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RIAA Parses 'P2P' As 'Peer 2 Porn'
watchful.babbler writes "Having largely failed to galvanize public and political action against P2P systems, the RIAA has mounted a campaign to link P2P systems with child pornography (NYT, reg. required). The result is H. R. 2885 (available via Thomas), which has the remarkably clear and honest intent 'To prohibit the distribution of peer-to-peer file trading software in interstate commerce.' Amongst other things, the proposed law will require the creation of 'do-not-install beacon products' (do-not-ask, you really don't want to know), force P2P apps to include warning labels that users may be exposed to pornography, and require P2P developers and distributors to obtain and store users' personal information -- ostensibly for age verification, but one can think of other reasons that the RIAA might be interested in that info. Worse yet, even given the 'operation exemption' (Sec. (4)(b)(1)(C) in the bill), applications such as AIM and iChat appear to fall under these provisions."
This is a logical step for them. After all, they want to villify the program - since capturing the hearts and minds is the only strategy that'll effectively work for them, because less people = less sharing = less effective. Same strategy as the lawsuits they're mounting against Kazaa users. They know they can't sue everyone, so they're trying to make the service unusable. Your local P2P network's only as good as the users who use it. Write your local congressperson and denounce this strongly.
Go on, prove me wrong. Destroy the fabric of the universe. See if I care. ~Terry Pratchett
I think that this is hillarious. Porn seems to be the one thing in our society that everyone hates (in public anyway). They say it's bad, immoral, etc. So the RIAA is trying to associate file sharing with child porn. Now, if you use filesharing clients, you're a pornographer. Great.
Unfortunately for them, a search for a common song rarely turns up porn. Not a lot of porn around with MP3 headers. So rather than implementing a list of all subscribers, file sharing services could filter out all non-music files. Just like the RIAA made Napster do with certain songs.
So with only music on the P2P network, the RIAA could only object to "their" "copyright" being infringed upon. And nobody would care.
fp?
My other car is first.
Could this be the most effective attempt on their part, so far? It's hard to argue against them, without being labelled as a supporter of kiddie-porn. It doesn't matter how legitimate your claims against this bill, you'll still have to put up with the obnoxious cries of, "think of the children!"
This is really slick, on their part, because they can try to humiliate their opponents, reglardless of the validity of their arguments. How can people easily claim that this is just profiteering and securing a closed market in which to play?
Obviously, I don't want to see this go through, and it likely won't (not on the first try, anyway). But, it is an interesting tactic.
Down with Saudi Arabia!!!
The story doesn't explain what the bill sets out a 'beacon' to be, but basically the intent is to (within a year of the bill's passage) develop a US standard for a magical 'beacon' one can set on a computer that will prevent people from installing P2P software on it. While it's a great idea IF YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT COMPUTERS (hey, parents can keep kids from using evil Kazaa! and workplaces can prevent employees, too!) it's a stupid act. Stupid act. Anyone who votes for this act should it ever come up in Congress should be publically ridiculed in every venue available.
I see it's time to start the letter-to-Congress process...
We recently had heard in the office over one of the Yellow Machine that's made by Anthology Solutions.
"warning this contains explicite..."
interesting. since the RIAA's members are promoting so much smut this days which is passed as "art" by them - eminem anyone?
This strategy seems bizzar to me. the RIAA should know what those "warning - explicite lyrics" stickers did for rap and hip hop..
KaZaA is just like Joe Camel," she said referring to the cartoon logo that had been used by R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings to promote its Camel cigarette brand. "KaZaA has done an incredible job of attracting young people to their site, and as a result they have been really able to attack children."
I don't think I've ever heard Kazaa or such being associated with a product image specifically created to get kids to damage their health. She (Laura A. Ahearn, the director of Parents for Megan's Law) makes it sound like Kazaa is luring "kids" and then just giving them child porn.
I wonder how much she is getting paid to say stupid crap like that.
Maybe we DID take the blue pill. You wouldn't remember anyway.
They do put them on web browsers. Whenever you go to a porn site, the site warns you (and they have to by law) that you're at an adult site and must be 18 years of age or older to enter.
The RIAA says P2P is marketing porn to children? No, the RIAA affiliated labels have been marketing pornographic music to children for decades. In the eighties, their actions led Tipper Gore et al to start the PMRC. (info on this now defunct organization via Wikipedia.) I wish those racketeers at the RIAA had to deal with Tipper Gore as First Lady!
It's about the only country in the world where showing a little sex is worse than showing a lot of violence. Why would you rather have your children see a murdered woman than a naked woman ?
Such biased puritanism is contemptuous and says a lot about mentality of a nation.
Intelligence shared is intelligence squared.
We'll all just resort to going back to IRC channels or setting up telnet-enabled BBS' and go 'old sk00l' on you. Or, barring that - just resort to installing some 56K modems and running WWIV or some other BBS without hooks into the 'net.
More likely than not, people will simply resort to participating in file- and song-trading parties like we used to in the 80s. Unless you're prepared to raid all the Incredible Flying Pizza Society locations (any Austinintes here?) or other places we're known to gather, how about you just sit back and have a nice cup of Shut the Fuck Up?
The sad thing is, Joe Q. Public will actually buy into the idea that P2P programs are stomping grounds for pedophiles. While there may be an isolated number of child porn traded over P2P (I've never run across any, but I'm not looking for it) I imagine this isn't the norm.
Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
By that rationale, we should restrict access to TV, books, magazines, CD's, DVD's, VCR tapes, handwritten notes, drawings, all internet file transfers, art, imagination, speech, and the eyes in our own heads.
After all, there's just no telling what could be distributed via these media.
But, first and foremost, lets restrict RIAA music CD's, given that we have no idea what might be stored on them. Here's an article which suggests that their net harm is potentially worse than anything shared on a p2p network:
http://www.aap.org/policy/01219.html
It would be a nice show of support from the industry [that's wasting our government's time, our money, and challenging our freedom] if they would kindly restrict themselves.
PS - The congress link off the main article was broken. Here's a working one - just choose the first item in the list:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query
"Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us." -Jesus Christ The Lord's Prayer
What we have here is a simple case of having so many laws that our [semi-]elected officials do not know what laws already exist and how to call for enforcement of those existing laws.
As with this case - several 'law-makers' cannot be bothered to discover the many laws regarding child pornography (banning the manufacture, possesion & distribution). So they incorrectly believe that writing more laws will be the answer. Naturally, the lobbying by certain corporate interests to encourage the writing of new laws that are not in the public interest by law-makers that do not have a bit of common sense and do not have the technical knowledge of a ten year old child is extremely troubling.
We need a letter writing campaign to stop this bill. Any takers? I would write a letter but my writing style is too abrupt ("hey sh*tforbrains!" is not a good way to get your point across). Come on, somebody write a sample letter... Somebody?...
The DMCA is not unconstitutional. It's overly vauge and allows for great abuse, but let's not call it somthing it's not. Fair use was never part of the constitution. The vaugness can lead to possible abuses of the first amendment, but that in itself doesn't make it any more unconstitutional then the limits on public pornography.
The DMCA was a voice vote and was a rather unknown generic bill. The concept behind it was rather needed, which is to say extending copyright (or at least atempting to define copyright) for digital products. But it's fately flawed in some of its more vauge points. The DMCA was a sheep with fangs that no one really noticed until it started being abused. None the less, it or somthing like it was needed to fill in the legal holes that existed.
*This* bill however, does nothing to clarify the legal code, nor does it help to resolve any existing problems therin. Further most people know what P2P is and they can imeditatly see why such a bill would be a bad thing. It's not going to go anywhere.
A rally call of "Remember the DMCA" is all well and good, but there are much more dangerous pushes for legislation (see patriot act II) out there with a far biger push (see Ashcroft and the US goverment) to get them passed.
This bill is a small fish, and it should be pretty much ignored until it gets some "real" support behind it.
It's fundamentally wrong to blame the medium for the content. The role of a public library, for instance, is simply provide information to everyone, not to decide what information is suitable for whom. The internet is like a gigantic library.
People should accept that not everything on it is going to agree with their views. One person's right to have a copy of Hustler and another person's right to have a copy of the Bible are the exact same right. It's dangerous to think otherwise. Likewise, the technology that may allow people to spread things like child pornography (which I agree is horrible and should be illegal) helps make other forms of information free as well.
It's scary that some types of information are more free than others, because who ultimately decides what's appropriate for whom? And why is it so easy to convince people that the technology is the problem?
Are the Allman Bros. on an RIAA label? Don't they have an album cover that features a naked 14 year old? Isn't this kind of hypocritical of the music publishing industry?
Show me on the doll where his noodly appendage touched you.
And cars are equal to date rape, because date rape happens a lot in cars.
And Dungeons and Dragons leads to witchcraft. And Marylin Manson leads to killing. And watching Arnold Shwartzengovernor movies turns you into a carrot. And masturbating leads to killing kittens. And being a catholic leads to pedophilia. And using linux leads to never having sex. Ever. And watching too much anime leads to a sudden fascination with schoolgirls and tenticles.
Wait, the last one was true...
Still, what I see this as is a final act of desperation. The lawsuits are just giving them a bad name, and finally they realized instead of letting the internet badmouth them, they should badmouth the P2P services. What next, badmouth Sean Fanning?
Still, the scary thing is what I see here is a potential legion of child porn pics being uploaded onto the networks by the RIAA, with the titles 'michaeljacksonsfacemelting.jpg, madonna.jpg, coolpic.jpg, or tatugirlskissing.jpg,' then they'd somehow (using secret RIAA black magic) track these files, and turn the hapless bastard who downloads them into the authorities. That way they'd save money on lawsuits...
Who would think first of sexualizing kids for profit? I suggest that this kind of thought would first come to mind to people who already thought of children in a sexual way.
Who are these specific people? The names of the major players in entertainment industry and those who are leading the movement to criminalize P2P using phony kiddie pr0n are a matter of public record.
How good is the security on their personal computers?
Wouldn't it be terrible if any private individuals were to take the law into their own hands and to do the kind of random fishing that the RIAA/MPAA organizations have been doing by subpoena?
Wouldn't it be just awful if the press and the FBI were informed as to which of the people whose intent is to abrogate our civil rights for profit are the proud owners of their own kiddie porn collections?
Actually, considering the sexual content of many of the RIAA's most popular current "music" works, I find it most hypocritical that these people would attempt to clothe themselves in piety. Disgusting and cynical.
Give me a break...
I had to laugh when i read this though.
2 things.
1) Britney... No kiddin. Look to MTV for the reasons there! I believe that many outraged people (who wrote piles of letters to newspapers) would consider the 2-second kiss to be of that nature.
2) So, the lessons to be learned here are:
a) Files can have misleading search information associated with them, and
b) Some people will use "common" search terms to attract attention to specific files that have no association with them.
Well of course they say they didn't download them, admitting they did if they did would be a crime.
But wait, didn't we learn from 2a & 2b above that often people use search terms to attract attention to files that don't necessarily have any association, just to generate interest?
Non sequitur and propaganda, plain and simple.
So which US slashgeeks are going to run for office and replace these incompetent people?
Toss the two named terms in google and find dozens of "legitimate" sites seeking the same type of attention.
This is sad.
-dave-
Looking for YOUR peer-to-porn engine? Get it here!
The pig browse. With Google. Sigh is to the chicken. Chicken is fool. Giggle. The DailyWTF giggle.
This proposed bill is such a laughably stupid pipe dream that it'll never see the light of day. Nobody should lose a wink of sleep over this political fumbling.
On the other hand, there is a general lack of understanding which is causing silly bills like this to even be considered. This is in dire need of correction. There seems to be a common trend assumption that computers--software especially--are something controllable. Ultimately, this is a failure to realize their very nature as programmable devices. People who start talking of "beacon software" and prohibiting certain types of generic program design prove that they have absolutely no fundamental understanding of computers whatsoever. There is a strong "manufacturing fallacy" as well -- the false assumption that software can be viewed as a manufactured, scarse product. As such, software begins to sound to them like something they can regulate to protect somebody's interests, much as safety belts were eventually required by law in all new automobiles. Some of these guys probably mean well--they're just poorly informed and as a result, knee jerk reactions get made. The big question: how to educate these clueless politicians.
Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.
What's funny is they almost always give you a login/password in the slashdot blurb.
You always see 'free registration required, yadda yadda'. that's code for login: yadda password: yadda
P2P lives from participation, and it normally requires the user's consent to get child pornography to his computer. The percentage of users that really want that is very low. If some such content still get's through, maybe by disguising itself, most users check what they have downloaded (hey, you don't use file sharing just to keep your line busy, do you?), and material they don't like is deleted at once.
Still, I personally have never had and never heard of an incident that child pornography got onto the hard disk by mistake.