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Norwegian Student Ordered to Pay for Hyperlinks to Music

Posted by michael on from the aiding-and-abetting dept.

Stephan writes "The AP reports that Norway's Supreme Court ruled Thursday that a student whose Napster.no homepage (no relation to the U.S. Napster, apparently) had links to free Internet music files must compensate the music industry. The around 170 links to mp3s will cost its creator $15,900. In a summary of its ruling, the supreme court said the music was clearly published in violation of copyright law. An unofficial English translation of the Court of Appeal decision (earlier in the case) provided by the lawyer of the defendant and more information on the case can be found at the Links & Law Website."

46 of 580 comments (clear)

  1. *Bang* by Bigthecat · · Score: 5, Insightful
    And with a mighty pop, the number 1 excuse behind hosting Torrents fizzles.

    In Norway at least.

    1. Re:*Bang* by FuzzyDaddy · · Score: 3, Insightful
      I would argue that the torrent is linking to the files. Just like an html hyperlink, it provides software running on your machine a way to get a given file. I mean, the hyperlink was probably no more than 30 characters long, but functionally "published" the files, according to the court.

      --
      It's not wasting time, I'm educating myself.
    2. Re:*Bang* by Bigthecat · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Anyway it isn't the same thing. They link to a torrent, which is a harmless ~10kb piece of data. What the user does with the torrent is none of the web-site owner's business, and if the data is fed through the right programs the programs can connect to another site which can give links to where it may be downloaded. But the torrent sites aren't linking to the actual files.

      It's all great that that's the way you think it should be, but the point is that these decisions are occuring now. Somehow I don't think that there are going to be many who would decide that linking is infringement, but then split hairs over whether linking to a torrent that basically links to the file is infringement.

      Think like a layperson. The question is: Will clicking on this link get you illegal content?, and wonder if the courts are going to get into semantics over it.

      Like that myth that posting that the site is for 'educational purposes' or that no law enforcement officials are allowed to enter is going to stop someone from getting caught hosting a Warez site, so will this for the Torrent community.

    3. Re:*Bang* by Bigthecat · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Except that the torrent tracking sites don't expressly know that the files represent a copyright infringement. In this case the person was linking to files he knew (and evidently could be proven that he knew) would be illegal to download.

      However; when there's infringing content constantly on the front page of the tracking site and asking almost any user why they're going there leads to the obvious answer, I don't know which court isn't going to make the leap of logic.

      It's all well and good to cut things down into semantics, but when every man and his dog on the net knows a particular torrent tracking site as 'the source' for infringing content, it's a little hard to believe that the person(s) spending their money, designing and running the site aren't just as aware. Courts are smarter than many seem to think; and little schemes like this may sound great for getting out of legal hassles on the 'net, but when it comes to that silent courtroom where dozens of people are intently listening on every semantic of what is said, I don't think it has much of a hope of holding up.

    4. Re:*Bang* by Rei · · Score: 2, Insightful

      > They link to a torrent, which is a harmless ~10kb piece of data

      Amusing. Do you honestly view it that way? A torrent has one purpose, and one purpose alone: getting the file(s) associated with it. What, are you going to print it out and put it on your wall?

      What you said is like claiming "Oh, I just purchased and installed a bulk emailing tool, and bought a list of a million emails, but I had absolutely no intent to send spam... you see, this tool and the email list aren't themselves spam, they're just pieces of data."

      Heck, your argument could be applied to digitized music itself. "It's not copyrighted music! It's just a harmless couple megs of block compressed cosine waveforms! Who cares that it *stands for* the music in question, and *allows you* to reproduce the original...."

      --
      We also have a halon fire extinguisher. Its always nice to have a fire extinguisher that kills people around.
    5. Re:*Bang* by Jim_Maryland · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If this were about say drugs instead of music, would a person still be held accountable?

      Example...

      Lets say a friend asked me where to find some crack and I tell him to check the corner of 4th Avenue and Jefferson Street. How would I be charged in this case? Should I be charged? How about if I have absolutely no ties to the person/area I send the person?

