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Norwegian Student Ordered to Pay for Hyperlinks to Music 580
Stephan writes "The AP reports that Norway's Supreme Court ruled Thursday that a student whose Napster.no homepage (no relation to the U.S. Napster, apparently) had links to free Internet music files must compensate the music industry. The around 170 links to mp3s will cost its creator $15,900. In a summary of its ruling, the supreme court said the music was clearly published in violation of copyright law. An unofficial English translation of the Court of Appeal decision (earlier in the case) provided by the lawyer of the defendant and more information on the case can be found at the Links &
Law Website."
*Bang* (Score:5, Insightful)
In Norway at least.
Re:*Bang* (Score:5, Informative)
The torrent sites have a very slim chance of pleading ignorance the same way that any community message board or service can plead ignorance to what's being posted. Of course, the **AA will come back and say that they need to make a reasonable effort to make sure copyrighted material isn't posted.
Re:*Bang* (Score:4, Insightful)
However; when there's infringing content constantly on the front page of the tracking site and asking almost any user why they're going there leads to the obvious answer, I don't know which court isn't going to make the leap of logic.
It's all well and good to cut things down into semantics, but when every man and his dog on the net knows a particular torrent tracking site as 'the source' for infringing content, it's a little hard to believe that the person(s) spending their money, designing and running the site aren't just as aware. Courts are smarter than many seem to think; and little schemes like this may sound great for getting out of legal hassles on the 'net, but when it comes to that silent courtroom where dozens of people are intently listening on every semantic of what is said, I don't think it has much of a hope of holding up.
Re:*Bang* (Score:4, Insightful)
Example...
Lets say a friend asked me where to find some crack and I tell him to check the corner of 4th Avenue and Jefferson Street. How would I be charged in this case? Should I be charged? How about if I have absolutely no ties to the person/area I send the person?
Is telling a person where to obtain something illegal in itself illegal?
Likely this guy knew exactly what he was linking to and if illegal, he should be punished, but I would like to think it wouldn't be nearly as bad as the people actually hosting the illegal content. From what I've seen, the fines this guy faces exceed those mentioned in other settlements to the RIAA (yes, I realize these are settlements not fines).
Re:*Bang* (Score:4, Insightful)
Hasn't it connected yet? Haven't you guys figured it out? Copyright isn't being considered the same as most other things. Look at the decisions that have been made. Decisions such as this get made, and somebody uses an analogy as to why it shouldn't agree, they get modded, people are merry, but that doesn't change the simple facts: This is the decision for this region, for now it is law, and an analogy won't change that. It is what it is.
If you'd wanted a killer analogy, you should have used the old 'Gee, if I find some links to illegal stuff on Google then they'd get nailed'.
And there's the problem: The Slashdot crowd seems to think that these courts and legislators are not only stupid, but have to be tied to a stupid set of rules. Make an analogy that paints it in a different light and it's all better; but if you think that they have to think in terms of these broad analogies e.g. 'Oh gee, it's only a link, people have links everywhere, therefore this site can't be specifically geared towards directing people to illegal content'. These people know perfectly well 'what is going on' and who to target, and making an analogy that may have some merit for people they aren't targetting isn't going to achieve anything. When making decisions such as these they don't have to reflect on the universe of possibilities of what may happen with ludicrous interpretations of it, because in the end they're simply going after the people categorising and making a service that points to infringing content.
At exactly what stage are you people going to realise that they know what the popular methods are for getting illegal content, and that they're not going to be fooled by a legitimate file here and there that 'some guy on the net' thinks will make a person with a lifetime of experience an utter moron and not realise it?
And the 'anti-copyright rights movement' wonders why decisions keep being made against their cause with laughable arguments that seem based on the idea that every person in the RIAA, MPAA, any court, etc. doesn't know how to turn on a computer. People constantly scream about how 'copying isn't stealing' and these computer and Internet processes are unique and are misunderstood and not realistically covered under conventional laws: Well guess what guys, this is why all of your analogies aren't worth they time spent typing them out, because the other side realises this also, and hence why these decisions for modern-day technologies are different when put in a traditional environment. You're getting something you asked for and something you didn't; and that something you didn't is the understanding that the courts and the legislators aren't as computer illiterate as you once imagined and they are creating decisions that wrap around a new environment for copyright protection.
Re:*Bang* (Score:5, Interesting)
I am not sure what movement you refer to, but the one I consider myself being a part of has completely different motivation. We do believe that there is no such thing as "intellectual property" not on legal grounds but on moral and phillosophical ones. In other words, the "Intellectual Property" "laws" are nothing but a conspiracy by a cabal of crooks and idiots aimed to entrich themselves at the expense of the entire human race. Thus the analogies you mentioned are only used to illustrate utter ridiculousness of the entire idea of "intellectual property", and by extension any "laws" drafted to protect the insane thing. This technique, to demonstrate idiocy masquarading as wisdom by wrapping itself in semi-plausible complexity, is ancient and has even a latin name originating from ancient Rome, it is called "reductio ad absurdum".
People constantly scream about how 'copying isn't stealing' and these computer and Internet processes are unique and are misunderstood and not realistically covered under conventional laws: Well guess what guys, this is why all of your analogies aren't worth they time spent typing them out, because the other side realises this also, and hence why these decisions for modern-day technologies are different when put in a traditional environment.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Not only we do not claim that Internet is "unique" and "misunderstood" but we claim the exact opposite: that the concepts of "property" and "stealing" are ancient and immutable, being the very foundation of our branch of human civilizations, and thus are not subject of being mutated and transformed at a whim of a current crew of greed-worshippers just because they happen to use new technology to get rich. While we claim that one can only steal physical property, it is they who claim that the concept of stealing is a quaint little old thing and needs to be "updated" to include puffs of electrons and sequences of integer numbers. The fact that these decisions go against us have far more to do with victories of corporate globalization and establishment of permanent strata of corporate masters and overlords, whose "laws" superceed those "obsolete" ideals like freedom of thought and commerce.
Re:*Bang* (Score:3, Insightful)
But this:
In other words, the "Intellectual Property" "laws" are nothing but a conspiracy by a cabal of crooks and idiots aimed to entrich themselves at the expense of the entire human race.
is nonsense.
And your further conclusions are nonsense as well.
Material property, what is that? A car, a house, a real estate? So if you own real estate, and you grow crops on it? Who owns the crops? You! Right?
If under the earth on your
Re:*Bang* (Score:4, Insightful)
Let's see.
Material property, what is that? A car, a house, a real estate? So if you own real estate, and you grow crops on it? Who owns the crops? You! Right? If under the earth on your real estate is ore, or oil, and you dig it out, who owns it? You! Right? If you take mud from your ground and form a statuett who owns it? You! Right?
Right. All of these are examples of property, since they have the following characteristics: they are physical objects that can occupy only one unique location in space and can be used by a person or group of persons ("the owners") who would lose the use of the said items if someone were to take them to another physical location i.e. "commit theft" (this of course does not apply to land unless you are in possession of a planet moving device).
And now the quantum leap: if you write a story .... who owns it? At roman times, where you reffer to, no one owned it. Everybody could "use" it and "make it to money". With the result that the "inventor" rarely made any money and barely could make a living.
This is a crucial piece of evidence here indicating that you have lost all perspective and are totally in the clutches of greed-worshippers. The actual truth is that the inventors did make fortunes if they were good at making fortunes from their inventions, but more importantly, most of them invented not because they wanted to get rich but because they were people who wanted to invent things from an intrinsic need to discover and improve things. This is the fallacy of the corporatist arguments. A worshipper of greed can only understand people as long as they are motivated exclusively by money. Money is a factor in people's lives but very few of us would go into science or art for the money and still could call themselves "scientists" or "artists". The argument you are making applies only to corporations, whereby the actual inventors who do it for the love for inventing are employees and the owner of the invention is the corporation. Corporations are indeed motivated exclusively by money.
