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Wipe your iPod before selling it, RIAA warns
The Register ^ | Monday 13th February 2006 | Tony Smith

Posted on 02/13/2006 11:02:23 AM PST by nickcarraway

If you sell your iPod and don't remove your music first, you could find yourself with the Recording Industry Ass. of America (RIAA) breathing down your back. The organisation last week told sellers in the US that doing so is a clear violation of copyright law and warned them that it's sniffing out for infringers.

Apple's rapid iPod refresh schedule, not to mention those of its competitors, have generated a tide of old music player offers in classified ads columns and on sites like eBay. Rather too many sellers are shipping their old machines with music libraries intact - some we've seen even make a virtue of the fact.

But it's illegal, not only in the US but also in the UK and the rest of Europe. As, incidentally, is ripping all your CDs and LPs to MP3 then selling or even giving away the originals. By disposing of your physical media, you're ending your right to use the music they contain. The RIAA's point, made in an MTV online report (http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1524099/20060209/story.jhtml) is that handing over music on a music player is no different from duplicating a CD and selling the copy.

The only way around the problem is to either erase the iPod, or make sure it ships with only copies of the music - downloads if that's how they were obtained, or the original physical media. And don't keep copies yourself.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Extended News; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events; US: California; US: District of Columbia; US: Nevada
KEYWORDS: congressontake; intellectualproperty; ipod; kissmyrear; mpaa; music; riaa; riaacantenforceit; savefairuse
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To: nickcarraway

Really? So I can lend a book, borrow one from the library, or read a magazine in a doctors office, but if I lend or sell my i-pod I go to jail or incur heavy civil lability?

USE AN IPOD GOT TO JAIL


Sorry, but we just past the silly point here.


181 posted on 02/13/2006 5:20:21 PM PST by Wiseghy ("You want to break this army? Then break your word to it.")
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To: nickcarraway

What the Nimrods from the RIAA have managed to do is to assure that doing business with them results in a basic civil rights violation....without making you sign a formal contract otherwise. IMHO, a precedent profoundly dangerous to capitalism.


182 posted on 02/13/2006 5:23:46 PM PST by mo
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To: Wiseghy

the silly ones here are the RIAA...


183 posted on 02/13/2006 5:25:11 PM PST by mo
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To: nickcarraway

These RIAA clowns are going to keep playing this "Weekend at Bernie's" routine until consumers begin to ACTIVELY look for ways to break it off in them.


184 posted on 02/13/2006 5:39:23 PM PST by papertyger
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To: jpl
Oddly enough, I don't think I've ever heard software companies claiming that you're a criminal if you don't wipe your entire hard drive clean before selling your computer to someone else.

Well, they care; they even offer online snitch forms if you want to rat somebody out. But they're mainly concerned with businesses that do things like buy one copy of Photoshop and then install it on 300 computers without paying for the extra licenses. For them, the average Joe unloading an old PC on eBay (which probably contains software two versions out of date anyway) is barely worth bothering with.

I'm all for recording artists making the money that they deserve, but the arrogance of the RIAA is just too much to take at times.

Never forget: The artists never get the money they deserve from album sales; it doesn't matter whether we're talking physical CDs or downloads. First off, for every song sold on iTunes (at 99¢ each), the record company gets 65¢ of that, without lifting a finger; it's purely a rights fee. Of that, the artist gets about 9% or 10%, so we're talking about a nickel. (Most of the rest of the 99¢ is eaten up by costs; Apple as the company that's actually providing the service, has to pay for everything out of its own pocket: hardware, bandwidth, personnel, etc., and has to eat the fees for each transaction charged by the credit card companies; in the end, they're lucky to get 7¢ to 10¢.

But of course, in the end, the artist usually never even sees that nickel. Most recording contracts are designed essentially as loans from the record company to the artist. Yeah, you get "signed", but the record company is only fronting you the money to record the album, publish it, promote it, etc. Until and unless you meet some pretty high sales targets (and most don't), you not only never see a penny, you often end up owing the record company money.

So don't feel sorry about the poor artist the next time you see someone burning a copy of a CD. If you really want to support them, go to one of their concerts; that's where they get their take. Or just buy him a cup of coffee the next time you see him walking down the street; that alone will give him more profit than if you bought a dozen of his CDs.

185 posted on 02/13/2006 5:45:04 PM PST by Dont Mention the War (This tagline is false.)
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To: Grit
Wonder if the same applies to selling a video tape I recorded an HBO movie on and then sell it in a garage sale?

Yes, it does.

The difference is that the HBO movie was copied off of HBO without paying any additional fees for the right to license the movie for home use. The songs on the iPod were bought at $0.99 each from iTunes. If I have 1000 songs on my iPod, that's $999.00 that is taken from my pocket and simply disappears if I can't resell the rights to the songs along with the iPod.

186 posted on 02/13/2006 5:53:23 PM PST by FreedomCalls (It's the "Statue of Liberty," not the "Statue of Security.")
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To: nickcarraway

I like that :Recording Industry Ass of America (RIAA)


187 posted on 02/13/2006 6:34:17 PM PST by philetus (Keep doing what you always do and you'll keep getting what you always get.)
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To: LibertarianInExile

"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."


I would take the theory behind this wording to mean that they didn't want the Authors and Inventors to quit after making one thing. Progress is only promoted if the creators are forced to make something new every once in a while in order to earn a living.


188 posted on 02/13/2006 9:26:48 PM PST by Apogee
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To: Apogee

That's exactly right. The patent and copyright laws at one point were enabling inventors and artists a good living. Now the middlemen, producers who cobble together a distribution network and saturate markets with cheap, inferior pop-crap, are the ones who really benefit.


189 posted on 02/13/2006 10:28:48 PM PST by LibertarianInExile (Freedom isn't free--no, there's a hefty f'in fee--and if you don't throw in your buck-o-5, who will?)
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To: Antonello

"Does difficult enforcement of a law equate to moral justification for breaking it?"

No, of course not. I didn't mean to imply that it did.


190 posted on 02/13/2006 11:21:18 PM PST by LiveBait
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To: Recovering_Democrat

Giving the music away for free....now that might work!


191 posted on 02/14/2006 6:24:29 AM PST by Clovis_Skeptic (Islam is a religion of peace my as@)
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To: HamiltonJay
They have no way to know if a persons only copy of a song is on a MP3 player they are selling... or even where that song inately originated from. I bought a record in 1978... the record is now long destroyed, but I have lifetime right to hear that music... so if I download a song from the internet from that 1978 albumn I bought, and don't pay for it, I haven't broken any rules....

Therein lies the fundamental problem: the industry wants to have it both ways, taking the position "you bought a license" when it suits them (i.e. when you sell media secondhand) and taking the position "you bought the physical media" when that suits them (i.e. when you have to buy the same thing all over again because the original media became obsolete).

That has the same effect on public respect for copyright law as speed traps do on public respect for traffic law.

192 posted on 02/14/2006 6:30:49 AM PST by steve-b (A desire not to butt into other people's business is eighty percent of all human wisdom)
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To: Keeper of the Turf
Anapod Explorer looks like a better option (cheaper if you are buying the software for a specific iPod version, and according to the FAQ they don't charge extra for additional computer licenses).
193 posted on 02/14/2006 6:38:36 AM PST by steve-b (A desire not to butt into other people's business is eighty percent of all human wisdom)
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To: Dont Mention the War
Well, they care; they even offer online snitch forms if you want to rat somebody out. But they're mainly concerned with businesses that do things like buy one copy of Photoshop and then install it on 300 computers without paying for the extra licenses.

I've heard of bosses stupid enough to do that and treat their employees like crap to the point where they were actively looking for ways to get the SOB in trouble (and, of course, they quickly happened upon the snitchsite). I wonder how people like that summon up the neural processing power to keep inhaling and exhaling every five seconds.

194 posted on 02/14/2006 6:46:31 AM PST by steve-b (A desire not to butt into other people's business is eighty percent of all human wisdom)
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