      Is telling a person where to obtain something illegal in itself illegal?

      Likely this guy knew exactly what he was linking to and if illegal, he should be punished, but I would like to think it wouldn't be nearly as bad as the people actually hosting the illegal content. From what I've seen, the fines this guy faces exceed those mentioned in other settlements to the RIAA (yes, I realize these are settlements not fines).

    6. Re:*Bang* by Rei · · Score: 1, Insightful

      A direct hyperlink to a music file is a lot more than directing them to the general vicinity of a place where you may or may not be able to get it. In your crack analogy, it would be as if you took their money and came back with the crack and handed it to them.

      --
      We also have a halon fire extinguisher. Its always nice to have a fire extinguisher that kills people around.
    7. Re:*Bang* by gowen · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Yes. Nearly all those things are contributory infringement, under US copyright law. Knowingly helping other people to commit crimes is almost always a crime itself.

      --
      Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
    8. Re:*Bang* by Bigthecat · · Score: 4, Insightful
      If this were about say drugs instead of music, would a person still be held accountable? Example...

      Hasn't it connected yet? Haven't you guys figured it out? Copyright isn't being considered the same as most other things. Look at the decisions that have been made. Decisions such as this get made, and somebody uses an analogy as to why it shouldn't agree, they get modded, people are merry, but that doesn't change the simple facts: This is the decision for this region, for now it is law, and an analogy won't change that. It is what it is.

      If you'd wanted a killer analogy, you should have used the old 'Gee, if I find some links to illegal stuff on Google then they'd get nailed'.

      And there's the problem: The Slashdot crowd seems to think that these courts and legislators are not only stupid, but have to be tied to a stupid set of rules. Make an analogy that paints it in a different light and it's all better; but if you think that they have to think in terms of these broad analogies e.g. 'Oh gee, it's only a link, people have links everywhere, therefore this site can't be specifically geared towards directing people to illegal content'. These people know perfectly well 'what is going on' and who to target, and making an analogy that may have some merit for people they aren't targetting isn't going to achieve anything. When making decisions such as these they don't have to reflect on the universe of possibilities of what may happen with ludicrous interpretations of it, because in the end they're simply going after the people categorising and making a service that points to infringing content.

      At exactly what stage are you people going to realise that they know what the popular methods are for getting illegal content, and that they're not going to be fooled by a legitimate file here and there that 'some guy on the net' thinks will make a person with a lifetime of experience an utter moron and not realise it?

      And the 'anti-copyright rights movement' wonders why decisions keep being made against their cause with laughable arguments that seem based on the idea that every person in the RIAA, MPAA, any court, etc. doesn't know how to turn on a computer. People constantly scream about how 'copying isn't stealing' and these computer and Internet processes are unique and are misunderstood and not realistically covered under conventional laws: Well guess what guys, this is why all of your analogies aren't worth they time spent typing them out, because the other side realises this also, and hence why these decisions for modern-day technologies are different when put in a traditional environment. You're getting something you asked for and something you didn't; and that something you didn't is the understanding that the courts and the legislators aren't as computer illiterate as you once imagined and they are creating decisions that wrap around a new environment for copyright protection.

    9. Re:*Bang* by Kierthos · · Score: 2, Insightful

      If the person you told were a minor, you would be contributing to the delinquency of a minor. If they're not, it's possibly criminal facilitation of a felony.

      IANAL. But I watch Law & Order regularly. :P

      Kierthos

      --
      Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
    10. Re:*Bang* by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I dont want to argue that the current way how copy right is handled is correct.

      But this:

      In other words, the "Intellectual Property" "laws" are nothing but a conspiracy by a cabal of crooks and idiots aimed to entrich themselves at the expense of the entire human race.
      is nonsense.

      And your further conclusions are nonsense as well.

      Material property, what is that? A car, a house, a real estate? So if you own real estate, and you grow crops on it? Who owns the crops? You! Right?
      If under the earth on your real estate is ore, or oil, and you dig it out, who owns it? You! Right?
      If you take mud from your ground and form a statuett who owns it? You! Right?

