacy or sympathy from the rest of us, regardless of how despicable the actions were of those you are trampling over the constitution to get.
Next you'll be arguing the police should put cameras in our homes or listen in on every phone call, simply because somewhere out there there is a dirty old man molesting a child or someone contracting a murder for hire.
"Do it for the children! Stop Crime!"
What you suggest is the digital equivelent of a camera in every home and a wiretap on every phone, and it has no place whatsoever in a free society irrespective of what crimes a few idiots (or a billion idiots) may be committing.
Constitutional safeguards and legal procedure is there for a very important reason: to afford all of us protections regardless of our guilt or innocence. A damn good thing, too, as with the current laws on the books every single one of us is guilty of breaking some law, somewhere, nearly each and every day we get out of bed. Want private thugs in pin stripe suits enforcing all those laws against you, and breaking down your door to do so?
No?
Then stop advocating unconstitutional and draconian behavior, merely because the target of your particular ire threatens your outdated business models, or offends your notions of right and wrong. Because I guarantee you, somewhere, sometimes, you are offending someone else's notion of right and wrong, and once you open up that door you too will be on the wrong end of someone else's personal or business "enforcement action," and civil government accountable to the people will have been replaced by corporate, plutocratic fascism accountable to only a few CEOs and shareholders as they trample over the rest of us.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
If that's one of the funniest things you've ever read, I truly feel sorry for you. Try reading more.
You're doing something illegal (copyright infringement), you are then caught, and you are then identified
How bout this, the MIT student is getting sued for DOWNLOADING MP3s. What if he/she already owns the CDs in question?
Mega beers for the first person to get a subpoena form the RIAA for downloading thousands of MP3s of CDs they already own. If had any balz, I'd do it myself.
Nah, they'll just have to do it the old fashioned hard way. Which is, getting enough evidence to get the judge to sign it.
X(7): A program for managing terminal windows. See also screen(1).
Ever hear of a wonderful thing called Due Process. Well, it's all going out the window now. Unless you are rich enough to hire some good lawyers you no longer have the right to Due Process.
If somebody believes they have evidence of criminal behavior they should have to take it to a Court of Law which would then issue a subpeona or warrent. But in our New World Order big corporations merely have to finger you and you are presumed guilty. So lovely.
Those two Universities are at the forefront of Intellectual Property Law. If they get their faculty on board, I can assure you they have more legal firepower than Verizon. In any case, this point is moot since they don't seem like they're trying to fight it.
At least, they delayed the intrusion and they gave their students ample notice that they were going to be raided. That's not bad.
That's a good question actually. It is a violation of privacy (I've never seen that called "privacy infringement"...are you affiliated with the RIAA?) because the DMCA allows the lawyers acting on behalf of the RIAA to obtain these subpoenas without sufficient judicial oversight. They file their claims with a clerk, pay the fee, and voila! Usually, to obtain a subpoena that grants the right to violate the Fourth Amendment, one must actually prove harm sufficient enough to justify the violation of that Constitutional right to a judge. But thanks to the good ole DMCA (a copyright lawyer's bestest friend!), the quaint notion that you must actually prove your case before being granted a subpoena has been neatly side-stepped.
Hmmmm....so let's apply your logic to another set of criminal circumstances. You're doing something illegal (selling crack), you are then caught, and you are then identified. See, when it comes to selling crack, the police have to actually identify the offender first in order to obtain a warrant. (And, by the way, warrants are issued by judges...not clerks.)
I do think you have a good legal argument with your final statement but the existence of proxies nullifies it on a technical level. (Then again, how often does technical common sense actually scale with legal theories?) How many of the 871 subpoenas obtained by the RIAA will turn out to be people running open proxies on the Internet? Last I heard, we haven't made that illegal yet.
"Privacy infringement"....I do like that term. It's a nice check on the power we've given to those who are rabid in their pursuit of unsubstantiated losses due to copyright infringement.
--K.
Sig: Bad people happen. Try to avoid being one of them.
"Under a provision of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, passed by Congress to combat music piracy, music companies may issue the subpoenas without a judge's approval. Verizon has challenged that aspect of the law, saying it violates users' rights to due process and privacy. A judge ruled in January, however, that subpoenas do not require a judge's signature; Verizon again appealed"
IANAL but wow, I thought courts had to issue subpoenas. I did not realize the the RIAA was issueing them lone gun style. SCARY
I think the REAL question is.. why isn't anyone ATTACKING them? I wait for the day that the news reports that someone with a shotgun walked into RIAA headquarters and starts blasting...
So what about the rest of reality?
.torrent file out and dealt with the central tracker issue, finding people becomes that much harder... Is the person unknowingly distributing the information, or do they do it on purpose... It puts an interesting twist on the questions. It's like in the article where they traced a IP to a room, but they don't know which machine was using it, so Oooops! my hard drive had a catastrophic failure that involved my trading it with a friend and losing it somewhere... Now who do you sue?
I'm sure that most people want to know what is happening with respect to the DMCA and the RIAA being annoying to all of us... But what is the RIAA or equivalents doing in the rest of the world along the same vein? I live in Canada and use random P2P utilities often. What are they going to try up here?
And that leads to another issue, if they don't bother people in other countries, what happens when people figure out how to use locations in other countries to hide their actions? Hackers do it, I've seen that plenty, what happens when the P2P downloaders figure out how to do it and automate it. Or create zombie programs that basically turn any infected computer into a P2P forwarder, like the spam virii that are out there these days?
And then there will be the day when something like waste or freenet will be common... what do they do then? I may chose to let the software and network store a certain amount of information on my system, but I don't know what is in there, and cannot find out. Will I still be liable?
This random collection of (possibly badly placed) lawsuits will definatly lead to people just finding a way to stop the lawsuits. Lawsuits are annoying, and people find ways to avoid things that annoy them.
As I said about BT, if someone started to get a good setup that used Freenet to get the
Anyway, just my thoughts...
On Arrakis: early worm gets the bird. Magister mundi sum!
Yeah, right.....
eat shiat and bark at the moon
I know this is all about file sharing and stopping P2P users from downloading copyrighted material but this issue has now transformed into something much larger.
The main issue is now your rights as guaranteed under our constitution. How the hell can the RIAA issue supoenas without judicial oversight? I'm not aware of any govermental department that can issue supoenas on a whim and on an as needed basis at the federal or local level. Our rights in the constitution guarantee us from unlawful prosecution so this RIAA gifted law as madated by paid off politicians is inherently flawed at it's core.
Is it going to take the RIAA busting in your house and holding you at gunpoint treating you as an enemy combatant to realize wtf is going on here? This is bordering on insanity. Prosecuting users at whim with little or no proof and throwing them into financial ruin over an mp3? These aren't the big fish or anywhere near it.
As said previously there is clear and open PIRACY not infringement in many foreign countries and our own where many elements play a part in mass producing cds and dvds to sell on the open market.
P2P is not the black market.
It is the sampling pool for future purchasers of the product the RIAA is demonizing into something that is to be resented and despised. I know there are people out there who just dl and don't buy but my experience is most do buy but as our rights are restricted and our choices limited how long will the buying continue?
I myself no longer buy because I'm not supporting the RIAA period. I have never seen a group of supposedly savvy business people be so ignorant to what is going on in their own market.
Consumers are voting with their wallets so now they want to sue us into submission? How is this progressive thinking?
I will not let the RIAA impose what they think is best for me.
I will not let the RIAA make my decisions on who, what, when, where, and how I listen and buy my music.
I will not give into to this bullying and I will not support them again.
A business entity is buying laws that restrict our freedoms and making downloading entertainment a crime more severe than violent crime with much harsher punishment. I keep asking myself when will people wake up to this and do something or in this case nothing-meaning boycotting cd/music sales?
The ramifications for these laws being passed are far reaching so take a cold hard look at what's going on before it's too late...
You aren't free to do anything, until you've lost everything.
I've read the first few replies to this, and aside from the fact that a lot of people seem to have misunderstood the situation (the colleges will comply, they're basically just objecting to incorrectly filed paperwork) everyone thinks this is great.
It is not an abuse of the court system to take legal action against someone who is breaking the law. The fact that these kids may be at college doesn't excuse being criminals.
If, as you say, it is the responsibility of the colleges to manage their own networks, then what do you say about a college that condones breaking the law by taking no action to prevent it?
If colleges don't take reasonable action to prevent the users of their networks breaking the law using those networks, then whose place do you think it is? Clearly central government don't have the resources to combat this problem effectively, which is why they pushed through the DMCA in the first place.
As usual, this comes down to "me, too" bitching about how unfair the RIAA is, and as usual it's aiming at the wrong target. You have a legitimate complaint that the RIAA and those they represent abuse an effective monopoly position to overcharge for the goods they sell. You do not have a legitimate complaint when people who have broken the law get chased down for it.
If the colleges concerned actually were trying to prevent that, they wouldn't be heroes, they'd be accomplices. However, since they're not, they're simply being professional and not giving out private details until a properly filed order requires them to do so.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
That in the U.S., a company can issue a subpoena _without_ a judges signature...man, that's really screwed! Can anyone elaborate on the specifics of this, are there any control processes in place?
Verizon did want to hand over names and IPs, and I can assure you they have much more legal firepower than a college...
Uhh, no. MIT's endowment is in the billions; not sure about BC, but I would be stunned if it wasn't at least in the hundreds of millions.
Once you're in this kind of league money doesn't matter much. Seriously. Both sides can hire as much legal help as they need. Both can afford to support this legal team for as many years as it takes.
If both sides have $400 an hour lawyers, then in terms of legal firepower it's pretty much an even fight. It then, finally, comes down to law.
Before the ISP's just get fed up with this and lobby congress to have some sort of protection clause against these lawsuits. I remember reading a while back that all these subpoenas are costing the ISP's a fair amount of money since they have to use there own employees (that should be doing other things) into spending a LOT of man hours and money in getting the info that the RIAA is demanding. Considering that the lawsuits and subpoenas are getting more numerous, there has to be a point where they say the hell with it and brib..er give campaign contributions to there own congressman.
Sounds like a pathetic rallying cry to me.
The enemies of Democracy are
It is this issue that might make a difference. If the provision of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act for issuing subpoenas without judicial action is ruled unconstitutional, and the ruling is upheld, then the efforts of the RIAA will be stopped in their tracks until the law is rewritten.
As I understand it (and please, someone correct me if I'm wrong), the subpoena has to be issued by the court, but doesn't have to be signed by a judge. I assume it just has to be rubber-stamped by a court clerk. Kinda like a drive-thru subpoena service.
Hate to pop your bubble, but there is no violation of the 4th amendment here. The 4th amendment simply requires a warrant, sworn out by a court upon probable cause and that specifically describes the search and seizure to be conducted.
The second branch of the government (you know that pesky branch that is elected by the people), has instructed the courts via legislation, that evidence of illegal downloading is, ipso facto, sufficient evidence and probable cause. Therefore, there is no need for judicial review, and the clerk (who is an official of the court) can simply sign the supboena.)
Personally, I find it a bit refreshing that the representatives elected by the people are defining this instead of a few robed justices on a bench acting like dictators. We have too many judges making law already from the bench. The Arizona state supreme court has even had the temerity to rule on multiple occasions that amendments the state constitution violated the state constitution.
That, my friends, is tyranny.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
but the real issue is neither P2P nor the the RIAA's price-fixing and other disreputable goings-on.
The real issue, why BC and MIT said "Hey, wait a minute!" is Internet privacy. I agree with the previous poster who gave the nice example of the telephone service -- we expect (and should, given the tenets of the US) an assumed privacy in our communications. Once reasonable evidence is brought forth, conforming to the search and seizure laws, then communication can be monitored, and after that, the law can be brought down on the offender.
It seems to me that the RIAA is trying (and often succeeding) in skipping a step -- that of monitoring after evidence is brought forth (a la a search warrant). They're monitoring and then getting the names to prosecute.
Then again, I'm going off hearsay I read here.
"Oh, poor us! We're being attacked by terrorists! We really need to expand our *cough*illegal*cough searches to track these people down!"
And you're posting as an Anonymous Coward, why?
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
I think it is time for SlashDot via The RIAA in a good 'ole fashion class action law suit. Surely there is some SlashDot reading Laywer with that has an itch to sue the living pants off RIAA. It is probably a fair assumption that some of the Slashdot members are potential RIAA targets, why not? With 45 million Americans as file swappers, and as potential targets for RIAA, then a class action law suit on behalf of the 45 million Americans to get the DCMA struck down by a court would be in order. If that doesn't work, perhaps the Slashdot developers out there could be kind enough to make a really sweet kick butt program that would wipe your hard drive of an evidence of Kazaa, Kazaa Lite, etc, and clear out any evidence of MP3s?
And this is important because it's finally a large corporation without the backchannel communications and handshakes that is willing to stand up to the recording cartel.
It got me to thinking "What can I do to support Verizon's case?" (even though I happen to work for one of their biggest competitors). I asked a few lawyer friends and they told me that I could file an amicus ("friend of the court") brief directly with the court hearing the appeal but unless I was representing a lot of other people from a major organization...it would pretty much be spinning my wheels. They said the best thing to do is to write letters to the editors of every paper in my area laying out the whole situation and the potential risk to our privacy. Even though federal judges are appointed and not elected, public opinion can often sway the legal interpretation that federal judges adopt (after all, nobody likes to be unpopular and flamed in the press) and it also influences future appointments.
So, eloquent Slashdot posters with a real understanding of the case...take your next Slashdot post and | lp -d editor. I know I will.
--K.
Sig: Bad people happen. Try to avoid being one of them.
I remember the president of GT made a similar statement when the RIAA wolves came down on us
Couldn't agree more with you. Very eloquent post. Kudos.
over music?
come on, I like music but not tHAT much
Chuck
simply because somewhere out there there is a dirty old man molesting a child
Yes --- and furthermore, where's the outrage about dirty children molesting old men?
Good question. The problem comes when that same person allows others to copy those MP3s from his collection, effectively "distributing" copyrighted material. That's not so ambiguous, though I don't know to what extent it has been tested in court.
That said, I'm glad at least a few universities think their students still have the rights granted to them under the Constitution.
Shop as usual. And avoid panic buying.
No, MIT might not have a P2P proxy server for you, but they have Internet 2.
Which, IIUC, is intended to be free from any commercial use, thus if RIAA invaded it, THEY would be the bad guys.
Regards,
--
*Art
It looks like sheep have arisen. I for one...
You gonna finish that? "I, for one, welcome our new avine overlords"?
Shop as usual. And avoid panic buying.
Two words: "Hell Yeah!"
Translation: I couldn't agree with you more.
I run a Debian/Kernel/Knoppix Mirror: (http|ftp|rsync)://debian.ams.sunysb.edu/
apt-get @ > 5MBps == teh win!
Well done, lad. Bravo! Very eloquent. Nice to know there are others out there who remember what the Constitution was like before the Corporations took over.
We have to respect their naming traditions... :)
This alone gives me the justification to bring my laptop to the local college, plug into their network, and share every damn pron movie, mp3, and app that I can get my hands on. Share and share alike, folks.
And to all you jerks that think that file sharing is stealing... What do you call selling CDs for $20, giving the artist pennies from that $20, and blatant violations of the United States Constitution
Down with the RIAA and their lobbyists. What a bunch of senseless assholes.
I used to work at this computer repair place years ago. When someone came in to have their PC repaired, another tech would demand to see their Winblows license. If they had none, he would refuse to work on the PC. He had many things to say about people "stealing" software and music...
Until one day, he was caught stealing from the register. Ha!
DISCLAIMER:
I don't believe what I write, and neither should you.
Many here are downplaying this as some kind of "technicality" or frumpy MIT only rules kind of thing. I'm not sure why. The whole thing is a "technicality" if you want to look at complience with fedearal law as some kind of technicality.
If MIT is right, they are right everywhere. Privacy issues for students are a federal issue, the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act specifically. All the schools that agreed to comply had better think twice before they violate federal laws. Juristiction issues are not just a Boston thing either. Sure, the RIAA can do it all again and obey the law this time, but that will cost them. Imagine them sending teams to every real jusristiction for every screen-name with 5 songs downloaded. Pththth-fit! MIT's stand should be embarasing to the RIAA in any case, but my money is on MIT being right.
The only thing the RIAA should be dissapointed in is the way their lawyers have cocked this up. Had they done just a little more homework, they could have saved themselves considerable expense. I hope this costs them a fortune and that they decide they might be better off promoting music instead of screwing their fans.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
That was pretty funny. Am I reading K5?
your are a little bitch.
tee hee
(Just for the sake ot argument, although I'm not arguing with you)
It didn't say downloading with the intent to share. It said downloading.
Define "distributing"?
Matthew Oppenheim is the lead lawyer for the RIAA. Jonathan Lamy is another legal lackey. Amy Weiss is head of the RIAA Dis-Information Ministry. If you want to contact the RIAA here is their phone number and address: RECORDING INDUSTRY ASSOC OF AMERICA 1330 CONNECTICUT AVENUE NW SUITE 300 WASHINGTON, DC 20036 US Phone number is 202-775-0101 (Apparently this number was copywrighted by an individual who now wants to sue the RIAA for using it) Here is the board of directors for the RIAA (from www.boycott-riaa.com): I wanted to make sure everyone understands who is behind the decisions the the RIAA makes. If it is going after users, or going after software companies etc. These are the people who make those decisions. Remember when you buy recordings from the RIAA members you are helping to finance their assault on the copyright laws of this country, on the people who love music, and yourself. Bill Evans Roger Ames, Warner Music Group Michele Anthony, Sony Music Entertainment Inc. Val Azzoli, The Atlantic Group Jose Behar, Univision Music Group Bob Cavallo, Buena Vista Music Group Ronnie Dashev, Maverick Recording Company Clive Davis, RCA Music Group Tracey Edmonds, Edmonds Record Group Dick Griffey, Solar Records/J.Hines Co. Zach Horowitz, Universal Music Group Don Ienner, Sony Music U.S. David Johnson, Warner Music Group Lawrence Kenswil, Universal Music Group Mel Lewinter, Universal Music Group Alain Levy, EMI Recorded Music Roy Lott, Virgin Records David Munns, EMI Recorded Music Worldwide Antonio Reid, Arista Records Inc. Sylvia Rhone, Elektra Entertainment Group Rolf Schmidt-Holtz, BMG Entertainment Tom Silverman, Tommy Boy Music Andy Slater, Capitol Records Thomas Stein, BMG Entertainment Tom Tyrrell, Sony Music Entertainment, Inc. This list is directly from the RIAA website. lawmakers who do the RIAA's bidding: Rep. Robert C. Scott Rep. Adam B.Schiff Rep. Bob Goodlatte Rep. Darrell Issa Rep. Ed Bryant Rep. Elton Gallegly Rep. Henry Hyde Rep. Howard Coble Rep. Howard L Berman Rep. James Sensenbrenner Rep. John Conyers, Jr Rep. Lamar Smith Rep. Lindsey O. Graham Rep. Melissa Hart Rep. Ric Keller Rep. Robert Wexler Rep. William L. Jenkins Sen. Dianne Feinstein Sen. Fritz Hollings Sen. Gordon Smith Sen. Joseph Biden Sen. Rick Santorurn Sensenbrenner,(head of the copyright committee) took an RIAA funded 18,000 trip in Jan of 2003 to Taiwan and Thailand to warn them about copyright. This is Illegal. Learn more about it and write your represenatives requesting an ethics investigation here(webcasters alliance): http://216.116.171.66/zzformpage.asp The RIAA is DIRTY! Use the system to beat them at their own game. We out number them about 1,000,000 to 1. Never forget that, write congress today.
Thanks for the info but, far from popping my bubble, you just gave it a titanium lining. So basically, you're saying that subpoenas now carry the same power as warrants...only it's a media cartel instead of law enforcement that wields it and a clerk instead of a judge that grants it.
It sure is a good thing that the second branch of government always passes perfect laws since they represent all of us. Good point about the clerk being an official of the court...that's probably necessary but if it is, their powers need to be limited. Clever hack by the media cartels and their paid-off legislators (those pesky people that get elected and then promptly accept campaign money to blow off their constituents), I'll give them that.
While I'm with you that no one branch should ever gain too much power, I question your interpretation of the balance of powers...especially in light of today's environment. Where you seem to believe that the Judicial branch has too much power, I believe that the Legislative branch has been bought off and is no longer representative of its constituents. So while you see the Judicial branch saving us from the Legislative branch, I percieve the situation from the opposite point of view.
Tyranny can come from any direction, be it clueless judges, bought-off legislators, or power-happy executives. The goal of the constitution is to make these threats sufficiently at odds enough that the end result is palatable.
--K.
Sig: Bad people happen. Try to avoid being one of them.
We are seeing the DMCA as an enabling piece of legislation. By granting the ability of private companies to take action to protect their interests without having to turn to judges and the legal system initially we are decreasing the load on our court systems.
In this time of financial crisis and budget shortfalls, any actions that reduces the burden on the courts and that will save money must be seriously considered and pursued.
The companies that pursue those stealing from them are naturally the best ones to take on the expensive costs involved with identifying and pursuing the criminals. After all, if the theft is small, then the company can decide for itself whether the matter is worth pursuing.
We have already seen the success of this program. Judges are no longer required to issue subpoenas as law clerks now issue them under certain guidelines. That means fewer judges are needed for the courts. One law clerk dedicated for this task can issue more then 50 times the subpoenas of a judge. Imagine the savings.
We are planning on completely automating this process, and if all goes well, the companies will be able to sign on to a "court" web site, fill in a few pieces of information, and be able to print their own official subpoenas directly. This would not only save money by not requiring the law clerks, but also no longer requiring courts to pay for the delivery of the subpoena, since the company filing for the subpoena would pay for that.
We also see this as a potential revenue generating system, similar to parking meters, charging companies for the amount of time they are connected to the automated tools.
It's just a matter of time...
Matthew Oppenheim is the lead lawyer for the RIAA.
Jonathan Lamy is another legal lackey.
Amy Weiss is head of the RIAA Dis-Information Ministry.
If you want to contact the RIAA here is their phone number and address:
RECORDING INDUSTRY ASSOC OF AMERICA
1330 CONNECTICUT AVENUE NW SUITE 300
WASHINGTON, DC 20036
US
Phone number is 202-775-0101 (Apparently this number was copywrighted by an individual who now wants to sue the RIAA for using it)
Here is the board of directors for the RIAA (from www.boycott-riaa.com):
I wanted to make sure everyone understands who is behind the decisions the the RIAA makes. If it is going after users, or going after software companies etc. These are the people who make those decisions. Remember when you buy recordings from the RIAA members you are helping to finance their assault on the copyright laws of this country, on the people who love music, and yourself.
Bill Evans
Roger Ames, Warner Music Group
Michele Anthony, Sony Music Entertainment Inc.
Val Azzoli, The Atlantic Group
Jose Behar, Univision Music Group
Bob Cavallo, Buena Vista Music Group
Ronnie Dashev, Maverick Recording Company
Clive Davis, RCA Music Group
Tracey Edmonds, Edmonds Record Group
Dick Griffey, Solar Records/J.Hines Co.
Zach Horowitz, Universal Music Group
Don Ienner, Sony Music U.S.
David Johnson, Warner Music Group
Lawrence Kenswil, Universal Music Group
Mel Lewinter, Universal Music Group
Alain Levy, EMI Recorded Music
Roy Lott, Virgin Records
David Munns, EMI Recorded Music Worldwide
Antonio Reid, Arista Records Inc.
Sylvia Rhone, Elektra Entertainment Group
Rolf Schmidt-Holtz, BMG Entertainment
Tom Silverman, Tommy Boy Music
Andy Slater, Capitol Records
Thomas Stein, BMG Entertainment
Tom Tyrrell, Sony Music Entertainment, Inc.
This list is directly from the RIAA website.
lawmakers who do the RIAA's bidding:
Rep. Robert C. Scott
Rep. Adam B.Schiff
Rep. Bob Goodlatte
Rep. Darrell Issa
Rep. Ed Bryant
Rep. Elton Gallegly
Rep. Henry Hyde
Rep. Howard Coble
Rep. Howard L Berman
Rep. James Sensenbrenner
Rep. John Conyers, Jr
Rep. Lamar Smith
Rep. Lindsey O. Graham
Rep. Melissa Hart
Rep. Ric Keller
Rep. Robert Wexler
Rep. William L. Jenkins
Sen. Dianne Feinstein
Sen. Fritz Hollings
Sen. Gordon Smith
Sen. Joseph Biden
Sen. Rick Santorurn
Sensenbrenner,(head of the copyright committee) took an RIAA funded 18,000 trip in Jan of 2003 to Taiwan and Thailand to warn them about copyright. This is Illegal. Learn more about it and write your represenatives requesting an ethics investigation here(webcasters alliance):
http://216.116.171.66/zzformpage.asp
The RIAA is DIRTY! Use the system to beat them at their own game. We out number them about 1,000,000 to 1. Never forget that, write congress today.
(Sorry for the double post, keep forgetting to change the formating.
The sad, cynical, probability is that it will last until they fund the colleges something, regally. With ususal "enticements", "inducements", et aliter.
Time will tell.
Simply put, in this case, the law is wrong and needs to be changed. It is wrong for the RIAA to be able to sue someone $750 all the way to $150,000 for "supposedly" sharing a song. And theres the fact that in most cases they seem to want to go after the maximum amount. All the RIAA is doing is searching Kazaa and other services to see what everyone has available for sharing. They aren't checking to see if a file has been shared, or how many times its been shared. Remember, even when the college kids earlier in the year were sued, the RIAA gave a count of the number of files they were supposedly sharing, they never gave an account as to how many times each song was downloaded, etc. The amounts they are able to sue for are "perceieved amounts" in terms of financial damages, and have no basis in reality.
For example, lets say Billy Jo Bob, a newly signed country singer, makes an album. Billy joe sucks, and very, very few people like him. His album grosses, not nets, but grosses, $50,000. Now, lets say that one of the few people who bought it rips it, shares it, and is then sued by the RIAA. For each TRACK, not entire compilation, they can legally sue for $150,000. Now, lets say the album had 10 tracks on it, and the user puts them all up for grabs. That user can be legally sued for "costing" the record company $1,500,000, even if theres no proof that a single song was downloaded from him. All of an album that grossed barely a percentage of that amount.
To put it in terms that you might be abe to understand, this is the legal equivalent of saying that if you own a gun, and someone on your street is murdered using a gun, you're guilty. The police do not need to gather evidence beyond your owning the gun, for example, ballitics or checking alibis for veracity. Then, the family of the murder victim can sue you for wages lost, and the total they can legally sue you for is the same as if the guy became CEO of a Fortune 500 company and worked til he was 80.
Instead of adopting the holier than thou attitude, consider that this is a democracy. We are, at least in theory, in charge of this country, not the lawmakers. The rights of protest and civil disobedience are etched throughout the history of our legal system. And, from what I understand, the stance that MIT and BC are taking is that they're being polite right now, giving the RIAA a gracious way out, but if the RIAA still pursues the information, they will tell them to shove it.
As for file sharing itself, I'm not saying its right and legal. I do it myself, and I acknowledge I'm breaking the law. And I could care less. I have my reasons, none of which I will speak of here, but I do acknowledge it is not legal by any means. However, it is not the place of the RIAA to be creating so much FUD and irresponsible litigation. I imagine if the laws were changed to something somewhat sane, the universities would have no major issues with giving the RIAA the information. As of now however, I hope that they're seeing an abuse of the system, and an opportunity to protect their students from a ravenous corporate beast, while they deal with the issue themselves.
However, jusding by your apprent support for the DMCA:
Clearly central government don't have the resources to combat this problem effectively, which is why they pushed through the DMCA in the first place.
I expect you might need help in understanding all these big words.
Mod Points: Helping you keep your opinion to yourself.
Of course "that road" is still being traveled by Verizon, but I would like to propose that this may be, in fact, an entirely different road.
Almost every college I have been to behaves a bit like a small city - sometimes it's own state - with it's own set of rules, regulations, and policies.
Most also have their own policing organizations and post office. What is the point?
The point is that this may be slightly a matter of juristiction, and I'm certain that at least the college that invented Kerebos sees it that way. They police themselves - watching their own networks, and work very hard to ensure that their citizens are protected, and that what is private remains so.
They also discipline them when they do something they shouldn't.
This may not be legal reasoning for MIT and Boston, but it sure is ethical grounds. It is not in either MIT or Boston's best interest to have massive file-swapping, and as tech-savvy colleges, they certainly limit it.
Does anyone know of any cases where students rights where protected from outside litigation because schools were taking care of the problems?
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
Dave Matthews and Radiohead [...] have always been in support of file-sharing...
Not of everything. Like most taper/trader-friendly bands, they ask that you only trade unofficial concert recordings, not actual albums. In fact, while I'm not a fan of DMB or Phish, word on the grapevine is that both bands have changed their policies to be more restrictive recently, and that this may be because too many fools aren't following the quite-generous rules: DON'T TRADE OFFICIAL RELEASES (and don't charge money, or try to make money with ads).
As for Radiohead, they seem to have a policy more like Metallica -- taping is allowed, but trading is on a don't-ask-don't-tell basis. However, I'm sure they're no happier than any of these other bands to have their official releases traded.
About 150 of the subpoenas were addressed to Verizon Communications Inc., which said Friday that it will release the names and addresses only after exhausting all legal challenges
I'm impressed with Verizon for keeping the fight.
Of course, the words "shall not infringe" don't leave a lot of room for interpretation....
Quick! Buy the CD now so when they finally get to you, you can claim prior ownership.
I made a PHP/MySQL library that prevents SQL injection & makes coding easier!
I'm thinking about our campus. For the student VLAN, we have a DHCP server. Right now, anyone can come on campus, plug into a port, get an IP and launch Kazza.
There really is no way of tracing someone down unless we find the machine online and go see who is plugged in that port.
All that is assuming that someone did not forge the MAC address to be someone elses.
So, a school could turn over student info, and that student would have to expend tons of $$$ to prove it wasn't them, or just cave and pay off the RIAA extortion. (Sounds like SCO)
What's next, laws requiring a certain amount of logging everywhere? And who is gonna pay for this? Are the gonna outlaw dumb hubs?
And let's not forget the fact that there's no way to prove that _I_ downloaded anything, especially if my computer is in a dorm room with others, or even roaming on a wireless LAN. So you've got an IP address, a filename, and a time. So what. That's not jack squat on most networks.
If someone else commits a crime with my car, does that make me the criminal? Maybe so, if I knew about it. But then again, maybe not. My point is that there's just to much slack given to the RIAA at this point.
Having famous, reputable organizations defying the RIAA is very important...
...not to mention that MIT is an 800lb gorilla in the world of academia and has enough money to pound the shit out of whoever crosses them.
You don't have to worry about being caught under the Patriot Act because they're not really worried about music, and for the RIAA to catch you would be like finding a needel in a haystack, because there are lots of people who buy CD's from the libary without ripping from them.
Thus, you can vote with your wallets, and get those few songs that you liked off of the radio off of (insert-band-here's) latest album without worring about being sued.
Also, since we're during the summer time, you can check out Garage Sales for the albums you want on either CD or Cassette. If they're on Cassette, you can download the music and claim you're backing up an legitimate copy. If they're on CD, you're getting the album for cheap and the RIAA isn't seeing a penny of your money.
Zagreus sits inside your head, Zagreus lives among the dead, Zagreus sees you in your bed and eats you in your sleep.
My roomate hears my CD in my player
No.
My roomate borrows my CD
No, unless he copies it, then yes for him. If you know of his intent beforehand, then you are an accessory
My CDs are on my desk at work where anyone to listen to them
Identical to above
My CDs are on my computer which others use
No, unless people transfer the files. And if you know of their intent then you are an accessory
The person distributing the song and the person downloading the song already paid for a CD
Unqualified yes.
And now one for you
Songs are posted in a directoy on a public webserver, but without any webpage and without any links (maybe you put them on your home webserver so you could listen to your cds from internet cafes or something?).
In Soviet America the banks rob you!
Denise Mattson, a spokeswoman for DePaul University in Chicago, said the school has been unable to determine who was using the computer listed in the subpoena.
Every university should follow suit.
