Posted on 04/29/2003 1:09:02 PM PDT by Mister Magoo
Wednesday April 30, 3:06 AM Music Industry Sends Warning to Song Swappers By Sue Zeidler
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The record industry opened a new front in its war against online piracy on Tuesday by surprising hundreds of thousands of Internet song swappers with an instant message warning that they could be "easily" identified and face "legal penalties."
About 200,000 users of the Grokster and Kazaa file-sharing services received the warning notice on Tuesday and at least one million will be getting the message within a week, according to music industry officials.
The copyright infringement warnings, which were sent by the Recording Industry Association of America, on behalf of the major record labels, said in part:
"It appears that you are offering copyrighted music to others from your computer. ...When you break the law, you risk legal penalties. There is a simple way to avoid that risk: DON'T STEAL MUSIC, either by offering it to others to copy or downloading it on a 'file-sharing' system like this. When you offer music on these systems, you are not anonymous and you can easily be identified."
The music industry's campaign for the hearts and minds of Internet song swappers comes four days after a federal judge threw an unexpected roadblock to its efforts to shut down song-swapping services in court.
U.S. District Court Judge Stephen Wilson on Friday ruled that the Grokster and Morpheus services should not be shut down because they cannot control what is traded over their systems. Like a videocassette recorder, the software in question could be used for legitimate purposes as well as illicit ones, he said.
"We're expecting to send at least a million messages or more per week because these users are offering to distribute music on Kazaa or Grokster," said Cary Sherman, president of the RIAA.
Sherman described the move as an educational effort to inform users that offering copyrighted music on peer-to-peer networks is illegal and that they face consequences when they participate in this illegal activity.
The RIAA and the Big Five record companies need to make it worthwhile for musicians to accept contracts that will give them pennies on the dollar and force them to spend most or all of those pennies at the "company store". Otherwise no musician in his right mind would ever sign with them.
Historically, the way the record labels have been able to do this is by offering access to broadcast radio. A band which signs with the RIAA will get radio airplay, and will thus become famous. People will thus seek out concerts and buy their music. If the band is really lucky, they might even net a few cents from people's purchase of their music.
Although the RIAA mainly squawks about people who download its music, its real fear is people who download other music. If too many bands discover they no longer need the RIAA to promote them, the RIAA won't be able to attract musicians with an offer of pennies on the dollar anymore.
It would seem that kiddie porn would be easily enough traced back to them and it would be illegal for them to send unsolicited kiddie porn ---I don't think it'd be very smart of them to try this.
Or so the people providing it claim.
I use a firewall that lets me know of unauthorized communications, in or out, plus regularly use adaware - a spyware detection program.
I have not found spyware...neither have thousands of other users of Kazaa lite on the internet.
You can't beat us, but you can join us.
I can see burning CDs and selling them should be a crime --and the profits should be confiscated ---but as long as no money is exchanged then it's a different situation. You can find all kinds of cheap bootlegged CDs at any flea market around here ---if those guys can make a profit selling them then the music companies should be setting their prices accordingly. Free market competition.
BTW, let me ask a somewhat-related question: if someone purchases a printer (as opposed to, say, leasing it), does that person have a right to refill its ink cartridges, and to make such modifications to the printer or cartridges as are necessary to make them work?
Not if they expect the manufacturer to stand behind the printer's warranty. Other than that, they may do as they choose with what they own, however the new printer cartridges have embedded chips that disallow refills by the end-user - an example of a proprietary system to protect a company that sells printers for $125 but charges $35-$50 a pop for ink cartridges. And yes, someone will eventually figure out a way to circumvent the system. It seems the most ambitious people in the world are those who want something for nothing, but it's not even a remotely close parallel to the music industry imho.
While I may or may not agree with any number of opinions about the RIAA, the p2ps, the law itself or the artists, I feel that the rule of law should prevail if the US is to stand. The arguments being made that the recording industry is already dead, also argue that the rule of law is dead as well and it no longer even depends on what is is.
It's either right to take what is not yours, or it is not. Many of the arguments being made by conservative people at Free Republic, if carried to their logical conclusion would advocate that since the banking industry is an outmoded business model (because I arbitrary decided it is due to the rates and high charges imposed by the greedy banks), I have the right to steal from the bank as long as I manage not to get caught. I don't really see the difference in arguments, therefore I'm some sort of puritanical moral monitor open to insult and loathing for espousing a conservative principal on a conservative web forum. What's up with that?
If I burn a copy of one of my CD's and lend it to a friend, I can have some degree of confidence he's not going to burn more and sell them at flea markets. While it's possible I don't know my friends as well as I think I do, I don't lend music to people I think might do such a thing.
By contrast, if you put music on the Internet for promiscuous download, there is a fair likelihood that it may be downloaded by people without such scruples. If someone downloads a song you put on the Internet, burns some CD's, and sells them at a flea market, have you not contributed to their crime?
Someone has. And they've been sued for copyright infringement for copying the codes that the embedded chips send out. I believe the case is still pending, but would ask: should the vendor have the right to sue for copyright infringement in this case?
While I may or may not agree with any number of opinions about the RIAA, the p2ps, the law itself or the artists, I feel that the rule of law should prevail if the US is to stand. The arguments being made that the recording industry is already dead, also argue that the rule of law is dead as well and it no longer even depends on what is is.
