Kazaa Owners Risk Jail

An anonymous reader writes "There's been a twist in the Sharman Networks vs record labels case in Australia. Lawyers for the music industry now claim that Sharman's attempt to block Australian IP addresses from accessing the Kazaa website doesn't comply with a court order. As such, they want Kazaa masterminds Nikki Hemming and Kevin Bermeister to go to jail term. The saga began in Feb 2004 and ZDNet Australia has a complete timeline."

Comments

It's their own fault

[Hey Pope Felcher . .]

They should have made Kazaa ownership much like their softwares ideology, P2P.

I'd like to see Australia try to jail that many people.

Re:It's their own fault

[ziggamon2.0]

Well, consider that once, their entire population was imprisoned...

Re:It's their own fault

[Patrik_AKA_RedX]

Weren't European criminals exiled to Australia a few centuries ago? I seem to remember me something about this being mentioned in The Simpsons.

Re:It's their own fault

[JonN]

Um, for them it shouldn't be that hard. "Britain decided to use its new outpost as a penal colony; the First Fleet of 11 ships carried about 1500 people--half of them convicts. The fleet arrived in Sydney Harbour on 26 January 1788, and it is on this day every year that Australia Day is celebrated." Right from the Australian Foreign Affairs website

Re:It's their own fault

[Ilex]

If the media cartels get their way everyone's going to jail.

Why don't we have done with it and implement the final solution. Turn the whole planet into a jail.

The Record Company execs will of course have to be ejected into space.

Re:It's their own fault

[Fishstick]

indeed
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_colony

The British used North America as a Penal Colony through the system of indentured servants. Convicts would be transported by private sector merchants and auctioned off to plantation owners upon arrival in the colonies. It is estimated that some 50,000 British convicts were banished to colonial America, representing perhaps one-quarter of all British emigrants during the eighteenth century. When that avenue closed in the 1780s after the American Revolution, Britain began using parts of modern day Australia as Penal Colonies. Some of these early colonies were Norfolk Island (which became the flogging hell meant to deter even the most hardened criminals- see cat o' nine tails), Van Diemen's Land and New South Wales. Advocates of Irish Home Rule or of Trade Unionism (the Tolpuddle Martyrs) often received sentences of transportation (the harsh regime started during the long shipping) to these Australian colonies.

also
http://www.eurekatimes.net/1788-1868.htm

The Penal Colony of New South Wales stands even today as one of the darkest episodes in English Imperial History. Yet in the way they ran that military camp, a set of remarkably strong social institutions were born. These institutions continue to provide a bulwark of strength that has underpinned the growth and stability of our modern Australia society even to this very day. In this index we record the birth of those great Australian Institutions together with some other interest notes on that period.

Re:It's their own fault

[Idimmu Xul]

What with the syndication of Neighbours, Home and Away and Dame Edna back to the UK, I think the Aussies are getting their own back :(

Re:It's their own fault

[Ced_Ex]

Why don't we have done with it and implement the final solution. Turn the whole planet into a jail.

Well, considering the vast majority of us are prisoners of gravity, I'd say it's already a jail.

Re:It's their own fault

[ZorinLynx]

I think jailing people for such pathetic white collar crimes is ridiculous.

They're not a danger to society; if you want to punish them, take away their computers or something. But jail? Come on!

Jail should be reserved for murderers, rapists and other violent types. Not people who write software for trading music on the Internet.

Why are governments so damn messed up?

-Z

Re:It's their own fault

[GigsVT]

Kazaa's ownership is as close to P2P as you can get, with fake corporate entities all over the place and other sleezy business tactics designed to make them hard to be held accountable.

They aren't martyrs. If they hadn't latched onto this thing they'd probably be running drugs or operating some sort of pyramid scheme.

Re:It's their own fault

[Anonymous Coward]

how about the guy that steals a billion dollars and results in a few hundred thousand people to lose their jobs?

is that deserving of jail?

Re:It's their own fault

[Ucklak]

That's a damn good point.
I don't want murderers or rapists on my streets, at all. Get em out.

But jailing someone for stealing a digital 'copy' where it doesn't hurt anyone is ridiculous.
So the content creator maybe lost out on a 'lost' sale. Let that content provider SUE for monetary damages if need be.

Now if the person makes digital copies for profit, then I'm for jail time because they hurt commerce and busines in general.

Re:It's their own fault

[DaHat]

I agree with the other poster. Your idea is quite naive as it ignores all of the criminals who may have committed non-violent crime.

So if I break into my local Best Buy at 3am, steal all of their iPods and plasma tv's and sell them on eBay and if convicted I get... house arrest?

Re:It's their own fault

[Catbeller]

Since we'll have GPS in our phones, accessible at will by spooks and cops; cameras on every corner, every highway; DNA catalogued against our will; health care taken away at the whim of unknown lords, drug testing at will by our employers; unacceptable speech not permitted on private property (almost anywhere you shop or work or park...) free speech in public monitored by the military, spooks, and the dominant political party; laws that make everyone in the world a criminal; the ability to vote taken away if we're convicted on any of these new "felonies"; and all of us subject to recordings of everything we ever do on the internet (which soon will be surfing, TV, phone, all our purchases, text messages), the ability to run for office taken away if "they" decide to broadcast any of your recorded pecadillos...

We're to be numbered, watched, recorded, arrested at will, fired at will, paid slave wages per a "free" market that somehow can't pay workers but pays the bosses ever increasing millions.

Prison can be defined as what YOU can do compared to what your jailers can do, or do to you.

How, exactly, are we all now NOT in prison? Of course, I'm speaking of the U.S, but I assume Australia isn't exactly shrinking from doing the same as the US and the EU.

This is the most important subject in all our lives. We're being locked up, and we're helping them do it.

Re:It's their own fault

[nelsonal]

You should have to pay them back at full retail for the amount of the iPods and plasmas you took. Plus a kicker to the state for having to round your loopy butt up.

Re:It's their own fault

[suitepotato]

Why don't we have done with it and implement the final solution. Turn the whole planet into a jail.

(tinfoil hat on, whispers...)

And what makes you think it already isn't?

(tinfoil hat off)

I mean, it's not as though we can presently escape this system.

Re:It's their own fault

[Headcase88]

And if you don't get caught you're off scott-free. The worst that can happen is you lose what you stole and have to pay a little kicker. Let's see what happens to theft rates when fear of jail time is removed.

Re:It's their own fault

[jasen666]

Sure, that's what the ankle bracelets are for. Program the thing sound the alarm if he goes anywhere other than his home or his work.
This way, our legal system isn't spending my tax money housing and feeding his ass, and he's forced to work to pay off what was stolen.
Now, if he had used a gun and robbed the place, he's a menace and should be locked up.
But most white collar criminals are generally just idiots that don't want to hurt people, just wanted to steal something. Don't lock them up and make us pay for them. Put their asses to work and make them pay it back.

Re:It's their own fault

[freidog]

They're not a danger to society;

I'm reasonably sure the powers that be at Enron, Worldcomm, et al possed a danger to society; certainly to their employees, sharholders and ultimately custormers. Catagorizing 'white collar' crime as 'not a danger' is rather naive. I would much rather see some one like Ken Lay in Federal Pound Me in the Ass Prision than some idiot who FedExed his buddy LSD.

That said, contempt of court is applicable to all colors of collars. The guys over at Kazzaa were order by a court in Austrailia to filter a whole bunch of keywords to minimize copyright violation. Instead they blocked all the IPs in Aust. from connecting.

I put the over under for some one to start distributing a version of Kazzaa that by default connects to a proxy server in say Thailand then to the Kazzaa servers at about 2 weeks.

and of course, if they actually bothered to filter those keywords, I'd think it might effect more than just the people in Aust., somewhere Kazzaa might block copy protected material where they're not legally bound to give a damn about infringment yet. That of course would decimate their buisness model

Re:It's their own fault

[wx327]

Don't lock them up and make us pay for them. Put their asses to work and make them pay it back.

Their asses are being put to work in jail. They just don't make any money during that exchange.

Re:It's their own fault

[hesiod]

> Their asses are being put to work in jail. They just don't make any money during that exchange.

Nor do they make enough money for the prison to cover the costs of their own incarceration, though. Of course, if they weren't there, they could get on welfare, effectively "stealing" from everyone instead of one person. *

* no, I am not implying that welfare=theft, nor that the majority of those on welfare are "stealing" or even undeserving of the help.

Re:It's their own fault

[masdog]

The problem is that the RIAA is going after the wrong target. I'm sure the Kazaa network was designed to allow users to share files, particularly music, but the company that runs the network is A)not providing the content, and B)not charging you for the content that users might recieve on the network.

I remember when the courts ordered Napster to block all copyrighted content on their networks. It didn't take longer than a day for all that material to reappear in ways that got around the program's content filters. Technically savvy people will get around those limits, and there is very little you can do to stop them besides banning them outright. Even then, you're not likely to keep them off the network for long.

The problem with the RIAA/MPAA is that they started off by going after the wrong targets. Instead of going after the networks, they should have gone after the individuals who provided the content. It wouldn't have been too hard to track down those individuals who were sharing massive amounts of files and sue them into oblivion, and then it would have made people think twice about sharing over the Internet.

Now, becuase they allowed this situation to develop, it seems like the **AA has to sue indiscriminately, seeking punitive damages in each case. They don't show any discretion, which causes them to lose many cases in the court of public opinion.

While there are very few people who would argue that a file trader with 5000+ songs freely available on Kazaa has a lawsuit coming to him, most people think that suing a grandma who accidentally downloads a modern rendition of Glenn Miller's Moonlight Serenade is absolutely nuts. The file trader deserves to be sued into oblivion while the Grandma should just be forced to buy a legal copy of the offending material and be told not to be more careful next time.

Before anyone attacks my example, I will admit that it is extreme. My point, however, is that the **AAs don't appear to consider anything but their business model when filing lawsuits.

Re:It's their own fault

[Guspaz]

So if somebody steals a $10 CD, they should go to jail where society has to pay thousands to support them?

I'm sorry, I don't think society should be expected to pay thousands of dollars for a $10 CD that they could care less about. Jailing digital pirates amounts to shifting the burden from the theif to society. Such crimes need to be handled with fines and penalties, not jailtime. On top of that, any penalties collected from thiefs should first go to cover the costs of the legal system, including all involved (Judges, jurors, bailiffs, assistants, power, heating, etc).

Notice I'm not making a statement on if Kazaa and digital piracy is right or wrong. I just think that jail time is an unfair burden on the rest of us (since we have to pay for it), and that compensation should first go to the system that is persecuting. It isn't free to run a legal system, you know.

Re:It's their own fault

[Hatta]

Jail should be reserved for murderers, rapists and other violent types.

Not to mention those dangerous pot smokers. Get em off the streets I say!

Re:It's their own fault

[shmlco]

So we should provide a financial incentive for the court system to process more cases through it? That sounds like a GREAT idea. Perhaps we should pay the cops a bounty on each arrest too. Or a percentage of each speeding ticket.

Re:It's their own fault

[petermgreen]

yeah iirc we used them because you broke free from our empire.

Re:It's their own fault

[Guspaz]

It isn't an incentive, think of it more like having to pay for lawsuits.

Limit the rule to jury-decided suits, then. The court has no more incentives since it doesn't control anything. These digital piracy cases are SUPPOSED to be settled by jury, after all, when they aren't settled via extortion.

Re:It's their own fault

[mj2k]

and what's sad, is people who pirates dvds will spend as much time in prison as a first time rapist... Now I'm not saying it's right to counterfeit dvds/ music, but it's not exactly equivalent to a violent crime either... The government's pretty messed up when the former gets nearly a penalty on the same scale as the latter... And moreover, what right does the RIAA or MPAA have the right to keep someone from creating software to share files accross the net with? It's about equivalent to suing manufacturers of cassette tapes or VHSes back in the 80s/early 90s, since they were the medium used for pirating copyrighted material... If they ultimately shut down Kazaa, they won't stop there... Bittorrent, emule, gnutella, etc, will be next... It's a dangerous precedent to set, even if it is in Australia, since left wing judges in the USA don't hesitate to pull in "international decisions" as their basis for judgement (take Justice Suitor as an example)...

Re:It's their own fault

[jahudabudy]

So we should provide a financial incentive for the court system to process more cases through it?

I don't know where you live, but here in the U.S., it would be great if the courts processed more cases through. Its not like they would worry about running out, and then go out at night trying to drum up more business. Hopefully, it would simply mean that the average court case would take less time from indictment to verdict.

/Perhaps we should pay the cops a bounty on each arrest too. Or a percentage of each speeding ticket/

Not that this has anything at all to do with the original proposal, but
a) most local jurisdictions DO receive the proceeds from speeding tickets -- it would be naive to assume that none have ever, or ever will provide an incentive for cops to hand out as many as possible

b)I doubt it is straight cash, but I would be surprised if there were NOT some sort of reward system in place for cops that have lots of arrests that lead to convictions. That seems to me a good metric for measuring "effective cop"

Re:It's their own fault

[Paraplex]

The whole piracy argument is overblown.

I've said it before and i'll say it again. As a musician, music will *not* stop being created once it is no longer profitable. The music *business* will die, but music itself will not.
The RIAA once had something to offer (studios - manufacture - stockists) but musicians have outgrown them.
Bring on piracy and the eventual demise of the horde of middlemen its absense is feeding.

If you like an artists music, send em a couple of bucks.

Re:It's their own fault

[Ixne]

Considering that many such thefts are committed by people who can't afford such items, how do you propose they pay back the amount in full?

Re:It's their own fault

[Ucklak]

Here, here (or hear, hear ? :-))

If I buy sheet music, should I have to send a nickel to the publisher every time I play it?

Re:It's their own fault

[Simonetta]

While there are very few people who would argue that a file trader with 5000+ songs freely available on Kazaa has a lawsuit coming to him

    I would definitely argue this. If a song has been intoduced into the public environment by playing it on the public airways to millions of people, then it becomes de facto public property. Putting people in prison for making a copy of music that gets played on public airways thousands of times is nothing by kidnapping and slavery.

most people think that suing a grandma who accidentally downloads a modern rendition of Glenn Miller's Moonlight Serenade is absolutely nuts.
    By any civilized sense of public domain, any song that your grandma swooned to in her romantic years is public domain. You, your grandma, or anyone has a right to download it, accidentally or not. And how does one actually 'accidentally' download something? Claiming to own a 60 year old recording is absurd; using violence and intimidation against 80 year-olds who listen to 60-year-old records is criminal. This is what should be punished.

Re:It's their own fault

[dgatwood]

.o= . <- joke

.o
-|- . <- you
/ \

Re:It's their own fault

[TeraCo]

Just take the money from him, give it back to the people it was stolen from, and have him flogged/caned/etc.

What if the money doesn't exist anymore? ie: Enron, the recent NAB fiasco, etc.

What does putting this guy in jail get anyone?

It's generally accepted that jail time is meant to be a deterrant. I know it stops me committing all kinds of crimes.

Re:It's their own fault

[hesiod]

reality -> * - the "joke"

The statement that was made wasn't even slightly funny, it was accurate but incomplete.

Re:It's their own fault

[TheDugong]

What does putting this guy in jail get anyone?

Are you serious?!?!

It is called "a deterent".

Do you think CEO types would be more or less corrupt if there was the possibility of spending a few years in a cell with someone who insists on them calling him daddy?

Personally, I think they should be made bankrupt (see below) and have to spend time in proper jail - no weekend release or special phone calls so they can still run businesses. After release they should be kept bankrupt until the employees who have lost their jobs as a result are fully compensated - with standard redundancy packages, all customers reimbursed for losses and all investors have been reimbursed. All "gifts" to spouses/friends/associates from around the time of the incidents have to be returned to the corrupt f**ker to help pay for it all.

That would stop a great deal of corruption me thinks.

Re:It's their own fault

[MooUK]

"The Record Company execs will of course have to be ejected into space."

Oh no, what a terrible shame...

Re:It's their own fault

[drinkypoo]

Note to idiot: Kazaa basically engaged in making "digital copies for profit." It's basically ALL they did, plus or minus some pseudophilosophical smokescreen.

Sigh. That's like saying that the federal government has distributed thousands of pounds of marijuana because, after all, "they" built the interstate highway system.

Re:It's their own fault

[drinkypoo]

I suggest debtor's prison, in which they can work at a job that is beneficial to society, and earn a wage, with which they can pay back not only the value of what they stole, but also pay for their room and board, their processing, and their court costs.

A debtor's prison can probably be lower-security than other prisons, since it won't be filled with violent criminals. We will also need high-security debtor's prisons for those who have a history of violent crime, and for those who develop one in the low-security debtor's prison.

Re:It's their own fault

[shark72]

"I think jailing people for such pathetic white collar crimes is ridiculous."

The potential jail time is for contempt of court. Judith Miller... Scooter Libby... if you're a US citizen, these should ring some big bells.

"Jail should be reserved for murderers, rapists and other violent types. Not people who write software for trading music on the Internet."

Agreed, but this is wholly irrelevant. I believe that judges should still have the right to send people to jail when appropriate for contempt of court, since that is what the article is talking about. Contempt of court. Not writing software. Do you have an opinion on that?

Re:It's their own fault

[shark72]

"But jailing someone for stealing a digital 'copy' where it doesn't hurt anyone is ridiculous."

True, but irrelevant. The article in the summary is referring to possible jail time for contempt of court.

Re:It's their own fault

[mumblestheclown]

So if somebody steals a $10 CD, they should go to jail where society has to pay thousands to support them?

Who suggested jail time for ONE CD stolen? The people who modded you up for making a bullshit scarecrow response should be ashamed of themselves.

Re:It's their own fault

[Guspaz]

Sigh, look past the number. If somebody steals a hundred CDs worth a thousand dollars, does THAT justify society paying tens of thousands of dollars in prison costs? I don't think so. Society should be paying the burden of somebody elses's digital piracy. Prison should be used to keep dangerous or violent people off the street, not punish somebody for downloading ones and zeros onto their computer. Restitution can be made in a way that doesn't harm society more than the crime.

Because face it, prison costs do more damage to society than any damage the crime caused, in this case.

Re:It's their own fault

[mumblestheclown]

• Should we lock up hackers who break into bank computers and transfer money to their own accounts?
• Should we lock up white collar criminals like corrupt CEOs?

Both may have committed only computer crimes involving ones and zeroes. And the results of both may be completely reversible. Yet every society in the world agrees that jail is an option for such people. Likewise, while no serious person proposes jail time for the act of downloading a few songs off the internet, large-scale distributors of copyright infringing material on the net are basically involved in an organized crime and should be subject to the same criminal penalties as somebody who, for example, runs a major counterfeiting operation. You dont need to be an expert criminologist to figure out that the threat of fines alone are a sufficient deterrent to such people.

Society has developed white collar prisons for a legitimate reason. And yes, the number does matter. I understand what you are trying to say, but you are wrong.

Incidentally, nice work in trying to subtly shift the topic from "CDs" to "digital piracy." Yay unethical discussion technique!

Elimination

[CmdrGravy]

I'm surprised the movie industry doesn't just have them shot and be done with it, it'd be cheaper in the long term and the relative evilness of the act wouldn't impact there current evilness quotient too much.

Re:Elimination

[JonN]

But...wouldn't that make them, at least to some, 'evil'? ...oh wait, we are talking about the movie industry, move along nothing to see here

Re:Elimination

[Patrik_AKA_RedX]

hmm, what's worse? A bullet through your stomage and a slow painful death or being assraped every day in the showers?

Re:Elimination

[grumpyman]

Guys, I'd wonder what are the ramifications if a company or organization actually murder a person? The chief executive goes to jail and that's it (like mafia)?

Re:Elimination

[CmdrGravy]

I actually meant to type "record labels" and "their" in that post, please forgive me if these mistakes cause any offence.

Re:Elimination

[CmdrGravy]

Maybe they could outsource the hit to Al Quaeda or some other terrorist outfit, they need the money and the support of a major industry might help rebuild their reputation.

Re:Elimination

[grumpyman]

On the reverse, maybe it's much easier to accuse Kazza guys AS the Al Qaeda compatriots then the government got a good excuse to lock em up.

Re:Elimination

[Ryan Amos]

IANAL, but same as any murder investigation, people are personally responsible. Anyone who knew about the plan and made no effort to stop it or report it would be guilty of conspiracy. This would be a textbook case of conspiracy, actually (in Texas at least, conspiracy is defined as an agreement between two or more parties to commit a felony.)

Re:Elimination

[mzwaterski]

Well a company or a corporation can't really pull a trigger. An employee could. That employee would certainly face jail time. Presumably any co-conspirators would too. If the board of directors all voted to have the employee kill the person, they'd all be likley facing jail time for conspiracy and aiding and abetting.

Re:Elimination

[quokkapox]

Getting whacked is easy enough to avoid - don't accept a free ride on a small airplane that says SONY on the tail.

Re:Elimination

[westlake]

I'm surprised the movie industry doesn't just have them shot and be done with it

Posts like these, modded +5, and the comments which inevitably follow, do not say much for the maturity of the Geek mind and culture:

"But it's no more surprising than the fact that nobody's yet provided the movie and music industry bosses with remedial education of the ballistic kind. With 100+ million active downloaders in the world feeling persecuted by a greed machine, death is coming, statistically"

It is lunatic to define "persecution" as "being forced to pay for music or movies produced for commercial distribution." and to suggest that the proper punishment is death.

Re:Elimination

[Slime-dogg]

If the board decided that the person should be killed, then the board should be held for first degree murder. The person doing the actual killing is merely the weapon being used by the board to do the muder. The actual killer should also be held on the same charges.

Aiding and abetting would be the action of the board, after finding out that one of the members became a murderer, in covering up the crime.

Re:Elimination

[hackstraw]

Guys, I'd wonder what are the ramifications if a company or organization actually murder a person? The chief executive goes to jail and that's it (like mafia)?

Its easy and common to knock off one person, its difficult to knock off multiple people that are affiliated with each other and get away with it.

Re:Elimination

[mzwaterski]

Which they would do after the killing... But you are right, a higher level of accountability would probably apply. Perhaps I was a bit too hasty in my analysis.

Re:Elimination

[Anonymous Coward]

Not having a "stomage", I think I'd be fine with that.

Re:Elimination

[crawling_chaos]

I do not believe that there is any difference in penalty for a felony or conspiracy to commit said felony, and if there is, I'm pretty sure the conspiracy gets the harsher sentence. In fact, I'm pretty sure that conspiracy to attempt murder carries a much worse sentence than attempted murder itself. If you are worried that the board would somehow walk while the hitman faced the gurney, I think that that would not be the case.

Re:Elimination

[hesiod]

> or being assraped every day in the showers

"You mean... you were raped?"
"Well... at first."

Re:Elimination

[Fuzzie Viking]

I remember reading this a while back but never followed up on it. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/11/27/incorporat ed_man_makes_murder_confession/ This man was wondering the same thing.

Re:Elimination

[PFI_Optix]

It's happened before.

Supposedly an ancestor of mine was murdered for land he and his brother owned. His brother fled to another part of the country to save his own life. That land was promptly condemned and handed over to an oil baron, who drilled on it. The wells have since produced millions (billions?) of dollars in oil and the original company ultimately was consumed by one of the major oil companies.

No one can prove it happened that way, so the family has been trying to bring it to court for generations.

Re:Elimination

[aqfire]

Probably not much. After all, corporations already have more rights and freedoms than individuals. It's not much of a stretch.

Re:Elimination

[Petrushka]

You have a good point, but I reckon it's just a matter of times changing. They do hire hit-men, it's just that they're called "lawyers". You're right, though, it would be interesting to see a risk and cost comparison of having someone assassinated, compared with having your lawyers sue them until they commit suicide.

Re:Elimination

[Auckerman]

Um, I'd like to point out that corporations have committed negligent homocide. A crime, which if a specific person did it, would lead to prison time. When a company does it, the most that happens to the company is law suit. It's considered a civil offense. The execs get punished if the investigation leads to a cover up of some kind and even then it's rare.

Re:Elimination

[drinkypoo]

Suggesting that the likely result of their actions is premature death due to ballistic projectiles is not "to suggest that the proper punishment is death." I suggest you put more time into studying English.

Of course...

[Anonymous Coward]

Time to put the CEO of Xerox in jail too, I guess. Oh, and Sony, for their VCRs. And DVD-RW drives. And Microsoft, because Kazaa runs on Windows. Oh, and the Intel CEO too, because Windows runs on Intel processors. And don't forget Maxtor's CEO, because the files are written to a hard drive.

What happened to putting the actual people who commit crimes in prison? Oh, wait, it's much easier to target the gun maker...

Re:Of course...

[morgan_greywolf]

And Jon Postel, who is the principle author of RFC 959. Probably Tim Berners-Lee, too.

Re:Of course...

[Lumpy]

Actually you have the answer in there.

