Glad to help. I was fortunate enough to have discovered Rockbox before I bought my Archos. If it weren't for Rockbox, the Archos would be OK, but certainly not great (I do like the lack of DRM & ability to use it as a straight hard drive). Rockbox fixes virtually all of the Archos' faults, while keeping all of it's advantages as well. It's still a bit big, but for my purposes (95% in car), that's not a problem.
In the long run, I bet you'll appreciate sticking around for the extra 9 months. In the 3 weeks since I've joined, they've upgraded everything from 128 bit to VBR, and added a few new labels, most notably (for me at least) Beggars Banquet/4AD (The Pixies, Throwing Muses, Bauhaus, the Fall, Stereolab, and many, many more). On top of that, keep in mind, they are adding each new release as it comes out as well (unfortunately, not necessarily on the street date, however). Overall, I think you'd be hard pressed to not be able to download at least one god album from emusic each month.
I estimate that eMusic is a great deal for someone who currently purchases 30 or more CD's a year. I say this because I'm assuming that for someone with varied musical taste, only about half of the albums they want will be on eMusic (though this could get better over time), and that no matter how good eMusic is, they'll want to purchase the CD of some of their favorite artists (to have the liner notes and the higher-quality uncompressed audio).
I disagree. If you love music, Emusic is an unbeatable value. For $10 a month (roughly 2/3rd the cost of a typical CD), you can download virtually unlimited music, from thousands of artists on over 950 labels. I joined about 3 weeks ago, and have already downloaded EASILY $120 worth of music, much of which I probably would have bought anyway. One perfect example, the boxed set "Cigarrettes & Carrot Juice" by Camper Van Beethoven is $50, or free with your emusic subscription. True, I don't get the liner notes, and in many cases, they are worth having, but in most cases, are they really worth $15?
That doesn't even deal with the artists that I have downloaded that I probably -wouldn't- have bought. That's one of the most exciting things about Emusic, is that you can experiment. True, on iTunes, it only costs a buck to try out a new artist, but it's still a buck, and that's only for one song. With Emusic, it's free (with your subscription), and you get the whole album (if you want it, single track downloads are available if you prefer), not just a single track.
As for quality, Emusic recently switched over to LAME stadard (AKA r3mix) VBR, so I challenge you to tell the difference between an Emusic mp3 and a CD track (Probably 95% of their catalog is currently vbr. There are a few lingering 128 bit tracks).
Will you still buy CD's if you join Emusic? Sure. But I guarantee, in the long run, the $10 bucks a month you pay for emusic will not be money you regret spending.
It already exists, and it's DRM free. Emusic already has over well over 250,000 songs available from over 950 different labels (Such as Matador, SpinART, Beggars Banquet/4AD, Epitaph...). All tracks are cd-quality VBR mp3s (well, -almost- all, a few are still only 128bit). You can download individual tracks, or entire albums with a single click. It's $10 a month, but requires a 1 year contract. Not bad since I've easily downloaded $120 worth of CD's in the three weeks or so since I've joined.
Uhm, Linux is NOT in the public domain. It is, however, distributed publicly.
You're correct, but you're missing the point. Any trade secret that becomes common knowledge is no longer protected, therefore is in the public domain. As long as you do not have a reason to believe you're dealing with a trade secret, then there's nothing to prevent you from publishing the code in question. Once it has been published legally once, it's open season for anyone else who wants to use it.
In the specific case in question, the code that was alledgedly taken from SCO is now used in the GPL'd Linux, but generally speaking, a trade secret, once it's no longer a secret, is in the public domain.
But if the evidence is considered a trade secret, don't they have the right to request that the evidence be kept sealed so that it's not available to the public? I think this happened with the Microsoft anti-trust trial.
You are correct to a point. IANAL, but I believe that once a trade secret is "in the wild", it is no longer protected. The only violator that can be punished is the person who originally violated the secret (in this case IBM, according to SCO). Anyone who got the code from IBM (or a third party), and who does not have a reason to suspect that the code in question is a trade secret, would not be liable. Therefore, there is no reason to seal the code since it is now in the public domain.
In a case where the trade secret may have been divulged, but not widely, then, yes, the court records may be sealed.
For an excellent summary of Trade Secret Law, see the Nolo Press Page.
I figured out that Microsoft won't buy SCO for the UNIX license. At first, it seems that it might be good idea, especially if all of the UNIX flavors would have to pay license fees to Microsoft.
You're missing one significant possibility, though. Depending on the severity of the infringement (a big unknown), MS could buy SCO and use it against the Linux/Unix world. If they hold the license, they can refuse to grant licenses to anyone, making it illegal to sell Unix.
Of course, this would be a blatant violation of antitrust law but, at least under the Bush administration, that isn't something they're worried about.
People keep saying that we wont have IDE compatible computers 20 years down the track - but if you are backing up all your data onto IDE drives - then just keep a computer thats IDE compatible for 20 years too and you'll ALWAYS have a comptuer to play them with.
The big problem with that theory is that hard drives aren't really meant to be used as a back-up media. Everything I've heard is that they have reliability problems if stored for long periods of time. The advantage of a RAID is that you can easily check your media, and even if one disk fails, you have a real-time backup.
That's not to imply that the server needs to be on all the time, just as needed to access the data.
On the other hand, you could set the thing up as a Freevo or MythTV box, and you can throw away your TiVo at the same time as you throw away your video tapes. Everything would always be online, ready to access as needed, and new stuff could be added anytime.
Agreed, Archos + Rockbox kicks ass. This is truly one of the best examples of open source I've seen yet. The feature set of Rockbox blows away the standard Archos, and new features are being added all the time. My favorite new feature will automatically pause the playback when you turn off the ignition in your car (when hooked up to the car cigarette lighter).
Other cool features of the Archos: MP3 recording, FM tuning & recording (on the FM recorder models, not currently supported in rockbox), built-in batteries are rechargable AA's, so a spare set is easy & cheap (except the FM model).
One caveat... Be sure to get either the Recorder or FM recorder model, not the Player or Multimedia. The player is supported by Rockbox, but due to hardware limitations & a bad interface, isn't a good choice. The Multimedia is not supported by Rockbox, and likely never will be. Who really wants to watch movies on a postage stamp size screen anyway.
the only way to keep data safe would be to constantly keep massive RAID-4+ disk drives constantly checking and correcting mistakes as the disks degrade over time.
I know you're being sarcastic, but you might actually be on to something. You can get 4 fast 160GB drives for $600 bucks, giving you 320GB of mirrored data. Assuming the poster above was correct in his calculations, with DivX, you'll only need 200GB, but that will give you plenty of room to grow your collection.
My main concern with the various people who've said "back it up to IDE drives" is-- what is the likelyhood you'll have a IDE compatible computer 20 years from now. The server approach isn't the cheapest, but it gives you high quality backups, and you can be certain that media remians reliable.
Since the primary use is archival, you'll need to include off-site backups, but any media that the server can access would be sufficient. The easiest would be two more IDE drives (better yet, external USB 2 or firewire drives which will probably both be around longer then IDE will). Depending on how quickly you are expanding your archive, annual or bi-annual backups should be sufficient. Eight hard drives (two main drives, two mirrors, plus two backup pairs) would run $1200, and the server could probably be built for less then $200. Of course, you'll almost certainly have to upgrade this system over the years due to hardware failures, but as storage prices drop, the cost should be less and less of an issue. Just be sure to remain proactive & keep backups on a media that the next generation of computer will be able to read as well.
You can do your video capture on your desktop, but be sure that your server includes all the software needed to decode the data, just in case.
This is obviously debug code that was forgotten about and left in.
Even if this were true (it's not-- the "crash" is just an example, any word, or none at all, would work), that would not be a reasonable excuse. Standard coding practices say you delineate debugging code some how-- a comment, a constant, whatever-- so you can remove or disable it before you ship. Seeing as how this is a rather significant potential problem, if it were debugging code that wasn't disabled, I'd actually be even more harsh on MS. Bugs are a fact of life, though it takes a pretty incompetent programmer not to perform at least some level of error handling when dealing with user-input (as all HTML is). But not disabling critical debugging code rises above even that level of incompetence.
It would NEVER be used in real life.
Oh, I'm sure you're right. No script kiddie, slashdot troll, Goatse.cx fan, etc. would ever think of putting up a page like this maliciously.
