RIAA Sues More Music Lovers

DominoTree writes "The RIAA, a trade group representing the U.S. music industry has filed a new round of lawsuits against 744 people it alleges used online file-sharing networks to illegally trade in copyrighted songs, it said on Wednesday."

Comments

A chilling effect on sales?

[erick99]

Yesterday I was taken to task about my comments related to a similar article where I stated that the RIAA was suing more of it's customers. I say this because there are plenty of people who download a song or even an album (I hate to buy an album and find that only one song is any good) in a "try before you buy" spirit. I did this recently and then took advantage of Real's $4.99 price for an album. I know that a great deal of people simply download and do not buy but it cannot be a blanket statement. Anyway, this particular round of suits are, once again, filed against John Does:

The Recording Industry Association of America (news - web sites) said the various suits, filed in courts across the country, cover "John Doe" defendants whose true identities are unknown to the group.

From the previous group of John Doe suits more folks have been identified:

Separately, suits covering 152 people who were previously sued anonymously but later identified and offered the chance to settle, were refiled with their true identities after they ignored or declined those offers, an RIAA (news - web sites) spokesman said.

I still maintain that suing your customers, whether your are the RIAA or SCO, can have a chilling effect on sales.

Cheers,

Erick

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[Pofy]

>I say this because there are plenty of people
>who download a song or even an album

I think that the cases here are for people sharing music, not the ones downloading, that is relatively easier to find than people downloading.

As regarding customers allready comiting copyright infringement, I do download music and it is not uncommon that I own such music allready, I just find it more convenient at time than to convert the music myself.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[poofmeisterp]

I still maintain that suing your customers, whether your are the RIAA or SCO, can have a chilling effect on sales.

...which will lower their revenue further... which will make them find a scapegoat... which will target more technologies... which will prompt the creation of new technologies... which will prmopt more lawsuits.....

You see where this is going.

Also, wouldn't suing your customers piss them off, making them switch to alternate providers, further lowering sales, prompting you to sue more people in a desperate attempt to preserve your business model, causing them to stop purchasing from you (resume loop)?

I'd love to be in the room when the "brains" behind the RIAA finally say "screw it - we lost."

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[harlows_monkeys]

I say this because there are plenty of people who download a song or even an album (I hate to buy an album and find that only one song is any good) in a "try before you buy" spirit. I did this recently and then took advantage of Real's $4.99 price for an album.

Of course. Numerous studies have shown that file sharing probably overall does more good for the RIAA than harm, and so they should embrace it, at least somewhat.

However, one point that is often overlooked here is that this is their decision to make, not ours.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[jest3r]

I wonder when the RIAA will figure out that they are suing the wrong people ...

For starters the Internet is a global medium. I really don't see how picking on a handful of John Does in the United States will limit the availability of audio on P2P networks as a whole. Even if the RIAA managed to shutdown every computer sharing audio files in the United States people would still be downloading (from the rest of the world) and not buying.

The fact is it doesn't matter where the people sharing are ... because in order to stem to decline in CD sales you have to stop the downloads themselves.

I think the more successful campaign revolved around flooding the networks with low quality audio files. This way they could market CD's as a big step up. In fact even today low quality audio files are a major drawback of using P2P for regular folk.

Furthermore I wonder why the RIAA hasn't gone after .binaries newsgroups, torrents or some of the other networks where people have been "sharing" high quality MP3's and lossless audio for years. Torrents have made sharing audio via websites even more accessible than ever before: to the point that Google searches for band name / torrent usually get results.

The RIAA seems to be 2 steps behind what is going on in the real world.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[ack154]

I'd love to be in the room when the "brains" behind the RIAA finally say "screw it - we lost."

Somehow, I don't think that will be any time soon...

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[glenrm]

I'd love to be in the room when the "brains" behind the RIAA finally say "screw it - we lost. It is more likely they will be sitting in the room, and somebody will come in and say "screw you - you lost." They should have let iTunes happen much sooner. Still time, just have to quit fighting reality, they need to make sure several legal music sites have every song that they control and allow independant music as well.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[evil carrot]

Also, wouldn't suing your customers piss them off, making them switch to alternate providers

That's one of the issues here that you won't find in other situations - there's no legal way to acquire this music without the RIAA getting a cut. The RIAA knows this and the organization plays that card with a bit of hostility.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[Dan Ost]

Well, plenty of independent artists/labels exist. Perhaps being an
independent artist/label will become a selling point to a greater
demographic than it is now (will it then become uncool to those
currently interested?).

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[southpolesammy]

Three reasons:

• P2P clients are much easier to use than torrent or newsgroup clients.
  
• The breadth of coverage available at any given time on P2P networks far exceeds that via torrents or newsgroups.
  
• Many P2P clients automatically setup the user as both a user and a supplier, which allows the RIAA to determine if someone has crossed that line into sharing, not just downloading. Without that ability to monitor for sharing, the RIAA is powerless unless they co-opt the ISP's to allow RIAA drones to monitor their network traffic.
  

Remember, the RIAA is targeting distributors. The fact that some just happen to be users is coincidental.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[halowolf]

Well luckily in Australia music sales revenue has been going up not down... oh, but we don't talk about that... never mind!

It looks like however that the RIAA will need to be taken, kicking and screaming into the new age of music. An age where hopefully more quality music will be produced and less populist blond breast augmented voice modified bimbo' won't be ruling the charts. Oh and a place where they might not be particularly relevant anymore.

I've been finding it harder to do the try before you buy thing as many stores I go to don't let you try before you buy for some bizarre reason. I find it bizarre because I would of thought that music stores would want to encourage people to buy music not make it harder for customers to pick something they would like. And the stores that do usually charge some quite unreasonable prices on their CD's for the priviledge, or simply don't have a good range of music to listen to.

But of course, its all the customers fault that they are demanding more than they are getting, and when they don't get it they then take it. Thats a rather naive however, there are people that will always steal music, software etc because they see it as better than paying. I don't but hey thats just me. Those people, I have no problem with them having to defend their actions in court. However this situation we are in is infact many shades of grey and not just black and white with such simple examples as those I have described. The RIAA members steal from artists too, that is documented in places that I can't be bothered finding.

Bah I can't be bothered wondering if what I've just written makes any sense. I'm going to bed! :)

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[MeanSolutions]

Well, with a car dealership, you at least have the option of taking the car you are thinking about buying out for a spin...

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[squiggleslash]

I still maintain that suing your customers, whether your are the RIAA or SCO, can have a chilling effect on sales.

Which is presumably why the RIAA is suing people it clearly believes are not "its" (or rather its members') customers. Remember, the RIAA is suing people for "sharing" (mass distribution to anonymous strangers without authorization) the music made by its members, so that those anonymous strangers do not need to visit record stores or the iTMS and actually buy anything. I don't see a customer relationship there, I see a competitive relationship (copyright infringers vs the members of the RIAA), and one where one of those groups, the infringers, are apparently acting illegally.

Back when Napster was having every law in the book thrown at it, many Slashdotters argued that this was morally wrong because it was only Napster's customers who were infringing on copyrights, not Napster itself. In general, the operators and creators of these networks have, quite deliberately, created a tool that makes copyright infringement easy and potentially accidental. Meanwhile the focus has changed to these people.