      And now the quantum leap: if you write a story .... who owns it? At roman times, where you reffer to, no one owned it. Everybody could "use" it and "make it to money". With the result that the "inventor" rarely made any money and barely could make a living.

      Intellectual property makes a person who has nothing but his mind equal to any other person who has property, be it money, land or resources. Its NOT AGAINST humanity to have intellectual property laws. Its a basic human right that my ideas are MINE, that my work is MINE. If we had no laws, the people with the money had EVERYTHING. With no money you can't compete with them.

      And now come up with a schema which gets rid of the inappropriated parts of current IP laws. But abolishing it just means that the rich reign us .... and that the poor never can get any stance.

      angel'o'sphere

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    11. Re:*Bang* by IgnoramusMaximus · · Score: 3, Insightful
      is nonsense.

      Let's see.

      Material property, what is that? A car, a house, a real estate? So if you own real estate, and you grow crops on it? Who owns the crops? You! Right? If under the earth on your real estate is ore, or oil, and you dig it out, who owns it? You! Right? If you take mud from your ground and form a statuett who owns it? You! Right?

      Right. All of these are examples of property, since they have the following characteristics: they are physical objects that can occupy only one unique location in space and can be used by a person or group of persons ("the owners") who would lose the use of the said items if someone were to take them to another physical location i.e. "commit theft" (this of course does not apply to land unless you are in possession of a planet moving device).

      And now the quantum leap: if you write a story .... who owns it? At roman times, where you reffer to, no one owned it. Everybody could "use" it and "make it to money". With the result that the "inventor" rarely made any money and barely could make a living.

      This is a crucial piece of evidence here indicating that you have lost all perspective and are totally in the clutches of greed-worshippers. The actual truth is that the inventors did make fortunes if they were good at making fortunes from their inventions, but more importantly, most of them invented not because they wanted to get rich but because they were people who wanted to invent things from an intrinsic need to discover and improve things. This is the fallacy of the corporatist arguments. A worshipper of greed can only understand people as long as they are motivated exclusively by money. Money is a factor in people's lives but very few of us would go into science or art for the money and still could call themselves "scientists" or "artists". The argument you are making applies only to corporations, whereby the actual inventors who do it for the love for inventing are employees and the owner of the invention is the corporation. Corporations are indeed motivated exclusively by money.

      This ludicrous argument of greed is of course is far more acute in the area of arts. I am sure Plato wrote out of greed. Shakespeare did it because he wanted to own a theatre chain. Mozart was composing out of love of gold. Etc. In fact, no artist does it for money. The definition of art is a search of way of expression of internal state of mind of an artist so that he/she can communicate it to other people. Money is a distantly remote factor, only useful as far as granting the artist tools for expression. That is why music and film "industries" aren't. An idea of an art "industry" is a perversion akin to having a "ministry of love". And just like Orwell predicted, terms such as "music industry" and "intellectual property" are made to obscure the truth and tilt the discussion towards the greed mongers by framing the issue in their terms.

      Intellectual property makes a person who has nothing but his mind equal to any other person who has property, be it money, land or resources. Its NOT AGAINST humanity to have intellectual property laws. Its a basic human right that my ideas are MINE, that my work is MINE. If we had no laws, the people with the money had EVERYTHING. With no money you can't compete with them.

      This is absolutely untrue. If it were so, no progress could have occured. The primodial caveman would demand that the idea of a "wheel" is his and his inhereitants until the end of time. An idea of a language. Alphabet. Numbers. All of these were brought to the world by people who were furthering the human race. If they were anything like you and yelled "Mine! Its all fucking Mine! Yeaa! Gimme! Gimme!" we would still be using stone tools to hunt. Furthermore, none of the ideas we have lives in vacuum. In order to learn we need the language (someone's property according to you), written symbols to read (someones else's property), numbers, formulas, physical discoverie

  2. He only gave LINKS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful


    He only provided the links and didn't host any of the files? What a sad day for freedom on the net. Soon it will be a crime to link to bittorrent or eMule's respective homepages.

    1. Re:He only gave LINKS by harlows_monkeys · · Score: 1, Insightful
      He only provided the links and didn't host any of the files? What a sad day for freedom on the net.

