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Kazaa Trial In Australia Underway
wadiwood writes "Five record companies are suing the makers of Kazaa. Sharman (moved to vanuatu in Feb 2004) say they are not responsible for what their users do with the software.
Personally I don't get what Sony is doing selling MP3 players for all your "favourite tunes" and then selling music which they say you are not allowed to copy to their MP3 players, but that's another story."
Yea, Sony is a little mysterious that way! One would think it could recoup some music losses thru its hardware sales. W00T!
My Favourite Meme
you mean that a corporation is greedy and realizes that they can make more money by screwing over as many people as they can? wow... as for kazaa, it's very obvious that most P2P networks are there solely to get illegal stuff (music, movies, etc), but proving it in court will be a totally different matter.
President Bush Supporter
This would seem to be inconsistent.. unless, you know, you actually took a moment to think about it.
Sony has some online music service where they do not allow you (vis a vis the linked to licensing agreemnet) to copy the songs to other players. Fine. If you dont like that, DONT USE THE SERVICE. The consequences of this licensing proviso has been factored in to the "supply and demand" equation for the service offering.
On the other hand, it has been shown that you are welcome to take your purchased sony CD-ROMs and make Mp3s for them for your personal use on your sony MP3 players or whatnot. It has been pretty much universally acknowledged that as long as its for your own personal use, this is a privilege that you get with your physical CD purchase and this has likewise been "supply / demanded" in to the price offering.
Why is it so hard to understand that one company might offer two different levels of service / product at different prices?
Two different departments/subsidiaries/legal companies often have competing interests with competing executives...the old ignorant left hand problem. It's impossible for a large corp to be consistant accross all entities since they have competing interests at various times and are run by different people. Add in your average dose of corporate politics and general large company ineptness and it's shocking that any company of any consequence at all doesn't contradict itself daily.
As for the rest of it...it's just a fight for the few remaining profits in a changing industry. Once there's no profit left in the standard model or there is more in the digital music distribution models Sony and everyone else will adapt to the new environment. If you want it to happen faster don't buy any music. If you're comfortable with the general level of silliness proceed...either way it's only a matter of time be for the distribution of artistic media changes dramatically.
Yes, but it's not legal to circumvent the DRM on the discs to rip them . . . . .
Only in a Slashdot fantasy can a Slackware install turn into several hours of sex . . . . .
This sort of argument gets very tiresome across the years. It's the gun's fault when someone shoots their neighbor. It's the car's fault when a wife drives over their husband. It's the alcohol's fault when someone shoots themself. It's the marijuana's fault when you sadistically abuse people.
CornNUTS! It's pure fluff.
People who "incorrectly" use a product are liable, not the makers.
On a side note, sales typically go up as the trend of piracy does. Why settle for MP3s when you can hear it on MP3 first, then go and get the CD which has the harder-to-find songs, plus sounds better to boot? Or at least, when you can afford it? Some of us can't from time to time, but plan to when we can.
There's nothing neater than when that little CD spins up, and U2's "Staring At The Sun" (or otherwise your favorite song..) knocks ALL of the stuff off of your walls and shelves.
"A Goddess rarely smiles for she is forced by others to be an island unto herself." - Zephiris
Wow.. 100 million people use Kazaa.. I think they've put suits out against approx. 4,000 people now? What percentage of 100 million is 4,000? 00.004%? Yeesh. How unlucky do you have to be to be sued by the RIAA? *cringes*
"hey, could you pass me a paper towel? er.. I mean... DEPLOY ABSORBTION PANEL!"
Ok, what the hell does that have to do with the stated news article about suing Shaman Networks? More news, less uninformed opinion please? Nah - too much to ask.
Personally I don't get what Sony is doing selling MP3 players for all your "favourite tunes" and then selling music which they say you are not allowed to copy to their MP3 players, but that's another story."
It's pretty simple, isnt' it? Not all your favorite tunes are from Sony; thus, you can pirate the songs from other labels, but not from Sony. Sony gets to sell more players than ATRAC3 players alone (ka-ching!) and still gets to prevent people from copying their music (ka-ching!).
It's all about money!
Is that if they claim billions of dollars lost from piracy, then why are these losses not spelled out in their tax forms?
no
Forever time with this "If you don't like it, don't buy it" argument.
No. If they don't like it, they don't have to sell it. I am tired of being an unpaid enforcer of their policies. Fact of the mater is they are introducing a product with an immature technology for protecting their interests. So they impose upon mine. Licensing be damned: I don't tell them how to spend the money used to purchase their product, so quit telling me how to use the product. If you don't like what I am going to do with a product, perhaps you shouldn't have sold it to me. Why should the onus be strictly upon me?
I have to imagine basic piracy is also factored into the equation of their product offering (as well as buying off members of congress to pass legislation favorable to them). And for all the rampart piracy, they still continue to bring products to the market (albeit in crippled form). The terms of the licensing is just a means for them to keep collecting revenue while crying foul all-the-while. If I stopped payment on a check until they agreed to all of my terms of use, I doubt you'd be as sympathetic.
EULAs, Steam, RIAAA; perhaps they should have researched to whom they are selling to instead of taking the money and bitching about it afterwards.
That exception doesn't extend to the provisions against distributing software to get around said copy restriction software. It might be legal to use DeCSS for fair use, but it's illegal to give it to others or receive if from others.
This kind of makes the fair use exception of the DMCA useless.
The DMCA is contradictory on this point. It does state that it won't be construed to change fair use concepts. But it also states, quite clearly, that copyright measures cannot be circumvented. It's not clear which section controls. One would hope the rules of statutory construction (particularly, a bias toward non-contradictory interpretation) would favor the former - i.e., implicitly, one may break copyright enforcement measures in furtherance of fair use - but this is not at all clear.
Also: The DMCA criminalizes some activity that isn't fair use, but that must fairly be permitted. For instance, reverse-engineering for commercial purposes is not typically regarded as fair use, but has been tolerated in the interest of market competition. Lexmark comes to mind here, in its attempt to assert the DMCA against a company that reverse-engineered its printer hardware in order to produce non-Lexmark-branded (and infinitely cheaper) toner cartridges. Of course, Lexmark lost that suit, but the ruling was quite limited to the field of access/lockout codes.
- David Stein
Computer over. Virus = very yes.
... would be if they ALSO sued the US Postal Service . How many bootlegged Metallica tracks did they aid and abet?
UTF-8: There and Back Again
Yeah... "technically savvy enough". That's such a hugely grey area that it's not even funny. Indeed, the DMCA is basically trying to prohibit anyone from sharing any information or technology which could make anyone else "technically savvy enough" to do so, which basically means that they better start outlawing computer science classes in University.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'