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RIAA Afraid of Harvard
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "According to a report on p2pnet.net, the RIAA's latest anti-college round of "early settlement" letters targets 7 out of 8 Ivy League schools, but continues to give Harvard University a wide berth. This is perhaps the most astonishing display of cowardice exhibited to date by the multinational cartel of SONY BMG, Warner Bros. Records, EMI, and Vivendi/Universal (the "Big Four" record companies, which are rapidly becoming less "big"). The lesson to be drawn by other colleges and universities: "All bullies are cowards. Appeasement of bullies doesn't work. Standing up to bullies and fighting back has a much higher success rate.""
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
Are we talking about an African elephant or an Asian elephant?
If a student brings a lawyer to the school where I teach, the school always caves. One student was able to graduate in spite of the fact that he copied most of the work for a final year course. Not only that but he couldn't demonstrate competence no matter how much extra time he was given.
We also paid tens of thousands of dollars to a teacher who didn't pass his probation because it would be cheaper than paying lawyers.
Harvard is the lawyer breeding ground. I'm fairly sure, almost everyone working in the legal departments of the various RIAA members comes from there.
Now, who do they have their knowledge from? The profs there. When you teach, do you tell your student everything you know? More important, when you learn, do you know afterwards as much as your teacher does?
Rarely loses the master against his padawan. So to challenge him, a fool you must be.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Nobody in their right mind sues a lawyer assembly plant, coward or not.
If you're a laywer for the RIAA, you are not paid to be brave. You are paid to further the agenda of the recording industry. If they believe suing Harvard students would hinder rather than help their cause, well is that really being "cowardly" or is it being smart? Would suing Harvard be "brave" or would it be counterproductive to their goals?
I'm as disgusted with the RIAA's tactics as anyone, but this childish name calling is getting old. It seems like every day on the front page of Slashdot is some article title with an overblown ad hominem attack against persons, groups or companies that rub us the wrong way. C'mon, people. We're smart, educated and savvy, do we really need to stoop to this?
WARNING: If accidentally read, induce vomiting.
That's the comment I was looking for, seems pretty cut and dry to me.
Pushing around smaller and less reputable colleges and students may be fine and dandy...but trying to shove your weight around against Harvard is like lil timmy firing his peashooter at the deathstar, the RIAA would be decimated and a huge precedent would be set. Better to just leav'em be.
Trackball users will be first against the wall.
It is well worth trying out the Freenet p2p network. It is an anonymous distributed data storage system that is ideally suited to filesharing. I have been using it for the past few years and just recently it has got a lot faster and more usable. Music and movies are regularly shared and it can only take a few hours to get a full album. Speeds are slower than bittorrent etc., but that is to be expected - you never get something for nothing.
I find it funny that they are targeting 7 out of 8 ivy league schools. Doesn't that say that maybe pirating is a good thing? Maybe these smart people know that pirating is illegal in the minds of the IP holders but don't care. They would much rather get educated and cultured through things like torrenting and other p2p programs. At what point does the public have a say in what is right and what is wrong? The way I view p2p and torrenting is that it is the biggest library of any kind. It holds not only entertainment but educational purposes as well. I have tons of videos, music, games, etc. that are very illegal but then again I don't care. 90% of that stuff I wouldn't of seen to begin with so I don't feel guilty about taking what I wouldn't of seen or heard or enjoyed. A lot of it is educational (ie. Modern Marvels, Discovery, History Channel, etc)
I do not care about actors, musicians, directors, managers, producers because they all get paid no matter what. If they are good they will continue to get paid. When I see shows like MTV cribs...and what these celebs buy with my money...screw them. They don't need their 3rd or 4th super car. They don't need their insane boats or whatever it may be. I am sorry but actors/actresses don't need to be paid millions for their roles in movies. Musicians shouldn't expect $90,000 for a small gig at a club. Execs make way too much money for me to give a rats ass about me stealing a damn album.
These guys have outdated ways of thinking and they are fighting for their last breath and instead of working with the consumers they go and fight the consumers. All I know is that I want to see propirating videos on youtube.
Well you're challenging the entire premise of my story, and I heartily disagree with you. These guys pick on defenseless people. That doesn't take anything except cowardice.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
I would say that the RIAA is a white elephant
-1 not first post
I'm not sure if you're confused or just being a karma whore with the links, but no, the submitter of the story is not Charles Nesson. It would appear to be Ray Beckerman. Or better still, Ray Beckerman.