      What is sad about it? Before the net came along, purposefully going out and helping people do things that were wrong or against the law was considered to be a bad thing to do.

      I see this as completely orthogonal to any issues of freedom on the net.

    2. Re:He only gave LINKS by Kiryat+Malachi · · Score: 2, Insightful

      He didn't.

      *Links* to external content.

      That's like someone who says "Hey, I hear you can pick up hookers on 8 mile!" being arrested for aiding prostitution.

      --

      ---
      Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
      (I read with sigs off.)
    3. Re:He only gave LINKS by Catbeller · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Robbing the state of California of untold billions of dollars, as Enron did, was illegal. I see the White House covering for them, prosecution nearly nonexistent, the governor who opposed Enron ousted from office by the White House and replaced with an Enron supporter selected by the White House.

      Point to a song, get nailed. Steal billions, go free, and you get to choose a new governor who's yer best bud.

      The law is an ass. Little smurfs get destroyed for disobeying laws bought by rich men, and rich men steal billions without consequence. The trouble with stupid, mean little laws is that people lose respect for the institution after observing such service for the wealthy and torture for the small.

    4. Re:He only gave LINKS by iamacat · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Don't steal copyrighted music, don't get sued into oblivion.

      He didn't steal anything, he just pointed out where other people are infringing copyright. The music industry should get their fine in the form of information on how to get a photocopy of $15,900.

    5. Re:He only gave LINKS by Lodragandraoidh · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You make a good point - what if I do a google search and come up with the same link as the person who was prosecuted for this. Whould google be responsible for compensation to the RIAA? And how in the world are you going to filter out all the 'legal' and 'illegal' content links for literally trillions of urls?

      I don't think this will hold up in the long run - because it seems like all these lower court rulings are stupidly attacking the very fabric of the internet itself - instead of focussing on the real culprit (who provides the content, versus who points to it). You should be able to point to any url without fear of prosecution. It is the responsibility of the site that contains the actual content to ensure that it is appropriate for external dissemination.

      This is equivalent to me being arrested for giving someone directions to a house - "where is 5555 Green Lane?". It just so happens that the owners are doing something illegal - so I am culpible too? I don't think so.

      --

      Lodragan Draoidh
      The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it. - Mark Twain
    6. Re:He only gave LINKS by That's+Unpossible! · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I see the White House covering for [Enron]

      You do? Where?

      prosecution nearly nonexistent

      Come again?

      the governor who opposed Enron ousted from office by the White House and replaced with an Enron supporter selected by the White House

      Do you have proof that this replacement is related to Enron, or is this just causation without correlation?

      Steal billions, go free, and you get to choose a new governor who's yer best bud.

      Which of those that stole billions are "going free"? They are either already sentences, awaiting sentencing, or awaiting their trial. Trials take time, especially in humongously complex cases like this one.

      The law is an ass. Little smurfs get destroyed for disobeying laws bought by rich men, and rich men steal billions without consequence.

      I find it humorous that you are comparing US law, which is prosecuting the Enron hustlers you are referring to, with Norway's law, which is doing the "smurf destroying."

      --
      Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
  3. Break the law, face the charges. by pstreck · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm all for free information exchange, but if the copyright holder want's compensated for it that's his/her choice. We must learn to work with the artists and record industry, along with the movie industry and others, instead of against them. We have our rights and so do they. So can we stop complaining about this and start coming up with productive solutions to media rights and drm.

    --

    Later,
    Phil
    1. Re:Break the law, face the charges. by baudilus · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You are correct in that the copyright holder has the right to seek compensation for his/her work, but they don't have a right seek it from people who aren't using their work. Imagine getting sued by the RIAA because you told a few friends where they can find a guy selling bootleg CDs... that's just plain stupid. Go after the bootlegger, by all means, but you can't really go after someone for KNOWING the bootlegger; that is frivolous.