Unfortunately, we have courts that routinely ignore the Supreme Law of the Land. Determining what the law really is, then, is often problematical, especially in cases where statutes seem to contradict the Constitution.
Many of the arguments being made by conservative people at Free Republic, if carried to their logical conclusion would advocate that since the banking industry is an outmoded business model (because I arbitrary decided it is due to the rates and high charges imposed by the greedy banks), I have the right to steal from the bank as long as I manage not to get caught. I don't really see the difference in arguments, therefore I'm some sort of puritanical moral monitor open to insult and loathing for espousing a conservative principal on a conservative web forum. What's up with that?
Some here say that there's nothing wrong with promiscuous music "sharing"; I for one disagree with that premise, as do many others. Nonetheless, I do believe that the RIAA's business model is dependent upon their maintaining near-exclusive control over music promotion. If artists discover ways to promote their work without signing their lives away to the RIAA, the RIAA's business model will collapse.
The real danger to the RIAA comes not from people who distribute RIAA music illegally, but who distribute independent music (some legally, some not, but none actionable by the RIAA in any event).
That's a good example of prices being way out of line ---if the cartridge was $35-$50 and I buy one, that cartridge is now mine. If I find cheaper ink to put in it ---what can be wrong with that? Same as buying a Ford car and later buying an off-brand air-filter instead of a Ford part.
If I have a firearm in my house and a thief breaks in and steals it, I am in no way responsible for what the thief does with it.
If, however, I abandon a loaded firearm in the middle of a crowded park, however, I would bear significant responsibility if someone were to pick it up and injures or kills someone else.
Besides--something I haven't figured out: why do so many people "share" music promiscuously? Sharing with friends I can understand. But these open-ended sites just baffle me.
. . . so maybe the RIAA may have to find other revenue generators to pay artists and such, perhaps live performances & tours, endorsement deals for products, T-Shirts, mugs, and other merchandise, or some other venue have to come into play. All I can say is that the music industry has to find a way to shift gears somehow . . .No offense to you personally, but that is the last time I can actually stand to read some blockhead telling me that musicians are going to have to give away their music for free and make their living selling coffee mugs because their music is not subject to copyright law and even if it is, you'll steal it anyway.
No one is missing his/her property if you copy a file.
No? He is missing the cash that he is legally entitled to receive from you for your use of his copyrighted property.
As for the copyright laws being universal, they're totally arbitrary, capricious, vary from country to country
Reread my post. I did not say copyright laws are universal. I said that the mere existence of the word "copyright" indicates that the right to copy is not universal. Yes, copyright laws do vary somewhat from country to country, but basic copyright protections exist in virtually all countries.
In some poor communities, picking up unattended property is not considered stealing, did you know?
Yes, I did know. Thank you for proving my point! I'll bet you didn't know that the law is the same in the United States and virtually every other country. The emphasis is on the word "unattended." If someone voluntarily relinquishes their ownership right to property, whether tangible property or intellectual property, it is free for the taking. If I leave a piece of used furniture on the side of the road, I have relinquished my ownership and control of that property and it may be freely taken. Similarly, if a musical group posts a song on mp3.com and authorizes free and unlimited downloading, it has relinquished it's ownership interest in that song.
In the case of almost all song downloading from Kazaa, etc., however, the owner has not relinquished it's ownership interest in the song so it may not be freely taken.
It's all about what rights the owner chooses to give up. Consider the owner of a beach house. He has the legal right to keep people from walking across his property to get to the beach. Because he's a nice guy, though, he lets people access the beach through his property. He has the right to keep them off his property, but has chosen not to assert it. Because he still has the right, though, at any point he can say enough is enough and stop it.
It's the same with copyright. The owners can decide what rights they want to enforce and what rights not to enforce. Let's look at the oft-cited example of people copying records to cassettes. People ask why that is okay, but downloading files is not okay. Well, the fact is that it's okay only because the owners of the property, the record companies, have said it's okay. It is clearly a copyright infringement, but the record companies have chosen not to enforce their rights. Why? Because they were making money on the cassettes people were purchasing to make the copies and they were satisfied with the compensation they were receiving. It's no diffenent than if the beach property owner collected $1 from every person walking across his property. He has the right to stop them at any time, but since he's getting compensated what he feels is a fair amount, he lets them continue to do it.
In the case of song downloads the property owners, namely the record companies, are screaming at the top of their lungs "You are not permitted to do this. We are asserting our right to keep you off of our property unless you pay us." They have the absolute right to do that. Why are they asserting their rights with respect to downloads, but didn't assert it with respect to cassette copies. Well, obviously, they are not happy with the revenue the activity is generating. The ease of transfer and superior sound quality make downloads much more ubiquitous than the making of cassettes. Plus, many, if not most, of the downloaded files are stored on hard drives, so there is no significant product being purchased to accomodate the downloads from which the record companies can generate revenue. The point is that the record companies are entitled to assert whatever rights they choose to assert
I am not a record company hack and, like just about everyone else on this thread, I hate to spend $17 for a CD that contains just a couple of songs that I like; however, as I said in a previous post, the proper way to fight the battle is to refuse to buy the product, rather than to steal the product or claim that the record companies have no right to protect their property.
In this case, and in many similar situations, we allow loud, well organized interest groups to tell us what is moral and what isn't!
When all else fails, resort to meaningless platitudes.
Doubtful. By the way, it's "Ph.D."
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