Rapidshare Divulges Uploader Information 281
Gorgonzolanoid notes a post on TorrentFreak reporting that the German Rapidshare is divulging uploader information to rights holders. Record labels are apparently making creative use of "paragraph 101" of German copyright law, which gives them a streamlined process to ask a court to order disclosure of information such as an IP address. "In Germany, the file-hosting service Rapidshare has handed over the personal details of alleged copyright infringers to several major record labels. The information is used to pursue legal action against the Rapidshare users and at least one alleged uploader saw his house raided."
Why even use RapidShare anyways? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is what you get... (Score:4, Insightful)
Some basic rules to follow. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:3, Insightful)
How? By writing a letter to your local politician? Protesting? These actions do jack shit with regards to changing laws these days.
Corporations are winning the war against our rights. What else are we suppose to do about unjust laws?
The only alternative is to defy the laws. If enough people do so, then either the laws will be repealed, or there will be too many people breaking the law it'll be untenable to prosecute everyone.
Disclaimer: I'm a coward who only breaks laws I can get away with (eg. downloading stuff I shouldn't on torrent sites). I do it because the risk is low, at least for now. If the police actually went full-bore with dealing with downloaders, I'd stop immediately. I'm just talking about the ideal way to fight an unjust law.
Rapidshare.de, right? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:5, Insightful)
Why not just post next time with "My opinion is worthless, please ignore me>" since it's obvious that your "stance" is about as strong as a peice of wet paper.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:2, Insightful)
It's best to avoid illegal acts. If you don't like a law, work to change it.
The problem with these laws, is they are essentially criminalizing everything. Its not that easy to say "Well, you uploaded X, X is copyrighted", no, the laws have gone to such extremes that if there is simply background music, or someone is lip syncing a certain song, it can be taken down. This isn't just about uploading Hannah_Montana_Song.mp3.
How do we change them? The entirety of the internet has been protesting against the DMCA since day one, yet I don't see a movement to change it. Heck, there have been many, many, many, letters sent to congressmen, and they don't do anything. Its not easy to change a law when those supporting the laws have million dollar worth of lobbyists.
Support alternatives to infringing activities. I don't like the music industry any more than most people here, and I like to support independent artists in any way I can. I use Linux on all my desktops and servers because I (a) it works well for me, and (2) I don't enjoy feeding Microsoft more money.
Sure, the example of using Linux works because MS is basically dependent on piracy to entrench Windows users in poorer countries. But for independent artists it just doesn't work. What happens is RIAA sees a drop of 10% in CD sales, now, having a basic monopoly on CDs have made them not think logically. They see the 10% of CDs not just as 10% that has gone to non-RIAA labels, or has gone to purchasing other things that aren't music, but rather because CD sales have dropped 10% that must be piracy!!! So because they think that they manage to convince a blind congress to passing more RIAA friendly bills and increasing DRM.
Re:Non-German users? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, you distributed it to RapidShare. You "sent" it to them without permission of the rightsholder.
Re:This is what you get... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:This is what you get... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:4, Insightful)
So, to take 2 examples from more or less opposite ends of the spectrum, smoking weed at home or hiding Jews from the Nazis don't count as ethical disobedience? You can not agree with a law but not want to die/go to prison for it. Perhaps he has another term? Moral disobedience? Who cares what he calls it?
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, you'd be thrown off the jury for having a pre-conceived opinion, and rightly so. It is the duty of a jury to be completely neutral to either party, so that a fair decision can be made.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:2, Insightful)
My hairdresser can come up with a set of rules with just as much validity, as I don't see the sun shining out of Schuyt's or Gandhi's arses. As there is no objective standard, their opinions are just that: opinions. Mine, for what it's worth, is to just disobey the law, assuming whatever level of risk with which you're comfortable. Working to change it is good, but not mandatory.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's best to avoid illegal acts. If you don't like a law, work to change it.
The copyright laws are not going to get changed anytime soon. The media conglomerates just ahve way too much clout.
Civil disobedience is a tried and true way to oppose unfair laws. The fact that non-whites no longer have to go to the back of the bus is a testimony to that.
But note that it isn't civil disobedience unless you're willing to go to jail. Is anybody out there willing to go to jail for their "right" to download a copy of Terminator Salvation? No? Didn't think so.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:2, Insightful)
You might wanna, ya know, like listen to the case first.
Re:Why even use RapidShare anyways? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Truth in naming (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This is what you get... (Score:1, Insightful)
...when you distribute stolen goods. (Hey, if stealing cable is theft of service, stealing IP is too.)
Re:Wow.. House raided (Score:4, Insightful)
Gotta appreciate the lazy cowardly policemen that chose to raid a music pirate instead of dealing with serious violent/criminal offenders.
I don't approve of that kind of crap either, but you do realise that that is a false dichotomy, right?
Re:Wow.. House raided (Score:3, Insightful)
Gotta appreciate the lazy cowardly policemen that chose to raid a music pirate instead of dealing with serious violent/criminal offenders.
Oh come on--the police are just doing what they're told. There's some guy/gal way up the chain that made the decision to raid the pirate^H^H^H^H^H^Hcopyright infringer's premises.
I agree that it's a stupid use of resources, but don't put that on the folks that are at the bottom of the chain.
When I served in the military, if there was more work to be done, you don't go home. That is part of service. I fail to understand how the police go home after a shift of handing out speeding tickets when there is quite obviously a *lot* more to be done --- that is not what they have sworn to do when joining the force, nor is it what we should permit them to maintain.
I don't know about you, but I got into the military by signing a lengthy contract that essentially obligated me to do whatever the service deemed necessary, whether it was 12 hours of watch every day, marathon sessions to close out monthly maintenance jobs before the clock ran out, or death in combat.
I suspect the police don't sign on the dotted line for anywhere near that level of obligation. Keeping them there "until all the jobs are done" probably requires a declared state of emergency or something similar.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:5, Insightful)
Good job for Godwinning the discussion! :-)
Resistance during war-time occupation is a different ball game from civil disobedience (although see Gandhi). The purpose of resistance (including hiding jews and other persons) is not to force the Nazi regime to change, it is to kick them out and limit their effectiveness.
[although, *IF* a lot of people (esp. Germans) would have stood up and openly challenged the Nazi regime, for example by refusing to serve in the army and by refusing to co-operate in the Jew laws, things might have ended differently...]
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:3, Insightful)
If enough people do so, then either the laws will be repealed, or there will be too many people breaking the law it'll be untenable to prosecute everyone.
Or the third option which is what they do right now with many laws. They prosecute a handful of people, making extreme examples of them, giving them fines and penalties so large that their life is basically destroyed.
Saves having to arrest everyone and helps to force the majority to cower in fear of the unjust laws.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:5, Insightful)
What rights? The sacrosanct right to wipe my ass with how an author asks that I handle his work? Or the right to bitch about how awful music/movies/games are today, all the while massively consuming whatever the RIAA/MPAA-children spit my way?
;)) "fuck all y'all, I'm writing my own OS". Most (yes, some do walk the walk, but most? Not at all) digital "rebels" of today would have settled for cracking and pirating, instead of creating, and we wouldn't have gotten the GNU-led FOSS community that not only serves as realistic alternative to commercial computing solutions, but also are an important counterweight that at the least, helps keep commercial vendors on their toes, and at the most, slowly makes the light dawn on them: You can profit without enslaving users! What a novel concept.
How about actually creating new works and sharing them with the community, how about supporting content creators in tune with your ideas regarding copyright, how about laying the foundations for a freer community by actually creating content people are free to take and share, with no strings attached?
Richard Stallman decided contractual and copyright-related restrictions were threatening his community. So he said (may not be an exact quote
If instead of whining about the "right" to take (sorry, "share") that which the creator/rights owner has placed restrictions on, people actually created new content, the world would be a far richer place than if copyright were simply done away with. But it isn't going to happen. Because downloading "Wolverine" while feeling you're striking a blow for freedom beats actually doing so.
I love free culture. Sometimes for practical reasons (OpenOffice is better than MS Office, in my opinion), sometimes for financial reasons (I have no beef with MS operating systems, but Linux gives me a comparable experience for zero money), sometimes for political reasons (I try not to buy DRM-restricted content). But going from that stance to "everything is free because I decree it" is just infuriating. I like copyright. I like the notion that if I create something, I get to decide the terms for its distribution.
Contribute something to the cultural enrichment of the community. Modern copyright law just means that "they" can keep tight controls on the content "they" own. So let's stop favoring their offerings, if the terms are disagreeable. Let's make sure there's a sufficiently large and appealing body of free works so as to make them as obsolete as sympathizers of poohooping (trying really hard not to use the word "piracy", in order to avoid the mandatory "surely you mean 'copyright infringement', as 'piracy' means high-seas pillaging" retorts) say their business model is.
Re:Truth in naming (Score:2, Insightful)
There is some relatively new order in place that the prosecution doesn't get active for minor incidents anymore. ( There were just too many cases over the last years that it meant too much work for the courts, like a few hundred thousand open cases ... )
Well, downloading a few songs alone might look like a minor issue to the prosection, so they refuse to get active there. But p2p traffic also usually means that you are also uploading. And uploading means that you are spreading that copyrighted material. So if the music labels prove that you were uploading, it's probably much easier to argue, that the damage wasn't minor but big enough for the prosecution to get active and force the provider to give them their customer data, even if it's only about a few songs.
That's the whole reason, I think.
Not copyright, but invasive law. (Score:2, Insightful)
What matters is not whether or not copyright should be abolished or fundamentally altered because of the digital revolution: it probably should.
What matters is the streamlined procedure to obtain ip addresses, as specified in German law. What we should ask ourselves is whether or not these laws are just, constitutional and proportional. We should ask ourselves whether we want to hand out such broad authorizations, turning private entities into 'law enforcement' agencies.
Piracy, copyright and "intellectual property" were vehicles to get these laws passed, if the vehicles disappear, the law remains, as does the drive towards totalitarianism. New vehicles will emerge, new totalitarian laws will get passed.
Re:This is what you get... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why even use RapidShare anyways? (Score:4, Insightful)
Apparently they lend enough credibility for a judge to okay your home being raided.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:4, Insightful)
And your alternative? Oh yeah, we're back to protesting and working to change laws which has done absolutely no good whatsoever since the 60s. So what's your point? You don't seem to have one to have one.
Re:Wow.. House raided (Score:3, Insightful)
This is the geek's all-purpose defense to a charge of white collar crime.
But the police can multi-task.
Re:Truth in naming (Score:2, Insightful)
But p2p traffic also usually means that you are also uploading.
I'm not sure if you're referencing Rapidshare as as P2P, but it's pretty much the polar opposite.
People generally only download when using rapidshare, as 'leeching' has significantly less negative affects on the community than it does in a bit-torrent community.
Accidental copying? (Score:5, Insightful)
How about actually creating new works and sharing them with the community
If I did, I could get sued for accidental plagiarism. It happened to George Harrison.
Richard Stallman decided contractual and copyright-related restrictions were threatening his community. So he said (may not be an exact quote ;)) "fuck all y'all, I'm writing my own OS".
To establish that copying has occurred, the copyright owner must demonstrate both 1. the alleged infringer's access to the copyrighted work and 2. the substantial similarity of the works in question. It's easy to shield yourself from access to proprietary software: don't read non-free source code. But music differs markedly from computer programs in this respect. Once you've heard a song on the radio or as background music in a grocery store, you are deemed for the rest of your life to have had "access" to that song.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:5, Insightful)
Why not just post next time with "My opinion is worthless, please ignore me>" since it's obvious that your "stance" is about as strong as a peice of wet paper.
I imagine he's like most of us who download illegal stuff. It's a law that is socially and to some extent morally acceptable to break with very little risk. Hence we do it, to get free stuff. The sad state of the record and movie industry leaves any 'guilt' long gone.
But if consequences and risk increases, of course people are gonna stop. I think people who try to pretty up downloading illegal stuff as a politically 'stance' against it are really just trying to validate to themselves a nobler reason when really, we just want free shit.
~Jarik
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's see how this plays out for some copyright protester. He sets up a laptop outside MPAA headquarters, downloads that Wolverine pre-release (never mind how he gets an internet connection), and plays it for everyone around. Most likely outcome is he's ignored, of course, but let's assume he's not. The MPAA calls the cops. The cops arrest him, under a criminal copyright infringement statute. It's page 3 news, at best. The guy disappears into the system, maybe rating a Slashdot article at conviction and sentencing, maybe even an AP brief. He's in Federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison for a few years. Few know about it. Fewer care. Nothing changes.
So why are these rules considered the only "ethical" way to do it? Perhaps it is precisely because they are ineffective: those who support the status quo are seizing the high ground by declaring that in order to object "ethically", one must also object ineffectively. Why, as an opponent of that status quo, should I or anyone else accept their definitions of "ethical"?
Re:Truth in naming (Score:2, Insightful)
How is it that books are put in libraries yet somehow music and movie makers seem to think that their product (which is spat out in weeks or a few months) is somehow better than that of authors that spend years creating the books that many of the movies are based on. I will personally not purchase any of their products until they stop these tactics. They act like the SS.
Re:This is what you get... (Score:4, Insightful)
... when you are posting protected works.
I know artists who use Rapidshare to post their own music to download, and they love it. But why should Rapidshare protect you if you are posting their other albums, etc, that they don't want to be given away for free.
Why should they protect you before they uphold the laws of their land?
Re:Why even use RapidShare anyways? (Score:4, Insightful)
IP addresses are not nor will ever be valid evidence in a court of law.
A bold statement. Time and again it has been proven that judges don't know jack about the inner workings of the internet and believe all too readily that something "is hard fact" if some "expert witness" (paid by the side with deeper pockets) says so.
Yes, it's anything but a proof. But that doesn't mean it can't be used as such.
Re:Some basic rules to follow. (Score:3, Insightful)
In a "free market"--that is a market where the laws of copyright are the same for everyone, then there should be a clear demand for stuff thats not "rubbish" and "crap" that a company could exploit for some profit. If the current prices are so out of whack and internet distribution is so free then low prices should lead to high volume and large margins. So what is everyone waiting for?
Oh thats right. They are all sitting at their desk with a computer that their mother brought them with an internet connection they didn't pay for downloading music and movies that they claim is "rubbish".
Password-protect the stuff (Score:3, Insightful)
Just RAR and password-protect the uploads then. And give the archives non-obvious names. You'll be safe. In theory, the passwords can be bruteforced, but they have better things to do. Like hunting down people who upload in "the clear" so to speak.
Re:Truth in naming (Score:2, Insightful)
How about..i dunno... obeying the law? (Score:2, Insightful)
how about people just don't routinely ignore the law?
oops, forgot that apparently if slashdot readers find the law inconvenient, then they just ignore it.
The law exists to protect copyright holders and businesses. If you want to share music with the world, go buy a guitar and write your own.