This ludicrous argument of greed is of course is far more acute in the area of arts. I am sure Plato wrote out of greed. Shakespeare did it because he wanted to own a theatre chain. Mozart was composing out of love of gold. Etc. In fact, no artist does it for money. The definition of art is a search of way of expression of internal state of mind of an artist so that he/she can communicate it to other people. Money is a distantly remote factor, only useful as far as granting the artist tools for expression. That is why music and film "industries" aren't. An idea of an art "industry" is a perversion akin to having a "ministry of love". And just like Orwell predicted, terms such as "music industry" and "intellectual property" are made to obscure the truth and tilt the discussion towards the greed mongers by framing the issue in their terms.
Intellectual property makes a person who has nothing but his mind equal to any other person who has property, be it money, land or resources. Its NOT AGAINST humanity to have intellectual property laws. Its a basic human right that my ideas are MINE, that my work is MINE. If we had no laws, the people with the money had EVERYTHING. With no money you can't compete with them.
This is absolutely untrue. If it were so, no progress could have occured. The primodial caveman would demand that the idea of a "wheel" is his and his inhereitants until the end of time. An idea of a language. Alphabet. Numbers. All of these were brought to the world by people who were furthering the human race. If they were anything like you and yelled "Mine! Its all fucking Mine! Yeaa! Gimme! Gimme!" we would still be using stone tools to hunt. Furthermore, none of the ideas we have lives in vacuum. In order to learn we need the language (someone's property according to you), written symbols to read (someones else's property), numbers, formulas, physical discoverie
Re:*Bang* (Score:3, Informative)
Re:*Bang* (Score:4, Interesting)
But this case was in Norway, so that's not really relevant.
Re:*Bang* (Score:3, Interesting)
You stand all day on the street corner and direct people to different locations for different people and locations depending on the drug or illegal item they want to buy.
At least take the analogy all the way through. In your example it would be as if somebody e-mailed a link to a friend to get the content rather than publishing a list of links all to infringed content.
Re:*Bang* (Score:2)
Anyway it isn't the same thing. They link to a torrent, which is a harmless ~10kb piece of data. What the user does with the torrent is none of the web-site owner's business, and if the data is fed through the right programs the programs can connect to another site which can give links to where it may be downloaded. But the torrent sites aren't linking to the actual files.
Re:*Bang* (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:*Bang* (Score:4, Interesting)
If it's infringement for one, it's infringement for all. If so, commercial law triumphs basic freedom to speak. The commerce-based society Poul and Kornbluth's "The Space Merchants" has finally come to pass, where CC -- Commercial Crime --becomes the most heinous, unspeakable thing an individual can commit.
The answer is No (Score:3, Informative)
Re:*Bang* (Score:3, Insightful)
It's all great that that's the way you think it should be, but the point is that these decisions are occuring now. Somehow I don't thin
Re:*Bang* (Score:3, Insightful)
Amusing. Do you honestly view it that way? A torrent has one purpose, and one purpose alone: getting the file(s) associated with it. What, are you going to print it out and put it on your wall?
What you said is like claiming "Oh, I just purchased and installed a bulk emailing tool, and bought a list of a million emails, but I had absolutely no intent to send spam... you see, this tool and the email list aren't themselves spam, they're j
He only gave LINKS (Score:5, Insightful)
He only provided the links and didn't host any of the files? What a sad day for freedom on the net. Soon it will be a crime to link to bittorrent or eMule's respective homepages.
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:2)
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:2, Insightful)
What is sad about it? Before the net came along, purposefully going out and helping people do things that were wrong or against the law was considered to be a bad thing to do.
I see this as completely orthogonal to any issues of freedom on the net.
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:5, Insightful)
Point to a song, get nailed. Steal billions, go free, and you get to choose a new governor who's yer best bud.
The law is an ass. Little smurfs get destroyed for disobeying laws bought by rich men, and rich men steal billions without consequence. The trouble with stupid, mean little laws is that people lose respect for the institution after observing such service for the wealthy and torture for the small.
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:4, Insightful)
You do? Where?
prosecution nearly nonexistent
Come again? [chron.com]
the governor who opposed Enron ousted from office by the White House and replaced with an Enron supporter selected by the White House
Do you have proof that this replacement is related to Enron, or is this just causation without correlation?
Steal billions, go free, and you get to choose a new governor who's yer best bud.
Which of those that stole billions are "going free"? They are either already sentences, awaiting sentencing, or awaiting their trial. Trials take time, especially in humongously complex cases like this one.
The law is an ass. Little smurfs get destroyed for disobeying laws bought by rich men, and rich men steal billions without consequence.
I find it humorous that you are comparing US law, which is prosecuting the Enron hustlers you are referring to, with Norway's law, which is doing the "smurf destroying."
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:3, Informative)
For US law on this, you should look at the cases of Braun vs Soldier of Fortune and Eimann vs Soldier of Fortune. In both cases SoF magazine ran an ad for a hired killer (as they apparently tend to
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:4, Informative)
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think this will hold up in the long run - because it seems like all these lower court rulings are stupidly attacking the very fabric of the internet itself - instead of focussing on the real
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:3, Informative)
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:3, Informative)
I guess it shows that its only illegal if you don't have lots of money and lawyers. So no, the US courts have only shown that Money = Justice once again, at least when it comes to free speech.
Technology Aside, A Crook is a Crook (Score:4, Insightful)
He linked to illegally copied files. That means he told people where the illegal files were and enabled them to acquire them.
Except for the technology, this is equivalent to knowing where stolen property is being sold, directing traffic to it, and helping people carry away their new purchases.
The problem isn't the technology or the Internet of the freedom to use it. It is the wilingness of a lot of people to break the law.
Re:Technology Aside, A Crook is a Crook (Score:3, Insightful)
"helping people carry it away" is just imaginative fiction; might as well say "help them carry it away, kill the owner, desecrate the remains, then make soup from the carcas", 'cause if you are going to fabricate a strawman, might as well *really* fabricate.
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:3, Interesting)
You know, my first reflex when reading this story was the Slashdot mob mentality: "He was only linking!"
But after reading the replies to this post, I had a change of heart. To steal one of the badly-construdted, not-really-applicable real-life analogies from this story, let's say I was pointing people to a computer store selling illegal MP3's. Telling one person isn't illegal, but realistically neither is giving a friend a link to an MP3 file. Putting up a billboard, or a large website with a search eng
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:2, Funny)
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:3, Insightful)
*Links* to external content.
That's like someone who says "Hey, I hear you can pick up hookers on 8 mile!" being arrested for aiding prostitution.
Re:He only gave LINKS (Score:3, Insightful)
He didn't steal anything, he just pointed out where other people are infringing copyright. The music industry should get their fine in the form of information on how to get a photocopy of $15,900.
Break the law, face the charges. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:2)
Here's the problem as I see it. For the most part we mere citizens have no rights at all as far as copyrighted material goes. Protection schemes are making it impossible for me to exercise my right to make archival copies. Bittorrent services are being brought down, even though they're the best damn way to distribute large files like Linux ISOs. Now you can't even have a link to music? Explain where exctly my rights are
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:3, Informative)
The court found that the uploaders of the MP3s were effectively making an unauthorized performance. The guy publishing the links knew that the original upload was illegal. He thought, "it's nice that they are 'performing' via the Internet - I'll try to get them a bigger audience by making more people know about the 'performance'." He w
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:5, Insightful)
You would have a valid point if this guy had actually been hosting the content, but he was only LINKING to it. The idea that someone can be held responsible for the contents of pages that he links to can, if adopted by other countries outside of Norway, destroy the very nature of the World Wide Web.
The Web is, at its core, a mesh of interlinked pages. Pages that you control link to pages that you do not control. What if I linked to an innocuous site that was later hijacked and used to host kiddy porn? Should I be arrested? Am I to be held responsible for a site I have no control over changing its content just because I linked to it?
This decision has enormous implications for the future of the Web in Norway, and all of those implications are bad.
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:2)
CC.
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:4, Insightful)
Metallica - Enter Sandman [link.to] (note: not a real link)
Now, if the links were, say:
My friend Jeff's music collection [link.to] (note: not a real link)
You know, its kind of funny... a lot of people, on threads like this, seem to be of the impression that there should be some magical "get-out-of-trouble-free" card in the legal system that lets you encourage the spread of copyrighted material at will. While I strongly disagree with current copyright law, the notion that the legal system is going to do anything to accomodate you in that goal by providing you with a reliable way that you can do so without consequences is just laughable.
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:2)
How about $170? Let's be reasonable here.
