Music Industry Sends Warning to Song Swappers

Reuters ^ | April 29, 2003 | Sue Zeidler

[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.

[Alberta's Child]

Dear RIAA:

If duplicating copyrighted material is illegal, then why do some of your members (Sony Records, for example) have sister companies with consumer products divisions that manufacture and market MP3 players specifically intended for use with said duplicated, copyrighted material?

Sincerely,

A Confused Customer

[AAABEST]

Your #11 is the posting of a deluded blockhead.

You tight-assed types can't stand when you encounter something that can't be controlled.

[Poohbah]

Fine. Please supply the *authority* for YOUR comment re: trespass.

[tuna_battle_slight_return]

"Music Industry Sends Warning to Song Swappers"

I'm NOT listening (covering ears with both hands) -- "I can't hear you -- na, na, na." No pun intended.

[babylonian]

So, wouldn't George Orwell be surprised to learn that Big Brother turns out to be copyright owners.

[Dominic Harr]

And in related new:

RIAA's Rosen 'writing Iraq copyright laws'

[borkrules]

Your "plan" sounds like something the RIAA parasites would think up after a few too many rounds with Jose Quervo at the local watering hole.

I suspect doing what you (tongue in cheek, no doubt) suggest would be slightly "actionable" in many senses of that word.

Is the brief you carry for the RIAA simply a product of an instinctual revulsion for "stealing" or do you collect a paycheck from them?

I see both sides of this argument, from an intellectual perpective. But RIAA, in tenanciously defending a business model that is going the way of the buggy whip and Betamax whether they like it or not, and doing it all in the most Snidely Whiplash manner possible looks increasingly foolish.

I don't know. Carry on righteously defending these heavy handed buffoons if it suits your fancy. Crap like this almost makes me want to go out and download kazaa, just to stick it in the eye of these dim-witted suits.

What's it going to take for someone to replace RIAA with an industry group that can develop a business model that reflects current reality?

[Poohbah]

Not at all.

I recognize that it WILL, eventually, be controlled--it just won't be controlled in anything resembling a LEGAL fashion.

And P2P software types aren't exactly angels of sweetness and light--reread some of the licenses attached to Kazaa. Basically, you're pledging to turn your computer over to whoever wants to use it, as long as they've paid the Kazaa folks their cut.

[Jorge]

The RIAA may simply insert a Trojan into Kazaa and Grokster clients in revenge.

This would't surprise me one bit.

[Poohbah]

I suspect doing what you (tongue in cheek, no doubt) suggest would be slightly "actionable" in many senses of that word.

When you engage in thievery...you kind of lose your ability to complain about illegal things getting done to you in return.

Is the brief you carry for the RIAA simply a product of an instinctual revulsion for "stealing" or do you collect a paycheck from them?

If I got a paycheck from the RIAA, the RIAA would quit lobbying Congress tomorrow...and then the fun would REALLY start. This won't get fixed in the world of law; it's going to get fixed under the law of "s**t happens."

I don't like thieves.

[El Conservador]

It's "swappers"

[Poohbah]

When I read the Kazaa license, and the licenses for the 'wares Kazaa loads by default, I laughed my a$$ off.

For people who hate the RIAA and present IP law, they sure love to use its mechanisms for their OWN ends.

[blondatheart]

I wonder if WIN-MX is next on their list???

[Dominic Harr]

I don't like thieves.

I know it's not important, but it's not 'stealing'. 'Stealing' is a word that has an actual meaning -- taking something.

If I come to your house and see you've just made a nice chair, then go home and make a copy of that chair, down to the last detail, I have not *stolen* from you.

Illegal copying, not theft.

Making a copy is not 'stealing'.

It is 'breach of contract', but I suspect the misuse of the term 'theft' is deliberate . . .

[Mister Magoo]

Poohbah, I agree that the P2P software is invasive. But MP3 swapping was going on long before Napster and its ilk. There were countless search programs (i.e., Audiogalaxy) that would search registered FTP sites for indexing, and one could use an FTP client such as CuteFTP to download directly from someone's computer. Getting rid of every file swapping service will never stop MP3 swapping. A recent Business Week article stated that over 60% of teenagers under the age of 18 get all or most of their music from file swapping. I have friends that haven't bought CDs in over 5 years. The RIAA will never win this battle.

[Poohbah]

Mr. Clinton, in case you haven't figured this out yet:

YOUR willie in HER mouth equals "SEXUAL RELATIONS."

[LowOiL]

Spyware is a fact of life in alot of "freebies" nowdays. The smart know how to defeat them. The dumb lose privacy and a lot of bandwidth.

Here at FR, I'd say very few download the spyware version when the Kazaa lite version is available to those that look for 5 more minutes.

[Poohbah]

Poohbah, I agree that the P2P software is invasive.

That's what cracks me up about Kazaa. They b!tch and moan about the RIAA's "obsolete business model," and then they create a business plan that demands they follown the same pattern as the RIAA.

What will get them into the big leagues is when Kazaa's distributed computing service gets used by a terrorist group--to run the hydrocodes necessary to model a thermonuclear device.

[Poohbah]

Better check the Kazaa Lite license carefully.

[Dominic Harr]

My point exactly -- you're using words to imply things that aren't true.

"Sharing is stealing" is the same as "Oral Sex isn't Sex".

The words have meanings.

Oral Sex is Sex.

And making a copy is not stealing.