RIAA Sends Letter to Senate Supporting INDUCE Act

The Importance of writes "Slashdot has discussed the INDUCE Act before (and here and here). The act would make 'intentionally inducing' infringement a crime, but defines inducing so broadly that all sorts of technology is threatened. A little over a week ago, tech companies and civil rights groups sent a letter to some senators asking for hearings on the bill. A couple of days ago, the RIAA responded with their own letter sent to all 100 senators. There is also an abridged and annotated version of the RIAA letter. LawMeme has put together an index to INDUCE Act analysis."

Comments

A rearguard strategy.

[Pig Hogger]

Sharing music via MP3s is no different than sharing music via minicassettes, which records companies have not opposed.

Both are lossy formats, so they are a lesser-quality than the original.

Re:A rearguard strategy.

[Pieroxy]

There is a huge difference. 10 people sharing a cassette can - at best - hit 10 other people at once. Whereas one guy putting MP3s on BitTorrent can flood the entire world in hours.

The magnitude is quite different here, you must admit.

Re:A rearguard strategy.

[bechthros]

Um, the RIAA WERE SUCCESSFUL in outlawing cassette recorders in the late 70's and early 80's. You couldn't get them except to order them from Europe or Japan. The RIAA's claim was that everybody would copy their records for their friends and then the RIAA'd go out of business. Sound familiar?

Only thing that stopped it was enough American's getting pissed off and writing their congressman. And then Congress passed the "mixtape law". How many times do we need to go over this, folks?

Re:Freedom of music and my responses to their lett

[Anonymous Coward]

Havent there been quite a few articles recently talking about the rather steep decline in peer 2 peer downloading in specific age groups? you would figure if the number of people dowloading music thru less then legal means that would also mean that their losses wouldnt be in such a slide....unless the slide in sales is actually being attributed incorrectly?

Americans can send a message

[d_jedi]

In their upcoming election:
Support those candidates who aren't in bed with the RIAA (are there such people?)

By continuing to vote for the same people who take bribes from the RIAA, you're supporting the DMCA, the INDUCE act, and any/all of the other lamebrain pieces of legislation the RIAA wants to push through.

Anyone who votes for those who support these poor pieces of legislation deserve what they get.

Re:Americans can send a message

[kcbrown]

Support those candidates who aren't in bed with the RIAA (are there such people?)

You basically refute your own statement with your question. :-)

There are people who aren't in bed with the RIAA, etc., but they are essentially "unelectable".

That's because to be electable means that you have to get media exposure, and favorable media exposure at that, since nobody votes for someone they haven't heard of. And guess who happens to own the media? Why, the very same corporations that are also members of the RIAA and/or MPAA!

This is essentially why our government no longer listens to its people, only its corporations.

Re: Americans can send a message

[kcbrown]

And if you vote for someone who's going to win anyway, then your vote for them won't change that fact either.

The problem isn't that there's only one electable candidate. There are usually more than one. The problem is that all electable candidates are undesirable.

So while a vote for an unelectable candidate won't change the fact that they won't be elected, a vote for an electable candidate can.

And the end result is that if you want your vote to have any real influence over the election, you must vote for one of the electable candidates. The problem with this is that the influence your vote has is limited to deciding which electable candidate makes it into office.

Don't you see? If you vote for an unelectable candidate, your voice isn't heard. That's because an unelectable candidate basically cannot win, whether you vote for him or not. And that's because there simply aren't enough people like you to make that candidate electable, because that candidate can't get sufficient media exposure, because that candidate isn't willing to play ball with the corporations.

Like I said, the real world is consistent and unforgiving. When the only people who have any real chance of being elected are the ones who are willing to play ball with the corporations, a vote for anyone else is a vote that will have no effect. That such a vote is "thrown away" isn't misguided belief, it's unforgiving reality. And the act of voting for one of the electable candidates even if they're not your favorite choice isn't an act of playing the lottery, it's the only real chance you have of influencing the election at all.

