Sure it's a small number, but it's a beginning. What's important are the principles -- the recognition that open source (a) contributes to the growth of ideas, (b) makes our economy more efficient, (c) helps both industry and government improve the services they provide, and (d) should be encouraged.
Indie songs might work for GH, but they won't for Rock Band. People like to play songs they know, especially beginners.
I don't agree with that, but even if it's true..."indie songs" and "indie albums" are 2 separate things. An indie label can put out albums of old familiar songs performed by other -- maybe better -- artists.
You are all missing the most important piece.
Rock Band should immediately cease all talks with Warner and switch back to cover songs. I that case they will only need to pay a mechanical royalty of about $0.091 per unit sold per song. The only difference is that a cover band will be playing the songs.
If they choose to do this, Warner has literally NO say in the matter. They cannot deny them the license.
So if Warner wants to pull their catalog from the list of available options, it will only make it that much easier for Harmonix to catch up with other artists from some other labels. I have a feeling Rock Band won't be lacking for anything, but Warner will have to answer to their artists about why they aren't seeing the advantages that other artists are enjoying.
Exactly. I don't see what Warner has to negotiate with. Who needs 'em?
I was a little confused by the way the report mixed refuting some of Jabobson's claims with points possibly exonerating Jammie Thomas.
The possibilities of spoofed IP addresses are remote and just countering Jacobson's assertion that an IP address uniquely identifies a computer. If she ran Internet connection sharing or NAT only matters if she had an open wireless router.
Realistic scenarios like that the MP3s might be just rips she did herself and that KaZaa might have shared files she didn't want to share are much more valid (I'd view that aspect of P2P programs as malware.) Did anybody check if the files' hashes match anything that's out on P2P? Were the files deliberately put into an upload directory or were they somewhere else on the disk? Did she own the CDs?
Finally it would have been nice if the report had looked at Jacobson's software and found similar assumptions as in his testimony, showing that it was more of a sales pitch than factual statements.
They only had a couple of weeks to do it, as opposed to the years and years Jacobson has had to try get his story together.
Not only do you make it hard to hate lawyers, but you have so much fun with this, you kinda make me wanna be one. You're not hiring, are you...?
Bite your tongue. I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemies. I do have fun on Slashdot, but that's not practicing law, and trust me -- there's no money in it.
Of course you're biased -- you want "The People" to win. But that doesn't mean you let your bias get in the way of your professionalism. I haven't seen you "forget" to include a piece of information in any reporting you've done.
Thanks, Chabo. Much appreciated. Although the purpose of the blog was to assist lawyers defending against these cases, (a) it's not in my nature to present less than a full picture, and (b) I would not be helping those lawyers were I to attempt to do so.
Wasn't that the company that in addition to being the RIAA's techno-snich, was also the one responsible for flooding networks with false files.
Yes.
Besides being totally unethical and wrong, I seriously wonder why they were never taken to task for criminality. To me it is the same thing as spammers flooding the net with bad links, and we are throwing them in jail these days.
I don't know why the defendant's lawyer did not object to the RIAA expert. He is a veteran trial lawyer; he must have had his reasons.
I can tell you this:
Jacobson's financial conflicts of interest would not have been grounds for excluding his testimony, it would merely have gone to his credibility;
there were good grounds for excluding his testimony, namely that the record companies had failed to lay a proper foundation for the admissibility of his expert testimony under the Federal Rules of Evidence and applicable case law.
But what the strategy consideration was, in deciding not to object, that I don't know.
Would a "reasonable man" conclude that those interests are in conflict? If the answer is yes (and it probably is) then why was Dr Jacobson not eliminated as an expert witness straight away by a defense attorney raising an objection in court and mentioning this conflict? Perhaps I am missing something here, but I am sure that NYCL can explain.
Dr Jacobson is not stupid, I've met the man. I graduated with a degree in computer science from Iowa State University in December. I haven't taken a class from him, but again the man is not stupid.
He's malicious.
He's being paid.
In fact I bet he even knows his testimony is full of shit.
Again, he's being paid.
More than being paid, he has a major financial interest in the "Audible Magic" software which the RIAA is peddling for him. They go to LAN operators and say "Pay us $76,000 and the letters will stop".
In this case, the RIAA expert didn't even admit the possibility of likely things.
For example, until I locked it down, neighbors on both sides of my place were stealing bandwidth off the wireless router where I rent. If they were downloading music, we'd be the ones hit, because it would be our router that would be showing up in ISP records / on Kazaa. (A similar example appeared in Dr. Kim's report. You did read the report, right?)
The RIAA "expert" seemed to think that because the (non-timestamped) traceroute went to Thomas's computer, that it -always- went there. This isn't automatically the case. IP/MAC spoofing or other attacks (as appeared in Dr. Kim's report. You did read the report, right?) can easily obfuscate the issue.
The RIAA's expert also said that the presence of MP3s showed that Thomas downloaded them from the internet, again, ignoring the extremely likely possibility that Thomas ripped them from CD (which, I will note is both extremely easy, and mentioned in Dr. Kim's report. You did read the report, right?).
The problem with the RIAA expert is that he neglected to list other possibilities. Would he have needed to list the extremely unlikely ones? No.
But he did need to address likely alternative explanations. And when you add his extremely bad analogies, and apparent lack of understanding of NAT (to be 'fair', he could actually understand NAT, but ignored it because it would weaken his report, but that's being a bad expert), his report deserved to be torn apart by Dr. Kim. (You did read the report, right?)
Good post. When I deposed Dr. Jacobson in the UMG v. Lindor case, he admitted that he had never considered any alternative explanations.
If you'd like to have a great editor with a great conflict of interest, then yes, he should be an editor.
Otherwise leave it to people who don't submit stories.
I wouldn't have to decide whether to accept or reject the stories I submit. I could just reject them mentally, before I write them, and save myself the work.
I understand that the RIAA is a popular target here, but why was this article shown in bright red when I came here a moment ago? I've read Slashdot for years and I've never seen that...
Either
(a)it was because it was one of the best written articles ever in the history or internet journalism, or
(b) all the articles start out red -- during which time they are visible only to people with paid up subscriptions.
I prefer to think it was the former, but am pretty sure it was the latter.
Hi NYCL,
the summary (TFS) should have been written as:
"Lest there be any doubt that Brown University's Planetary Geosciences Group graduates Samuel C. Schon, James W. Head, and Caleb I. Fassett, study authors, NASA Martian crater dating, really do 'get it' about the presence of water in recent Mars history, all such doubt should be removed by the paper his team just released (http://geology.gsapubs.org - March 2009, either slashdotted or slow). It shows the Martian gully system is craterless, possibly as young as 1.25 million years old (see bottom right of photo). In the paper lead study author Schon spells out, in the clearest possible terms so that there can be no misunderstanding, that at the extraordinary HiRISE (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) image taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter...
:)
(For those of you who don't know what Troll8901 is getting at... he's mocking me, referring to this)
What the heck does water on Mars have to do with Battling the Evil RIAA???
Get back to work, Ray!!!;-)
What, are you kidding? We need some place to house these guys when the law catches up to them. Our existing prison infrastructure doesn't have that much room.
3/3/10 12:50 PM UPDATE
The question of whether it's a 'standard form' is not necessarily so clear. I have just heard from a few veteran Minnesota federal litigators who say they have never seen such an order in their experience.
I take the blame. Although the trial will be in Duluth, you are correct that the notice specifies Minneapolis as the location of the settlement conference.
Slashdot Mirror
Sure it's a small number, but it's a beginning. What's important are the principles -- the recognition that open source (a) contributes to the growth of ideas, (b) makes our economy more efficient, (c) helps both industry and government improve the services they provide, and (d) should be encouraged.
Indie songs might work for GH, but they won't for Rock Band. People like to play songs they know, especially beginners.
I don't agree with that, but even if it's true..."indie songs" and "indie albums" are 2 separate things. An indie label can put out albums of old familiar songs performed by other -- maybe better -- artists.