I don't get it. What's wrong with politicians. Think about the Do Not Call Registry. they had like 700 bazillion signups in the first day. Why did it take so long to get that in place, clearly people wanted it.
Now the RIAA/MPAA and the DMCA is way out of hand, and clearly there are 700 bazillion people that would rally along side anyone who brought a legitimate intelligent attack against it. That person would be a hero, and could easily siphon votes and money from the tens of billions of fans she or he'd have, but no, instead they'd rather piss off the entire world and destroy basic freedoms we fought hard to achieve in order to appease a few big shot companies.
What cowards.
How bout this, the MIT student is getting sued for DOWNLOADING MP3s. What if he/she already owns the CDs in question?
I think that is just sloppy writing. The RIAA would like people to think that they are suing the downloaders, but I think they are really only suing those who allow uploads.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
The second branch of the government (you know that pesky branch that is elected by the people), has instructed the courts via legislation, that evidence of illegal downloading is, ipso facto, sufficient evidence and probable cause. Therefore, there is no need for judicial review, and the clerk (who is an official of the court) can simply sign the supboena.)
The question here is "who decides that the evidence is legitimate?" Currently, it's a group with an interest in the case. Judicial oversight is needed to prevent errors and abuse.
Example: Let's say I'm Vice President of Asskissing at the RIAA. My neighbor buys a nice shiny new car, which pisses me off because I should have a better car. So I arrange for my underling to issue a subpeona to the university my neighbor's kid goes to. The kid's dad gets notified by the University and hilarity ensues.
Sound far-fetched? Maybe it is. But it's not entirely unheard of for folks given power to abuse it.
Now, say I want to improve efficiency in the Legal Department. Is it a big stretch to send out form-letter subpeonas to anyone sharing a file that could be infringing before evaluating whether the file is actually in violation? Of course not. I'd stamp out subpeonas by the thousands then decide who to sue.
So, yes, I think it should go through a judge. The ability to obtain personal information about any user based on his or her IP address is too easily abused without oversight.
I'm definitely one of those people who are cared about being caught! Lets *hypothetically* say I have about 2300 songs in my mp3 library (all of which have been taken off KaZaa's shared system) and I am caught. With the RIAA able to ask $750 to $150,000 for each illegally shared song thats 1,725,000 to $345 million! Now I obviously don't have either sum, neither do my parents, so in essence, I'm screwwwwed. And so are you, unless you made Forbes billionare list. I know what I'm going to do: lay low until the legal dispute is resolved.
Speaking of a legal loophole, think about ex post facto for a second. If most of these songs have been downloaded prior to any ruling stating that downloading copyrighted music is illegal, wouldn't ex post facto be a viable arguement. Ex post facto basically states that if you can't be tried for doing something if it was not illegal at the time you did it. So downloading songs wasn't illegal a year ago, so...most songs in my library can't be used in any arguement by the RIAA. Correct?
I guess now is the time to say I told you so with respect to those banner ads telling everyone that their IPs are being broadcasted over the Internet. Next thing you know people will be complaining that they missed their email when they are told plain and clear they have 1 new message waiting for them.
this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom. -- Lincoln, Gettysburg Address
We might imagine "counsel" for MIT comes from one of the less technically adept Universities. After a couple of years at MIT, they might even get it. In the mean time, you don't have to be much of a tech guru to understand the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act requirements to notify students before the release of personal information such as names and addresses. Nor do you have to be much a lawyer to understand jusritictional issues. Hell, they could get someone from LSU to do that much. What's up with these RIAA clowns? OK, extortionists and music pimps are not well known for their legal prowess either.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
> My roomate borrows my CD
No, unless he copies it, then yes for him. If you know of his intent beforehand, then you are an accessory
> My CDs are on my desk at work where anyone to listen to them
Well then. What's the real difference between me leaving my CDs on my desk (aka 'sharing' them), a coworker accessing them (call it receiving via physical process instead of digitally receiving/downloading) and listening to them when they don't own them?
So I'm naive. I fail to the see the real difference between the two.
Now let's assume that instead of downloading these MP3s, the student is listening to them over the net via streaming from another persons machine (who own's the cd). He/She isn't downloading a copy in that sense of the term. So what's the difference?
I'm mostly ok with people getting busted wit sharing out MP3s. But busted for downloading them is completey bogus IMHO.
I call bullshit.
Er, I respectfully disagree.
People on Slashdot keep on talking about how this is the "public Internet" and how people must "secure their machines" and that it's somehow their fault if they get hacked, because "it's the public Internet, you should keep patched if you don't want to get hacked." Also people keep on saying that if you have a webpage, it's your responsibility for making sure people can't access content you don't want them to access, because "it's the public internet."
Now I know that not everyone on Slashdot has the same opinion, but it seems that people want a double-standard: what I do is private, what others do is public. (Or pubic, depending on the site.)
Bless you, sir.
Eloquently stated.
uR iGn0ranc3, Their Power
You don't have to worry about DMCA-style laws up here. Check out here for why. Basically, we have bill C-6 (The Privacy Act) and the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act to protect us. To boil it down, when the last stages of these laws come in to effect in jan2004, any non-journalistic/artistic business has to have a court order signed by a judge (not just a stamp from a clerk) to release any information about an identifiable person. So if an (RI|MP)AA-type organization sends just a subpoena to your ISP, your ISP is then supposed to tell them to go screw themselves. Gotta love it!
A man who can't pronouce "nuclear arsenal" shouldn't have one -sig ends here.
FINALLY, a large, respected organisation telling the RIAA to go fuck themselves until they bleed.
As far as I'm concerned, the RIAA has driven more people to illegal file sharing than any other force or organisation, and they've done it deliberately just so they can get indignant and prosecute those same people.
Fucking RIAA. At least have the decency to treat the musicians better than dirt.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
I'm curious. I understand that the RIAA can't get everyone and they are just trying to set a couple examples of people but could it be possible that file sharing is so pervasive that this is impossible?
I mean let's take a look at cable tv. Ever since cable broadband became available to me over 4 years ago I've been stealing free cable TV. I even steal free satellite now. I'm willing to bet there are thousands upon thousands of people who steal cable and/or satellite just like me. I'm sure at some time in the past some **AA organization tried to crack down on this..I believe they still are trying to crack down on it. But why has nothing happened to me? Could it be, perhaps, because this violation is difficult to enforce and just pervades society too well?
Ultimately I question what the **AA can accomplish. They're going to fine a couple people, and some people may even go to jail, but, from the looks of it, it doesn't look like anybody is going to quit file sharing any time soon. What seems more realistic is that I'm going to continue to hear about some ppl being fined, some more apps/networks getting shut down, newer apps/networks being created, more *AA bitching, and I'll continue to download free content when my heart so desires.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
the recording industry organization provides a KaZaA screen name, an Internet Protocol, or IP, address, and a list of songs it says were shared from the location.
A LIST of files. No actual files, just a list. The actual file called "Metallica - Master of Puppets" could conatin my voice saying "Lars, this was your last album worth buying" repeating over and over again to fill the 5.53 time slot. Everyone knows these are out there and I swear I read in the past about the RIAA doing this themselves to water down the results. How can a list of file names possibly stand up in court? I am not sticking up for copyright violators but the RIAA was no real evidence here.
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
Students don't pay for school, their parents do. ..And those that do pay their own way don't have a life savings to worry about anyway. ...And even if they did, and they had to quit shcool because they lost it, there's more potential students waiting to replace them. So no matter how it works out, the college's tuition stream is safe.
Nope, the colleges are not doing this for the benefits of the students. They are just doing it to protect themselves from the students. If the college helps and illegally offers the RIAA the info, or if they don't follow their own privacy policy to the letter on this, the students will sue them.
Welcome to the net of 1000 lies. Upgrades are scheduled soon that should bring us to the 10,000 lies mark.
The RIAA and their associated record labels have millions and millions of dollars in lobbying power. Telemarketers are far more decentralized and have virtually no lobbying power. Furthermore, pretty much every voter is against telemarketing to various degrees whereas most consumers are in a bit of a "swing" area with the RIAA, MPAA and DMCA - a lot of people are willing to download content but few, if confronted, would defend their downloadings as just actions. I feel this is more because of ignorance than anything else.
*footsteps*
*knock knock*
One thing you seemed to have left out, or understated, was Litigation. Litigation is not just "extra time"..it could drag on forever. The issue doesn't seem so clear cut because the 1998 DMCA act is a law but the rules by which MIT protects personal information is also a law (or rule).
The other issue is State vs Federal laws. Here in California it is legal to grow/smoke medicinal marijuana (or maybe that's just here in the bay area). However, this is illegal according to federal law. What happens is that local law enforcement treats these situations as legal while much cannot be done if the feds come in.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
How does the RIAA find out who downloaded these files anyway?
Or to take this one step to far. :-)
What's the difference between:
I own a CD.
I put the CD in my CD player.
Someone else accesses that CD via Cat5 cable.
and
I own a CD.
I put the CD in my CD player.
Someone else accesses that CD via 1/8" headphone cable.
They're both sharing. Will the RIAA come hunt me down because everyone I work with can listen to my CDs using headphones? Will they also hunt down the person using the headphones?
Students don't pay for school, their parents do
Really? I'll have to explain that to the bank that gave me my student loans. My mom and dad will be overjoyed to hear this also!
My Karma is bad. May I take you out for a drink? It's on me...
The trouble is, the RIAA doesn't define what is illegal; what they can do is allege an infringement and ask it to be tried before court.
That's the way its done in a system of laws, anyway.
And anyway, is copyright enforcement more important than presumed innocence? Personally, I don't think that is even a close contest.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
How is anyone who is sharing mp3s supposed to know whether or not the person downloading the song has or has not bought the cd already. So in effect these kids could be getting sued for sharing songs that are already legally owned by both the person sharing the songs and the person downloading the songs. I know it's highly unlikely that that is the case but how does the RIAA know that? It reminds me of the time I had the police called on me for trying to climb in through the window of my own apartment. I had locked myself out on accident and I was almost arrested for trying to enter my own apartment! The groundskeeper hadn't recognized me from a distance and because of my actions that would have been illegal otherwise I had cops knocking at my door about to bust the door down. I had to explain the whole thing to them and show them my license to prove I lived there. The point is that although their actions can be illegal they can also be legal based on the circumstances. The tragedy as someone already pointed out is the lack of due process. If you think someone is doing something illegal then get the authorities involved. Get a search warrant. Wiretap legally. Collect evidence.
rant
Suing kids thousands upon thousands of dollars is just a scare tactic. There is no way it can be proven that the amount of money the RIAA is suing for is even justifiable. Legally maybe, but definitely not realistically, ethically, or morally, not that anyone ever thought the RIAA was realistic, ethical, or moral anyway.
I've got a better idea. How about lowering the price of cd's from 17-18 dollars to 11-12 dollars. The price of CD's is rape nowadays. Most of the money doesn't even go to the artist. We're just paying for the record company's pockets to get fatter. To be honest I do download songs occasionally but usually just to preview them before I buy the CD. My old roomate would only buy a CD if it was 10 dollars or less. Everything else he just downloaded. I can't really blame him either. The record companies love the current setup. All they need is one hit on the radio and then they can sell you a full CD that has only one good song on the whole thing. Singles are pretty much a thing of that past. It's more profitable for them to sell you a whole bunch of crap that you don't want.
Time makes more converts than reason
I like your point. You can also look at who is excluded from the Do Not Call list. Interestingly enough its most of the people with a lot of polititions in their pocket.
Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels.
No, the net is not private and having that expectation is very foolish. however, all that is being stated by freeuser is that normal due process be applied to the accused as would be done for other crimes. I don't see how stealing music warrants such harsh treatment. Come on, its just MUSIC. Its not like people are being accused of 20 counts of 1st degree murder.
As far as I'm concerned, I do not have to open my door for ANY lawyer, whether hired by my neighbor, or by the RIAA, no matter how much hot air they blow out of their asses. Its all posturing until I have my day in court.
I don't see this so much as "schools helping students break the law" as I see it as "a respected institution not allowing itself to be pushed around by some piece of crap assocation".
Perhaps MIT just has bigger balls and greater respect for their students than most other institutions do. Perhaps they feel that they do no agree with the idea of "unlawful" subpoenas. If that's the case, then the respect of an institution justifies spending money on litigation.
With respect also comes reputation. I wonder how much of this is MIT keeping her reputation of an educational institution that can't be messed with. I know that if I were an MIT alum and I knew that MIT were going to such lengths to protect her students, I'd be willing to give a lot more in donations.
Lastly, let's not forget that we're talking about MIT and not Podunk University. So far everyone has characterized MIT as just another institution, but I'm willing to bet that MIT has much more political power than people recognize. They have a long history of putting out the world's smartest people and many of them are in positions of power as well.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
call them and tell them what you think of their antics. :)
800 223 2328
I have a fairly newbish question. Why dooesn't MIT and such just, NOT log ips, or at least not log them in a way that connects them to some user. Then it will be impossible for them to comply with any such request.
How about the official mit news release here.
It better explains what they are really doing.
Since the nature of "sharing" on Kazaa is one of offering your files to anyone who may care to download them, including the RIAA and their agents, there is no "reasonable expectation of privacy." This is not breaking and entering to find out your identity. This is logging the IP address of a computer, at the behest of its owner, offering up files to anyone and everyone.
This is the digital equivalent of them marking down the license plate number of someone with a bumper sticker that says, "THUG FOR HIRE." Or something like that.
No, but I know of at least one case at the school I go to where the administration completely rolled over when the Feds decided to seize a student's computers on hacking suspicions (which were completely invalid). I believe he had his equipment returned eventually.
I'm no longer a student there but I believe that in order to use the wireless on the campus you need some sort of account. From what I hear, this involves identifying yourself as a student (with some login/pw info) as well as matching MAC address. So that's pretty much the easiest way you could identify students on that campus.
Back in the day, land lines were accessed by user/pw too which would identify the student with an IP.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
Many unsigned musicians provide free downloads of their music on their websites as a way to attract more fans, for example my friends the Divine Maggees. Many such musicians, while relatively unknown, are as good as any major label band and certainly an improvement over the pablum they serve up on ClearChannel.
You can find many more examples in my new article:
-
Links to Tens of Thousands of Legal Music Downloads
The article also explores some of the historical and legal issues behind copyright, and suggests steps the file traders can take to make file sharing legal.If you're a musician who offers downloads of your music, I can link to your band's website from the article. Please follow the instructions given here.
Request your free CD of my piano music.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtm l?itemNo=264863&contrassID=2&subContrassID=5&sbSub ContrassID=0&listSrc=Y
r 01 2903.htm
The fight for privacy is losing on all fronts.
Long, but a great read. He has my vote in 2004 for president if he gets there. The guy is all about the constitution.
http://www.house.gov/paul/congrec/congrec2003/c
I've got a better idea. How about lowering the price of cd's from 17-18 dollars to 11-12 dollars.
I think one step further would solve it.
If I could walk into a record store and pay $12 for any 18 songs of my choosing, I'd buy CDs like they were going out of style.
The RIAA would never go for it because the dime-a-dozen-created-in-a-marketing-department boy/girl bands would never sell complete albums, nor would people be forced to buy complete albums just for one decent song.
To which I says, if it's shit and no one wants it, it's still shit. put out better material and I'll spring for complete CDs once in a while.
What the RIAA will never get, even after it's last dying breath is that Kazaa and the like provide people with what the RIAA can't: customization of their listening preferences and experience. Offer that same thing, and you're golden.
Remember this is CIVIL court and things are rather twisted..
You have to prove you are innocent, and they don't have to prove anything 'beyond a reasonable doubt', just a 'reasonable suspicion'. Due process doesn't really apply here.. etc etc etc
And you have to pay for it.. regardless of the outcome. And no free lawyers in Civil Court..
At least in criminal court you have a chance for common sense to prevail.. though admittedly these days a SLIM chance...
---- Booth was a patriot ----
dude, he explained your case too. No one wants to hear you whine about your student loans.
Big Brother is watching you - and documenting
By Yuval Dror
eBay, ever anxious to up profits, bends over backward to provide data to law enforcement officials
"I don't know another Web site that has a privacy policy as flexible as eBay's," says Joseph Sullivan. A little bit later, Sullivan explains what he means by the term "flexible." Sullivan is director of the "law enforcement and compliance" department at eBay.com, the largest retailer in the world.
