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Mark Cuban to fund Grokster vs. MGM case.
Deadric writes "According to Mark Cuban's latest blog entry, he will help fund the Grokster vs. MGM case, which threatens to destroy the Betamax shield."
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I hope he doesn't make it into a reality series.
Cuban libre?
Who the F is Mark Cuban?
rooooar
You can see what he has done in nearly every business he has run. He has made it work, made it run smooth and gotten a lot of money for it when he sold it off. He took the mavericks and made them into a contending team instead of a team that never had a chance of making the playoffs let alone winning anything.
Its nice to see him getting in on this. He might be goofy and really into himself, but he is good at winning.
Mark's quite the maverick himself.
I think he started Broadcast.com or something and sold it to Yahoo for a gajillion dollars. Then he bought a basketball team and other stuff and laughed when all the people that didn't use their boom money lost it.
The Betamax shield doesn't necessarily fit the circumstances. With the analog VCR tech, there are generational losses and the machines aren't conducive to easy affordable mass-distribution because of their 1x record rates. One reason SCOTUS gave Betamax their blessings was that people at the time weren't trying to build libraries of videos, but rather watch TV shows at a more convenient time, but my impression of P2P users is that they are trying to build libraries, and of material that wasn't necessarily licenced for broadcast anyway. Even when the material was licenced for broadcast, the ads are often removed.
With P2P, there are no generational losses and it doesn't require any money other than a working computer and an internet connection to distribute as many infringing copies as the user likes.
I am not a technology owner.
;)
I call bullshit.
The coolest voice ever.
This is not the editors' best work.
Spelling errors intact from his blog(I added the bold) :
So , the real reason of this blog. To let everyone know that the EFF and others came to me and asked if I would finance the legal effort against MGM. I said yes. I would provide them the money they need. So now the truth has been told. This isnt the big content companies against the technology companies. This is the big content companies, against me. Mark Cuban and my little content company. Its about our ability to use future innovations to compete vs their ability to use the courts to shut down our ability to compete. its that simple
Dood wants to be a Hero - the Benefactor, the Mavericks, this guy is desperate for attention - not that I don't mind his neurosis helping protect my freedoms.
The rock, the vulture, and the chain
Its MGM v. Grokster, not Grokster v. MGM. The way it currently reads in the summary, it gives the strong impression that Grokster is suing MGM and that Mark Cuban is defending MGM.
Its always Plaintiff v. Defendant, NEVER the other way around.
The
I don't know about the USA, but in England it has long been held that a manufacturer of a kitchen knife cannot be held responsible for a murder carried out using the knife.
One reason SCOTUS gave Betamax their blessings was that people at the time weren't trying to build libraries of videos, but rather watch TV shows at a more convenient time
...the court recognized that there were people who did this, who probably were in violation of copyright law. An actual infringement is one of the requirements for contributory infringement. What they decided was that the potential illegal uses did not negate the tool's legal uses.
There is no way to rule against Grokster without violating the Betamax shield. Essentially, a tool has legal and illegal uses (specific circumvention tools like DeCSS might not fall under this, but otherwise the Betamax shield is wide). Can we punish the producers because a significant amount of the population chooses to break the law, using their tools?
If so, I would like to see the class action suit against Ford, Mazda, Chevrolet, Toyota, Hyundai, BMW et al for creating tools of speeding. At least around here, official numbers say 90%+ speed at times (and the rest are probably liars). You can fine the perp, but you don't punish the toolmaker.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
It's nice to see someone funding an anti-media -oligarcy case.
Next up, hopefully, is a case limiting copyrights to 50 years with none of this authors death + x years nonsense.
This would get us past the unessarily high cost of verifying an author's death + the nonsense of determinging if a work os owned by a corporation.
I don't know about the USA, but in England it has long been held that a manufacturer of a kitchen knife cannot be held responsible for a murder carried out using the knife.
In the USA, we use guns to irresponsibly kill each other. Only in rural and/or southern regions does the concept of a special "kitchen gun" make sense. Now you know!
not their best work?
you must be new here
this IS as good as it gets around here!
Betamax was never questioned in the case.