I'm really wondering who's morally in the wrong here. The RIAA? Music owned by the members of the RIAA (and their suppliers) is, very obviously, being illegally distributed on P2P networks. The users? In many cases, the redistribution is obviously illegal but many still seem to believe in some kind of loophole to protect them, from a belief that they only downloaded the music (not realising that it became automatically "shared" the moment they did, and in any case knowing full well they were encouraging that illegal distribution to begin with), to a belief "fair use" implies any kind of not-for-profit redistribution (it doesn't..)

Sharman networks and their ilk? I'm sure there are a few idealists amongst these groups who envisage millions of garage-based bands turning their music into MP3s and distributing it for free, but, come on, when Shawn Fanning wrote Napster as an alternative to IRC based distribution, what were the majority of MP3s that were being distributed?

Sometimes it's necessary to side with the "bad guys". The entire problem with P2P could have been resolved had anyone been willing to build responsibility into the networks, so that nobody would have thought redistributing music without authorization was something they could do without getting caught to begin with. All this infrastructure has been built instead of building something that would have created a genuine, independent, alternative to the major commercial record labels - I say instead, because as things currently are, the current infrastructure is open to legal attack, and, clearly from the lawsuits, the networks seem to be predominantly used to distribute the music of the major commercial record labels, not the alternatives.

So, what we have here isn't custom, it's competition. It's legally challenged competition. It's not really doing anything the swivel-eyed idealists said P2P would do, because it's not designed to. I don't think the RIAA is suing its (members') customers.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[BoomerSooner]

I would be willing to bet almost 100% of people who download/share music have been a customer in the past and probably will be in the future. I cannot name one person I know that doesn't own at least one cd, 8-track, record, tape, ...

Maybe you should read your own definition.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[fakeplasticusername]

I guess my argument would be that i think i shouldn't have to pay for music. I think the ideal would be realized if the artists distributed their music for free, and made their money off of performances. I would compare this to the art world. I can go to google and search for any work of visual art and find an image. Yet there is no uproar from the fine art world. If i want a more immersive experience, i go to the museum.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[shostiru]

Furthermore I wonder why the RIAA hasn't gone after .binaries newsgroups

Usenet wasn't intended for file sharing and the RIAA can't make a case to that effect. A lot of Usenet admins also claim common carrier status. I don't know whether this has ever been upheld in court, and it's by no means the case that every Usenet personality agrees this is a good idea (c.f. Karl Denninger, who as I recall was the one who came up with "megabytes and megabytes of copyright violations" as the description for alt.binaries.pictures.erotica).

I expect if the RIAA does anything it will be to go after individual Usenet posters, not Usenet itself. On the other hand, people still post clearly illegal material on Usenet and seem to get away with it. Complicating matters for the RIAA and company, US citizens can use a Usenet server outside of the country, and that server's admins can tell the RIAA to go fuck itself.

torrents

They're certainly aware of it. We just got a DMCA notice for one of our users who was sharing movies using BitTorrent (I don't know the tracker). This has been going on for several months at least.

or some of the other networks where people have been "sharing" high quality MP3's

You mean like Direct Connect? Edonkey? Gnutella2? AFAIK every popular P2P protocol has users who've been hit with DMCAs, and many have been subject to more aggressive action.

To my knowledge outside of Freenet (and others which offer similar protections) there are no P2P networks immune to DMCA and lawsuits.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[squiggleslash]

How would you propose doing this? Magical Metallica detectors that can identify Sandman no matter how much its compressed or how its encoded? This is what the RIAA wanted earlier in this war on P2P software.

Rather easily, as a matter of fact. If you want to publish music, you sign it, and you sign it with a verifiable signature.

Or you serve it from your own, tracable, website.

Your solution doesn't create responsibility incidentally, it just traces what music is being published. It says nothing about who is publishing it, and provides no means for the person responsible for ripping and uploading it to be caught. So I'm not sure why you suggested it, other than trying to come up with a randomly technically-unfeasable solution to try to ridicule something entirely appropriate. FWIW, I don't think it would help us create responsibility if we transfered the music only at a speed faster than light either.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[loyalsonofrutgers]

That point rests on the moral equivalency of a corporation and a person. We don't even give all people the full personation in this country (children have many restrictions put on them by society, for their own good), so why should a corporation be considered the equal to you or me?

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[drinkypoo]

It is their decision to make because we have made it their decision, and as a nation we [should] have the power to revoke that right. The fact that we haven't yet done so suggests that we are not in control of our nation - the corporations are. (This is not a surprise.) The Sonny Bono copyright act should have been seen as the clear conflict of interest that it is, but sonny met up with an evergreen and now we're going to be stuck with the damn thing probably forever.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[LocoMan]

Not condoning the RIAA here (actualy, living outside of the US don't really care much about them), but I think the problem isn't as simple as that (IMHO, at least). Word of mouth isn't really a very effective marketing campaign when used alone. Just name one band that has gotten as famous as, say, Nsync to name one that was the product of lot of marketing, by using word of mouth on the internet alone, and artist can only really expect lots of interest on performances (therefore earning money of them) if they're somewhat famous, and to be famous there needs to be marketing (videos shown on TV, music played on radio, magazine ads, etc) which is expensive, and whoever pays for that wants to earn money in return, and that is a gamble to begin with since few bands get to be famous moneymakers to begin with. As I said, don't suport the RIAA and what are they doing, but I don't think it's as easy either, since the artists do need a huge backing up to have hopes of becoming famous these days and someone needs to pay for that, and hope to get back their expenses and some earnings because of that. Wether they're charging too much or geting too much back is something different, though.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[Simonetta]

I clearly, openly, and honestly maintain that since the RIAA (and Disney) stole the public domain by indefinitely extending the copyright period, any and all downloading, copying, and sharing of anything, anywhere is morally and ethically justified. By using overwhelming financial resources to destroy the legal balance between copyright and public domain, they have abrograted their legal 'right' to own anything. Their claim to legal ownership is meaningless given their felonious actions. Any act that they do against us is a crime: extorting money from us and stealing our property.
They are the ones who have destroyed the copyright laws, not us. We are only protecting the public domain for future generations. It is right and proper that we do so.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[HeghmoH]

I think that the cases here are for people sharing music, not the ones downloading, that is relatively easier to find than people downloading.

I may be mistaken, but I am under the impression that simply downloading is not illegal per se. Copyright covers distribution, and downloaders are not distributing the songs, people who share are the distributors here. Of course, with most modern P2P programs practically mandating uploading along with downloading, this distinction gets pretty blurry.

Also, I think that this is how things should work, at the very least. This way, compliance with the law is in the hands of the distributor, who is in the best position to make sure everything is in order. Imagine if everybody who downloaded from a shady but legitimate-looking music store could get hit with a copyright infringement suit!

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[DarkMantle]

Lets review some facts about the Recording industry.

• Fact: The artists on a Platinum selling album breaks even, while the record label makes over $100,000
• Fact: On a typical one ear tour as of the late '90s the band would usually make about $250,000+ to divide between them, while the record label would make a mere 10% of that.
• Fact: Other then rent for the offices, and paying the over paid executives. The record label has no expenses. It is up to the artist to find a studio, rent the studio, and pay for the mixing, mastering, and production of thier albums.
• Fact: Concert sales have increased since "illeagal" music trading. This is good for the artists, and bad for the record industry.

