Napster the original corporation has been destroyed, its trademarks now owned by an authorized music retailer. But the Napster paradigm, in which computers and networks give ordinary people unprecedented control over intellectual property, continues. This is another quarterly installment in a series of weblog and discussion about the deconstruction of the music industry and other copyright industries, with side forays into 'intellectual property, freedom of expression, electronic media, corporate control, and evolving technology,' as polygon once phrased it. Several years of back items are easily found in the music2 and music3 conferences, covering discussions all the way back to the initial popularity of the MP3 format.72 responses total.
Yes, its illigal. But, coping music off the internet isnt REALLY as bad as the music industry makes it sound. They are all just power and money hogs that wouldnt give a shit if a person at a lower position then them died, as long as they didin't make any money. They've got plenty of cash, and i don't really think it would affect the music writers or producers much if they lost just a bit of it to those in a lesser position. Pardon me if I'm wrong but thats just my opinion.
Yes, you're wrong. Copying music off the internet, per se, is not illegal.
uhh yah... all those people that have been sued cause the d/l'd music off the internet kinda should tell u its illigal
plus im sorry, i know people in the music industry arent evil people, i just kinda exaggerated it. I just think that their making it seem ALOT bigger a deal than d/ling music off the internet is.
There's been a bunch of stuff for this topic, and I just don't feel like digging up the links right now. The third round of RIAA "John Doe" lawsuits targets universities for the first time, including 9 IP addresses at the University of Michigan, presumably students. The IFPI (international version of the RIAA) is trumpeting new legal action against file sharing users in Germany, Denmark, Italy, the UK, if I remember the countries correctly. In a Canadian case, a judge threw out the claims of the Canadian record industry association, who were seeking to have ISPs turn over the identities of users alleged to be sharing files, and the judge seemed to come darn close to legalizing file sharing in Canada. USA CD sales for first-quarter 2004 are up something like 9%. International sales for 2003 were generally down, with Germany reporting an eye-popping plunge of 19%. Congress continues to cry, "Why won't they stop?" and there are new proposals for harsher penalties and lowering the standard of proof required to punish file-sharers. And finally, the World Intellectual Property Organization is proposing that consumer recording of broadcasts be stopped, proposing to grant broadcasters a "right of fixation". This would overrule the US Supreme Court "Betamax" decision which legalized VCRs. Press reports are starting to mount about the new regulations for digital TV equipment; under the new regime, the broadcasters and movie companies will tell your video recorder what can be recorded, how many times it can be viewed, and when the recording will be destroyed. It's not certain yet, but it seems probable that computers will be prohibited from accessing video content, because they can't be made secure enough.
I might easily be wrong in this, but I believe that any decision the world court makes is non-binding. I think the whole digital media aspect is something people aren't going to let get taken away from them, without a fight. Granted, might not be a huge fight, but a fight. People have gotten used to being able to make a working and/or backup copy of items.
Depends on the country. Most countries are described as accepting the jurisdiction of the world court "with reservations"; iirc the US is one of those renegade countries (in company with places like Tajikistan?) that don't accept World Court jurisdiction *at all*.
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is not the World Court. The WIPO proposes rules to "harmonize" copyright and patent rules around the world, usually by toughening; their work results in treaties which the member states are expected to implement through the appropriate legislation.
Here's a link for a Cnet story about the copyright industry pushing for sweeping regulations of how electronic devices can handle video: http://news.com.com/2100-1025_3-5186881.html?tag=nefd.lede
It seems likely to me that the content industry will be able to write laws which prevent devices that don't critically inhibit consumer ability to record and play back video from being made and legally sold in the USA but in my opinion they'll only succeed in creating a gray market for fully functional devices, such as already exists with region-free DVD players and game-console mod chips. Ordinary consumers might not go to the trouble to obtain such devices but then "ordinary consumers" don't even know how to record a program using their current VCRs. Video enthusiasts won't settle for the solution the content providers want to impose.
And if someone is really desperate, they can use an analog to the "print screen" solution for PCs: They could train their camcorder on the TV screen and record the movie *that* way. Crude, but...
Couldn't they also just record to video cassette?
Making a copy by going to analog isn't really the issue here, it's digital media, and copies of them.
resp:10 on Mike's argument that probably the equipment to circumvent recording restrictions will be widely available: I can only quote Clay Shirky's recent article: "To a first approximation, every PC owner under the age of 35 is now a felon."
Right, the WIPO is NOT the world court. The post previous to *my* last confused me.
Has anyone tracked CD + DVD purchases? or total media buying dollars. Propably not, as it has, I can guess, gone up dramaticly. It's just the music part that is in decline.
DVD purchases of just the hottest titles have been more than all CDs. That's not surprising, when you consider that you can buy an entire movie on DVD for less money than the cost of the soundtrack on CD.
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Or at least overpriced.
http://www.unitedmedia.com/comics/dilbert/archive/dilbert-20040425.html
About three or four years ago, in discussing the lack of moral authority behind the concept of intellectual property, I wrote: "The Lord did not say, 'Thou shalt not copy thy neighbor's scrolls.'" (note to Certain Readers of Agora: it's a METAPHOR) Skip ahead to 2004: From an article in a Christian news service: http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/4/202004a.asp "Poll finds music piracy rampant among believing teens" "A new survey done by Christian pollster George Barna for the Gospel Music Association finds a disturbing trend among Christian teens. Not only are teen believers stealing Christian music through Internet downloads and CD burnings, but they are doing it at the same rate that non-Christians are pirating secular music." ... "The Barna survey found that only one in ten Christian teens surveyed consider music piracy to be morally wrong, and 64 percent of them say they have participated in some form of music piracy." The NYTimes has a variant of the story: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/25/weekinreview/25lela.html "Praise God and Pass the Music Files"
Not only are teen believers stealing Christian music through Internet downloads and CD burnings, but they are doing it at the same rate that non-Christians are pirating secular music." Er, yah.
Sidebar: what's up, twenex? Some folks like music, but not secular music.
They do. What I'm saying is, the only people capable of being surprised that Christians are downloading Christian music at roughly the same rates as "seculars" are those who believe that Christians are better than seculars. I'm willing to bet /that/ section of Christianity probably thinks that about Muslims, Jews, Insert-You-Favourite-=Religion-Here aand probably any other sect/branch of Christianity they don't happen to belong too, also.
> "The Lord did not say, 'Thou shalt not copy thy neighbor's scrolls'" Of course He did. It was on the tablet that Mel Brooks dropped.
(Christians aren't "better" than 'seculars', but they do sometimes try to live up to their ideals.)
Hmm, and "seculars" don't?
Different ideals.
Hmm.
Well, I don't necessarily agree. Of course, I don't believe in God, but many of the things that the Bible proposes, "Love thy neighbour", "Thou shalt not kill," etc., still make sense to me. If believing in God constitutes an "ideal", then you're right. Otherwise I think you may be stretching that a bit too far. It's also true, of course, that it's by no means certain that all atheists and agnostics believe in downloading, whilst not everyone who believes in God is whiter than white.
Re resp:28: "You shouldn't steal other people's stuff" isn't exactly an exclusively Christian ideal, though.
Copyright violation is not theft.
Apparently, some would disagree. There's an anti-piracy organization over here called the Federation Against Copyright Theft.
Oh, that's why the conversation took off.
Re resp:32: It may not be theft in the narrow sense of the word, but it *is* denying someone compensation for their labor.
Ah, so it's "being in charge of the Finance Department", then ;-)
re #35: if I don't buy their product am I also "denying someone
compensation for their labor"? Pretty clearly few people would
argue that I am.
Let's imagine two scenarios, then:
In scenario A I do not buy their product and do not
infringe upon their copyright to obtain a copy unlawfully.
In scenario B I do not buy their product, but I DO
infringe upon their copyright and obtain a copy unlawfully.
The artist has the same tangible possessions and the same amount
of money in both cases, but by your definition one of these cases
is theft and the other is not. What, exactly, have I stolen?
Ah, yes, the "but I wouldn't have bought a copy anyway!" defense. The difference in the two scenarios is that in A, you're not getting anything. In B, you're getting something for nothing, something that cost money to create and produce.
re #38: > Ah, yes, the "but I wouldn't have bought a copy anyway!" defense. I'm not defending anything. I'm simply trying to establish what has been stolen. It's clear why the copyright interests deliberately misrepresent infringement as being theft, as it allows them to cast the debate in terms that are much more favorable to their position. It's also an implicit admission of their belief in the weakness of popular agreement with their aims. If we're going to have a useful debate about infringement (which seems unlikely in any event) I'd prefer to be precise about what we say, as sloppiness confuses the issue quite a bit.
Are you arguing that intellectual property has no value? Or just that "theft" is the wrong word?
Some people deny not just that intellectual property has no value, but htat it does not exist. I believe Richard Stallman, the FSF of which he is a part, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation are three groups of them.
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Heh. I presume witting=willing?
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> (178) #40/44: David Brodbeck (gull) Wed, May 5, 2004 (09:04) > Are you arguing that intellectual property has no value? Or just that > "theft" is the wrong word? In an argument it's traditional to respond to what your opponent wrote rather than try to deduce telepathically what he meant and argue against that. If you want to have a useful argument on this topic, don't start by assuming that anyone who doesn't agree with you 100% is an "information wants to be free" Slashbot. I think I've quite clearly limited my objections to the misuse of the term "theft." I don't see how I could have been any clearer, nor do I see how you could deduce from what I have written that I am "arguing that intellectual property has no value." Clearly it has value -- it is bought and sold, is it not? The term "intellectual property" is a bit of a misnomer, though, in my opinion. Allow me to ask my question again: in the infringing case from the two scenarios I outlined in a previous response, *what* has been stolen?
