If Microsoft tried to pull this off, could you imagine the outcry?
Google just tried to gain the rights to nearly every book ever written, for pennies on the dollar, and they almost got away with it.
Are all geeks so blinded by reflexive anti-copyright attitudes that we can't be alarmed at the prospect of one company gaining so much power at the expensive of authors
Isn't this already covered by existing laws against fraud? Do we need a separate law for each possible variation of fraud? Are they sure they don't need a law that prohibits impersonation over telegram cables or by using smoke signals?
Copying other people's stuff and giving it away isn't "sharing."
If you want to share, create your own work and give it away for free.
In the past (and present) this is precisely what Richard Stallman did with GNU. He wanted software to be free. Instead of bootlegging copies of Windows (or MS-DOS) he created his OWN stuff and gave it away for free. Now Linux is a force to be reckoned with. If he had simply pirated other peoples' work, this innovation would have never happened.
Sharing is when you give away something that belongs to *you*. Making and distributing copies of other people's work doesn't quite fit this description.
Apple is not responsible for the DRM used in iTunes. They are required to include this by the majors labels. Most independent music featured on iTunes does not contain DRM.
Were the RIAA attorneys aware of the defendant's illness when they filed the suit? This is not clear from the article, unless I have overlooked it.
This seems to be a result of one of the RIAA fishing expeditions, rather than targeted malice. The judge would have been the best position to... well judge and was apparently unmoved by the defendant's illness. Maybe the judge should be the target of this criticism.
Many here have observed that recording an album does not entitle you to payment. This is certainly true.
However, if I derive value from the work of another, am I not obligated to reciprocate? The problem with the typical suggestions from the pro-piracy/copyright infringement crowd is that this reciprocation becomes voluntary, and it's obvious that the majority of people choose not to reciprocate when if they don't have to.
Despite what Apple has claimed in the past, iTunes is profitable. Obviously their profit margins are slim, but so are Walmart's.
I do agree that the performance rights royalties owed by Pandora should be comparable to those imposed on other forms of radio, provided that the streams are listened to passively and largely non-interactive.
Maybe thats high, but it seems less steep once you realize that 100% of their business is based on profiting off of other people's work. We often critique the record labels for being unable to find a business model that works, yet most of these Web 2.0 companies will fail once it comes time to actually pay the musicians for the work that draws the traffic to their websites in the first place.
Also, publishers are no less greedy than record labels. We just don't think of them as greedy because we aren't engaging in a post hoc rationalization necessary to justify the pirating of books as we often do to justify the piracy of music.
The fact that music can be copied infinitely does not make it free any more than the fact that the fact that a television show can be copied means that cable television should be free. It just means that music must now be sold in a manner that reflects the fact that music can now be freely copied. This would most likely take the form of either subscription services or some kind of bundling of music will cell phone subscriptions. The only thing that is dead is "a la carte" music purchases.
It has always been possible to make copies of copyrighted material at no cost to the copyright owner. This has been the case long before the Internet. The Internet is a disrupted technology, but it is not without precedent.
Imagine the uproar if they added a copyright filter that prevented people from playing back music that they ripped from a CD (an "unauthorized" copy, in RIAA parlance).
In the bookstore analogy, the author loses income because instead of being paid for his work, people just make copies of it without paying him. Of course, it would be unrealistic to argue that every, single unauthorized copy is a "lost sale," but arguing the opposite is equally silly.
It seems like a lot of people here are assuming that Metallica plans to give away their album for free. I can't find anything in the article or the interview that states this. I see the term "free players" being used by the band, but it's not clear what that means. It could simply mean that they plan to remain independent after their record deal expires.
I agree that they will probably follow in the footsteps of NIN and Radiohead by putting their music online, but this is not the same as giving away their album for free. Neither of those bands just gave away their albums for free. They both expected to be paid for it. Radiohead just asked you to pay what you felt the album was worth; NIN gave a free sample, but sold the complete package for $5.
I think the right analogy about the road is that the police would simply be used to monitor traffic, not to sue the "road owner." For the postal service analogy, the FBI already intercept mail that is suspected of being involved in something illegal. The sort of thing is already well-established.
It does not make sense to expect copyright owners to install network software for ISPs at their own expense any more than it seems fair to expect individuals to pay for the police to investigate a illegal activity.
"lastly, why should it be up to the isp's to monitor this? how the hell is it their problem?"