In essence, the system is rigged and the choices are rigged. This system cannot be changed from within -- the way it's rigged prevents that. It can only be changed from the outside, and that means via revolution. And revolution can't happen because the military (which answers to the government) has too much firepower compared with the civilians, so any attempt at revolution would be lost.

That means that we're screwed. We have no choice but to bend over and take it, because all our other options have been removed from us. Welcome to the real world.

Sure

[arieswind]

And while we're at it, why dont we ban cd-r and dvd-r drives, since they can be used to copy cds and movies, and audio cassettes, since they can be used to copy music as well. One could even go as far as suggesting that all computers and the internet be banned, since they are obvious outputs for warez and piracy.

Re:Sure

[jeffasselin]

I'll forget about moderating this discussion to answer your post:

They don't want to forbid the internet or computers. What they want to make illegal is "all-purpose" computers under the control of their owners. They want Consumer Electronics-like devices that do ONLY what they want us to do with it, make illegal any tampering of the devices in question, and control the internet at its key points (the ISPs and content providers) to transform it from a world of ends and user-provided information to a corporate-regulated consumer marketplace.

They want to control our habits, our views and our needs, so that we provide them with more and more power and money. They don't give a shit about liberty, or about the people, they care only about themselves and their need to regulate our lives, to change us into drones that will do nothing but buy what they want us to buy. They want us to have 2 cars per family, buy one CD per week (of whatever artist they think we should be liking), and one toaster a year.

They want to de-humanize us, by controlling any new technology solely for their own benefit, and prevent the emergence of any new ideas that could threaten their power and control over our civilisation.

I'm not talking only about the ??AA here, but about most corporations, it's just that the ??AA are more vocal and public about it than most, possibly because they happen to be the most publicly threatened these days. Other industries do the same and have done it in the past: think about how long it's taking for hydrogen cars to materialize, or for hybrid or electric cars to get on the market at a reasonable cars. We have the engineering capacity to do all those things, but since it threatens a lot of industries it's not happening very fast.

Re:Sure

[swb]

What the parent poster said is true of China as a country, as well. Just substitute "corporate" with "communist party" and it remains true.

What really scares me is how alike the modern western corporation and totalitarian communist governments have become. It used to be that they were actually opposed -- the communists took anti-capitalism, pro-worker philosophy seriously, and corporations at least paid lip service to entrepreneurialism and freedom.

Now the corporations lie and propagandize in ways that would make Goebbels or Stalin blush.

Re:Freedom of music and my responses to their lett

[Stripe7]

It is getting near election time. Time to remind these senators who actually votes them into office and keeps them there.

Not a problem

[symbolic]

As long as people continue to shove money into their warchest, they can expect more of the same. This issue has almost become source of amusement- it's like the consumer public is paying the RIAA/MPAA to build a lynching platform, and to supply the rope and enforcement detail that go with it.

The solution is simple: stop buying, stop stealing, stop playing the game.

Good timing

[NanoGator]

Hot off the heels of iTune's 100 millionth (legit) download and the movie industry's lucrative success, they need to really crack down on piracy!

While we're at it...

[Anonymous Coward]

why don't we go after the manufacturers of lock pick tools, crow bars, and bricks... they are obviously inducing people to commit burgulary and theft! Gun manufacturers are inducing people to commit murder! Car manufacturers and liquor distributors are in a conspiracy to induce people to drink and drive!

This is a slippery slope here; once you start going after any tool that might possibly be used for some currently illegal purpose, where do you draw the line?

Record Companies are like Union Bosses

[Nom du Keyboard]

Record companies are like Union Bosses.

1: They might once have been necessary, as when the cost of production, distribution, and promotion was a high barrier of entry to independents.

2: That case no longer exists in anything like its original form.

3: They continue to live well off the efforts of others, not due to any contribution of their own that actually adds to the work being done, but rather through their ability to continue to convince the workers that they remain somehow essential to that worker's survivial.

There oughta be a law...

[Lonath]

making it illegal to INDUCE Congress into using IP and "doing it for the children" as reasons to hinder the progress of Science and Useful Arts by restricting what computers can do.

