EFA Claims No Illegal Material On mp3s4free.net

An anonymous reader writes "Electronic Frontiers Australia (www.efa.org.au) claims that the raids organized by the music industry on mp3s4free.net have come up with nothing. Only links to other sites and not copyrighted material have been found. The music industry is now saying that just linking is in itself illegal. This does not appear to be supported by Australian law." Update: 10/29 15:26 GMT by T : This story originally referred to "mp3s4free.com," while it should have said -- and has been corrected to read -- "mp3s4free.net."

Comments

Linking should and shouldn't be illegal

[Andy Smith]

If you ask me where Fred lives and I tell you he lives next door, that's fine. If you ask where you can hire a hitman and I tell you that Fred can do it for you and he lives next door, I could be an accomplice to murder.

Same with linking. If a site posts links to other sites and one (or more) of them contains something illegal, but the illegal content was neither the overt or covert reason for the link, then that should be fine. But if the purpose of the link is solely or primarily to help you do something illegal then the person posting the link should be regarded as an accomplice.

Obviously this requires discretion on the part of law enforcement agencies and, specifically, judges.

Re:Linking should and shouldn't be illegal

[surprise_audit]

Take it a step further - turn yourself in for living next door to Fred-the-hitman. You're obviously "linked" to him by virtue of living in the same building (apartment block) or on the same street (separate houses). If enough people did that, maybe the police/courts would get the message that some level of linking is ridiculous.

Note: You might want to make sure the police/judge have some sense of humour before trying it.

Re:Linking should and shouldn't be illegal

[Pseudonym]

That analogy works for criminal cases, but what about in a civil case, such as is the case with copyright infringement?

Let me put it this way: You want to break a contract that you signed. You ask me who can help you with that and I say "Fred can, and he lives next door". Should that be illegal?

Re:Linking should and shouldn't be illegal

[IBitOBear]

So I have this friend fred and everybody is always making jokes about how honest he is. I make a link on my site "cheap crack and murder-for-hire at freds house" because that is the last thing I or anybody who knows me would beleive of fred. It is, in fact, funny.

But the joke is on me because frank is just really good at hiding his darker nature and he does sell crack and kill people. Whoops, my bad. Made a joke, spend life in prision as an accessory to murder.

Or even worse, franks "frank.com" gets taken over while I'm not looking by a less honest frank. And I am screwed again.

Sound far fetched? Its not. It is simply likely outcomes which are "no more extreme" than your extreme example.

Consider you hate $cientology, and you link to their site on your site, as an example of how screwed in the head you think they are. They change the contents of the page you link to so it contains some of their intellectual property and then get your site and your ISP taken down.

Unlikely? Nope, actually a near-certian outcome.

Since the linked-to content is out of the control of the linker, it is too easy "become guilty" as a result of your innocent act when a target page changes.

Allowing prosecutors and complaining parties to "posit theroies" about your intent is always a bad thing. Consider the "Intent to Sell" clauses of drug laws in the US. The state doesnt have to proove any actual intent, as after "intent to sell" was made a criminal condition, they (re) decided that having more that a certian raw weight of drugs prooves that intent. Sounds clear and obvious and "ok"? Turns out it isn't. Consider that the statute says how many milligrams of LSD is one dose. Then they measure the LSD-soaked paper (the paper weighs several hundred times "one dose") so you have five doses and you go to jail for intent to sell because the raw wight of the innert material takes you over the limit. No abuse there. No sirreee.

You simply cannot trust "the state" to do the right thing. If you could, then you wouldn't need the Bill of Rights (or non US equivalant where you live).

That is your baby in that bathwater. Who do you choose to decide what gets thrown out and how? If you are smart you don't give that power to random strangers.

Re:Linking should and shouldn't be illegal

[mcrbids]

If you ask me where Fred lives and I tell you he lives next door, that's fine. If you ask where you can hire a hitman and I tell you that Fred can do it for you and he lives next door, I could be an accomplice to murder.

One of the elements of crime is intent. That's the part that requires a jury - both the greatest strength and (as with most things) the greatest weakness of the English-derived legal system at use in the US.

