p2pnet - rss feed: Will somebody please explain?
p2p news view / p2pnet: A lot of people are confused by the Organized Music family’s tactics.
Among them is Julian Bond who, in a Reader’s Write, asks, Would somebody please explain? >>>>>>>>>>
Just what, exactly, is the RIAA claiming?
By - Julian Bond
I don’t understand this. Could someone please explain what infringement the RIAA is actually claiming?
In a recent case, the RIAA initially claimed 1000 infinging tracks. The defence showed that all but 30 were owned on CD so the RIAA reduced the claim to 30. Doesn’t this mean that downloading, uploading and offering is legal provided you can show where your library came from?
So what is the crime here?
- Downloading. Well maybe, but from where? It’s actually not at all clear what sources are legal and what are not legal. And apparently if you download something you’ve already bought, that’s legal. Which means the RIAA ought to be *proving* that the tracks on your PC were copyright material and were obtained illegally. So they would have to have records of actual transfers of proveably copyright material from proveably non-authorised sources.
- Uploading. Well maybe, but then we need proof of actual uploading. And if the only proof they have is that the RIAA uploaded from your machine, surely that’s entrapment?
- Offering for upload. It’s way too easy to share bits of your PCs disk, or all of it. You could have a collection of 10,000 Mp3s that have all been ripped from CDs you’d bought, share the wrong directory and mistakenly offer them for upload with operating system commands or iTunes configuration. But if nobody actually downloads from you have you done anything wrong?
- Presence of copyright material on your machine. As for downloading, the RIAA ought to have to prove that you did not purchase it or obtained it from non-authorised sources. Given the wide possible sources and the number of CDs that my kids have just plain lost or destroyed, that’s damn hard.
The claims the RIAA are actually making against these John Does appears to be that
1) They run one of the 4 or 5 major P2P programs
2) They offered for share, files with filenames that appear to be the same as album and track titles of copyrighted work.
And that’s it. But that doesn’t actually prove any wrong doing. It says nothing about
1) What those files actually contain.
2) Where they were obtained.
3) Whether they were downloaded from an unauthorised source.
4) Whether they were ever uploaded to anybody.
So are they actually saying that running a specific piece of software on your machine is illegal? Or that the presence of certain file names on your PC is illegal? Or that it’s your responsibility to prove your innocence and not theirs to prove your guilt? All three of those are deeply suspect in terms of their effect on the law. Is it actually the uploading, downloading, offering to share or source of the offending files that is the problem? Do I have to keep a complete audit trail of every MP3 on my system next to a complete audit trail of every physical CD, cassette, vinyl or 8-track that goes through my life? And of course, not just my life but those of all my family members as well.
If the Santangelo case runs its course, it might actually help everybody else just by clarifying exactly what the RIAA is claiming in their 10s of 1000s of lawsuits. Because right now it’s not at all clear to me. And just to make it worse this is all USA law. Canada, UK, Europe and everywhere else they’re bringing cases have subtly different copyright laws that some times radically change the legal landscape over what is legal and illegal behaviour.
Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don’t buy their ‘product’. Do bug your local political representatives. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you’re into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep’s doorstep, making sure you’ve contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance
December 30th, 2005 at 11:44 pm
It looks to me like you guys just looking for ways to justify illegal music downloads. As an independent musician I hate RIAA but I do not understand your point of view on music downloads either.
You are saying that when your kids destroy a CD you get so upset about it that you just fire up Kazaa and get the lost music from there. Let’s forget about CDs for a sec and think about the problem from another point of view. You gave your kids a toy which is a physical object which you purchased legally at some store. They broke it and in order to compensate the loss you want to obtain the same exactly object from some other source for free. I do not think you can do that unless you are planning to rob the place, right? Then, why are you complaining about music CDs if you do not get the same kind of deal on any other physical object you have at home. When your socks get old you throw them away and buy a new pair but when you get a scratch on CDs it’s like the whole world is crashing before your eyes. Take it easy, it’s just a CD, pal. Buy a new one and if you are really care about your collection make a copy of it and keep original cd in a safe place, it’s simple as that. According to this site millions of people downloading music every day. The question is: what are they all do not know how to create MP3 from cds they have at home? .. or all these people have their CDs scratched and they need a replacement? I do not think so. They are after music they do not owe yet.
Here is the deal you get for music CDs which you cannot get for any other product:
you can make copies of CDs
or transfer music into some other format
you like for your personal use.
You can keep original CD in a safe place while using a backup copy.