    2. Re:Break the law, face the charges. by eln · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Hi,

      You would have a valid point if this guy had actually been hosting the content, but he was only LINKING to it. The idea that someone can be held responsible for the contents of pages that he links to can, if adopted by other countries outside of Norway, destroy the very nature of the World Wide Web.

      The Web is, at its core, a mesh of interlinked pages. Pages that you control link to pages that you do not control. What if I linked to an innocuous site that was later hijacked and used to host kiddy porn? Should I be arrested? Am I to be held responsible for a site I have no control over changing its content just because I linked to it?

      This decision has enormous implications for the future of the Web in Norway, and all of those implications are bad.

    3. Re:Break the law, face the charges. by Sanity · · Score: 2, Insightful
      I'm all for free information exchange, but if the copyright holder want's compensated for it that's his/her choice.
      Can't have it both ways. Copyright relies on preventing the free exchange of information.

      In this case the guy didn't even make content available, he just told people where they can find it.

      So can we stop complaining about this and start coming up with productive solutions to media rights and drm.
      The solution to DRM is not to buy any product that includes it.
    4. Re:Break the law, face the charges. by pstreck · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Whether it's a link, or hosting he is still acting as a gateway to the pirated files. I don't think you should be allowed to link to pirated files, why should you? And the reason that a lot of the bit torrent sites are getting torn down is because it has become a haeven for pirated software. I found more torrent trackers with illegal content them on the google than I found legit. The biggest problem with bit torrent is the lack of drm. It's a neccesity now, not an option.

      --

      Later,
      Phil
    5. Re:Break the law, face the charges. by mcc · · Score: 5, Insightful

      We must learn to work with the artists and record industry, along with the movie industry and others, instead of against them.

      Why?

      Let's say I don't give a shit how much money the RIAA makes, and in fact do not generally support them or their artists because I consider music from independent sources to be superior.

      However, I do demand that I have the right to not face legal repercussions for something I type, and I do expect as a customer that if I buy a piece of audio equipment I am not restrained from exercising my fair use rights with it.

      I don't see any way to "work with" the RIAA in this situation??

      The RIAA has demonstrated they certainly aren't willingly going to compromise in terms of giving up some control over the exact nature of distribution in order to take advantage of new technology; I don't see why I should "compromise" rights I've had since birth so a music cartel whose products I mostly don't like can feel better about themselves. Saying "they have their rights" does not justify that they are using the scapegoat of digital music distribution to lay claim to new and unjust new rights, and you are apologizing for them.

      --
      Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
    6. Re:Break the law, face the charges. by Rei · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yeah, but what were the links like? I mean, intent is pretty darn easy to prove if the links were, say:

      Metallica - Enter Sandman (note: not a real link)

      Now, if the links were, say:

      My friend Jeff's music collection (note: not a real link) ... he might actually have an argument. Now, illegal data on Jeff's machine, especially in the top level directory, was found timestamped from before the linker made the link, "plausible deniability" would be a much harder argument to make. One could try ("Jeff asked me to add the link, so I did... I never actually visited it myself"), but I don't think you'd be believed.

      You know, its kind of funny... a lot of people, on threads like this, seem to be of the impression that there should be some magical "get-out-of-trouble-free" card in the legal system that lets you encourage the spread of copyrighted material at will. While I strongly disagree with current copyright law, the notion that the legal system is going to do anything to accomodate you in that goal by providing you with a reliable way that you can do so without consequences is just laughable.

      --
      We also have a halon fire extinguisher. Its always nice to have a fire extinguisher that kills people around.
    7. Re:Break the law, face the charges. by tyldis · · Score: 2, Insightful

      First off, I'm no supporter of this verdict, but for the love of $HIGHER_POWER, please don't make this the beginning of the end of the world.

      The site's sole purpose of the site was linking to infringing material. The site made that perfectly clear. The verdict is saying that if the *intent* of your link is to infringe, then "hey, we don't like it".

      Your raving about a site going from disney.com to some kiddieporn nest is totally irrelevant.

      This decision has little, if any, impact on "future of the Web in Norway".

  4. Uhoh.... by Cougem · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Will Slashgot get sued linking to a site that link(ed) to MP3's?

    And surely search engines do this?

