The news these days is filled with stories of stealing by the RIAA.

What else can you call people being forced to give money to the RIAA through the use of threats?

While I like the irony implied, of the music industry's hypocrisy in accusing file-sharers of stealing when they, in fact, are stealing themselves, I think the two ideas of intellectual property stealing do not mesh quite so easily. The file-sharing theft usually committed is one of profit-deprivation; users download and share for personal enjoyment, depriving the industry of sales money. The theft committed by artists, publishers, recording studios, authors, and the like in unauthorized use of other's works in their own, as much as it may be argued to be a form of innovation, aims to boost one's own profits. This difference, while alleviating some of the irony of the situation, does not paint the industry in any better of a light...

And the other: Takes one to know one. I mean, come on, these people would sell their own mothers (or at least it seems) to make themselves a dollar. They steal outright from musicians, in the form of low royalties or in the form of music copyrights. They steal outright from consumers, in the form of exorbitant prices for albums that are mediocre at best. (And this makes the thing above seem all the more curious.) They steal from the distributors, in the form of very low margin on CD sales. So...this whole thing isn't that surprising to me, or anyone I hope, it's just business as usual.

For example, you can't prosecute someone just for producing "Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life."

We need tighter legislation NOW!

Congratulations RIAA keep up the good work, I hope you proceed to the next level which is taking the elderly out into the middle of a street for a public stoning from unsellable cds.

Perhaps putting children to work in your cd factories might teach them that each song they steal is worth not the 1 cent it's pressed on, but thousands of dollars.

Between the RIAA and SCO, plus ongoing Microsoft FUD, I think we're starting to see the fraying edge of a maturing "Internet Economy", and some companies are clinging to really ancient buisness models that will not work in this era.

The RIAA member companies failed to get together to innovate a new buisness model when the InterNet came along, and transferred this problem to the RIAA, which became their personal pitbull. Everyone's blaming the RIAA for this latest round of should-be-RICO-prosecuted behaviour by this company, but let's not forget at the same time the recording industry labels support these chuckleheads - where's the boycott against the labels?

SCO is *really* the leading edge of "my buisness model failed" along with Microsoft - the pair of them are like the old IBM of the 90's, except instead of the hardware buisness, they're in the software buisness. Remember PS/2's, proprietary hardware, and IBM almost incredulously holding on to a market that was churning out clone PC's by the millions?

SCO & Microsoft are like this - dinosaurs in the software industry that think you can still lock a customer in with a proprietary product and control their innovation path. Take a fresh look @ Microsoft as the IBM of the new millenium and it starts to become clear - Microsoft is nothing more than a proprietary product with a lot of market share trying to protect that marketshare with intimidation and borderline legal tactics.

There's another two boycotts we should tell the Anti-Trust folks about in California & New York enforcing the decree on Microsoft anti-trust actions. Tell them the TCPA and security certificate scheme Microsoft is developing along with LongHorn represent another way Microsoft is trying to deny people access into their code - that "trusted code" argument is reeking all across it.

And could someone please expose how much the US Government spent this year on inferior Microsoft product? I'd like to know how much insecure RPC crap my Congress-critters managed to purchase this year...

"In a sense, Internet technology is a metaphor for the new morality. As long as you can get it, it doesn't matter how."

I don't get it.

via http://www.unix-girl.com/mt/mt-comments.cgi?entry_ id=1130 Comment by insin http://ds.dial.pipex.com/thumbs_aloft/ffi/ffi1.htm To summarize it: - Filesharing is copyright infringement at best, which is a civil offence ("at best" meaning, if you forget about fair use and stuff like that) - Stealing is a crime The above link contains some rude words, but is to the point.

The EFF petition is a move in the right direction, but does it really make a difference? What is it that keeps the RIAA going? It's the fact that people still buy music from its members. Why do people buy this music? Because they want to listen to it. Because there is a demand.

Breaking the law is bad. But so is working to take away our rights. The RIAA is an organization which exists to work for record labels, in order to maximize profit. It is basically an organization which works for the industry, against the customer (or "consumer" which we are today).

Perhaps it is time to take matters into our own hands and really strike them where it hurts the most. If they don't make any money, they can't afford lawsuits and lobbying to take away our rights as individuals and as customers. They cannot spread lies about P2P and other useful technologies.

If as many people as possible spread music for free as much as possible, fewer would buy music. That's right, we are fighting this fight by breaking the law. We are trying to force the RIAA out of business.

A normal argument from RIAA apologists is that it is "morally wrong" to "steal music". I would say that the only morally right thing to do is to fight for one's rights! And this fight must be taken on a number of levels. From nice petitions that most likely will not make a difference, to breaking the law. Standing by and accepting that one's rights are taken away is a true sign of a "morally challenged" individual!

With several angles of attack, maybe the RIAA will eventually disappear.

RIAA should realize that tor many people, this is war. And wars are dirty. But it would benefit everyone except the RIAA members if it died, including the artists!

Would it be a good thing to form an organization with a single purpose - distribute as much as possible for free to prevent money from ending up in RIAA members' hands? The RIAA is already spreading lies and deception, so we don't really have much to lose do we?

Hey, the humour piece on the RIAA detention centers was pretty funny, but its really not that far from the truth. For over a decade and a half now the US government has been setting up and maintaining fully operational detention centers all throughout america.

There were estimates a few years ago that the capacity was over two million. Part of me doesn't want to know what their capacity is currently.

The camps were set up as a part of operation Rex84 (search [google.com]) in the 80s, established on the reasoning that if a mass exodus of illegal aliens crossed the Mexican/US border, they would be quickly rounded up and detained in detention centers by FEMA.

Now that the Patriot Act and Patriot Act II move to establish anyone that breaks any law as a potential terrorist, it makes you wonder what they've got planned...

There's a lot of info on the net about these and other operations. A lot of the websites play the 'paranoid' card a little too strongly (*cough* alex jones*cough*), but I highly recommended you check out available info!

Some links:

http://www.apfn.org/apfn/camps.htm [apfn.org]
http://www.abovetopsecret.com/pages/camps.html [abovetopsecret.com]
http://www.mindcontrolforums.com/concentration.htm [mindcontrolforums.com]
http://www.c0balt.com/egg/insane.shtml [c0balt.com]

I'm not trolling, this is some serious shit, America!

...courtesy of google: not above stealing themselves [nytimes.com] musicians [nytimes.com] internet [nytimes.com]

Please, submitters - take a few seconds to look up these links - it'll save those of us who block cookies and/or are always on public computers and so loathe having to reregister for every single story (for whoever remembers their password for throw-away accounts?) quite a bit of time.

I'd never, ever downloaded music nor accepted a copy of a CD from a friend until the RIAA started issuing the subpoenas.Two wrongs don't make a right, but sometimes the second wrong (the RIAA actions) piss off the honest folks so much that they side with the original lawbreakers.

I wonder if anyone else, like me, has been driven to a life of crime - or at least a life of acts of civil disobedience - by the RIAA goons?

• opening its massive detention facility in the high desert of Movaje, CA

That is on US soil & human rights would eventually be enforced. They should have learned from the US government and located the facility in Cuba, I gather that there is some spare space in Camp X-Ray.

Well, that would have been one way of improving the story!

In general, the conversation about P2P misses the constitutional point entirely. Forget about the filesharer's rights and think only in terms of the author's rights. This is purely a conflict between author's rights.

There is music out there which the author wants shared. There is music out there which the author doesn't care if it's shared. There is some music out there which the author wants protected by copyright. The problem is that it is impossible to tell which music is which.

The filesharer is simply a hapless bystander who is caught-up in a legal quagmire. If the filesharers assume the work is protected by copyright then they are infringing the author's right to speak and be heard by willing listeners. If they assume the work is an act of free speech then they might be infringing the author's limited commercial copyright.

The question, then, is this: Ought the filesharer assume the work is a constitutionally protected act of free speech, or ought the filesharer assume the work is protected by an obscure federal statute giving limited commercial protection from copying?

If they are happy to download the music to see if it belongs to them, consider the mistake if it did not.
If someone has a name similar to that of their artist (or not), records some copyright material to mp3 and then puts it on the network. The condition is it is free for anyone to download, except the major record labels, their employees, agents, contractors or affiliates. By virtue of their copyright laws, they are not allowed to download it (aka steal it) and are subject to $1500 or $150,000 fine if they do.