The original case went to a summary judgement over two laws: contributory infringement [A & M Records, Inc. v. Napster, Inc. (114 F. Supp. 2d)], and vicarious infringement [Fonovisa, Inc. v. Cherry Auction, Inc. (76 F.3d 262)].
In the original case, the judge notes during sumamry judgement that Grokster found a loophole in copyright law, which allowed them to dance around the conditions needed for contributory and vicarious infringement.
The language currently being used for this loophole is "willful blindness".
Hey, I'm with you. If he wants attention so bad, I'd rather him duke it out in the name of consumer freedoms rather than flashing his titties at Mardi Gras!
Viva Cuban ... .Still sad that you need this kind of cash to defend our rights against bussiness in the USA though.
This is wonderfull news , We need more people of his financial stature to help take on the errosions of our libertys
Land of the free as in $
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
I don't know about the USA, but in England it has long been held that a manufacturer of a kitchen knife cannot be held responsible for a murder carried out using the knife.
... and I've lived here all my life, mate.
I, too, don't know about the USA
The nut of the Betamax case:
In the Betamax case, the Supreme Court ruled that a company was not liable for creating a technology that some customers may use for copyright infringing purposes, so long as the technology is capable of substantial non-infringing uses. In other words, where a technology has many uses, the public cannot be denied the lawful uses just because some (or many or most) may use the product to infringe copyrights.
Source
To my thinking, this means that manufacturers of cute cuddly teddy-bears are not responsible when some crazed maniac uses stuffed animals to perpetrate a murderous asphyxiation spree.
Furthermore: the knife is too goddamned obvious -- any fool can knife a man to death. It takes an innovator to kill with stuffed animals.
-kgj
-kgj
This isn't offtopic, it relates directly to the story you dipshits! This is the problem with user moderation, it allows any random idiot to come in and impose his will on people. There is no reprecussions becuase all the other idiots like him will simply metamod this stuff fair. If metamod really worked, shouldn't moderations be almost completely fair due to the process of elimination brought from metamod?
who?
I say this over and over here. Copyright for corporations is done and over. Its time that America goes back to its roots and abolish corporations that don't serve the public good.
If we stood together and told the government that we no longer recognize copyrights they would go away. The idea that I cannot copy something is ridiculous. If you have the means, then copy away. Giving power to governments and corporations to tell us what we can do with technology is a very bad idea.
This is a battle that must be won, and the people must have free reign to copy and manipulate data anyway they want to. I am OK with giving recognition to someone who creates, but that is all.
but there are some things that even I would not want the whole world to know !
Living in Texas I've known several people over the years that have known Mr. Cuban. No matter which one you talk to they all say the same thing. He's a realy down to earth guy that hasn't let all the money and power get to him. It seems that if he sees something he likes, he makes it succeed, AND still manages to make money off of it too. So rock on Mark, because you're doing one hell of a job.
Keep Austin Weird!
I think that it is very likely that either SCOTUS decides that pirate-to-pirate networks are illegal or Congress does. The RIAA and MPAA bought Orin Hatch long ago.
...I'll just take this opportunity to say good-bye to all my friends in the US, before the lights on your subnet goes out. As much as I'll miss slashdot, I'm sure you will miss Internet more.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
And he's putting out the Enron movie. Finally, someone spending Bubble money on something as worthwhile as Aeron chairs!
--
make install -not war
I wouldn't say wanting to defend your business requires a psychological defect. That he's framing it as a David versus Goliath struggle is not unprecedented. It's a great story.
Sudafed is now a behind the counter drug in many states (slowing sales) because end users used it to make meth.
Thanks for putting on the feedbag. Thanks for going all out. Thanks for showing me your Swiss Army knife.
I know the parent post to mine was offtopic, but it was funny. (Did you not get the joke?)
My post was offtopic to the article, but not in a smaller context.
So, what was your thinking? Or were you simply trying to spend your mod points quickly and picked a safe one?
all the best,
drew
FreeMusicPush If you want to see more Free Music made, listen to Free
Kill kill kill the poor. Every gun that is baddass you mean and that i care about nothing, so as a direct result, nothing that ever happens will upset me, unless of course is an assertion we as a people need to kill you. And nobody wants that! The poor are my slaves. I skull fuck their daughters. Fuck the poor.
