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International Music Industry Amps Up Anti-P2P War
newtley writes to mention a BBC article discussing a new initiative against file-sharers by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. This international version of the MPAA is breathing down the necks of 8,000 users of file-sharing software. From the article: "The new cases cover file sharers in 17 different countries who have been allegedly using sites including BitTorrent, eDonkey, SoulSeek and WinMX. For the first time legal action is being taken in Brazil, Mexico and Poland. The IFPI said the actions affect a wide-variety of people: a laboratory assistant has been charged in Finland, while a parson has been served with action in Germany."
Can't wait to see the first Canadian sued, then him/her countersuing this group and/or the SOCAN for their levies since copying is legal for personnal usage in Canada.
Pardon me, but in some countries it just might be legal to download for your own use. Like it used to be in Finland, before Tanja ex-Karpela now-Saarela, Jukka Liedes and the Gramex mafia sold out to the media biz.
And all those trained monkeys in the Parliament just keep on pushing the button as they are told by the party.
We might as well replace the "elected representatives" with remote-controlled robots. I bet they would be cheaper, too.
Yes, nowadays you can buy and download legally, IF the record label or rights holder in question has authorized your country to be the one who can download that specific track you want.
Actually, you can get a high-end turntable these days with a USB port. I just use line-out to my nforce2 audio in, and sample at about double CD quality; that ALMOST gets all the sound that is on vinyl that a CD misses.
As for P2P, I can't use it anymore. My ISP politely asked me to stop, as it was really killing their ability to service their other customers.
I'm serious; they didn't threaten to throttle me, kick me off, or sue me, they very politely requested that I cut back as much as possible.
Which sucks, in a way. if they were assholes, i would have just circumvented whatever they tried. Now I have to play nice.
Grrr.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
Someday, maybe soon, the most popular peer-to-peer networks will have TOR or something similar built in and turned on by default, with the seed- and data-carrying nodes hidden behind .onion. Yeah the speed sucks but subpeonas suck worse.
I'd love to see the RIAA try to shut down a beowulf cluster of those babies.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Since when do they go hand-in-hand?
Music is not a commodity, it is an art. It is not meant to be sold, it is meant to be heard and played. It is meant to be shared and it will be. Try as it may, the corporate music industry cannot stop this movement. I look forward to its rapture.
Anything can, could, and will happen.
Agreed. One of the sad side effects of Idiot America is that the new generation doesn't appreciate amazing guitarwork or groovy bass lines or solid time or meaningful lyrics. Guitarists once were asked how often they practiced; nowadays they're asked how they manage to get on the radio so much.
Support artists who don't bow down before the RIAA. There are people, like me, that only publish under Creative Commons and won't ever sign a record contract. Find them, listen to them, support them. Odds are they sound better than anything you'll find on the radio.
Above all, stop buying the music! Most music is not worth the cartel's price of $20 a CD. Hell, I could get three weeks of gas to commute to university and work for $20. The RIAA is still making roughly $40 billion a year. Maybe you working alone can't make a difference. That's fine. There's more than just a few of us. We are already clear enough on our position and large enough in numbers that it is scaring the shit out of these fat-cat businessmen, and forcing them to react in a rather panicked manner.
They aren't suing people for the hell of it, and they aren't suing people to recoup money. They're doing it to instill fear. Show them that you aren't afraid to defy them.
~ C.
I say, put up or shut up. If you don't like what the RIAA does, if you think labels only offer music that sucks, if DVDs are overpriced or you don't like the "new release-newer release with extras" cycle, don't respond by taking their product on your own terms. That just says that you do indeed value that product and are willing to pay for it, just not in upfront cash - you are confirming the demand for the product.
I don't know about you, but in my case it's that I only want to pay in upfront cash. I don't want to hit any region codes (I've got DVDs from three regions now and not going back), I don't want any unskippable ads, I don't want to buy a new monitor because my perfectly capable one doesn't support HDCP, I want to put them on my HTPC, I don't want to buy a new if it gets scratched (it's a 10 cent disk with a 10 dollar movie - it's like finding out you can't replace wear parts on your car). I want to be able to put in a CD and burn an MP3 CD for use in my car, or copy to my MP3 player.
I want to buy a copy that I can then watch the way I want, no matter what format or medium or playback device I choose to use including making fair use copies to achieve that. My copy is mine and I can view it, lend it, sell it or whatever else I choose to do with it as long as all fair use copies go with it or is destroyed. That right is not contingent on any activation, authorization, transfer or revocation service from the copyright holder, it is inherent and inalienably stored in my copy. That I can't make copies for sale, public performance and so on is fair enough.
You might of course say that is unreasonable and that I have no right to dictate what terms they should sell copies under, even though they affect my use of it in ways that has nothing do to with the copyright holder's law, but you are wrong. Courts have upheld rights that the copyright holder doesn't want to grant, it is not an absolute right. The fact that everything is now licensed, not sold is another symptom of this disease, in which they both legally and technologically go into my living room and tell me what I can and can't do.
People "confirm demand" because they are demand. And I will get my supply from those who provide the superior product. In that sense, it seems awfully stupid make your product artificially inferior, but what do I know. I'm only a consumer.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings