Slashdot Mirror
RIAA Cracks Down on Internet2 File Sharing
Daverd writes "Hundreds of students at 18 universities nation-wide have had lawsuits filed against them by the RIAA for filesharing over Internet2." The official RIAA Press Release and commentary at MSNBC is also available. From the article: "i2Hub has been seen as a safe haven, and what we wanted to do was puncture that misconception," said Cary Sherman, president of the RIAA. "This has been a subversion of the research purposes for which Internet2 was developed."
Yes, we all hate the *AA's but they were breaking the law, and bastardizing a research network.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
How did the RIAA get access to Internet2 to begin with?
Rhymes that keep their secrets will unfold behind the clouds.There upon the rainbow is the answer to a neverending story
Uhm, 1999 called and they want their bullshit excuses back. The general concensus on /. for several years has been that individual infringers should be punished and not the technology. Here, you have the RIAA doing just that, instead of trying to get I2 banned or restricted.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
I remember back during the lawsuit when slashdotters were complaining that the RIAA wasn't suing the actual infringer. Now that they are suing the actual infringers, why is everyone complaining.
And no, the RIAA isn't going to sue you for making and mp3 rip of your friend's CD (although they would be within their rights to do sue). They are going to sue those who are doing the largest amount of copying. That used to be bootleggers, but it is now everyday Joe college students sharing hundreds of gigabytes of copyrighted material to everyone else on the Internet.
Come play Heroes of Might and Magic Mini online.
I believe you meant to say:
"Yes, we all hate the *AA's *AND* they were breaking the law, and bastardizing a research network."
The RIAA is not an academic/research institution, and therefore had no business being on the I2 to monitor file sharing activity in the first place. They were abusing the network and probably breaking laws governing access to restricted computer systems to be on there at all.
But of course we all know it's perfectly all right to break in to other peoples' private networks, as long as you've got plenty of money and lawyers and lobbyists to back you up.
From the article it said that they weren't divulging how they got this information.
I don't think that the schools are ratting people out because of liability reasons (if the school is monitoring the network, then they have to report EVERY illegal action they see. If they don't monitor the network, then they don't have to report anything... )
The RIAA is certainly not a research institution, and if they are trying to get access to internet2 to "test" it for content delivery, then I can see an argument, but I think the (obvious) real motivation is just to catch filesharers. And that is morally wrong. Even if the filesharers are breaking a law, two wrongs don't make a right.
I'm not sure who is in charge of internet2, but I sure would like to hear that organization tell the RIAA that they're not welcome on internet2 if they're just going to spy on people. If the RIAA starts spending money on new (open) technologies and provides test services for students and researchers, etc... then that might be something. Until then, the RIAA should stay off internet2.
...when no matter how hard they try, no matter how many laws they buy, no matter how many sleazy tactics they pull, the amount of music shared over the internet keeps *increasing* rather than decreasing. From 12-year-old girls to 72-year-old grannies, everyone seems to be getting in on the game and no amount of whining/threatening/suing by the RIAA is making so much as a dent in the traffic.
Seems it's time to re-evaluate the situation and see if the law - and perhaps someone's business model - is in need of change.
(cue RIAA apologists)
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Catch: What if there is a band signed to a label that you like. It doesn't matter if it's U2, or Bon Jovi, or Def Leppard, or Jethro Tull, or Rush. They're signed. And if they put out a new album, you're frelled.
That's the whole problem with the whole "ditch the RIAA and all their artists" thing. Some people like some of the bands that have been signed.Zagreus sits inside your head, Zagreus lives among the dead, Zagreus sees you in your bed and eats you in your sleep.
Why is this modded insightful? Every time one of these threads comes up, someone says this. Every. Single. Fucking. Time. If anything it should be modded "Redundant".
Anyhoo, a lot of the stuff the RIAA puts out bites, but there are some geeks, some of whom post on Slashdot, who like some of the music on an RIAA affiliated label.
Likewise, just because music is independent doesn't mean it's good. 99% of everything is crap. That means music that's on the radio. That means independant artists and labels too.
Besides, I haven't heard about any local "independant" group that isn't metal in some form or another (Death, Christian, Heavy, whatever) or punk. Frankly, I don't like metal, I prefer something with a melody. And I can't find it in the independant scene. And I don't particularly like punk (With the exception of the Ramones, the Clash, and "I Hate You" from the soundtrack of Star Trek IV).Zagreus sits inside your head, Zagreus lives among the dead, Zagreus sees you in your bed and eats you in your sleep.
Any number of reasons exist for a student or an employee to know that the school's facilities are being used to traffic music on the I2. Any number of reasons also exist for someone to pass the information on to the attornies representing either the RIAA or the school.
In fact, I'd wager that a condition of employment at the school is to not engage in or facilitate illegal activity. It would be pretty hard for a network admin to learn that some kid was illegally moving tens of thousands of files through his servers, then keep his mouth shut, and not be vulnerable to charges of aiding a criminal activity. Fear of getting caught covering that up would be a strong motivator to report the activity to the school.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Anyhoo, a lot of the stuff the RIAA puts out bites, but there are some geeks, some of whom post on Slashdot, who like some of the music on an RIAA affiliated label.
I agree with you on this one. There is some stuff on RIAA labels that is good. My guess is some people don't even know just how many damn labels there are in the RIAA. There's also stuff on non-RIAA labels that I like. But in the end, I agree with the "Don't buy it" attitude. If you are really pissed at the RIAA for all their idiotic actions, boycott them. No, a boycott is not always going to be fun - sometimes it hurts to stick to your morals. For example, I really started getting into Bad Religion about a year and a half ago. I loved every album I could get my hands on, but since a lot of their stuff is from Atlantic, I won't buy it.
Go ahead and rip on the Slashbots who spew the "Everything indie is good, everything RIAA is crap" line over and over again. However, don't demean the message that a true boycott sends. I vote with my dollars because that's what I believe in.
In all this endless discussion about law and who 'owns' music, let us not forget that RIAA has no moral right to own music anymore.
By indefinitely extending the copyright period by paying off the politicians, the RIAA companies stole the public domain.
This is the biggest theft of artistic work in history.
As a result, they have no longer any moral right to claim to own music copyrights.
Copyrights are based on the principal that there is finite period of copyright ownership for artistic material. Since they broke this fundamental legal pricipal, we have no moral obligation to accept their claims of ownership of any artistic material, regardless of how old or new it may be.
The rule of law is a balance: destroy the balance and you have destroyed your legal protection.
Download all you want!!!