You are all missing the most important piece. Rock Band should immediately cease all talks with Warner and switch back to cover songs. I that case they will only need to pay a mechanical royalty of about $0.091 per unit sold per song. The only difference is that a cover band will be playing the songs. If they choose to do this, Warner has literally NO say in the matter. They cannot deny them the license.
Excellent point.
So if Warner wants to pull their catalog from the list of available options, it will only make it that much easier for Harmonix to catch up with other artists from some other labels. I have a feeling Rock Band won't be lacking for anything, but Warner will have to answer to their artists about why they aren't seeing the advantages that other artists are enjoying.
Exactly. I don't see what Warner has to negotiate with. Who needs 'em?
Earth to Guitar Hero:
You don't need Warner.
You got indie music.
Can't find any? Here's my short list.
You could have a contest. The winners get to have their music on Guitar Hero and Rock Band.
I was a little confused by the way the report mixed refuting some of Jabobson's claims with points possibly exonerating Jammie Thomas. The possibilities of spoofed IP addresses are remote and just countering Jacobson's assertion that an IP address uniquely identifies a computer. If she ran Internet connection sharing or NAT only matters if she had an open wireless router. Realistic scenarios like that the MP3s might be just rips she did herself and that KaZaa might have shared files she didn't want to share are much more valid (I'd view that aspect of P2P programs as malware.) Did anybody check if the files' hashes match anything that's out on P2P? Were the files deliberately put into an upload directory or were they somewhere else on the disk? Did she own the CDs? Finally it would have been nice if the report had looked at Jacobson's software and found similar assumptions as in his testimony, showing that it was more of a sales pitch than factual statements.
They only had a couple of weeks to do it, as opposed to the years and years Jacobson has had to try get his story together.
Not only do you make it hard to hate lawyers, but you have so much fun with this, you kinda make me wanna be one. You're not hiring, are you...?
Bite your tongue. I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemies. I do have fun on Slashdot, but that's not practicing law, and trust me -- there's no money in it.
Of course you're biased -- you want "The People" to win. But that doesn't mean you let your bias get in the way of your professionalism. I haven't seen you "forget" to include a piece of information in any reporting you've done.
Thanks, Chabo. Much appreciated. Although the purpose of the blog was to assist lawyers defending against these cases, (a) it's not in my nature to present less than a full picture, and (b) I would not be helping those lawyers were I to attempt to do so.
Thank you for your coverage of these events, even if you're biased. ;)
Everyone is biased one way or another. Your point?
I'm not biased.
I hate their friggin' guts... But I have an open mind about it.
Okay, WTF? I've been wading through his deposition (I'm not finished yet) but this guy doesn't know what he's talking about!
If you want more laughs you can read his trial testimony in Capitol v. Thomas.
Wasn't that the company that in addition to being the RIAA's techno-snich, was also the one responsible for flooding networks with false files.
Yes.
Besides being totally unethical and wrong, I seriously wonder why they were never taken to task for criminality. To me it is the same thing as spammers flooding the net with bad links, and we are throwing them in jail these days.
It ain't over yet.
I don't know why the defendant's lawyer did not object to the RIAA expert. He is a veteran trial lawyer; he must have had his reasons.
I can tell you this:
Jacobson's financial conflicts of interest would not have been grounds for excluding his testimony, it would merely have gone to his credibility;
there were good grounds for excluding his testimony, namely that the record companies had failed to lay a proper foundation for the admissibility of his expert testimony under the Federal Rules of Evidence and applicable case law.
But what the strategy consideration was, in deciding not to object, that I don't know.
I'm surprised there hasn't been more discussion of the actual technical stuff which Dr. Kim discusses.
Would a "reasonable man" conclude that those interests are in conflict? If the answer is yes (and it probably is) then why was Dr Jacobson not eliminated as an expert witness straight away by a defense attorney raising an objection in court and mentioning this conflict? Perhaps I am missing something here, but I am sure that NYCL can explain.
That's easy.
The defendant's lawyer did not object.
