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Lessig, Zittrain, Barlow To Square Off Against RIAA
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "The RIAA's case in Boston against a 24-year-old grad student, SONY BMG Music v. Tenenbaum, in which Prof. Charles Nesson of Harvard Law School, along with members of his CyberLaw class, are representing the defendant, may shape up as a showdown between the Electronic Frontier and Big Music. The defendant's witness list includes names such as those of Prof. Lawrence Lessig (Author of 'Free Culture'), John Perry Barlow (former songwriter of The Grateful Dead and cofounder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation), Prof. Johan Pouwelse (Scientific Director of P2P-Next), Prof. Jonathan Zittrain (Author of 'The Future of the Internet — And How to Stop It'), Professors Wendy Seltzer, Terry Fisher, and John Palfrey, and others. The RIAA requested, and was granted, an adjournment of the trial, from its previously scheduled December 1st date, to March 30, 2009. (The RIAA lawyers have been asking for adjournments a lot lately, asking for an adjournment in UMG v. Lindor the other day because they were so busy preparing for the Tenenbaum December 1st trial ... I guess when you're running on hot air, you sometimes run out of steam)."
Before those of us here who love to download copyright films and music at no cost start cheering these men on who challenge the RIAA, let's remember that Lessig doesn't want to abolish copyright, but simply restore short terms. He is not our ally in ensuring we can get whatever media we want whenever we want for no cost.
Hit 'em hard for freedom's sake, eh?
I keep forgetting my place. Jesus is for losers. Why do I still play to the crowd?
Is anyone surprised that the Righteous Inquisition Army of Autocrats is resquesting more time? It takes a LOT of lawyers to succesfully bully and threaten an entire all-star team of intellectuals college professors well-reknowned in their fields as opposed as a single young student. You don't just steamroll a group like that with a single "cease and decist or we'll ruin you" email.
I might stop being spitting mad.
I hate:
1. DVD's that lock you out of fast forwarding through the crap (long intros, FBI warnings, previews, etc).
2. Stupid itunes making it a hassle to give my wife a copy of something WE own legally (or often was free in the first place).
3. Anti-competitive prices on CD's, and music in general. There have been findings of fact showing anti-competivie behavior, but nothing done to stop it.
4. CD's that try to install crap on my machine (yes, you Sony).
5. DVD's that all prevent me from being able to make fair use of their content (using short clips for example) without becoming a criminal.
6. Retarded EULA's.
I want to own my own shit again!
I can't wait until my clothing starts coming with FBI warnings that the design is trademarked, pateneted and that I may only wear the shirt before Labor Day, and before 8 PM on weeknights. You just wait.
I had posted that story to a photography forum I'm a member of and someone took the initiative to contact Toyota's legal department. They're backpedaling now on their original claim:
Translation: We found a couple of legitimately infringing photos on your site but rather than give you specifics we decided to be lazy and just order them all down. We figured you'd just roll over and take it, but then you had to spread the word. Now we're facing a ton of bad PR so we're going to limit our claims to just those originally infringing photos.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
words evolve in meaning and use, and you need to get used to it
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Just because the law permits something, doesn't make it right to take advantage of it, when it's a stupid law. The law allowed slavery and slaveholders got rich off the sweat of other human beings, until time, circumstances, and war finally put a stop to it. All the slaveholders had to do was free his slaves to avoid the consequences of war.
The law currently allows ridiculously long period of copyright protection, while technology allows individuals to undermine the stupidity of current law. All copyright holders have to do is to put their works into the public domain (or a Creative Commons license).
See the analogy?
I would feel sorry for the Georgia slaveholder, he'd already (however rightly so - since it was made illegal) lost property that he'd paid for. But since he was doing something completely legal for years, society had made it illegal, it's okay for government thugs to destroy his home and and food/income as well? In the land of bad analogies that is /., your analogy truly stinks.
Just because something is legal does not make it right. He still deserves what he gets.
There you go again foisting your morals off on others.
He does not deserve what he gets, and the type of bullying you're suggesting amounts to something quite worse than what the RIAA does to the people on the receiving end of their bullying.
Forcing him to comply with the law is one thing, basically killing him by destroying his ability to eat is as bad as it gets, it's tantamount to murder. In fact, they are basically murdering him and his whole family (children and all), as well as anyone else who depended on him.
When freeing the slaves, the government should have done what they are required by law to do whenever they take property, they can force a sale, but they still have to pay whatever they can convince a judge is the fair market value for it. That's right, you heard me, the US government should have bought them and freed them.
And just so your high and mighty "morals" don't get too out of control, remember, most of the culture you likely benefit from was built by societies that allowed slavery or other types of indentured service. If you're a religious nut I'll also remind you that Paul, from your New Testament sent the runaway slave back to his owner.