I say we skip the middle man, and use the internet as the "record label" to represent musicians, and watch them be happier for making more money because people will go to see them live.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[fatcatman]

But then people who are dowloading music instead of buying it aren't the RIAA's customers.

How do you know they aren't buying it, too, you idiot?

I just downloaded "The Girl Next Door". I hadn't heard of the movie before but I saw it while browsing for torrents and decided, "What the hell." It rocked. So much so that the next time I'm at Costco I'm buying the DVD.

If someone hadn't illegally shared that with me, the studio would have sold one less copy.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[swv3752]

Wrong. It is out decision. We are stakeholders and more importantly, we are citizens of the United States. Stakeholders should influence a company's decisions. (Stakeholder include shareholder, suppliers, employees, and customers.) Citizens grant the right for the company to exist in the first place.

The members of the RIAA were granted corporate charters to promote the public welfare. Suing everyone can be argued to violate thier corporate charter. It could be grounds for thier dissolution.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[NoData]

No. Those distributing songs probably just downloaded them or the majority of them.

You might be right. It's an empirical question.

I just point out one thing. There's a finite regress here. Somebody is providing the tracks ripped from CDs. And I suggest that anyone who's providing MP3s from one CD is probably providing MP3s from most of their CDs.

And those people are the customers that are getting sued.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[cpt kangarooski]

Has it actually been decided what the legal definition of reproduction is?

Yes. 17 USC 106 sets forth the exclusive right to reproduce like so:

Subject to sections 107 through 121, the owner of copyright under this title has the exclusive rights to do and to authorize any of the following:

(1) to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords;

17 USC 101 provides us with numerous definitions:

''Copies'' are material objects, other than phonorecords, in which a work is fixed by any method now known or later developed, and from which the work can be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated, either directly or with the aid of a machine or device. The term ''copies'' includes the material object, other than a phonorecord, in which the work is first fixed.

A ''device'', ''machine'', or ''process'' is one now known or later developed.

A work is ''fixed'' in a tangible medium of expression when its embodiment in a copy or phonorecord, by or under the authority of the author, is sufficiently permanent or stable to permit it to be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated for a period of more than transitory duration. A work consisting of sounds, images, or both, that are being transmitted, is ''fixed'' for purposes of this title if a fixation of the work is being made simultaneously with its transmission.

''Phonorecords'' are material objects in which sounds, other than those accompanying a motion picture or other audiovisual work, are fixed by any method now known or later developed, and from which the sounds can be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated, either directly or with the aid of a machine or device. The term ''phonorecords'' includes the material object in which the sounds are first fixed.

Furthermore MAI Systems Corp. v. Peak Computer, Inc., 991 F.2d 511 (9th Cir. 1993), and the cases that are based on it, such as Intellectual Reserve, Inc. v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry, Inc., 75 F. Supp. 2d 1290 (D. Utah 1999), hold very plainly that due to the fact that most computers necessarily infringe even when displaying information because their architecture is such that the copyrighted work is unauthorizedly and illegally reproduced in RAM, which constitutes a new copy of the work, being a tangible object in which a work may be perceived.

Reproducing bits WITHIN the NIC, as well as to the hard drive, RAM, cache, procesor, etc. are all reproductions capable of infringment. It's a bizarre result, but that's what the law is right now. Please read through those cases and you'll see this.

And, incidentally, provided your DVD player has no memory onboard -- which it almost certainly does, being more complicated than an ancient record player -- while it is not illegal to buy such a DVD, it is illegal to make incidental reproductions in the act of watching it.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[Carnildo]

Are you willing to go to prison for this stance?

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[HeghmoH]

Reproducing bits WITHIN the NIC, as well as to the hard drive, RAM, cache, procesor, etc. are all reproductions capable of infringment. It's a bizarre result, but that's what the law is right now. Please read through those cases and you'll see this.

I'll take your word for it; I don't really understand legalese. Anyway, doesn't this mean that, even if you buy legitimate material (like from iTMS or wherever), every router that it passes through infringes?

How does this all work with fair use? It seems very odd to me that copying a DVD bought from one store is perfectly legal, while copying an identical DVD bought from a different store (which makes its own unlicensed copies in the back) makes you infringe. Of course, as you've shown, the law is often very odd. I guess it boils down to the whole "ignorance is no excuse" thing.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[geekee]

"I still maintain that suing your customers, whether your are the RIAA or SCO, can have a chilling effect on sales."

A person who is making hundreds of your songs available for download by anyone in the world is not your customer. He is your competitor.

Re:A chilling effect on sales?

[cpt kangarooski]

Anyway, doesn't this mean that, even if you buy legitimate material (like from iTMS or wherever), every router that it passes through infringes?

No.

Firstly, you're authorized to download it, and that implicitly would involve it going over the Internet to get to you, so it's sheltered by that authorization.

Secondly, the safe harbor at 17 USC 512 covers a lot of situations like this and can be used to protect those people in the middle, even where there was no authorization. Of course, in such a scenario, you, not being in the middle, are still in some trouble.

Although it kind of runs against the whole concept of downloading -- and therefore merely even looking at -- things via computer, I would advise you to expect that the law is going to follow the contours of common sense.

How does this all work with fair use?

Well, there's two bodies of thought with fair use.

The first is that it is a universal defense of equity that is available for anything that happens under Congress' copyright power (which is the ONLY power that can be used to grant copyrights -- other powers cannot, since it was specified as being in this one).

The other is that it is a defense to copyright infringement, but not to non-infringing acts that are nevertheless prohibited by Congress, whether under the copyright power or via other powers that are being used in a functionally equivalent manner. DMCA anti-circumvention is referred to as a paracopyright, meaning it's of this sort -- if you believe in all this.

In either event, as to downloading, that's traditional copyright law, and so fair use would certainly be a defense. But n.b. that each time you assert fair use, the court has to look at the specific facts and decide if it really is. No use can be said to always be fair or unfair. It depends on the totality of the circumstances each time. Thus some for-profit uses are fair, others are not. Some parodies are fair, others are not. A few trends might be visible, but I'd stick to running through the four-part analysis (see 17 USC 107) each and every time.

It seems very odd to me that copying a DVD bought from one store is perfectly legal, while copying an identical DVD bought from a different store (which makes its own unlicensed copies in the back) makes you infringe.

Well, I'm not sure I understand your example here. Still, I think in the context of the fair use analysis, what you mean is that you're thinking about the fourth factor.

If you make, say, a personal copy of a book (let's set aside DVDs to avoid complicating things with 17 USC 1201), and the master copy of the book you are using was one lawfully made by the copyright holder and lawfully came into your possession, then it has some, but little, economic impact on the copyright holder. After all, you paid once, and few people would pay twice. There's really no harm.

OTOH, if it's a pirated copy of a book, then even though what you're doing is the same, there is a greater economic impact since you didn't pay the copyright holder for the master copy. This could tilt the scales against you.

Remember, fair use is a matter of equity: you are basically appealing to the court's sense of fairness to let you do something that is against the letter of the law, but within the spirit of justice. If you have done something wrong, you're not going to get this kind treatment. It's reserved for people who do the right thing and only unfortunately run into conflict with the law. It might help to remember that the distinction between law and equity dates back to England: law courts did what the letter of a statute said. But you could appeal to equity courts -- basically the king, or his councilors -- who could override it in special cases for people who were sympathetic. In the US, we combined law and equity together into one court, but the latter is still only used in the last resort.