In order to commit a crime, you must knowingly commit an act which deprives another of rights with the intent of so depriving the other party.

(BTW, IANAL)

That's not to say that there aren't statutory crimes, like running a red light, but in cases where an act could have multiple constructions (such as "Where is Bill" -> "Next door" vs. "Where is Bill, I need a good hitman" -> "Next door") the concept of intent must be introduced as a judicial guide.

It's this principle that provides most of the insanity and complexity that comes out of our court system - McDonald's didn't pay a kazillion because some lady burned her lap on coffee, they payed because they it was proven in court that McDonalds corporation was knowingly distributing coffee at dangerously high temperatures - and that proven (in court) intent is what cost the case.

-Ben

Re:Linking should and shouldn't be illegal

[pla]

But if the purpose of the link is solely or primarily to help you do something illegal then the person posting the link should be regarded as an accomplice.

Well then, I guess we can all rest easy that my dog ate my collection of top-40 boy-bands, and sites like this exist only to allow me to make use of my protected right to a backup.

I know I sure feel better that sites like this have a legal reason to exist.


A tad more seriously, though, I've really grown quite tired of this topic. The RIAA sucks, the BSA sucks, the MPAA sucks. Some people will buy, and some people will pirate. Trade groups need to accept that the pirates wouldn't buy their products under any conditions whatsoever (short of giving stuff away), and treat them as the free advertising (rather than "criminals") they serve as.

If I see my pirating friend Steve playing a cool new game, I may go out and buy it. He might never have plunked down a penny for software in his entire life, but some of his friends have and will.

Industry groups only need to worry about this sort of "advertisement" if their product sucks. I have little doubt that the RIAA knows all-too-well the complete crap they push on us, thus their fear of try-before-you-buy. Those who actually have quality products to sell love free advertising, and do their best to get people to check it out.

I seem to recall reading a SciAm article once upon a time that mentioned that, since we've all had to grow filters against advertisements, the single best way for a company to sell products consists of recommendations between friends. So sure, it make perfect sense that the RIAA would sacrifice the single most effective form of advertising - since in this case, it mostly ends up negative.

Okay, I've gone a tad OT here. I just wish the world made a bit more sense. Real, law-abiding people getting screwed by the RIAA (or its AU equivalent) legal machine does not make sense. People wonder why I feel so strongly anti-corporate. I need point no further than the RIAA, and you'll either get it or not, end of discussion.

Re:Pull the other one - it has bells on it

[lafiel]

Surely this is like hosting a list of places you can buy illicit drugs. You do not actually possess said drugs, but you are party and complicit in assisting access to illegal materials.

Does this mean linking a site with links to illegal material is also a crime? Where does it stop? A link of a link of a link? Can you prove that they were purposely attempting to provide aid to gain illegal material?

Your analogy is harsh, your logic surely missing a couple key points. Assisting access to illegal materials requires proof. At least some sort of proof that they were purposely providing aid for illegal services.

To use your brutal analogy. You can't pay your tutition. An old friend lends you a couple hundred that you'll pay back. Later you tell your best friend about this great loaner. Your best friend goes to 'loaner', who ends up being a crack dealer. You are the link. Are you guilty?

This would be one hell of a brutal world if intent is no longer required to be proven.

Re:Pull the other one - it has bells on it

[cyril3]

I think your biggest problem would be with the drug sellers not the police. The police would probably give you a medal.

And please don't use analogies involving drugs. If you can't see the moral difference between crack and mp3s then you are in poor shape morally. And the kids won't believe a word you say.

"Linking Is Bad" is BAD thinking

[IBitOBear]

Consider the chilling (abbusable) effect of making linking illegal or conspiritorial act.

You have a problem with a person or organization. You link to their site as an example of the problem you have with them. (Say you link to the Debold site because they are "election fraudsters".)

If your problem is that they can (a) persue you because you linked to their stuff or (b) change the page you innocently linked to to an infringing content site (you infringe their content, but they don't, so clearly you meant others to infringe their property.)

Plus there is a proof-by-induction problem. You link to a friends page because you like him. Unbenonst to you, he links to infringing material. An over-zealous RIAA decides that the "only possible reason" for you to have linked to such a malcontent was that you must share his every view.