I half agree with you, but something like %30-50 of traffic on the internet is bittorrent, and a big chunk of bittorrent traffic is regarded as illegal activity (in most jurisdictions) by a good many folks. If there was a highway where %30-50 of the vehicles were widely known to be transporting something illegal, would you be surprised if the local authorities took an increased interest in that particular road and began to watch things a bit more closely?
"I also think it's bullshit to claim it was easier to download a song in 2000, go on any of the dozens of torrent websites and you'll find anything you want in 2 seconds flat."
You'll find them listed, but they aren't necessarily current or well-seeded. I'm not saying it's necessary *difficult* now, but it's not quite as easy or as immediate as it was back in the Good ol' Days of Napster. Those small increments of difficulty and gratification delay are increasingly significant when DRM-free music is now much easier to get legally and quickly.
The two "obvious ways" to defeat Audible Magic (as listed in the article) do not seem very promising to me. If large numbers of filesharers begin to send huge transfers amounts of data over SSL, it's going to be pretty noticeable. In this day of ISP "traffic shaping," I wouldn't be surprised to see SSL throttled down to the point where transferring large files becomes painfully slow. The second strategy is not currently possible (as the article itself states). It goes on to admit that future OS upgrades would be required. I'm sure Microsoft will be more than happy to modify their TCP/IP stack to help make filesharing as easy as possible.
This technology is not foolproof, but it does require filesharers to jump through additional hoops to distribute files. Hardcore filesharers will no doubt toil obsessively to workaround the issue, but some casual downloaders may conclude that the hassle and risks associated with filesharing is becoming greater than the costs of paying $0.89 to get the song from Amazon, etc.
Eliminating %100 of copyright infringement is not a requirement for the RIAA to regard its strategy as successful. Simply making the process risky and aggravating enough that most people will switch to paying for music is enough. Each generation of this cat and mouse game between the "pirates" and the RIAA has resulted in an increased compartmentalization of p2p networks. Sure the "hydra" will grow more heads and live on, but it's hard to ignore that something that could immediately be located and downloaded on Napster in the Year 2000 now frequently takes time to hunt down and leech via bittorent.
"And what about people working very hard at off-shore oil platforms? Can we use them? I'm pretty sure that their wage is somewhat lower than the average artist on tour, but they have to do it anyway."
The average person working very hardon an off-shore oil platform makes decent money. The average artist on tour is making nothing, or close to it.
"So poor artists with their luxury hotel rooms, first-class plane seats, 50 foot long limousines and multi million dollar contracts can't stand tour pressure? Too bad. Makes me cry."
Do you get your information about the arts from MTV Cribs? Very few "artists" live this sort of lifestyle.
This sort of thing shouldn't be a surprise at a time where people expect their entertainment to be free and will jump through hoops to avoid advertisements.
A similar thing is happening in the music industry. Musicians are beginning to sell their albums exclusively to non-music-related businesses (such as general retailers or newspapers). The businesses then either resell the album exclusively at their store or bundle it with another product. Prince, Ray Davies, and the Eagles have all done this. Considering the state of the music industry, expect more to follow.
There used to be a time where this sort of thing would be greeted with outrage by the public, but it looks like the public is content to allow their culture to become even more crass and commoditized if it means that they can continue to download stuff for free.
Anyone can hit a baseball. Anyone can catch a football. Anyone can write a song. Anyone can sing. Anyone can have a "good idea" for an invention or a business. It's probably true that anyone can do a mediocre job at pretty much anything. But few actually do it exceptionally well.
If it's so easy to paint, sculp, act, write and record music, why are you (I assume) not hugely successfully at all of these things? Do you purposefully choose to have a regular (again an assumption) day job out of a sense of personal modesty?
"there is simply no way for the music industry to harness the internet to their continued existence. the internet, the substance of it, is simply anathema to what they do: charge a fee for music distribution. the internet is simply replacing them. effortless free distribution has no economics too it. there's no money to be made"
It has always been possible to make copies of other people's work at no cost to the creator. This is nothing new and is the reason why copyright laws were created, hundreds of years ago.
The difference is that, in the past, making unauthorized copies was expensive to the infringer. Now that it is cheap to infringe, it is very popular.
Slashdot Mirror
If Microsoft tried to pull this off, could you imagine the outcry?
Google just tried to gain the rights to nearly every book ever written, for pennies on the dollar, and they almost got away with it.
Are all geeks so blinded by reflexive anti-copyright attitudes that we can't be alarmed at the prospect of one company gaining so much power at the expensive of authors
Isn't this already covered by existing laws against fraud? Do we need a separate law for each possible variation of fraud? Are they sure they don't need a law that prohibits impersonation over telegram cables or by using smoke signals?
Regards,
Abe Vigoda
Uploaders are not motivated by money, nor altruism.
They are motivated by the social status boost conferred to those who are prolific leakers.
Copying other people's stuff and giving it away isn't "sharing."
If you want to share, create your own work and give it away for free.
In the past (and present) this is precisely what Richard Stallman did with GNU. He wanted software to be free. Instead of bootlegging copies of Windows (or MS-DOS) he created his OWN stuff and gave it away for free. Now Linux is a force to be reckoned with. If he had simply pirated other peoples' work, this innovation would have never happened.
The word "sharing" is used incorrectly here.
Sharing is when you give away something that belongs to *you*. Making and distributing copies of other people's work doesn't quite fit this description.
Apple is not responsible for the DRM used in iTunes. They are required to include this by the majors labels. Most independent music featured on iTunes does not contain DRM.
Were the RIAA attorneys aware of the defendant's illness when they filed the suit? This is not clear from the article, unless I have overlooked it.
This seems to be a result of one of the RIAA fishing expeditions, rather than targeted malice. The judge would have been the best position to... well judge and was apparently unmoved by the defendant's illness. Maybe the judge should be the target of this criticism.
Many here have observed that recording an album does not entitle you to payment. This is certainly true.
However, if I derive value from the work of another, am I not obligated to reciprocate? The problem with the typical suggestions from the pro-piracy/copyright infringement crowd is that this reciprocation becomes voluntary, and it's obvious that the majority of people choose not to reciprocate when if they don't have to.
Despite what Apple has claimed in the past, iTunes is profitable. Obviously their profit margins are slim, but so are Walmart's.
I do agree that the performance rights royalties owed by Pandora should be comparable to those imposed on other forms of radio, provided that the streams are listened to passively and largely non-interactive.
"That's 70% of projected revenue for Pandora"
Maybe thats high, but it seems less steep once you realize that 100% of their business is based on profiting off of other people's work. We often critique the record labels for being unable to find a business model that works, yet most of these Web 2.0 companies will fail once it comes time to actually pay the musicians for the work that draws the traffic to their websites in the first place.
Most libraries have CDs.
Also, publishers are no less greedy than record labels. We just don't think of them as greedy because we aren't engaging in a post hoc rationalization necessary to justify the pirating of books as we often do to justify the piracy of music.
Sorry--that should be "disruptive," not "disrupted."
Close to zero is not the same as zero.
The fact that music can be copied infinitely does not make it free any more than the fact that the fact that a television show can be copied means that cable television should be free. It just means that music must now be sold in a manner that reflects the fact that music can now be freely copied. This would most likely take the form of either subscription services or some kind of bundling of music will cell phone subscriptions. The only thing that is dead is "a la carte" music purchases.
It has always been possible to make copies of copyrighted material at no cost to the copyright owner. This has been the case long before the Internet. The Internet is a disrupted technology, but it is not without precedent.
"Yet they are still at the price they were when they came out. Probably higher if you figure inflation."
A CD that cost $15 (usually more) in 1985 was a LOT more expensive than a CD that costs $15 today.
Imagine the uproar if they added a copyright filter that prevented people from playing back music that they ripped from a CD (an "unauthorized" copy, in RIAA parlance).
Oh wait, maybe I shouldn't give them any ideas.
Honestly, both of these analogies are flawed.
In the bookstore analogy, the author loses income because instead of being paid for his work, people just make copies of it without paying him. Of course, it would be unrealistic to argue that every, single unauthorized copy is a "lost sale," but arguing the opposite is equally silly.
Did anyone here actually read the article?
It seems like a lot of people here are assuming that Metallica plans to give away their album for free. I can't find anything in the article or the interview that states this. I see the term "free players" being used by the band, but it's not clear what that means. It could simply mean that they plan to remain independent after their record deal expires.
I agree that they will probably follow in the footsteps of NIN and Radiohead by putting their music online, but this is not the same as giving away their album for free. Neither of those bands just gave away their albums for free. They both expected to be paid for it. Radiohead just asked you to pay what you felt the album was worth; NIN gave a free sample, but sold the complete package for $5.
At least %30-50 of drivers have exceeded the speed limit or run a red light, yet we still have speed limits and traffic laws.
I think the right analogy about the road is that the police would simply be used to monitor traffic, not to sue the "road owner." For the postal service analogy, the FBI already intercept mail that is suspected of being involved in something illegal. The sort of thing is already well-established.