All we need to do then is monitor the downloads of this mp3, and then sue the RIAA when they download it. If there is more than 216 of us doing this, then we can easily outweigh their laws and settle this similar to how the large companies settle patent lawsuits, you lower your weapons and we lower ours.

From the article: "Somehow everybody seems to be making out," she said. "I don't see any poor rock stars. I don't see any poor designers."

From the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Everyone was rich and nobody wass poor. At least, no one very important

How does this idiot woman think she would ever hear of the poor (ie, failed) rock stars? In this month's "No Longer Rolling Stone"?

TWW

is that with all the sanctimonious condemnation of file sharers as thieves, so far no one has dwelt opon the truly egregious thievery going on by the RIAA. That is, that they stole and continue to steal CONGRESS from the American people. (Not to mention the executive and judiciary, I mean come on people, Dubya? Scalia? Thomas? Ashcroft? Rumsfeld?)

They effectively take you and me out of the loop and expect us to have any respect for the laws they pass? Check your local copy of the Declaration of Independence for a take on what a "Good American"'s reaction is supposed to be to that.

Ms. Frank, the MTV executive, noted the limitations of unlimited customization, even amid unlimited access. For young Americans, she said, "because of the way they've trained themselves to use media, they never have to be exposed to an idea, an artist, or anything that they did not select for themselves."

I call BULLSHIT! Obvious this person is either lying straight out, misquoted, or an complete asshat if she works at MTV and doesn't understand what is going on. First, I'm willing to bet that kids (just like me) do research to find artists they like: especially the trend setters. Those that don't spend the time finding the good stuff are the sheep: they follow the trend setters. Thus, peer influences are going to be the biggest factor - and yes, MTV tries very, very hard to pass itself off as a peer, or at least showing "peers" watching and listening to the crap they play on MTV.

Thirdly (and most importantly), what the f8sck is wrong with people listening to the artists they choose themselves? The quote is implying that the kids aren't listening to what we told them to! "Whaaa! How can we use marketing to control people that make their own decisions!?" This is a great example the NYTimes doing what it does best. Here is an example of something really positive - people chosing what they like - and the Times spins it like it is some sort of terrible limitation. Unless the Times has replaced The Onion [theonion.com]...

People have already pointed out the one interesting paragraph in the article (i.e., the music exec stealing a Forrester report). The article should have stopped there. I despise this kind of "culture analysis" article that aims to shed light on those rascally inscrutable teenagers. It reminds me of Better Off Dead [imdb.com], where the father reads a book called "How to Talk to Teenagers" and tries out slang but screws it up, e.g., "Right off!"

Here some great lines from the NYT article:

use your pirated e-mail program to send tidbits to your hundred closest friends. Uh, what? Who the hell pirates an email program?

If this is the democracy of the copy, it is enough to make one long for the elitism of creative genius. This is annoying in oh so many ways. OF COURSE people copy what artists create. It's normal behavior. In fact, it's normal for artists to copy other artists too. I'm really getting fed up with this idea that "creative genius" pops out of nowhere and isn't itself somehow a copy or a derivative.

"The New York Times writes that record industry executives who are adamant that file sharing is stealing are not above stealing themselves."

You mean like artificially keeping CD prices high by using your power as a monopoly to steal more money from people who like music? I'd say the record industry has been stealing from all of us for many, many years. I will not shed a tear about their tiny loss of profit that is probably more due to their inability to put out good music and alienating their customers than file "sharing".

Ms. Frank, the MTV executive, noted the limitations of unlimited customization, even amid unlimited access. For young Americans, she said, "because of the way they've trained themselves to use media, they never have to be exposed to an idea, an artist, or anything that they did not select for themselves."

Yes, because people that d/l music and such live in a cave and never come out. Thy must make their own food and clothes too, because they are never exposed to an idea they did not select. I can't walk outside my house without being exposed to ideas I did not select. My neighbor's clothes, billboards, branding on food at the store...I am forced to look at these things just to survive. I don't really want to at times...

I think she should have said "They haven't been exposed enough to our ideas, our select artists, or all our other marketing campaigns because they feel they have freedom of choice."