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Individual ReplayTV Users Pulled Into Lawsuit 28

Posted by Hemos from the pulling-them-in dept.
1010011010 writes "A moderator on the AVSForum website has been deposed in the lawsuit against SonicBLUE. He says, "Never forget that the internet is as huge as it is tiny. Your off-the-cuff remark on some website you don't even remember visiting may someday be presented to you on a sheet of paper with an exhibit number." He goes on, "Right now, the RIAA has shown that it is perfectly willing to sue individual users who are believed to be sharing copyrighted material over the internet. I believe that it is certainly possible that copyright holders may seek to make their point directly to the users of ReplayTV by suing those users who are believed to be using the Show Sharing in a manner that they believe infringes on their copyrights." And, "I present this scenario, along with my first comment, in order to make sure that people understand what could possibly be at stake in this case. I know it seems unfathomable that you could buy a consumer electronics device at Best Buy and then be sued for using all of its features. There was a time when I would have said "what would they do, sue everyone?" But now I realize that the answer is that they don't have to sue everyone. They just need to sue a few to make the point." This worries me, as I've written my own software client (I'll decline linking to it here, thanks) for the Replay, so that I can perform the digital equivalent of saving shows I like on VHS tape, just like the Boston Strangler. I wonder if I will be re-living the CueCat vague-legal-threat experience, except that this time it won't be so vague? Maybe this should be an Ask Slashdot -- "Where does the RIAA get off?" As jleavens, the moderator who was deposed, goes on to say, "Join the EFF or simply donate a few dollars (http://www.eff.org/perl/join)." I would like to add, "Do not support the RIAA and other greedy organizations actively working to screw you." Yeah, seems obvious. Do something about it. Don't just not buy their CDs. Do everything you can to let people know how awful they are. And, if they want to use the legal system -- well, that's a sword with two edges. How do we get the RIAA outlawed? I think it's come to, "What's bad for the RIAA is good for America.""
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Individual ReplayTV Users Pulled Into Lawsuit More

Individual ReplayTV Users Pulled Into Lawsuit

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  • where was he King of?

    Seriously though, for the benefit of us non-Americans and phobic IANALs, what the hell does 'deposed' mean in this context?

  • the whole debate reminds me of the scene in Risky Business where Tom Cruise the neophyte pimp is warned by the established pimp "not to mess with another man's livelihood":)

    Gangsta's all around, no honor among thieves, etc.

  • getting rid of the RIAA (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dbrutus ( 71639 ) on Monday February 17, 2003 @11:06AM (#5319177) Homepage
    The trick under US law to getting rid of an organization is to demonstrate that they are behaving inconsistent with their charter in some core way and should no longer exist. But the RIAA is just a group of groups so you wouldn't be doing much as they'd reorganize with the same personnel and slightly modified policies in a week. The trick would be to demonstrate that they are a criminal enterprise bent on abusing their govt. granted monopolies (copyrights) and have engaged in a criminal conspiracy through the umbrella organization RIAA to overly restrict the right to copy through intimidation and abuse of process.

    That would not only get the RIAA banned but would threaten the existance of the underlying distribution networks and land people in jail as criminal conspirators, ie radioactive for any other position of trust in corporate governance.

    The question remains are the intimidation tactics, abuse of P2P networks, SLAP suits, etc. evidence of hardball tactics or something more sinister?

    • They've had a pretty good run of it, but the RIAA's days are already numbered, they know it, and like a cougar with it's back to the wall, they are going to hiss, bite and scratch at every ridiculous thing they can to avoid their inevitable extinction. The funny part is that it doesn't matter if file sharing is legal or not, and it doesn't matter if they figure out how to make use of the internet or not because the the job they were chartered to do no longer exists.

      It occurs to me after seeing YET ANOTHER abslutely kick-ass song backing a Mitsubishi car commercial on TV last night ("Breathe", by Telepopmusik, I think) that Mitsubishi has done a better job of finding and selling new music to me than ANY of the RIAA labels.

      They are arrogant, they have phony-baloney jobs and they are already dead. We are just waiting for them to stop breathing so we can get on with the music.

      • Please look up the history of mohair and honeybee subsidies and how long the emergency tax on telecom lasted to pay for the Spanish-American war. Oh and by the way, what *did* happen to our helium reserve for our prospective military blimp fleet?

        Given enough legal pull, dead organizations/movements can survive for many decades. When they're firmly attached to the body politic, these ticks need to be forcibly removed. The real question is *which* strategy is best for removing them? Do we create a proxy fight and get major labels to pull out of bully boy tactics? Do we go the legal route? Do we create better, alternate distribution and steal their best talent away?

        Strategy is all up in the air right now. What won't work is doing nothing and waiting for them to die.
        • I'd like to see more publicity about the non-RIAA success stories like the album The Artist Formerly Known As The Artist Formerly Known As Prince released and marketed himself over the Internet. Doing his own distribution, he was able to make 95% profit. I don't know how accurate this story is, and of course, Prince has many years of success and noteriety behind him.

          Still, with organizations like MP3.com growing and the record companies constantly pushing themselves into irrelevance by hyping the same old boring crap (of course, it sells...) and tenaciously holding on to a 19th century distribution scheme, the demise of the RIAA is imminent. But unfortunately, as Disney has shown, they can buy their way into continued existence and monopoly.