Oh my god! Someone found! A BUG! In SOFTWARE! And it happens on TOTALLY INVALID HTML! How could Microsoft possibly make such a horrible, horrible mistake!!
HTML should NEVER crash your browser. Error checking is a simple matter. The fact that a simple malformed tag can bring down the entire browser is a --very-- significant bug.
If they were to release their entire PC lineup on Linux, yhey'd get marginal sales from their EA Sports line, and maybe some sales from Battlefield 1942, but that's about it.
You might be right, but it would still be a very important development. Remember, most computer users won't bother with two OS's. If they have to rebot in order to play games, they'll just stick with Windows.
If EA were to start releasing their titles on Linux (and that's a big if), then it would be a MAJOR step towards mainstream Linux acceptability.
10 bucks a month? For unlimited downloads? That wouldn't even cover the bandwidth used for 20 tracks, much less even begin to compensate the IP owner, STILL less the artist.
Damn! You pay WAY to much for bandwidth! In volume, you can easily get bandwidth for $.35/GB or less. You can probably get it for substantially less then that if you tried (I've never run a truly bandwidth-intensive business, so I don't know how much less, but you can bet that Amazon.com doesn't pay anywhere near that much per gig.). A 80 minute CD -UNCOMPRESSED- is only 800MB, and compressed will be closer to 100MB (at a reasonably hi-fi compression rate), so you can figure that a typical album will cost no more then $.04 for bandwidth.
You see, the problem with that is that a $700 PC with $400 software is not high-end. That hardly even counts as middle of the road. I'd say that's actually closer to upper low-end. Absolutely no one in their right mind would use a rig like that for professional video production.
Ok, by that reasoning, absolutely no one would use a $10,000 Mac for professional production either.
You may be right that the outfit in question is not suitable for the task, but simply saying that it won't work because it's only $1100 isn't a very good argument. So, since you are presumably famililar with both packages (you are, right? I can't imagine you'd be putting down a package that you haven't used yourself), why is Final Cut Pro so much better then the proposed PC software?
Once again, you're reading more into my comment then I said. I never defended the RIAA, nor the obviously bad lawsuit that they are pursuing. I merely pointed out that the parent poster fundamentally lacked understanding of the copyright law. In order to form a reasonable opinion on the validity of the case at hand, it's important that you have at least a basic understanding of copyright law to begin with. without that, you cannot have a well reasoned opinion. The parent poster said that unless you were making a profit, you were not violating copyright law. That is absolutely and completely wrong.
No offense, but *MY* point was that SMB can be used to violate copyright. Whether there's profit involved or not, it still can be, especially among schools who use it (or other technologies such as NSF) to share files.
Certainly SMB can be used to violate copyright law. I guess I don't see what you're arguing for. As I said, I never disagreed with the parent's general point, only that he fundamentally lacked understanding of copyright law. His point was sound, his reasoning was flawed. Of course the lawsuit is ridiculous. And hopefully the RIAA will be slapped down hard for malicious prosecution.
I think from the tone of your posts that you already agree that the law is bad; in that case, arguing points of the law is detrimental. It *needs to be changed* and we have to come up with a better solution (and no, I don't know what it is either).
Copyright law is a good thing. As an artist, I should have some say in how my art is used. Let me give you an example: I have a friend who was a radical back in the sixties (he still is, actually...) During the vietnam war, he did a work of art, and like all of his other art, copylefted it. It seemed a good idea at the time. Unfortunately, the fact that it wasn't copyrighted made it open season for anyone to use it however they wanted. In the eighties, a neo-nazi organization used it as cover art for their magazine (with attribution to the artist) & suddenly the artist was thrust into the spotlight for a work that was 20+ years out of date, and used in a context that he never intended (the artwork in question featured a black soldier rather viscously killing someone. It was intended as an anti-war piece, but in the context it was later used, it appeared to be rascist). Giving up copyright means giving up control. Even the FSF supports copyright law (the GPL is fundamentally tied to it).
The problem is not with copyright law, but with what the RIAA has managed to do with copyright law. Between the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, and the DMCA, the RIAA & the MPAA have managed to almost completely do away with fair use, and the public domain. Certainly the law needs to be fixed, but that doesn't mean that it needs to be completely abandoned.