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:3, Insightful)
Can't have it both ways. Copyright relies on preventing the free exchange of information.
In this case the guy didn't even make content available, he just told people where they can find it.
The solution to DRM is not to buy any product that includes it.
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:2)
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:5, Insightful)
Why?
Let's say I don't give a shit how much money the RIAA makes, and in fact do not generally support them or their artists because I consider music from independent sources to be superior.
However, I do demand that I have the right to not face legal repercussions for something I type, and I do expect as a customer that if I buy a piece of audio equipment I am not restrained from exercising my fair use rights with it.
I don't see any way to "work with" the RIAA in this situation??
The RIAA has demonstrated they certainly aren't willingly going to compromise in terms of giving up some control over the exact nature of distribution in order to take advantage of new technology; I don't see why I should "compromise" rights I've had since birth so a music cartel whose products I mostly don't like can feel better about themselves. Saying "they have their rights" does not justify that they are using the scapegoat of digital music distribution to lay claim to new and unjust new rights, and you are apologizing for them.
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:2)
Sweet! Keep it up, they can't stop you from doing that.
I agree 100%. Linking to a fre
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd like to see an effective peer to peer system that uses a donation-weighed upload/download ratio. I.e., the ratio of how much data you have to upload to how much data you have to download is set at something like (TheirContribution + X)/(YourContribution + X), where X is an amount designed so that freeloaders can download as well at a reduced rate, to encourage those not even willing to cough up a few buck
Re:Break the law, face the charges. (Score:3, Interesting)
So, this means that we should allow them to search our persons, papers and computers without any hindrance, because we're guilty until proven innocent (private entrepreneurs do not have the money to establish their own equitable justice, so they will do it as expeditiously as possible).
Let them start respecting OUR fair-use rights; respect is a
Erm? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Erm? (Score:3, Interesting)
Your right. However in this case he is providing the links. Just as telling someone where to buy drugs, illigal firewarms, slaves etc will get you in trouble so will telling people where to get warez, MP3s and DiVX rips of DVDs.
Re:Erm? (Score:2, Insightful)
Am I arrested yet?
Re:Erm? (Score:2)
Now this http://www.ebay.com/ [ebay.com] is a link.
Disclaimer: If you live in Norway, close your eyes and forget you saw this post.
It is a sad day when people can be ordered to pay damages for merely having a link.
Guess it isn't just the USA with unfair laws.
I think your base premise is wrong (Score:2)
One Expensive Song (Score:5, Interesting)
That's one expensive song. Almost makes iTunes seem worthwhile.
Re:One Expensive Song (Score:2)
Uhoh.... (Score:5, Insightful)
And surely search engines do this?
Re:Uhoh.... (Score:2)
To be fair (Score:5, Funny)
Insanity (Score:5, Insightful)
How have I committed a crime?
Re:Insanity (Score:4, Interesting)
An analogy is intended to clarify the situation. What you've done is created a overcomplicated contrived situation as an attempt to prove an assumed argument.
An analogy - in general - can't be used to prove anything because it is by it's nature a metaphor. i.e. a different situation.
He linked to the files knowing they were illegal, and in doing so provided a mechanism for others to download them. He was facilitating copyright infringement. A link is more than just a line of text. It is a functional component of the internet.
Re:Insanity (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Insanity (Score:2)
Re:Insanity (Score:2)
Now from that question, it is reasonable to assume I am looking for a prostitute, (I could just be looking for a legal escort but...) but has the bartender done anything wrong if he points to Sally in the corner?
Besides if I do a search on Google, have they done anything illegal? Just use the search phrase "norway mp3 file" and see several that are questionable if the site owner has permission to redistribute.
Re:Insanity (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
apparantly he doesn't watch... (Score:5, Interesting)
Last night's episode on The Disney Channel, showed how our hero Kim resisted peer pressure to download music without paying for it.
Kim told her new friend that she "wasn't afraid, she just knew the difference between right and wrong".
Way to go Disney! Being pro-active and teaching our children to repect the RIAA.
Re:apparantly he doesn't watch... (Score:5, Funny)
I didn't see it. Anyone have a torrent of it?
Re:apparantly he doesn't watch... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:apparantly he doesn't watch... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:apparantly he doesn't watch... (Score:4, Insightful)
You must be new to this "Disney Channel" thing.
Not very coincidentally at all, an episode of "The Proud Family" a while back which actually made the downloading of music a plot point. The upshot of it was, "Downloading music is bad, mmmmmkay?"
Slashdotters and Slashdotettes, they're engaging in meme warfare. First they got the laws of questionable morality made by buying the legislators, and now they're trying to get around the immorality by changing childrens' morals (spokescharacters, showing inflated consequences of breaking their manufactured mores, etc.).
I've heard about propaganda that "kids smell bullshit," but how many geniuses did you know from grade school? Expect some of them to fall for it. And if enough of them do, the rules changes come that much closer to wide acceptance.
My neighbor... (Score:5, Funny)
Can we fine him for copyright infringement or have him put away for a while? Pretty please??
Re:My neighbor... (Score:2, Funny)
If you're in norway.
On the internet != Free (Score:2)
Apparently, the music files were not free at all, but simply posted on the Internet, which is completely different from a legal point of view.
what about the mp3 providers (Score:3, Insightful)
An unofficial... (Score:2, Funny)
In other news, linksandlaw.com sued by the Clerk of the Norwegian Supreme Court for $1,337,455 dollars in translastion fees and $45,570,534 in court transcription fees following Slashdot effect.
I'd link to that other news, but I can't afford to.
Am I reading this right? (Score:3, Informative)
According to the Copyright Act Section 54, subsection two, anyone acting in contribution of other persons' copyright infringement like illegal publication, could be liable for punishment. The criminal offence Bruvik has contributed to would be the public performance of the files uploaded by others. In the view of the Court, the actus reus of uploading files was terminated when the music itself was made accessible. The criminal offence, as such, was thereby terminated the moment the music was published on the Internet. The actus reus is not formulated as a static delict. The Court of Appeal cannot see that the uploader, after publication of the music on the Internet, is committing a new criminal offence. The Court finds it hard to say that the music is performed publicly anew each time a transfer is conducted by persons who knew the address or clicked on a link on another site and they initiate the transfer of the files from the site of the uploader and download to their own computers.
When the main action is terminated before Bruvik published his links to the music files, one lacks the necessary causal link between his actions and the main action. The actions of Bruvik cannot be regarded as contribution to such acts.
Bruvik did, however, contribute, by publishing his links, to playing or copying the music files from the uploader's web page to his own computer. But this must be regarded as contribution to the action of the downloader. Such downloads for private use is not illegal, and cannot justify a claim for damages according to the requirements in the Copyright Act Section 55.
Does the say that Downloading of Copyrighted Material is perfectly legal but Uploading is not? Continuing on the case, wouldn't this also make Google liable for linking to sites that host illegal MP3s?
Re:Am I reading this right? (Score:3, Interesting)
i don't think so. google is a general search - even if sites with illegal mp3s come up, it's not deliberate, with "malicious" intent. by having a linked page for specifically for music, i don't think there's much debate on what the intent of the page was.
a bad analogy, perhaps, but if a guy publishes a list of contacts for pedophiles to identify families with children, i think thats' a crime. ge
Yes, you're reading it right. (Score:3, Informative)
So far, downloading illegally uploaded music files is legal in Norway. The appeals court tried to make the argument that the crime of making the files available had been committed and was over after the files were uploaded, thus he could not be an accessory to the crime. I guess they hadn't heard about the term "Accessory after the fact".
Norwegian law (Score:4, Informative)
- It's legal to aquire publically avaiable copies og music, paintings etc. (IIRC not software) for personal use. This makes downloading music from any site (or network) legal. However this law is probably going to change so that the source must be legal, (as in copyright holder agrees to publication (like radio or TV.))
- It's legal to copy music from family and _close_ friends. Thus uploading to a P2P network is illegal.
- It's also legal to reverse engineer legally aquired software, alter its contents, and learn from your findings.
Some of these things may change (INFOSOC??) and som things may already have change so anyone with any updated information are welcome to correct me.
