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Report Says 36.4% of World's Computers Infringe on IP
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "According to a new report by Digital Music News, 36.4% of the world's computers have LimeWire installed. Given their claim that filling an iPod legally would cost about $40,000, they're pretty sure that most of those computers are infringing upon at least a few imaginary property rights. BitTorrent shouldn't feel left out, though. BitTorrent actually uses more bandwidth, but the article suggests that this is because it is used to share larger files, like movies."
Haven't they heard of NNTP?
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
that's 36% with LIMEWIRE! There are other P2P software that isn't bittorrent also, is this based on all documented computers and did the limewire software report back home or did users say that they have it installed?
Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what your country did to you
If you count IP infringements made by software vendors. Face it, in the world where One Click patent can even exits, you're _guaranteed_ to infringe on someone's intellectual property if your code is more complicated than "Hello world". And software vendors can't guarantee non-infringement, either, because there are tens of thousands of vaguely worded patents.
Thankfully all of us that have eMule installed are downloading purely legal files.
What doesn't kill you only delays the inevitable
It's hard to believe that only 1/3 of computers engage in copyright infringement. Perhaps most of those 2/3 belong to business or education, but I would be hard-pressed to find someone that hasn't borrowed a copy of MS Office or copied a song from a friend.
So I guess screw innocent until proven guilty.
Becuase I have bittorrent installed to download Mandrake, I *MUST* have illegal things on my machine?
Screw that report and the assholes who wrote it!
WTF? Over?
Or people could rip songs from vinyl, tapes, or CDs that they already own. Or they could have cheap music from online sources that is cheaper than $1/track, like Amie Street.
How much would it cost to fill an iPod with songs from used CDs?
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
"36.4% of the world's computers have LimeWire installed"
That's some damned weak logic, since LimeWire's real reason for existance (and the RIAA's opposition to it) is for independant artists to get their music out.
The RIAA labels have radio and empty-v. Since the RIAA effectively killed "internet radio" P2P is all the indies have.
Now someone please tell me, I heard a song by some indie whose name I don't remember named "scatterbrain". There are literally hundreds of different songs with that name. How can I get a copy of the lagal song I want without ACCIDENTALLY downloading some crap RIAA song with the same name?*
The war against P2P is a war against their competetitors, the independant musicians.
-mcgrew
* Fuck LimeWire, Morpheus has a check box where you don't automatically share downloaded files. The RIAA can go fuck themselves. Hey guess what they are!
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
So basically, -1 troll/offtopic is really slashdots way of saying "I hate that you thought of something before me."
~36.4% of PC users are freeloaders.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
TiVoToGo can easily fill a video iPod with perfectly legal recordings transfered from a TiVo for no additional cost beyond the TiVo setup and a copy of the TiVo Desktop Plus package. You can save a little money by not buying the Plus package if you already have software that can do the transcoding for you. Podcasts, etc, can cost nothing, as well...
That's probably more people than have floppy drives. I personally don't even know what limewire looks like, but I do have bittorrent installed and have only used it for downloading linux distro ISO's. I don't know about you, but I'd rather put useful data on my hard drive than crappy media files that waste the space on my drive. I have some mp3's, about 3 gigs of it, ripped from my entire CD collection and stuff I burnt to a disc and then ripped from iTunes, but I can attest that I don't even think of looking at bittorrent sites or limewire, eMule, or whatever, when I want something new. Anyway I used to have the old school Napster before it was abolished, but that was the end of my IP stealing days...and I haven't even a single one of those media files, because that host died long ago. Just about when I decided to make a living by producing and selling some of my own IP, I stopped deciding that I should look for ways to steal other people's. It is possible you know not to steal shit just because you can.
Speak for yourself.
34% of the world's computers have limewire? I think they have inflated this quite a bit. 1 or 2 percent maybe.
Contrary to popular belief, Unix is user friendly. It just happens to be particular about who it makes friends with.
somehow, there must be a tension of powers between shared public wealth, and private corporate wealth. there is no such mechanism to legally reflect this tension in the current world. and so all we have is the the ever increasing encroachment of corporate ownership into what should naturally be public spheres of public ownership. and so none of corporate ownership can be respected. naturally, some of it should, but not the overextended monstrosity that the corporations currently expect
and it is not up to the corporations to restrain themselves. it is their job to squeeze money out of every possible nook and cranny. that is what corporations do, that is their nature, it is not their nature. we should not expect them to restrain themselves. it is our job to restrain them, so they do not become cancerous growths. and we, the legal world and our legal frameworks, are not currently doing that. so we must begin doing that then, so that some of private ownership is respected, not none of it, as currently is the case, because current private ownership laws overreach in time and in venue
as if these means somebody won't still make money, and good money! it is just that the old models won't work anymore, and the corporations are nervous about the unknown
in the current world, the legions of lawyers representing the corporations, and the congressmen they buy (sonny bono, et al) push the scales firmly in the direction of irrational monetization. in a world where i cannot play "happy birthday" without paying someone, something is seriously broken
it is not that we shouldn't respect morality. it is that we shouldn't respect a legal system that is seriously broken, and doesn't reflect morality. current ip law is nothing more than an overextended farce
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The math isn't very hard. It may not be an answer you want to hear, but it seems like a legit estimate to me.
Now, it's true that there are plenty of great bands that distribute their music for free. But given that the going rate is $.99/song and given that most of the most commercial bands want to make money and given that people seem to like the more commercial bands, I think it's a fair estimate.
Still, if I were making the estimate I would do something like say, "Assuming that people only devote half of their iPod to commercial music, it would cost $20,000 to fill it legally."
31.2% of computers infringe TCP.
22.9% infringe UDP.
The report doesn't mention other protocols, but as IPv6 gains ground, we're all sure to see lots more infringement.
From the report linked to in the article, the data was collected when users went to a site (pcpitstop.com) and allowed their computers to be scanned so that the software could find "performance improvements" and make suggestions for their machine. Although I'm sure it was buried in the fine print of the TOS, I wonder how many people realized they were allowing this type of information to be sold to data mining and/or marketing companies.
I am Jack's complete lack of surprise.
How is it possible that the number is that low? I would guess that even the computers of IP lawyers infringe on some IP.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
Since the concept of intellectual property is almost completely meaningless, the title must be about Internet Protocol, and I bet close to 99% of the worlds computers have IP, and most use it every day.
Oh, you mean that 36.4% of the computers have tools installed that facilitate copyright infringement?