  5. Insanity by reporter · · Score: 5, Insightful
    What the Norwegian did is similar to me driving my Chevrolet Camaro and having my friend sitting in the passenger seat. Then, we pass by a computer store where I know that the owner is selling pirated software. I then tell my friend, "Look at that store. The owner is knowingly selling pirated software". My friend looks at the store.

    How have I committed a crime?

    1. Re:Insanity by pstreck · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It's a little different here because the norwegian is acting as conduit in providing the music files, even if they are not directly being distributed by him... Example: a guy stands on the corner of a school and a street and tells the kids they can get some crack from his friend a block down. Is that a crime? It's grey, but I sure hope he goes to jail.

      --

      Later,
      Phil
    2. Re:Insanity by iGN97 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      His analogy, while "overcomplicated" is quite accurate and interesting. If the passenger of the car is inclined to buy pirated software from a store, the sentence "Look at that store. The owner is knowingly selling pirated software" is facilitating copyright infringement the exact same way.

      You are supporting his argument. The question is whether facilitating is indeed illegal, to what extent and how it should be enforced.

  6. what about the mp3 providers by kevinx · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Did they sue the people actually providing/hosting the illegal mp3s or did they just go after this guy because it was an easier target?

  7. Re:Erm? by drxray · · Score: 2, Insightful

    www.ebay.com

    Am I arrested yet?

    --
    Slashdot - Mutual Assured Discussion
  8. They only catch the dumb ones by twigles · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Seriously, hosting a page full of links to copyrighted mp3s? Cmon, what did he think was going to happen? The community would hail him as a hero and the RIAA cartel would cower in fear?

    Do what you will with your music, and if it's blatantly or borderline illegal then shut up about it. You'll be fine.

    1. Re:They only catch the dumb ones by twigles · · Score: 2, Insightful

      But laws and lawyers are thinking on a finer-grained level than that. He didn't just talk about it, he *helped* people break the law. If you, out of the goodness of your heart, told someone about a guy selling pot in the building behind you and proceeded to negotiate the price, quality and other logistics of the deal without touching any drugs or money then you are an accomplice. To say otherwise is to claim that the mafia doesn't exist.

      He didn't mention in passing that places had mp3s like, "Hey, they have some music for dl over and acme.com, go check it out". This guy did actual legwork. I don't like what they did, but he *really* had to see this coming.

    2. Re:They only catch the dumb ones by fuzzybunny · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If you want whores, guns, gambling and drugs, go to borough XYZ in New York or Arr. xyz in Paris or whatever. If you want Heroin, go to Amsterdam and look for N. African looking guys to approach you (they will if you stand around long enough.)

      Could I be more specific? Probably, if I asked around a bit. Would I be committing a crime? No. I would not. I would be exercising my right to free speech & expression. Period.

      If I say "they have some music for dl over at acme.com", I am likewise not committing a crime, I don't care which legal statutes you judge it under. I see your point, but I'm sorry, this simply holds no water. There's no issue of complicity at all; you are not involved in he actual transfer of illegal information, nor are you aiding and abetting an illegal act any more than if you publish a manual on how to build a pipe bomb (Poor Man's James Bond, I forget the publisher.)

      --
      Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage
  9. Technology Aside, A Crook is a Crook by reallocate · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Not sad, unless you like helping criminals.

    He linked to illegally copied files. That means he told people where the illegal files were and enabled them to acquire them.

    Except for the technology, this is equivalent to knowing where stolen property is being sold, directing traffic to it, and helping people carry away their new purchases.

    The problem isn't the technology or the Internet of the freedom to use it. It is the wilingness of a lot of people to break the law.

    --
    -- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
    1. Re:Technology Aside, A Crook is a Crook by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Not sad, unless you like helping criminals.

      The problem isn't the technology or the Internet of the freedom to use it. It is the wilingness of a lot of people to break the law.

      If people like you -- and there have been an awful lot of them -- got their way throughout history, women wouldn't have rights and Africans and Chinese would be slaves. Actually maybe they wouldn't be, since America would be a colony of England.