Or, if you like, think of the story of LaGuardia, who at one point was a judge,

Has there ever been an actual court case

[ralf1]

or is the RIAA just using mass-mugging tactics? Seems the ACLU or EFF or someone would want to make a big public test case out of some individuals lawsuit defense.

Re:Has there ever been an actual court case

[TedCheshireAcad]

First check to see if you are among the accused.

The EFF is helpful :)

Re:Has there ever been an actual court case

[Mateito]

Wow.

This "John Doe" guy is absolutely fucked.

Same ol' same o'

[Underholdning]

Film at 11... oh wait, make that puppet theater at 11, since the RIAA has confiscated the film

This about sums up the story.

[Anti Frozt]

"Nothing for you to see here. Please move along."

Is it really news that the RIAA is still filling lawsuits against grandmothers and 12 year olds?

Re:This about sums up the story.

[Evil Adrian]

a) People that are old enough to be grandmothers are old enough to know that copyright infringement is illegal
b) If your 12-year-old is pirating music, you aren't doing a good job as a parent and the lesson will be taught one way or another
c) I'm sure most of the people named in the lawsuits are neither grandmothers nor underage, and you are just blowing things out of proportion.

Re:This about sums up the story.

[maximilln]

People that are old enough to be grandmothers are old enough to know that copyright infringement is illegal

That same grandmother wouldn't bat an eyelash if you gave her a CD with old big band music for Christmas. Non-smokers would have no problem if smoking became a felony. People who don't drink have no problem with prohibition.

Your subject group is skewed.

If your 12-year-old is pirating music, you aren't doing a good job as a parent and the lesson will be taught one way or another

There is no theft. This is an artificial crime called "copyright infringement". While the spirit of copyright is a starry-eyed ideal which everyone supports the implementation is flawed and anyone who actually lives under its sway knows that it rarely, if ever, benefits the original author in the way that you think it does.

Re:This about sums up the story.

[mabinogi]

All crime is artificial, and most of the implementations of the laws are flawed.
That doesn't mean they're _not_ laws.
Go ahead and practice civil disobediance if you wish, that's up to you, but don't pretend that copyright infringement is any less against the law than any other type of theft.

If obtaining something that is not rightfully yours (and no, it's NOT - a musicians music isn't yours to take any more than a sculptur's sculpture would be) is not stealing just because there isn't a tangible decrease in a inventory somewhere, then what is it?
The only English word that comes close to fitting is Steal. Which, being a word that comes from Old English originated in a time when the only method of stealing involved physically removing. The world has moved on now, and there are ways of illegally obtaining something from someone without physically removing it.

Also, it is quite acceptable to use steal in the sense where the owner is deprived of something, but you don't actually gain it yourself (stealing someone's life for example) so why not the other way round?

The "it's not stealing/piracy it's copyright infringement", is a straw man argument that misses the point that no matter what you call it it _is_ illegal whether you think it should be or not.

Re:This about sums up the story.

[maximilln]

All crime is artificial

Most crime is real. Intellectual property and copyright are intangible. Can you tell the difference between music which was purchased vs. music downloaded with only your ear? If someone tells you they have a "great idea" can you immediately swear that they didn't hear it from someone else two days earlier?

a musicians music isn't yours to take any more than a sculptur's sculpture would be

A musician's music isn't the musician's anymore. It belongs to some media conglomerate. You're attempting to arouse sympathy for a group of people who aren't even involved anymore.

not stealing just because there isn't a tangible decrease in a inventory somewhere

It's not stealing. The product was legally sold. Rights of ownership were transferred at the point of sale. Misrepresenting a rental as a sale is a poor way of defending business stupidity. If they feel they are losing profits they should reevaluate the worth of their product.

Take the agricultural industry. They produce genetically engineered crops. They only sell seed which produces sterile crops because they are intelligent and they know that otherwise the product would be EASILY COPIED. The agri industry could have lobbied for federal oversight and DNA testing of crops. They could have run down farmers for "stealing" their intellectual property. Instead they 1) subsidized, out of their own profit margin, engineered crops in order to put them in the marketplace and 2) invested in the research to produce seed which produced sterile crops.

The music industry should take a lesson. Making criminals out of customers is the wrong business model. Why not admit,"We're so stupid that we didn't realize our product was so easily copied."

The product was legally sold. The government is not their personal Guido.

Re:This about sums up the story.

[JWW]

You don't need to teach your kids not to download music. You need to teach them not to download music OR buy CDs.

yawn

[welshwaterloo]

Dupe

Oh.. wait..

Fair Sentence

[grunt107]

Why can't these 'illegal downloaders' just repay the RIAA with their purchased CDs, like the RIAA got to do?

Of course, the repayment CDs would be chosen by the defendants, just like the RIAA got to do.

Re:Fair Sentence

[bconway]

I think if the people sharing music were forced to pay for CDs equal to the number of songs/songs from one album that people had pirated through them, it would probably be a lot more expensive than the settlement others have been paying.

Re:Fair Sentence

[kenthorvath]

Of course, the repayment CDs would be chosen by the defendants, just like the RIAA got to do.

Exactly, and they would be blank CD-R's from my mom and pop CD-R shop that I charge $1000/piece for. No I never said I actually had one customer who ever bought a CD-R for such, but I value them at $1000 and I'll give a spindle of 100 of said item for settlement, and I'll even throw the spindle in for free (a $5000 value).

Re:Fair Sentence

[EnsilZah]

Wouldn't a closer analogy be the poeple paying with a bunch of stuff they have around the house that they don't need at the price they got it at?

Re:Fair Sentence

[3terrabyte]

Shoplifting CD's from a store wouldn't get you into a $150,000 per infringement fiasco by the RIAA though. Instead, you can 'settle' by pleading guilty to the misdemeanor crime.

This is why...

[MalaclypseTheYounger]

You all need to get your butts over to MEDIACHEST.COM http://www.mediachest.com/ and start trading your music, DVDs, CDs, and Books there.

(This is not a plug, I don't work for them or get paid by them)

Basically, you catalog your collection of stuff using their amazon-like lookup functions, and then other people can search your collections (they find you by Groups, by Zip Code, etc) and then you trade with them any way you want (in person, by mail, etc).

This service is excellent because the RIAA and MPAA and FBI and whomever else cannot I repeat CANNOT get you on law breaking. As the 'swapping' happens offline, they have no way to find out about it.

Please give it a shot, if this website takes off the world be a happier place.

Re:This is why...

[stubear]

"This service is excellent because the RIAA and MPAA and FBI and whomever else cannot I repeat CANNOT get you on law breaking. As the 'swapping' happens offline, they have no way to find out about it."

Ummmm...can you say "Sting Operation" boys and girls? How the hell do you think they catch kiddie porn freaks who try to meet up with kids offline? Do you know you're not setting yourself up to illegally distribute songs offline with a cop of FBI agent?

Re:This is why...

[JWW]

Reselling/giving away your stuff is not stealing. Back a few years the RIAA DID try to stop CD stores from selling used CDs and failed miserably.

There is a rather old case about reselling books that setup this precedent. Basically the onwer of the book can resell it for any price they want. Of course, this is why computer software is LICENSED and you don't actually own it.

