p2pnet - rss feed: China’s Baidu.com ‘guilty’
p2p news / p2pnet:- Chinese search engine Baidu.will appeal a court verdict ruling saying it infringed copyrights.
Universal, EMI, Warner, Sony BMG and local subsidiaries claim the search company made it easy for users to illegally download mp3s of their songs.
“Beijing’s Haidian District Court found Baidu guilty on Monday, saying it provided access to Web sites offering illegal MP3 files of music belonging to recording company Shanghai Push, also known as Shanghai Busheng Music Culture Media Co,” says the Associated Press.
"We believe that the district court order was based on a misunderstanding of the search engine technology and therefore is without merit," Baidu’s lawyer, Li Decheng,told AP in an email.
Google has an interest in the company.
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See:-
made it easy - Big Music sues China’s Baidu, September 16, 2005
Associated Press - Baidu.com to Appeal Court Verdict, September 20, 2005
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September 20th, 2005 at 4:58 pm
“As a matter of fact, we’re just a search engine that tells users where things are – this has been our business model since we started. If the copyright owners can prove their ownership of songs or other items, and pinpoint the pirates, we will definitely delete the links once for all.” Robin Li (Baidu CEO).
What’s the big deal with linking to a search result. That’s what a ‘GOOD’ search engine is supposed to do. That’s what I EXPECT a search engine to do.
So fine, Baidu will remove the link on request. I personally, find it all so ridiculous. Times are changing, technology is improving, data is easier to share, and “sharing means caring.”
Something is not right here. Some business “models” are not working. Either that, or it is us, the people, who are in err?!
Look at it this way.
File sharing is not the only culprit. Take the following REAL situations:
(1) Music label “STEALS” from the artists by coercing/deceiving the artist into signing into “exclusive” contracts. These contracts prevent the artist from doing anything, from making a buck “without” the permission of the label. The vast majority of cases, these artists “sit idle for YEARS” without being “allowed permission” to sing/perform/create/record. That is why you see such “mainstream crap.”
Furthermore, and here’s the interesting point, ALL of the “creative works” and it’s distribution rights get automatically accrued to the labels. Now, it get’s more interesting. It now “BELONGS” to the cartel, without them paying a cent for it. If you study contract law, you would know that for a contract/transaction to be valid, there must be “consideration” (i.e. money/value) going BOTH WAYS. If most artists knew how screwed they get, none would sign with the cartel.
(2) Music labels “STEALS” from the people. EVERYTHING is based on prior art, whether it is science, math, engineering, art, music, culture, religion, beliefs, poems, language, stories, movies, ANYTHING AT ALL!!!! When the cartel claims EXCLUSIVE OWNERSHIP to ANY piece of work, they are HIJACKING ALL OF THE PRIOR ART that the piece of “art” is based on! Think about that. The “prior knowledge” does not belong to any one person, nor organization, nor country — it belongs to the collective human race. So the whole issue of “Intellectual Property Rights” is one giant SCAM. It is an systematic attempt to HIJACK (i.e. Steeling through use of force) PRIOR WORKS!!!
If anyone has any strategic intelligence, they would focus on these two points, especially the second one. One someone “trys” to make a “case” for IP, let them know the very foundation of IP is FLAWED — There can not exist IP, because EVERYTHING owes it’s existence to prior work — And to CLAIM OWNERSHIP over all of the prior work as your exclusive property is ridiculous!!!