Put the CEO of sony in jail and you creater a recursive loop that will make all RIAA and MPAA members heads explode.

you single handed discovered the one flaw in their armor. BRAVO!

Re:Of course...

[Politburo]

Oh, wait, it's much easier to target the gun maker...

Then the solution is simple. The software industry merely needs to lobby Congress to enact a liability shield.

Re:Of course...

[Lisandro]

All the aforementioned were designed for things other then copyright infringement but can be used to infringe.

    You mean like guns?

Re:Of course...

[MoogMan]

Don't forget Mr Bob Selotape!

Re:Of course...

[Shanep]

Time to put the CEO of Xerox in jail too, I guess. Oh, and Sony, for their VCRs. And DVD-RW drives. And Microsoft, because Kazaa runs on Windows. Oh, and the Intel CEO too, because Windows runs on Intel processors. And don't forget Maxtor's CEO, because the files are written to a hard drive.

What happened to putting the actual people who commit crimes in prison? Oh, wait, it's much easier to target the gun maker...

The core business of those companies you cite, is legitimate. The products they provide, can be misused. Like many items can.

The core business of Kazaa, is to make a shit load of advertising revenue by providing tools which make it easy to infringe copyright.

The difference is black and white.

So its ok for sony to sneak in root kits?

[ZiakII]

So when will Sony be going to jail for their root kit issue? Funny how there not facing criminal charges when what they did was so worse. Add in the fact they still have not taken responsibility for what they did.

Re:So its ok for sony to sneak in root kits?

[caffeinex36]

MONEY.

Re:So its ok for sony to sneak in root kits?

[dr.g]

So when will Sony be going to jail for their root kit issue? Funny how there not facing criminal charges when what they did was so worse. Add in the fact they still have not taken responsibility for what they did.

Errr...there is the matter of damage...the **AA can at least make their (very dubious) case that they have suffered lost sales. Anything like the rootkit issue, wherein someone's product damaged or compromised my property (or I purchased a product I couldn't use as I wiashed) should be handled in the marketplace.

IOW, boycott or try to avoid Sony products, badmouth them, etc. Hopefully, whatever the effect on Sony, this will work to show those **AA fucks that whoever takes a big step forward with effective DRM is at least stepping into the Dog Poopoo of Controversy, if not, as we might wish, onto the Bannana Peel of Legislation-Inspiring Outrage.

Re:So its ok for sony to sneak in root kits?

[shark72]

"So when will Sony be going to jail for their root kit issue?"

If a court tells Sony's CEO to fix the problem, and he doesn't, and the judge finds him to be in contempt of court, then he may go to jail.

With this whole Judith Miller thing that was in the news for months, us US citizens are all too familiar with the issue of going to jail for contempt of court. Reading the discussion today is a good reminder that many Slashdotters aren't US citizens. They might be reading the phrase "contempt of court" for the very first time today.

And...

[Meagermanx]

In other news, your constitutional freedom of speech has been revoked to prevent crimes such as slander, assault, libel, and copyright infringement.

Re:And...

[leonmergen]

Explain to me, what exactly is the direct relation between P2P file sharing and freedom of speech?

Filesharing sounds a lot more like freedom of beer to me... :-)

Re:And...

[ari_j]

Does Australia have a constitution that guarantees the right to free speech?

The thing that strikes me about this story is that in the US, corporate crimes are punished by fines or by dissolution of the corporation, except in cases like Enron where it was not the corporation doing bad things but its directors. Even so, the directors were punished, not the owners (i.e., shareholders).

Re:And...

[EvilSporkMan]

Well, if I send you a file, all I've really done is used my computer to tell you a rather large number, which you've used your computer to remember. It's a lot closer to speech than property transfer...it even takes place over a _communications_ network, not a shipping line.

Re:And...

[MC68000]

Technically yes, you're telling the other computer to remember a large number when commiting copyright infringement. But it is still wrong. Think of it this way. Both mixing two chemicals in a beaker and stealing a TV from a store boil down to a group of chemical reactions. True, one is unbelievably more complex than another, but then again, so is a DVD unbelievably more complicated than the number 548. By your logic, if you can do one, why can't you do the other? You can't just reduce certain things to very small parts, and say that because a small part can be innocent, that an aggregate of small parts is also innocent.

Re:And...

[EvilSporkMan]

Actually, stealing the TV involves a physical "reaction" - there's nothing chemical about the actual movement of the TV. Sorry, try again.

Re:And...

[Dhalka226]

Erm -- when did freedom of speech EVER cover slander or libel? And I really don't see how sharing copyrighted material without permission is a freedom of speech issue.

Re:And...

[HiThere]

Usually, if a corporation is convicted of a crime, the corporation is fined. It is unusual for the individuals who committed the crime to be prosecuted, though they could be. It is *quite* unusual for the corporation to be dissolved. I know that it's possible, but I've never heard of it happening, even when conspiracy to commit multiple murder has been proved. In fact usually they won't have been fined more money than they've saved by committing the crime.

(My opinions were shaped by a major chemical company in Georgia who was found to have intentionally dumped lethal chemicals into a water supply upstream of a city. A large number of people died from this over several decades before it was traced back to them. When it was traced back to them, evidence showed that they had calculated that the fine for killing the people would be less than it would cost them to properly dispose of the chemicals. The fine imposed by the court proved that their estimation of the situation was correct. One case doesn't prove the rule, but other people have reported other cases. [My source was Science News, and I didn't find the article sufficiently challenging to the way I already believed the system was structured to do further research...or even to save and frame the issue. Science News also thought it a minor article...about 3-5 paragraphs if I remember correctly.])

Sometimes cynicism seems the only rational attitude.

Re:And...

[MC68000]

Alternatively, hacking into a computer and stealing credit card numbers is just moving electrons, as is flipping on a light switch.

Re:And...

[EvilSporkMan]

Ah, but stealing credit card numbers isn't wrong in of itself - every business I buy something from has my credit card number. The wrong comes in when (possibly indirectly) I am deprived of some physical good through the use of that number to take money (that I've already got; potential revenue ain't money) from me. I wouldn't tell give out my credit card number because it would facilitate someone misusing it in the above way. Keep trying. =)

Re:And...

[MC68000]

Then consider stealing the credit card number and making an electronic purchase, or changing bank statement information. This is a perfect example of something immoral using nothing more than the movement of electrons. Just like copyright infringment (when it's used as an alternative to buying the product, of course) is nothing more than copying bits.

Just saying that the argument that it is only bits is flawed and irrelevant to the question of morality. The question should be "Does this hurt someone?", not whether it can be broken up into many small harmless parts. Not defending the movie industry at all.

Re:And...

[ari_j]

I never said dissolution was common, but it has happened. I think that the case you mention is extreme, but certainly not out of the ordinary. And that's why we need the civil justice system to keep them accountable - by suing them and getting enough punitive damages to make proper disposal seem like a cheap alternative.

It still seems odd to me that Australia makes it so easy to go after the owners of a company. That would be like putting Enron's shareholders in jail for what its directors did. In the US, even putting the directors in jail is extreme.

Time paradox?

[voice_of_all_reason]

Australians "risk" jail? Australia was jail!

Re:Time paradox?

[Anonymous Coward]

I went to Australia once. Going through immigration they asked me "Do you have a criminal record?", and I said "I didn't know you still needed one..."

Re:Time paradox?

[east coast]

Heh! Mod parent funny. That's the best thing I've heard all day.

Re:Time paradox?

[ziggamon2.0]

That joke is like a million years old...

A quick google shows:
577 000 occurences of it on the web

Re:Time paradox?

[renehollan]

Do you have a criminal record?

Yes.

You can't enter, then.

Why?

Because you have a criminal record.

So, why can they enter?

Because they don't.

How can they not? They either have a clean record of crimes committed, or an unclean one, but they can't not have one in the same way that they can't not be somewhere. Damnit moron, ask the right questions!

It's rather like the time I went to the U.S. immigration office just insude the Canada/U.S border from my TN1 interview. The immigration officer asked me, "How long live you U.S.?"