They will cripple computers because computers are machines that can send, receive, copy, modify, and display huge amounts of arbitrary data. That's really all that computers do. Copyright law allows authors the exclusive right to copy, distribute, make derivative works of, and display or publicly perform the work. Funny, since these restrictions are exactly the things that computers do.

So, computers are copyright breakers. Therefore, the way to preserve copyright is to cripple computers or make them illegal. But that would hinder the progress of science, since computers are NEEDED to advance science these days.

So who will win? I dunno. I would like to think the Constitution will win, but I dunno. My request here is that you minimize the amount of money you give to the copyright industry because they realize that they need to make computers illegal to stay in business. They will just do it in 1000 little baby steps like this law where they make more and more computer uses illegal until you can't do much of anything with these machines without the permission of giant corporations. Then they will decide to just make the machines themselves illegal, and we can all sit around the house watching our perfectly legal Content Appliances wondering how the heck the rest of the world has left us behind.

PICK ONLY ONE:
COPYRIGHT
COMPUTERS


Oh, and please don't download illegally using Kazaa or whatever. :) You're not helping.

One question...

[Anonymous Coward]

could this bill also apply to libraries, which also are in the business of distributing music for free?

Let's just get this...

[Morphine007]

...out of the way right away. Before anyone starts bitching and complaining about the whole "copying music/software is stealing" and then the enlightened come back with "no it's copyright infringement" and then we get into the whole car analogy.... etc.... I'll start off with the "NEW AND IMPROVED CAR ANALOGY"(TM) ... as far as I can tell it's the closest damned thing to a valid analogy as I can get to (and still maintain the simplistic view that talking about cars empowers one to employ):

Suppose you somehow manage to build a true-blue 3D copying machine. You feed the damned thing with various scrap materials that you own/paid for and take it to your favorite car manufacturer and use it to scan a car.... note that this scan does not in ANY way have any effects (adverse or otherwise) on said car. A short time later, however, you are the proud owner of (insert car name here) ... now, and idiot can see that you have NOT stolen a good-god-damned-thing... so besides breaking and entering (maybe... if you needed to do so in order to scan the car) what crime have you committed? Automobile manufacturers are just lucky that no such technology exists, otherwise their business models would be in just as much jeopardy.

Re:Let's just get this...

[njfuzzy]

There's a fallacy at work here, though I can't quite put my finger on it. People are arguing that copyright infringement isn't the same crime as theft, but they don't stop there. Without arguing it, they jump from there to the conclusion that copyright infringement isn't as serious a crime as theft. That's really the role these arguments play on slashdot, and we all know it.

For my part, I say that copyright infringement is a subset of the crime of theft. Specifically, theft of information. Is the difference between theft of object and theft of information any larger than the difference between the theft of patio table and the theft of moped? I don't think so.

Re:Time to wake up?

[KevinKnSC]

You'd $like $the $RIAA $a $lot, $too, $if $you $saw $them $the $same $way $politicians $do.

dear slashdot

[circletimessquare]

it has come to our attention that you are talking about potential problems in ip law

due to the nature of this sort of discourse, it is possible it might induce infringement of some ip laws

therefore, we have no choice but to take legal action against this website until such time that you are bankrupt

thank you,
your friendly riaa

The Real Question...

[Nom du Keyboard]

The real question is why do musicians make music?

Do they do it to:

1: To enrich big companies that hold their contracts?
2: To enrich themselves?
3: To enrich their descendents for n generations through perpetual copyrights?
3: Because it's more fun than anything else they can think of to do?
4: Because the music is in them and this is what they do, and they'd perform for free on the street corners if there was no other way to express themselves?
5: Some combination of the above?

Your answer to this will determine if the failure of the big record companies will destroy the creative future of music for us all.

Observation: There are a lot of fiction authors who publish their work for free on the Internet because they can't sell it otherwise. The lack of a big publishing contract has not stopped these people from creating and sharing their works with the rest of us!

sheesh

[Anonymous Coward]

This entire thread is deja-vu. RIAA gets mentioned and we hear the same posts over & over.

Re:A rearguard strategy. Like I Care?

[Nom du Keyboard]

Both are lossy formats, so they are a lesser-quality than the original.

Like I care? AM radio is very lossy, and that's where I've often fallen in love with the songs I've chosen to own afterwards.

Abuse it and Lose it I'm afraid

[mosb1000]

Well I appreciate that none of us wants to live in an Orwellian nightmare, I can't say that it's entirely undeserved. We had the right to share files freely, and we abused it. The results are detrimental to society, and therefore that right is now being taken away. People can complain about it all they want, but the fact is that intellectual property is this countries largest export and it will be the basis of the future economy of the world. This being true, it is the responsibility of every world citizen to respect intellectual property and behave appropriately.

It's easy to rationalize that it's okay because it's just the music industry, and the RIAA and their respective labels don't actually make music. The fact is if people don't respect the music industry, they should not buy or listen to it's music. There are lots of other ways to support music, buying indy music, attending live shows, donating money. Notice that none of those options involve not compensating artists whose livelihoods depend on music. If this were about social revolution, people would not be stealing music, they would be supporting local and independent artists.

This is a lot like why people can't legally do drugs. Too many people are irresponsible about it, and it ruins it for the rest of us. People need to learn to take responsibility for their actions rather than blame the government or big business for their own indiscretions. That fact is you simply can't have rights if you refuse to take the responsibility to not abuse them.

Re:Abuse it and Lose it I'm afraid

[nattt]

"Intellectual property" itself is an abuse, and should by your agurment be lost. For all my intellectual creations are based upon the work of others, and those of society that pave our roads and feed our bellies are those that allow me to have the free time to be creative. Creativity is not an island, and all of us that create stand on the shoulders of giants. There has not been one invention, innovation or creation that stands alone as the work of one person without the support of society and history behind them.

Your argument is false because intellectual property is theft from the public society that allowed it to be created in the first place. While patents allow monopolies of thought, and copyright lasting virtually forever, there is a land grab going on for IP, where the only winners will be the RIAA MPAA "robber barrons" who declare it's fine for them to base their movie on a classic novel, but it's not ok for me to base my movie on an old classic of theirs.

Copyright must be a balance between the individual (or group of individuals - not corporations) who do the hard work of creating, and of society that by feeding and clothing them, and supporting their creative efforts, allows them the time and energy to be creative. Limits on the term of copyright is one way to balance this. Copyright must have a short, limited lifespan, and must remain in the hands of those that create it. Sure, they should be able to licence their efforts to others for limited times, but they should always own their own IP and especially moral rights, which should never be removed or waived. Fair use is another balance - the fair use to parody, quote, review, question. The fair use to copy for non-commercial use. The fair use to back up what has been purchased to protect against damage. The fair use that your own IP is as protected as much as those of the big corporations.

Language

[ZeroGee]

Sadly, you make some very good points, but they get lost in the noise. Maintaining a professional demeanor is very important to being heard and understood. I assume since you are posting these thoughts here, you want others to listen to them. I respect the opinions you present, but using foul language and vicious comments only undermine the (otherwise very high) effectiveness of your message.

Re:Freedom of music and my responses to their lett

[gradius3]

They are havens for pornographers that project their filth into your homes when your kids innocently seek to find their favorite artists.

Because we all know that gansta rapper songs about cop killing and drugs are wholesome familiy entertainment...

If you don't vote Libertarian, you ASKED FOR THIS

[Bob_Robertson]

Just look at the selection of senators and congress crawlers looking seriously at this filth. It's quite bi-partisan.

The Senator from Disney is a Democrat, Senator Hatch is Republican. There isn't any difference between the two. None. Zip. That's why they can trade members like baseball players and the same policies continue to be enacted.

That's because R's and D's have NO PRINCIPLES, they react to focus groups and think tanks with what they think will get them re-elected this time.

Read the Libertarian platform on this, and ask yourself what you're actually voting for when you cast your ballot.

