FBI Raids Arizona School District Over Copyright Infringement 786
markclong writes "Federal agents in Phoenix and elsewhere in the country raided schools and other targets in a national crackdown on pirated music CDs and movies. The schools lost Internet access including emails to and from elsewhere on the Internet." Despite the assertions in the article, Google doesn't currently pick up any indications of a national school sweep.
Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Insightful)
So now the Copyright Infringement of Music and Movies is linked to organized crime activities. O.K., I can believe that.
A school district is searched because of piracy?
Obviously the AZCentral.com site sees the link, but I don't. For organized crime to bother, there would have to be money exchanging hands, and I highly doubt that either students or staff of the Deer Valley Unified School District are paying for downloaded pirated materials.
Am I missing something here?
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Interesting)
Are we talking about sharing the purchased CD, or about sharing a copy of the purchased CD?
You can share a CD you own.
You can share an analog copy of a CD you own, but only with "friends", and you can't do it for commercial gain.
You can't make a digital copy of a CD and share it without seriously risking infringment.
Under this reading, sharing an MP3 ripped from a CD with friends is fine, as long as it is an analogue of the original. If an exact duplicte of it turns up anywhere else, you're toast.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Interesting)
"You can share a CD you own."
That much I understand. If I have a CD, I can loan it to a friend. If he makes a copy of it, he's in violation of the law, but that's largely irrelevant to the act of me loaning him my CD.
"You can share an analog copy of a CD you own, but only with "friends", and you can't do it for commercial gain. You can't make a digital copy of a CD and share it without seriously risking infringment."
This is where I get lost. Can somebody please point me to the section of US copyright law [copyright.gov] which spells this out? I understand the part of the law about libraries and similar institutions being allowed to make copies for archival purposes, but I can't find anything that relates one way or another to making copies and giving them to friends.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:4, Informative)
No action may be brought under this title alleging infringement of copyright based on the manufacture, importation, or distribution of a digital audio recording device, a digital audio recording medium, an analog recording device, or an analog recording medium, or based on the noncommercial use by a consumer of such a device or medium for making digital musical recordings or analog musical recordings.
--
Bold emphasis added.
The only question is the meaning of the word, noncommercial.
Vauge Law, Detailed Rules (Score:4, Informative)
That doesn't stop certain groups from coming up with insanely detailed rules (interlibrary loan guidelines, for example, involve things like the lesser of one chapter or 10% of a written work if requested less than 5 times a year unless the work is over 5 years old etc. etc.) that have no real legal foundation.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:3, Informative)
If the CD was purchased and then shared. How is the sharer committing copyright infringement.
Is a copy being made without the copyright holder's permission? If it doesn't fall under fair use, then it's copyright infringement. It doesn't matter if you make any money from it. It's like saying "hey, if you weren't paid to kick that guy's head in then, it's not assault".
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:4, Insightful)
That's woefully simplistic. There are numerous exceptions to copyright other than fair use that permit people to make copies without infringing.
Fair Use (Score:3, Informative)
Making a physical copy of a venerable media qualifies as fair use. Making an MP3 of a small portion of a song to use as an example of that song is also fair use (in the more traditional sense). In fact, making a cassette tape of a CD and giving it to someone you know (without money exchaning hands) is also fair use.
However, putting a copyright work in a location where absolutely everyone can copy it is not fair use.
Re:Fair Use (Score:4, Interesting)
Fair use was deliberately written to be vague so that each case can be analyzed. There are no absolutes. But... with enough money, I suppose there are no absolutes in law at all.
I'd also like to point out to your parent that Fair use was created during the Analog days. The NET ACT and DMCA are both additions that have been made to ruin Fair use for digital copies.
For instance, the NET ACT could be invoked against you when you "give a copy to a friend" even when no money is exchanged. Why? Because they redefined what "monetary gain" stands for. Expecting something back in return (like trading) now falls under monetary gain.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Interesting)
If I understand US fair use rights correctly, I can legally buy a CD, rip the data to MP3/OGG or whatever and store them on my hard drive for personal use. If so, then by the RIAAs logic I become a criminal the instant I share that folder on the Internet. But if we extend that line of reasoning, why not prosecute a library for copyright infringement? After all, they are willfully leaving all those books lying around where any number of Joes could come in and photocopy them.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:3, Informative)
Exactly. As soon as you make it available to others, you are responsible for the copies that leave your machine. You have no right to make available copies to people, since you don't have the right to redistribute the recordings. The RIAA is not wrong here. Foolish in their methods, yes, but not wrong.
But if we extend that line of reasoning, why not prosecute a library for copyright infringement? After all
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Insightful)
Ugggggg....
Since when does easier == illegal?
It doesn't. Never has, never will. Why do people keep bringing this up?
Think about it for a moment. Transcribing a book by hand is hard, taking pictures of all of the pages is easier, therefore, taking pictures of books is illegal, right? Nope.
Using a photocopier is easier than taking pictures, or transcribing it, therefore using a photocopier is even more illegal, right? Wrong again.
Copy a pdf of a book from one location and pasting it in another is easier still, that's got to be sooo illegal we need to apply the death penalty, right? Um, no.
The "how" is, or should be, irrelevent. The "what" is what matters. "Fair-Use" is the same no matter what the material is, regardless of how easy or difficult the process is. The fact that I can legally "space-shift" music (for one example) is still legal no matter how I do it. Copying an LP to another LP, an analog tape to another analog tape, a CD-ROM to analog tape, a CD-ROM to another CD-ROM, an LP or analog cassette, or CD-ROM to a MP3/WMA/Ogg are all equally legal. As long as I keep them to myself the RIAA and the FBI can take a rather long walk off an equally short pier.