Re:This is why...

[the_mad_poster]

Hmm... so your theory is that by posting a public e-mail address unobfuscated, I'll lose yet another public account to spam, or idiots such as yourself, as if I haven't already gone through a dozen publics by now anyway? And, of course, you're forgetting that if I really want another gmail account, I can use one of my remaining invitations to reinvite myself.

Except, my private address, where anything of any concern goes, which you do not know, will continue to function as it always has...

You're a bit of a moron, aren't you? You must be a conservative. Nobody else could possibly be that stupid.

Re:This is why...

[tomhudson]

What the idiot failed to realize is that by posting your gmail addy, all he's doing is helping improve gmail's spam filters :-)

So, as a show of solidarity, I'll post mine unobfuscated too: thudson@gmail.com

Spam away, I won't see most of it - and what I do, will just improve the service.

Circumvent the RIAA

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not pay your favorite artist personally?

Circumvent the managers at the RIAA by letting your software music jukebox manage your favorite artists. This requires a central database listing creative works and the artists who actually made them so that you can donate automatically to your favorite artists.

problem: telling some site what kind of music you have my get you sued as you declare to have illegal music.

solution: give partial hash code (checksum). Site returns say 200 potential hits. You verify for yourself if you have have a copyrighted song 'belonging' to the site. You discard the 199 misses and you use the info about the song to compensate the listed artist directly. This can be done anonymously: "I love your (unspecified) work here is a donation of 20 cents". Artist uses statistics to figure out how to compensate those who helped him with popular creations if the donations rise above thousands of dollars.

So you spend say 300 dollar per year to (automatically) compensate your favorite artists directly without confessing a crime as your jukebox figures out compensation anonymously and you can also donate manually, even though you do not have any works of arts of that artists in your possession, making the system a black box, meaning that donations do not directly indicate illegal possession.

Why pay for distribution? Let's circumvent the RIAA.
--
Dennis SCP

Re:Circumvent the RIAA

[xhorder]

Or one could only buy from non-RIAA labels. See RIAA Radar http://www.magnetbox.com/riaa/ for a cool service to search for independent music. Also... Support metal! \m/

Re:Circumvent the RIAA

[tobybuk]

You should pay all the people who have an interest in the song - this includes the record company as well.

By just selecting who you want to pay, you're denying someone their rights. That's against the law!

It's the same as copying an eBook and just paying the artist. What about the people who spent money and time on preparing, promoting and releasing the eBook?

How much do you pay the artist? Do you decide on what they should get? What if the artist wants more than you are prepared to pay? What if the artist wants you to pay all the other people entitled to their money?

You're living in a dream land where you make excuse after excuse as to why your own version of stealing is OK. Its not.

The only really effective form of protest is to not buy the music. Cannot live without your music? Then you just don't feel strongly enough about it, so just stump up the money and but the friggin CD.

Just what gives you the right to do what you please with someone elses property?

You are an arse.

Kudos.

[Sj0]

Kudos on the inflammatory title. They're not even infringers, they're "Music lovers"! :P

Re:Kudos.

[maximilln]

sharing music is considered copyright infringement in US law

Everyone supports copyrights because they believe it will benefit the artists. It doesn't. The companies own everything the artists produce as soon as a contract is signed.

Copyrights only benefit the corporate tag-alongs and, as such, need to be removed or revised.

"We need to enforce laws to protect the profit of CEOs, VPs, and executives who already have base salaries of multi-millions per year!" Who else agrees?

Re:Kudos.

[Tim C]

It may not be inflammatory exactly, but it's certainly dishonest. The title implies that they were sued because they were music lovers, or perhaps despite being music lovers. It seeks to evoke feelings of pity and empathy - "Hey, I love music too!".

In reality, they were sued for copyright infringement. Whether or not they truly loved the stuff they shared is irrelevant.

Keep it coming

[maximilln]

Dear Mr. Ashcroft,

Please continue turning a blind eye to reality. Please continue to pulverize youngsters for sharing music, which youngsters have done since anyone could copy a tune on a banjo or flute. Please continue to support corporations with broken business models. Please continue to encourage businessmen to neglect the physical realities of their product in favor of government backed enforcement of arbitrary laws.

Some day, all of these evil p2p sharing kiddies will come visit you in the nursing home. Enjoy your power while you've got it. It'll never substitute for intelligence.

Steven

Re:Keep it coming

[richieb]

So when the good musicians give up and find "new jobs" in something other than music, are you really going to enjoy crappy, lo-fi, amatuer music? Remember MP3.com? The one with the business model of giving away music for free? There were some great gems in there, but far and away, most of it was awful. That's what the future of music without payment sounds like.

If you want to see real great musicians working go see a symphony orchestra or visit your local jazz club. Here are people who are working at making music.

The stuff being pushed by the RIAA members is mostly amateur crap that has been "productized" by the "music industry" and marketed to death.

Since when is production of music supposed to be an "industry" anyways? I thought music was art?

There was plenty of music before the record industry and there will be plenty of music after.

When will they learn?

[cecil36]

It was in the article that fans are stating that the decline in CD sales is not due to piracy, but the quality of the music (in terms of performer's talent) being published. It's not mentioned in the article about the cost of CDs being a contributing factor. The RIAA lost a class-action suit for setting CD prices high. When you set a price for something, there is a certain demand for the product at that price level. If there is a significant price increase, the demand will drop off to where only the people who really see value for what they are going to spend will buy.

All the better reason for me not to buy another CD again. Last time I bought one was in '99.

Euphemisms

[essdodson]

"RIAA Sues More Music Lovers"
I guess that sounds a little nicer than the truth. "RIAA Sues More People Who Habitually Break the Law"

Re:Euphemisms

[Evil Adrian]

If you don't like the price of something, then don't buy it -- you don't have any right to take it for free.

Taking something offered for sale without rendering payment is UNJUST.

Re:Euphemisms

[t_allardyce]

I think many countries round the world punish people for breaking the law.. often the law includes gems like "not smoking certain plants or else you get jail", "not saying anything bad about the leader or else you get your tounge cut out" and "not having sex outside marrage or you get stoned to death".
Breaking the law is never ok..

Re:Euphemisms

[wazzzup]

I can't believe you placed laws against stealing music in the same category as slavery. The suffering you incur buy paying $9.99 for an album doesn't even begin to encroach on the suffering slaves endured.

I'm continually amazed how the average person's sphere of awareness drops off dramatically roughly where his nose ends.

Mod me down now, since I haven't defended stealing music. Where this topic is concerned, opposing thought at Slashdot is quickly quashed.

Boycott?

[Glock27]

An effective response to this type of behavior would be to boycott RIAA products.

Sadly, this would probably be trumpeted as "yet more evidence that piracy hurts CD sales".

I don't download music, and I haven't bought a CD in years.

BTW, an interesting alternative is to digitize analog from FM or digital cable, then rip to MP3. It's even legal (VCR law). ;-) You won't notice a quality difference in most situations.

Just don't share.

Re:Boycott?

[Kombat]

BTW, an interesting alternative is to digitize analog from FM or digital cable, then rip to MP3. It's even legal (VCR law). ;-) You won't notice a quality difference in most situations.