==

http://www.lp.org/lp-blue-ribbon.html

"We defend the rights of individuals to unrestricted freedom of speech, freedom of the press and the right of individuals to dissent from government itself. ...

We oppose any abridgment of the freedom of speech through government censorship, regulation or control of communications media, including, but not limited to, laws concerning:

Obscenity, including "pornography", as we hold this to be an abridgment of liberty of expression despite claims that it instigates rape or assault, or demeans and slanders women; ...

Electronic bulletin boards, communications networks, and other interactive electronic media as we hold them to be the functional equivalent of speaking halls and printing presses in the age of electronic communications, and as such deserving of full freedom;

Electronic newspapers, electronic "Yellow Pages", and other new information media, as these deserve full freedom. ... "

==

http://www.lp.org/issues/internet.html

Politicians are trying to take away your right to read what you want, and to say what you want.

The Internet is making it possible for new voices to be heard -- the voices of people who simply could not afford to publish their ideas or display their artistic talents to a wide audience using older technologies. Established interests of both the left and the right fear new voices, and are trying to control what appears on the Internet through new laws and regulations.

America's Founders couldn't foresee the Internet, but they knew that government control of information was not only a violation of personal liberty -- it was a threat to their hopes for a nation based on the principles of self-government. So they gave us the First Amendment.

==

Stupid

[nrich239]

"Any law that makes criminals out of over 10 millions americans, probably isn't that good of a law" - Dan from the TV series Sports Night

This quote applies here as well becuase even if this passes, there will always be a way.

Re:Voters who pay politicians $0

[maxpublic]

if government was run the way slashdot thinks it is, then why are we all still using computers? remember the SSSCA?

Remember the DMCA? Didn't help Joe Voter one single bit, and yet it still became law - and has been expanded on since. Law bought and paid for, by entities that have no vote.

Max

Re:It's good to be Canadian!

[3terrabyte]

You're correct, you're not aware of it.

Canadians can download... they'd can't upload/share/distribute/etc.

Re:Always a good time to mention the EFF

[finkployd]

Puh-leeeze. Left wing all the way!

So protesting and concern over constitutional rights are the sole domain of the left? Right wingers never protest or are concerned over constitutional rights? Plenty of gun owning, anti-abortionists would disagree I'm sure.

As for the arguments presented - the RIAA claims their business is being wrecked by this. That's all that matters.

So following your logic. The only thing that REALLY matters is that the tech industry claims their business will be wrecked by this law, and they are larger. So sorry but they matter more.

The only counter-argument that would have any traction would be that the RIAA is lying, and no one is advancing that pov because no one has the credibility to do so.

Actually the RIAA's numbers are anything but reliable. They have profited in a period of economic slump at an unheard of rate, yet spew out illogical estimations of losses. Given the number of times their claims have been effectively discredited I'm surprised it is even necessary to prove they are lying at this point.

I repeat: this is a lost cause and it's going to pass.

If it is such a closed case, I wonder why the RIAA felt the need to write a long winded (and as I read it again, childish sounding) letter to every senator? Sure they have better things to do than lobby for bills that are guaranteed to pass.

Finkployd

They are not Borg

[ihaddsl]

lets see your logic goes like this

A Republican sponsored a bad bill
A Democrat Sponsors said same bad bill

Therefor Repulicans = Democrats and vice versa

Buzzt sorry

Just because there are stupid D's and stupid R's doesn't mean they are the same, nor does it mean that other R's or other D's share the same views

Being a Democrat or Republican is not like being Borg

Outlawing scissors...

[Lodragandraoidh]

This bill is equivalent to outlawing the production, manufacture and use of scissors because they might be used to stab someone.

The potential loss of utility outweighs the alleged protection imparted.

People get stabbed by scissors from time to time, and the police and justice system deal with the actual crime committed quite well - without closing down the scissors manufacturers or arresting large number of outlaw scissors users!

The greed of these people has overpowered any shred of good sense they may have had left. Now I know the USA is in decline... :(

Re:If you don't vote Libertarian, you ASKED FOR TH

[wwest4]

The problem isn't that R's and D's are the same, it's that: mainstream politicians are generally centrists, and the "center" of American politics is skewed to the right such that democrats are no longer very liberal.