Sullivan was speaking to senior representatives of numerous law-enforcement agencies in the United States on the occasion of "Cyber Crime 2003," a conference that was held last week in Connecticut. His lecture was closed to reporters, and for good reason. Haaretz has obtained a recording of the lecture, in which Sullivan tells the audience that eBay is willing to hand over everything it knows about visitors to its Web site that might be of interest to an investigator. All they have to do is ask. "There's no need for a court order," Sullivan said, and related how the company has half a dozen investigators under contract, who scrutinize "suspicious users" and "suspicious behavior." The spirit of cooperation is a function of the patriotism that has surged in the wake of September 11.
eBay is the world's largest auction site. Some 62 million registered users buy and sell a variety of merchandise through the site, which charges commissions for every item sold. Sullivan claims that 150,000 Internet users earn their livelihood from the site, some having left their old jobs to become buyers or sellers on eBay.
The sales method on the site is simple: An individual registers as a user, types in his particulars, and affirms that he accepts the user conditions and the site's privacy policy. Whenever an item is sold, the buyer fills out an evaluation form, telling other users about the treatment he received, whether the merchandise was sent on time, etc. Other eBay users can then avoid buying from sellers who have received poor grades.
Sullivan says eBay has recorded and documented every iota of data that has come through the Web site since it first went online in 1995. Every time someone makes a bid, sells an item, writes about someone else, even when the company cancels a sale for whatever reason - it documents all of the pertinent information.
One would think that preserving privacy of the users, whose moves are so meticulously recorded, would be keenly observed at eBay, whose good name in the Internet community is one of its prime assets. But in the U.S. of the post 9/11 and pre-Gulf War II era, helping the "security forces" is considered a supreme act of patriotism.
Who needs a subpoena?
"We don't make you show a subpoena, except in exceptional cases," Sullivan told his listeners. "When someone uses our site and clicks on the `I Agree' button, it is as if he agrees to let us submit all of his data to the legal authorities. Which means that if you are a law-enforcement officer, all you have to do is send us a fax with a request for information, and ask about the person behind the seller's identity number, and we will provide you with his name, address, sales history and other details - all without having to produce a court order. We want law enforcement people to spend time on our site," he adds. He says he receives about 200 such requests a month, most of them unofficial requests in the form of an email or fax.
The meaning is clear. One fax to eBay from a lawman - police investigator, NSA, FBI or CIA employee, National Park ranger - and eBay sends back the user's full name, email address, home address, mailing address, home telephone number, name of company where seller is employed and user nickname. What's more, eBay will send the history of items he has browsed, feedbacks received, bids he has made, prices he has paid, and even messages sent in the site's various discussion groups.
Attorney Nimrod Kozlovski, author of "The Computer and the Legal Process" (in Hebrew), heard the le
Imagine the turmoil to a school administrator, knowing their students' life savings are about to get sucked up by the RIAA for sharing a few songs.
Even moreso: Imagine the turmoil of a school administrator, knowing their students' life savings are about to get sucked up by the RIAA because they wrote a useful tool for informtion cataloging that JUST HAPPENED to catalog some copyrighted files that some OTHER students were sharing.
Or a school administrator who realizes that the next target is probably the administrator, for allowing the school's net to be operated in such a way that students (those perpetual finders-of-ways-around-barriers) could use it to share copyrighted files.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
What is this fight you speak off??
Seriously, people take this too far... (against the RIAA, I'm NOT refering to the DMCA... that's another story) Sure, I download music but I at least recognize that it's stealing
There is no cause, there is only free music.
*obligitory "don't mod this as a troll" comment so people mod it up instead*
Logging an IP address and forcing the ISP give out private information about you are two very different things.
OK, this is probably off-topic, but I have to point out that lots of people seem to be in favor of handing over what we think of as governmental duties to private industry. The current administration is paying off big corporate contributors with lots of juicy contracts for what were once thought of as government jobs. Take that most governmental of duties, collecting taxes. The current administration wants to give away fully one quarter of our (that's you and me, the taxpayers) delinquent accounts receivable to private contractors to collect the money. The simple idea of just hiring more government employees whose job is to collect taxes (and who do so umpteen times more efficiently than private industry) just doesn't occur to the powers-that-be. To top that off, all your computerized records at the IRS will soon be controlled by private company employees because the Office of Management and Budget has recently (illegally) revised the rules (a document named Circular A-76) for contracting out work so as to make virtually no government job safe from easy privatization. For references, just google on NTEU (one of the unions fighting this crap) and A-76.
Yes, law enforcement is being handed over to big corporations in lots of ways these days. Any suggestions for how to stem the rising tide of government-by-corporation?
Well "fulltime" is nothing for the NY lawyers I know. When all the junior and senior associates aren't sleeping for days, then they cant bill any more hours.
Statistically speaking, there's a 99.998% chance that my IQ is higher than yours. Get over it.
I fear that the RIAA will start to pressure the donors of these schools (where many $$'s for research and support come from).
Donors to schools like MIT are proabably techies.
Even if they aren't already riding a privacy hobbyhorse, they're likely to already have a bee in their bonnet about how the RIAA's pressure against any new technology that CAN BE USED to "pirate" music is crippling the industry.
- DAT tapes were crippled and virtually killed.
- Taxes on computer media.
- Attacks on authors of P2P software applications.
- "DRM" software and hardware that cripples computers and makes them more expensive and untweakable.
and the list goes on.
IMHO pressure on contributors to MIT from RIAA is likely to result in a flood of new money for MIT. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Downloading isn't stealing, it's rape. Or maybe it's murder. Or maybe trespassing is stealing? Or maybe contract violation is jaywalking? Or maybe assault is really copyright infringement? Tell you what - why don't we do away with thousands of years of law and language evolution and just call all crime murder?
By mislabeling "copyright infringement" with "stealing" or "piracy" or "rape" or any other term that has a well defined and more serious meaning, you are either purposefully or dupefully spinning the issue and allowing a very major concession to those who serve to benefit from the government enforced temporary monopolies of ideas/information/etc.
When crime is outlawed, only criminals will have records.
XML causes global warming.
Its privacy infringment becuase these subpoenas never see a judge. They are issued by the record companyies and specify only the ip, a list of somes downloaded and the users nick name. They demand that the university identify the students and provide the company with the name and adress of the "violater". It is one thing for a lawful agency to ask for someones informantion, not a company.
Also, wasn't there this thing called "innocent until proven guilty"?
I feel like I'm in Wonderland, sometimes. The RIAA does not control your food or water supply. They aren't your landlord. Their sole power is to offer a certain subset of music for sale, and to decide on the terms under which it will be sold. If they decided not to sell any of their music to anyone at any price, what would be the net effect? A lot of pissed off artists and consumers, sure, but everyone would live right through it.
Hate the RIAA? Don't like their business model and practices? Then don't do business with them! If you're a music consumer, go to clubs, buy microlabel and band-pressing CDs, swap non-RIAA mp3s, and enjoy. If you're a music producer, release your tunes through some other channel.
Why is this so hard for people to deal with?
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
Interesting, I need to start a music company so I can issue my own subpoenas.
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
What if I start calling people offering them stolen goods for free. I bet after a few complaints the courts would allow the people I stole from a chance to know who I was.
Kazaa is like putting abig sign in front of your house, here is what I have for you, it may or may not be legel.
If I went somewhere and found stuff identifiable as my stereo system (matching S/N) you can bet that I would have a right to know who lived there.
nobody is sayign the RIAA can look at the actualy packets sent between two people. Only that they can see who advertises what. They want the phone logs, not recorded conversation. And phone logs can be aquired quite easily in a criminal case.
Of course if they are pursuing civil charges there may be more limits (I don;t really know). ALso the RIAA should not really be allowed to pursue criminal charges, that is the police job.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
It's not *stealing*. It's copyright infringement, a horse of a very different color.
Stealing means that the original owner no longer has it, which is obviously untrue in the current incarnation of file sharing networks.
You download a song from me, and I *still* have my copy. I haven't lost a thing. There's been no damage done to my system. Oh, sure, a miniscule amount of bandwidth has been "consumed" (if such a thing is possible), but that's about it.
However, because I shared the song, and you downloaded it, we're *both* guilty of copyright infringement.
The RIAA/MPAA have done a wonderful job of equating "File Sharing" with "Stealing". A classic case of spin doctoring, if you will. After all, isn't photocopying a page from a book at the library copyright infringement? Everyone does it, and it's condoned by most people, including the library. It sure doesn't sound as bad as stealing.
So do everyone a favor, and call it what it is, not what the *AA would like it to be.
-- Karma is for people who think they matter.
That was just so well expressed.
Thank you sir.
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
Excellent use of the word "catalyst", my friend!
I'm not sure about that argument, but the BC and MIT are aguring that they require consent of the students to give up their personal information to a lawyer, I guess that may count as a yes.
Let's see.. the factory worker in the south just killed a few of his co-workers over what? A simple job? Wow... why would anyone get so frustrated that they would do that?
Or perhaps the school shootings? What was that over? Being unpopular?
your statement, 'over music?' may seem trivial to you.. but it's very well could mean the world to someone else.
The "law" never stopped anyone from anything. They just punish transgressions of some governmental process or decision. If the law changes, does that mean the actions have stopped?
.357 revolver in the drawer.
Anyhoo, I lock my door every time I leave my apartment, even though I KNOW it is against the law for someone to enter my unit. Somehow, that paper in some book just doesn't feel as protective as, say, a
The US, and most Western nations in fact, have adopted a siege mentality against their own citizens. We pay the bills, and the are hooked to the drug. If we dare stop their habit, what would they do?
A click-thru EULA is a technological measure used to protect your copyrighted software. It's been held up by the courts, use it to your advantage. Stick in a clause that you explicitly do not have permission to make a copy of Kazaa on your hard drive (by clicking the download link) if you're a member of the RIAA, MPAA, or any federal agency. You are simply refusing to extend permission to copy to select parties, a right you have under the US Constitution. When someone knocks on a student's door for copyright violations, the EULA should get the evidence dismissed. You could even countersue them for a DMCA violation, breaking the terms of your copyright, and EULA contract violation.
This post expresses my opinion, not that of my employer. And yes, IAAL.
Maybe i'm mistaken, but i thought that you could only know if someone was downloading a file using kazaa if they were downloading it off of you. In this news article it said that the student was download a Radiohead song, does that mean that the RIAA had to be the one sharing the file? Are they allowed to do that and still retain the right to sue?
And forcing the ISP to give out information is what this and the Verizon cases are about. But the parent post appeared to hink logging the IP address was a violation of privacy, that there is a "reasonable expectation of privacy" when conducting communication on the Internet.
All lawsuits require some form of valid evidence. A "list" does not quantify evidence. Get your attorney to demand that the RIAA download and play every alleged file you have on their list.
Every.
Single.
Song.
They'll either dismiss the case, or the jury will have comitted suicide by the 8th hour of your "Best of Menudo", "Backstreet Boys Greatest Hits", and "Nsyn Nlimited" collection.
End of case.
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
OK... My turn. I call bullshit on this.
"Public internet" is a meaningless term here, just confusing the issue - you may as well talk about "public phones." The fact that people have to take precautions to secure their machines in no way relates to their _right_ to privacy - any more than the fact you have to lock your doors to keep out crooks reflects on your 4th Amendment Rights (that's "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects..." in case you're curious).
Attempting to compare accidentally publishing content on a webpage with someone reverse-engineering a communications system to eavesdrop on its participants AND allowing out-of-band personal information about them be released at someone's whim without the oversight of a judge... It doesn't fit, does it.
That's the real point of all of this. Not that you should be totally secure in your right to privacy against all other concerns, but that a court and a judge have to sign off on breaching that trust. DMCA, incredibly, gives the RIAA (just some private corporate entity) the power of a judge-and-court to arbitrarily invade your private life if (by their own determination) they suspect you've committed a (really underwhelming) crime - and that, I think, is what we're concerned about.
No matter _what_ the suspect is doing, searches at the whim of a corporate entity without the oversight of a judge... I'm sorry, there's no mincing words. it is black-letter unconstitutional, and categorically unamerican.
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
Anyone who downloaded it, share, and ONLY share, Charlie Manson's "Whitey Album".
Then when the RIAA tries to nail you for it, send out a press release stating that the RIAA is contributing profits to a convicted mass murderer.
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
I was able to get them to compromise and they allowed me to remove the executable files and leave all the relevant source code up, thereby complying with the exact wording of the C&D (if not its intent), but it wasn't exactly a public display of defiance of the DMCA. And frankly, my guess is that as soon as the subpoena comes through with the i's dotted and the t's crossed, MIT and BC will bend over like good little boys. Thinking that university's legal departments (no, the tech people at MIT have no say in this) are interested in policy issues surrounding intellectual property law is pure self-delusion on the part of slashbots.
right on!
This is so funny, cool, and well-worded that I was ready to steal it for future use before I noticed the flaw: the Cat5 cable has (at least potentially) a billion "headsets" attached, and these are magic headsets which store what they play and can each have another billion headsets attached, and so on.
It really is a cool analogy, and I wanted it to work. Really.
everything in moderation
Tell the MIT alumni office now.
Tech Public Policy stuff
"I noticed the flaw: the Cat5 cable has (at least potentially) a billion "headsets" attached, and these are magic headsets which store what they play and can each have another billion headsets attached, and so on. "
That's easy to fix. Set the server/computer so that only 1 person at a time can download or listen to your CD. There. Now the 1/8" and Cat5 cables are on the same playing field.
No one seems to get this.
Your IP address isn't what's at issue here, although the RIAA's eavesdropping on a peer to peer network does have components of eavesdropping on email or other communication systems in my opinion (look to intent; the RIAA doesn't play by the rules of the system, and for a definite purpose).
The issue is whether or not we still have the sacred, black-letter constitutional requirement for a judge to approve a search warrant... or if we just gave the power of a judge to some random private entity, so that it can invade privacy all over the countryside, without any oversight, at the least provocation... at best being "corrected" later, at great expense and long after the horses are out of the barn door.
It's the whim of the RIAA now, not the judgement of a court... and that's what doesn't fly in this country. Make light of it at your peril - many, many people bled into the earth to secure this right for you. No private citizen, picking suspects at their sole discretion, should decide whose person and privacy should be violated. We have checks and balances for a very good reason.
--
Bill of Rights cramping your style? Try China!
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
Boston College Law School.
The army of RIAA lawyers just came up against a juggernaut of loyal Double/Triple Eagle litigators.
Welcome to Stalingrad for the 21st Century, kiddies...
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.
Because it's not realistic. No one will find the music, because the RIAA (in addition to being an organization comprised of true assholes) is a publicity machine.
Like it or not, our society is a big sucker for that kind of publicity, and we rarely notice anything else (like indie labels).
Instead, buy from independent non-RIAA musicians and labels. You'll have to look around on the Web to find those, but you should be able to find one to match your tastes no matter what they are. If record sales go up, but the RIAA labels go even deeper into red-ink, it'll be obvious that piracy is not the problem, no more excuses to make bad laws. It really won't take a lot of this to blow the labels right out of the water.
They're losing money anyway. They blame piracy. If they lose money a hell of a lot faster, what good is a "name brand" when customers see the name and automatically buy elsewhere? The label owners will see a bunch of "tainted brands" losing them money. The mulitnationals will unload fast to investors who will only want the catalogs and artist catalogues. Who will want to buy a CEO who managed to turn a $5 billion company into a $500M company?
CDBaby has a quite a few. Some with downloadable music.
Or check my sig to hear another one. We've got downloadable MP3s, too.
If you aren't sure whether an artist is RIAA or not, check RIAA Radar search to see if the artist is listed.
Every dollar spent on non-RIAA label music is another nail in the coffin of the RIAA and its record company members.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Most of the time, portscans from university machines are not initiated by the legitimate users of those machines; more often a portscan is a concomitant effect of the legitimate user's machine being compromised! In these cases, revealing the name of the student would almost certainly be a breach of privacy (unless of course we think it's OK to report a student's poor system administration skills).