England may apply this logic to kitchen knives, but they don't apply it to PlayStation mod chips, which a judge, last year, decided were illegal to make, advertise, or sell.
Illegal to own, or carry around the street? I dunno diddly about law in England but here there's a lot of stuff that you can own but not transport, like throwing knives.
... not to mention the quaking of my inner Aristotelian teleologist ....
Of course you can't transport throwing knives -- you have to throw them.
How the hell are we supposed to manage our planned economy if people go around carrying knives meant for throwing? The mere thought of it staggers my inner social Darwinist
-kgj
-kgj
Mark's argument "software doesn't steal music, people steal music" is the same as the argument that "guns don't kill people, people kill people". Let's get things into perspective. Technology by itself doesn't do anything unless it's applied. People make the decision to use the software and how to use it. The RIAA got it wrong. The MPSS got it right. Discourage people by educating them on how stealing movies is wrong. How you affect all the little guys. Nobody cares if Britney Spears and fat record execs make less money. Really, they don't.
If record companies stopped killing innovative music, then I think people would care about stealing their stuff. If all people can get it trash, and they see it as trash, then they will respect it as trash. Pop music has become trash. Since people see it this way, and that's the only stuff they can get, they steal it cuz it's worth nothing to them anyways.
People steal music, not software.
Sure, but suppose this case did go the wrong way for P2P. We can probably assume that shortly after the SCOTUS "vindicated" the media industry position, we'd see H.R. 666, a.k.a. the Piracy To Piracy Solicits Users' Extreme Zero Royalties Zero Payments Acts or P2P Sux0rz Pact for short.
Seriously, I'm pretty sure P2P use in the US would die out real fast if all ISPs were required by law to disclose the name and address of any users whose computers are involved in sending or receiving data on some arbitrary set of ports, to be specified and updated by some government agency without further changes in the law. (Notice that if they managed to get that open-ended concept into the law, on the no unreasonable basis that P2P would just switch to use another port otherwise, then there would be serious implications for any use of the Internet.) Couple that with, say, an automatic $10k fine or 6 month prison sentence for anyone convicted, and it would just be too risky for most people to bother, and without the volume of users P2P is dead.
It would be a very bad day for a promising range of new technologies if something like this happened, which is why it's so important to separate the technology from the acts of the user in law. The argument is just as valid here as it is when you protect car makers, knife makers, etc.
Strangely, the media industry actually did seem to have come around to doing this until this case, going after those who were clearly distributing copyright material illegally. I would have thought bringing this case, which apparently could give permanent legal support to P2P networks that might be used as a defence in lesser cases in future, was a big risk. Then again, IANAL and neither do I know which big names the industry does and doesn't directly influence over in the US.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
With that much money he can afford to make spelling errors and not give a crap about what some jelous people consider a chance to take a shot at him with
This is an incredibly important case. At its core is the question: Can the makers of a product or the providers of a service be held responsible for the misuse of that product or misuse of that service?
Can the maker of DVD recording equipment be held liable for you or I using that equipment (and/or programs) to distribute copyrighted material. Can ISPs be held liable for any illegal use of their services? And let's push it to its limit: Can gun manufacturers be held liable when the equipment they make is used to commit a crime?
If this appeal succeeds, be afraid.
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
I think we are digressing. There is no doubt that some guns were designed to kill people. But even the fact that a gun is designed to kill people isn't enough to cause the manufacturers to be held liable for a crime committed with their products. Like you said defending myself is legal.
Where they cross the line is in things like making the finish "finger print resistant" or obviously if they made the weapon fully automatic or semi automatic but sell a conversion kit.
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
The poster was pointing out that TCP/IP is 'peer-to-peer' and so our subnets will go dark. I was joking that we won't quit using it even if it is illegal -- both p2p and IP. It would be typical of US law to make all p2p illegal then years from now mitigate that to protect IP networks, all the while with everyone using IP anyway.
Your point about the law killing P2P effectively in the US is right I think. Even if the technology could provide safety/anonymity it would be little used if prison was a possibility.