It does not make sense to expect copyright owners to install network software for ISPs at their own expense any more than it seems fair to expect individuals to pay for the police to investigate a illegal activity.
"lastly, why should it be up to the isp's to monitor this? how the hell is it their problem?"
I half agree with you, but something like %30-50 of traffic on the internet is bittorrent, and a big chunk of bittorrent traffic is regarded as illegal activity (in most jurisdictions) by a good many folks. If there was a highway where %30-50 of the vehicles were widely known to be transporting something illegal, would you be surprised if the local authorities took an increased interest in that particular road and began to watch things a bit more closely?
"I also think it's bullshit to claim it was easier to download a song in 2000, go on any of the dozens of torrent websites and you'll find anything you want in 2 seconds flat."
You'll find them listed, but they aren't necessarily current or well-seeded. I'm not saying it's necessary *difficult* now, but it's not quite as easy or as immediate as it was back in the Good ol' Days of Napster. Those small increments of difficulty and gratification delay are increasingly significant when DRM-free music is now much easier to get legally and quickly.
The two "obvious ways" to defeat Audible Magic (as listed in the article) do not seem very promising to me. If large numbers of filesharers begin to send huge transfers amounts of data over SSL, it's going to be pretty noticeable. In this day of ISP "traffic shaping," I wouldn't be surprised to see SSL throttled down to the point where transferring large files becomes painfully slow. The second strategy is not currently possible (as the article itself states). It goes on to admit that future OS upgrades would be required. I'm sure Microsoft will be more than happy to modify their TCP/IP stack to help make filesharing as easy as possible.
This technology is not foolproof, but it does require filesharers to jump through additional hoops to distribute files. Hardcore filesharers will no doubt toil obsessively to workaround the issue, but some casual downloaders may conclude that the hassle and risks associated with filesharing is becoming greater than the costs of paying $0.89 to get the song from Amazon, etc.
Eliminating %100 of copyright infringement is not a requirement for the RIAA to regard its strategy as successful. Simply making the process risky and aggravating enough that most people will switch to paying for music is enough. Each generation of this cat and mouse game between the "pirates" and the RIAA has resulted in an increased compartmentalization of p2p networks. Sure the "hydra" will grow more heads and live on, but it's hard to ignore that something that could immediately be located and downloaded on Napster in the Year 2000 now frequently takes time to hunt down and leech via bittorent.
"And what about people working very hard at off-shore oil platforms? Can we use them? I'm pretty sure that their wage is somewhat lower than the average artist on tour, but they have to do it anyway."
The average person working very hardon an off-shore oil platform makes decent money. The average artist on tour is making nothing, or close to it.
"So poor artists with their luxury hotel rooms, first-class plane seats, 50 foot long limousines and multi million dollar contracts can't stand tour pressure? Too bad. Makes me cry."
Do you get your information about the arts from MTV Cribs? Very few "artists" live this sort of lifestyle.
This sort of thing shouldn't be a surprise at a time where people expect their entertainment to be free and will jump through hoops to avoid advertisements.
A similar thing is happening in the music industry. Musicians are beginning to sell their albums exclusively to non-music-related businesses (such as general retailers or newspapers). The businesses then either resell the album exclusively at their store or bundle it with another product. Prince, Ray Davies, and the Eagles have all done this. Considering the state of the music industry, expect more to follow.
There used to be a time where this sort of thing would be greeted with outrage by the public, but it looks like the public is content to allow their culture to become even more crass and commoditized if it means that they can continue to download stuff for free.
Anyone can hit a baseball. Anyone can catch a football. Anyone can write a song. Anyone can sing. Anyone can have a "good idea" for an invention or a business. It's probably true that anyone can do a mediocre job at pretty much anything. But few actually do it exceptionally well.
If it's so easy to paint, sculp, act, write and record music, why are you (I assume) not hugely successfully at all of these things? Do you purposefully choose to have a regular (again an assumption) day job out of a sense of personal modesty?
"there is simply no way for the music industry to harness the internet to their continued existence. the internet, the substance of it, is simply anathema to what they do: charge a fee for music distribution. the internet is simply replacing them. effortless free distribution has no economics too it. there's no money to be made"
It has always been possible to make copies of other people's work at no cost to the creator. This is nothing new and is the reason why copyright laws were created, hundreds of years ago.
The difference is that, in the past, making unauthorized copies was expensive to the infringer. Now that it is cheap to infringe, it is very popular.