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Supreme Court Takes Hard Look at P2P

Posted by Zonk on from the under-the-judicial-microscope dept.

Patrick Mannion writes "Supreme Court justices quizzed attorneys for file-swapping software companies and Hollywood studios Tuesday, in a case that will help determine the future of both the technology and entertainment industries. In their questions, the justices were critical of the entertainment industry's proposal, which would hold companies "predominantly" supported by piracy liable for copyright infringement. However, they showed little sympathy for the file-swapping companies' business model."

6 of 489 comments (clear)

  1. Business Model? by Ioldanach · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What do the "business models" have to do with this? There are file sharing clients out there that are entirely free and have no company behind them to have a "business model". Not everybody's selling something.

  2. Hmm by Sv-Manowar · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They seem to be lumping together the technology used to produce P2P software, and the businesses that use P2P to make profit

    This will enable them to make a stronger case in their basic "p2p is bad" argument, when it's not the way it should be. Hopefully they will view the two things differently

    --
    Business Voyeur
  3. Hard Cases = Bad Law by overshoot · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The trouble is, Grokster is not a sympathetic defendent. The Court have (more or less rightly) noted that the Defendents have build a business model predicated on copyright infringement, and will be inclined to Do Something about it.

    Unfortunately, the only tool really before the Court is an overturning of the Betamax doctrine, which was decided with a much more sympathetic defendent.

    This is one of the few cases I can think of where the appropriate charge should have been conspiracy. It's a crappy bit of law, but it would actually fit. As it is, I'm afraid that the Defendents may have screwed us all.

    --
    Lacking <sarcasm> tags, /. substitutes moderation as "Troll."
  4. The scary part about it is... by BlackMesaResearchFac · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I agree that the Supreme Court will likely keep things as is and move on, but once this issue gets to Congress, watch out...

    Then it becomes entirely about who is lining whose pockets. The RIAA, with the help of some of its friends, has a decent shot at buying what it wants.

    Granted there are opponents w/ money, but the RIAA has proven to be very motivated.

    --
    -- Scientist: You aren't going to leave me here, are you? Boagh! Thump...
  5. what's the best way to support musicians? by rjnagle · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It seems likely that the Supreme Court will not overturn the lower Court's decision, and that is good for artists and consumers. Good riddance to the big labels, I say.

    But the question of compensating artists has not been addressed. We need to create an environment where downloaders want to support musicians they love rather than simply downloading their stuff for free.

    Musicians need to start setting up tipjars and consumers need to ask rigorous question about how much of anything they purchase goes to an intermediary.

    I recently went to a concert of Kristin Hersh where she sold no CD's but encouraged people to support her by buying mp3's of demos off her website. I bought $20 of mp3's off her website, of which Hersh received a significant percentage. Is that the future?

    Here are some other thoughts about how to reward musicians

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    Robert Nagle, Idiotprogrammer, Houston
  6. Re:Activist Court by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Heh, the sad thing is that what Republicans and Democrats alike call "activism", most normal people call "applying the constitution". Read the majority and opposition opinions of most of their cases. Rarely do any of them read "I'm a Democrat and your Republican law sucked ass so we're cancelling it" or vice versa.