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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...'"
Once Defendant converted Plaintiffs' recording into the compressed .mp3 format and they are in his shared folder, they are no longer the authorized copies distributed by Plaintiffs. Moreover, Defendant had no authorization to distribute Plaintiffs' copyrighted recordings from his KaZaA shared folder.
In other words, they're complaining about sharing the MP3s, not making them. The fight against corporate copyright bullies will not be helped by intellectual dishonesty and exaggeration.
foo mane padme hum
They almost certainly were unauthorized. But that doesn't matter, as copyright law does grant you some limited rights to make copies without authorization.
In most jurisdictions these rights would include transferring cd's to mp3's for personal use.
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.
Except that they are claiming that mp3s outside your shared folder are yours, but they are no longer authorized copies once they enter your shared folder?
That's a step beyond claiming that "making available" is piracy, which is a step beyond what most of us accept as piracy.
I do agree with your assessment, though. Nothing is helped by intellectual dishonesty and exaggeration.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Just to get people to respond and say how stupid and misleading the article is ... is getting quite old. But heck it works and people come back for more every day spitting out the same tired responses again and again and again. It really makes me feel good about wanting to continue reading and posting tired articles/responses on slashdot. Keep up the *fine* work guys.
The RIAAs problem is they made ripped copies *avaliable* via a shared folder. It does not say the act of ripping is illegal.
What I did find interesting was the description of MP3 as a perfect copy. Niquist aside MP3 is a lossy format. Songs in MP3 format are most certainly not a perfect copy of the origional work but they don't degrade unless re-encoded which I think was the real point they were trying to make.
Erm, maybe when their shares stop making them money? People will invest in all sorts of things and ignore moral/ethical dilemmas, as long as it is making them money. Such is human greed and capitalism.
That'll only happen when Joe Public who buys the random, mass-produced crap that makes it into the charts feels he is affected. For the moment it is only the comparative minority who rip and share MP3s en-mass who really worry, and those geeks who keep track of the news who can see where it will end up.
Maybe when their business model finally bites the dust and some other group using online distribution without DRM is still going strong. Even then it is only a maybe.
Again, it'll cost money to do that. They can sue lots of people for tens of thousands or they can spend millions restructuring and working on a better model. Which one seems better in the corporate world?
What we are seeing here is a classic case of the death of an obsolete business model. The RIAA is part of the old guard and the whole reason for their existence is the current business model of selling and distributing music. They are fighting for their very existence. There will always be music and musicians and long may they prosper.
"The true triumph of reason is that it enables us to get along with those who do not possess it." Voltaire
Part of the problem is the RIAA thinks that fair use isn't fair. And they're bound to be able to change a few people's minds to their side with the way they throw around money; let's hope they don't change too many (more) politicians minds on that before people stand up as you suggest, because by that point it may simply be too late.
Gee, I wonder if that was what they were doing:
Just because
Yet another misleading kdawson post. I haven't had the urge to filter by editor since the JonKatz days, but I think I'm about there again.
I don't think I can make this any simpler: Stop Buying Music from RIAA Members. Its easy, they don't seem to want you to buy their product anyway. Music CDs might or might not play, just like they might or might not infect your PC with rootkits. Legal downloads might or might not play on whatever portable device you have, and they probably wont play on your next one, or your next PC, so what are you spending your money on anyway? Stop Buying Music from RIAA Members.
The RIAA gets its funding from the big labels in addition to these racketeering activities. As SCO has so thoroughly demonstrated, suing your customers is not a sustainable business plan. Cut off the other source of revenue: Music Sales, and they will eventually wither away and die. I am not condoning piracy here, and as a musician its hard to advocate intentionally killing off an industry I've spent a significant part of my life studying, but it simply must be done. It is the only way to rid the planet of what has become a blight on the world. Only then can something better rise up to fill the void. It is a sacrifice we all have to make for the greater good.
Theres a theme here: Stop Buying Music from RIAA Members.
You can easily check if an artist, album or label belongs to RIAA using http://www.riaaradar.com/
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
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.
DG get it. Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft supplies 380k mp3s with pdf format booklets and album art. All for less than the physical cd. I've bought several things from them already and intend to buy more.
Well, what you propose is IMHO no different than the prisoner's dilemma, only scaled to some millions of people. And it just doesn't scale.
The mechanics are just like in the prisoner's dilemma, really. With two people it's just "am I sure that my pal will do the same? or am I shooting myself in the foot?" Which boils down to how well you know him, I guess. There have been plenty of people who've been surprised there. With millions of people, it becomes "am I sure that all these millions will do the same? or am I just the idiot depriving himself of something, while everyone else doesn't give a damn?" Since you don't know them all, the latter becomes the far safer bet. And you know they'll think the same.
Briefly, if your rights depend on some tens of millions of other people doing the same thing, you've already lost them. Isolated individuals are insecure, weak, vulnerable, easy prey for FUD, etc.
No, what most of the world discovered a long time ago, is that you need some laws if you're against something.
E.g., if you want, say, the factories to stop polluting rivers, you need a law that forbids that or at least gives them a cost feedback for it. Because just hoping that everyone will suddenly say "well, I'll refuse to work for anyone who pollutes, or buy their products" just doesn't work.
Same here. If you don't like copyright law and the loopholes/privileges/whatever it gives to the RIAA, then have that law changed. Just hoping that millions of independent people will individually decide to boycott them, never worked, never will.
Or at the very least, get organized. If you want people to stand up for something, at personal cost or inconvenience, see the prisoner's dilemma again: they have to be sure that everyone else, or at least enough others, do the same thing. Plus, it gets you taken more seriously by the other side you're negotiating with. A group of a million or two sworn to never buy CDs until fair use is respected, has some bargaining power. Isolated individuals whining separately do not.
The last paragraph is why unions appeared. Much as that seems to be a swearword for many nerds.
Or before them such things as the guilds or medieval communes. Isolated burghers were no match for the noble of the land. A whole city standing together for their rights, well, now that got taken a bit more seriously.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
The Fair Use argument was negated when he shared them on KaZaA - RTFA, and look at page 15 that is even mentioned in the summary.
.mp3 format and they are in his shared folder, they are no longer the authorized copies distributed by Plaintiffs. Moreover, Defendant had no authorization to distribute Plaintiffs' copyrighted recordings from his KaZaA shared folder. .mp3 format in the shared folder on Defendant's computer hard drive, and each of these eleven files were actually disseminated from Defendant's computer.
But let me point out what I believe ruins the Fair Use argument (IANAL):
Once Defendant converted Plaintiffs' recording into the compressed
Each of the 11 sound recordings on Exhibit A to Plaintiffs' Complaint were stored in the
Ramen
Don't forget Magnatune. Large selection of music, very inexpensive, plenty of download formats, and 50% of what you pay goes directly to the artist.