Let me play devil...

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, so we all know that the RIAA/MPAA are trying to maintain their current business model, as it has made them large (read "ungodly") amounts of money over the years. They are so big, in fact, that, yes, they are in cahoots with big brother. Unfortunately for those of us not in the position to reap such rewards as big brother, we can only threaten to not re-elect those in bed w/ the **AA or we can bend over and take it you know where.

So I read the letter to the 100 Senators, and it is well-written, with a few contradictions. However, as much as I am against the further evaluation of this act, can we not see the problems that do exist with P2P? It seems the problem is the fact that programs cannot (or simply don't) discriminate against illegally created content. That is the real issue, and therefore is what the **AA should be supporting.

Oh yeah, and stop "hating" on the **AA for all the money they make. Those are just cheap, low-blows and effectively dodge the issues. I can also guarantee you that they are not arguments any (sane) senator would consider presenting to oppose the act.

I don't think copyright is really at issue here.

[ScuxxletButt]

It's the survival of big record companies. When you can build a professional grade 16-24 track, 24-bit audio studio in your basement for under $10,000, and then use P2P nteowroks and the web to distribute and promote your music, why on earth would you need a reocord company?

Seems like the RIAA is trying to keep the independants out of the biz.

RIAA letter rebuttal

[0x0d0a]

First of all, has anyone noticed the number of *awful* things sponsored by Sen. Orin Hatch? Why is he the source of so much stupidity? Why doesn't he get, y'know, voted out? It seems like a lot of things he does are awfully unpopular.

It is no secret that the intellectual property assets of our nation are under assault, as never before.

Absurd. We have had stronger intellectual property protection in our nation for the last few decades than we have *ever* had.

The bill is aimed at ensuring the vibrancy of both our creative community and our technology community.

I'm not sure that it helps either artists or technology companies. It is possible, if the RIAA's thesis that they are badly losing money is correct, that it helps music publishing companies.

We urge you to support it. It is intended to target bad actors only - those who have built business models to get away with stealing the creative work of predominantly American artists. The bill finds the right balance to protect both technology AND content innovators.

In subsection (g), "intentionally induces" means intentionally aids, abets, induces, counsels, or procures, and intent may be shown by acts from which a reasonable person would find intent to induce infringement based upon all relevant information about such acts then reasonably available to the actor, including whether the activity relies on infringement for its commercial viability.

As other analysis has pointed out, no, the bill decidedly *does* target people who are not "bad actors".

Global sales of recorded music - dominated by our country - quadrupled from 1980 to 1999. Then, almost on a dime, that trend line reversed, with sales figures falling by about a third to the mid point of last year. Before the launch of lawsuits by the industry last fall against those induced to steal music online, we were spiraling down with no sense of a floor.

I do not have the data necessary to judge the accuracy of this claim. However, I have seen many citations of numbers that do not agree with this, and many people have pointed out that there is a strong coincidence with the current economic recession and finally, that it is possible that RIAA-sold music simply does not have the appeal that it once did -- for example, the Internet allows a broader range of new types of music to be discovered, which makes the music that the RIAA markets have less advantage relative to non-RIAA marketed music.

I do not think that this data is convincing enough to broadly extend the reach of IP law, and to make illegal much development in a field that is seeing some of the most interesting research in computer science.

Finally, let us assume that the RIAA really is losing large sums of money and that copyright infringment is the direct cause -- what of the companies that have *benefitted* from the current boom in MP3s? Apple, HP, and many other companies have profited admirably. I know people that spent more money on music-related technology than ever did on music. There are still questions of whether this is a sustainable or long-term beneficial system, but even if the RIAA establishes that it is making less money is not cause for the RIAA claiming that this bill is necessary. Finally, the ultimate goal of IP law is to ensure that production in the arts continues -- I know people that have both pirated music and found new musicians that they were never familiar with before, and purchased albums from those (European musicians, odd techno types, and the like). In addition, electronic music distribution may be a more economically efficient method of music evaluation for such purposes than MTV or the radio. I am very unsure that even if the RIAA is making less money, that there is less money going into the pockets of content creators. The RIAA is primarily a set of companies that do music promotion. If promotion is no longer required for people to find artists that they like (the now-Microsoft-purchased-and-d

Re:Freedom of music and my responses to their lett

[Bob(TM)]

You made a lot of interesting points but your response took a little creative license WRT the original letter:

* The RIAA does not specifically attack BitTorrent. BitTorrent is not named in any part of the RIAA document.