Their business model collapses, hopefully chapter 11 ensues, new management enters, abolishes overpaid execs.
Not in today's United States. Federal bailout. It's the new model for capitalism these days.
Incompetent execs? Outdated business model? Are you selling something that was great in the 80's but sucks today?
Federal bailout. After all, we can't have these overpriced incompetent execs making the unemployment numbers worse, can we?
I'm only halfway kidding. I would not be surprised if these sleazebags tried to dip into the new broken economy safety net of federal bailouts.
"OMG the pirates have taken our money! Help help help! NONE of this is our fault at all! Just because we've redefined music to be this thumping easily mass produced crap a trained seal and a drum machine could make and force DRM down our consumers throats (that is, when we're not suing them) doesn't mean a thing!"
I give about 60/40 odds that some RIAA goon will try this sometime before the current administration is replaced. You watch.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
To which publisher of DRM-free feature films are you suggesting the grandparent switch?
Feature films aren't food or clothing. You can live a contented life without them.
If you really can't go without them then I guess you don't really care about DRM that much.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Is what do these all these "expert" witnesses contribute to the case before the court?
The plaintiff will try to convince the judge that Tenenbaum downloaded 7 songs and owes them $1 million. The expert witnesses will try to convince the judge that Tenenbaum downloaded 7 songs and owes the plaintiffs nothing (or maybe $6.93).
In the 1925 Scopes "Monkey Trial," the issue before the trial court wasn't evolution, it was the teaching of evolution in the public schools in violation of Tennessee state law.
That was the position of the prosecution. The position of the defense was that the law was unconstitutional because it violated the teacher's (Scopes) constitutional rights (the law benefited a particular religious group). But at some point the trial became a media circus full of the celebrities of the age and the defense just made speeches (that as you point out were irrelevant).
The Music Industry wants to keep its cash cow alive for as long as it can (time is money) even if it requires very expensive lawyers to do it. But sooner or later (later if the Music Industry has its way), the digital music culture will start feeding on public domain music and independently produced and distributed music, then things will change geometrically. The most interesting factor in all of this is talent. How rare is talent? How much talent does it take to develop talent? The future may help answer this.
In my experience, talent is not rare. Being untalented myself, I am always surprised by it, but there are a great many very gifted people out there who have been underemployed, in the sense that they are not employed to do the thing that best utilizes their special talents. And the reason these very talented and creative people have not been able to make a living at their art has been the 'gatekeepers'... i.e. the MAFIAA. The internet and digitalization have made it possible for the 'gatekeepers' now to be dispensed with. In my view, we are entering a golden age of music, where there will be less 'megastars' but there will be more people making a living at their art, instead of having to take 'day jobs' to sustain themselves. Society will be the better for it.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Is what do these all these "expert" witnesses contribute to the case before the court?
The plaintiff will try to convince the judge that Tenenbaum downloaded 7 songs and owes them $1 million. The expert witnesses will try to convince the judge that Tenenbaum downloaded 7 songs and owes the plaintiffs nothing (or maybe $6.93).
Well spoken, danzona. I hope you get modded up for that succinct observation (and I hope I don't get modded down as 'redundant' for agreeing with you and for not being able to improve on what you said).
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Respectfully, I have to tell you I found more heat than light in your argument.
Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others.
Get a grip. It's attitudes like yours which make everyone who opposes the RIAA look like a criminal jerk.
Are you sure you meant to say that? That is tantamount to saying that the large majority of people in this country 'look like criminal jerks'. I have never met anyone who ever heard of the RIAA who does not oppose it, except for people who are on its payroll. And I have never met anyone who thinks that 'everyone who opposes the RIAA looks like a criminal jerk'.
A lot of people think it's the RIAA and their aiders and abettors that are 'criminal jerks', such as these attorneys in St. Louis, who just filed RICO counterclaims pointing out the RIAA's extortion, mail fraud, and wire fraud, and these government officials in North Carolina who have summoned the RIAA's investigators to a "probable cause hearing", and these state troopers in Massachusetts who have ordered them to "cease and desist" from their illegal "investigations".
So, just between you and me, I think you may have overstated things a bit. If it's you who thinks that everyone who opposes the RIAA looks like a criminal jerk, well, that's you, and you alone, and maybe this guy.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
I agree with you on what these copyrights cover.
But if one copyrights the fixes or upgrades to a software work, it gives them standing to claim that an equivalent fix or upgrade infringes their copyright.
Similarly, copyrighting a "compilation" of a set of otherwise free works - for instance, a Linux distribution - would give the holder of that copyright standing to claim that another, later, linux distribution was an infringing work derived from theirs.
Even if the claim is provably bogus the ability to assert it in court, especially in combination with the draconian penalties for infringement in current copyright law, is a major burden on the targets of such claims.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way