Except for the annoying, inane chatter of the DJ at the beginning of the song, and breaking back in at the end, as the song is trailing off. "That was 50 Cent's latest, 'Kill all the white ho's and sell drugs to kids,' off his latest album, 'It's fun to pretend you're a pimp.'"

Why do they do that, anyway? On the radio stations around here, the DJ will be introducing a song, talking about whatever, and the song will start while they're still talking. Just the instrumental part though. The DJ always finishes whatever he's saying just before the lyrics of the song actually start (I'm convinced they have some kind of countdown display that tells them exactly how many seconds are left before the lyrics of the song start). Are they just trying to be smooth, or do you think their license agreements for the songs actually requires them to talk over some portion of the song, to try and discourage exactly the kind of activity you described (i.e., taping the songs off the radio)?

Re:Boycott?

[pjt33]

I believe that in the UK at least they are required to render part of the song useless - start a few seconds in, finish a few seconds early, or talk over part of it. Of course, with patience it's theoretically possible to record a song a few times and either get one with the start trashed and the end okay and one the other way round for splicing or use correlation to filter out the voice.

Misleading headline

[Evil Adrian]

The headline is misleading, and puts an obviously pro-filesharing (pro-piracy?) spin on the whole thing.

It's like if someone was getting mauled by a dog, and another person ran over and killed the dog to save the person, and the headline ran: Man Beats Puppy To Death

A bit misleading, no?

Canada

[tobechar]

As a Canadian, I will do these people justice by using my protected rights to share gigabyte after gigabyte of pirated music.

We need more Canadians to have music 'available' for download. We could really cause a ripple effect in which so many of us can legally provide music to p2p apps, that there would be no way to stop the rest of the world.

I'm going home tonight, making a bunch of torrents for my 100 disc collection of mp3, and making all few thousand singles available on gnutella network.

I propose a rally of all Canadians or any other nation that can legally share music. If you can share music, spend the bandwidth and do it. Lets create so much of a problem that the RIAA is defenseless.

Let's show the RIAA that we are in control.

Re:Canada

[Ubergrendle]

I'd like to point out that it has not been proven whether we have the right to legally share copyrighted music. The point proven in a court of law was that the standard of evidence presented for copyright infringement by the CRIA was insufficient to proceed with copyright infringement charges against individuals (basically the John Doe approach was rejected by Canadian courts).

The argument that 'sharing music online was like a photocopier' was in favour of treating the technology as a neutral medium, and that it was the activities of the users that needed to be questioned. ~Another~ A+ for common sense...

However...

I'm glad that our courts are more prudent and careful with judgements, but I'm less confident that our government will pass laws that are more open than the US. Just take a look at the joke called CRTC...

Re:Canada

[Kombat]

Note that Parliament will be stengthening Canada's copyright laws as soon as the MP's return from summer break. So enjoy it while you can, because it will be made explicitly illegal in Canada shortly.

Not so innocent

[Anonymous Coward]

The RIAA is suing *distributors*, not mere downloading "music lovers". Distributing copyrighted content has never been legal. It's not fair use to serve up a song for download by others.

If some guy is selling ripped CDs on the side of the road that's illegal, just because you're doing it online for free doesn't make you any better.

If they were suing people for downloading a song we'd have something to be outraged about, but people serving the downloads have brought it on themselves.

Re:Not so innocent

[cpghost]

If they were suing people for downloading a song we'd have something to be outraged about, but people serving the downloads have brought it on themselves.

Where do you think do all the wonderful files come from, that you'd be downloading? Isn't it a bit unfair to offload the responsibility onto those who helped you get the files in the first place?

Attacking distributors (and a distributor is everyone participating in a p2p network, including bit torrents) is just easier for RIAA et. al, because: 1. of the typical seeders/leechers ratio, and 2. of legal, formalistic reasons.

So please stop feeling safe and "legal," just because you download files without ever giving anything back to the community from which you got them.

Rate of suing

[EpsCylonB]

Including the 744 from Wednesday, the RIAA has sued nearly 4,700 people since last September in its efforts to combat piracy, which the music industry has blamed for a multiyear decline in CD sales. Some music fans have countered that bad music, and not piracy, was to blame for the decline.

My maths might be wrong but 5000 people sued in year, 2.5 million kazaa users divided by 5000 = 500. So in 500 years time they will have sued everybody. Good luck to em.

patterns..

[t_allardyce]

In the UK we have a similar but different thing, every couple of weeks the police arrest about 100 people around the country under our wonderful new terrorism laws (thank you Blunkett) then about 6 months later 99 of them get released without any charges. oddly around the same time about 4 people are released from concentration camp x-ray and are flown back to the UK where they get questioned for about 24 hours and then released.. without charges.. maybe they're actually filesharing or something?

Re:what is the RIAA again?

[log0n]

A good writer knows that you should never assume your audience can read your mind. When in doubt, elaborate. You may know what the RIAA is and find the info redundant, but don't assume everyone else pulls from the same bank of knowledge as you.

boycott

[Eisenfaust]

I no longer listen to music released under RIAA labels. There is plenty of music out there released under different labels, much of which is better anyway.

I don't support corporations that sue their customers on a regular basis.

Burden of proof

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it illegal to download a digital copy of something that you have already purchased (ie. misplaced it, have on vinyl or on a scratched up CD)?

I am old enough to have 2 large boxes of vinyl. One day I would like to find them online in digital format. And, I have a CD sitting right in front of me that is so scratched that I can not recover the music from it. Am I not entitled to download digital copies of those?

So, if the RIAA comes knocking, where's the burden of proof if you say you already own the music?

Re:Can they keep up?

[kzinti]

If they only sue approx 700 people a month and the net population is growing at a faster rate then can they physically keep up with the explosion of P2P and file sharing?

That depends on how many people are deterred by the lawsuits. I'm not sure about the rate of growth or use of the P2P services, but I'd guess that if filing one lawsuit deters 100,000 people, then they probably can keep up with the rate of growth. If it's 1,000 then maybe. If (as is probably the case) it's fewer than 10, then they would seem to be fighting a losing battle.

I'd also guess that the "discouragement rate" was the highest with the first round of lawsuits, and is diminishing steadily each time.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Dreamworks sues torrent tracker

[Anonymous Coward]

This is what can result when mediacompanies (dreamworks in this case) goes after torrent trackers and warez-traders abroad:

Piratebay response to dreamworks

and how many 9 year olds did they sue this time?

[Jrod5000 at RPI]

kid to teacher: "he stole my lunch money!"
teacher: "who did?"
kid: "that lawyer over there!"

Screw the RIAA. Support Artists Directly

[wackysootroom]

A good way to tell if an album is released by an RIAA member is to use the RIAA Radar website.

It's a good way to boycott the RIAA while still being able to buy CDs.

Simple cure..

[Turn-X Alphonse]

put low quality mp3s for free download (add an advert at the start and the end to hence make money) and let people download them. If they like them then people will goout and buy them.

It's a simple cure AND they get money from selling thr advertising space. Why haven't they tried this yet? They can also track who downloads it, put upa mini survery, whatever is popular they can whore even more.

It's fucking common sense and costs alot less then repeatedly sueing people.. and makes you get a free fans.

Basic legal fact.

[Kjella]

Settling is a lot faster than trial. RIAA has no hurry either, it is the press coverage they seek. The settlements are slump change to the RIAA. Don't expect any rulings for quite some time.