Can we please stop using the term "IP" or "Intellectual Property" and actually specify what we are talking about, which in this case is copyright infringement? Especially since the source articles never use either of those two term in them?
It would be very hard to infringe on trademarks using limewire or bittorrent in any way, and the same goes for patents unless the patents cover the implementation of the software.
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
My iPod has 3489 songs on it, that's 19.49 gigs, which means about 5.5 megs per song. Until they come out with a 250 gig iPod, I disagree that it would cost $40,000 to fill one.
4GB iPod, bought one movie from iTunes for 9.99
used just over 2GB of space
so I buy another movie and I have filled my iPod for 20 bucks, LEGALLY
what a bunch of lying SOBs these music/movie labels are.
ZONK puts up a submittal and gives credit, instead of taking it...? How is that so?
Meanwhile, here in the real world, a 320x240 DVD rip will take up about 500MB. That's 320 per 160 GB iPod. 320 times $5.99 is a bit over $1900. That's 20 times less than the number quoted in the article and still 100% legal. And that's the iPod with the highest storage capacity. For the non-classic models that dollar amount starts to fall pretty quickly.
Well, looks like we need to start building a LOT more prisons to house these criminals! Oh, and don't put a library in them, it would only encourage anti-copyright recidivism...
Seriously though, Limewire still exists?
...Especially since the law (in EU-Countries) now require the ISP to keep all data-traffic logged for up to 1 year minimum, some countries 2 - year minimum. Gawd - I cant even imagine the harddisk space for that, but yes - 2008 will therefor be a very interesting year. Who do ya trust?
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
I went to a movie theatre this weekend and an interesting thought occured to me: Would people who download copyrighted works feel guilty about sneaking into a theatre to watch a movie? You're not physically taking anything, and the cost to project the movie would cost the theatre the same regardless of whether you were there or not.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
you can write as much as you want about "imaginary property"
it won't help: Copyright law is for real
Right now we have a gang of scam artists trying to erase that law by means of repeated and flagrant violations.
The Music and Entertainment Industry will not give up their bread and butter without a counter-attack. and when that counter attack comes M/E Industry will have the law and the Court on their side. those involved in our current ILLEGAL copyright infringement rackets will most likely find themselves facing some extreemly serious penalties.
Don't forget that most of the major ISP's will pipe your traffic to big brother. If an agent or proxy working for the *AA/DOJ makes available a file which you shouldn't download, and you download it from them, then you will be flagged. Fortunately, there will be an election in the US very soon - hint, hint.
Indie artists can use HTTP (and Torrent if necessary), theres plenty of willing hosts.
The Live Music Archive The live music archive provides high quality live concerts in a download-able format. The Internet Archive aims preserve and archive as many live concerts as possible for current and future generations to enjoy. All music in this Collection is from trade-friendly artists and is strictly noncommercial, both for access here and for any further distribution. Jamendo Jamendo offers free access and free download of music tracks, published with Creative Commons licences. On Jamendo, the Artists choose to give access to their music for free to the users. Users are encouraged to donate to artists, and artists earn money from add revenue. Magnature Listen to complete albums for free. If you like what you hear, download an album for as little as $5 (you pick the price), or buy a real CD, or license our music for commercial use. MP3s & WAVs, and no copy protection (DRM). FreeIndie.com A smaller selection of independent artists in various genres. Free to download. IndieFeed A free podcast of independent artists from around the world. CBC Radio 3 A popular weekly podcast featuring new Canadian rock, pop, hip-hop, singer-songwriters, alt-country and electronica."Knowledge is the only instrument of production that is not subject to diminishing returns" -Journal of Political Econom
"[I]maginary property rights"? Wow, I guess in addition to being bad editors, Slashdot's paid staff also don't know the current state of the law.
I don't care whether you agree or disagree with those laws, the current state of the law makes a mockery of any argument that IP rights are "imaginery." Score another one for Slashdot as propaganda tool.
You want to know who isn't running Firefox 2.x? They spell it "definately" and "rediculous".
Nice to know there's no bias... (I know, I know, with a 5-digit UID I should know better.) Guys, intellectual property is real, there's a body of law defining it going back almost three full centuries (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_Anne). Intellectual property is what powers the GNU licenses, etc. Intellectual property represents ~5% of the GDP of the United States (think our economy is in poor shape at the moment? Cut out IP related commerce and see where we're at -- if you still have a job and a home).
geek. lawyer.
this is a very interesting comment
M/E industry can go after copyright infringers
but it cannot go after a transmission protocol
I get all my IP from DHCP for free, catch me if you can!!
Also, internet radio is not currently affected in cases where it plays an unsigned artist's material, as royalties only apply to copyrighted tracks. Correct me if I'm wrong on that, but the only way royalties hurt IR is that it's harder to get many people to listen to a purely indie station.
I'm sure there are services out there that make it easy to find, sample, and download independent music for free. If they exist, they aren't well known enough (at least not well enough for me to have heard of them and know what they are). The only one I can think of is Myspace, and there are piracy problems there as well.
I fully agree that the RIAA is rightfully threatened by increasingly easy recording, production, and distribution of quality independent music. However, as long as this walks hand in hand with rampant piracy, they will always find it a wise move to suppress it. It's a given that P2P systems that allow sharing of entire libraries, with no restrictions, will inevitably result in heavy piracy (that's human behavior - no matter how much the recording industry complains).
Here's what I think would make for a wildly successful way for artists to distribute their work, easily, cheaply, and without fuss:
An easy to access system, requiring no login, that allows you to freely sample it's entire library of music. Let the artists themselves select their sample clips.
Focus on a combination of samples (since many artists might not want to give it all away) and full tracks (for those who want to gamble on popularity, or are trying to get their name out).
Controlled uploads - ie I can't just start sharing my collection of Pink Floyd (all legal except for my beloved bootlegs). You want it to be easy for an artist to put up their work (and keep the requirements for "artist" as loose as possible), but make it harder for someone to put up material that is not theirs.
Absolute separation from the sale of these tracks - this isn't a requirement, but will help keep the system from eventually degenerating into a profit-driven system.
Checksum system, or other similar method, of identifying a track (and allowing the uploader to retain their rights later, except for the free distribution of what they have already released).
Adoption of any current DRM models, but without utilizing it's restrictive nature - just enough to be supported by DRM-driven software.
A means to keep the servers and bandwidth flowing without requiring a standard business model (ie go for advertising revenue - everyone hates it, but it works better than subscription and praying for donations).