Thanks for putting on the feedbag. Thanks for going all out. Thanks for showing me your Swiss Army knife.
Its not the wording, its what you were willing to believe.
Most people wouldnt have been surprised if Cuban was on either side of this debate.
THAT is problem.
Sort of like Micheal Jackson. We dont know if hes guilty or not but based on his other behavior, were not surprised.
Mark is an interesting character, thats not necessarily a bad thing and I'm glad he is helping out in this way. Perhaps we can all be part of this in a united organized front. Slashdot org anyone.
I think we are going to see a come-to-jesus moment as Peer to peer, and gun lobbying issues get closer to the same point.
As an aside, I overheard, on a right wing radio show, the other day someone laying blame on all these student killers and prosac. Brilliant, blame the killing spree on prosac. I wonder what caliber that prosac was. If you are not going to hold the fact that the kid had access to weapons as a factor in the latest school killing, at least have the balls to be consistent.
Now here is my rant. Our country allows gun ownership and it's mainly based on the second amendment. I am a gun owner and I had no problem waiting 10 days to get my gun. Somehow the NRA believes that making people register guns or go through a background check first is unconstitutional. Why? Why do they not argue that it is also unconstitutional to force demolishion experts to register their TNT? Why do they not fight for my right to own an RPG, plastic explosives, etc. After all, WACO showed that Koresh could not stop an M-1 tank with just bullets.
Now here is my point. The government has a responsibility to keep the peace as well as ensure public safety. Registering TNT is a responsible step in that direction. A gun licenses and registration which helps police track down the history of a gun, in my view, is also a good step. You might argue that registering knives should be next. I'm not sure what to say there. It seems that what level we enforce stricter rules is a matter of opinion, but I will at least argue that no mass killing in our great schools have been carried out with knives.
And now finally back OT. If the majority of Peer to Peer is used for rampant pirating, which hurts the greater economic interest of this contrary, why not allow Peer to Peer, but force members of those networks to register? To be honest, I'm a little wary of IP laws in general. Imagine a world where the government mandates a chip in your head so everytime you sing to yourself a copywrited song, you have to pay royalties. Ug. At the same time though, I think it is absolutely fair for the government to help protect someone who writes a book from someone who copies it and distributes it without permission. So while we are figuring all this out, why not allow Peer to peer networks as long as members are not anonymous. If you don't like IP laws in general, I think that is a different battle.
Thanks for listening.
-Nuke the moon
Not everyone is supposed to know an American billionare.
1) The GPL does not need to exist any more if copyright dies, so that is moot.
2) Binary code is not expressive, so copyrights are not effective.
3) Money is a promiisory note, so if money can be copied without recouse to law, we are now on a trade economy. No paper billionaires.
I find I don't have a problem with this.
He's out to be more than the average joe like you, who makes a point that he can catch blatantly intentional grammar errors.
He's out to make a stand, draw media attention, and make it an even bigger case. This is now an undeniable part of the justice system in America.
Yes, he wants to be a hero, and he's actually becoming one. He's not sitting at home criticizing someone else's efforts in an attempt to gain brownie points from the slashdot skeptic/cynic crowd.
Hasnt he run through everything he made on the Real Networks deal? Certainly his NBA team isn't earning him much. Is this guy investing that well?
In the original case, the judge notes during sumamry judgement that Grokster found a loophole in copyright law, which allowed them to dance around the conditions needed for contributory and vicarious infringement. The language currently being used for this loophole is "willful blindness".
Well, if that's a loophole, many are using it. All common carriers and ISPs are "willfully blind". So is the USPO and FedEx. As is the storage lockers on train stations and god knows how many others. And what about "escort" ads in papers? Everybody is fully aware that their (commercial) service is probably involved in illegal activity. I would hardly call that a loophole. A sane system, if you ask me.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Nail 'em! MGM, after all, are the ones responsible for unleashing Unspeakable upon us... quite possibly the worst film of all time, bar none. Oh yeah, and that whole thing about being severe douches on P2P and so on. There should be some clause in the ruling requiring that movies like that be released solely on P2P, so that no one will feel like they've spent their hard-earned money on them. Jesus, but it was that bad...
Guns are for killing.