* The RIAA does not say P2P is wrong. On the contrary, it makes one statement saying the technology is "magnificent". It points out that the law makes it mighty difficult to enforce a copyright when P2P is used.

Editorialize all you want about the quality of the artists but the bottom line is there are people paying for "creative product". These artists are agreeing to the terms of the deals that make their material available and assigning the distribution rights to members of the RIAA and they have a choice (albeit an anemic one - the RIAA has quite a hold on the industry - like Microsoft).

RIAA members have invested money and have a right to protect their investment. However, they must do so legally and should to so ethically. Going after kids is legal, though, perhaps, not the most ethical thing. However, what deterent means do they have to protect their investment in copyright which has been granted under US law?

And, THAT'S the fundamental issue. Should the law be changed to make it easier to inforce copyright?

The onus for protecting copyright has always been on the owner. That being said, Congress has the sole responsibility under the Constitution to create a legal environment that makes protection of copyright possible in order "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts."

Technological innovation happens. Photocopiers made it easier to copy print. Tape made it easier to copy audio. VCRs made it easier to copy video. The very nature of technology is to make things easier. So, attempting to prevent making things easier is an attempt to prevent technological innovation.

To change the law to stifle innovation in order to protect a recording industry failing to innovate is inconsistent with the responsibilities of Congress.

Existing law is enough. Innovation happens and it's up to the recording industry to adapt. They can continue to sue, if they want - that's their right. But, the world is becoming difficult for them to make any headway by sueing people. They are better off figuring out a different way.

How could this be used?

[crazedlunatic]

PCs, Disk Drives, DVD/CD burners, could all be construed as "inducive" to copyright infringement.

Developers of Operating Systems, open source, or not, would be required to spend money and resources to avoid "inducing" copyright. Do you go after the people who wrote the compilers also, since they're used to write the code that is used to induce the copyright? What about the contractors who set up a production line for a DVD burner that was used for copyright infringement?

Where does the buck stop with this? If you give someone a baseball bat as a gift, and they use it to beat down your neighbor, does that make you a criminal? Should you be prohibited from distributing baseball bats? This logic is insane!

If this is passed, I would get out of this country, or at least get some gold or foreign currency. Our economy will collapse in a matter of months. No one has the resources to reverse engineer this functionality into existing product lines.

This will just drive the technology sector into bankruptcy and its resources will go to the entertainment industry. When all is said and done, the entertainment moguls will probably turn the tables and buy out the techs. Instead of "AOL - Time Warner", we'll have "Viacom - Dell - Comcast". There will be no jobs for millions of tech oriented college graduates, and they will not spend money on overpriced DRM enabled media if they don't have jobs. It's like an economic virus - once it consumes its host, there is nothing left to thrive on. Unfortunately its host is anything and everything in our economy that is even remotely involved with "entertainment".

Re:Responses

[John Allsup]

Except that these days, what the studio is capable of is that much greater than before. Your artist with the right image can't sing in tune? No problem, just fix the pitch in the studio. etc. etc. Studios in Crosby's day weren't able to make up for lack of ability in the artist in the way that the modern high tech studios can.

Prohibition?

[mosb1000]

Well, many years ago people though that way. As a result they enacted an amendment which brought about "prohibition". After a while it was discovered that Alcohol was so engraved in our culture, that the amendment had merely forced the alcohol trade underground, bringing about a huge illicit trade and organized crime in general. Eventually people realized that despite the general consensus among the population that alcohol is bad, prohibition had done more harm than good and the amendment was repealed. I hope this has been a fun history lesson, it's too bad more congressmen haven't heard about this.