He wasn't distributing it, he was simply indexing a filesharing service which has a much larger base of legitimate use (or do you think Microsoft created SMB to pirate music?).
I never argued that Mr. Peng was a violation of copyright law, only that the poster of the parent article apparenly doesn't know what he's talking about. He stated that unless the files were traded for profit, no violation takes place. That is absolutely incorrect. However, since (as you point out) Mr. Peng did not actually distribute the files, it seems to me that he is not guilty. (At least as documented by this article... It doesn't go into the "direct infringement" portions of the case, so I won't comment on those).
The basis of Copyright Law is simple: A copyrighted work can not be used to make money by anyone but the copyright holder. If Mr. Peng were "bootlegging" copyrighted music - ie Making CDs and selling them for a personal profit - then yes, he would be in violation of Copyright Law. But this wasn't the case.
Ummm... I think you need to get your money back on that course... You are violating copyright law whenever you distribute copyrighted material without the copyright owners permission, unless your use falls under the category of fair use. In most cases, even copies given away freely are not allowed. Profit is a factor in determining your liability, but not your guilt.
for any of that to matter the Judge and Legal counsel would have to be technologically literate.
Not really. The case spelled out, even in the executive summary, is quite clear. In addition, the possible repercussions of this case are so significant that I can't imagine that Mr. Peng won't have the best possible legal council.
Think about it... If wake.princeton.edu is liable for $150,000 dollars for every copyrighted song they liked to, so is Google, Yahoo, Inktomi,... I guarantee that they (knowingly or not) link to more copyrighted material then wake did.
The DMCA spells out very clearly what a copyright holder needs to do to deal with copyright violations on the web. In this case, the RIAA is trying to be lazy & not have to send out thousands of cease & desists. Unfortunately for them, they have no legal ground to stand on.
Slashdot Mirror
Man, are you asking for it! Putting down Robert Jordan is kind of like defending MS in these parts...
Glad to help. I was fortunate enough to have discovered Rockbox before I bought my Archos. If it weren't for Rockbox, the Archos would be OK, but certainly not great (I do like the lack of DRM & ability to use it as a straight hard drive). Rockbox fixes virtually all of the Archos' faults, while keeping all of it's advantages as well. It's still a bit big, but for my purposes (95% in car), that's not a problem.
However, the Archos suffers from some incredibly flaky firmware.
Check out Rockbox, The Open Source firmware replacement for the Archos. Far and away superior to the default firmware.
In the long run, I bet you'll appreciate sticking around for the extra 9 months. In the 3 weeks since I've joined, they've upgraded everything from 128 bit to VBR, and added a few new labels, most notably (for me at least) Beggars Banquet/4AD (The Pixies, Throwing Muses, Bauhaus, the Fall, Stereolab, and many, many more). On top of that, keep in mind, they are adding each new release as it comes out as well (unfortunately, not necessarily on the street date, however). Overall, I think you'd be hard pressed to not be able to download at least one god album from emusic each month.
I estimate that eMusic is a great deal for someone who currently purchases 30 or more CD's a year. I say this because I'm assuming that for someone with varied musical taste, only about half of the albums they want will be on eMusic (though this could get better over time), and that no matter how good eMusic is, they'll want to purchase the CD of some of their favorite artists (to have the liner notes and the higher-quality uncompressed audio).
I disagree. If you love music, Emusic is an unbeatable value. For $10 a month (roughly 2/3rd the cost of a typical CD), you can download virtually unlimited music, from thousands of artists on over 950 labels. I joined about 3 weeks ago, and have already downloaded EASILY $120 worth of music, much of which I probably would have bought anyway. One perfect example, the boxed set "Cigarrettes & Carrot Juice" by Camper Van Beethoven is $50, or free with your emusic subscription. True, I don't get the liner notes, and in many cases, they are worth having, but in most cases, are they really worth $15?
That doesn't even deal with the artists that I have downloaded that I probably -wouldn't- have bought. That's one of the most exciting things about Emusic, is that you can experiment. True, on iTunes, it only costs a buck to try out a new artist, but it's still a buck, and that's only for one song. With Emusic, it's free (with your subscription), and you get the whole album (if you want it, single track downloads are available if you prefer), not just a single track.
