RIAA Loses DMCA Subpoena Case Against Charter 372
BrynM writes "According to an opinion published today (PDF), the RIAA has lost its case against Charter Communications regarding subpoenas for the cable ISP's users to be identified for copyright infringement in the Eastern District of Missouri. You may remember that Charter Communications filed a motion to block the RIAA's subpoena back in late 2003. Now Charter has prevailed. Here's the blurb from the Court 'Civil case - Digital Millennium Copyright Act. District court erred in issuing subpoenas on internet providers to obtain personal information about the providers' subscribers who were alleged to be transmitting copyrighted works via the internet through peer-to-peer programs; the internet providers' function was limited to acting as a conduit for the allegedly copyrighted material, and Section 512(h) of the Act does not authorize subpoenas in such circumstances; case remanded with directions. Dissent by Judge Murphy. [PUBLISHED] [Bye, Author, with Murphy and Bright, Circuit Judges]'"
So what? (Score:1, Insightful)
Score one for the good guys (Score:4, Insightful)
Stick it to the man!
Alright! (Score:3, Insightful)
Finally (Score:3, Insightful)
what's next? (Score:5, Insightful)
If it can, then it's not really news at all, is it?
Regardless of the outcome, kudos to Charter for realizing that they, and their users, actually have rights.
Judges Rule! (Score:2, Insightful)
What gets me, though, is that he cited the DCMA on why they CAN'T subpoena.
Power (Score:5, Insightful)
Freedom (Score:2, Insightful)
Why? The Judicial branch is mostly the only form of government that is not corrupted. They don't take bribes like Senators and the Executive branches do. This allows them to speak sense without restriction. This is a rare example of how the United States is supposed to function; it is a little glimpse into our great paste. Savor in this moment people, for it is rare.
Time and effort (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm sure this trend could have very easily gone the other way.
Three Words... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Alright! (Score:5, Insightful)
The fourth safe harbor, under section 512(d), protects an ISP when it merely links users to online locations containing infringing material.
So, under the DMCA, ISPs are immune from being sued for linking to copyrighted material. IANAL, but with the recent bittorrent suits, it would seem that this would help. It also seems that if an ISP runs a tracker or a torrent website, they can't be sued under the DMCA...interesting, very interesting.
Re:Enemies List (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Freedom (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:what's next? (Score:4, Insightful)
They lost the battle... (Score:3, Insightful)
I have no hope for any sort of just or fair resolution to this situation.
Well, that and filesharing -is- wrong, IMO. But that isn't really the issue...To me this is more an issue of the inescapable march towards total corporate rule.
Re:Judges Rule! (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, duh! The DMCA (and all of the Copyright Act for that matter) are just like the U.S. Constitution, they grant limited rights and powers. If a power is not explicitly granted by the statute, it is not available. Obviously, you must look to the DMCA to see if the DMCA grants the right to subpoena common carriers.
Re:voluntary cooperation (Score:5, Insightful)
In addition, once an ISP gets a reputation for cooperating against their customers, it will lose far more customers than just the 'hogs'.
What about the ANT technology (Score:3, Insightful)
This method, however, does slow the rate at which files are obtained. But for a lot of users, the extra security is worth the extra couple of hours.
Re:Enemies List (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The subscribers are screwed anyway (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Score one for the good guys (Score:2, Insightful)
It ain't the rights they care about, it's your cash.
Re:voluntary cooperation (Score:4, Insightful)
Hellooooo.... ISPs sell bandwidth. DSL costs more than dialup. A T3 costs more than DSL. Don't take my word for it - check with your ISP. It's actually true.
You might as well say that a gas station owner would do well to ban trucks and SUVs becuase they're fuel hogs.
Re:Score one for the good guys (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:They lost the battle... (Score:5, Insightful)
You have bought into their marketing bullshit my friend, filesharing cannot be "wrong", as it is simply the technology that allows people all over the world to share files between each other.
Now if you are talking about copyright infringement, that is a whole different ballgame. Please do not confuse the two.
This is more complex.... (Score:3, Insightful)
I've little time for the RIAA and they way that they function, but the others who signed on represent a number of creative people that I work with. I am still troubled by the amount of copyright infringement that goes on in the world.
It's one thing when you are getting material, it's another altogether when your material is used without permission. On one occasion, I had a school ask if they could make 500 copies of one chapter in a book I wrote for distributiuon to their students. They had no desire, or intent, to compensate me for my work.
The artists are the ones who get screwed in this- they deserve just compensation for their work and should be given such. When you can't pay the bills with your craft, you change to another craft. How many decent artists does that deny us the pleasure of seeing or hearing?
It's always about the money, but in the case of a number of industries, it's about keeping the money coming in for those who did the work. I've paid a bar tab with a royalty check- and I needed the drink. How many of us will pay the tab for artists?
Re:what's next? (Score:4, Insightful)
Now, say Comcast is seen as ratting out their customers to the [MP|RI]AA, and suddenly those users decide downloading those files isn't worth the risk anymore, and by the by, they no longer need broadband. Big impact on Comcast.
That's not to say this isn't a good thing for them to do, but it isn't out of the kindness of their hearts. They did the math.
Re:Alright! (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, your right... the constitution nor the bill of rights don't say anything about the right to pirate music, movies and software.
However, this *IS* a win for public rights. Look at it this way, I can effectively turn your IP address into a real name and address just by sending a legal threat to your ISP. All I have to do to be able to do this is hold a copyright I think you might have infringed.
Would you want basically anyone in the world to be able to turn your IP address into your real name and address? That's what this case is about, not the morality of copyright infringement.
Although, I will argue that point since that seems to be what you want.
Well, since you brought up the constitution... one thing it does say, is that copyright is to last *17* years. Currently, if my memory serves me right, copyright lasts for the lifetime of the author, plus 100 years.
Mickey Mouse won't become public domain until at least 2066. He was created in *1928*! Disney has profitted off him for 77 years, and still has another 61 to go, unless they buy another extension law from our government, and you can safely bet the farm that they will.
The public domain, is the *PEOPLES* main benefit to copyright law. It has been stolen from us by these copyright extensions.
Anything copyrighted you read, watch, or see today, will *NEVER* become public domain, in your lifetime. Not here in the US, or any other country that has signed any of the many worldwide copyright treaties.
Now, ask yourself, is *NON-COMMERCIAL* copyright infringement that much worse then stealing the public domain out from under us?
I won't argue the commercial infringers... I support going after them, and that was how our copyright law was intended to be used back when it was written.
We used to have something called fair use. This would allow you to use copyrighted works in non-commercial ways and not be punished.
Ever record something from the radio, or the television? That's fair use.
Ever make a backup copy of your $999.99 software install disc or rare first run only played twice Elvis album, to protect it from damage or loss? That's fair use.
Have you ever copied a cd to a tape, to listen to it somewhere where you didn't have a cd player? Or, converted a cd you own to mp3 to listen to it on the device of your choice? That's fair use.
Have you ever photocopied sections of a book from the library to use for research? That's fair use.
Thanks to the DMCA, there is now a way to close all those legal loopholes too. Just encrypt the data somehow, and breaking, or even talking about that encryption is a violation.
This has already been done with Audio/Software CD's, DVD's, radio(satellite) and Television (Broadcast Flag). The only example left above that you could legally do if the media companies don't want you to in 2066 is copy a book. Let's hope e-books never replace the real thing.
Now, is non-commercial copyright infringement morally worse then stealing the rights of the public domain, AND fair use from the entire American (and damn near the whole world's) people?
Interesting copyright factoid: The song "Happy Birthday" is copyrighted. This is why resturants don't sing it. They have to pay royalties to do so. You are a copyright infringer every time you sing it in a public place and money is directly, or indirectly involved, you dirty pirate.
Re:voluntary cooperation (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree with the guy who said that most broadband subscribers are folks who check their email daily and won't want to wait for cnn.com to load. It has also gotten to the price point where dial up over a dedicated phone line doesn't make economic sense. From personal experiences, a lot of people just don't want the mess of a second phone line, connect times and having to "dial in."
Re:Enemies List (Score:2, Insightful)
What part of may not be recorded without the express written consent of Major League Baseball is hard to understand?!
Re:Score one freedom. Score zero DMCA. (Score:1, Insightful)
It's cheaper than a trial.
Re:U.S. Constitution: Fourth Amendment (Score:3, Insightful)
no, but it sure does mean that they can't go on "fishing expeditions", demanding the records of 20 people looking for that one in twenty that did commit a crime.
Giving in has a future cost (Score:3, Insightful)
No, it doesn't... (Score:4, Insightful)
1) Nowhere in the parent was it stated or implied that this was the case.
2) Nowhere in the Plantiff's complaint did they really, really meet the criteria of identifying a specific infringer (Required by law, both for Copyright and for the obviously Unconstitutional DMCA...)- ergo, a very probable instance of where the DMCA's provisions are at odds with the Fourth Ammendment. If they don't have anything on you specifically, they can't go on a fishing expidition- which is what the RIAA was on.
an analogy (Score:3, Insightful)
A private courier company, FedUPS, carries packages all across the country. It has come to the point where, say, 75% of its packages contain illegal narcotics. Drugs have been identified as harmful to people, and it is a legitimate interest of the government to stop the flow of drugs. Is it not reasonable to require FedUPS to provide the addresses of those packages intercepted and known to contain drugs?
of course, in this RIAA case, it is a civil matter, and this story is about how the DCMA explicity protects ISPs from being targeted for traffic they cannot control. Plus, reasonable people are disagreeing over how illegal/unethical it is to copy pirated music. But the structure of the problem is similar, right? If we decide to make copying copyrighted music illegal and we declare it is a problem, what are we going to do about the conduits of that illegal traffic?
perhaps it's a signal to lawmakers that we have two very different competing interests both attempting to use the laws to advance their ends...
Yes and no... (Score:3, Insightful)
You can't have an action held against you unless they have good reasoning to do so, they can have sanctions handed down to them if they do attempt it without backing, and you can countersue the Hell out of them for trying.
It may protect the ISP, but it makes it pure Hell for them to get at you because they can't identify you specifically. Now, I'm not one that does the fileswapping BS, but I have a BIG problem with the way they're all going about this shite.
I actually don't have an issue with that... (Score:3, Insightful)
RE: flat rate vs. sales by units (Score:3, Insightful)
The whole "MP3 music player" fad is certainly driving up orders for DSL and cable Inet connections. (And let's be frank here... How many of those people are really just buying it so they can quickly download their legally purchased music from places like the iTunes music store? More likely, it's a *combination* of buying some things, and getting the rest from p2p networks.)
The same can be said for movie downloads, too. The MPAA may scream and rant about it - but folks like the ability to download a "preview copy" of a new movie release, before shelling out the $8.50 or more for a movie ticket to see it in the theater. This ability is worth just enough so people might say "Yeah, I'll pay the extra $10-15 per month for a faster connection so I can get them.", but NOT worth enough for folks to pay some sort of subscription fee on top of the ISP bandwidth fee to do it.
Re:Score one for the good guys (Score:2, Insightful)
There is no way in hell telecoms will be pushed-around by tiny chickenshits such as the music industry
One has to keep things in perspective. Given their size, the music industry has to be one of the biggest pretentious things around...
Re:what's next? (Score:2, Insightful)
You said it: they're just saying (in a metaphorical kind of way) 'we don't negotiate with terrorists'.
momentum (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:The subscribers are screwed anyway (Score:4, Insightful)
It doesn't matter that if they were not on the list that Charter supplied, becasue the RIAA can't check if they were or not without violating the ruling!
Re:So what? (Score:4, Insightful)
Anyway, a sibling post before mine claimed that copyright violation isn't criminal, and as others said, that's false. However, the RIAA cannot bring a criminal charge. They can ask the government to bring one, but then the government prosecutors will run the case their own way.
I think it likely that the RIAA doesn't want the risks associated with a trial they can't control or settle.
Re:Freedom (Score:1, Insightful)
Perhaps coincidentally, note the recent crusade of the bush administration to demonize "activist judges" and their "out of control" system, and to limit liability of megacorporations via "tort reform"....
Re:U.S. Constitution: Fourth Amendment (Score:2, Insightful)
The fourth amendment doesn't grant individuals the right to commit crimes anonymously.
Since when does any portion of the United States Constitution "grant" any right of any kind?
Re:but keep up on the bad guys (Score:3, Insightful)