Slashdot Mirror
Amazon Fights Piracy Tool, Creators Call It a Parody
jamie points out an interesting story which started a few days ago, when a pair of students from the Netherlands released a Firefox add-on which integrated links to the Pirate Bay on Amazon product pages. Customers who had the add-on would see a large "Download 4 Free" button next to items which were also available on the Pirate Bay. The add-on quickly drew notice, and the creators were hit with a take-down notice and threats of litigation from Amazon. Now, the students have removed the add-on, and they are claiming an unusual defense: "'Pirates of the Amazon' was an artistic parody, part of our media research and education at the Media Design M.A. course at the Piet Zwart Institute of the Willem de Kooning Academy Hogeschool Rotterdam, the Netherlands. It was a practical experiment on interface design, information access and currently debated issues in media culture. We were surprised by the attentions and the strong reactions this project received. Ultimately, the value of the project lies in these reactions. It is a ready-made and social sculpture of contemporary internet user culture."
Be interesting if the source was published to Wikileaks.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
I don't want to be part of your "social commentary." If your art project involves the participation of a lot of people, and you fail to inform them going in that they're part of some kind of demonstration, you're an ass.
So how is this more illegal than what tpb already does? All they're doing is /linking/ to a torrent. Whether that should be legal or not is a whole 'nother can of worms.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
I have just downloaded and installed this extention. Not that I would ever use it -- if I need a torrent, I'd go to thepiratebay.org in the first place.
But as amason tries to forbid this thing, I think I'll give it a try. Somehow it feels really good browsing amazon with this add-on knowing that this is exactly the thing they don't want you to be able to do.
Indeed. What exactly are they threatening to sue them for? Contributory copyright infringement? Guess what? Amazon isn't the copyright holder of many (any?) of these works. They have no standing.
Of course, there is that trademark issue ;)
How we know is more important than what we know.
... running a confidence scam, successfully robbing banks, the finer points of mugging, or the detailed design of a botnet/phishing/money laundering operation could be similarly defended as "art". B-)
Doesn't need defending - everything you mention is perfectly legal (at least in the US). Why would simply describing some illegal activity be against the law?
Not that I have anything against freedom of speech.
Yes you do. You are suggesting that sharing of information should be restricted if it's conceivable that someone could potentially use that information for some illegal purpose; that's pretty far into the "not for" freedom of speech end of the spectrum.
But I bet this "art work" is in direct violation of a number of laws and is about to get the "artists" into a lot of legal difficulty.
Is it? TFA is pretty light on details, but I'd be very surprised if Amazon's complaint was about anything other than their trademark being used in the name of the plugin. Even if it is possible to sue people for linking to links to torrents in the US (which I'm not sure it is), Amazon are not the copyright holder here.
sic transit gloria mundi
were found with a bunch of issues of Playboy in their office
In the year 2008, soon to be 2009, is that really that scandalous? ;-)
(Believe it or not, I actually once did cite Playboy in a literary analysis paper while at school: They carried an interview with Kurt Vonnegut and Joe Heller. No joke.)
Where did the article say anything about DMCA? You can threaten to sue no matter where you are.
We're America bitch! That's since when!
Eggs
Milk
Bread
Cat Litter
Soda
Nope. Apparently, this tool created for this school project is not over. The second half of the experiment, after they take down the software, should be to see what kind of punishment they would receive if this were to happen in the real world.
Then they will really know, not just by the reactions of Amazon and their take down notice, but through the legal system about the social feedback such a software will receive...
Previewing comments are for sissies!
What might have made a nice further comment would have been to code an extension that would show e.g. "available on Amazon for $2.00" on the pirate bay site, and see what kind of traffic would go in the other direction. ...or maybe the comment was that more insightful media corporations would have thought this up for themselves a while back.
Amazon should instead create another Firefox add-on, when users are browsing through TPB torrents, a large "Buy Genuine 4 Cheap" button next to those torrent listings would appear and link back to Amazon.com.
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
>What I do NOT understand is why those peole cannot see that if everyone does what they do, no new content will be produced.
Well, I don't think I have ever seen an explanation of how the imperative/compulsion to create gets overridden by the need to make money doing it.
I mean, our oldest paintings are something on the order of 30000 years old, are you trying to tell me they only got painted because the painter got paid and hade copyright protection?
Belief is the currency of delusion.
Yes, yes, but you could be more precise. Here, let me help: ... (wait for it) ... then the slashdot editors could be served with a second-degree charge (first-degree is elsewhere) of Conspiracy to Piss Off Amazon.
Since slashdot (in the US) has nonspecifically allowed a user (who appears to be in the US) to post a link to thepiratebay (in the netherlands) providing a mirror of a tool created (by students in the netherlands seemingly otherwise unaffiliated with thepiratebay) for the alleged purpose of allowing a user to automatically alter the appearance of the online catalog of (US) media vendor amazon to include links to thepiratebay, a website that offers a service which tracks data sets (torrents) that allow said user to obtain, in whole or in part, providing said user has the appropriate third-party software, a copyrighted work for which the user may not have this sort of reproduction right, via an international, dynamic, online peering network whose members are represented in the aforementioned torrents,
And, they could get a count of conspiracy to contribute to patent infringement as well as their own count of patent infringement, since the offending comment allows any firefox user (what about us poor dillo users?) to download the plug-in with only One-Click (TM).
[You know how you can get Windows Explorer to open things with a single-click instead of a double-click? Shouldn't web browsers have the reverse of that as the default (you have to double-click to do anything) just to be safe? And, hey, does anybody know any mechanics who can mod my car so I have to turn the ignition twice to start the car? I don't want Amazon to come after me for having a car that starts with just one turn of the key! I mean, I just have to turn the key once, and my car automatically starts the engine and chooses my last credit card, errr, last radio station, and my default shipping address, I mean, um, my default gear ratio for starting from a dead stop. *g*]
--TheOrangeSquid Is it any wonder things seem so awry? We swim in a sea of confusion and don't have to think to survive