Dr Jacobson is not stupid, I've met the man. I graduated with a degree in computer science from Iowa State University in December. I haven't taken a class from him, but again the man is not stupid. He's malicious. He's being paid. In fact I bet he even knows his testimony is full of shit. Again, he's being paid.
More than being paid, he has a major financial interest in the "Audible Magic" software which the RIAA is peddling for him. They go to LAN operators and say "Pay us $76,000 and the letters will stop".
In this case, the RIAA expert didn't even admit the possibility of likely things. For example, until I locked it down, neighbors on both sides of my place were stealing bandwidth off the wireless router where I rent. If they were downloading music, we'd be the ones hit, because it would be our router that would be showing up in ISP records / on Kazaa. (A similar example appeared in Dr. Kim's report. You did read the report, right?) The RIAA "expert" seemed to think that because the (non-timestamped) traceroute went to Thomas's computer, that it -always- went there. This isn't automatically the case. IP/MAC spoofing or other attacks (as appeared in Dr. Kim's report. You did read the report, right?) can easily obfuscate the issue. The RIAA's expert also said that the presence of MP3s showed that Thomas downloaded them from the internet, again, ignoring the extremely likely possibility that Thomas ripped them from CD (which, I will note is both extremely easy, and mentioned in Dr. Kim's report. You did read the report, right?). The problem with the RIAA expert is that he neglected to list other possibilities. Would he have needed to list the extremely unlikely ones? No. But he did need to address likely alternative explanations. And when you add his extremely bad analogies, and apparent lack of understanding of NAT (to be 'fair', he could actually understand NAT, but ignored it because it would weaken his report, but that's being a bad expert), his report deserved to be torn apart by Dr. Kim. (You did read the report, right?)
Good post. When I deposed Dr. Jacobson in the UMG v. Lindor case, he admitted that he had never considered any alternative explanations.
If you'd like to have a great editor with a great conflict of interest, then yes, he should be an editor. Otherwise leave it to people who don't submit stories.
I wouldn't have to decide whether to accept or reject the stories I submit. I could just reject them mentally, before I write them, and save myself the work.
Thank you Ray for all you do for us.
Thanks, Tibor. Much appreciated.
I understand that the RIAA is a popular target here, but why was this article shown in bright red when I came here a moment ago? I've read Slashdot for years and I've never seen that...
Either
(a)it was because it was one of the best written articles ever in the history or internet journalism, or
(b) all the articles start out red -- during which time they are visible only to people with paid up subscriptions.
I prefer to think it was the former, but am pretty sure it was the latter.
3/3/10
Did I miss a year?
Yeah. Were you taking a nap, or what?
Hi NYCL, the summary (TFS) should have been written as: "Lest there be any doubt that Brown University's Planetary Geosciences Group graduates Samuel C. Schon, James W. Head, and Caleb I. Fassett, study authors, NASA Martian crater dating, really do 'get it' about the presence of water in recent Mars history, all such doubt should be removed by the paper his team just released (http://geology.gsapubs.org - March 2009, either slashdotted or slow). It shows the Martian gully system is craterless, possibly as young as 1.25 million years old (see bottom right of photo). In the paper lead study author Schon spells out, in the clearest possible terms so that there can be no misunderstanding, that at the extraordinary HiRISE (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) image taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter ...
:)
(For those of you who don't know what Troll8901 is getting at... he's mocking me, referring to this)
What the heck does water on Mars have to do with Battling the Evil RIAA??? Get back to work, Ray!!! ;-)
What, are you kidding? We need some place to house these guys when the law catches up to them. Our existing prison infrastructure doesn't have that much room.
the record execs will be exposing themselves to a world of legal hurt if they simply ignore this court order
That is correct.
3/3/10 12:50 PM UPDATE The question of whether it's a 'standard form' is not necessarily so clear. I have just heard from a few veteran Minnesota federal litigators who say they have never seen such an order in their experience.
I take the blame. Although the trial will be in Duluth, you are correct that the notice specifies Minneapolis as the location of the settlement conference.