Kjella

Re:Dupe

[Danse]

Sheeesh, this is pretty much a re-post of the same comment a few days ago. First the stories are duped, now comments are getting duped?

A few days ago? Several comments virtually identical to this one have been posted to every RIAA-related story for the last few years.

More rationalizations for being cheap

[CajunArson]

"It's not stealing, only the big evil RIAA loses money!"
I know somebody who is not rich, not an evil RIAA executive, and hell, he doesn't even make music, but he has personally been hurt by P2P file traders who think it's their 'right' to get everything they want for free.
This guy does in depth analysis of political issues and publishes research online that are used by high school and college debate teams. He provides a very valuable service since there would not be enough time to stay abreast of current political issues and also be prepared to debate so his reports act as executive summaries to condense all the garbage floating around on Google.
So what happens to his stuff? Well there are a few people out there who will pay for it, but then P2P kicks in and for every 1 debate team that buys the report there are probably 10 that don't.
"Information wants to be free!" "It's evil to want to get money for your work!" (in which case why do you complain when your job is outsourced?)
This guy is providiing a valuable service, and he does it all on his own, but I'm sure there will be 10 posts rationalizing why stealing his work is OK and he is worse than Bush for daring to charge to make the lives of other people easier.

Re:More rationalizations for being cheap

[wongaboo]

This is an interesting example, but I wonder how your guy knows that file sharing is what is hurting his business. The music industry has complained that P2P has ruined their business but their numbers are going up? I think the recent downturn in music sales might have more to do with the recent dearth of quality pop music. That is just an opinion but so is your friend's opinion that P2P is what is hurting him. And my opinion is also the result found by a harvard study.Any good debater would know that you must back up your opinion with evidence rather than assertion. Does your friend have any evidance directly conecting his drop in business to filesharing?

As a former High School and College debater I am well aware of the usefulness of the type of briefs your friend produces and I recognize that the market is very small. However, I am also well aware that the problems your friend faces existed well before P2P came on the scene. High School and college debate are relatively small communities. These people see each other every weekend and they probably go to camp together over the summer. One of the main activities at summer camps is photo copping useful information. That is the primary motivation for going to camp. We would make sure someone went to camp every summer from our HS team just to be sure we had a copy of all the latest briefs? Did we pay for them? Well the camps are not cheap, but I suppose not. On the other hand no one would go to camp if they didn't come back with two or three decent cases. So maybe it is the camps stealing from your friend rather than the individual debaters (some camps do work very hard to prevent the reproduction of copywriter works but it is very hard to do when you have kids up all night and day at the photocopier).

In short, the photocopier, the word wide web, and plain old sharing (not file sharing) are, in my experience, a greater threat to your friend's livelihood. And I know it to be a fact. Your friend chooses to blame P2P but how does he know?

My Analysis

[Ckwop]

I'm going to use the 5 step approach that Schneier utilises in Beyond Fear to analyse security decisions. Hope you enjoy this analysis. I don't have the book to hand so I'm not sure i've got the steps spot on but it's close enough.

What assets are you trying to protect? The profitability of copyrighted music.

What are the threats to your assets? The biggest threat to profitability is the very large levels of copyright infringement. This is such a massive risk that considering any other threat to profitability is a waste of time at this stage.

What is the proposed countermeasure? Suing random copyright infringers.

How does the countermeasure mitigate the risks? The idea is that by suing random copyright infringers you instill fear in people who are more risk adverse. They don't want to be slapped with a large fine so they'd rather pay for the record. There are a number of questions that need to be asked. Firstly, how many people does this approach really scare off? Secondly, How much revenue is it likely to recover? Let's say for every person sued 10 people decide not to infringe and go out and buy the record and each record brought a record for $3. Then the revenue brought in would be $2232. The cost of the legal action would be more than the revenue recieved. Even if 100 people were dissuaded for every infringer sued this would only increase to $223,320. You'd likely make a profit over the cost of the legal action but it'd be small and you've not really done much damage to the millions of remaining pirates. In light of this analysis, I don't think this counter-measure mitigates the risk.

What side-effects does the proposed counter-measure produce? People generally don't like to buy from a company that likes to sue its user base so public relations may be damaged. A side-effect of particular note is people boycotting your products. In those circumstances you've the lost sales as a direct result of deploying the counter-measure - a very bad situation.

Is the trade-off worth it? This step is always subjective but I think the counter measure is meritless given the damage to public image, the small amount of money recovered from most of the infringers and the small amount of people who actually stop downloading as a result of the legal action. The RIAA should consider other counter-measures.

Simon.

YRO Bingo

[Stiletto]

With all these YRO articles lately, I think it's time for some...

Your Rights Online BINGO

Download the card, print it out, and play!

Easy and fun: Every time someone comments about something in a box, or somethin g happens that matches an illustration, check off the box. You win if you can c onnect a full row, column or diagonal!

None of the examples you've given are the same...

[AzrealAO]

people are taking the fruits of his labour.

Blacksmiths are no longer in high demand because technology has left the blacksmiths products behind. Which is substantially different than people simply taking the fruits of the blacksmiths labour without paying for it.

In this guys example, his product is in high demand, (if 10 debate teams use the report for every 1 that actually buys it) people just refuse to pay for it.

Just as music is clearly in high demand if the volume of music trading that goes on on the various P2P networks is any indication, people are just taking the product without paying for it. That's not a change in business model, that's wholesale 'theft' of a product.

RIAA sues music THIEVES [headline correction]

[curtisk]

True enough they may be music lovers, but I doubt thats what the lawsuit states, "you are hearby being charged with loving music"

Talk about overly slanted editing! LMAO

Hey, I love $$ CASH $$, so if I get take to some whenever I want by circumventing laws and protections that are in place, thats cool right, since I just *luv* cash money?!

I think the RIAA is heavy handed, but jesus criminey that headline is piss-poor!

Countersue the RIAA?

[Anonymous Coward]

I recently devised a plan that would turn the RIAA's methods of searching for copyright infringement against them. Anyone think this would work?

RIAA Honeypot:
1) Create thousands of MP3 files with names of songs of popular bands that are under RIAA labels. However, make these MP3s contain nothing but dead air, or possibly you talking about the song. Make sure the "songs" are the correct time and comparable sizes. Also, if you own any real MP3s, take any media that holds or ever held the data and hide it away, possibly in a safety deposit box or some other long-term storage.
2) Log onto Kazaa and any other services that are being targeted. Stay on for a long time. Try to get sued.
3) When sued, willingly give your computer over as evidence.
4) In court, demand that each of these "songs" be played.
4a) Alternate: When they dismiss the suit once they get their hands on the "evidence", go to step 5.
5) When the suit is dismissed, file a countersuit for barratry, defamation, time lost due to having to deal with court, problems due to lack of a computer, etc. Make the dollar amount large enough that it'll damage them.
6) Profit. Encourage others to repeat.

It'd take a lot of work, but the payoff could be worth it.

In other news...

[Call Me Black Cloud]

Police are now arresting money lovers.

I think we need some clarification here...

[EmagGeek]

The RIAA is filing these lawsuits against people whom they allege traded songs copyrighted by RIAA **MEMBER LABELS**...

There are plenty of copyrighted songs floating around out there by people who are not RIAA members, or don't even care that it is happening, or in fact encourage it.