As for quality, Emusic recently switched over to LAME stadard (AKA r3mix) VBR, so I challenge you to tell the difference between an Emusic mp3 and a CD track (Probably 95% of their catalog is currently vbr. There are a few lingering 128 bit tracks).
Will you still buy CD's if you join Emusic? Sure. But I guarantee, in the long run, the $10 bucks a month you pay for emusic will not be money you regret spending.
It already exists, and it's DRM free. Emusic already has over well over 250,000 songs available from over 950 different labels (Such as Matador, SpinART, Beggars Banquet/4AD, Epitaph...). All tracks are cd-quality VBR mp3s (well, -almost- all, a few are still only 128bit). You can download individual tracks, or entire albums with a single click. It's $10 a month, but requires a 1 year contract. Not bad since I've easily downloaded $120 worth of CD's in the three weeks or so since I've joined.
I don't think you got the joke. Read the post you replied to again.
Uhm, Linux is NOT in the public domain. It is, however, distributed publicly.
You're correct, but you're missing the point. Any trade secret that becomes common knowledge is no longer protected, therefore is in the public domain. As long as you do not have a reason to believe you're dealing with a trade secret, then there's nothing to prevent you from publishing the code in question. Once it has been published legally once, it's open season for anyone else who wants to use it.
In the specific case in question, the code that was alledgedly taken from SCO is now used in the GPL'd Linux, but generally speaking, a trade secret, once it's no longer a secret, is in the public domain.
But if the evidence is considered a trade secret, don't they have the right to request that the evidence be kept sealed so that it's not available to the public? I think this happened with the Microsoft anti-trust trial.
You are correct to a point. IANAL, but I believe that once a trade secret is "in the wild", it is no longer protected. The only violator that can be punished is the person who originally violated the secret (in this case IBM, according to SCO). Anyone who got the code from IBM (or a third party), and who does not have a reason to suspect that the code in question is a trade secret, would not be liable. Therefore, there is no reason to seal the code since it is now in the public domain.
In a case where the trade secret may have been divulged, but not widely, then, yes, the court records may be sealed.
For an excellent summary of Trade Secret Law, see the Nolo Press Page.
I figured out that Microsoft won't buy SCO for the UNIX license. At first, it seems that it might be good idea, especially if all of the UNIX flavors would have to pay license fees to Microsoft.
You're missing one significant possibility, though. Depending on the severity of the infringement (a big unknown), MS could buy SCO and use it against the Linux/Unix world. If they hold the license, they can refuse to grant licenses to anyone, making it illegal to sell Unix.
Of course, this would be a blatant violation of antitrust law but, at least under the Bush administration, that isn't something they're worried about.
Nah, use CAT5 + a shield, use the shield for ground, and use two twisted pairs for +/- for the two channels.
Just out of curiosity... Do you use one wire from each pair per channel, or is each pair used as one heavier wire?
People keep saying that we wont have IDE compatible computers 20 years down the track - but if you are backing up all your data onto IDE drives - then just keep a computer thats IDE compatible for 20 years too and you'll ALWAYS have a comptuer to play them with.
The big problem with that theory is that hard drives aren't really meant to be used as a back-up media. Everything I've heard is that they have reliability problems if stored for long periods of time. The advantage of a RAID is that you can easily check your media, and even if one disk fails, you have a real-time backup.
That's not to imply that the server needs to be on all the time, just as needed to access the data.
On the other hand, you could set the thing up as a Freevo or MythTV box, and you can throw away your TiVo at the same time as you throw away your video tapes. Everything would always be online, ready to access as needed, and new stuff could be added anytime.
Agreed, Archos + Rockbox kicks ass. This is truly one of the best examples of open source I've seen yet. The feature set of Rockbox blows away the standard Archos, and new features are being added all the time. My favorite new feature will automatically pause the playback when you turn off the ignition in your car (when hooked up to the car cigarette lighter).
Other cool features of the Archos: MP3 recording, FM tuning & recording (on the FM recorder models, not currently supported in rockbox), built-in batteries are rechargable AA's, so a spare set is easy & cheap (except the FM model).
One caveat... Be sure to get either the Recorder or FM recorder model, not the Player or Multimedia. The player is supported by Rockbox, but due to hardware limitations & a bad interface, isn't a good choice. The Multimedia is not supported by Rockbox, and likely never will be. Who really wants to watch movies on a postage stamp size screen anyway.
the only way to keep data safe would be to constantly keep massive RAID-4+ disk drives constantly checking and correcting mistakes as the disks degrade over time.
I know you're being sarcastic, but you might actually be on to something. You can get 4 fast 160GB drives for $600 bucks, giving you 320GB of mirrored data. Assuming the poster above was correct in his calculations, with DivX, you'll only need 200GB, but that will give you plenty of room to grow your collection.
My main concern with the various people who've said "back it up to IDE drives" is-- what is the likelyhood you'll have a IDE compatible computer 20 years from now. The server approach isn't the cheapest, but it gives you high quality backups, and you can be certain that media remians reliable.
Since the primary use is archival, you'll need to include off-site backups, but any media that the server can access would be sufficient. The easiest would be two more IDE drives (better yet, external USB 2 or firewire drives which will probably both be around longer then IDE will). Depending on how quickly you are expanding your archive, annual or bi-annual backups should be sufficient. Eight hard drives (two main drives, two mirrors, plus two backup pairs) would run $1200, and the server could probably be built for less then $200. Of course, you'll almost certainly have to upgrade this system over the years due to hardware failures, but as storage prices drop, the cost should be less and less of an issue. Just be sure to remain proactive & keep backups on a media that the next generation of computer will be able to read as well.
You can do your video capture on your desktop, but be sure that your server includes all the software needed to decode the data, just in case.
This is obviously debug code that was forgotten about and left in.
Even if this were true (it's not-- the "crash" is just an example, any word, or none at all, would work), that would not be a reasonable excuse. Standard coding practices say you delineate debugging code some how-- a comment, a constant, whatever-- so you can remove or disable it before you ship. Seeing as how this is a rather significant potential problem, if it were debugging code that wasn't disabled, I'd actually be even more harsh on MS. Bugs are a fact of life, though it takes a pretty incompetent programmer not to perform at least some level of error handling when dealing with user-input (as all HTML is). But not disabling critical debugging code rises above even that level of incompetence.
It would NEVER be used in real life.
Oh, I'm sure you're right. No script kiddie, slashdot troll, Goatse.cx fan, etc. would ever think of putting up a page like this maliciously.
Oh my god! Someone found! A BUG! In SOFTWARE! And it happens on TOTALLY INVALID HTML! How could Microsoft possibly make such a horrible, horrible mistake!!
HTML should NEVER crash your browser. Error checking is a simple matter. The fact that a simple malformed tag can bring down the entire browser is a --very-- significant bug.
If they were to release their entire PC lineup on Linux, yhey'd get marginal sales from their EA Sports line, and maybe some sales from Battlefield 1942, but that's about it.
You might be right, but it would still be a very important development. Remember, most computer users won't bother with two OS's. If they have to rebot in order to play games, they'll just stick with Windows.
If EA were to start releasing their titles on Linux (and that's a big if), then it would be a MAJOR step towards mainstream Linux acceptability.
10 bucks a month? For unlimited downloads? That wouldn't even cover the bandwidth used for 20 tracks, much less even begin to compensate the IP owner, STILL less the artist.
Damn! You pay WAY to much for bandwidth! In volume, you can easily get bandwidth for $.35/GB or less. You can probably get it for substantially less then that if you tried (I've never run a truly bandwidth-intensive business, so I don't know how much less, but you can bet that Amazon.com doesn't pay anywhere near that much per gig.). A 80 minute CD -UNCOMPRESSED- is only 800MB, and compressed will be closer to 100MB (at a reasonably hi-fi compression rate), so you can figure that a typical album will cost no more then $.04 for bandwidth.
You see, the problem with that is that a $700 PC with $400 software is not high-end. That hardly even counts as middle of the road. I'd say that's actually closer to upper low-end. Absolutely no one in their right mind would use a rig like that for professional video production.
Ok, by that reasoning, absolutely no one would use a $10,000 Mac for professional production either.
You may be right that the outfit in question is not suitable for the task, but simply saying that it won't work because it's only $1100 isn't a very good argument. So, since you are presumably famililar with both packages (you are, right? I can't imagine you'd be putting down a package that you haven't used yourself), why is Final Cut Pro so much better then the proposed PC software?
