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BitTorrent To RIAA: You're 'Barking Up the Wrong Tree'

Posted by Soulskill on from the can't-we-all-just-get-along dept.

An anonymous reader writes: The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) sent a letter to BitTorrent last week asking the company to help stop copyright infringement of its members' content. Brad Buckles, RIAA's executive vice president of anti-piracy, asked BitTorrent CEO Eric Klinker to "live up to" comments made by former chief content officer Matt Mason. Two quotes by Mason stand out in particular: "We don't endorse piracy," and "If you're using BitTorrent for piracy, then you're doing it wrong." Both of these remain accurate, but the RIAA wants to see BitTorrent do more. VentureBeat contacted BitTorrent to get their stance on the letter, and the company said, "Our position is that they are barking up the wrong tree, as it seems they were with their approach to CBS last week. ... We do not host, promote, or facilitate copyright infringing content and the protocol, which is in the public domain, is a legal technology.".

2 of 109 comments (clear)

  1. Dumb as a bag of rocks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't endorse murder...that's my view.
    That doesn't mean society or any company can expect me to go vigilante and try catching murderers. In fact if I did that I'd probably be arrested.

    It's not within my power to prevent everything *I* find offensive or immoral.
    Also, not everything I find morally repugnant is a shared world view. There are no moral absolutes.

    Also, who thought going after a file transfer protocol was a good idea? It's a fucking file transfer protocol. It's job is to get files from A to B - it doesn't care if they're MP3s, DOCs or JPGs. It doesn't care if they're MPGs full of donkey porn. It'd be like demanding car manufacturers try to stop cars being used as getaway cars: How the hell do you detect that?? It's all just driving to the car.

  2. Re:Ha hA! by lister+king+of+smeg · · Score: 5, Funny

    If RIAA really wanted to they should go after TCP/IP, I hear virtually all online piracy uses it.

    don't go give them any ideas. I don't want to regret getting rid of the token ring nix or the IPX gear tossed when cleaning out my parts box

    --
    ---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.