p2pnet - rss feed: RIAA and Top Cop in p2p case
p2p news / p2pnet: The RIAA has launched an anti-p2p file sharing lawsuit which, without exaggeration, threatens to take down the Net in the United States.
The case is Elektra v Barker, pending in Manhattan federal court before recently appointed Judge Kenneth Karas who is, by coincidence, a former federal prosecutor.
And because of its ramifications, it’s possibly the most important file sharing case not only in America, but also in the world,
On first blush, there’s nothing particularly different or unusual about it and in fact, it’s the standard text the RIAA has churned out for more than 18,000 similar cases.
And it’s not just because Tenise Barker, a young former social worker who lives in the Bronx, made a motion for dismissal - ie, she tried to stop the lawsuit on the grounds it would apply fully to ALL the RIAA’s cases.
As Ray Beckerman says on his Recording Industry vs The People blog, it’s because there are probably a dozen other cases pending in which the same motions have been made.
And that’s set loud alarm bells clanging in Hollywood and elsewhere.
The RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America), in its blind obsession with profit, has allowed greed to get in the way of intelligence, provoking a massive confrontation involving Hollywood and its MPAA, the American Association of Publishers and the George W. Bush administration in the shape of America’s self-described Top Cop, attorney general Alberto Gonzales, all of whom are lining up against not only Barker and all the other RIAA victims out there, but against the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the trade associations which represent most of the giants of the internet and computer industries, says Beckerman.
How did it come about?
Barker made a simple motion to dismiss the complaint, saying it didn’t give her adequate notice of the infringement she’s accused of.
In response, “the RIAA made its most shocking and outlandish arguments to date, claiming that merely having a ’shared files folder’ on one’s computer, and thereby ‘making files available for distribution’, is in and of itself a ‘distribution’ and a copyright infringement,” says Beckerman, ie, “even if the recordings were legally obtained, and even if no illegal copies were ever made of them, the defendant is still guilty of copyright infringement”.
The EFF, the Computer & Communications Industry Association and the US Internet Industry Association realized that if this “absurd argument” was accepted, the entire Net, “nothing more than a giant network of hyperlinks making files ‘available’,” might be forced offline in the US.
A win for the RIAA would have painful and significant repercussions for vested interests elsewhere in the world.
It was also abundantly clear that by herself, Tenise Barker doesn’t have the financial resources to protect the Net or to wage what would amount to a full scale, single-handed war against the rapacious corporate music industry, Recording Industry vs The People adds, so they were quick to file amicus curiae briefs pointing out to Judge Karas the absurdity of the RIAA’s arguments.
Shortly after, the MPAA filed an amicus brief supporting the RIAA’s argument, the American Association of Publishers requested permission to file a similar brief, and the United States Department of Justice wrote to the Court indicating the possibility of filing a “Statement of Interest”.
And all to collect about $6,000 from a young woman who’s now a nursing student and who lives in the Bronx?
Beckerman doesn’t think so.
=============================
Revision @ 7:17 am Pacific: This piece was originally, and incorrectly, headed ‘RIAA vs Hollywood in p2p case’. That’s the trouble with a one-man editorial team doing things in a hurry. I try hard to avoid mistakes, but they happen and sometimes, they’re embarrassingly dumb, as on this occasion. Sorry. Cheers! Jon.
Also See:
former social worker - DoJ interest in RIAA case, April 5, 2006
blog - On the Importance of Elektra v. Barker, April 18, 2006
April 18th, 2006 at 3:34 pm
This case could take down the internet?
I don’t think so.
This is such a stretch, I’m surprised the author didn’t pull a muscle.
April 18th, 2006 at 3:48 pm
think about it
April 18th, 2006 at 5:02 pm
Honestly - as much good that’s come from the internet aside, I’m tired of the mess our lives have become! We’re losing our rights daily as the RIAA/MPAA attempt to find some grand loophole to put the genie back in the bottle and all on a silver platter handed to them by our weak minded Governmental leaders who have a blatant interest in their pockets being lined over the well being our Global and local society.
Look. ISP’s, save us all the hassle - disconnect all your core lines and walk away from the internet.. While it’s the best means mankind has found yet to interconnect the globe it’s also the worlds greatest weakness given various leaders and companies that have dictatorial power over legislation will undermine everything our various countries have stood for and for that matter the very reason America was even created.
When a Gov’t becomes too self interested and disconnected from the will of the people we are called to stand up and overthrow them to put in place a new Gov’t that represents the will of the people.
Yes, I know those are words by a few American’s back before the internet and before the global society as we know it today existed - but it’s a calling to everyone that has ever heard those words. Being American isn’t about living in America - it’s about standing for freedom and justice! Somewhere that has been lost on our leaders here and our ideals are no longer represented.
We’ve been sorely misrepresented and you know what? Our children are changing the world. How? How many kids do you know that chat daily on the net - with people in dozens of different countries - without judging them for looking different or speaking different.. On the net, our kids are learning impartiality and equality among ALL men and women.. on the net the ideal that all women are created equal and that no one should be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character has become a reality. It’s hard to do in great moves in the real world but the net makes those changes happen.
What in the heck am I ranting about - first I say kill the net and then I show why it’s more important than any stupid (faked) trip to the moon or mars.. when you look at this little blue speck out in space - we’ve done a lot of things to be embarrassed about should God’s son come today - a lot of mistakes that have pulled us further apart as a global people and this global internet has been our best link into an informed, global society instead of our respective countries being closed off and the only knowledge we know about other countries being what our Gov’t and our history books tell us.
So go ahead - take away the internet. All in the name of helping society block movie and music shares. We’ve had a taste of information freedom - without dictatorial lines. Our various Governments will not be able to keep up with the changes people make to keep interconnected. From Undernet’s to private networks through the internet - people WILL remain connected.
We’re not going back to the stone ages just because our Government’s have no spine - but this really did make me wonder about something. There was a comment about ‘Daddy, where you when the internet died’ or something to that sentiment - if this we’re to really go through and be taken literally, effectively banning the internet and all it’s effective functions thereby killing companies being able to use ATM through the internet and ebusiness as a whole then as dependant as people and businesses have become on the use of the internet we’d see an instant flush down the toilet of our global economy.
But the internet isn’t that important right? It’s not ‘that’ big a deal, right? It’s just some stupid lawsuit about music and movies, right?
Something to realize - it’s NEVER ‘just’ about one thing and to say the ‘internet’ really talks about thousands of things - millions of things.. but don’t worry, go back to your normal happy life and forget all about this nasty stuff going on.. everything will be juuussst fine without you worrying about it, right?
Get off your butt and DO something. Contact your Congress-person. Contact your Governor. Contact the puppet President.
But if crap like this is permitted to get through - and you’ve done nothing - it’s YOUR fault, just as much as the morons writing the lawsuits and it’s on YOUR head.
Just my 10 cents.
_-Jile-_
April 18th, 2006 at 5:17 pm
It won’t work. Even if there is no internet, the government is still gonna be disconnected.
Remember the 1950s and McCarthyism?
April 18th, 2006 at 5:18 pm
That’s exactly what WORLD WIDE response should be. Let’s create a new root registry, lock out the Americans and let them try to profit from their walled garden ecommerce intranet.
Controlling the Web for profit is what they’re trying to do anyways, let’s help them along
April 18th, 2006 at 6:18 pm
You are a nut.
April 18th, 2006 at 6:20 pm
Yea, seriously. You need to just calm down dude and think before you type….
April 18th, 2006 at 6:36 pm
> the MPAA filed an amicus brief supporting the RIAA’s argument
I’m trying to figure out why this was titled “RIAA vs Hollywood”. . . ?
–
Ciro
April 18th, 2006 at 6:52 pm
The author of this article is out of his/her mind. There’s nothing in this case that will bring down the Internet at large. There will of course be consequences for sharing copyrighted material, but the Internet today is littered with cease-and-desist orders, etc., etc. This case isn’t about the Internet at large. While it does have ramifications, a decision either way won’t be the downfall of the Internet. Coming from a p2pnet.net site, I can’t expect unbiased reporting, but let’s be more realistic …
April 18th, 2006 at 7:41 pm
Yes, because we all know the internet is used for nothing but file sharing.
There’s more to it than just file sharing. What we certainly don’t need is someone regualting technology who doesn’t know what it is used for or what it is capable of.
April 18th, 2006 at 8:35 pm
The RIAA is a membership organization with the most influential members being In Germany, England, and Japan.
It ain’t America baby, its those multinational companies. They bought and paid for the DMCA, and now are using it to shakedown Americans.
April 18th, 2006 at 9:33 pm
and it ain’t even memebrs. the big four own all them all one way or another.
April 18th, 2006 at 10:32 pm
Story title is inaccurate. Original blog cited from RIvP states that MPAA is supporting RIAA in the case, not confronting them.
Overall, this story was very confusing and unsatisfactory to read, due to the contradiction between the title and contents.
Please correct title to lower the global FUD factor, as digg already lists this story as reviewed for being inaccurate.