Tie this with a venue system (ie see where the listed artists are playing, and make it easy for them to get a gig, tied heavily to their tracks)
And of course, a good user rating system, to make it easier for truly good work to rise to the forefront, but limited enough to where it's hard for heavy marketing to do anything more than draw attention to something (ie you cannot offer prioritized placement of a track in a rating system - the best you could do is pay for banner ads highlighting the artist)
The key is to make the system as trustworthy as possible (ie any complaints the RIAA has should be spurious, and DRM is used against them in that it marks the tracks as being from a trusted source), and focus on it's main goal (distribution of unsupported artists in a way that is difficult to , and steering clear of the politics of IP). Also, there has to be a means of selling the music, though it might be a good idea for the actual sales to be done from elsewhere (so there is little conflict of interest).
End result, independent artists have an easy way to get their names out, and the RIAA has a target that they can't blame for piracy. This forces the RIAA to either put on a white hat and not interfere with some
Do not confuse "Freedom of Choice" with "Free Will".
I did not put the acronym "IP" in the title. As you can see from the firehose link, it was added.
For those complaining that it doesn't say that they're used for infringement, that's why the original title had a question mark at the end. I know that some hate that practice, but that really was the question the report was asking rhetorically. Yes, that makes the title more provocative, but that provocation was intended in the original report.
Just look who sponsored that report to see what I mean. It is being used by those who sponsored it to say, or at least imply, that at least a third of the world's computers are used by copyright infringers.
I tend to agree with those saying it underestimates that, though. Politicians would be wise to tread lightly, because I doubt that one third of voters (assuming the infringement is evenly distributed) are going to like being told they're evil criminals who deserve huge fines and jail time.
filling an iPod legally would cost about $40,000
What they don't tell you is that the $40K is spent in bandwidth, CPU and quaaludes while you wait for iTunes to download "missing album artwork" for 160 GB worth of mixed and independent music (for which there is no artwork to download). God only knows how much you spend waiting for it to scan your files for gap-less playback...
It goes from God, to Jerry, to me.
i find it easier to believe this article refers to installed gnutella clients, not specifically limewire. i cant be alone in thinking limewire is horrible software and that the 3rd party alternative of the week is generally superior.
and why isn't there a cadre of slashdotters screeching against limewire as bloat/spy/lameware? or preening about how they wrote a gnutella client in 9 lines that runs on their dreamcast? my how times have changed.
Unbiased news reporting at its finest. Regardless of how the editors may feel about the legitimacy of intellectual property, commentary like that is without class. I'm embarassed for you, honestly.
----------------- Oink. Moo. rarr! -----------------
Yes, they can and do. But having your FANS distribute your music adds value to it for the fans themselves.
Thanks for adding those links though, I'm sure a lot of slashdotters don't even know there IS free, legal music.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Interesting... the original Napster was required to implement filtering software, which far from perfect, did remove a great deal of the major label music while allowing the independent music to remain. Why was it not successful? Why did its usage fall to zero?
If LimeWire's "real reason for existance [sic]" is for "independant [sic] artists to get their music out", how many indie artists have exploded in popularity thanks to LimeWire? What percentage of LimeWire traffic is indie? I'm sure the percentage is non-zero, but if LimeWire's main purpose is to promote indie music, I would say it is a colossal failure.
Lol. You won't mind if I take your "imaginary" car then?
I don't pretend to predict the future but when the majority of the citizenry can freely flout a law that they don't understand and don't think is that important and when those who benefit from that law can do very little to enforce or punish almost all of the infringement..... well, the end of that law must be upcoming somewhere in the near future. I've no idea how that law will end, what the last thrashing desperation of the "IP holders" will look like, and what, if anything, will replace (so called) IP. But it's gonna innerestin', for sure.
I suppose I could be wrong, but I would imagine that the majority of computers in the world are owned by corporations rather than individuals. I base that on the fact that I have one computer at home, but in work I use several different machines. IT policy in almost every company worldwide will stop people installing or running software like Limewire. So assuming that 63.6% of computers in the world operate in this kind of environment, does the report not really imply that 100% of individually owned computers in the world run P2P software?
It kind of undermines the position of groups of the RIAA if they are fighting against something that 100% of the population is in favour of.
Yeah, exactly.
Attention **IA, this is my current seed list, you insensitive clod
- debian-40r1-i386-DVD-1.iso [1180675963]
- debian-40r1-i386-DVD-2.iso [402297137]
- debian-40r1-i386-DVD-3.iso [24379392]
- debian-40r1-i386-netinst.iso [0]
- debian-update-4.0r1-i386-DVD-1.iso [3342336]
- openSUSE-10.3-GM-Addon-Lang-i386-iso [917504]
- openSUSE-10.3-GM-Addon-Lang-x86_64-iso [1261568]
- openSUSE-10.3-GM-DVD-i386-iso [180797440]
- openSUSE-10.3-GM-DVD-x86_64-iso [819200]
- StealThisFilm.Part1.mov [428353952]
- strip_souffle_high.wmv [0]
It's either opensource software, or a couple of movie which are freely available.So could now please all this stupid companies stop equating "Peer 2 peer" with "Imaginary Property infringements" ?
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
The premise of this argument is that no content worth having exists in the public domain, so any use of this tool must be directed toward infilching upon proprietary content.
Half of the motivation being the Mickey Mouse copyright extension act was not just to protect Mickey's inflated infantilism, but also to keep the public domain shelf as bare as possible, so legitimate sharing doesn't cloud the wolf cries of MAFIAA, where every untaxed gratification over every untaxed wire represents a pimple-faced insurrection against the natural order bought and paid for.
However, as long as this walks hand in hand with rampant piracy, they will always find it a wise move to suppress it
I think it's more like they will always have an EXCUSE to repress it. Piracy sells product. Examples are Photoshop; who can afford that? And about any product Microsoft has ever made. "Piracy" and legal P2P does and can help RIAA artists as well as indiies; there's no magic that makes free samples work for indies but not for RIAA members. It's just that the RIAA labels have radio and don't need other ways to give free samples.
From the hilarious Uncyclopedia article about crack cocaine: Adoption of any current DRM models
I am completely and totally against any Dumb Restrictions on Music (DRM). I think the DMCA is backwards; if it has DRM it should lose copyright protection. DRM does absolutely nothing to hamper pirates, especially commercial pirates, but restricts the use of a product you have bought and paid for. I wrote an article at K5 a few years ago, How to rip from vinyl or tape that probably breaks the law (if they want me to respect the law they need to write respectable laws) when it saysAs someone (wish I could attribute it) once said, "it is as easy to keep bits from being uncopyable is it is to keep water from being wet". DRM doesn't work. DRM is counterproductive. DRM gives the illegal product have more value than the legitimate product. DRM is only used by the technologically ignorant. "DRM driven software SHOULD BE incompatible with indie music. DRM driven software, like DRM itself, needs to die and die a horrible death.
A means to keep the servers and bandwidth flowing without requiring a standard business model
Sounds like P2P to me.
As I said, you have some excellent ideas there. Perhaps some of the P2P guys will impliment some of them. I especially like the venue and ratings ideas.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
It strikes me as odd that they single out Limewire, since Gnutella (which Limewire runs) really isn't that prevalent in the first place and other User Agents are way, way more prevalent than Limewire. Depending on where in the world you happen to be situated, BitTorrent, eDonkey, Ares or Winny/Winmx/Perfect Dark would be the preferred poison, both in terms of hosts and bandwidth consumed.
Which is not to say that there isn't a lot of gnutella out there, but 1/3 of all (consumer) hosts is sheer hogwash. No way I'll be paying for that report, but it sounds like they could be making some very odd assumptions about Gnutella based on network traffic (i.e identify *all* non-port 443 SSL as Gnutella or something equally silly), or just got an extremely skewed host pool they're looking at.
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
You're applying the adjective "imaginary" to the wrong noun. Indeed, you're applying it to a noun that isn't even there. You may not have noticed, but not once have I referred to "imaginary property law" (which would contain the ambiguity you describe).
It is the "property" that is only imaginary, because it is a non-rivalrous good with a very low marginal cost. In other words, we can both have a copy without deleting the other person's and it's cheap to make more copies. The law tries to make it rivalrous by giving the author legal rights to prevent duplication and certain other things, but it can't do much of anything about the low marginal cost, so a black market flourishes. Yes, they've tried things like blank CD levies, but those don't seem to do much.
As for the propaganda comment, I'd say that you must be new here, but come on. Believe it or not, I do not represent any government or business, just myself. To call it "propaganda" because you think I'm sensationalizing a report that's going to get passed off to those in power as saying exactly what I said it implies is a bit much. I know the report is badly flawed. That's actually part of why it's newsworthy.
Finally, you should have realized something already, but I can't count on that if you think that adjectives like "imaginary" modify nouns like "law" that aren't there, so I'll tell you outright: I know all this because I am the submitter and I was the first I know of to coin the term "imaginary property." Don't worry, though. You can use that term freely, as much as you want.
You're welcome.
Oh I know! Why don't we throw 1/3rd of the world population into jail!!!!
Or maybe, just maybe, the IP laws as they stand now are not sufficient to meet the demand of the populace in what and how they expect content to be transfered/delivered/received.
If a single indie artist has sold a single CD because a single music lover found it with LimeWire, then it isn't a failure. I know a lot of independant musicians, everybody has CDs these days. Most of them get sold at shows, any that get sold elsewhere is just icing on the cake.
You don't need to be a megastar to be sucessful. That's no different from any other profession; if you love your work and it keeps the wolf from the door, you're far more successful than someone who makes a gazillion dollars a year who works sixteen hours a day at a job they hate.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Frankly, Limewire should sue RIAA for "slander"...
BULLSHIT #1 - I am sorry, there is no way I am buying the fact that 34% of computers have "Limewire". Why? Because...
- the computers I use at work DO NOT.
- none of my machines have it (so that's several more)
- very few of my friends have Limewire installed
- of those few acquaintances who do download files, none that I know of use Limewire (oh, and if RIAA thinks they're losing billions, those individuals also have little free cash to spend on their merchandise.)
BULLSHIT #2 - $40,000 cost to fill iPod?
- I have not spent anywhere near $40,000 and could easily fill up close to a hundred iPods with music if I chose to do so in lossy format. And several even in much higher compressions.
- Just moving all the seasons of Stargate SG-1 & Atlantis could fill up many iPods. For much much less than $40,000
- During my photography endeavors I can easily fill up a 4gig compact flash card with Canon 20D in a single outing. A few outings and my "photo" iPod is full.
The truth....
RIAA's business model is outdated and needless.
Hey give me a break, I can at least spell "lose" and don't say "you're mom is ugly". I log in to slashdot and it says "you have sixteen hundred thirty seven messages waiting for you*", which doesn't give me a lot of time for proofreading.
-mcgrew
*ok, that was a slight exagerration, and yes I know that was misspelled but screw it
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
I think 'Imaginary Property' is good but 'Illusionary Property' defines the lawyers wet dream IP better.
Nice Article about "Intellectual Property"
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/not-ipr.html
"The RIAA labels have radio and empty-v. Since the RIAA effectively killed "internet radio" P2P is all the indies have."
Mercy me, I must be imagining the fact I'm listening to internet radio right now. Seriously though, every since the bizarre internet radio royalty rates business started not a single internet radio station I listen to has shut down. Granted, I don't listen to that many, but, that still strikes me as an overdramatization.
There's no way that many people paid for Limewire. Fuckin' pirates!
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
It was 36.4%. Or was that 36.43687286723%
:D
When you see B.S. like this (adding decimal places to stupid statistics), it is a signal to ignore it.
What kills me is that it totally reminds me of project management bozos who track project progress to the decimal place. I can understand tracking it in 10% increments, but I realistically can only maybe tell people I am 20, 40, 60... percent complete. Sometimes on 25, 50, etc.
But then there are others who can track the details so well. "Sir, we have millions of lines of code, a few hundred programmers, testers, analysts, and we are 42.48403% complete to date." Right.
-- I ignore anonymous replies to my comments and postings.
but if I were to download a 'backup' of one of my legally purchased CDs--mind you, I'd -never- infringe on a copyright, goodness
You just admitted that you did. It's just as illegal to download a copy of a CD that you own than it is to download a copy of a CD that you don't own. That's the way it works - when you buy a CD you buy limited rights to play that *exact CD* on your CD player. That's all. Sucks, but that's the way it is.
but it's owner could do.
Just arrest everyone that has a computer as you know they are doing something illegal.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Yeah, I said stolen. Those contracts they offer are nothing more than legalized thievery. Most artists don't have legal ownership of the music they perform. Each artist gets generally $.07 from each song from any album. The artists are essentially forced to enter a one sided contract in favor of the music mogals. These guys have parties that i'm sure many of you would be aghast at the bill. The music mogals had made billions of dollars off the backs of the artists.
Don't get me wrong. These artists are not getting much money. They are essentially being ripped off of all their creative work. This has happened for decades. Once the moguls found out how to steal from the creative artists they used their power to do just that, ripped them off.
I don't care about the music mogals. I don't care about the people that are loosing their jobs. I don't care that they can't pay their bills. I don't care that the moguls are no longer making billions. I could care less. They can go and shove it up their asses. They need to go back to the artists and give them their fair share. They need to grant each artists retroactively all their fair share of the royalties that they would have earned. It's just sad that these dimwits were allowed to get so powerful.
How can anyone feel bad about downloading music when it is so obvious that the music moguls stole the music from the artists. Screw them all, we all should.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
It also means infringing on patent. Most MP3s from the warez scene are encoded with LAME, and most videos from the warez scene are encoded with Xvid. In countries with software patents, including the United States, use of LAME violates patents controlled by Thomson Multimedia, and use of Xvid violates patents controlled by MPEG LA.
It also means infringing on trademark. Canada permits a trademark owner to enforce copyright-like exclusive rights in a work whose copyright has expired, such as Anne of Green Gables. On the other hand, the United States does not (Dastar v. Twentieth Century Fox).
Or maybe their crusade against the term "IP" is just a straw man for the real issue: educating the public. I'll admit that it is such a straw man. If the public only had a brain, it wouldn't take the U.S. entertainment industry's deceptions at face value. The difficulty with educating the public is that the owners of mass media outlets through which the public might be educated are the people who profit from the public's confusion about issues related to "intellectual property". Just as a straw man is good for scaring crows away from a corn field, precise language is good for not misleading the public.Why do they assume people only fill their ipods with music? The vast majority of the space on my 30g ipod is videos, either music videos, movies, tv shows or video podcasts. All of it legal.
Call me lazy or what you will, but do any of those sites you linked to (or any site you know of) allow you to enter the names of bands or songs you like and then suggest indie music that is similar. Can I say I like Nirvana, Foo Fighters and Green Day and have them give me a list of bands that I would probably like?
Stop Global Warming!
Just say no to irreversible processes!
....are made up on the spot.
The last place I would send anyone looking to discover up and coming bands is a P2P. The thing is... if people don't know they name of your band, they can't search for you. I think things like Limewire have brought upon more headaches than benefits for musicians. Before P2P having a good album meant you had something you could sell as long as you could get the word out. Now having a good albums means you have something people will download guilt free because it's not a "great album." It means that music is worth much less to people as a result.
New! Device Legs: These legs will help your poor OEM installed product escape any hamfistedness it may encounter. Ava
> You won't mind if I take your "imaginary" car then?
:-)
No, so feel free to download it whenever you please
It's free music, idiot. Just download everything and delete the songs you don't like. Shouldn't take more than a couple months.
My only guess is that the other 63.6% use Microsoft Windows.
The 36.4% is the market share compared to other P2P clients. The actual number of PCs that have Limewire installed is 18% see: http://torrentfreak.com/utorrent-gains-popularity-azureus-loses-ground-071216/
Believe it or not, Limewire can be used for things other than downloading music. I was never big into music so I never got into the whole p2p thing. Then one day I was at a friends house and he had kazza or something like that running so I decided to play with it. It was really amazing -- not that you could share music -- that you could share any file at all! You could have Word documents or pdfs or anything else. Of course, people could still use it for bad things like warez, but even if everything on it was totally legit, it would still be cool.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Curious; I was under the impression that the fair use doctrine allowed a single backup--at least, last time I checked. I note, though, that with the qualifier 'if' I note this as a hypothetical situation anyway. Certainly wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of the RIAA and whatnot. .....because they're bloodsucking bastards who ruin the good name of copyright for those who have actual legitimate uses for it.
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
There is nothing "imaginary" about intellectual property. It is the 21-st century and making most things is getting easier every year. Designing things remains hard.
But the fruits of the designer's labor are even easier to duplicate than to implement. Copying them without the creator's permission is just as immoral (and often illegal) as the traditional stealing is.
The submitter seems to imply, the non-tangible property is entirely "imaginary" and thus one can choose to "believe" in it — or not... He also links to a page of a perfectly respectable organization, which has nothing in common with his inflammatory "name"...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Limewire is a good client. And it is GNU GPL software. And Java. I give you that.
But it uses the Gnutella protocol which is pretty much dead among the filesharing community. I use Mldonkey to share stuff like Linux images and hard to get legal software. Sometimes I run the Gnutella part of it and the statistics show that Limewire might get one third of the Gnutella clients. But how many Gnutella clients are out there compared to computers connected to the internet?
I suppose someone got those two mixed up. Limewire runs one third of the Gnutella network, not on one third of all computers. But still, that is a pretty good marketshare.
I have it on good authority that 84,63% of all statistics are made up!
I'll stop using 127.0.0.0 I know it wasn't right for me to start using it and I should have asked first.
Land is inherently rivalrous.
We can't all live on the same acre.
We can all copy the same file.
Find a way to copy land, though, and we'll talk.
"* Fuck LimeWire, Morpheus has a check box where you don't automatically share downloaded files. The RIAA can go fuck themselves. Hey guess what they are!"
I don't really understand all the limewire bashing on Slashdot, i use it and although the quality of files i find lately kind of suck ass (compared to say 3 years ago when most of the files found were relevant) i can usually find what i want and download it pretty fast, it even lets you specify a different download to and share from directory so no illegal file sharing issues there... what's the big deal with all the limewire hate?
If there is a way better solution what would it be? right now i have an old pro version i install of limewire whenever i do a new build so i'd be happy to use something "better" if i knew what that was.. sorry i'm just not that into music and all, but do occasionally like to download a track and drill it into my head once in a while.
Napster tried that defense, remember? The obvious counter-example is, "well, if Napster is designed to discover new artists, how come there isn't a 'random artist' or 'recommend an artist' feature?" Last time I used Limewire, it had zero features dedicated to helping you find new artists, but tons of features based around stealing movies and TV shows. Go figure.
Comment of the year
Certainly you understand that statistics and expressed opinions have nothing to do with constitutional rights. They're free to make estimates and inferences all they want.
Sure. Of course, I'd like it if the statistics were vaguely accurate before people go writing whole articles on them. I mean, I read that LimeWire was installed on over a third of the world's PCs and boggled at the sheer impossibility of that statistic and went looking to find what it REALLY is.