As long as you follow these directions you will enjoy your music for the rest of your life and nobody going to come after you. If this situation still upsets you think - CONDOMS - they cost more and you use it only once. I do not see anybody complaining about it!
I am tired of hearing: …this 21st digital century…. nobody going to buy CDs anymore. And next sentence usually goes like this: ….they sell us low quality, overpriced MP3s….blah, blah, blah.
I see it as cost of music doesn’t fit you “lunch money” budget. Get a job, pal, and if you still think that music is expensive you might want to ask your government why, the hell, a working man cannot afford to buy a couple of CDs? And again if you do not like MP3 quality why you keep buying them? I do not like MP3s so I do not buy them. I get CDs.
The problem with MP3 is that you do not see it as a physical product which has certain value like any other product would have. But MP3s have the same value as a CD just because first you need a CD in order to make MP3. For me as a composer MP3 have the same value no matter what you think because I have to invest the same sum of money into product no matter what format we going to have at the end which includes:
1 cost of education
2 cost of equipment
3 rent, utilities, transportation (auto insurance), food
medical bills or/and health insurance, pension plan.
4 time spent on practice (money not earned)
5 time spent on recording (money not earned)
6 cost of cd print
7 cost of advertisement
8 cost of distribution
9 state and city tax
And that’s a lot of time, work and money should be invested before he or she is able to produce a decent CD. So, you have to be a brain dead moron to assume that a CD costs $1.00 to produce. A good CD print cost $2 per cd and even CDbaby want $4 per sale it’s $6 right there so how many CDs should I sell and at what price in order to cover the cost of everything else? Duh?
Some people think of internet as an advertisement vehicle. Wrong. A lot of independent music is shared on the p2p networks since Napster but do we get anything out of it? Not really. Here is a little story that happened here in Brooklyn this Christmas. I was participating in the recording of a Catholic’s school choir. The idea was to sell the CD to raise some money for music program. The idea was supported by most of the parents. So they did the recording. They sold a bit more than 200 instead of 800 CDs as it was planned. You might think that it’s was a bad CD. You might be right at some point. Children choirs cannot really sing as professionals can no matter how much you train them but that’s not the point. The point is that many parents made copies from other parents/children who bought the cds. Even children (30 students) from the choir didn’t buy the CDs. They all made copies. And you want to convince musicians that’s people with this kind of mentality will buy our music after they got it for free from p2p networks? No man, they do not buy it. They do not delete this music from their computers either. They think of music realm in terms of Michel Jakcson and Celine Dion but it’s as stupid as thinking of American people in terms of Bush and Cheney. We are not rich and never will be. All we have in life is music and the only chance for us to survive is only if you support us.
My English is not perfect but I am sure you got the idea.
Full time musician
ViC Phoenix
December 31st, 2005 at 12:54 am
Quote* Get a job, pal, and if you still think that music is expensive you might want to ask your government why, the hell, a working man cannot afford to buy a couple of CDs? And again if you do not like MP3 quality why you keep buying them? I do not like MP3s so I do not buy them. I get CDs. End Quote *
A: I have a job. I work 44+ hrs a week. I have a wife and 5 kids. a mortgage and alot of other expenses. CD’s are over priced.. I WILL NOT buy cd’s . why? Because I only want selected tracks from albulms. So mp3’s it is.
B: ‘ask your government why’ .. UMM hello… goverments don’t set music prices. Greedy album labels and mobsters like the RIAA influence this.
C: If the music industry is giving you such a hard time earning some cash… GET A REAL JOB.
December 31st, 2005 at 2:08 am
You DON’T need the music industry. If they’re making it hard for you to make money get out of it!! You can make and record your own music on just about any pc you can buy new, and many second hand these days.
Which also means you don’t need to start with a cd to get mp3’s at all.
I don’t think anyone here really has a problem supporting the artists who make the music. The problem is we can’t. The only option we have is to support the cartels, who in theory are supposed to support the artists. I’m sure there’s been enough bands suing their labels for under reporting sales and under payment of royalties to give the lie to that concept tho.
You want ppl to support you? Set up a website and sell the music yourself. Don’t rely on a pack of weasels who’s only interest is in making the Dividend Bludgers (aka shareholders) richer than they are already.
December 31st, 2005 at 2:59 am
It’s amazing how people that do not know anything about music business without any hesitation put labels like CDs are overpriced and that’s it. How did you figured that? I can say it right about any product you consume so what. Why don’t you pick some other product or service to bitch about like health care or something.
If you cannot support your children and provide them with all necessary things in life including proper education and music CDs why, on earth, do you make them?