      The law is not Absolute Truth. Get it through your thick skull.

    2. Re:Technology Aside, A Crook is a Crook by civilizedINTENSITY · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "directing traffic" is close...but it is more passive than active

      "helping people carry it away" is just imaginative fiction; might as well say "help them carry it away, kill the owner, desecrate the remains, then make soup from the carcas", 'cause if you are going to fabricate a strawman, might as well *really* fabricate.

  10. Re:apparantly he doesn't watch... by alan_dershowitz · · Score: 2, Insightful

    It IS wrong if you didn't pay for it or already own it though, isn't it?

  11. Bah, He shouldn't have been taken to court at all. by meatspray · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Big Mistake

    You have a guy that's working hard to provide links to infringing material. (for free no less) If they were smart they would have just been watching this guys page and stamping out the owner of every link he finds. As it sits now, they stopped his linking but the files will remain.

    Now it's just a matter of time untill another site does the same thing. This puts them on the offensive paying people to go hunt down more linkers.

    Don's sue Google for linking to a page with your copy on it, thank them for helping you find it and shut down the source.... armatures.

  12. RST? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    So if my homepage has a link to his homepage, does that make me liable also?

    Is this a Transitive operation?

    me->him->music => me->music

    therefore

    you->site1->...->me->him->music => you->music

    You are all terrorist pirates now! Wtf?

  13. Re:apparantly he doesn't watch... by Crash+Culligan · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Way to go Disney! Being pro-active and teaching our children to repect the RIAA.

    You must be new to this "Disney Channel" thing.

    Not very coincidentally at all, an episode of "The Proud Family" a while back which actually made the downloading of music a plot point. The upshot of it was, "Downloading music is bad, mmmmmkay?"

    Slashdotters and Slashdotettes, they're engaging in meme warfare. First they got the laws of questionable morality made by buying the legislators, and now they're trying to get around the immorality by changing childrens' morals (spokescharacters, showing inflated consequences of breaking their manufactured mores, etc.).

    I've heard about propaganda that "kids smell bullshit," but how many geniuses did you know from grade school? Expect some of them to fall for it. And if enough of them do, the rules changes come that much closer to wide acceptance.

    --
    You cannot truly appreciate Dilbert until you read it in the original Klingon.
  14. Re:apparantly he doesn't watch... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I've heard about propaganda that "kids smell bullshit," but how many geniuses did you know from grade school? Expect some of them to fall for it.

    I've made the point a few times that the USA is now engaging in a War on Copyright Infringement in the same way it is engaged in a War on Drugs.

    The USA has already progressed past the point of private corporations doing this kind of brainwashing - last year politicians were talking about funding school programmes to teach kids how wrong copyright infringement is.

    Assuming that goes ahead... how many people use illegal drugs? How many of them were taught over and over again that illegal drugs are bad? Did it stop them? What makes you think the same tactic will work for copyright infringement.

  15. Thus the Bourne convention makes all links illegal by metoc · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The Bourne Convention automatically copyrights everything that is published.

    Therefore everything published/posted on the Internet is copyright by someone.

    Therefore all external links are by default links to a site with copyright materials on it.

    Therefore every publisher of a web page with external links is quilty of copyright infringement by linking to a copyrighted work.

    Therefore every publisher of a web page can sue for copyright infringement unless they have licensed the work to the other party.

    The publisher establishes the fee schedule for the licensing of the work.

    So who gets rich?

  16. Changes everything by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Actually there is one group who is trying to have it both ways and it is not the "anti-copyright rights movement". The RIAA and MPAA constantly talk about needing stronger laws, new laws, broader enforcement, the ability to obtain information without a subpoena, etc. because "digital changes everything" and "networks allow a 14 year old teenager to send a movie around the world at the speed of light". Then they turn around and argue that just because computers are new and basically allow every user to be their own publisher, that nothing has changed and copyright should exist intact.

    Please, choose one argument or the other and stick with it.

    (I honestly can't stand to respond to the rest of your arguments since you spend so much time setting up straw men. I just don't feel like tearing them all down today. Sorry.)