It's interesting to see the bod from Gracenote talking about this being a "great opportunity to
keep the Napster phenomenon alive"...
Let's take a non-roseyeyed look at Napster. Forget what the Napster apologists have spun out since the RIAA began looking at them - Napster is only good for getting copies of MP3s of songs you don't want to pay for. I'll admit quite readily that I've downloaded copyrighted songs that I have no intention of ever buying. Sometimes, I'll get the song of a band I saw for 5 seconds on MTV, and just MAYBE it'll tempt me to buy the album.
If you take the copyrighted mp3s off, all you're going to be left with is a bunch of crap mp3s of people's bands, which you're never going to find anyway because you don't know what you're looking for. Also, just because a big record company isn't behind a band, doesn't mean that said unsigned band wants the world to get mp3s of its songs for nothing.
Napster is dead without its illegal aspect, for unsigned bands promoting their music, a far better option is mp3.com which at least has music grouped into categories, so you can find songs that bands want you to download, since I believe they get royalties based on advertising revenue.
It's been said before, but $99.99 for one of these
things Plus Shipping. God knows what
they'd charge me for overseas on top. Jesus,
I can get a calculator with more memory
and a better processor for less than that!
and I wouldn't have to put a glass of cold
water on the back to stop it overheating...
"They screw you with cellphones! They screw
ya they screw ya they screw ya! They love it when
you get cut off, cause that means that when
you call back - which they know ya gonna
do, they get to charge a minute at the higher rate"
"That's if you're able to get through
if you're lucky enough to be somewhere where
you get reception... And why do they have to make the goddamn handsets so small.. I'll tell
you, so you can lose them. And why do
they want that? So you can buy More phones "
I don't think the mobile industry has anything
to worry about regarding profits. I promise you, Chris Rock and Joe Pesci know where its at.
God, i sincerely hope this was supposed to
be a witty parody:)
It's not wrong, or illegal, or theft, for that
matter. It's like suing people who make blank
cassettes, accusing them of facilitating
video piracy, or the companies that made it so
easy to just plug a couple of jacks into the back of a couple of videos to rip off commercial videos
for years before the big bad corporate people found out how to make it harder
The good thing that has come out of this is that
a lot more people are aware of DeCSS than could
possibly have been made aware through the obvious bunch of rag tags that the open source community is being portrayed as could possibly hope for. All that has been achieved by those who pursued this pathetic and expensive lawsuit is that more
people are going to look for it, and since they
can't stop people in a variety of non US-affiliated countries posting it up on servers around the globe, people are going to find it, use it, and probably a lot more people are going to be able to pirate DVDs than would have tried to in the first place.
Congratulations on your victory, RIAA, may you wallow in peace.
Well, apart from the total hack'n'slash slur
on every single open source developer, and the
now common misunderstandings by the legal system
of anything to do with computers, there is one
point that interests me.
Reverse engineering, it appears, is illegal in the
US. That's all well and good, and someone being
charged across states, well that's all well and
good too. What I wondered is why nobody from
the European Community gives it a crack, taking
pointers from the original code. The right to
reverse engineering is enshrined in European
Law, and also it would be a lot more difficult
to try and claim jurisdiction on a different
continent.
Well yeah but they did put a big fat notice on the site saying "We're moving sites, any new comments posted will be lost" Or isn't that obvious enough?
Slashdot Mirror
Let's take a non-roseyeyed look at Napster. Forget what the Napster apologists have spun out since the RIAA began looking at them - Napster is only good for getting copies of MP3s of songs you don't want to pay for. I'll admit quite readily that I've downloaded copyrighted songs that I have no intention of ever buying. Sometimes, I'll get the song of a band I saw for 5 seconds on MTV, and just MAYBE it'll tempt me to buy the album.
If you take the copyrighted mp3s off, all you're going to be left with is a bunch of crap mp3s of people's bands, which you're never going to find anyway because you don't know what you're looking for. Also, just because a big record company isn't behind a band, doesn't mean that said unsigned band wants the world to get mp3s of its songs for nothing.
Napster is dead without its illegal aspect, for unsigned bands promoting their music, a far better option is mp3.com which at least has music grouped into categories, so you can find songs that bands want you to download, since I believe they get royalties based on advertising revenue.
Goodbye Napster, it was nice while it lasted
Reliable my left foot...
It's been said before, but $99.99 for one of these things Plus Shipping. God knows what they'd charge me for overseas on top. Jesus, I can get a calculator with more memory and a better processor for less than that! and I wouldn't have to put a glass of cold water on the back to stop it overheating...
"They screw you with cellphones! They screw ya they screw ya they screw ya! They love it when you get cut off, cause that means that when you call back - which they know ya gonna do, they get to charge a minute at the higher rate" ... And why do they have to make the goddamn handsets so small.. I'll tell
you, so you can lose them. And why do
they want that? So you can buy More phones "
"That's if you're able to get through if you're lucky enough to be somewhere where you get reception
I don't think the mobile industry has anything to worry about regarding profits. I promise you, Chris Rock and Joe Pesci know where its at.
It's not wrong, or illegal, or theft, for that matter. It's like suing people who make blank cassettes, accusing them of facilitating video piracy, or the companies that made it so easy to just plug a couple of jacks into the back of a couple of videos to rip off commercial videos for years before the big bad corporate people found out how to make it harder
The good thing that has come out of this is that a lot more people are aware of DeCSS than could possibly have been made aware through the obvious bunch of rag tags that the open source community is being portrayed as could possibly hope for. All that has been achieved by those who pursued this pathetic and expensive lawsuit is that more people are going to look for it, and since they can't stop people in a variety of non US-affiliated countries posting it up on servers around the globe, people are going to find it, use it, and probably a lot more people are going to be able to pirate DVDs than would have tried to in the first place.
Congratulations on your victory, RIAA, may you wallow in peace.
Well yeah but they did put a big fat notice on the site saying "We're moving sites, any new comments posted will be lost"
Or isn't that obvious enough?