Oh, look. There's a clarification posted here from December 17 which reads:
Clarifications, Corrections
In our recent report covering LimeWire installation levels, we inadvertently noted that LimeWire was found on one-third of all PCs, instead of one-third of all PCs with at least one P2P application installed. The overall installation level is 17.8%, and the data is treated properly within the report.
I'd say that 17.8% still seems stupidly high for LimeWire, but whatever. Essentially the Ars article used an obviously wrong statistic from an article that was corrected over a week ago and then added to that the assumption that having a specific piece of software on your computer means you are using it in violation of intellectual property laws.
In other words, if I were the author, I'd be really really embarrassed right now because that was one crappy piece of writing.
Thank god for copying. really. Where would we be if the digging-stick and the wheel and the tran-fricken-sistor weren't copied. huh? huh?
On a slightly different point: Human nature to copy, human nature to get advantage with maximum economy, human nature to try to fool your fellows into giving you money for ephemeral nonsense (apparently).
Two out of three for me, and Im winning at the moment, so more power to me I say.
Do I feel guilty about everything Ive downloaded? I'm not sure, but definitely not as guilty as if I had paid retail for them. Good Grief, people with real jobs deserve that money!
(Note: I just bought Reverend and the Makers album, and the Bladerunner: Final Cut Collectors edition tin thing - Im giving that to my Brother (yes, I made a copy)
I guess what Im trying to say is, I dont really care too too much.
Boomkat's another one I came across a few months ago.
"36.4% of the world's computers have LimeWire installed"
That's some damned weak logic, since LimeWire's real reason for existance (and the RIAA's opposition to it) is for independant artists to get their music out.
Even worse, it's the wrong statistic. It's 36.4% of all computers with at least one p2p application installed. And that statistic was clarified over a week ago.
See my longer post on the subject here. It has the link to the clarification (and the text of it).
You are a fool. You have not provided a full OR legal definition of property, and your ability to read what isn't even legalese is outstripped in the instant sources. Perhaps you are tired of "Family Law" and "Agency Law" too, since they describe things that also don't exist. Your tired lay excuses and obtuse reasoning spins no wheels. The only people sewing confusion and drama lie here, between RMS and hypocrisy, in that path of irrelevance known as Slashdot. also includes any intangible right considered as a source or element of income or wealth. It is the right to enjoy and to dispose of certain things in the most absolute manner as he pleases, provided he makes no use of them prohibited by law. property, considered as an exclusive right to things, contains not only a right to use those things, but a right to dispose of them, But property in personal goods may be absolute or qualified without ally relation to the nature of the subject-matter, but simply because more persons than one have an interest in it Property is again divided into corporeal and incorporeal. he latter consists in legal rights, as choses in action, easements, and the like Personal property is further divided into property in possession, and property or choses in action.
I work as an on-site computer technician. I only see computers that are broken. P2P software tends to cause broken computers, so I have to assume that I see P2P software on a higher percentage of computers I see than the general public.
Yet I know that less than 36% of the computers I see have P2P software on them. (Let's see, not counting my own computers, I saw 8 customer computers today. Only one had P2P software.)
My own household contains 12 internet connected computers. NONE have P2P software. (Please note that by "P2P software", I mean software for which the primary purpose on a computer is to download software that is shared by others, such as LimeWire. it does *NOT* include BitTorrent, because at least in my case, BT is used solely for legitimate, non-copyright-infringing uses.)
In addition, I have a full 30 GB iPod (3G, audio-only; so no video or pictures taking up space,) for which, every single song was either purchased from the iTunes Store (a significant minority,) purchased from other online "legitimate" DRM-free music stores (aka either approved by the RIAA like Amazon, or completely RIAA-free labels,) or, for the vast majority of it, ripped from CDs (as 256 Kbps AAC files,) with a small minority (growing when I have time, though,) of recorded-from-vinyl.
Of course, we know that the RIAA now considers my ripped-from-CD songs to be infringing, too, so I guess, in their view, I *AM* infringing.
Another non-functioning site was "uncertainty.microsoft.com."
The purpose of that site was not known.
To believe in something means to trust in it; there's more than one definition of "believe" you know. So not believing in it is not trusting it, rather than doubting its existence.
As for what part of it is imaginary, that would be the "property" part. As a non-rivalrous, low marginal cost good, the only parts of it similar to real property are the legal rights attached to it which attempt to make it rivalrous and fail miserably because the good is inherently non-rivalrous.
You talk a lot about "fruits", "labor" and "creators" but fail to appreciate that most works are derived from others. I mean, just how many of those words did you coin? You realize that someone coined each and every one of those words, right? They didn't spring from nothing. Each one was someone's idea, though probably no one remembers where each of them came from. Most etymologies go back quite a ways, too, so the flow of ideas is rather important given that every single idea you ever had was built on top of them. Significantly more important than a set of laws that only began to go seriously and completely wrong in the last generation or two.
That said, you are correct in that I do not represent the EFF, I merely wish to support them. As you may have realized by now, yes, I am the submitter.
Check out this article that's recently appeared on Torrentfreak
It states that the number of 36.4% is incorrect and it's actually more like ~18%, it seems that someone got their sums wrong....
IP's real and we have privacy rights in part because of it. Maybe a clearer understand would be is that the whole virtual/real dichotomy is false.* A point that will be made ever clearer as technology improves to the point that physical items that result from the creative process can be treated with the same disdain and contempt that virtual items now enjoy. And yes virtual items and physical items both have that common element (output of labour) and should be treated with the same amount of respect not only for the items but those who've dedicated their lives to making the efforts you all can't or will not make (the basis for a society).
*So's the "they have the original" argument. Because it's not about original/copy but bringing the idea of reciprocal agreements to IP were as it has already been proven they enjoy no natural protection (hence this story).
"Cut out IP related commerce and see where we're at -- if you still have a job and a home)."
Once you've seperated out those who simply want a reasonable IP framework, then you're left with the extreamists who's position is one of ignorance. Not only of the benefits they currently enjoy but because IP isn't solely a monetary issue, nor are they cognative of the true scope of IP. The abolishment of IP will not help copyleft for as GPLv3 has shown it's the law and not ideology that ensures it's continued existance.
Number one, the RIAA doesn't need to crush competition that way. They can do it the usual way, by marketing, pandering to popular tastes, and sneakily circumventing payola laws. They've very successfully mined all significantly profitable music markets, with indie artists creating small dedicated niches. Crushing them wouldn't suddenly turn rabid indie fans toward them (quite the opposite in fact).