How many link steps does it take to wash an outgoing link?

Suppose you have a bunch of links lying fallow on your friends page that you haven't bothered to clean out for a while. A new user takes over an old firends equally fallow account and posts kiddie porn. Your link reads (and always had read) something innocent like "A young lady who's company I enjoy" but "margrets-life.com" now takes you to naughty-margret the hottest little 12 year old in siagon...

Its a mire.

You sould be able to link to anything. Essentially when you link you are in a crowded stadium and you are pointing your finger across the crowded field (at a possible stranger). Such pointing should not make you responsible for the actions of the person you are pointing at.

Its just too much "who guesses what whom intended where? We'll let the prosicutor who is up for reelection decided... he should be impartial..."

(And yes, this goes for a link that says "crack and murder-for-hire at franks house" because when you wrote it, it might have been a joke. How do you *really know* what frank does in his off time anyway?)

Don't sacrafice your life on the alter of "seeming reasonable".

MP3's

[rf0]

It might be that the site just had a list of MP3's that are in the public domain. Just because something is in MP3 format doesn't mean that it isn't legal

Rus

Re:Pull the other one - it has bells on it

[bm_luethke]

I always understood it to be more the lines of intent. If you intend to stand at the corner of a school and get kids to buy crack by telling them to go to the store then it is illegal. If you tell them where to go buy ice cream ral cheap and it just so happens that the place also sells crack then it is not. Or at least that is what the founding fathers meant - which we have drifted quite a bit in the last 50 or so years from that.

I do not know what aulstailian law says on this, or if this is even the case anymore in the US.

It is clear that the site was linking to copyrighted MP3 websites for the purpose of downloading them. I would imagine under US law this would be illegal. Google, OTOH, only runs a bot to index things and isn't trying to peddle in music piracy. Though once more I have no idae about aussie law (and not being a lawyer only what I understand it to be in the US, which could be wrong). Deep linking with the expressed intent of music piracy is also wrong (saying "Hey, go look here for a list of sites" isn't really different from "here is a list of sites" and would get you no place ih the courts)

If it is illegal to pirate music then what they did should be illegal (though I am among the crowd that doesn't think it should be illegal, that is different from what the current laws are).

Re:Pull the other one - it has bells on it

[tetro]

Libraries too contain information on how to access illegal things, does that make them liable too? Use your imagination before you dispute my claim.

Re:Pull the other one - it has bells on it

[Mwongozi]

buying drugs is an offence... mainly because of the harm it causes to the user

I realise this is off-topic, but I feel the need to vent anyway. I have never understood why it is illegal to do harm to yourself. After all, you own your body, is it as least once thing that isn't licensed to you (Does God have a EULA?), and so why shouldn't we be allowed to do whatever we want to it?

The only arguments I can think of are:
Intentional damage to yourself will cost the state money when you check yourself into a hospital. This applies in countries like mine, the UK, but not the USA, where healthcare is not funded by the government. Even in the UK, I wonder how hard it would be to limit the free healthcare to those who did not cause intentional damage to themselves. (It would also be very handy to lump smokers into this category.)

The other argument I can think of is
Being under the influence of drugs may prompt you to cause harm to others. This, surely, can be solved in neater ways than banning drugs outright. Ban them in public places, but allow them at home.

I don't take drugs, I don't even smoke, but banning them does seem unfair.

Anyway... </rant>

Yay for Oz

[POds]

This does not appear to be supported by Australian law.

And why should it be? Just because i know theres a drug dealer down the road and may direct the odd pot head to him. I dont think im breaking the law. Just helping someone feed their addiction.

Immoral as it is, its not illegal.

How are links different from citations?

[dpbsmith]

I don't get it.

Am I infringing copyright if I say "Leopold Stokowski and Mickey Mouse shake hands in Walt Disney's Fantasia?"

Am I committing an indecency if I say "Grove Press created a sensation when they published Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer?"

Am I committing a terrorist act if I say "Nuclear weapons information which the government, in the eighties, claimed was classified, appears in the Encyclopedia Americana?"

I don't think so.