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Kazaa Going to Court
msim writes "According to the The Sydney Morning Herald" Kazaa will be going to court after their appeal to the Federal Court was dismissed. The case will be going ahead on March 23rd"
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I don't use Kazaa. I was one of the kids fined for downloading music off the internet, and guess what, I still am going to do it. In all seriousness.. I don't see how the RIAA can sue everyone, and besides for them to catch users of Kazaa, don't they have to use Kazaa themselves?
Federal Court Justice Murray Wilcox dismissed an application by the world's largest file sharing network to delay proceedings against it until a similar case in the United States was finalised.
This has got to be kind of tough. So Kazaa has to defend themselves against two recording industry associations simultaneously? I wonder if there was any agreement between the RIAA and the Australian counterpart to hit Kazaa at the same time. Hopefully Kazaa can use some of the work for one case in the other but still that's not too much fun to have to fight a two-front war. That takes resources and I wonder if Kazaa has enough to hold their own.
GMD
watch this
Even if kazaa goes down, there is no way in the world that they are going to eliminate p2p. They live in a world of red tape and formalities. We just find ways to go around the system, and therefore, we're always a step ahead of them. Networks start blocking ports in schools and offices, we simply change the port we get it through (at least that's what we do at our school in our dorms) The RIAA starts tracking p2p transactions, we set up massive networks based on ant behavior (e.g. MUTE p2p). They take down one major p2p client, we'll set up 10 more. I think Pepsi and iTunes got it right in their commericial... "We're going to keep downloading music for free whether you like it or not..."
It's a gnutella network. All the machines connect to each other rather than a central localtion. As long as a central server is up somewhere for a starting point then it will work. I do believe that it is almost impossible to take the gnutella network down.
Evolution or ID?
Most cases so far have upheld the "don't blame the technology" view, and I would tend to agree.
However, following your own analogy, do you think that you should be held liable if you did make prank calls all day long?
Here's what I do: Bitty Browser & Andromeda
A retelling of a story based on memory (which means some 'facts' may actually be wrong)
Once there was a mighty napster whose technology allowed for swapping files. Due to poor insight, the technology also allowed users to be tracked -- Fanning be damned.
Along came the peer to peer networks, with gnutella seeming to be the frontrunner. Then came the FastTrack network with Sharman in the back and the mighty Morpheus at the helm due to its ease of use and improved reliability.
The Kazaa folks (Sharman) did not take kindly to Morpheus apparently not paying their bills or whatnot, and thus cut them off the network. Alarm bells should have immediately rung as anyone who has the power to cut clients off a network clearly cannot be "anonymously" peer-to-peer to begin with.
Morpheus ran to the gnutella networks, gathering up Gnucleus code and branding it. By branding, of course, I mean the trend in p2p software of installing various products, some of which amount to adware and/or spyware.
Kazaa touts itself the survivor, gathering up more Morpheus users than either bearshare or limewire or [insert gnutella client here].
Kazaa seen as the filesharing client for the masses and now holds major scrutiny by the recording industry. More p2p networks pop up promising better anonymity.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
So, if Kazaa loses this... do you really think the music industry is going to get more CD buyers? Probably not. It seems to me that the reason most people even download music from Kazaa is because they want to see what other music is on a CD before they buy it. At least there are a few more alternatives now such as Apple's iTunes or some other internet sites. Maybe if the rest of the music industry would wake up and smell the modern age, there wouldn't have to be things like Kazaa to cause them to panic.
On 8 February 2004, in Washington D.C., Trade Minister Mark Vaile concluded an agreed text for the Australia-United States Free Trade Agreement with his US counterpart, Trade Representative Bob Zoellick. These means Australia will take on IP standards much like the US.
Jax