Number two, revenue lost to piracy is greater than revenue lost to indie artists. More importantly, piracy has much greater potential to grow unchecked. Because the RIAA members are corporations, and money is a corporation's food, water, and language, the long term costs of any destructive are as good measure as any for the intentions of a corporation. Therefore, they do it not to crush distribution of indie music, but to crush piracy.
Number three, indie artists have plenty of other (better) methods for distribution, ones where they could make some money, reach people who aren't already looking for them, and ones where their music won't be overwhelmed by illegal copyrighted content. Yet another reason why indie presence on Limewire isn't a threat to the RIAA.
Number four, it doesn't exactly matter what Limewire's purpose once was. Anyone with half a brain and some historical perspective would realise that any P2P network that doesn't actively filter unauthorised copyrighted content (yeah, good luck with that), will fill up with it.
As you can see your logic is just as faulty (if not moreso) than the people conducting this survey, or the RIAA.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
- We're talking about the largest available iPod, the 160GB version, ignoring the majority of users who're happy with the painfully limited flash memory based versions.
- That the full 160GB is available, which it isn't.
- That the 160GB iPod is filled exclusively with music - ignoring home movies, digital pictures and all kinds of other rights free things it does just fine.
- That all of that music is bought through the RIAA - there's a lot of perfectly legal royalty free music out there
- That all of that music is bought from iTunes at $1/track, ignoring perfectly legitimate discounted, sale, clearance and second hand CDs that are often only a fraction of that cost.
I've got an 80GB iPod. Of that, about 50GB is filled with music, the rest with pictures, video, etc. Of that 50GB of music, we're looking at about 600-700 albums. Just like I never buy $19.99 DVDs and would rather wait and pick them up at $4.99 in a BestBuy sale, the CDs are split roughly equally between second hand (many of which cost all of $0.01 plus S&H on Amazon) and ~$7.99-$9.99 in various "Artists You Ought To Know" promos, sales, etc. And that's before the $9.99 3CD sets. There are, total, about 20 tracks downloaded from iTunes where I knew, damn well, I'd never want anything by the artist again and thus $1/track was acceptable.Insured value, that collection's worth about $10,000 - assuming I had to buy all of the CDs at full retail if I wanted to quickly replace them in one go. The actual price to put that whole library together? Probably around the $3,000 mark, spread over a decade of collecting and waiting for great deals.
So, I for one can say my iPod's entirely legally filled. Total cost: Around $3,000/10years, $300/year or $25/month - well within any music lover's reach and I'm not even collecting non-RIAA, royalty free music.
Granted: I've got an 80 not 160GB version and I've only two thirds filled with music because I do a lot of photography. Still, even quadrupling my numbers, $100/month is less than many people's phone bills. Not quite the large down payment on a house $40,000 they're talking about.
Actually I stopped listening to internet radio before the royalty thing, as there's a station in town that plays indie music, WQNA. It's a 200 watt teaching station and they play literally everything from local bands to classical to jazz to blues to country to RIAA pop. I once heard a Tennessee Ernie Ford tune followed by a Dead Kennedys song followed by Johnny Cash! And I have so many MP3s that internet radio is pretty much unnecessary at home.
Actually come to think of it since WQNA is on the internet, like most statioins these days, I guess I really am listening to internet radio too, albeit over the air.
Thx for the heads up. Is Shoutcast still in operation? Can I still broadcast legally like I used to do?
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Ahh, let's not forget good ol' Sneakernet. I have about 23k songs on an external hard drive from one of my friends. Need to return that one of these days. Still haven't found much worth listening to on it though.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Uh, I'm pretty sure that filling an iPod with podcasts won't cost that much.
http://outcampaign.org/
LimeWire is installed on less then 0.2% of the worlds PCs. The original sorce failed math.
Check the numbers, do research. Don't believe unsubstantiated statistics because they make a story news worthy.
What's sad is that, as well as other features, is one thing I would look for in a P2P client.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Isn't that like people blaming the weapon rather than the criminal?
Number one, the RIAA doesn't need to crush competition that way. They can do it the usual way, by marketing, pandering to popular tastes, and sneakily circumventing payola laws
If they're so sucessful at their marketing then why are they crying about lost sales and lost revinue?
Number two, revenue lost to piracy is greater than revenue lost to indie artists
You assume that piracy loses revinue. That has not only never been proven, but all evidence suggests the opposite. Rather than costing sales, piracy increases it. Is it purely coincidence that CD sales started falling shortly AFTER the RIAA sued Napster to oblivion? Or that studies show that P2P usere spend more money on music than non-P2P users?
Heve you heard of Roger McGuinn, front man for the 1960s band "The Byrds"? His career was in the toilet, and he credits the old outlawed Napster for bringing his music to a whole new generation and revitalizing his career.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
IANAL, but simply having the files available for download on your IP address apparently is enough to consider you a thief, even if you do purchase it legitimately later on. That, and you're also receiving stolen property. That said, why post it on your CNET blog? Do you WANT the MAFIAA to knock on your door?
I normally post as thyrteen, but whatever. too lazy to log in.
ANYWAY, this is pure speculative bullshit. I have 100 cds that I ripped to ALAC (apple lossless) in itunes, and that fills half my ipod. and I bought all the cds, and I'm speaking of a 40 gig ipod. now, most people I know (brothers, parents, etc), probably have about 20 cds worth of music on there, so how do these guys know people are filling ipods?
Depends on where you live. Not every country has the same copyright and fair use rules as the USA. Some countries are more restrictive, and some are less restrictive. I can legally copy a Cd I purchased as much as a want and even distribute copies to my friends. I can't upload it to the internet.
Anarchists never rule
LimeWire's real reason for existance (and the RIAA's opposition to it) is for independant artists to get their music out.
No, that's what LimeWire says their real reason for existence is, as a thin veneer of legitimacy. Most of the people I know who use LimeWire use it for getting free major label music, maybe some porn, and nothing more. LimeWire sucks ass for getting independent artists known, simply because it provides no way to look for them or even differentiate them from other artists.
Someone seeding their album on Mininova or such, however, might have a better chance; they get their album shown on the front page and can give a short description of what they sound like, where they come from, the track listing etc. I actually have the most hope that the torrent aggregators could be anything other than just a repository of pirated albums and camrips; they can be used for numerous legitimate purposes as well (the fact that 99% of the time they aren't is the main problem here).