WTF is that supposed to mean? (Note: lying to a U.S. immigration officer is a felony). How long have I been living in the U.S. up to this point (which would have been illegal)? How long have I ever lived in the U.S. in the past (legally or otherwise)? What was the longest contiguous interval during which I lived in the U.S. in the past? How long did I intend to live in the U.S.? Strictly speaking, TN1 holders can be present in the U.S. for up to one year, but live in Canada, are non-residents immigration wise, but can be residents tax-wise. Lying to the IRS is also a crime, so one has to tell immigration that they are non-residents, the IRS that they are residents (if they've been in the U.S. for more than 180 days or otherwise meet a substantial presence test), and answering either one incorrectly can get one jailed or deported. The safest legal thing would be to answer "I don't know," or "I don't understand," but then you look like either a fool, smartass, or idiot.

In the end, I answered, "I do not currently live in the U.S. as that would be illegal. I have previously been present legally in the U.S. between such and such dates. I lived in the U.S. temporarily while on an H1B visa. If my TN1 visa is approved, I can be present in the U.S. for up to one year so long as I remain employed by the petitioner."

Basically, I tried to answer all possible interpretations of the question with as few words as possible. It was a bit nerve-racking.

Another fellow looked visably shaken as he was being yelled at to "Pay that man $110!". $110 was the amount of the processing fee, but the way the order was issued, it was not clear whether he was being tested to see if he would profer a bribe, and should therefore refuse, or if he was being directed to the cachier.

I've had better INS experiences "doing the loop" at Blaine, WA, when I exited on a TN1 visa and reentered to get an H1B. It helped to have all my paperwork in order, and then some: I had to renew my passport after getting the TN1, so the new one didn't show the TN1 stamp and the immigration officer, not seeing a TN1 stamp in my recent passport quizzed me if I still had the old one (I did, properly cancelled, but still showing the TN1 stamp). The process was a lot more formal, with signigicant paperwork to check, but the INS officer at least spoke proper English, and appeared to appreciate my preparedness: The INS immigration checkpoints often like to keep copies of documents but individual INS officers sometimes hate to have to take the time to make them, so I always keep a set of copies just for that purpose. The odd thing is that they appreciate that I had copies to save them time, but copy the originals anyway (just so there is no discrepancy, obviously).

Kazoo owners risk jail

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Now if only they'd jail harmonica players, too.

Re:Kazoo owners risk jail

[AndersOSU]

First they came for the kazoo players/ I remained silent/ I did not have a kazoo
When they locked up the harmonica players/ I remained silent/ I did not have a harmonica
When they came for the triangles/ I remained silent/ I did not play the triangle
When they came for the cowbell/ there was no one left to speak out.

Re:Kazoo owners risk jail

[Olix]

That conjures up images of Africa and Yams, for some reason. Curse you, Secondary School English GCSE....

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[east coast]

It looks as though record labels will keep fighting against change until it's too late for them to change themselves.

They've ultimatly dug their own hole. Instead of embracing a viable e-business model early in the game they instead went after a very small segment of the population that was taking music via napster and the like. During this time they were writing up their "victories" in the hopes of beating back the tide of geeks sharing 2 Live Crew albums. Instead of fending off the geeks they got Joe Sixpack interested in his own form of music theft. And here we are today; the music industry is trying to embrace the internet to the tune of 99 cents a song but Joe already has an easier and cheaper solution.

I wonder if the RIAA thought that P2P and music piracy was going to go away once they defeated Napster? They would have been better off leaving Napster alone and spending the resources on serious developement of technology to keep their media on a paying basis.

But it's like they say; hind sight is 20-20. I'll drink to that.

What?

[Rayin]

As such, they want Kazaa masterminds Nikki Hemming and Kevin Bermeister to go to jail term.

Actually, they want no such thing.

From the article:
Counsel for the record industry, Tony Bannon, said his side "didn't want" an imprisonment outcome, but argued that Sharman had failed to comply with the order.

Re:What?

[Lxy]

I think "didn't want jail time" is referring to the original charge of copyright violation. I may have misread something, but it appears that they are now pushing for jail time in light of the federal law violation.

totally irroneous judement

[Saint37]

Quote: "ruling that Sharman and associated parties had authorised users of Kazaa to breach copyright." This is rediculous. The statement makes absolutely no sense. It's like saying that if I buy an FTP program and use it to uload viruses, then the maker of the FTP program has authorised me to do so and can be found liable. It's also clear from the article that the judge invovled here is knows nothing about technology and doesn't seem to be very interested in learning. In my eyes this should disqualify him from the case due to incompetence.

http://stockmarketgarden.com/

Re:totally irroneous judement

[chrismcdirty]

But the creator of the FTP program is not providing the network to share the files. Sharman Networks created the software and provided a master server that told the clients what was available.

Do I feel they're responsible for what their users shared? No. Is it the same as the situation your presented? Again, no.

Re:totally irroneous judement

[hesiod]

> the creator of the FTP program is not providing the network to share the files

Well technically no, but which came first, FTP or FTPd? Unless it was started as Point to Point, the server had to exist as well. Still, it's not the best analogy.

Re:totally irroneous judement

[BatwingTLM]

The statement makes absolutely no sense. It's like saying that if I buy an FTP program and use it to uload viruses, then the maker of the FTP program has authorised me to do so and can be found liable. It's also clear from the article that the judge invovled here is knows nothing about technology and doesn't seem to be very interested in learning. In my eyes this should disqualify him from the case due to incompetence.

I once thought as you. I mean, really, how can Sharman be held responsible for what the users share on the network, I mean sure it is their network, but anyone can access it right? How are they to blame?

Sharman lost this case not because the Australian record industy had a tight case against them, but because they were idiots and they lied.

Kazaa: We are not resposible for what people put on the network, we can't stop people searching for copyrighted material

ARIA Lawers: But you can influence the search result

Kazaa: Nope, we can't do that

ARIA Lawers: But you do, with these "Gold Files"

Kazza: Ah, but that's so we can make money and boost the exposure of certain files, we can't manipulate what people search for, nore can we block it.

ARIA Lawers: so people can download Child Pornography from your network?

Kazaa: oh no, we would never allow that, we attempt to block that

ARIA Lawer: so you can filter search resuls and block files

Kazaa: nope, we can't do that...

and this was how it went for the ENTIRE case. Kazaa were idiots, they lied to the court about what their software was capable of, there were monitoring files even though they told the court it could not be done. they shot themselves in the foot repeatedly.

Judge Wilcox was a very good choice to hear this case, I don't think that he had any lack of understanding, he had many meetings with both parties to understand what the technologies in this case were about. But Kazaa lied, changed their arguments, ran around in circles. They lost because they were interested in one thing only, MONEY. and they had a massive infrastructure built around new ways to make money. problem was, that this very infrastructure could be used to do all the things that Kazaa said they couldn't do.

I had hoped that Kazaa would win this case, but after reading the reports from the case I can assure you they had no hope whatsoever

Read about it for yourself here . These reports are written in a comical manner, but I believe that this is the best way to view this, it makes the story a little more palatable

Translated for those who didn't RTFA

[Lxy]

Yes, there is the possiblity of jail time. This goes beyond copyright issues.

Sharman is being accused of contempt. Contempt because they may not have complied with a court order. This case appears to be going to trial. If found in contempt, they could face jail time.

This isn't about copyright anymore. The last judgement against them was about copyright. This is about violating federal law. If they are found to not have complied with a court order, they are in violation of federal law, which is grounds for jail time.

Breaking federal law is not good, and getting caught is worse. Sharman did this to themselves.

Re:Translated for those who didn't RTFA

[Predius]

I don't see the contempt of court here.

Court - "Fix your software to meet our requirements for our market."
Kazaa - "Nah, we'll just pull out of your market, no infringement, no issue."
Court - "Uh... like, no, you have to offer software to us so we can impose requirements on it, cause, ummm..."
Austrailian RIAA - "Yeah, cause we loose if we don't have someone to blame for 'lower profits!'"
Court - "Thats not quite right, shut up you!"

Re:Translated for those who didn't RTFA

[91degrees]

But presumably the requirement unus of proof is on the court to prove contempt. Sharman have a fairly solid argument that they made a good faith attempt to filter the keywords by the date required, and on realising they didn't, blocked downloads in Australia, therefore effectively going considerably further than the court order.

Re:Translated for those who didn't RTFA

[CalCudahy]

Well they've blocked new downloads of the software from Australia, but I'm sure there's thousands of installed copies still merrily downloading as we speak.

Re:Translated for those who didn't RTFA

[HiThere]

What lesson? That if you're a little guy you're likely to take a fall to give PR shelter to the friends of someone powerful?