That process would probably be sufficient to demonstrate identity in court (especially in a civil case, where the standard's not "beyond reasonable doubt" but "preponderance of probabilities"). While this is almost certainly true, it makes me wonder whether people who want to hurt their enemies will just steal the relevant IP addresses and start sharing copyrighted material. Based upon my exposure to university residential and laboratory networks, in most cases such a coup is entirely possible and also rather difficult to prove afterwards.
I saw somewhere in one of these places that it said the student is guilty of "downloading songs." If I'm not mistaken, isn't it legal to download a copy of a song off a cd that you have previously purchased??
I don't know the details of the process, but maybe they could have stalled it by refusing the subpoenas and refusing to say what was wrong with the filing.
Also, what happened with the Verizon appeal? Is it still on its upward march or pretty much deadended?
In the article, it mentioned that not all boston schools decided to refuse the subpoenas. I'm glad that Northeastern makes the news by complying with the threats. I'm definitely wondering who the one student at Northeastern is that got a subpoena, and I'm looking forward to our newspaper doing some sort of article on it.
hooray! it's a sex wiki
Even Michael Jackson says "Don't Jail Downloaders".
Now, about that nose...
just a small nit. I do agree with everything you say. But the constitution does not protect one citizen from another. Thats what laws and law enforcement are for.
The constitution is layed out in a way that states 'the goverment shall, or shall not'.
However the problem with the DMCA and its flotila of ancilary laws. Is this, vigilantizim? It basicly creates the corp version of a vigilante.
Law enforcment is usually fairly unconcerned about small time jimmy copying a few files. They are more concerned about the big time guy who is cutting 30k of cds and selling them out the back seat of his car. This is what the music industries beef is. They HAVE the laws but they are not being enforced. They got pissed that they were not. So they bought laws so they could do it. Now does this not make them a 'law enforcment agency' beholden to the same constitutional rights as the goverment? Thats the interesting question.
hmm The way I figure it is, its only a matter of time before they piss off the wrong combination of people. Then they will end up in a legal morass that will make watergate look like a fun romp through the park. And that was just a bit of B&E with some coverup.
As for the school telling them to take a hike without a court order good for them. They have the law to back them up. If not they probably can find a few alumni who will make SURE it is backed up.
However if I was a student there and had done this I would be sweating it. You can be sure they will go get that court order. Then more than likely those students will be on the bricks as those schools will see them as liablities and chuck em. They are not only breaking laws. They are also probably breaking an agreement they signed to use the school network. It probably says something like 'we can kick you out of school if you break the law on our network'.
All of the examples you give describe search warrant / court order situations. But the DMCA cut the judge out of the loop. Anyone can get the equivalant of a court ordered search warrant at will. *I* could file the appropriate paperwork and force Slashdot to turn over *YOUR* IP address, then I can go to your ISP and force them to turn over your name. It should NOT be possible for me to get your name and addresswithout firstmaking a case before a judge.
The only penalty I could find for abusing the system is perjury for claiming to be (or represent) the copyright holder. I'm not sure if there are any penalties for making bogus claims that you infringed my copyright, but even if there are the standard I have to meet to defend myself is absurdly low.
The US congress essentially turned over actual judicial powers to anyone and everyone who claims someone is infringing their copyright.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
getting sued for DOWNLOADING MP3s.
No, the lawsuits are strictly against people disributing the files. The RIAA can't touch anyone who only downloads. The RIAA hasen't yet managed to buy a law against receiving files. It would be a rotten law, but I have no doubt the RIAA hopes to create it.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Ownership of culture. That's what it boils down to. American culture is owned by corps. It's taken to the extreme. Hell you can't even sing "Happy Birthday" to someone at work unless you pay the RIAA a royalty.
A people's culture is a lot like food and water. And there's a huge cartel that owns most of American culture. And they keep changing the laws, so they will keep owning it forever.
This is wrong.
This is only happening in Boston.
It's not like that's a great college town or anything.
This is all completely legal, and plausibly prohibits the campus officials from being able to identify anyone should they be approached
"Students don't pay for school, their parents do. ..And those that do pay their own way don't have a life savings to worry about anyway. ...And even if they did, and they had to quit shcool because they lost it, there's more potential students waiting to replace them. So no matter how it works out, the college's tuition stream is safe. "
yea dude, thats the way it is..... right.
that evidence of illegal downloading is, ipso facto, sufficient evidence and probable cause.
No, anyone can fill out the paperwork and make a completely unsubstatiated claim of infringement. There is no evidence required at all.
the clerk (who is an official of the court) can simply sign the supboena.)
No, the clerk MUST sign the subpoena.
I could fill out the paperwork and claim you infringed the copyright on my poetry (which you've never even seen) and the clerk MUST sign it and your ISP MUST comply turning over your name and address. The entire thing can be a load of crap - though there is a perjury penalty if I falsly claim I have the copyright on the poetry. The claim they you infringed it can be entirely without merit.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
why is it supposedly illegal to have a bunch of mp3's on your hard drive available for sharing? shouldn't it be legal for someone to download them from your computer so long as they have the original copy? isn't this fair use? could this be a legal arguement against the RIAA? I would think it would be, so how come they don't go after the ones downloading instead of people uploading?
Give 'em an inch, they'll take a mile.
The purpose of government is to employ more government employees.
Why is this such a hard concept for most slashdotters to understand? It's clearly demonstrated in history...
Freeuser....I salute you...you at least have a clear understanding of what's happening.
Let the trolling commence....
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
Not to mention the fact that they're not even making sure people are doing anything illegal, they've just got a program that automatically sends out the subpoenas, and guess what, it isn't even that accurate:
n l
http://news.com.com/2100-1025-1001319.html?tag=
So now they're wasting time and money accusing innocent people who may have to hire a lawyer just to find out they've been wrongly accused!
First the school needs to know which MAC belongs to which students. If the network card was issued by the university its consivable they can point to a name. I doubt even if the school would have this info.
Second the school has to log every single tcp connection and the the associated MAC with that connection. I really doubt any school actualy does this too.
Third the evidence has to provide ip and time of the download. Article says nothing about the time.
Even if all the pieces are available still it would be difficult because for example the NIC could have come from compusa or if students were clever enough (its MIT after all) they could have been tunneling all this trafic through some common machine which everyone disavows of.
The referenced article mentions some college kid getting hit for downloading some songs. I think there is some validity to your argument when applied to those advertising music - but not when applied to those downloading.
No matter what, RIAA sucks and I won't ever buy an RIAA backed cd again - unless it is used.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
So, yes, I think it should go through a judge. The ability to obtain personal information about any user based on his or her IP address is too easily abused without oversight.
m l?tag=nl
I definitely agree, especially after seeing that it's already happening:
RIAA apologizes for erroneous letters
http://news.com.com/2100-1025-1001319.ht
"About 150 of the subpoenas were addressed to Verizon Communications Inc., which said Friday that it will release the names and addresses only after exhausting all legal challenges. Comcast, which did not say how many subpoenas it had received, plans to comply fully with the requests, a spokeswoman said."
Ever since Comcast bought out AT&T, my Spam rate went from 3/yr to 3/day. It also seems like it just blithely kisses RIAA ass. I don't watch TV and so I don't have cable TV - but I hear their cable TV sucks too.
I just wish I could figure out some alternative broadband - I don't think I like comcast.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
According to this article Michael doesn't want music downloaders to recieve jail time for downloading music.
Nah, they'll just have to do it the old fashioned hard way. Which is, getting enough evidence to get the judge to sign it.
It would take a carefule analysis of the text of the law to determine if that is possible or not. When a portion of a law is struck down as unconstitutional it can take down other portions that are dependant upon it. If other portions of the law reffer to subpeona's issued through that part of the law then you couldn't substitute a different "old fasioned subpoena" without a congress passing a re-write.
There was almost a similar situation with the Sony Bono copyright extention act. Had the supreme court struck down retroactve extentions as unconstitutional then the entire law would have collapsed. Congress would have had to pass a new law if they wanted to reinstate the non-retroactve portion.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
But neither do the words "well-regulated militia"...
Private businesses turn over delinquent accounts to a third party collector all the time. What's the difference?
The simple idea of just hiring more government employees whose job is to collect taxes (and who do so umpteen times more efficiently than private industry) just doesn't occur to the powers-that-be.
You're arguing that a government entity would be more efficient than a private company? Where have you been for the past century? Besides, most collectors don't get paid on a contract basis - they get a percentage of what's collected. This gives them much more incentive to collect than a government desk worker.
To top that off, all your computerized records at the IRS will soon be controlled by private company employees because the Office of Management and Budget has recently (illegally) revised the rules (a document named Circular A-76) for contracting out work so as to make virtually no government job safe from easy privatization.
I bet you couldn't count on both hands the number of private organizations that have your SS# and other private info in their databases. If this is a problem for you, you might consider disconnecting your electricity and telephone, never getting medical attention again, and keeping your money under your mattress.
For references, just google on NTEU (one of the unions fighting this crap) and A-76.
Wait...I thought your concern was for privacy? It seems you're only concerned about upholding an obsolete union system.
I don't wish for anyone to lose their job. Hell, I'm currently unemployed, so don't say I don't understand. But come back and whine when you have a legitimate argument.
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
Exactly the point I was going to make.
The IP, kazaa login, file list "evidence" that is being touted in this issue are quite analogous to the DNA debacle of the last few decades.
We are already reaching a point where several high profile cases have occurred with blatant mishandling and concoction of DNA evidence. This is not even taking into account the early mRNA days of genetic fingerprinting and it's extremely dubious "proof" that was used as the almost sole basis for conviction
This seems very analogous to the current situation: technologically advanced (and hence only dimly understandable by a lay person) and prone to the problems of that technology.
The "proof" being used by the RIAA is so scientifically meaningless as to be ridiculous. Unfortunately, DNA testing (hopefully) taught us that we can't rely on the courts to show even a modicum of common sense (I wish it really was common...).
As cantabrigian pointed out, it would be a relatively minor affair to subvert someone elses computer and hence implicate them for a crime they did not commit.
Even an average user may well be able to get a radmin user/pass to the pc in the next dorm, install kazaa or similar (you can even hide the system tray icon now with the click of a button), download the latest 30 album releases, set it to share them continually to one and all. So it will not be limited to only a small cadre of l337 hackers.
So at the cheapest rate (the RIAA bulk discount? :) of $750 per song, and an average of say 12 songs per album - your victim is looking at 750 * 30 * 12 = $270,000.
Of course there is a modicum of track covering to do, so the victim has no plausible deniability, but I doubt the RIAA is going to be focussing on auditing hard drives for remote logins. And of course, nuking their disk after a time will leave only the RIAA logfile "proof".
Start lobbying everyone you can.
Please don't let history repeat - we the knowledgable must ensure a clear and correct stream of information to the policy makers. We do not need emotive pleas based on the liberation of information, we need understandable descriptions of the flaws and fallacies in the current method and how it may be exploited.
Good luck, we are going to need it.
Q.
Insert Signature Here
The RIAA is not a law enforcement agency and therefore cannot entrap someone. Further, scanning for an available file could easily be considered a solicitation.
While the entrapment argument may be one about which people could ponder, it wouldn't hold up in court.
You are correct. The law states that the clerk MUST approve it. The only thing the clerk does is make sure the paper work is filled out properly, aside from that they don't involve the court at all.
I need to start a music company so I can issue my own subpoenas.
No need. The law says any idiot can toss around worthless allegations of infringement and issue subpoenas. You just need to know how to fill out the paperwork.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
I was wondering the same thing -- the article mentions one student who was known to have downloaded 5 songs, one by Radiohead, one by Dave Matthews, and a few others. What's stopping him from checking the subpoena to see what songs were supposedly pirated, and going out and buying some used CDs to cover his ass, or at least borrow some CDs from friends.
They couldn't prove that he hadn't "purchased a license to the music" when he downloaded the songs.
This whole thing is such a fucked up waste of time, really.
My Karma was at 49, then they switched to words. All that work for nothing!
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
As you can see, the 4th Amendment does not say "The government shall not", instead, this seems to be an absolute statement.
HOWEVER, whose property is the information just floating in limbo out on the internet? The phone system isn't infested with spiders or bots that go out and collect every bit of data about everything on the network, nor is it nearly as open to that sort of thing. The Internet is a strange chimera of both private and public areas with lots of cross-over, and as blanket as the fourth amendment is, it is not well suited to handle this beast. Keep in mind, the Bill of Rights was actually written to be a bit ambiguous, so if you really want protection on this issue you have to push for an amendment to deal with the nuances of the information age.
common sense: noun
What those who are ignorant of the subject matter think; usually wrong.
"I wish my school was more interested in protecting student rights."
The schools are likely playing CYA games more than anything. They can get into trouble for giving away private information to people. The subpoena varifies these are agents of the law doing something pertaining to work (and not just using their titles/jobs to tease info out of people). I wouldn't be so quick to lay such high praise on the schools.
So these people are smart enough to get into MIT but are also stupid enough to use Kazzaa. *scratches head*
One reasonably expects one's communications to be private, whether it is by mail, telephone, or internet. Even large private meetings (private business teleconferences, etc.) have a reasonable expectation of privacy.
While you are correct when it comes to uses as e-mail, buisness transactions or internet telephones, I would say that posting in a public form or broadcasting your IP to a bunch of strangers for the purposes of swapping files kinda negates your expectation of privacy in this regard. The examples you described all have one thing in common, and that is they're point-to-point communications. Point-to-mass, as P2P is, is an entirely different animal.
common sense: noun
What those who are ignorant of the subject matter think; usually wrong.
(a) Which would be a worse thing to get, a letter from the RIAA, or a DUI?
(b) Given that no one has ever died of copyright infringement, what does your answer to (a) say about the current state of our society?
Is there any way you can tell my parents this news? Also, can you contact the agencies that loaned me money and tell them all future bills go to mom and pop?
Thanks! And thanks for the great news! You made my day :)
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
Democracy is two wolves and one sheep voting on what's for lunch, along with a panel of 5 old sheep and 4 old wolves ending the vote count before the wolves' votes can be counted.
Liberty is the army of well-armed sheep and wolves agreeing to abide by that decision instead of engaging in carnage over it.
paintball
Verizon may have more legal firepower than a college, but we're not just talking about a college.
This is MIT we're talking about here.
I doubt very, very seriously that there is anything that institution could NOT do if it decided it is in it's academic best interest to do so, including freaking orbital death rays to blast the RIAA's headquarters off the face of the planet.
But seriously, folks. MIT vs the mafIAA? if they piss 'em off, those guys will never be able to place a phone call again.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
Obviously they'll find a way to use the WTO to do their dirty work.
maybe we should start pooling all our files and sending them to the kids who are going to get prosecuted..
making them listen to 40 million hours of mp3's might run the RIAA out of money in the process (and cause a variety of court reporter suicide prevention businesses to start, yea capitalism)
Because it is an incorrect assumption based on a particular ideological belief usually associated with those who reside on the libertarian portion of the political spectrum. I'd like to see you prove where this is so clearly demonstrated in history instead of just repeating what your party leaders tell you.
The purpose of government is to enforce a social contract. Who is party to developing that contract and who it benefits vary from nation to nation, but generally that contract defines somewhat how are actions relate to one another and how that nation will act in relation to other nations in the world.
When the legitimacy of the government to wield the power it has is sufficiently called into question, and there is sufficient force (force not necessarily being the use of a gun or other weapon, although most often it is), then the government is changed. The history of most revolutions is that they tend to produce more bureaucratic forms of government and a centralization of power, but that is not the same as saying that the purpose of government is to employ more people - bureaucratization and centralization is not synonymous with an increase in size. Size of government tends to relate more to national population and programs and services provided by the government (regardless of whether you think those programs are beneficial, effective, or legitimate). You're confusing results with purpose.
Lesson over. Now go read a book.
fuck you.
yes, maybe the RIAA has rights to those logs..
maybe they do need them to investigate people that are infringing upon their copyrights.
But it should be a judge to decide whether or not the RIAA has the right to do so, the RIAA should not have the right to decide for itsself
What? Me? Worry?
Let's see how far RIAA gets when the schools they piss off's law students get to fight back as an assignment..
At least for me. Although I have not downloaded music in a while, if I wanted to, there would be no problem; I live next to Mr. Linksys. Mr. Linksys bought a "you plug I play" wireless dealie at bestbuy last month.