Please, though, don't fall into LimeWire's shitty marketing trap. They know full well what their product is used for. It's like people selling vibrators as "back massagers" where vibrators are illegal. All they want to do is avoid the wrath of the law(yers).
I write bullshit
But I'm not surprised. People can twist statistics, coincidences, and correlations so that they pervert all manner of common sense and logic and produce something blatantly wrong. The RIAA assume pirated copy = lost sale, the pirates manage to come to the conclusion that by cannibalising the sales of their own supplier (the copyright holder), they can help the supplier. What a load of shit.
Even if there are some positive effects now, who's to say they won't evaporate in a few years? It's a system of guilt right now. If everyone was a rational consumer (i.e. short-sighted and unsentimental), everyone would pirate. Why not? It's the same product, only infinitely cheaper and there's next to no chance of getting caught if you take proper precautions. Guilt is the only thing tying this orgy of free music to the people who made it. Without people/companies like the RIAA actively and harshly reminding people that it's illegal and that it's damaging, all the while trying to prevent as much piracy as possible, what makes you think that we, as a society, would remember the artist 10 years on?I realise there have been multiple cases of commercially failed copyrighted works that have been revitalised by piracy. The works have no perceived financial potential, so it doesn't hurt them when people steal the financial potential through piracy, and the whole thing ultimately ends up benefiting the artist if they get their career back on track. Unfortunately, most copyrighted works shared aren't failed, and don't benefit from the treatment. They just take the value away from an already very valuable work, which is very damaging. The onus is on the copyright holder to make the most of the copyrighted work and to tap every market. If they can't handle it properly, then they should either sell it to someone who can, or people will have to accept that it will be another of the mishandled copyright works that'll fall silently into the public domain. If the **AA were sensible, they'd create their own network, sharing out the songs/movies/TV shows not making any money (DRMed of course), and making observation based upon that. These situations are not, however, a launch pad to declare that piracy is mysteriously beneficial to the music business.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
That is a very interesting statistic. A little boring and obvious.
I am more interested in the average number of boobies per machine in the world. My own extensive research would lead me to conclude that there is at least a 3K Boobie average per computer with a minimum C-cup of quality.
This is Bush's Amerikkka. You have no Constitutional rights.
If they're so sucessful at their marketing then why are they crying about lost sales and lost revinue? Because it takes a chunk of their sales
I still have yet to see any indicatioon that this is true, let alone proof. It's been shown time and again that people who share files spend MORE on music than non-sharers.
Is it purely coincidence that CD sales started falling shortly AFTER the RIAA sued Napster to oblivion? Yes. It's rising broadband speed and penetration that triggered rises in piracy and falls in sales.
Of course it has nothing to do with the boycott against utterly remorsellessly evil bastard and their sickening actions towards their own customers, or the fact that damned little that's hit the airwaves is worth listening to, let alone buying. No, it's purely a coincindence, nothing more. Riiiiiight. You go on believing that, Mr RIAA lawyer.
Even if there are some positive effects now, who's to say they won't evaporate in a few years? It's a system of guilt right now.
Nobody I know or have even heard of has shown the tinyest hint of feeling guilty about downloading or fearful that they will be sued. If there is a positive effect, why should that effect evaporate? If file sharing does indeed, as the studies show, cause people to spend more there is no reason whatever to believe that should change. You might as well start worrying that the sun won't melt your snowman.
I don't understand why you RIAA folks insist on trying to convince us that water is dry or if water's a little damp it will be dry soon. Facts are facts and the fact is that there is NO INDICATION WHATEVER that file sharing has affected sales in any but a positive way, or that lawsuits have affected file sharing at all.
I realise there have been multiple cases of commercially failed copyrighted works that have been revitalised by piracy.
Commercially failed? This guy was in the top ten, playing on the pop stations back when he was young.
Now tell me, who are you and which label do you work for, or are you with the RIAA itself? Your spin is disingenuous to the point that anyone with half a brain can see that you don';t believe a word of what you write. Your indistry continually shoots itself in the foot, and the blood you see isn't from a pirat's cutlass but from your own stupidity. Your industry needs to wake up to reality, stop lying to yourselves and everyone else before it dies.
There is nothing more offensive than a liar who knows you knows he's lying but still trys to maintain the lies. You have offended me deeply.
-mcgrew
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Studies for this kind of stuff a long and costly. It's not like we can travel back in time, make a person who supported the artists of a work unsupport them, and test the difference. Any study that goes into that will be long and costly, and will rely a lot on statistics trying to prove what already makes perfect (common) sense, and is a proven economic fact: if you can get exactly the same product for negligible cost, you're not likely to pay for the original. I have never seen any studies to the contrary either, and it would be equally possible. Besides, it doesn't really matter what you think, only what the RIAA thinks, and they think piracy is a problem. It's your responsibility to back your claims up with a bit of evidence in order to stop that, but knowing your stance, I know that ain't gonna happen.
Y'know what really shits me? You probably think the boycotting of the RIAA is some great market force out there, that people are outraged that a network that is, by and large, primarily concerned with cannibalising a formerly benign industry, and yet as soon as the debate turns to politics, I'll bet you do a double take and preach to us about how the public are apathetic and ignorant, and refuse to take notice of the copyright issue. Not only that, but you are refusing to pay two seconds to my far more logically viable theory that increased broadband penetration rates spark increased piracy rates. It's simple: it was much cheaper to pirate, and now it's ludicrously cheaper, plus more convenient too. Give me a good reason why I'm wrong, rather than a reason why you possibly, may still be right, even though there hasn't been any evidence or precedent set.
Yeah? Maybe then you should find some friends who aren't assholes. Y'know, people who actually care that they are ripping off the value of a work, the value of which the person who kindly put their time and effort in to provide it for you relies on for a living.
Let me explain. If everyone were immoral, rational, short-sighted, consumers, who couldn't give two fucks about the law, we would all pirate our media. Why not? It's cheaper and it's easier. Fortunately, people feel morally obliged (i.e. guilty) to pay for the product that some people worked so hard for. Like with any moral or legal issue though, people need to be reminded of the guilt, or else it becomes an accept part of general culture (no, you are not the defining aspect of general culture). The RIAA constantly reminds the public that there are artists to support, and who need your money in order to survive. Without them, and without enforcing copyright law, who is going to make up for the public's lack of perspective? Who's going to remind them of the artists? Who will actually go to the effort of hunting down and donating to an artist when all the convenient stores close down, and artists cannot be located in any centralised mechanism? Who's going to believe their contribution will make a difference when no-one else they know donates
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.