Government do not set prices but they make laws that stimulate economy and if they do it right your salary should grow and that’s how you buy things.
Thanks for the comment but I have a real job.
You have a wedding - music is there.
You have funerals - music is there.
You get bored in your car- here you go I’m there to entertain you.
Gym? baseball?…have them covered. House of worship, a cruse trip, karaoke bar - no problem.
The list is endless. And after all that some guys say - you not penicillin we do not really need you, so you better agree to our terms. And the terms are: your CDs are overpriced, MP3 are worthless crap and it should be free (but notice, they want them anyway).
Yes, the industry and fans are giving us hard time but you have to realize that this job sucks like any other. So, stop figuring out how do make downloads for free without being caught. It’s not fare to artists no matter what you say. What we should think of is how to disintegrate RIAA so upcoming artists could keep their copyrights. The hell with copyrights, let’s just hurt them as much as possible because they are bloodsucking creatures which make your and our lives miserable. We do not need them! Period.
ViC Phoenix
December 31st, 2005 at 9:06 am
Wow, what a rant! But seriously, you need to get a clue, “pal”.
As a musician myself, I know you learned your trade by copying music and riffs from your favorite artists. We all copy and share. It’s basic human nature. Music, entertainment, information, they all demand to be free. Can you put a price tag on a songbird singing happly in the meadow, or the soft tinkling of a wind chime in a cool summer nights breeze? I think not.
The attitude of your post sums up exactly what is wrong with the music industry today. Money, money, money and more money. The music industry doesn’t care about the music, it’s all about the bottom line. It’s about how much profit they can wring out of the artists and consumers. It’s about how many times they can sell the same product over and over again.
Sure, you can sell shiny plastic disks to whoever will buy them and charge whatever price you think they will pay. But that’s not what they’re really buying is it? The basic tenet of a musician, artist, is to create and to share, to enrich the lives of those around him and to further the culture of mankind. Oft times the price of this is the artist’s own financial freedom. For assuredly music created for the love of music will be greater then music created for the love of money.
Music is not a tangible thing. It is fleeting and ethereal, even so, we have always possessed the capability to capture and preserve it in our memory. Good music has the power to make us laugh or bring a tear of sadness to our eye. It can evoke long lost feelings or transport us to faraway places. The very first time I hear a song and take it into my soul, even though you may be the author, it no longer belongs to you. The music becomes my personal experience, my memory. I am able to replay that song at will whenever, wherever. No law, no price tag, no copyright can ever take that away.
December 31st, 2005 at 4:09 pm
Here is a question for all you lawyers reading this:
Would I not be protected somewhat from some of the RIAA’s claims if I added a statement at the beginning of my shared files that states something like:
These files are for viewing purposes only They are to show you what I have in my collection. These files and this list are MY PROPERTY and SHALL NOT be copied , downloaded , written down , or shared in any way , in whole or in part , without express written permission from me THE OWNER.
Now I know this possibly may be written better but I was just wondering if anything like this would serve any useful purpose at all. I would think that the RIAA could not use what I have on my computer against me in court , unless of course I gave them permission to.
December 31st, 2005 at 5:08 pm
If it’s not normal for judges to grant ex parte orders, why are they doing it? Why don’t they notice that all these John Doe’s are unrelated, and not allow RIAA to file under one lawsuit?
Laziness? ignorance? I don’t get it.
December 31st, 2005 at 6:09 pm
- Uploading. Well maybe, but then we need proof of actual uploading. And if the only proof they have is that the RIAA uploaded from your machine, surely that’s entrapment?
Generally speaking, entrapment applies to a crime that was thought of, and setup by, the police. The accused would never have thought of committing the crime if the police hadn’t suggested it, or if the means to commit the crime had not been offered to the accused by the police. The 2nd part of entrapment is that the accused could not be otherwise predisposed to commit the crime involved, meaning the accused would probably never have committed this or a similar crime unless the police had got involved.
In this case, I highly doubt entrapment would apply, simply because the music being shared, accidently or not, was not supplied by police. The fact that they were sharing this music, means they were likely to commit this “crime” regardless of police involvment.
December 31st, 2005 at 8:18 pm
This will work only if you have a private server which requires login and password
in order to access the files, otherwise it would be like leaving a box of guns on a street with a note: “YOU CAN TAKE ONE ONLY IF YOU HAVE A PERMIT”.
No disclaimer will help you if you share copyrighted files on public networks where everyone has right to access the files by default.