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
As everyone knows (;-), Yale and Harvard are also primary competitors in their law schools, and Yale turns out about as many lawyers as Harvard. In fact, there have been some interesting studies done comparing the two schools, which have radically different teaching cultures in their law schools. The conclusion seems to be that both work quite well, and their graduates have roughly the same success rate after graduation.
...
So what's going on between the RIAA/MPAA and Yale? Does Yale's reputation as being the "nice" law school (if that's not an oxymoron) result in them being attacked more or less? Anyone have data?
Just curious
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
I think one likely reason that the RIAA/MPAA are avoiding Harvard is because of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society which is an outgrowth of the Harvard Law school. You may be familar with Berkman through the Chilling Effects Clearinghouse, OpenNet Initiative (mapping government repression of the Internet worldwide), and the Stop Badware projects.
Berkman is very forward-looking and proactive regarding emerging issues of Law and Technology. The various fellows have been vocal and supportive of copyright reform. With such an interested, knowledgeable band of law professors and law students, it would be a serious black-eye if the RIAA attempted to litigate on the Harvard campus. I have to believe that they would be handed a bruising defeat, that would establish precedent regarding their campaign of extorting* settlement monies from poor college students.
* I mean extortion in the common, non-technical sense. Don't sue me for libel please.
Pretend I said something meaningful or insightful here.
No, Mr. Beckerman, you misunderstand me. My comment was not meant to be in support of the media companies. I haven't bought anything from those people since 1981, because a little research convinced me that they were an overtly amoral operation that I couldn't, in good conscience, continue to support. They still are, and I still feel the same way. Most people don't even want to know who they're dealing when they buy their music, because then they might have to wonder where the cash from that last CD they bought actually went.
I just meant that it takes a certain degree of intestinal fortitude to keep doing what they do, for as long as they've been doing it, and not become violently ill from a sense of self-loathing.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Actually, "NewYorkCountryLawyer" is the Slashdot ID of Ray Beckerman, attorney at Vandenberg & Feliu and long standing pain in ass of the RIAA. Charles Nesson and John Palfrey wrote the original Harvard response to the RIAA which was orignally covered at Information Week, then picked up by P2PNet and Ray Beckerman's own blog, amongst others.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
Yes but in my life experience I have not found a correlation, but rather an inverse relationship, between "intestinal fortitude" and "capacity for cruelty". And I think this story supports my theory: All bullies are cowards.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Completely off topic... but I have always hated that phrase. I know plenty of people who "do" but don't actually "know" what they're doing... and plenty of people who "Don't" who teach... that DO know. The phrase always struck me a a snide comment against teachers, as though we are incapable of anything else so we teach. Many people who know what they're doing would make TERRIBLE teachers... which happens quite frequently in college. They are hired for their status and intellect for the college... but they don't know the first thing about teaching that knowledge.
Sorry, it's just that that phrase seems to carry a certain hubris that irritates me.
They may be 'stupid', 'insensitive', 'mean', 'cruel'. That is not 'ballsy'. Ballsy is those few people who have stood up these ghouls.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Far too many still see them as a Goose That Laid the Golden Eggs. Time to turn that percepction around.
What?
Everyone thinks it's just Harvard that isn't being touched. To the best of my knowledge (haven't checked recently, but I tried to find any instance of this about 6 months ago), they have yet to touch a single Berklee College of Music, or Julliard student/faculty member. I mean, it's not surprising. It would be pretty funny for the RIAA to have tried to sue John Mayer a few years ago (when he was attending Berklee) only to have some of their member companies trying to woo and sign him a few months later.
Then again, while music students have more music downloaded/shared in general than almost anyone else I know, they also actually purchase more music than anyone I know.
Tibbon
tibbon.com
I agree. But they're right to be scared of Harvard's lawyers -- they must be the bee's knees
-1 not first post
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
I find the cowardice suggestion highly unlikely. It makes absolutely no difference that Harvard has a law school. Yale's is arguably better. Sometimes you make strategic decisions in litigation. If there is one defendant who is going to fight very hard, and has let you know as much, sue the other defendants first and create precedent. Not suing Harvard now doesn't mean Harvard won't be sued.
The heavens do not fall for such a trifle.
I would even go an extra mile here.
Knowing how to TEACH is much more difficult than knowing the subject.
I have very poor teacher that knew a lot about the subject. I learned nothing from them.
I had great teacher that knew the subject well, but not lots. I learned a lot from them.
Anyone can know about any subject. All it takes is a book and some practice (to understand it). However, try and teach a bunch of teenager kids, and your views of teaching will change very fast.