I'm sorry, but while Martha Steward was obviously technically guilty, she didn't do anything outrageous, and those who were committing outrages at the same time have yet to be found guilty. And it is my belief that most of them will never even be investigated, much less charged. (I'd *LOVE* to see evidence proving my cynicism about the "justice" system incorrect. I'd also be surprised.)

Good

[Verteiron]

They've got it coming and I don't really care about the P2P issues. A couple of years ago, it seemed like every other computer I worked on was in my shop solely due to the spyware installed by Kazaa. An otherwise clean computer that had Kazaa installed on it became unusuable within a matter of days due to the sheer volume of popups, RAM-hogging spyware/junkware and all the other crap that Kazaa installed as a matter of course. Uninstalling Kazaa left behind all the junkware. Uninstalling the junkware left behind reinstall tricklers and more often than not would break Winsock completely. Kazaa was the first software to install really damaging spyware automatically; they certainly opened the door for lots of other software to do the same once Sharman proved it was a viable business model. If for no other reason, these yoyos should go to jail for intentionally deceiving hundreds of thousands of users without the slightest regard for their time and money.

Re:Good

[aniefer]

Kazaa behaved much better when you replaced the dlls that handled the ads with empty shells that implemented the api but did nothing. I never had problems with spyware after doing this.

Re:Good

[JaXx-StoRm]

If you ask them they don't include spyware http://www.kazaa.com/us/help/new_nospy.htm/

Nice how they redefine spyware to suit their own needs:
Kazaa, which is supported by advertising, and Kazaa Plus, which is not advertising supported, do not deliver software -- which we refer to as "spyware" -- that is installed without your prior consent or that gathers any personally identifiable information without your consent.

Not that I'm sayin spyware has a definition. Just makes me laugh that they decide what is and isn't spyware.

Re:Good

[Hrodvitnir]

"more often than not would break Winsock completely"

This is by design. Once the spyware reaches critical mass, the safety mechanism kicks in so the spyware can't call home for more. Very repsonsible of the programmers, I'd say.

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[turbohappy]

It wasn't really hind sight. There were thousands of people trying to tell the record companies that at the time. I was and I'm not even that smart!

Is the court's suggestion technically feasible?

[ragingmime]

So the courts want the Kazaa folks "to modify the software to ensure 3,000 keywords would be filtered by 5 December." The hitch is that existing copies wouldn't filter stuff, presumably - the nature of P2P makes that impossible.

I don't see what the big deal is: the owners did all they could to take Kazaa out of Australia altogether. Even if they made a modified version of the program for Australians - which I think would be less of a drastic change than denying downloads altogether - the fact remanins that the original version of the program will be floating around on the Internet and that plenty of people already have it. You can't filter those people's programs, and who's going to knowingly download a crippled verion of Kazaa? And deleting or disasbling existing copies of the program is similarly impossible.

So if you knowingly set up a network that you can't take down, what happens when it's deemed illegal and you say, "Hey, my hands are tied"? Is anyone to blame there? The users? The creators? Justin Frankel (who first dreamed up the Gnutella protocol that Kazaa is based on)? This is a really messy issue, and I don't think that the judge fully understands what the record companies are asking for.

Re:Is the court's suggestion technically feasible?

[Tezkah]

Yes, Kazaa connects to a central servers, which the spyware profiteers (Kazaa owners) run.

They implemented the Australia IP block on the server, and could easily do the same with the searches. Other programs, such as DirectConnect and Bittorrent wouldn't be so easily controlled by their creator, because they run on networks that were not set up by the creator of the program.

Re:Is the court's suggestion technically feasible?

[TubeSteak]

They prevented Aussie IPs from downloading Kazaa off the Sharman website.. as if they couldn't go to the dozens of major software sites and get the client from there.

The court ordered them to do something very specific.. and they didn't.

That qualifies as contempt of court in pretty much any legal venue I've heard of.

I realize you're saying that it wouldn't matter much if they complied with the court's wishes, because people could find older/unmodded clients, but that does not remove the obligation to comply with the court's order.

BTW- It is possible to disable all existing copies of the software. Like they've done many times, all they have to do is change the Fasttrack protocol and release a new client. That's what the did back when Morpheus forgot/stopped paying the license fee to be on the network. They could have complied, but didn't.

Re:Is the court's suggestion technically feasible?

[slavemowgli]

Kazaa is based on FastTrack, not Gnutella.

Re:Is the court's suggestion technically feasible?

[Derekloffin]

The court ordered them to do something very specific.. and they didn't.

Instead, they chose to filter 100% of the words by refusing to give Australia the product. That it's available via 3rd parties doesn't change that. Australia does not, and should not, have duristiction over the entire planet, and as such Kazaa should not need to comply anymore. Saying otherwise basically opens up every software company on the planet to every hair-brained law any government on the planet comes up with.

Re:Is the court's suggestion technically feasible?

[ragingmime]

Whoops... okay, that's what I get for not reading the Wikipedia article carefully & not having my facts clear. Thanks for setting me straight! :)

Hypocrites

[Anonymous Coward]

We all know what kind of stink this places gets into as soon as the **AA targets individual downloaders. Make up your mind. The same thing was true when they went after Napster, you all said that they should target the copyright infringers. They did. You changed your mind again.

I for one am glad that Slashdotters are too poor to own stock. Capitalism works!

Re:Hypocrites

[iamwahoo2]

I am sure most slashdotters own stock. And accept the fact that not all slashdotters are of the same opinion. You are also a slashdotter.

Uh huh

[GmAz]

So this small guy, Kazaa, has to take responsibility of its software, but large companies like Sony don't need to take responsibility of their software. Thats a thinker.

Re:Uh huh

[marco.antonio.costa]

"Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility."

I really like that one.

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[Funakoshi]

Nice to see someone else with the intelligence to see how the record labels dropped the ball. There are not nearly enough comments such as this one when it comes to this topic. The pop-explosion would have been ten fold if they had marketed the product properly (as would the new pop-punk explosion). Think of all the burnt CDs that are/were kicking around that revenue could have been earned on...I'd hate to guess how much it would be.

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[kamapuaa]

Obviously you are suiting history to fit your propoganda. The idea that Joe Six-Pack started filesharing copywrited files after the RIAA made news by suing these people is, well, not at all the truth. You know it, and everybody here knows it.

More than that, the RIAA started suing in different countries at different times. It hasn't happened at all in China, where filesharing is extremely popular. Face it, free easily-available music and movies is a model with no viable competition. The threat of legal problems or ramping up the difficulty of bootlegging is the only way to compete.

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[deleveld]

I very much doubt the music industry had any idea what would happen to online music once they defeated Napster. Nobody else knew what was going to happen either. Of course the lawyers making money from procecuting Napster told them that shutting Napster down would solve the piracy problem. This is obvious self-interest.

Any process with a positive growth coefficient grows exponentially until something starts to limit its growth. Consider the process of procecuting P2P. What does it cost? Who makes money from it? Of COURSE lawyers are going to scream about procecuting P2P. Its they way they make money! Whether or not its (P2P or prosecution) good for the music industry is an entirely different question.

Those terrible file sharers....

[fionnghal]

I think the Austrialians need to go after those guys who invented File Transfer Protocal, more files have been shared that way than any other peer to peer software ever written. :-P

The First Keyword to Filter

[Nom du Keyboard]

The first keyword on the list to filter: Kazaa_previous_version.exe

Re:Ideology?

[Rei]

Whether of not you consider P2P a good or bad thing, have no illusions. The people that made all of these programs are, at their heart, businessmen that simply want to profit.

I can name quite a few P2P software developers who would strongly disagree with your broad-stroke stereotyping on that front. For example, of the Gnutella clients listed on Wikipedia:

Acquisition, Acqlite, Apollon, BearShare, Cabos, CocoGnut, DM2, FrostWire, giFT, Gnucleus, Gtk-gnutella, iMesh, KCeasy, Kiwi Alpha, LimeWire, MLdonkey, Morpheus, Mutella, Phex, Poisoned, Qtella, Shareaza, Swapper.NET, Symella, XFactor, XNap, and XoloX:

Only 6 of 27 are closed source, while 18 of 27 are outright GPLed. The vast majority are both freeware and un-spywared/ad containing.

Kazaa is sooo 90s. Who cares...

[TastyWheat]

The dinosaurs in the record industry are showing their scales by wasting their resources on technology that is 5 generations behind the current P2P protocols.

The vedict is in and the record industry lost years ago.

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[Rei]

I wonder if the RIAA thought that P2P and music piracy was going to go away once they defeated Napster?

I read an article once that had an interview with a former Napster exec (I don't remember who) on why the RIAA settled with them. It was near the end, and it was obvious that they were going to lose, and they started talking with the recording industry. They pointed out that, hey, there's this new client out there called Gnutella, and guess what - it doesn't have a central server to take down. The RIAA people seemed completely unaware of this, and hadn't even thought about how to deal with such a situation; that's what prompted them to decide to start going after new digital media outlets after ignoring them for so long.

Yah but in the meantime

[kludge99]

People like Kenny lay of Enron fame get away with stealing us blind!

Archie

[RedLaggedTeut]

I think the Austrialians need to go after those guys who invented File Transfer Protocal..

You are trying to be funny, but the US music industry really did try to shut down ftp (successfully) by taking down the Archie index servers. The funny thing is, at the time I wasn't even aware that ftp could be used en masse for distributing music without a license; the Archie index servers were useful in general. This means the music industry will have no remorse to take the entire internet down with them if they expect to maintain their profit margins. You may not even remember Archie because it was killed by the music industry.

Re:Archie

[fionnghal]

The secret to humor is that it must contain a grain of truth - Archimedes.

The internet is a strange and new concept in the world. I feel it has the potential to alter not only the music industry as it is and has been for the past century, but probably the concept of ownership, copyright and even sovereignty as well.

I can see that the music industry will fight tooth and nail around the world to suppress it, but I personally see the internet as a tide that cannot be stopped. It is way too late, and way too useful to be controlled effectively by any government or corporation. In the end, I don't think they have a chance in hell.

Re:Archie

[xmorg]

I dont remember archie, but wow.... sad :(

Re:Archie

[fishbowl]

>I dont remember archie, but wow.... sad :(

Perhaps, but it was, like, instantly afterwards that the "WWW" took off. It's like they killed a garter snake and while celebrating, the Hydra sprang up behind.

Re:Archie

[drinkypoo]

The music industry is big, but it's not bigger than all other industry put together. Even movies+music isn't. The vast majority of industries have more to gain than to lose from the 'net.

Jail terminology

[digitaldc]

As such, they want Kazaa masterminds Nikki Hemming and Kevin Bermeister to go serve a jail term?
or is it:
As such, they want Kazaa masterminds Nikki Hemming and Kevin Bermeister to go to jail?

I am so confused.

Re:Jail terminology

[crazyjimmy]

I think the Record Companies are more concerned with the Kazaa masterminds passing Go and Collecting $200

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[capnchicken]

Bullshit,

There was a very small segmant of the population that knew about Napster, before Metalica stepped in and made it headline news. That was where they could've nipped it in the bud and realized right then and there that the jig was up and everyone knew how much their widely available, non-tangible, forced scarcity media was really worth in economic terms.

If there was a legal way to download songs at a nickle or 50 cents (a dollar is still too much for a song to me) back then, then the societal acceptance of free downloads would have never come into play. And people would associate it more with shop lifting.

Also how (not to be snoody, really asking this) does the Recording Industry Association of AMERICA have any say in Chineese law.

One more thing, if these guys hadn't tried to shut down K++ lite, then maybe I would feel some pity for them, but it's clear all Sharmen wanted out of this was a way to make a lot of money off with a tool designed to rip off of other people's copyrights while enforcing their own like it means more than everybody else's. Fuck them.

A BOOTING would be the best punishment!

[objekt]

Andy: [jovial] Well, you're free to go, Bart...right after your
              additional punishment.
Homer: Punishment?
  Andy: Well, a mere apology would be a bit empty, eh? Let the booting
              begin.
Homer: Booting?
  Andy: Aw, it's just a little kick in the bum.
                [a man with a gigantic boot walks in]
  Bart: Y'uh oh.

Awesome

[hypergreatthing]

Now can we get the music execs in jail for price fixing too? That would be awesome.

I'm pretty sure that once you start a company all personal responsiblity goes out the window and you're above the law. I mean, come on. Jail time? When are the Sony execs going to jail for installing crap on other people's computers?

Re:Awesome

[kurtis_mayfield]

corporation
n.

An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility.

Civ IV used it well.

Re:Awesome

[shark72]

The potential jail time is for contempt of court. To answer your question: if a Sony exec were in a similar situation (being told by the court to do something, then not doing it to the court's satisfaction), they would be subject to possible jail time for contempt of court.

The Wikipedia article on contempt of court has more information.

No. Not Good

[Crash Culligan]

They've got it coming and I don't really care about the P2P issues.

That's unfortunate, because if they do get prosecuted and jailed over anything, the record companies doing the prosecuting are not going to be crowing about jailing a spyware manufacturer. They'll be celebrating the jailing of the developers of a peer-to-peer software client that we both know has non-infringing uses.

And the message they're sending out won't be that "spyware is bad," it'll be that "file sharing is bad." (Optionally insert a ", mmmmmkay?" after each for the full effect.) Between the two, which do you really think will be chilled if this prosecution goes through?

As fallacious as the whole "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" meme may be, this may be an occasion to let it slide. Should they be jailed? Probably, but let it at least be for the right reason, and let it send the right message.

Re:Any recording company exec went into jail - eve

[wastedbrains]

I would be fine sending other corparte people to jail, but how about we start with the Recording industry people that have been caught red handed and admitted guilt in price fixing multiple times, and pay for play radio... Not to mention the price guaging they have been doing forever... CDS ALWAYS should have been cheaper than tapes, CDS always cost most than tapes...send em to jail... We need to stop proping up dinosaur businesses just let them fail and competitors take over... in the airline industry there is plent y of money to be made, we shouldnt be helping airlines that are going under stay afloat, let things go crazy for a couple years and most fail and everything will sort itself out.

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[east coast]

Obviously you are suiting history to fit your propoganda. The idea that Joe Six-Pack started filesharing copywrited files after the RIAA made news by suing these people is, well, not at all the truth. You know it, and everybody here knows it.

Uh, no, I don't know it and I've seen no evidence of this. The number of Joe Sixpacks who came to me and asked "what is napster and how do I use it", after the Metallica headlines, is astounding. Do you think Joe learned of Napster off of Slashdot? That's what I know. That's my experience. I don't know where you thought you had any insight into what I or anyone else knows but I'd say you're dead wrong.

Face it, free easily-available music and movies is a model with no viable competition.

If you'd take the pains to read my post you'd see that I said the same thing. So what's there to face? My possition was that if there was a model introduced early (before Joe Sixpacks p2p fetish) the RIAA would not have these issues today. If your concept was completely true there would be no iTunes today.

The threat of legal problems or ramping up the difficulty of bootlegging is the only way to compete.

I'd guess there tons more p2p users today than there was before the Napster lawsuits. Still some have gone the legal path and use services such as iTunes. Are these the same people that used Napster? Some doubtlessly but I think some people got into the concept from their iPods. Give me one good reason the RIAA couldn't have made an iTunes model years ago and coupled with mp3 hardware manufacturers such as Rio or Archos? Had they had done this Joe would have bought into it. Instead Joe's first venture into "internet music" was Napster and that hosed the RIAA.

Just take a look at Comcast and Dish Network and see how they beat out TV show piraracy with the help of TiVo. It's a fantastic model and while TV piracy still exists in large amounts the bottom line is that they understood that the same broadband service they were providing with cable could help doom their TV programming. So what do they do? They cut to the quick and make TV piracy seem childish in the face of paying 10 bucks a month for their own legal form of shows on demand.

Huh?

[dj_krztoff]

So Sharman Networks is now required by law to make their software available ... however in a modified state? Is there logic hidden in there somewhere? Wouldn't that be similar to Bill Gates pulling Windows from the shelves in a country that slaps Microsoft for bundling Media Player and/or Messenger, and being jailed anyway? This is what we call (in legalese of course) SUPER DUPER DOUBLE SECRET MEGA ULTRA COMPLIANCE!!

Who does this really benefit?

[9InchRails]

I'll tell you: the lawyers. Maybe we wouldn't be in this situation if the poor, starving record companies hadn't kept the prices of CDs high. Ford Fairlane said it best: "Those artist really take a bite".

doesn't hold water

[supernova87a]

I think jailing people for such pathetic white collar crimes is ridiculous.

hmm. That doesn't seem to me reasonable as a general statement. There *are* many white collar crimes worthy of imprisonment, which aren't violent against one particular person/victim. How about the corrupt pension officer who embezzles 12,000 people out of their retirement savings? How about a bank worker who helps funnel $25B out of a poor country's treasury? A judge who trades decisions for money?

None of those people are murderers, rapists, or violent. But aren't those crimes worthy of jail?

Having a very narrow conception of crime as something that makes you bleed, doesn't really work for sophisticated/long-term crimes.

Re:Any recording company exec went into jail - eve

[CylanR77]

"CDS ALWAYS should have been cheaper than tapes"

Ah, this tired old argument. Yes, a blank CD costs less than a tape, but you're not really just paying the record companies for blanks then, are you. You're paying for the content on those mediums. Why should a song on a CD cost any less than the same song on a tape?

I think you're just angry because you're being told that it actually costs money to produce music, but you want it for free.

Actually, you can have all the free music you want - just start singing. Or buy and play a $5 harmonica, and have loads of extremely cheap music. It amazes me how few people actually realize that the record companies don't own "music", they just own "their music". But, then I remember that most of the freeloaders are talentless and terminally lazy, so...

would that be tail recursive???

[MooseTick]

"Put the CEO of sony in jail and you creater a recursive loop that will make all RIAA and MPAA members heads explode."

Since jail is where you have your tail attacked, wouldn't this be tail recursive?

I know!

[xilmaril]

absolutely nothing.

For example, that time Coca-cola assasinated those union leaders in columbia.

scary world, isn't it?

Re:Warning: Literal Alert!

[renehollan]

Or how about you try and be a little less literal next time?

You haven't ever dealt with a U.S. INS officer (being a foreigner), have you? They have great discretionary powers.

How would you answer the question, "How long live you U.S.?" in similar circumstances (having been there legally at one time, but not currently) knowing that lying would get you arrested?

Re:Warning: Literal Alert!

[swillden]

How would you answer the question, "How long live you U.S.?"

I'd say "Sorry? I don't understand your question. Do you want to know how long I'm going to be in the US, or how long I've been in the US during other visits?".

It's a felony to lie, but there's no law against asking for clarifications. No reason to stress over an unanswerable question when you can just get it restated.

Filtering troubles?

[Travelsonic]

Somebody please explain to me how the filtering they ask for will not somehow block legal files (many songs sharethe same title, either that or filter that are based on individual words will basically kill P2P alltogether by filtering everything, legal or not), and can be dodged by title renaming and/or other means? And please don't pull the "If it's legal why would ti be on P2P" or "How would you know that song is on the network in the first place" lines out of your ass, answer the question.

why the lack of vision? Re:No light at the end

[speculatrix]

I have to agree. Apple are a computer company, what are they doing in the music distribution business, and why are they doing it so much better than the record label's own attempts?

The record labels have had plenty of time to catch up, so could it really be as simple as that they're lazy & incompetent, or simply just don't have the vision or understanding of what the consumers need? The labels could, if they really wanted, buy the whole of iTunes and the iPod business off Apple. Could it also be that the labels are staffed entirely by corporate bean-counters and lawyers who can only see as far as the next pay-cheque which is paid for by their next legal suit?

I recall an interview with a former head of General Motors, where he explained the terrible problems with car manufacturing in the USA... "organisations continue to do the wrong thing that's easy, rather than the right thing that's hard".

Re:Warning: Literal Alert!

[renehollan]

I had observed that when others asked for clarification, the inspector merely repeated the question louder, and showed irritation at having to do so. In my case the inspector never even acknowledged that his English was poor. He had a heavy accent as well. Such communication barriers don't usually bother me too much, but the stakes were high here. I don't know whether he really had such a poor command of English (how could he get the job?), or was simply trying to create a stressful situation to see if I would trip over my own words, as I might if I were trying to lie or hide something.

Not all INS inspectors I encountered had such a poor command of English, mind you, but the bunch at this particular border crossing (Buffalo, NY / Windsor, ON IIRC) generally seamed to. I fared much better when I "did the loop" at Blaine, WA., or at previous inspections at the airport POE in Dorval, QC.

Note to moderators

[drinkypoo]

Trolling is when you say something you don't believe in order to invoke a desired response. The parent comment is flamebait. And, in order to assist you further: This post is not a troll either. It's offtopic.

The worst thing that can happen to copyright

[Peaker]

The worst thing that can happen to copyright -- is it being enforced.

If 30% of the US's population gets huge fines and jailtime for their copyright infringements and/or DMCA violations.
If 90% of Israel's population gets jailtime for their copyright infringements.
If similar numbers occur in various countries around the world...

Copyright will be abolished.

Re:The worst thing that can happen to copyright

[The Master Control P]

That depends. If the bastards can make it a felony in the US, none of the people they screw can vote against their whores in congress.

Re:Any recording company exec went into jail - eve

[shark72]

"I would be fine sending other corparte people to jail, but how about we start with the Recording industry people that have been caught red handed and admitted guilt in price fixing multiple times, and pay for play radio..."

Price fixing multiple times? I'm aware of the thing a few years ago where Best Buy and Wal-Mart nailed Universal... have there been other times?

At any rate, price fixing is not an offense for which one can go to jail. Contempt of court, however, is. This is what we are discussing today: a possible jail term for contempt of court.

"Not to mention the price guaging they have been doing forever... CDS ALWAYS should have been cheaper than tapes, CDS always cost most than tapes...send em to jail..."

Virtually every other industry -- including the one you probably work in -- sets their pricing according to supply and demand; why can't the record industry? I wouldn't take a cassette tape for free; if somebody gave me a new release in cassette form, I would be sorely disapointed. Consumers simply value CDs more than cassettes.

"We need to stop proping up dinosaur businesses just let them fail and competitors take over..."

That's an interesting take on things. Apple's iTMS has been a runaway success. The original Napster is gone. Kazaa is on the ropes. Things don't look good for eDonkey. The open-source, "payment optional" record labels like Magnatune are barely making a blip. Looks to me like the record industry is doing fine.

Re:Any recording company exec went into jail - eve

[HiThere]

Actually they HAVE been found guilty multiple times, but to get higher than three you may need to go back to the 1950's. (And perhaps not, I haven't been counting.) I'm not aware of the execs ever going to jail.

Could they go to jail? Why not. They are guilty of conspiracy to commit a misdeameanor and guilty of conspiracy to commit a grand misdeameanor. I think those are both felonies.

Sony DRM CDs

[freedom_india]

Time to put Sony CEO and CMD in jail for "unauthorized" entry into my property (PC), breakage of my property, vandalism (leaving open doors), and theft of property for their DRM-crippled CDs.
How come RIAA and MPAA coveniently forget their own trespasses like these while trying to jail Kaaza?
How come EFF.org goes after Ashcroft, but fails to go after Sony?
How come those ever-present class-action lawyers go after Philip Morris, but "fail" to sue Sony?

Re:No light at the end of the tunnel

[ScrewMaster]

Some years ago a radio station down south (I forget which) put up a billboard that read "500,000 Watts. More power than God" or words to that effect. It was just a billboard, and yes I suppose some thousands of people saw it ... but it would have gone away in a few months. However, several religious groups got all torqued about it and started making loud public noises, to such good effect that millions of people all across the nation got to see it on TV and hear about it on the radio. Apparently, that disturbed these people even more since they really wanted it go away. The station's general manager took the position of "lighten up people, it's just a joke" and reveled in all the attention his little station was receiving. Eventually he took it down, but not before he got an incredible amount of free publicity. Maybe that was his original intent, I don't know. But that was the result.
So yes, I remember the heyday of Napster: I didn't even hear about it, much less download anything until the RIAA started making loud public noises about it. Matter of fact, I was driving to work one day when the commentator mentioned something about some software called "Napster" that was giving away hundreds of thousands of free songs. And that was only the first of many times I read or otherwise heard about it in the media. Naturally, since I had just had my first cable modem installed I had to go try it, but I might never have noticed if it hadn't been for the free publicity granted Napster by the RIAA. The bastards shot themselves squarely in their own foot on that one.

Sometimes it's best to just keep quiet about something, no matter how much it bothers you.

Correction

[RedLaggedTeut]

I have to correct myself;

According to
http://web.archive.org/web/19991116130844/archie.t h-darmstadt.de/why.html(german)

Archie was shutdown because the authors of the archie software were trying to earn a living from it without investing additional work in return. The universities felt they were getting cheated and dropped Archie.

I'll try to correct myself on /. if the thread is still open.

Sorry for the red herring/urban myth.