Anyone else want this kind of swank setup? next time you go apartment hunting or house buying, take a laptop, and scan for your very own Mr Linksys.
Unless you want to do your filesharing sitting in your car outside of the nearest CompUSSR, or any of the other 9000 unsecured access points in your city.
And yes, my wireless network is secured with a Code. Any hacker worth his salt could crack it in a few hours, but why worry when Mr. Lynksys lives next door?
My point? dont really have one but the RIAA cant really prove anything. They dont sell any good music anyway.
Lawyers, at the Massechussets (sp) institute of Technology?.
Han-Wen Nienhuys -- LilyPond
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
RIAA/MPAA have a screwdriver, hence they try to screw everybody.
Thanks for the info but, far from popping my bubble, you just gave it a titanium lining.
Sorry, is this still a regular bubble but with a titanium lining, or is it basically a titanium bubble now?
I'm amazed it didn't pop by itself while it was being lined.
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
month:
Next you'll be arguing the police should put cameras in our homes or listen in on every phone call, simply because somewhere out there there is a dirty old man molesting a child or someone contracting a murder for hire.
"Do it for the children! Stop Crime!"
"I wonder how long the schools will be able to keep the RIAA's pack of lawyers at bay..."
The more pertinent question is, how much of the tuition money that gets paid to any given college ends up in lawyers' pockets? How much are MIT and Boston College going to spend fighting this legal battle?
Or, are they simply demanding that the subpoenas be proper and lawful? We all know the RIAA is not a government agency and has no legal authority over anybody.
The distinction made in almost none of the press coverage is how the RIAA is obtaining the IP addresses that are being subpoenad. There is a world of difference between the possible methods:
Lastly, the moderator needs some heavy meta-modding down. The expectation of privacy is a critical issue on whether evidence was properly gathered. Therefore, the post raised a valid point. It wasn't with sufficient clarity to win "Insightful" points, but labeling any unpopular opinion as "flaimbait" is an abuse of moderation.
Plus if the students they sue are law students, then I can see the RIAA getting a rough ride in the future.
A legal expectation is not the same thing as a reasonable expectation.
If I leave my front door unlocked and leave on a two-week vacation, I am legally entitled to the presumption that nobody has the right to enter.
My insurance company might be able to argue that I was negligent and that they aren't liable. But the thieves will not be allowed to argue that I had no reasonable expectation that my property would not be stolen.
A valid distinction can still be made between Internet communications that are intended to be private communications and those that are offered to the public at large. There is nothing improper about searching web sites for download links. Searching private communications on the other hand is improper and illegal, no matter how easy it is to do.
Ah, yes, name-calling, exaggeration and patronising prose: the tools of defensive hypocrites everywhere. Why do you assume that because I disagree with you, I am stupid or ill-informed? I am neither.
On the contrary. If you had bothered to read any of my past posts before making assumptions about me, you'd have found that I wrote on the importance of constantly questioning laws just the other day. I also suggested that the way to see things changed for the better is to fix the broken laws, not to break the current ones.
Oh, please. The hypocrisy around this whole debate is staggering, and your "supposedly" above does nothing to help your case. One minute, going after P2P is an abuse, and they should go after the perps. When they do that, everyone's up in arms about invasions of this or that. Now the perps aren't really perps, they just happened to leave illegal downloadable copies of current tracks lying around their systems? Who are you trying to kid?
And yes, the astronomical amounts they can theoretically sue for are "perceived" amounts disconnected with reality. And how often have the courts awarded them those amounts?
If you insist on using emotional and disconnected analogies, then at least be sensible. It is more akin to saying that if someone points a gun at me and I genuinely believe they're about to shoot me, I can shoot them first and it's reasonable self defence.
I'm adopting a holier than thou attitude? Now that is funny.
And no, you don't live in a democracy such as you describe. Think about it, and if necessary, check what the word "democracy" actually means.
That's an interesting understanding, which appears to differ from the understanding of almost everyone else here. What do you know that we all don't?
Perhaps at some point you should consider that copyright laws used to be sane. Then people like you abused the system on a massive scale, and the system responded. You don't like the response? Maybe you should have thought of that before you were abusive, instead of naively believing that you could get away with it forever.
And no, I don't like the DMCA, nor did I say or even imply that I did. I simply look at it from an impartial outsider's point of view, and recognise why it was proposed and allowed to pass successfully into law.
I've noticed that people from the US usually cry "Unconstitutional!" under two circumstances. One is that a law has been passed that is a genuine violation of their rights or a real threat to their liberty. Another is that a law has been passed that prevents them personally from doing something out of line, a
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
You mean Jack still hasn't graduated? ;-)
I'm sure the other address will be registered to the Bexley Hall Dorm President. I wonder how you serve a subpoena on a dogwood tree or a cat.
are you able to listen to one track of a CD while the other person listens to a different track -at the same time-? NO.
Bad analogy.
1. The current business model used by the Music Industry does not work these days. Times have changed.
- Instead of recognizing this fact, they are running around placing the blame for their failure on us.
- Under the guise of 'artists rights', they do what they do. How much money does the artist see of each CD sale?
- If they simply re-think the business model, they could make many times more money than they currently do. Perhaps the artist could actually see a bigger percentage of the money someday?
2. Current distribution methods do not meet the demands of the people.
- I will pay for music. I wont pay $15+ for an entire CD of crap.
- How bout $.25 or $.50 per download? Perhaps some overhead for the spin off idustry of providers...
Downloading and using copywritten material is illegal. That is not up for disbute. All of understand you don't walk into a bar a demnad free beer. We pay. We even tip if the service is good. Listen to the market. Use the current situation as a catalyst for change. Failure to recognize this for what it is will surely mark the demize of or at least severly hamper the music industry.
-major_linux
Except make the lawyers chuckle, and mutter "Suckers" under their breath.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
It's a provision of the DMCA. Weren't you wondering why the thing is so fucking evil? It doesn't just make reverse engineering and circumvention techniques illegal, it allows copyright holders to issue their own investigative subpoenas. Fucked up, huh? Write your congress critter. Bitch about it. Use real snail mail, not email. Email gets a canned response and generally doesn't get read by anyone above the level of intern.
This message brought to you by the Council of People Who Are Sick of Seeing More People.
Revolution? Merely getting Democrats in office won't change anything. Clinton started us down the slippry slope and Bush is gleefully rolling the country down it. Of the current crop of presidential candidates only Howard Dean seems relatively free of corporate allegiance, though I suspect there's merely stuff that's being hid.
Private businesses turn over delinquent accounts to a third party collector all the time. What's the difference?
Are you serious? Private businesses to not answer to the citizenry in the first place, so there is no reason why they shouldn't be able to turn over accounts for collection. Besides, anyone who has a delinquent account with a private entity entered in to the relationship of their own free will, they chose that situation. Where a tax relationship is entered into by birth, there is no choice in the matter, one is not free to avoid that relationship as they are one with a private entity.
I personally am very worried about all of the work being done on the people's dime (taxes) by people with no responsibility to anyone, or anything but profit (private corps). I want accountability, I want freedom of information. If someone fucks up, I want them to answer to me (citizen), not to some CEO who doesn't have much incentive to care unless they will loose money over the incident.
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
Besides, most collectors don't get paid on a contract basis - they get a percentage of what's collected. This gives them much more incentive to collect than a government desk worker.
Collecting debt due the government is different then a private business. A private business sells your debt to a collector at a fraction of what is actually owed. Your debt is written off and you no longer owe the original company money. It is in the best interest of the collector to get as much as possible as anything over what they bought it for would cover costs and be profit. This is why it is common for private debt collectors to negotiate with you if they feel you are not going to pay and also why they hound you like a dog to get thier money.
The government wants all of thier money and does not "sell" your debt, they contract out someone to collect it for them. Government debt collectors have to add to what you owe to make any money and only get paid when you pay. I believe it is normally an option to bypass the collector and still pay the original government debt directly to the government and avoid the extra fees the collector adds on. If it finally gets to the point where your income or tax return money will be docked to get the money, the contracted collector is out of the loop and docking is for the original amount owed.
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
"libertarian"
You know, that's funny, because Jerry Pournelle says it quite often, and he's a staunch republican. Hmmph.
"I'd like to see you prove where this is so clearly demonstrated in history instead of just repeating what your party leaders tell you."
I'm not an affiliated libertarian...so knock off the partisan crap.
Try looking the the results of 9/11 and airport security, for one example.
"You're confusing results with purpose."
You're confusing textbooks with reality.
What you just said is the *stated* purpose of government. What I'm talking about is what happens in reality, which is a combination of the stated purpose and many other factors. Whose "social contract" are we enforcing in the US? Seriously?
Criminy. Point out a ironic truth and get a armchair lecture that could have come out of a textbook for 10th graders.
Tell you what. You point out to me where I'm wrong instead of spouting political theory at me...
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
...May 2002 to see if my company would continue to invest in the Media Lab as we had for the past 5 years. During the main Q&A session, I asked in front of about 500 attendees if the Media Lab was worried that legislation such as the DMCA would effect their ability to innovate and what they were doing to protect themselves. When I stood up and asked the question, a good portion of the audience let out a laugh. They thought it was a funny/silly question. I was probably only one of the only research-types there. Just goes to show how out of sync with reality corporate money spenders are...
All your base are belong to us!
funny, i thougth it was also illegal to sniff the traffic on someone's connection without express permission to do so.
please remember, 2 wrongs don't make a right, but 3 lefts do...
The Constitution and the Bill of Rights define the U.S. Federal Government. None of it applies to private activities. The "government shall not" is implied.
Also, "protection on this issue" is implied. The Constitution specifies what the Federal Government can do, with everything else being not under its control. The Bill of Rights merely clarifies a few things. People have inherent rights, they do not have only the rights which are listed in the Constitution nor only the rights which someone lets them have.
Profit is the thing that makes them responsible. If a worker at a private firm fucks up, their bosses will have much more incentive to fire them because the person is a risk to the company being able to keep doing the collecting. Are you blind enough to really think a government worker is responsible to you?
Like I said (regardless if you entered into the agreement willfully or not), many different private organizations have your information - banks, credit reporting agencies, credit card companies, doctors, hospitals, schools, etc. Has this ever been a problem? If so, how did you deal with it?
Besides, you gave yourself away with your rant about unions and government workers losing their jobs.
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
The difference is the difference between government and private entities. It's wrong to turn over inherently governmental functions to private entities. Would you feel comfortable, for example, entrusting all the murder investigations in your area to a private corporation? Or would you feel better if those investigations were carried out by government employees who are at least nominally motivated by the pursuit of justice instead of a profit motive?
The same thing is true of tax collections. The IRS, despite all the negative (and mostly untrue) media coverage that preceded the 1998 Restructuring Act, is motivated not just to collect tax but to do so in ways that do not make a mockery of serving the common good, a concept that private entities do not grasp in any way. Look at it this way: Law enforcement should be done by the government, not private entities. Slashdotters have been pretty unanimous about that and, I think, rightly so. Well, collecting taxes is law enforcement.
Who was it who said that the power to tax was the power to destroy? Do you really feel comfortable with handing over the enforcement component of that power to any private entity?
Yep.
For most of it, I've been nonexistent. But for a substantial portion of the time I've been around, I was a tax collector.
Yep, you're absolutely right. That's why the last time Congress foolishly forced the IRS to turn over a portion of our delinquent accounts receivable to private companies for collection, those companies did such a stellar, highly motivated job of collecting money. (That's sarcasm, in case you didn't realize.) All that "piece of the action" motivation did was cause those private collectors to go ape shit. There were documented cases of telephone calls being made to debtors at 4:19 AM. The number of documented violations of the Fair Debt Collection Act were nearly uncountable. And when all was said and done, the private contractors used more man-hours at a higher cost to collect the money than the control group of government employees. The final figures indicated that IRS Revenue Officers not only collect money more efficiently than the private sector (almost THIRTY times more efficiently) but they do so without abusing debtors at all hours of the day and night and without running roughshod over their right to be treated like human beings.
Knee-jerk reactions of "The government is incompetent at everything!" are not something I can overcome with logic, so ignore this post if you wish. But the fact remains that the IRS collects debts far more efficiently and humanely than any private enterprise.
Even if that weren't true, I'd argue that it's wrong to give law enforcement power to private entities because of the abuse that inevitably happens. But you take your pick of which argument you like, the practical or the moral. I'm ready to defend both approaches.
I'll bet you can count on one finger the number of organizations that have both your SS# and a complete, itemized breakdown of everything you earned as well as near-complete insight into how you live your life and plan your finances since you entered the work force, all in one place. That one place is the IRS. Even your mortgage lender on
I can't decide which would be worse to try to challenge on legal issues:
The RIAA is gunna screw itself out of existance. Someone, somewhere, is eventually going to ask "Why hasn't the RIAA provided a subponea to EVERY P2P pirate?" You can't just go around "selectively" prosecuting people. Eventually, their legal budget will dwindle and they will fade away. What happens if I write a letter to my Mom in a WP, and name the file "Macarena.MP3"? Do I instantly qualify myself for a random trip through due process?
Several years ago I was in a major auto accident and spent about a week in the hospital. Insurance was pretty good about covering everything they were supposed to.
About three months after I got home, though, I got a notice from a collector. It said I owed money to an X-ray company and they were collecting it. I ended up speaking with the X-ray company. They had not been turning expenses over to my insurer, and on top of that were mailing bills to the wrong address. I corrected everything with them and the collector left me alone.
So obviously, your explanation isn't totally accurate.
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
there's a group at mit called stopit, and among other things, when a group like the riaa makes a complaint about a specific student, stopit tells the student in question. the files are removed from the network, and then mit lets the riaa know that the problem's been taken care of. in the past at least, they've consistently avoided direct outside interference by using this sort of a system.
Straw man. You're talking about two totally different things.
Look at it this way: Law enforcement should be done by the government, not private entities.
Wouldn't you agree, however, that in the case of say, a mortgage, laws apply? The law says I have to pay the bank back according to the contracted agreement set forth when I got the loan. How is this different?
The final figures indicated that IRS Revenue Officers not only collect money more efficiently than the private sector (almost THIRTY times more efficiently) but they do so without abusing debtors at all hours of the day and night and without running roughshod over their right to be treated like human beings.
Can you provide any official statistics to back this claim up? If it's so obvious that IRS Revenue Officers are much more efficient, why is the government looking to private collectors? There's something missing in your argument.
I'll bet you can count on one finger the number of organizations that have both your SS# and a complete, itemized breakdown of everything you earned as well as near-complete insight into how you live your life and plan your finances since you entered the work force, all in one place.
IRS, Social Security Administration, Department of Education, three different credit reporting agencies, state tax division, my CPA, my financial advisors/analysts...and that's who I can think of in the first few minutes here. I'm sure there are more.
Interesting how you think you can see into my motivations just because of what sources I choose to quote.
I think your sources indicate your bias - in this case, you're worried about losing your job. Give me some official IRS statistics on how much more efficient (what was it, 30x?) you and your fellow collectors are than a private collection agency and I'll be a little more sympathetic.
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
Define the words 'regulated' and 'militia.'
Just stop listening to music - I have, fuck the RIAA, there's more to do - like.... watch Div-X!
This is the letter to my senator... feel free to proof and send a copy to your own.