ViC Phoenix
December 31st, 2005 at 9:20 pm
Your logic is worse than your English. When you download or upload a song, no one deprived you of your prescious work, so it’s not the same as stealing a CD from a store. The laws were written a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. Don’t talk about & write long stupid letters about what you don’t understand. Also, this a PRO-filesharing sight. Go spread your propaganda somewhere where the sheep’ll listen.
Please provide your band name, etc. so we know not to buy music from a fucking moron.
Fuck you, you idiot. Flaming is now complete. Oh, fuck you again. Happy New Years!
January 1st, 2006 at 6:36 am
Vic Phoenix I must say it’s good to have different points of view and I don’t feel the need to call you any names or criticize you for it.
But here are some things you should consider
1. When people say “I don’t want to pay for crappy low quality mp3s”, they’re generally talking about the 128 kilobits per second music files that you would get from services like iTunes or Napster. The reason people (or at least I) use file sharing instead, is because you can find files of a higher quality than what is available on iTunes or Napster. For example, at times you can even find 320 kilobits per second files on file sharing programs, or if your lucky even .WAV files, which are the exact the same quality as the tracks on a CD. People who are avid music listeners can tell a big difference in quality between a 128 kb/s file and a 192 and up kb/s file. And to be fair, the RealPlayer music store has 192 kb/s files, but a lot of people with keen ears still want the full 1411 kb/s of CD quality.
I also would like to note that if pay services offered CD-quality 1411 kb/s .WAV files, (this would probably be used only by broadband users, but anyway…) I would be more than happy to pay for most of my downloaded music. I’m sure I’d still download some on file sharing programs, I’m not going to lie to you and say I’m not a greedy bastard when it comes to music. I am pro-file sharing but I do think people should just admit that.
2. When you said you can’t get a free replacement toy at wal-mart or however it went, your forgetting that that’s the physical world. Do you honestly believe we shouldn’t embrace the advantage over physical that digital creates? If you rip a CD you own, keep the files on your computer, but end up breaking or losing the physical CD, by your logic that person would have to immediately delete the files, and go buy the CD again if they wanted to still have it. Why not just keep the jewel case or something if you want proof you own those songs? What you wrote on this subject made it sound like even if you have copies of the CD, if the original is broken you no longer have the right to have backups.
And something else, if toy companies or wal-mart could send you a toy through the internet digitally, it would cost them almost nothing, and they would certainly do it, it would be huge. The problem with physical is real machines or people are making each one and you can’t instantly copy objects/files in the physical world. If you could, labor costs would be almost nonexistant. Much like with digital music. My point is, you didn’t choose a very good metaphor for the situation.
3. This isn’t necessarily a response to you Vic Phoenix, but one great benefit of file sharing programs that I never hear anyone talk about is that you can obtain music from albums that are discontinued (example, Ozzy Osbourne’s “The Ultimate Sin”, a solid record discontinued by Sony/Epic). It’s not a lost sale to record companies, because they aren’t even selling the music anymore! The downloader and uploader both are not in the wrong when dealing with records that aren’t available for purchase. The only losers in this instance are eBay sellers, who sell discontinued albums for ridiculous prices. And, I’m sure it won’t be long, but the RIAA currently could care less about eBay.
4. Would you rather someone who can’t afford your cd:
a) never hear your music
b) hear it at all, even if it means for free
Just thought you deserved a more thought-out response than “get a real job” and things like that. I look forward to your reply.
p2pnet reader/up and coming musician Kevin A
January 2nd, 2006 at 3:33 am
Mr . Phoenix . I think you need to reread my question. I never said anything about you could have any at all. Where do you get that I said you can have one only if you have a permit. I relate my files as personal property just like a landowner does. Everyone can see it and everyone has access to it, but if he posts a sign and says , Looking permitted but NO TRESSPASSING ,(meaning) you may look at my beautiful property but you cannot touch it. You or anyone does not have the right to be on his land and NO RIGHT to take anything from it. Like the landowner I have posted that sign. The road to this property is public as is the road to my files, BUT once you reach the sigh you MUST STOP……………… RESCUE
January 2nd, 2006 at 10:38 pm
You don’t buy the physical object when you buy a CD, you pay for the entitlement to enjoy the music. A licence if you will.
If I lose my car insurance documents which I’ve already paid for, my insurance company send me them out again, at their expense, not mine.
Do you think the RIAA will do that with a lost or broken CD?
January 4th, 2006 at 8:26 am
Having another discussion about the perils of P2P via badly crafted metaphors seems all a bit pointless.
Won’t anyone attempt to answer the questions in the original article?