There are lots of taper-friendly bands who, while owning the copyright for their own songs, love it when fans trade recordings of live shows, etc...

I think it's time to start grouping these RIAA-member artists with the RIAA. I dislike the generalization that the RIAA somehow has legal authority over ALL copyrighted content, whether or not they represent the artist in questions, and whether or not the artist even cares.

Re:"RIAA Sues More Music Lovers"

[east coast]

I was under the impression that the RIAA was only suing people that pirate music, not people who love music enough to actually pay for it instead of stealing it.

Yeah, the people who paid thousands to build a decent collection and, as part of a price fixing law suit, got less than the cost of a CD in return. That sounds pretty fair to me. Not to say that justifies piracy but I feel the public is more sympathetic towords Joe Sixpack than a multi-million (if not billion) dollar organization that produces nothing but lawsuits and sales charts. What a racket. The RIAA should have spent more time examining fair business practices and educating record labels to the dark side of price gouging. Anytime you make something so expensive you're going to create a black market.

Perhaps piracy wouldn't be such an issue if the music industry played on a level playing field all along. Too bad, the cat's out of the bag now and neither side is going to stop. If anything the RIAA has more of a chance of being taken down for shady practices. It's millions versus one.

Re:Suing over Bit Torrent...

[kryptkpr]

I'm going to debunk this once and for all..

Disclaimer: IAABCA (I _AM_ A BitTorrent Client Author)

It is -trivially- easy for the *AA to get
a) your IP
b) what files you're downloading
c) how much you've downloaded
d) how much you've uploaded

And they can do all this without ever connecting to your computer ... IP blockers are -USELESS- in this case, the Azerus people are wasting their time creating a false sense of security for their users.

All the above information is gained from the tracker level. Many even have a nice web-based interface to this information. (See, for example, here, login may be required)

If you're in a country where P2P is illegal (I'm in Canada, all my development and downloading goes on here, and so far the consumer is winning the war here) then don't download illegal material with BT, they're watching, and there's nothing you can do.

Regarding the guy who said "just don't upload and they can't do anything".. BT works on tit-for-tat. You send a block, you get (usually) 3 back. Sometimes a client will take pity on you, and send you a free block (to test how fast it can send to you, and if you will send back or not). In other words.. no uploading == very, very slow downloading, if any at all, which negates the purpose of BT.

BitTorrent is NOT a protocl for spreading w4r3z. It is for spreading large legitimate files in a situation where the author doesn't have access to the resources to spread the files himself.

Re:Music Lovers?

[A_Known_Coward]

What about music I "licensed" in the past? I have never been able to find that Led Zeppelin III LP I bought in 1983?

I mean, since I DID license the music when I bought the record, shouldn't I be able to download those songs legally?

It's not like I'm asking the record company to incur any additional distribution costs since I'd be downloading it via KaZaa.

But you will always share what you download...

[Penguinisto]

"I think that the cases here are for people sharing music, not the ones downloading, that is relatively easier to find than people downloading."

Just one prblem - while you download a song, you are also sharing it.Even if you download it and immediately remove it from your shared folder/directory, you're still sharng the thing while downloading, even if only from the temp directory where the file is being stored for assembly.

Some P2P systems, such as BitTorrent, in fact rely on this very thing to exist at all.

/P

Excellent Post.

[KrisHolland]

Really a good post, but the pest part is this, I laughted out loud.

"The government is not their personal Guido."

I also agree that copyright infrindgement is an artifical crime. Copyright property is a state-sponsored temporary monopoly which creates a scarcity which does not correspond to any state in reality. An *artifical* scarcity which does not exist or would exist except as created by law.

woohoo!

[N3wsByt3]

744 people sued!

Only 4.326.849 P2P users to go!

Which Networks?

[havoc]

We should turn this discussion towards a more proactive topic... Does anyone know which networks were targeted by the RIAA? Was any one network targeted more than the others? Which P2P is best for sharing with the least chance of getting caught? Are there any tools, services, or procedures one can use to reduce the chance of being caught? These are all good questions that we should be discussing.

Re:what is the RIAA again?

[DominoTree]

About RIAA:
RIAA (RECORDING INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the first organization which gathers GREEDY BASTARDS from all over America and abroad for one common goal - being GREEDY BASTARDS.

Are you GREEDY ?
Are you a BASTARD ?
Are you a GREEDY BASTARD ?

If you answered "Yes" to all of the above questions, then RIAA (RECORDING INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) might be exactly what you've been looking for!
Join RIAA (RECORDING INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) today, and enjoy all the benefits of being a full-time RIAA member.
RIAA (RECORDING INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA) is the fastest-growing GREEDY BASTARD community with THOUSANDS of talentless members all over United States of America and the World! You, too, can be a part of RIAA if you join today!

Why not? It's quick and easy - only 3 simple steps!

• First, you have to obtain a copy of HOW TO CREATE SHIT CONTENT AND SELL IT FOR LOTS OF MONEY and read it.
• Second, you need to succeed in creating an album (quality is not important)
• Third, you need to apply to the official RIAA membership council and wait for approval.

Book Analogy

[Long-EZ]

I haven't seen this analogy in the many RIAA stories I've read, but given the petabytes of online RIAA discussions, this is probably not new.

Computers have made it an easy matter to scan books and redistribute them. There are high speed scanners, good optical character recognition software, and plenty of bandwidth to simply distribute an entire book as a collection of graphics instead of rendering them back into text.

But book copyrights are seldom violated in the US, and almost never violated using PC technology. Why? Readers are more law abiding than music enthusiasts? Readers are too lazy to scan a book? Or is it because people resent the record companies' graft, corruption and excessive profiteering?

The abuses of the RIAA companies are well known. They include payola (paying radio DJs and station managers cash or coccaine to play their records), addicting artists to drugs to control them, and charging $20 for a CD that costs them $1 for the plastic, paper and distribution. The only place this sort of weasel behavior is remotely close to book publishing is the textbook marketing racket, which could teach the Mafia a thing or two about profit margins and market share.

The RIAA and John Ashcroft are legally in the right on this, even if it is difficult to agree with them on general principles, and it's difficult to respect a law that protects such weasels. I'll throw my lot in with the others who say, "Vote with your wallet. Don't buy RIAA products. Lobby your favorite bands to leave RIAA companies and make it financially viable for them to do so."

Geeks continue to compare SCO and the RIAA. At first, they seem like completely different issues, but there are some definite similarities. Both have outdated business models, both are weasels who prefer to fight in court than embrace new technology and profit from it, and both are making a lot of noise right now but will soon be insignificant footnotes in the history of technology.

This thread condensed here:

[slappyjack]

Headline: The RIAA sued people again. Those dicks.

Comment 1: FIRST POST!

Comment 2: Man, the music industry sucks.

Comment 3: Its illegal. period

Comment 3a: STFU, dink.

Comment 4: if albums didn't suck, people would buy them instead of downloading the songs thay like

Comment 4a: can someone send me the new Modest Mouse album?

Comment 5: I hate rich musicians, because they're rich

Comment 6: [ something about gay niggers that ususally gets modded out of existence ]

Comment 7: its all the fault of the government, because theyre clueless

Comment 8: You cannot stop technology. Technology is legion.

- - - -

You can now go read another article.

enough of the lawsuit count, guys.