Actually, gibibit is proper. See the IEEE
The problem is in the definition of distribution.
Once again, you're reading more into my comment then I said. I never defended the RIAA, nor the obviously bad lawsuit that they are pursuing. I merely pointed out that the parent poster fundamentally lacked understanding of the copyright law. In order to form a reasonable opinion on the validity of the case at hand, it's important that you have at least a basic understanding of copyright law to begin with. without that, you cannot have a well reasoned opinion. The parent poster said that unless you were making a profit, you were not violating copyright law. That is absolutely and completely wrong.
No offense, but *MY* point was that SMB can be used to violate copyright. Whether there's profit involved or not, it still can be, especially among schools who use it (or other technologies such as NSF) to share files.
Certainly SMB can be used to violate copyright law. I guess I don't see what you're arguing for. As I said, I never disagreed with the parent's general point, only that he fundamentally lacked understanding of copyright law. His point was sound, his reasoning was flawed. Of course the lawsuit is ridiculous. And hopefully the RIAA will be slapped down hard for malicious prosecution.
I think from the tone of your posts that you already agree that the law is bad; in that case, arguing points of the law is detrimental. It *needs to be changed* and we have to come up with a better solution (and no, I don't know what it is either).
Copyright law is a good thing. As an artist, I should have some say in how my art is used. Let me give you an example: I have a friend who was a radical back in the sixties (he still is, actually...) During the vietnam war, he did a work of art, and like all of his other art, copylefted it. It seemed a good idea at the time. Unfortunately, the fact that it wasn't copyrighted made it open season for anyone to use it however they wanted. In the eighties, a neo-nazi organization used it as cover art for their magazine (with attribution to the artist) & suddenly the artist was thrust into the spotlight for a work that was 20+ years out of date, and used in a context that he never intended (the artwork in question featured a black soldier rather viscously killing someone. It was intended as an anti-war piece, but in the context it was later used, it appeared to be rascist). Giving up copyright means giving up control. Even the FSF supports copyright law (the GPL is fundamentally tied to it).
The problem is not with copyright law, but with what the RIAA has managed to do with copyright law. Between the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, and the DMCA, the RIAA & the MPAA have managed to almost completely do away with fair use, and the public domain. Certainly the law needs to be fixed, but that doesn't mean that it needs to be completely abandoned.
He wasn't distributing it, he was simply indexing a filesharing service which has a much larger base of legitimate use (or do you think Microsoft created SMB to pirate music?).
I never argued that Mr. Peng was a violation of copyright law, only that the poster of the parent article apparenly doesn't know what he's talking about. He stated that unless the files were traded for profit, no violation takes place. That is absolutely incorrect. However, since (as you point out) Mr. Peng did not actually distribute the files, it seems to me that he is not guilty. (At least as documented by this article... It doesn't go into the "direct infringement" portions of the case, so I won't comment on those).
The basis of Copyright Law is simple: A copyrighted work can not be used to make money by anyone but the copyright holder. If Mr. Peng were "bootlegging" copyrighted music - ie Making CDs and selling them for a personal profit - then yes, he would be in violation of Copyright Law. But this wasn't the case.
Ummm... I think you need to get your money back on that course... You are violating copyright law whenever you distribute copyrighted material without the copyright owners permission, unless your use falls under the category of fair use. In most cases, even copies given away freely are not allowed. Profit is a factor in determining your liability, but not your guilt.
for any of that to matter the Judge and Legal counsel would have to be technologically literate.
Not really. The case spelled out, even in the executive summary, is quite clear. In addition, the possible repercussions of this case are so significant that I can't imagine that Mr. Peng won't have the best possible legal council.
Think about it... If wake.princeton.edu is liable for $150,000 dollars for every copyrighted song they liked to, so is Google, Yahoo, Inktomi,... I guarantee that they (knowingly or not) link to more copyrighted material then wake did.
The DMCA spells out very clearly what a copyright holder needs to do to deal with copyright violations on the web. In this case, the RIAA is trying to be lazy & not have to send out thousands of cease & desists. Unfortunately for them, they have no legal ground to stand on.