You have denied the profit that would have otherwise been made.
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I'd like someone to go into RIAA headquarters and check all their computer software to be properly licensed.
Good idea. We at grex come up with SO many good ones, don't we?
Re resp:45: Sorry. It's just that 99% of the time when I have this argument, it *is* with someone who believes "information wants to be free" and should never be bought or sold, only given away.
Which is a valid opinion, like most others.
I don't think it's a valid opinion, personally. But then, most of the people I know rely, in some form or other, on intellectual property to make a living.
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<twenex grins>
re #51: By your definition, what would be an example of an invalid opinion?
Depends mostly on the mores of the time, I suppose. For example, I suspect most people nowadays would accept that it's wrong to murder people, or to commit child rape. Since the vast majority of people in that society agree on it, then anyone's opinion to the contrary is not valid: we lock people up who exercise their "right" to rape or murder. Similarly, achievement of political ends by violent means is also not condoned. Therefore anyone who professes that it is acceptable is also expressing an "invalid" opinion. Another way to approach it would be to say that an opinion that is clearly contrary to established and demonstrable fact is invalid, such as the belief that the world is fla; or, if it could be proven that 81% of people in the UK were against the abolition of the monarchy, then to say that 75% of them are in favour would clearly be "an invalid opinion".
I'd more say that an invalid opinion is one which simply makes no sense, assumes facts not in evidence, displays unsound reasoning, is hypocritical, etc. Valid opinion: The monarchy should be abolished because it is an antiquated remnant of divine authority, and is today merely an expensive tradition and frequent source of embarassment. Invalid opinions: The monarchy should be abolished because fish swim. The monarchy should be abolished because the Queen is a three-headed space alien attempting to subvert human authority. The monarchy should be abolished because power, like information, wants to be free.
Re: #57. The first paragraph is a succinct version of #56. I really must try
to be mre to the point.
I'm not at all convinced that the one about the Queen having three heads would
be invaldi, if the Queen did indeed have 3 heads.
Information DOES want to be free, as in "freely available". Assuming "free"
in this context to mean "free of charge" or "at no cost to the consumer, or
profit to the provider, of information", is a common mistake we ALWAYS have
to keep banging on about to drum into people's heads. It's ironic that the
language which arguably displays the greatest propensity of all known
languages to borrow words expressing concepts which it lacks has not yet
borrowed a word to simply and unambigously represent the concept of "free"
as in "freedom", or "at liberty". Spanish and German both have it ("libre"
in the first case, and "frei" in the second, where "no cost" is respectively
"gratis" and "kostenlos").
Or as Richard Stallman puts it, there's a distinction between "free speech" and "free beer".
Indeed.
When I saw him speak once, he spent the entire speech digging energetically for a gold nugget, which was apparently buried deep inside his ass.
rotfl.
Information does "want to be free." That's why copyright law was established in the first place. Property rights subsist only in the physical copies you own. Nothing in property right prevents somebody else, who has legitimately acquired a copy, from making their own and selling them. But this was clearly unfair to the original author. So this artificial beastie, copyright law, was invented as a fair compromise. This worked until the Mickey Mouse Protection Act came along. I'm equally appalled at the people who say there should be no copyright - who want to return us to an ugly state of nature - and the people who want to make copyright a permanent property right - which is insane. If copyright were permanent, who are the legal heirs of Cicero? I might want to quote him sometime.
Indeedy. Opponents and freeloaders of open source and free software alike should note that Linux is copyright Linus Torvalds.
It it's Open Source, how can they be freeloaders?
re #65: > [If] it's Open Source, how can they be freeloaders? "Open source" just means the source is available, not that the software is free, which is a separate issue. There are companies which charge for the use of their software but make source available to their customers. The usual term for software that is free of charge is "free software" but that's become a politically charged issue because of the efforts of RMS and the GNU organization, who insist that software labelled "free" software be not just disributed without charge but also (mostly) unencumbered legally, (except of course, in the way they prefer..)
Re resp:65: The license does put certain restrictions on how it can be used. If you modify the source, package it up in a product, then sell that product without making the source code available, that counts as "freeloading" in my mind, because you're violating the license. Spreading copies around with the source code doesn't, because it's explicitly allowed by the license agreement.
Re: #65. I support either paying for, or making donations (not necessarily of money, perhaps of time, e.g. to code, or translate documentation) free and open source software. Those who take without giving /something/ back I consider freeloaders.
Much that has been said before, but for those who like reading interviews about how doomed the music business is, this one with David Crosby is better than average (and Crosby is surprisingly lucid..) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/music/interviews/crosby.ht ml
Thanks, Mike! I missed the show, but from the press and BBS discussions I read about it, it sounds like the David Crosby interview was the best part.
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According to Slashdot you'll be able to view the show on-line in a week or two, if I remember correctly.
You have several choices: