RIAA Argues That MP3s From CDs Are Unauthorized

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In an Arizona case against a defendant who has no legal representation, Atlantic v. Howell, the RIAA is now arguing — contrary to its lawyers' statements to the United States Supreme Court in 2005 MGM v. Grokster — that the defendant's ripping of personal MP3 copies onto his computer is a copyright infringement. At page 15 of its brief (PDF) it states the following: 'It is undisputed that Defendant possessed unauthorized copies... Virtually all of the sound recordings... are in the ".mp3" format for his and his wife's use... Once Defendant converted Plaintiffs' recordings into the compressed .mp3 format and they are in his shared folder, they are no longer the authorized copies...'"

Comments

Enforce it to the letter

[deniable]

Mr RIAA lawyer better not have any audio files on his laptop. Better have the judge make sure he has a note from every rights holder. Check his car too. Got an iPod, Mr. Lawyer? How about your kids? Unauthorized ring-tones on your phone?

Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. I'm sure we could find violations by the RIAA and it's members and staff.

Can't touch this? It's discovery time.

Re:Learn how to summarise

[Typoboy]

There is an 'and' there. But, line 3 of that page says: "It is undisputed that Defendant possessed unauthorized copies of Plaintiffs' copyrighted sound recordings on his computer." and then states that that refers to copies which were made from their original format. So it does seem that they are claiming that possession of mp3s of CDs you own is unauthorized. Unless (and it is a big if) they are saying that possession of mp3s in his shared folder is an unauthorized format. But I can't quite follow that. Page 8 says that space shifting fair use is invalid when it involves distribution to the public. Presumably it could be fair use otherwise?

MP3s and the Audio Home Recording Act

[Anonymous Coward]

The Audio Home Recording Act was a reaction by the RIAA to the dangers of Digital Audio Tape (DAT). Basically, the RIAA was worried that DAT would lead to widespread bit-perfect copies of its recordings. In order to prevent that, the RIAA agreed to the use of the Serial Content Management System to regulate DAT. What SCMS did was but in a flag that allowed one to make a bit-perfect copy of a recording. But one could not make a bit-perfect copy of the copy. (You could, of course, convert the copy to analog and make a perfect copy of the converted track.)

Obviously, DAT never took off and SCMS became a dead end. However, look at what the RIAA agreed to: you can make as many imperfect copies (for personal use) as you wanted. What is an MP3 except an imperfect digital copy?

Unfortunately, this almost certainly has no relevance to the MP3 debate because SCMS is specific to DAT. (If it did have relevance, I'm sure someone would have argued it by now.)

Re:You're *just now* starting to boycott???

[junklight]

no one is asking you to stop buying music - just no via the RIAA.

I buy pretty much everything direct now - from ultra obscure stuff like Richard Skeltons wonderful work: http://www.sustain-release.co.uk/ to mainstreamish things like Neubauten and (drum roll) Radiohead.

More bands should get with the program and opt out of the RIAA as well.

There is Music out there - the RIAA is not interested in music and it is not interested in its customers/victims

Re:You're *just now* starting to boycott???

[unapersson]

You can always buy your mainstream music second hand. I'm pretty sure that pisses them off a lot more than piracy. It's being sold legally yet they don't get a penny and they'd ban it if they could.