Good teacher are a rarity. If you take a class of 100 CS students, you will probably end up with 50 or 60 good programmers, 2 or 3 exceptional programmers. If you can get 1 good teacher from those 100, you are in luck. In most cases, you don't get a single one.
morcego
A civil litigation lawyer has several respinsibilities:
1) To represent his or her client(s) in the best and most effective manner possible.
2) To plead cases that they can win - to do otherwise violates Responsibility #1
3) To make money for their client or to prevent their client from losing money by counseling them not to try a case that is not winnable and/or to settle out if necessary to minimize damages.
The attorneys for the RIAA are civil litigation attorneys.
When the target of litigation is Harvard University, arguably the most prestigious law school in the world, by counseling against pressing action against the university, these attorneys are flfilling all three of these Responsibilities because you can bet your bottom dollar that the legal counsel for Harvard University will most assuredly make the pressing of ANY case against them an EXTREMELY costly affair, indeed! Not to mention that trying to win against the best law school in the world is a really, really tough thing to do...
And, by doing so, they are effectively representing their clients.
In any law practice, that's a Good Day at the office!
Why?
They don't really need to cost us anything. They're a self-autonomous entity, capable of earning the money to sustain itself off people who like what they do, and because there are many people out there who do, they are very valuable. The only reason they're having any significant impact on the rest of society is because of piracy. I would have thought that piracy itself would be the liability here.
An analogy: a man keeps getting assaulted by assassins, and cries foul murder over and over again. Everybody is sick of him screaming. Would the sensible approach be a) dispatch with him, or b) dispatch with the assassins?
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
and from what I can tell
:)
1) most kids here are too busy with chairing their Model-UN-Investment-Banking-Labor-Movement meeting to even care about music, so they listen to a few cds and buy tracks from itunes (like many college campuses with high tuition, most kids have some hardware from apple) and hear most of their music on the loudspeakers at god-awful binge drinking parties
2) the few kids who listen to a lot of music are into indie bands, and the RIAA seems to go after folks who download more popular tunes. also there's pretty significant downloading/computer-illiteracy here (kids dont have the time to waste playing with the computer, and thus dont really understand where to get music illegally)
3) there's only like a couple hundred cs majors here, and there's only one out of that group with immaculate taste in music (me!) so I'm probably the only person at harvard that the RIAA could ever be angry at, but I don't download music.
There's nobody to sue!
Note to reader: The error bounds on this comprehensive study may be non-trivial.
That:
1) They know they're case(s) are weak
2) Their campaign is most certainly not about suing wrongdoers. It's about calculated methods to change copyright by case law.
Really this won't stop until someone with resources starts playing in their playground.
That is, attacks the xIAA for racketeering, price fixing, extortion, by way of the civil courts this is not likely to end soon.
The US legal system is simply broken. Our society treats corporations as equals, yet they are designed to pool capital. Anyone can sue, with little recourse, and if you have enough money, you can make it so the average man cannot possibly fight back. Meanwhile, all the time that you spend fighting the lawsuit, you find it very difficult to better your life in any other way, even save and/or invest.
And if you start talking about methods to put the system back in check... well then you are labeled a socialist or a communist. There has been legislation all throughout the preeminent authority's tenure on free market capitalism, but I dare you to start talking about Antitrust legislation now.
But I digresss...
And that's not a troll, exactly how?
How on earth did Creationists get categorically thrown into the same class of groups as the RIAA, Nazis, and patent lawyers?
I'm agnostic, but I know many Creationists who are just trying to find the world view that makes the best sense of their experiences, their reasoning, and various bits of historical evidence. I'm getting pissed that popular sentiment on /. is becoming that Creationists are a bunch of evil, ignorant bastards who are out to wreck the public teaching of science.
Creationism is a world view and a particular take on history, not a political practice. You might judge some Creationists to hold their views for bad reasons or insufficient evidence, but the same could be said of many reductionist evolutionists. But I know plenty of people smart, articulate reasons who understand the debate and have judged it more probable that creationism (not necessarily young-earth creationism) is the most-likely correct account of natural history.
With competent assassins, this becomes much harder.
Or are we talking zombies and ninja assassins here? 'Cause that'd make a great movie.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Amongst 1st world nations, the USA is the only one that has a large portion believing in creationism. The rest of the developed world thinks of it as a joke.
I dare not pretend that I understand all the ins and outs of colleges and law but it would appear to me that more then just Harvard can get away from being targetted. If all colleges and universities were to stand united, perhaps law schools providing the legal front, against the RIAA and develope a system or group that is designed to protect students from this type of thing then maybe all these cases would drop. I'm just a junior in High School, when I go to college I dont want to have these types of issues to deal with. Instead of the universities giving in they should stand together and provide eachother with support. Surely there is strength in numbers.
I am a lowly high school student... please dont assume im an expert.
If they sued a university or college, they'd have a fight on their hand... which is what the RIAA assiduously avoids.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Hello. My name is Terrence "Mongo" Rennet, and I represent the American Council of Bullies, Toughs, and Schoolyard Ruffians. I'm here to clear up some tragic misconceptions about bullies and their place in the academic hierarchy, misconceptions that have gone unchallenged for too long. It is my hope that by "clearing the air," as it were, bullies and bullied can walk with head erect or cower behind lockers respectively with a newfound respect for one another.
Myth: Bullies are just jealous of your intelligence, sensitivity, or ability to play the oboe.
Fact: Bullies have no more jealousy of your mental abilities than we have of your clean, well-ironed, unfashionable clothing. To the contrary, we are profoundly glad that you have chosen to develop your mental prowess, leaving your body weak and defenseless against our brutality. For that we thank you, even as we elevate your underwear.
Myth: Bullies suffer from low self-esteem, and victimize others to make themselves feel better.
Fact: While each bully has his (or her, as is increasingly the case) own deeply personal reasons for bullying, I can assure you that a poor self-image is not one of them. To the contrary, bullying is a high-pressure occupation, and only someone with an unusual amount of self-confidence will have the elán to shake down younger students efficiently while evading authority. Children without self-confidence tend instead to spend recess in the library, the computer lab, or pretending to be warriors in ridiculous fantasy games. Sound familiar?
Myth: If you stand up to a bully, he will reveal himself to be a coward.
Fact: This is perhaps the most hurtful stereotype of them all, in the sense that if you try it we will hurt you. Endless movies and after-school specials depict a tormented victim finally working up the courage to attack his neighborhood bully, after which said bully runs away crying and -- I must chuckle here -- calling for his mommy. What writers of these "entertainments" don't realize is that bullies invariably establish a complex ritual pecking order through constant low-level violence against each other. Haven't you noticed us punching each other in the shoulder at the bus stop? Then you've witnessed the magic of our social structure. Even if you, with your weak, gelatin-like arms were able to do us physical harm, I can assure you that we would recover faster than you can recite your grade point average and teach you a few things about savage poundings you can't learn from Spider-Man comics.
With that thought, I take your leave, confident that I have, in my own small way, improved the world's understanding of the art and craft of bullying. Good day, and if I see you after school you're dead meat.
brunching.com
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
Expert Witness Defense Fund (For technical expert witnesses, technical consultants, and computer forensic examiners);
Marie Lindor Legal Defense Fund (For defense of UMG v. Lindor);
Jammie Thomas Legal Defense Fund (For defense of Capitol v. Thomas).
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Do you have even the slightest idea what you're talking about? No? I thought not.
... always the same thing. ALL Americans are useless, stupid people that want nothing better than to watch their big-screen TV sets and take over the world.
The attitude that comes across from so many non-American posters on Slashdot is interesting. They feel perfectly free to lump ALL Americans into some arbitrary (usually negative) category, criticize us, and call us names (even though we built the largest industrial economy and military on the planet, not something usually accomplished by Flat Earthers.) On the other hand, if an American says anything remotely similar you take umbrage. ALL French are cowards. ALL British are stuck-up. ALL Arabs are terrorists. ALL {insert nationality here} are {insert favorite racial epithet here.} You can talk about Americans not being able to think for ourselves, but we're the ones with all the "intellectual property" that bootstrapped China and India into the industrial age.
Ten to one the Chinese aren't too interested in what your country has to offer, except maybe target practice. For your sakes, you'd better hope we don't collapse too soon, before you've had a chance to build up your own defenses. Russia and China are going to be on the world scene in a major way, sooner or later. Mark my words. When that happens, you'll be wondering why you were complaining so loudly about us.
If you had even bothered to read any of the posts left here by politically-aware Americans (and there are many) you'd find out that A LOT OF US OBJECT TO THE SAME THINGS YOU DO. But nope
You, sir, are an ignorant, hypocritical prick. Don't bother replying, I've wasted enough keystrokes for the evening.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Got any proof for that, any links of real studies and surveys or is that just some comment you pulled out of your ass with no real basis in reality, just wishful thinking.