April 19th, 2006 at 12:03 am
You Americans crack me up. Watching your legal system in action is much more entertaining than your movies.
April 19th, 2006 at 12:08 am
you can’t imagine life more than 5 minutes into the future.
Their argument is that “making available” is copyright infringment. If I put a hyperlink on my site, I am making the site it points to available to my visitors…which according to the RIAA is illegal.
Hey, nobody ever thought that ripping and burning a CD for your little sister would be a federal crime either.
April 19th, 2006 at 2:20 am
If Hitler had finished the job there wouldn’t be any RIAA/MPAA left.
April 19th, 2006 at 3:27 am
First the user may have a file in this directory that is allowed and actually asked to be shared? I am sure some of the artists would take that position because……
one day there could appear a list of all artists this RIAA group represents and some of our stupid music lovers will wake up and and not listen to their work in protest to their indirect support of these actions.
Most of these artists tunes even involve different levels of protest about various subjects of some unresonable control. How are they going to feel if noone shows up at their concerts because they are helping to fund this. Concerts in which they rap and moan about someone trying to control them. They need to rock in the direction of their own words and people need to blow them off if they support these hunts anymore.
Please someone that has the material make a list of these “artists”. We all know who allowed Sony to use their work to infect peoples computers, I for one threw out their cds since they supported this trash. I never heard of one of those artists slapping a lawsuit on Sony big time, did you?
Boycott the artists that let these idiots use their money to trash these lives of their own fans because they downloaded a song or ten.
April 19th, 2006 at 10:14 am
I’ve got something more significant:
Both came from a different area they later claimed to be responsible of,
the both industry associations made themselves to an alternative government and the little man from Austria made himself the leader of Germany. And if my English lacks correctness, it is because I’m from Germany. Das nur so am Rande.
April 19th, 2006 at 2:53 pm
This poster, and other people who’ve emailed me about this, are quite correct.
I’ve just posted this at the bottom of the story:
—Revision @ 7:17 am Pacific: This piece was originally, and incorrectly, headed ‘RIAA vs Hollywood in p2p case’. That’s the trouble with a one-man editorial team doing things in a hurry. I try hard to avoid mistakes, but they happen and sometimes, they’re embarrassingly dumb, as on this occasion. Sorry. Cheers! Jon.—
I’ve also posted a correction on Digg.
Cheers!
April 19th, 2006 at 4:58 pm
Considering the way this article is worded, I’m not surprised by your response.
The courts already recognize the difference between hyperlinks and hosting the actual files. If they didn’t, Google would’ve been sued out of existence a long time ago.
The article is oversimplifying what the RIAA is arguing. The RIAA is suggesting that anyone hosting digital copies of songs for which their member labels hold the recording copyright, should be considered just as guilty of copyright infringement as those people selling or giving away bootleg copies of their albums on street corners. That’s a far cry from “all hyperlinks are illegal!”
Don’t misunderstand, I don’t agree with what the RIAA is suggesting. All I’m saying is that if, by some miracle, the RIAA is able to convince the court to agree with them on this, it will not be as devastating to the internet as Beckerman suggests.
I think Beckerman is letting his little “pro-p2p fan club” go to his head.
Btw, can you name one case where someone was tried and convicted in federal court for ripping and burning a CD for a family member? If you can’t find one, it’s because it hasn’t happened. It’s not a crime. At worst it’s copyright infringement that is arguably allowed by Fair Use. The RIAA and the feds would never even try to go after someone for it.
Take a deep breath, clear your head…and try to think about the situation rationally.
Kudos on your passion for the cause, though.
April 19th, 2006 at 5:01 pm
I did think about it.
You should try it…and while you’re at it, check out my response to “I’m surprised…” above.
April 19th, 2006 at 8:45 pm
Hey, Nick ….
Go back to writing for the “raputable” sun :).
April 19th, 2006 at 8:46 pm
and, when you are done, read nick’s article in the “sun” about exploding people LOLOLOLOLLOLOLLOLL!!!
April 19th, 2006 at 8:49 pm
That’s the problem.
They DO know what the internet is capable of, and what it can be used for. It scares them shitless.
Thats why lawmakers follow the RIAA/MPAA company line, ( aside from the fact that they get paid good coin by those corporations ).
Closing off, Controlling, regulating, and moetizing the net for the benefit of wealth and government is what they want.
Filesharing and pron are the excuses used to achieve that goal.
The water is almost boiling now, and we still haven’t left the pot.
