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Diamond and RIAA finally settle lawsuits
Rahga writes "This quietly-released and vaguely worded press release says that Diamond and RIAA finally settled all pending litigation, with words on Diamond vowing support for SDMI. Now record execs everywhere can sleep safely again. " Anyone know any more details?
Minidiscs only hold 74 minutes per disc. An mp3 player already exists than can use IBM's 340-meg hard drive, which can hold nearly 6 hours of 128kbps mp3s.
Also, minidisc sound quality isn't that great. It uses lossy compression, just like mp3 does. If you purchase mp3s over the internet, then record them to a minidisc, it sounds horrible, since you're going through two different levels of lossy compression.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
I did, I want you to quote me where it says "After Phase II you will still be able to play all illegally or legally obtained MP3 files."
I don't think you can find it, they have stepped around it quite nicely.
Another quote:
3Q: How does SDMI benefit consumers?
A: SDMI participants share a common goal: a satisfying consumer experience. With the major music, consumer electronics and technology companies supporting SDMI, consumers will have access to a variety of SDMI-compliant music, software and hardware. "
Sorry I just don't buy it. Limiting choice and keeping prices high are not a "satisfying consumer experience". And that's why they'll lose, I won't buy it, he won't buy it, and hopefully most people won't buy it, and it'll die. Find the music you like, listen to the music you like, buy the music you like. Don't let anyone tell you what kind of music you like. It's about choice. It's about freedom.
+&x
This is the part where I felt they were stepping around the issue. It doesn't say what it will play, only that it won't play "illegally copied SDMI music". Which is basically any MP3 or other file that doesn't meet their guidelines, at least from me reading (and knowing that they want to crush MP3)
If you read it, you'll also notice that it is a software upgrade needed to play SDMI files after phase II, so you have to software upgrade your hardware to keep it working. This gives TOTAL control back to these companies. Also there is no mention of what you can or cannot play in phase III or IV. Since they are using a mandatory (if you want to keep playing new music) upgrade process, additional more restrictive phases are very likely.
SDMI is bad. (but only if you're into consumer rights)
+&x
Duplication without permission is theft. By hitting "submit" on slashdot, you are giving permission for Slashdot to reproduce your comments. You are also giving me permission to look at them. When someone makes a CD, they give you a license to listen to the music. You are allowed to make archival backups of the music, but you are not allowed to distribute the music. This is illegal. You may not be stealing an idea, but you are stealing revenue from the people that created the idea.
You are taking something that costs money. They have not technically lost anything from your piracy, but they have lost an opportunity for revenue. If you're the sort of person who would never buy anything copyrighted (just let me know if you're the sort of person who's never bought a movie-ticket, book or CD and I'll produce my unicorn). Duplication and distribution is not necessarily wrong. I give my words to slashdot so that this can be done. Unauthorized duplication and distribution is illegal and wrong. If I wrote my post on a piece of paper and CmdrTaco came to my house and stole the paper and posted it on slashdot, that would be wrong. Leaving out the "unauthorized" part in your sentence is wrong. Is the duplication and distribution of your credit card numbers ok?
WTF are you talking about? "the will of the populace"? Who died and make you Lenin? So let me get this straight:the will of the people is that music should be freely distributable but not movies?
Now I'm going to hit submit, thereby giving implicit permission to Slashdot to reproduce my message.
Duplication without permission is theft. By hitting "submit" on slashdot, you are giving permission for Slashdot to reproduce your comments. You are also giving me permission to look at them. When someone makes a CD, they give you a license to listen to the music. You are allowed to make archival backups of the music, but you are not allowed to distribute the music. This is illegal. You may not be stealing an idea, but you are stealing revenue from the people that created the idea.
You are taking something that costs money. They have not technically lost anything from your piracy, but they have lost an opportunity for revenue. If you're the sort of person who would never buy anything copyrighted (just let me know if you're the sort of person who's never bought a movie-ticket, book or CD and I'll produce my unicorn). Duplication and distribution is not necessarily wrong. I give my words to slashdot so that this can be done. Unauthorized duplication and distribution is illegal and wrong. If I wrote my post on a piece of paper and CmdrTaco came to my house and stole the paper and posted it on slashdot, that would be wrong. Leaving out the "unauthorized" part in your sentence is wrong. Is the duplication and distribution of your credit card numbers ok?