Just for the sake of argument, I will temporarily give you this statement. But, I also ask; for killing what? Are guns advertised for killing people? Are guns not useful, as well as legal, for killing animals? Have you a better tool for pulling a bird from the sky in order to feed yourself or your family? Have you ever tried to run down and bludgeon to death a deer, moose, elk, bear, or other wild animal that is commonly used as a food source for humans? Have you a better means of dispatching a dangerous animal like a rabid dog or a man eating lion?
Step outside your own personal existence in your urban ghetto world and think about all of the legal and justifiable reasons for killing. The gun was not originally invented for the purpose of killing people and killing people is still not the gun's primary use today.
The gun is a tool, like any other. The fact that some people choose to use that tool for murder does not make the gun any more dangerous or liable than a hammer. People, by the way, often choose hammers as their tool for murder. Hammers can be quite effective for killing.
P2P networks are copyright neutral -- anything can go over the network.
Note that the same applies to the Internet itself, and to a plethora of its components: Routers, TCP, FTP, cabling, webservers, etc.
There is good reason to believe that a vast majority of the traffic on the Internet is "pirated" copyrighted material. If the movie, music, and broadcast industry conglomerates can use a "mostly used for piracy" argument to shut down one application or one protocol, they can use the same argument to shut down ANY or ALL of them.
The entertainment conglomerates would LOVE to have the Internet go away. (Some of them even flamed it systematically as it was catching on. Some of them still do.) It pulls eyeballs from their products and is thus perceived as cutting into their revenue.
Remember that the Internet itself was designed as a peer-to-peer system - an interconnection of a vast network of endpoints that exchange information. The perception of it as a client-server, vendor-customer network (like, say, a broadcast medium) is an illusion, created by three factors:
- The enormous success of a few client-server apps, such as the web, (where the servers are usually run by a corp or institution),
- the rise of ISPs (with terms of service discouraging consumer-grade customers from hosting servers), and
- the shortage of IPv4 address (leading to workarounds such as dynamic address allocation and NAT, which also impeed hosting a server on a consumer-grade connection).
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
It is interesting that most comments and citations to the Betamax case refer mostly to the infringing/non-infringing balance of a technologie's uses.
Another part of the Betamax case should also be noted: the courts found that the use of Betamax for recording programs for later viewing (time shifting) was a convenience to the public and added overall to the good of the people.
Perhaps it is just applicability that this part of the Betamax ruling isn't noted. However I feel that it is just as important when new technologies are created to recognize their benefit to society and not just the intellectual property value at stake.
Yes, shouldn't MGM be suing the end users? That's what everyone says when there's a story of this type on /. Of course when they actually do sue end users, this arguement is conveniently forgotten.
Vote for Pedro
You don't have to look into the future to see how worries of copyright infringement suits stifle technology. Ampex had the capability of making a home use VTR (that's Video Tape Recorder) in the 1970's, but they were concerned about the major studios suing them for promoting copyright infringement. Ampex figured that the Japanese companies had less to lose, since judgements would have been collected from the import arm, not the main corporation.
A Shadeless room is a brighter room.
Why is he funding it when the only thing left is the oral argument this Tuesday?
I think the only thing there's left to fund is a reality series.
Isn't that redundant?
:)
and should I be posting this twice?
hawk
Certain people would like you to believe that because your video file is "digital" that you are able to make a perfect copy of it forever. This is simply not true most of the time.
Digital data does not degrade the same way that for example, generational VCR-dubbing degrades a signal (four generations is pretty crappy on VCRs), but there are similar gremlins which make it much less bulletproof than popular belief holds.
Take your average 1 gigabyte video file from the net.
Once you convert the thing into a compressed movie file (that's two generations of loss, first the a/d conversion then the first compression process.. three if you are cracking a typical DVD since you typically recompress afterwards to get smaller) the file is ready to go. Now, here's where people want you to think the losses stop. And they are right, under ideal conditions, namely you copying the file to another spot on your own hard drive. The probability of incorrectly copying without loss is pretty low in that case, unless you have a broken hard drive, which unfortunately, Joe Public who bought his PC at a department store, usually has because the manufacturers of those things use low bid hard drives.
Anyway, once you start transmitting that gigantic file over the internet, you introduce transmission errors, especially when the transfer is interrupted and restarted several times. Not all file transfer software *correctly* resumes files. Most assumes that the last byte recieved was in fact whole, when in fact it could have been less than all 8 bits....you have to use rollback to be *sure*.
Optical media such as CDs and DVDs are in fact an analog medium, in that the data is stored as a sequence of dots burned on the surface of the disk. If you *lose* some of that surface, you lose the file. (yes, you can pull most of it off with the right tools, but most people don't know Norton utilities from their ass)
I don't know about you, but my ten year old CD-Rs that I burned in 1995 are getting CD rot pretty bad. Some of them have the foil flaking off. I lost my original OEM Windows 98 CD to CD rot as well. There is a pinhead sized hole on the surface of the cd where the data layer flaked off. Naturally, that hole is right in the middle of a cab file, and well, you get the picture.
My twenty year old video tapes may be a little fuzzier than they were when they were new, but they are still watchable.
Also, if you burn at higher speeds, and most people do, the error rate for the data written to the cd is much higher. That means that as the CD ages and God knows what the color change chemicals on the data layer do over time, the error bits on the CD will protect your data much less of the time.
Formats such as video cd and DVD are more error tolerant because if a chunk of the data is missing or unreadable the playback device can happily corrupt the display until it hits the next keyframe in the file it is playing....becuase the encoding method is relatively simple.
More complicated compression formats are smaller, but not so error tolerant, hence you get things like those divx green-screen ghost-trip video files that are found on the p2p networks. Those can be repaired sometimes, but since the file format is corrupt most player software poops out when regular people try to watch.
IIRC, the video-cd and video-DVD formats actually use the error correction bits on the disc to store more movie data, because it's considered to be no big deal if the picture is fubared for a second or two. (that's what causes those rainbow squares and pauses on a mildly scratched DVD)
And I don't even want to go into all the things people do to video files to make them fit on media that is too small, like truncation and recompression.
The bottom line is that while yes, under the right conditions you can make perfect copies of video data after the initial two generations of loss, the media on which you usually store them is *less reliable* than video cassette....
Not only is P2P technology capable of substancial non infringing use, it is also commercially beneficial.
The same 'viral' distribution that the industries loathe so much can be turned around to form a zero-cost distribution medium, meaning more profits for the holders and cheaper prices for the subscribers.
Pay-Per-Torrent, anyone?
http://pixelcort.com/
As I understand it, the crux of the RIAA/MPAA argument is that intellectual property is equivalent to real property; when the Damned Dirty Downloaders are swapping copies of "Spider-Man_2.avi," it's no different than if they had walked into a store and swiped a copy off the shelf. It would seem to me that if we're treating intellectual property as real property, then the RIAA/MPAA would become liable for any harm caused by their product (and groups like the infamous PMRC no doubt have tons of "evidence" available to "prove" such a link.)
Umm no. Courts routinely distinguish between the two. Appeals courts do not normally examine matters of fact at all - only whether or not the lower court applied the proper law and procedure in making their determination.
Have you even read the betamax decision? It doesn't sound like it.
The court in betamax found not just that the vast majority of betamax owners were infringing copyrights, but also that sony could have easily added a chip to prevent or at least hinder copyright infringment and refused, that their advertisements invited customers to use it for copyright infringement, and they found further that there would be little or no demand for VCRs if it weren't for these illegal uses.
In other words, every one of these issues that you (and plaintiffs attorneys) have claimed distinguish this case from Betamax, were in fact present in Betamax.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
I can copy whatever I want in the United States of America. I copy movies tv shows etcc.. But if I go outside I have to fear for my life cause just anyone could come up and kill me.
Completey agreee with you on that statement. I get so tired of people critisizing someones efforts when there is no basis behind why the criticizing is necessary. So what if he wants to be the hero? Like you said, at least he's ACTING on it and not just sitting there saying shit without the intent to follow through. And, whats more, you can obviously see he's doing this because he personally feels that this is in the right. I give a man credit if he seems to take any venture on and turn it into something productive (Dallas Mavericks, Broadcast.com, HDTV stuff). How many people can say they've done this type of thing over and over and be sucessful at it? Some people need not post unless they actually have any merit to what they are saying.