April 19th, 2006 at 9:24 pm
Write to the Department of Justice, and Alberto Gonzales, and express your take on the whole situation, plus tell them all about the RIAA.
April 19th, 2006 at 10:16 pm
Following the RIAA’s so-called ‘logic’ of the ‘making available’ scenario would imply that anyone leaving their travel case of music CDs on the front seat of their unlocked motor vehicle is liable for copyright infringement as anyone could come by with their laptop, rip the CDs and put them back, just as someone ‘wandering’ by could copy the contents of someone’s shared folder.
Many people are simply not aware of many of the nuances of computer networking whereby some or all of one or more of the disk drives on their machine can be exposed and the data copied from them. Sometimes it could be the result of a trojan inadvertantly downloaded, in some cases it could be surrepticiously installed spyware that a third party knows how to exploit. Sadly, it could be someone who simply could not understand the instructions of how to set up their router or the Windows firewall or some other component and inadvertantly left the barn door open for anyone who wanted to barge in.
Liability for copyright infringement should only extend what one does, not what one doesn’t do, fails to do, doesn’t know to do, doesn’t know how to do, or doesn’t know that it’s possible to do.
Until there are some kind of requirements are established for basic skills and knowledge before one is allowed to purchase a computer and connect it to the internet, true ignorance of technical matters should be permitted as a positive defense to alleged infringement. In other words, the plaintiff should not only have to prove the act of infringement occured, but there was actual intent to infringe as well.
–TurboGeek
April 20th, 2006 at 12:24 am
money talks and bullshit walks and according to the government and Arnold swarzenagger (how ever you spell that arogant a–holes name) everybody on the internet might as well just walk because money is the only thing they listen too!!!!!!
which I’ve said in the beginning everybody just thought I was ranting and raving now they are getting the truth aren’t you!!!!!
April 20th, 2006 at 12:33 am
Who the hell is Nick?
April 20th, 2006 at 12:35 am
What a constructive rebuttal. Thank you for an intelligent post that really made me rethink my position.
April 20th, 2006 at 2:11 am
youre forgiven
April 20th, 2006 at 11:33 am
“Btw, can you name one case where someone was tried and convicted in federal court for ripping and burning a CD for a family member? If you can’t find one, it’s because it hasn’t happened. It’s not a crime. At worst it’s copyright infringement that is arguably allowed by Fair Use. The RIAA and the feds would never even try to go after someone for it.”
Have you seen a DVD lately? They threatens you with legal advise that copying it is a federal crime with five year jail sentenses and a $250,000 fine. No responsible lawyer for the claim is named.
I personally think that what the dvds says is a wrong legal avise that comes from a non lawyer. Just like giving medical advise in public if you are not a medical doctor is wrong so should be wrong to give legal advise if you are not an identifiable lawyer.
When customers are threatened (with wrong legal advise in this case) they feel threatened. Worse, if tomorrow it is legislated to clarify that copying dvd’s for presonal use is legal, you will have millions of dvd’s in circulation that will in essense be giving threatening legal advise that is flat wrong.
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
April 20th, 2006 at 12:14 pm
“the plaintiff should not only have to prove the act of infringement occured, but there was actual intent to infringe as well.”
Problem: Actual intent can only be proven if the alleged infringer leaves a very clear signed document and the writer knew what infringement is.
Even if a person writes down “I infringed and knew what I was doing” it may not be a proper admission that he “knew” he was infringing, if the person later claims that he knew nothing abot copyright law. And who know anything about copyright law?
BTW, the American Copyright Act has a definitions section. The word “infringement” does not appear on it. See here: http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#101
My personal experience on a major copyright case tells me that even federal judges have no idea what the word means. Visit my site and you will be astounded by the judges decision regarding what is infringemnt. Hundreds of songs belonging to my family were stolen and copyright registered by two music publishers and the judge said there was no infringement of our rights.
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
Rafael Venegas
April 20th, 2006 at 3:39 pm
Please _-Jile-_, if you want to disconnect from the internet, do it already.
April 20th, 2006 at 9:08 pm
‘Making available’ could also include leaving a window/door open in our home while your music collection is not under lock and key.
And let’s not forget those evil doers at the library who do nothing but ‘making available’.
April 21st, 2006 at 8:32 pm
Copyright infringment isn’t illegal, it’s a subjective and civil matter. No matter how much the RIAA/MAA would have you believe that it’s criminal/illegal, thats why they are suing people instead of the state procecuting them in a criminal court.
They keep repeating false allegations.
April 21st, 2006 at 8:35 pm
Someone should counter sue for deflamation of character(being accused of commiting criminal acts).