WTF are you talking about? "the will of the populace"? Who died and make you Lenin? So let me get this straight:the will of the people is that music should be freely distributable but not movies?
Would you be more satisfied if there were no allowances for fair use? Then there would be no arbitrary line, and you can be sure that line is a lot closer to no fair use than uninhibited fair use. Fair use is extremely well defined through years of court history. It is not arbitrary.
Now I'm going to hit submit, thereby giving implicit permission to Slashdot to reproduce my message.
I never doubted that some people do this; and if that's what you do, good for you, I guess. It's much better than just stealing the stuff. But in my experience, most people who download MP3s off the Internet have stopped buying music. In fact, Slashdot is the only place I've seen your sentiment expressed. Maybe I just know all the wrong people. I don't doubt that it happens; I just don't think it's normal.
Are you sure about this? Most people? I find it very hypocritical when people say they don't buy CDs because the record studios cheat the artists. Of course, by stealing the MP3, you're cheating the artist out of the $1.50 or whatever that they would have made. Do they write a check for $1.50 and put it in the mailbox? No. Perhaps you do, but I doubt most people would. In fact, I doubt most people who use stolen (I will not mince words) MP3s give anything back to the artist, and if your only point is to try to screw over the record studios because they're screwing over the artists, you accomplish little by screwing both over.
I can see MP3s are quickly eroding music copyright, and I don't particularly think this is a good thing. I'm glad that the music I listen to (classical and "World" music) has a nice body of listeners who are willing to pay for the music rather than steal it. Because once a type of music becomes "commoditized" by piracy, a studio has no interest in promomitng it. They won't hire good editors, people to draw nice covers, and the artists themselves. You will have more music than you ever had before, I'm sure, once it all comes down. But it will be the music of garage bands who can't earn a living making music. Perhaps that in itself will satisfy you, but the music will be lower quality, just because not enough money is going into it (not to say that money==quality, but in general giving sustenance to artists does more to improve the quanity/quality of their work and tarnish it).
"If people are not honest, they will never be thwarted." This is true, depending on your definition of "thwarted." You can't stop people completely, that's for sure. But you can make things more difficult and stem a LOT of it. For instance, using and finding MP3s, believe it or not, is not something the general population can do with ease. It's difficult. Therefore most people don't use them. Likewise, it is common to sidestep Macrovision protection on DVD and VHS players, but it still does a lot to stem petty piracy. Macrovision does not "thwart" piracy; it still exists, in spades. But it does prevent an awful lot of it.
Copyright and money are not as tightly linked as some people might think, but they are still linked. When a company/individual fears losing control over the distribution, they seek other ways of making money off of their intellectual privacy. I loathe the day when music tracks come dubbed with ads. In short, without copyright, the artist can make money, but it's even less of a guarantee than it is now. You not only have to achieve a certain level of fame (and there will always be a few groups which have all the fame and a lot of groups which have no fame, regardless of the distribution method; this is the way human preference works), but you have to make sure that you can make money off of it. Now you just have to worry about the first.
Wrong, anytime there is a demand, anytime a service is desired, money can be made. Money can be made by offering a huge archive of free software (ftp.cdrom.com), or a search service.
Fans are an artists greatest asset. Fans buy t-shirts, attend concerts, talk to other fans. Most music groups make NO money in royalties until they sell a quarter-million copies.
Just as an illustration, why did you post your words to slashdot? You gave them away for free, why did you do something so stupid? Why am I posting my words to slashdot? Because I wish to enrich humanity with my words, not because I wish to enrich myself with monetary compensation.
I am an artist, like many other artists, I do my work for itself, because I wish to enrich humanity or my friends, to give them the gift of my opinions, my perspective, my aid. Not to make money. I do not make 'intellecual property', which may be posessed, hoarded, stolen. I make ideas, I make artistic works, my words here, my programming, my art, my works, the algorithms I design.
Do you believe that nobody is honest? That if you offered something for free, everyone would leech off of it, that there would be no contributors to the creators? I have sent bug reports in, made (and attempted to submit) patches, and such. I also help out on IRC occasionally. I gift others whom I will never meet again my time, my human labor, that which money only a measurment for.
There is lunacy on both sides of the issue, a gift culture will not work, nor is a purely capatilistic culture good.
I try to strike a reasonable balance. I gift my labor to others as I wish, with the only requirement that if they give it to others, that they give reasonable attributation to me. I also accept orders for where to direct my labor for my job.