(note that I misspelled some things, are you going to point out my grammitcal errors? For the record, I bet you couldn't write a blog in that length and only find one sentence with an error...)
Yes, burned CDs suffer from bitrot. But most of the other sources of data loss you mention are either very rare or not applicable. Conversions are usually lossy, but they generally don't need to be performed more than once. If someone wants to download a divx rip of a DVD, the original mpeg2 stream has suffered a lossy recompression, yes, but each subsequent transmission of that divx file doesn't result in more loss. This is in contrast to analog formats -- the act of distribution necessarily introduces a loss of quality. That's not the case with digital files. Your concerns about transmission errors and hard disk failures are just silly. These things happen, but rarely, and certainly not in a way that introduces quality defects in the "authoritative" copy of a piece of media on a p2p network (ie, the most popular copy of a file, with same-hash files considered identical (b/c they are)). You might want to have a look at wikipedia's entries under "crc" and "hashing". Your intuition that bits occasionally get flipped is correct, but when it happens it's almost always detected and corrected.
Upon turning thirteen, puberty hit and his penchant for reckless masturbation led to his nickname 'The Cuban Wanker'. Undeterred, he continued his pursuit of self-actualization and general ne'er-do-goodedness until adulthood where his childhood obsessions finally became realized on film, thus spawning a reality show series worthy only of being ejaculated upon.
a website is taking bets on the outcome of MGM v. Grokster
Uh-oh... With a name like his, the Feds are gonna be all over this case. It's nice to have someone with money stand up for what's right, but the semiliterate Powers-That-Be are gonna go wild over this for the wrong reasons.
I recall an article here on Slashdot about Mr. Cuban some time ago, where he enthusiastically brags about his consumer grade HP PCs and other nonsense. I think this seems to be another ill-informed publicity stunt for him. I'm willing to bet he'd love to turn this into profit by appearing to be the good guy fighting for the common person, or whatever. I could see him trying to sell some kind of media subscription service that's just as bad as any other, all the while using buzzwords/phrases like "revolution" and "take back the music" and the like.
Some people truly believe in what they fight for, but so many others look to make a profit on anything they can. I find that to be quite disappointing.
-K
The assymetry between uplink and downlink bandwidth for the consumer means that only a tiny fraction of what is available on P2P networks can actually be transferred by the network. A single person sharing files is limited by uplink bandwidth, and cannot really supply more than a few minutes of music a day. What the recording "industry" (actually distributors) are doing when taking individuals to court is actually abusing existing law that was made for a world were infringers would typically be mass infringers that do it for profit. A single infringement means a huge fine, but it was made so by lawmakers in a world where a single infringement caught (a single copied CD)would represent mass infringement (a warehouse full of couterfit CDs somewhere). It is necessary because criminals hide a well as they can, and law enforcement needs to be able to use what evidence they can lay hands on. In P2P networks it's quite the opposite: file sharers don't hide. They make their collections available online for evryone to see without really trying to conceal who they are. Copyright holders can then find individuals offering thousands of tracks. But in reallity these are offered through a very narrow channel: you can see all, but you can only sample very little. But the law can still be used to fine them as if for every track they expose they have a truck full of copies and no constarint on distribution!
I think everyone is jumping to conclusion in saying that this case could destroy the Beatmax precident. Personally, I do not see how making copies of legally owned material and passing them out freely to people you are not even aquainted with, could possibly be seen as anything close to fair use. A backup is one thing. A copy for yourself to use in a different format is fair in my book. Backups are fair. Since when is giving it away to others fair? It never has been, even under the Betamax precedent. An incompatable set of parallels are incorrectly drawn for this story.
If all people can get it trash, and they see it as trash, then they will respect it as trash. Pop music has become trash. Since people see it this way, and that's the only stuff they can get, they steal it cuz it's worth nothing to them anyways.
Can we have a chorus of "Exactafuckinglootly!"
If you believe in privacy, and believe you have "nothing to hide" at the same time, you're a goddammed idiot