Senator_______,
I am appalled at the way the US Federal Court system is being hijacked by corporations. The Recording Industry Association of American and others are using the US Civil Courts as a way to punish both the wrong doers and the innocent. In all cases brought by the RIAA, the deck will be stacked in favor of the RIAA simply because they have more money to throw at the problem than an individual and better lawyers than anyone can afford. I do not support copyright infringement, but I do not support big corporations bullying around citizens because they can, and I definitely do not support proposed legislation that would make distribution of electronic copyrighted material an automatic felony, because, it would hurt many more people than the few that benefited, and it does not require that there be material proof (a list of IPs and such) that the file was downloaded. The sad fact is that the current legislation supports the copyright holders far more than the rights of the people. Right now both the RIAA and DirecTV are suing people for alleged infringements without any Due Process or conclusive proof and without a judge watching over their actions (as of right now it only takes a clerk's stamp to subpoena an individual). They have become their own police force, without all the restrictions that the police have, and without the assumption of "innocent until proven guilty". Now it's becoming like "You might already be a Millionaire" but in reverse "You might already be sued for Intellectual Property/Copyright Infringement". More legislation does not help; it only gives more rights to the corporations, and less to the US citizen. In the end it looks and smells like extortion, especially by DirecTV (pay us $3,500 now and settle out of court, go to court and pay us $10,000 to settle, or take your chances with a judge) just for buying a smartcard reader! What is the reason why corporations can do this? It's a simple question with a simple answer: Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a law with good intentions, but with major flaws. According to the EFF (EFF.org/share) there are more that 60 million Americans that use file sharing networks. The RIAA (and friends) is trying to make everyone who has copyrighted material a felon (proposed legislation "AACOPS"), and you can bet everyone has copyrighted material on their computer. They could not shut them down because they do have legal uses, so they are instead going after the users instead. Also, why hasn't the RIAA been under investigation as a trust? It is an entity that its members control at least 80% of the current US music market. Not to mention those same corporations have recently been ruled against in a price fixing class-action lawsuit, yet they have not reduced the price of CD's. Not only that they try to bully out smaller independent means of distribution (one reason why the hate file sharing).
I'm not aware of any club-level/microlabel/indie bands that come anywhere close to (for example) Liquid Tension Experiment, Racer X, or the Mahavishnu Orchestra. These are all virtuoso-level groups in terms of outright skill. I enjoy their music -- so much so, in fact, that I am willing to pay money, and have paid money, for their CDs.
"Anything is better than IE, and you can quote me on that." -- Wil Wheaton.
Neither do the words "well regulated militia".
:)
But more to the point: Gun talk is the new Nazi/Hitler (a la Godwin). Want to hijack a Slashdot thread? Just put the word "gun" in your post and suddenly the topic is now effectively over as zealots from both sides of the gun debate spew the same sound bites over and over.
I do not have a signature
OK, so I make so the sharing program via Cat% can only share to on other person on the next, AND it's the same track I'm listending to.
Hell, WinAMP does that now. Will the RIA come after me, or the listener? Sure they will.
The analogy is fine. The only difference in the way a signal travels form the source to the destination.
Of course IANAL, but I think you are getting real close to the point here. What you are missing is the fact that academics (students and faculty) enjoy the most protection from "Fair Use" rulings as well.
It is legal for teachers and students to use copyrighted works in the academic environment without paying royalties. What Verizon and the others don't have is that specific protection. MIT and BC have a real ace in the hole here. This here is some hope that they'll actually use it.
"I'm just here to regulate funkyness." - James Gandolfini, as Winston in The Mexican
We are all here because we are tech savy. Why doesn't someone just do what the RIAA is doing, but attempt to focus on litigators. Specifically, if some of these senators or representatives are targeted they might see the picture a little more clearly. I'm sure that at least one of our great elected officials takes part in P2P or at least his children/grandchildren do.
From the medical bills I currently pay, some are to a third party that handles the payments and some are from the medical facility itself. From my experience, neither of these added anything extra to the amount owed as long as you pay them monthly (no interest or fees either). I had one that slip through the cracks when I was on leave in the military (should have been 100% covered) and I had to deal with a collector directly. I would have blown it off since it was over 5 years old but I had to pay it before my home mortgage was approved. Not worth fighting at that point. I guess medical places can go both ways.
My real point was there are two types of collectors, the debt collecting type and the debt buying type (which then collect for themselves). The government uses the collecting type. Private businesses use either one.
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
Besides, you gave yourself away with your rant about unions and government workers losing their jobs.
That wasn't me... Check names before you make accusations...
Like I said (regardless if you entered into the agreement willfully or not), many different private organizations have your information (emphasis mine)
what do you mean regardless!?! That is the entire point. If you simply disregard any points I make rather than countering them, then you can't be reasoned with.
The point is that one is free to not be involved with any of the entities you mentioned, if they choose so. One is not free from the government, regardless of what they choose.
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
1. Nope, no partisan name calling here. I called you a libertarian (the political ideology) not a Libertarian (the political party). Jerry Pournelle, the Republican (the party, as opposed to republicans, those who support a republic as a form of government), would likely agree with this statement, as the official party line of the Republicans tends to be fiscally libertarian (as opposed to their social policies, which tend to be morally fascist). Of course, while Republicans talk a good game, they can spend tax money as well as anybody else, as we've seen lately...
2. One would probably identify the Constitution as the primary document establishing the social contract, for the U.S. anyways. You could add to it the body of statutes, regulations, case law, etc., but the idea of a social contract is more of a metaphorical construct. It's the rules we establish so (ideally) we can all live with each other without killing each other. It's the expectation we have of what our government will do to serve it's citizens.
What I wrote is not just the *stated purpose* of government, it is *the purpose* of government. The fact that said purpose can be and often is perverted for other means does not change this. As I stated before, a government that recuses itself from conducting said duties will ultimately lose legitimacy with its citizenry and, given the proper circumstances, will be replaced (think regime change...).
Once again to re-state my previous point, the size of government is related to 2 things:
a. size of population
b. services provided
So naturally, as population increases over time, the size of government will tend to increase, even if no new services are implemented, however it should stay fairly constant as a percentage of the GDP. However, the idea that no new services will be implemented for from the government is ludicrous. There will be highway and other public works projects, welfare, social security, farm subsidies, whatever. Generally speaking, the government doesn't just come up with these ideas as an employment program for more government employees. They come about because somebody or some group asks for/demands it. As standards of living increase, so do expectations. And in the end, the result is/may be/probably will be more government employees.
Now, back to the point. What I invited you to prove is your little truism:
The purpose of government is to employ more government employees.
Because while a nice soundbite, your statement is simplistic, meaningless, and false. Your taking a fact (government tends to increase over time, which is bascially true) and assigning a bullshit reason to it (that that's it's purpose). But I guess you'd know that if you hadn't slept through 10th grade, as then maybe you would have made it to college where you might have taken a real poli sci course and actually learned something.
fuck you.
Their sole power is to offer a certain subset of music for sale, and to decide on the terms under which it will be sold. If they decided not to sell any of their music to anyone at any price, what would be the net effect? A lot of pissed off artists and consumers, sure, but everyone would live right through it.
The RIAA is a lobbying group, not a music company. If the RIAA actually coordinated things like terms for music sales they would probably be violating antitrust laws.
Also, given the rapid consolidation of a few large media corporations due to both economics, changes in copyright law, and increasingly corporate friendly rulemaking at the FCC, RIAA members have increasing power over our lives, whether we buy their products or not.
I do not have a signature
Personally, I find it a bit refreshing that the representatives elected by the people are defining this instead of a few robed justices on a bench acting like dictators. We have too many judges making law already from the bench. The Arizona state supreme court has even had the temerity to rule on multiple occasions that amendments the state constitution violated the state constitution.
The reason the arizona state supreme court did such a thing is to avoid any issues with Gun Rights, and other trendy issues currently in the tumbler as of the past few years.
Arizona is one of the few states that have the kahunas to actually stand up to keeping the current rights.
-- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
You are correct. I apologize for the mistake.
As for as info that private organizations have...when is the last time a credit reporting agency asked your permission before they compiled a file on you? I am directly addressing your point about willful disclosure of information.
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
If these students were using a P2P network to trade in copyrighted materials, then they were breaking the law. The problem with the public's perception of P2P networks is every person who has ever used one to download a song or a movie for which they did not at the time physically own the CD or DVD, meaning they paid for a right to listen/watch that media. Anyone who has ever used a P2P network to get media they have not paid for is guilty of theft, and I can honestly say that I have never used any of these, as I have held the conviction that getting copyrighted material for nothing is theft. Now, P2P networks do have legitimate uses, and I'm all in favor of their use. However, they now have a stigmatism surrounding them that says that a P2P network is a haven for pirates who want to get something for nothing. This has only helped the position of the RIAA and MPAA. Obey the law and work within the confines of the legislative system to preserve fair use rights.
Canada is harbouring weapons of mass destruction! ;)
Actually, you have to pay either BMI or ASCAP to sing Happy Birthday. They own the rights to songs, RIAA owns the rights to sound recordings.
my pet machine
The RIAA is a lobbying group, not a music company. If the RIAA actually coordinated things like terms for music sales they would probably be violating antitrust laws.
are you trying to insinuate that the companies that make up the RIAA don't coordinate between themselves such things as terms for music sales?
That's called unity.. it's the basic part of an association.
-- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
A certain level of cooperation and coordination by a trade group is expected and legal and ethical. Above that it becomes illegal and unethical. I think this was the basis for the recent price-fixing lawsuit that several major members of the RIAA settled by offering large amounts of money rather than admit guilt or face a trial.
I do not have a signature
Do not allow private corporations and their lawyers to simply invade one's electronic home and communications at will, bypassing the entire intent and letter of the reasonable search and seizure clause of the constitution, and accountable only to their own shareholders. Or, if you do advocate such obscenely undemocratic violations of people's basic civil rights to due process and privacy, do not expect any legitimacy or sympathy from the rest of us, regardless of how despicable the actions were of those you are trampling over the constitution to get.
This portion of the DMCA -- heck, the whole DMCA -- is a bad law, but:
There is a difference between a subpoena and a search warrant. With a search warrant, the police show up at your door and take what they want. With a subpoena, the person claiming a copyright sends you a notice asking for the information they want. If you don't want to give it to them, you can go to court and explain why you shouldn't have to. If the court agrees with you, then you don't have to give the information up. This is due process.
This is exactly what MIT has done. They got a subpoena; they thought there were reasons they shouldn't have to answer; and they went to court before answering and asked to be excused. Unfortunately, it sounds like MIT's objections are procedural. Even if MIT wins this round, the RIAA will probably fill out a new subpoena, doing it right this time, and MIT will have to answer that one.
Let's try an analogy. Say that your neighbor throws a big party while you're away for the weekend and his guests park their cars in your lawn, smashing your roses. You want to sue someone because your roses are smashed, but your neighbor won't tell you the names of his guests, and everyone agrees that he didn't do it because his cars were in his garage. What do you do? Well, you may have to sue the guests (names unknown) for smashing your roses, then issue a subpoena to your neighbor, demanding that he tell you who the guests were. He will then have to explain to a court why he thinks he shouldn't have to answer. That's how a subpoena works.
(Yes, yes, there are big gaping holes in that analogy. For instance, the DMCA copyright holder can demand some ridiculous sum like $150000 per song, while you can only ask for the replacement cost of your roses, more or less. But that wasn't the point of the analogy.)
"We reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals." --The American President (20.1.2009)
There would be no record if no willful disclosure of information had ever taken place...
Also, the last time I applied for a credit card I was informed that a condition of the application was obtaining a credit report. I would have been within my rights to say no, and they would have been equally within their rights to say no card for you...
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
Why is it that every time this issue comes up, there is someone that comes up with the "boycott" idea. As this is the most unlikely situation, it is the stupidest recommendation. That is like saying, "Well, I don't like all the pollution cars are making, so I won't buy anymore gasoline." First of all, if you want to get anywhere that is farther that say, 20 miles, you need a polluting vehicle.(And yes, I know there are long distance bike riders, duh). And second, even if YOU boycotted their wares, there are plenty of sheep out there that won't. I agree that their monoplistic ways suck and that there are a lot of things that need to change in the entertainment industry, but a boycott is just a plain stupid idea.
User logging on... 300 baud... 300 BAUD?!? (Click!) NO CARRIER
IANAL myself, but I believe the fair use provisions protect such things as a critiquing of a copyrighted work, not simple piracy. Academic institutions are not immune to copyright law nor should they be. They still have to pay the rights for books, multimedia, software, etc that they use. This case isn't really about a legitimate fair use at all. A couple of students outside of class time were downloading music.
FYI - The attorneys filing all of these subpoenas on behalf of the RIAA are Yvette Molinaro and Jim Trilling according to United States District Court for the District of Columbia documents available on PACER.
actually, there's this small liberal arts college down the road, I think its called Harvard? Yeah, well they all do lunch quite frequently. (and I'm certain they share adjunct professors)
Oh yeah, and they have a law school, too!
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
I think you misread the parent. I think the author says that this is a standard that corporate world does not necessarily adhere to, and thus it is in everyone's best interest to keep collection at the IRS.
My question is, why give the debt collectors all that information? All they need is a name, phone number, address, and the amount owed. No need to give them your entire tax history. So data privacy concerns are sort of bogus.
Matt
I would assert that for this kind of activity effiency is the wrong criterion.
My feeling is that any genuine monopolies should be a part of the government. True, this does create a bit of conflict of interest, but the government is already full of corrupting conflicts of interest.
More to the point, in any monopoly trial one of the possible outcomes should be eminent-domain seizure.
And there needs to be some incentive for the government to divest itself of those things, and *ONLY* those things, which are not natural monopolies. But the divesture should be done in such a way as to prevent the creation of new monopolies.
An example of a natural monopoly is an electric company, but the proper unit of government to seize it is probably a city or a county. This is (one hopes) a temporary phenomena. Eventually solar cells may be cheap enough that utilities will be inefficient historic relicts. But governments should not run at or for a profit. Governments should be run for the benefit of the citizenry. All of the citizenry. Including those who can't afford the up-front cost of plating their roofs with solar cells. (Consider rural electrification as a model here.)
Now as for how to implement this....
Anyway, if the RIAA owns enough of some particular market to be a monopoly, it should either be broken up or seized, and incorporated into the government. Or, perhaps, first seized and then broken up and released in pieces.
Monopolies are inherrently evil, but there's one that there appears no way to get around. The government. It is based around the monopoly on the use of force against people, and I don't see any better way of managing a large, mobile, civilization with a diverse population and many "instruments of power" (which includes cars, poisons, guns, fire, electricity, etc.) But we shouldn't need to tolerate more than one. And it should be so structured that local decisions are made locally. Taxes for the local schools? That should be a local issue. Taxes for the state colleges? That should be a state issue. Etc. This is how a federal system is supposed to work, but since the civil war the system has become increasingly less federal and more autocratic. (Which proves also that "good guys", "bad guys" is oversimplistic. In this sense the "good guys" were the South, though their insistence on the right to consider people as property also places them firmly in the "bad guys" column. And some who fought for the South were sincerely fighting against tyranny. [But not, by any means, most of them.])
So how could one design a system that had the good features of the current system but avoided it's faults?
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Inherent rights? No, people have only the rights they can protect. As for "the government shall not" being implied, when the Constitution was written there was a big debate over whether or not it was necessary. Many saw it as pointless as previous attempts had no legal weight. Thanks to this, again, the Constitution was written to be vauge, and therefor you cannot assume anything about it. Now, it may be your interpritation, that's one thing, but the Constitution, taken at face value, does not support it.
common sense: noun
What those who are ignorant of the subject matter think; usually wrong.
clueless judges, bought-off legislators, or power-happy executives
;)
well said. right now, i think we've got all three.
Nope. Law enforcement is law enforcement and law enforcement should be done by the government. Unless, of course, you think there are degrees of importance in the law and some laws are so minor in importance that they should be handed over to private entities for enforcement. Is that what you're saying?
Yep and yep.
Yes, I realize the first cite is a biased bit of testimony by a Union wonk. However, obtain and read the cited references contained therein before you pass judgement.
The second link is even more interesting. Authored by a function that can only justify its existence by finding things wrong with the IRS, it goes to great lengths to say, in effect, "Well, contracting for private agencies to do tax collections was a giant cluster-fuck when it was tried before, but things have changed and you ought to try it again." For those of us on the inside, reports like this one are an endless source of amusement. But the central facts remain: private contractors have been tried, they performed poorly, and a comparison to the standards of performance upheld by IRS employees shows that Revenue Officers are multiple times more efficient at collecting taxes than private entities. And even if some pols want to try it again, I doubt anything will change those facts.
As an aside, if you actually read the report, you can work out the efficiency/effectiveness ratios for yourself. The 30x figure comes from an admittedly liberal interpretation of the internal report cited on page 5. I can't locate it on the web, but even accepting the TIGTA-biased summary of that report contained in my cite, the IRS is at least 5 times as efficient as the private sector. I suggest you ask your local IRS office for a copy of the full internal report, IRS Private Sector Debt Collection Pilot Program dated October 1997, if you want the full numbers.
Well, first there's the basic (totally flawed) bias held by a number of folks that hiring government employees is never the answer to anything. Government should be smaller, not larger, no matter the circumstances. That's just wrong-headed, but it's also an essentially religious belief (i.e. a belief based on faith, not facts) and I won't attempt to rectify your thinking there.
However, a bit of tedious explanation of how government budgeting works is, apparently, in order. I now realize that you are not familiar enough with the process to understand what's going on. My apologies; I should have realized sooner. This stuff can be a bit arcane.
So what am I talking about? Here tis: Hiring more Revenue Officers (and Revenue Agents and Tax Compliance Specialists, etc.) requires the government to spend money. Someone has to put a dollar entry on a budget and get Congress to approve it. That's hard.
Letting a contract for a private entity to collect taxes is, by contrast, nearly without cost. A few people have to be paid to read through the bids, make a decision, and oversee the process, but the cost is nominal. Nothing ever comes out of pocket because the contractors are only paid a percentage of what they collect.
Are you getting the idea? Even though contractors are FAR less efficient than Revenue Officers, they don't cost any out-of-pocket money. It's WAY easier for politicians to support programs that don't cost any money than it is to support programs that cost money, even if the programs that cost money might be far, far more profitable 5 years down the road. Hell, that's a couple of elections away! Who cares about that?! Basically, we're dealing with the same sort of short-term thinking and "next-quarter" mentality that so thoroughly sucks in the private sector.
The reason people have to "secure their machines" as you put it, is because there are other people out there that don't respect the boundaries between public and private. THe files served up by a webserver on a machine are public. the files in /home/~joe_user are not, but some crackers won't respect that. Your analogy would legitimize cracking.
People have a reasonable expectation of not having other people taking the law in their own hands w/o due process. If the RIAA can get subpoenas without a judge's sayso, then I should be able to,also. My first targets would be SCO, then Microsoft.
It is possible that I misinterpreted what he wrote. I assumed that by using the word "draconian" he was implying that not only are the rules strict, they are somehow bad. I agree with your point about only giving the collectors necessary information.
This kinda reminds me of the DVD-CSS trail and the DeCSS Gallery (i dunno if linking that is illigal or not). An mp3 file is just a load of bits is it not? a mathematical expression of a song is just a load of equations right? If you code an mp3 file into some sort of graphic file (it would look like noise) you could claim that it was a work of art that you had created? You could even print it on a t-shirt. I can see how maybe a raw dump of the CD track could be a violation (but really i dont care) but if you code it - eg by mp3 then your going to end up with something that bit-for-bit is NOT the original. Ok so if that argument stood then you could just alter the raw dump by one bit and you would have the same effect, but thats pushing it. Why is the mp3 codec not an illigal circumnavigation device? How do you define what a copyright violation is? What if P2P networks become fully encrypted end-to-end?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
My fault for mixing up two issues there. Obviously the thrust of my post was about the sorry state of spelling/grammar here on Slashdot -- one which I will gladly defend to the end.
In the midst of my rant, however, I took a cheap shot about the poster not wishing to make himself or herself known. I'll debate this point, too, but I'll also concede right here that there is a strong case to be made for both sides.
Bottom line: I decided some time ago that if I had something of worth to say to thousands and thousands of people, I would stand behind it and sign my name to it.
It seems a symptom of an unhealthy democracy that people are growing more and more concerned with hiding who they are. Obviously there are larger forces at work here than just you and your posting and I am not faulting either you or the earlier ("excellent at spelling and grammer") anonymous poster for giving in to the fear that can come from living in frightening times -- but I will point out that contentious things have more weight when said as a PERSON. Writing anonymously makes you sound like a pamphlet or a slogan. Can you imagine the impact the Declaration of Independence would have had if everyone had merely signed an "X"? It was the fact that prominent community members stood behind what they wrote and signed (John Hackcock coming to mind, anyone?) that gave it the moral authority it enjoys to this day.
Now, if I were a troll, I'd say something like "KKK" members hid behind cloaks because they wanted to say "contentious" things but don't have the guts to back them up...Or, again troll-like, I could have pointed out that being anonymous allowed them to terrorize their victims without having to take any responsibility for their actions, which meant they didn't have to think through things... but, of course, I am not a troll and I will refrain from pointing out the obvious connection.
I didn't always feel this way. For a year or two, I would post my "insightful" and "thoughtful" posts under UptownGuy and leave my "what-ifs" and zingers and all the rest to the anonymous coward... But eventually I came to see that I wasn't painting an accurate portrait of myself for anyone who was reading unless I included the entire picture. Now, I am 100% me. Even when I know I will get modded DOWN for something. I guess it has to do with taking pride in what I have to say and being willing to stand behind it.
I value my privacy, too, but I don't think this has anything do with with it. I wouldn't take away the "right" to be anonymous from anyone. But I do feel that it shows a lack of confidence in one's ideas or often an unacknowledged understanding that what one is writing is irresponsible.
Just my two cents.
I would have to say that explosives are the most abused technology in all of history.
When I was an undergrad at Tulane, a friend of mine ran an FTP server which drew the attention of the RIAA. The University brought him before a review board, he claimed ignorance, shut off his FTP server, and that was the end of it. He never faced action from the RIAA, because it seemed that the University didn't release any information about him.
So you want some greedhead deciding how much tax you owe?
The identified legal and administrative problems included:
In other words: the IRS crippled the the pilot program from the start.
The IRS' low return on investment was addressed in a December 1997 IRS Inspection Service (now Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration) report. We reported that the majority of cases delivered to the collection agencies were small dollar delinquencies that the IRS can collect at a minimal cost. For example:
So the IRS was only supposed to provide private collectors a very small percentage of small dollar delinquencies (6%). Instead, they saddled them with 53% small dollar delinquencies. It would be interesting to see how things went if private collectors were given the cases they were supposed to get.
At the recommendation of the Congress when the pilot was canceled, the IRS and GAO met in February 1998. The IRS' Chief Operations Officer informed the GAO that because of the IRS' reorganization, contracting out tax debt collection activities was not an appropriate use of IRS resources since the reorganization was planned to take several years, and then the impact of the reorganization would have to be assessed. The IRS concluded that the contracting out to collection agencies would not happen in the short term and perhaps not in the long term.
Now that the IRS has reorganized into four business units that are focused on different segments of the taxpayer population, we believe the IRS should reconsider the use of collection agencies to help it reduce the growing tax debt receivables.
It seems their argument is that the IRS is more organized than it was seven years ago, and consequently can conduct a more realistic test of using private collectors.
Key Laws and Provisions Dictating Actions Collection Agencies Must Adhere to When Acting as Instruments of the Internal Revenue Service:
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
It's not limited to critiquing works, it goes to the ultimate use of the work. If it is used for education, excerpts are available for fair use. Ie- downloading one song from an album or copying a chapter from a book is not piracy, even using the MPAA's definition of copyright. I think there is a strong case that at an educational institution the media in question has a prety good chance of being used for education. The trueness of that statement is debatable but totally beside the point. My point is that MIT and BC have other areas of law that may benefit them in this case, even if you accept the whole copyright == property arguement.
"I'm just here to regulate funkyness." - James Gandolfini, as Winston in The Mexican
In a report on the legal basis for firearms controls, a committee of the American Bar Association observed:
Few would disagree that the crux of this controversy is the construction of the Second Amendment, but, as those writing on the subject have demonstrated, that single sentence is capable of an extraordinary number of interpretations. The main source of confusion has been the meaning and purpose of the initial clause. Was it a qualifying or an amplifying clause? That is, was the right to arms guaranteed only to members of "a well-regulated militia" or was the militia merely the most pressing reason for maintenance of an armed community? The meaning of "militia" itself is by no means clear. It has been argued that only a small, highly trained citizen army was intended, and, alternatively, that all able-bodied men constituted the militia. Finally, emphasis on the militia has been proffered as evidence that the right to arms was only a "collective right" to defend the state, not an individual right to defend oneself. Our pressing need to understand the Second Amendment has served to define areas of disagreement but has brought us no closer to a consensus on its original meaning.
Should we find ourselves unable to determine the framers meaning by reading the text perhaps the better choice is to determine the FUNCTIONAL meaning of the text. Does the second ammendment serve to protect the State from outside attack? Is it intended to allow the formation of a state group to defend the states against the Federal Government? Or is the 2nd ammendment intended to allow citizens to defend themselves individualy from the tyrany of the government and thus to garuntee the rights set forward in the constitution?
Our rights are an interesting thing. Brining this full circle (and back on topic) is this question. Where in the constitution is our right to privacy laied down? The answer is it's not. It's implied. I raise this point to challenge many of the strict constructionalists on
Finaly remember this. It is entirely possible that the founders left certain passages of the document intentionaly vauge and contradictory. A fairly well known legal theorist whose name escapes me at the moment once said "It is the nature of American Democracy to view as virtuous an incomplete conquest."
In short, American Democracy is built around the idea of compromise and resolution of conflict through debate and half measures. This makes the government inherently slow and often inefficient. It also works to ensure that radical steps are not taken without deep consideration. It seems that certain portions of the constitution are written specificly to inspire debate and disagreement, perhaps in the interests of creating a self regulating balance.
Is copyright becoming one of those areas?
Killfile(TGK)
No trees were killed in the creation of this post. However, many electrons were inconvenienced.
Yeah, forget this will of the people crap. It's darned inconvenient. We'll just let nine men wearing robes tell us what our "rights." are.
BTW, the constitutional amendments ruled unconstitutional (wrap your brain around that concept. It would be like the US supremes ruling that a Constituitonal amendment banning flag burning is unconstitutional.) had to do with English as the official state language and requiring a 2/3rd majority to raise taxes.
So, tell me again, how declaring a CONSTITUTIONAL amendment unconstitutional is NOT tyranny?
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
And then when the case goes to trial, and the court finds I perjured myself on the documents, my a$$ goes to jail for the rest of my life for falisfying evidence, and every penny I own is awarded in a civil suit filed by the accused.
Puleeze. Get rid of your conspiracy complex.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
Y'know, I won't disagree with you there. I think such a test would be just as dismal a failure as the first, but I won't disagree. Things are different now and maybe contracting might work out better now.
However, I think you should understand why I don't think it would work and why those of us with real-world experience with this thing find the whole shebang irritating.
First, you want to make sure that
That's a tough one. If we give them small-dollar cases (the sort of thing they previously asked for and agreed to take only a small margin on because they think they can do the collecting with just a phone call), they'll complain that we didn't give them anything big enough to make a profit on. Perhaps that'll be taken care of by the fact that the people pushing this thing now want to give away 25% commissions.
OTOH, if we give them large-dollar cases, they can't handle them. Congress has written into law so many safeguards against abusive collection practices that no private entity could cut through the Gordian knot of red tape that surrounds every case and protects every taxpayer.
So the cases they are supposed to get should be the small ones off of which they can make a decent profit at the higher commission level with minimal work. Fine. The problem is that we've already asked nicely for the money. We've already sent those debtors multiple letters asking for the money and explaining the possible consequences of non-compliance. I firmly believe that if they didn't pay us, they're not going to pay a private company. But, hey, if someone wants to test this thing, let them knock themselves out.
Second, you want to ensure that
This one is going to have to be explained to me. How do contractors collect debts other than by asking for the money? Last time around, the contractors complained that the test wasn't fair because IRS personnel had collection tools that weren't available to the contractors. And we do. We can levy wages and seize property, we can file notices and actually take tthe nitty gritty actions required to enforce a federal tax lien. All without court proceedings. But private contractors are not law enforcement officials and it's just flat out not legal for the state to sell to the highest bidder the power to enforce the law. So our alternative is to either grant public sector law enforcement powers to private contractors (something strictly prohibited by law), limit those contractors to just asking for the money and then being powerless if the debtor tells them to go to hell (which is what happened last time, much to the contractors chagrin), or require the contractors to use the civil enforcement tools that are normally available to them such as suing in court, getting a judgement, and enforcing on that judgement. That last alternative is not what collection agencies are good at. Delinquent accounts that are worth pursuing to that degree are not commonly discounted to collection agencies because they're worth pursuing by the original holder of the debt.
So what does making sure "the contractors are actually able to collect the debt" really mean? I don't think anyone really knows. But I sure as hell do know that the public good is not served by having people working on commission deciding whether or not they should levy wages. The potential for abuse and the creation of untold human misery is just too profoundly obvious. (And no, I'm not exaggerating. I've seen the devastation that can occur in people's lives when the IRS mistakenly takes too aggressive actions to collect debts. Lives can be destroyed.)
Finally,
I think you understand, but I want to make this clear.
Yes, the constitution guarantees us a kind of "due process" for various actions by the government - obviously, in this case, searches backed by the authority of the government.
So if the RIAA wants to come out to my ISP and flash a plastic badge it bought at a dime store and say, "but you're not constitutionally protected from my double-secret Acme Dick Tracy search warrant - open up!" I don't even call my lawyer, just the looney bin.
But the DMCA gives their searches the theoretical backing of the government - making them an improper, unconstitutional agent of court, or of law enforcement, or both, depending on how you read it.
This is not a legal gray area. This is heinously, over-the-top not kosher in the American system of government.
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
It will be interesting to see what happens with this situation. :)
***
Radio Shack. You've got questions...we've got blank stares(TM).
And then when the case goes to trial
First of all anyone can get one of these subpoenas never go to trial for anything. I can fill out the paperwork, hand it to a court clerk, he rubber-stamps it, and I can force Slashdot to turn over your IP address and force your ISP to turn over your real name and address based on that IP address. End of story. No need to ever go to court at all unless I actually chose to bring you to court. My choice.
and the court finds I perjured myself on the documents
Take a close look at the text of the law. The "perjury" clause does not cover the allegation that the target of the subpoena committed infringement. I just can't lie that I'm the copyright holder of someone else's work. But I can make empty claims that you infringed on my poetry.
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Thanks, I feel better now.
--K.
Sig: Bad people happen. Try to avoid being one of them.
I hope you didn't interpret my post as a call to boycott RIAA. Deciding that you personally don't care to do business with an entity is very different from organizing a boycott. I don't buy food at the supermarket nearest my home because I think their prices are too high, and I can get a better deal by going three more blocks. But I'm not 'boycotting' the nearer market.
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/birthday.htm
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"
What we really need to do is redefine music-sharing as a form of cyber-terrorism. That way the FBI could give out special-agent credentials to the RIAA and they could storm the dorms without having to identify themselves.
Becareful on the use of wireless ap as a defense tactic by a user attching to a stray wireless node. Most ISP have clauses stating that you are not to nat devices or share the internet connection to other PC besides the one PC license you buy with the basic account. Comcast does have this posted here: http://www.comcast.net/terms/subscriber.jsp
Excerpt:
Prohibited Uses of the Service: Use of the Comcast Equipment or the Service for transmission or storage of any information, data or material in violation of any federal, state or local law or regulation is prohibited. In addition, unless you are subject to a Service plan that expressly permits otherwise, the Service is to be used, and you expressly agree to use it, solely in a private residence, living quarters in a hotel, hospital, dormitory, sorority or fraternity house, or boarding house, or the residential portion of a premises which is used for both business and residential purposes. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, the Service is for personal and non-commercial use only and you agree not to use the Service for operation as an Internet service provider, a server site for ftp, telnet, rlogin, e-mail hosting, "web hosting" or other similar applications, for any business enterprise, or as an end-point on a non-Comcast local area network or wide area network.
Becareful of the agreements you have agreed to before using it for defense.
support it or lose it: www.boycott-riaa.com
BTW, the constitutional amendments ruled unconstitutional (wrap your brain around that concept. It would be like the US supremes ruling that a Constituitonal amendment banning flag burning is unconstitutional.) had to do with English as the official state language and requiring a 2/3rd majority to raise taxes.
First off, any ammendment to the constitution banning flag burning IS unconstitutional.
So, now that we're down to the nitty gritty, which were you mad about more, the fact that they didn't standardize on the state language, or the fact that they can raise taxes without a 2/3rd majority vote?
That answer will definately tell me where your morals are.
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In the last couple of days an additional good link on the subject came up. It's a round-table discussion among Union reps, contractor reps, and some other observers, of the way the process of contracting out government jobs works these days. If you don't mind a 9-meg wma download:
Discussion from FederalNewsRadio.com