Who defines "close?" (Score:2)
This is just begging to be abused. How "close" is close enough? Did we have to go to school together? My coworkers? The customer I see once a year? Someone I just met in a bar? The random stranger who also happened to have an IPod in the park?
This is why the American Bill of Rights is a Good Idea. You don't realize just how important it is until something this brain-numbingly stupid reminds you.
Double dipping? (Score:2)
On one hand, it would seem odd that the source of the files are off the hook. On the other hand, it would seem unfair that the industry could double dip and get more than it lost.
Re:Double dipping? (Score:2)
Awarding more than has been lost is nothing new. It used in cases for willfull commision of a crime and to discourage others from commiting the offence.
Re:Double dipping? (Score:2)
Usually when there is a loss with co-conspirators charged, they all jointly and severally have to pay the damages. My question was what will happen if the student pays it all, then charges are brought against the other perpetrator
His name and mirror to old site... (Score:3, Informative)
The Napster.no site provided links to music files in the MP3 format that could be downloaded for free. The site was online between August and November 2001, and provided links to about 170 free music files on servers outside Norway, the ruling said.
They only catch the dumb ones (Score:3, Insightful)
Do what you will with your music, and if it's blatantly or borderline illegal then shut up about it. You'll be fine.
Re:They only catch the dumb ones (Score:3, Insightful)
He didn't mention in passing that places had mp3s like, "Hey, they
Re:They only catch the dumb ones (Score:4, Insightful)
Could I be more specific? Probably, if I asked around a bit. Would I be committing a crime? No. I would not. I would be exercising my right to free speech & expression. Period.
If I say "they have some music for dl over at acme.com", I am likewise not committing a crime, I don't care which legal statutes you judge it under. I see your point, but I'm sorry, this simply holds no water. There's no issue of complicity at all; you are not involved in he actual transfer of illegal information, nor are you aiding and abetting an illegal act any more than if you publish a manual on how to build a pipe bomb (Poor Man's James Bond, I forget the publisher.)
Re:They only catch the dumb ones (Score:3, Interesting)
"If I say "they have some music for dl over at acme.com", I am likewise not committing a crime, I don't care which legal statutes you judge it under."
That's right, in fact it was exactly my point. Not sure what the contention is there.
"this simply holds
Who Won Now? (Score:2)
Association of Guilt (Score:2)
The actual cost of the fee isn't that much (Score:3, Informative)
This is comparable to a typical down payment for a Oslo apartment, which many students actually buy while still in college.
Minimum wage in Norway is equal to about $12.70/hr USD, and goes up by age (among other factors), so a 25-year old would be making a minimum of $19.84/hr USD.
Bah, He shouldn't have been taken to court at all. (Score:4, Insightful)
You have a guy that's working hard to provide links to infringing material. (for free no less) If they were smart they would have just been watching this guys page and stamping out the owner of every link he finds. As it sits now, they stopped his linking but the files will remain.
Now it's just a matter of time untill another site does the same thing. This puts them on the offensive paying people to go hunt down more linkers.
Don's sue Google for linking to a page with your copy on it, thank them for helping you find it and shut down the source.... armatures.
Thus the Bourne convention makes all links illegal (Score:4, Insightful)
Therefore everything published/posted on the Internet is copyright by someone.
Therefore all external links are by default links to a site with copyright materials on it.
Therefore every publisher of a web page with external links is quilty of copyright infringement by linking to a copyrighted work.
Therefore every publisher of a web page can sue for copyright infringement unless they have licensed the work to the other party.
The publisher establishes the fee schedule for the licensing of the work.
So who gets rich?
Re:um... google (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Clarification please... (Score:2)
Re:Clarification please... (Score:2)
This is really dealing with a similar legal quagmire to that the BSA got involved in some years back. The BSA tried (and largely failed) to use the law to shutdown certain sites linking to serials and keygens, but not providing the actual files themselves. In that case though, there was an extra step required; you still need
No, you mustn't tell! (Score:2)
If merely pointing out where to get warez is illegal, then you must not tell anybody.
I'm sure the cops will want you to tell them, but what if the "cop" isn't really a cop? Then you've broke the law by telling someone where to get warez.
Therefore you must not tell anyone, just to be safe.
Re:Ouch... (Score:2)