Re:If you don't vote Libertarian, you ASKED FOR TH

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, no. Libertarians actually support the most extreme forms of capitalism imaginable through their promises of weakening government control to benefit the "individual". Well guess what: multinational corporations are run by small groups of individuals with their own private interests, and a libertarian government would do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to stop this huge power imbalance between the rich and the relatively poor. We all know that money talks, and this would lead to the rights of citizens getting trampled even more than they are now. This is why I choose to be a libertarian-socialist instead of just a plain libertarian. Freedom for workers, government control for large businesses: this seems to be what you want, and it's not going to happen under pure libertarianism.

Government and Music (government music)

[kardar]

They have it in red China. Songs that are sung to praise the leaders and songs that sing about how great everything is.

Someone like W gets elected and then we have all of these right-wing authors and talk-show hosts that all of a sudden become relevant - they weren't relevant before, and won't be relevant if/when someone like Kerry gets elected.

The music industry should try to seperate itself from the government; the reason it should try to do this is because the music industry should remain in a place where it can enable artists to be critical of the government; where it can enable artists to be critical of unjust wars and other things.

When the music or entertainment industry goes to the government to seek help, they are hurting their future ability to remain independent of that government, they are hurting the ability of artists that they support in the future to be critical of the government, and to remain independent of the dark, inaccurate corners of that government's policies.

Any government will make mistakes, and constituent "bases" will take delight in things that need to be changed. Here is one area that artists can provide an alternate opinion, a different view - one can only infer from its actions that the music industry has no intention of trying to support and encourage diverse thought and opinion.

So they will keep churning out pickup truck and cowboy gear advertisements and SUV aftermarket parts advertisements and reality videos of karaoke, with perhaps the occasional college band-member's reality heartbreaking girlfriend-boyfriend relationship reality video mixed in here and there.

I think that a more likely scenario is that no one is really going to want to download anything the mainstream music media has to offer if they keep going at it the way they are going at it.

Popular music and conservative government should not mix, it does not lead to good things. If the music industry wants its fans to take care of it, and respect it, if it wants to attract talented artists who think outside the box, and aren't afraid to voice their political opinions, it should not go running to the government like it is doing.

There is the quote from an AC/DC song - "living on the streets, you gotta practice what you preach" - so that is, if the mainstream music industry wants to support and encourage artists that present an unbiased opinion, perhaps artists that present opinions that aren't as favorable to government and the status quo, they can't go running to the goverment for help like that. It won't work. No one is going to take the maistream music industry seriously.

Maybe all those dowloaders are just bored, and/or have nothing better to download. Destroying their ability to download anything other than music industry stuff via criminalizing competing technical gadgets isn't going to make them any less bored, or give them anything more interesting or more download-friendly (in a legal sense) to download.

Best quote from RIAA letter...

[Elminst]

Ironically, these P2P operators who hide behind the protective cover of "technology," resist deploying existing technological answers to solve this problem. They resist modernization because it undercuts their business model.

(Emphasis mine)

Wait... I think they got that backwards...

Classical Liberal, not "Democrat" liberal.

[Bob_Robertson]

You're missing an axis. Try the Nolan graph, which includes "statist" "libertarian" instead of just the "left" and "right" that came out of the French Revolution.

http://www.lp.org/quiz/

By the "deomcrat" definition, they are liberals. By the classical Liberal definition, they are statist.

You are absolutely correct that these policies end up being both "right" and "left". Remember that Nazi means "National Socialist", yet fascist is considered "right" while socialist "left". The fact is that both left and right come together under the simple aspect that the individuals involved come to desire control over everything.

That is why the original statement that the American Congress is "right" is so absurd. The efforts at control by Congress are both left and right, they are doing everything to build the welfare (left) and warfare (right) total state.

The classical liberals are now called libertarian. www.mises.org www.lewrockwell.com www.fff.org these are excellent sources of information on the "classical" liberals.

Bob-