  • The question (Score:5, Informative)

    by Nyarly ( 104096 ) <nyarlyNO@SPAMredfivellc.com> on Monday February 17, 2003 @11:32AM (#5319336) Homepage Journal
    The question shouldn't be "how do we get the RIAA outlawed?" Ultimately, the answer to that is to settle the legal issues finally so that some or all of the P2P, digital backup, personal control of data processing devices and digital storage issues are resolved in a way that makes sense for consumers (by which I mean actually makes sense for consumers, not makes sense in fantasy land.) And that involves, at the moment, having our interests valiantly defended by a small number of little known and unfocused charitable organizations (EFF, FSF, once in a month of Sundays the ACLU) (plus the inimitable Lawrence Lessig) from the ravages of a organization of some of the best financed, most motivated legal monopolies in the US. (And, the way things are looking, if you think I mean Americans by "our" think again.)

    The question should be, how can this become a public fight? Because, really, the government should be serving the public good - what the American citizens want is what ought to go, and the courts at least are pretty good at making that happen. But the RIAA's biggest asset is the apathy (or the uninformed agreement) of the populace in general. So, is this a point of academia above the head of Joe Sixpack, or is this something that's been skewed and discarded by the broadcast press for so long that JS no longer cares or understands?

  • RIAA? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by GeorgeH ( 5469 ) on Monday February 17, 2003 @11:51AM (#5319455) Homepage Journal
    I would have thought the MPAA would be more concerned with the ReplayTV. The RIAA is still upset that we can back up our CDs, I don't know why they're worried about what you're doing with TV shows they have no financial interest in. Why is the poster being sued by the RIAA? Does it make unlicensed copies of music too?

    • Re:RIAA? (Score:3, Informative)

      by MeanMF ( 631837 )
      Why is the poster being sued by the RIAA?

      The RIAA is not involved in this particular lawsuit [eff.org]. The plantiffs are Paramount/UPN, Disney/ABC, NBC, and Viacom/CBS. The article is comparing this new action against individual users to the ones brought in the past by the RIAA against music sharers.
    • The RIAA is still upset that we can back up our CDs,

      I rented a DVD movie recently, and noticed in the menu items a thing about registering the CD. So I read it. I noticed a blurb about either calling a number, or just popping the DVD into a computer, would put it on a web site to register. your perks for doing this was extra information about the movie or something, and to qualify you for a replacement CD should it get damaged. I think the RIAA is gearing up toward trying to ban personal backups completely, and use the fact that they will offer replacement CDs as a viable option for consumers. yeah right - try leaving your CDs around some elementary school age kids for a couple of days, and see how long they last!

  • - Write your own damn music.

    - Only buy music from people you personally know.

    This is not as difficult as it seems... [ampfea.org]

    You don't need 'recording artists' any more ...
    • I don't disagree with your points, but it needs to go beyond that -- the RIAA won't care at all if a few people (defined percentage-wise, those who read Slashdot are "few" compared to the RIAA's primary market) make their own music and only buy non-RIAA-supporting music.

      To make the RIAA pay attention, it's really necessary to get the Average Joes and Janes -- those who are quite familiar with Tower Records or Wherehouse but not very (or at all) familiar with the RIAA itself and who have no clue what Slashdot is -- to understand that they have Free music alternatives. (Actually, Free entertainment in general as well as Free software, since music isn't the only problem area.) Just sticking to non-commercial entertainment yourself is a drop in the ocean to the RIAA; it's the overall tide that will get their attention.

  • Individual ReplayTV Users NOT Pulled Into Lawsuit (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I have to read some stupid rambling just to get to this:

    I believe that it is certainly possible that copyright holders may seek to make their point directly to the users of ReplayTV by suing those users who are believed to be using the Show Sharing in a manner that they believe infringes on their copyrights.

    Just a stupid theory. The subject is false, there are no individuals pulled into this lawsuit. This story belongs on USENET, not Slashdot.

    • They probably could have used more specific terminology than 'pulled into this lawsuit' (which gives the idea that they're being sued to the casual reader), but this should have been front paged in my opinion. The real story here is that nobody can assume that they can relax and chat on the Internet without the risk of getting served with papers or an investigation (the K5 incident) if they don't carefully watch what they say. This is dangerous as hell to the free exchange of public information over the best tool we've got to do it, but the public good hasn't a leg to stand on against private interests.

      But a deposition, sucky as it is especially if you have to travel to give it, is still a far cry from being on the receiving end of the type of legal hurt the RIAA can deliver.

    • This story belongs on USENET, not Slashdot.

      I see you're new here.

  • RIAA not the problem (Score:2, Interesting)

    by soupdevil ( 587476 )
    The RIAA is a straw dummy set up to be the target of all our abuse, and to do all their dirty work, without damaging their precious brand names in the public consciousness.

    If they're going after individuals, I say we do the same thing. Sony, Death Row, Warner Bros., and all the other member companies have enormous resources invested in their trademarked names.

    I propose that every time the acronym RIAA is used on Slashdot, or elsewhere, we put the name of a member record company in parentheses following, as in RIAA (Maverick Records). Let's see how they like being singled out for the actions of many.

    Names of individual member organizations can be found at http://www.riaa.org/About-Members-1.cfm.
  • it looks as though this guy is not your average replay tv customer. I mean, he runs a ReplayTV FAQ website, participates in an show sharing website. I'd say they weren't going after "users".
  • ...when Hitler tried to make [only] Jews
    wear a yellow star... the king of the land
    I'm referring to got -everybody- to do that.

    Here, if -everybody- (especially those who
    decidely have NOT have downloaded someone's
    IP to their hardisk, in a way that would
    ever be actionalboe) wrote "I just downloaded X"
    big, in public online places...

    Think of all the bogus suits out there...

    And - hey! - think of all the countersuit
    potential here... ;-)

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