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RIAA Threatens More Music-Lovers
Xenographic writes "According to this article at SFGate, the RIAA has warned 204 more people that they are pursuing legal action against them. After the uproar over the last batch of lawsuits, however, they're not (yet) suing the people in question, but intend to allow them to settle out of court, first."
Downhillbattle.org, a music activism site, has set up a defense fund to help those who have been sued pay their legal bills. Slashdotters are always saying that more people should fight the suits, help out those who are.
When you download copyrighted music, you're doing so illegally and subject to the laws of your jurisdiction.
Have you ever sung "Happy Birthday" in a public place like a restaurant or school? Then you've conducted a public performance of a copyrighted work, probably without permission of the copyright holder, Time Warner. If you turn yourself in now, and give them the names and addresses of everyone else who was singing, they'll probably let you off lightly, if it's your first offense.
Earn your dough under the table, or leave the country while giving them the middle finger. Head to Canada where the laws haven't yet reached insanity.
Boy are you wrong.
First, file serving is not copying. File serving (at least in this context) is a violation of the copyright holder's exclusive right to _distribute_ copies of his work.
Downloading is copying (i.e. making a copy of data from a master stored on the remote server), and and is a violation of the copyright holder's exclusive right to _make copies_.
This is all terribly clear in 17 USC 106, and I suggest that you take a look at it. If you persist in arguing that downloading isn't infringement, please show something to support this claim. But you might want to read the Napster decision by the 9th Circuit, which points out that Napster was liable as a contributory and vicarious infringer for the infringements of its users, which the court says were distribution by uploading users and copying by downloading users.
Just because it is a little harder to go after downloaders, and just because they haven't gone after downloaders yet, that doesn't mean that it's legal.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
Nobody owns "Happy Birthday." It's public domain.
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Why would you assume that? Just 'cause you've heard it sung your whole life?
Did you think that song "just happened"? (SportsNight Reference)
It IS copyright protected - it is NOT in the public domain and now never will be (since Disney has ensured that copyrights will now never expire so they don't lose control over Mickey Mouse). "Happy Birthday" is owned by the estate of Mildred and Patty Hill.
This is also discussed this on the DVD commentary of Futurama - they make up a birthday song to sing at Nibbler's birthday so they don't have to pay to use "Happy Birthday"
If you sing "Happy Birthday", royalties are due (for commercial uses of the song) This is rarely enforced, but that doesn't make it not true.
see http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/birthday.htm
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This is SO educational! -- Kintaro Oe