Why do you think the RIAA the MPAA and their cronnies are trying to prevent you fom exercising your rights? Because it's rather well established that you in fact have those rights. They can't legally stop you from making a copy of the latest album that you have legally purchased. So what they are doing is making it illegal for anyone to make the tools needed to allow you to exercise those rights. The logic assuming there is any, would have prevented the VCR and photocopier if they could have gotten laws like "No Electronic Theft Act" (the NET act that made non-commercial copyright infringment a crime for the first time ever) and the "Digital Millenium Copyright Act" (DMCA - which made the tools used to do the copying illegal, as well as telling anyone else how you managed to exercise your legal rights illegal.)
In the twisted world ofo the RIAA/MPAA etc. All knowledge exists for the sole purpose of making them money. Anything contrary to that is, or should be illegal. The only right you have is to use the music/movie/book, etc. in a manner that maximizes their profits. Any attempt to do otherwise is, or should be illegal. If you come up with a new use for said book/music/movie, then you should have to pay them again for the privilege. Any use that is an easier or more convenient use of a previously existing right, should naturally result in more money in their respective coffers. Since they believe that any use, every utterance should result in more money going to them, all damages will be calculated in terms of money they believe they should have received. Since the courts are making it more difficult (read "expensive") for them to sue consumers, naturally the FBI should be doing it for them.
The fact that the more time the FBI spends chasing eight year olds downloading copies of Hillery Duff, is less time catching kidnappers, or foiling the next 9/11 terrorist conspiracy is irrelevant to the RIAA and their bottom line.
Unfortunately, the current crop of bought congress critters are more interested in pleasing their corporate masters than the citizens that ostensibly elected them, is a failing of our republic. Until enough people get mad enough to actually do anything about it, like voting the bulk of congress out of office. I don't see things changing.
As an aside, a Canadian court recently ruled that people who make files available for sharing on P2P networks aren't guilty of anything. They used the "photocopier in the library" analogy to justify their decision.
someone247356
Napster Library? (Score:5, Interesting)
I think that people would have a far different reaction to a "library" being shut down than a "peer-to-peer startup company". People understand that libraries are supposed to share information - that's what they do. And generally people don't have a problem with that. It's when buzzwords like "P2P" and "piracy" become involved that people have a problem with file sharing.
Note to self: if ever making P2P applications, call them Library-something-or-other.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Interesting)
You have this exactly backwards. The uploader is the one distributing copies of the media. A copy is made at the uploaders end and is sent down the wire to the downloader. The downloader is merely receiving the copy, he did not create the copy (and couldn't since he doesn't have the original). It makes absolutely no difference if the downloader "initiated the request." So far I have been unable to locate the section of copyright law [cornell.edu] which forbids receiving copyrighted material, although copying and distribution is quite clearly prohibited. This may be part on the reason no downloaders of copyrighted works have ever been sued. Does anyone know the specific part of law that prohibits downloading?
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:4, Interesting)
This is incorrect. He is making a copy. At the very least, he is having his computer write a copy into RAM or onto a disk according to what's coming down over the network. That's enough to count, given the MAI precedent.
The Napster case was pretty clear about all this.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Interesting)
That's a good point I'd overlooked. The copy of the data is indeed made on the host's PC, loaded into IP packets and sent on its merry way... Hmm. So, if I were to share a huge volume of copyrighted media but never actually had anyone download any of it, I wonder what the RIAA's take on that would be? The law prohibits making a copy, so if one of these cases actually made it to trial, presumably the RIAA would have to prove not only that the music was available, but was actually downloaded too.
Does anyone know the specific part of law that prohibits downloading?
Well, "downloading" is a little specific; I'd say "receiving" is more likely, if it's in there at all. I'd guess it would be have to be handled like receiving physical stolen goods; you'd have to prove that the recipient knew it was stolen and then accepted it anyway. I don't think the RIAA's lawyers would find this too difficult given all the press about P2P, so the only reason I can imagine they haven't tried using this law is because there isn't one (yet).
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:4, Insightful)
But if we extend that line of reasoning, why not prosecute a library for copyright infringement?
I have no doubt that is exactly where we are heading. The logical conclusion would be that books, and all copyrighted material, would not be freely available for anyone unless they paid the copyright holder.
What would such a world look like? RMS [wikipedia.org] guesses that this is what such a world would look like here [gnu.org].
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Insightful)
IP theft (Score:5, Insightful)
Which, of course, you do, right?
Let's switch some of those words around, and see if it still sounds as hypocritcal and self-serving.
Yup, it does.
In each of my examples though, notice that nothing physical was stolen, yet in every case, you're taking something you didn't earn, didn't pay for, and thus, don't deserve. If you can justify one, you can justify them all.
Who will create the next Unreal Tournament when no one feels like paying for them anymore? Will we bitch and moan on places like Slashdot about how "all current video games suck, why isn't anyone making any GOOD games anymore?", oblivious to the obvious causation - the fact that we've all turned to stealing our software/games/music/movies rather than paying for it?
Re:IP theft (Score:4, Insightful)
I myself don't even download as much music anymore, because I have most of what I wanted and am perfectly happy to buy anything new I feel is worth it. Anything inaccessible (read: not available in my country or out of print) I'll download. I have stopped downloading warez'd games for the reason you cite. I don't download movies because I feel $5-$7.50 is a perfectly fair price for the movies I do go see in the theater. I download programs only when I could not do my job without them (to date the only illegal program I have is Photoshop, and it's an ancient version that does what I want and nothig more-- and the only reason I downloaded that was because I didn't like the GIMP for putting together images for my web site design work).
We have not "all" resorted to stealing. Some of us do not steal at all; still others steal only when certain conditions are met.
But then again, reasoning with asshats like you never works, so that's why I'm psting anonymously-- so I can forget I ever wasted my time trying to "justify" my actions to someone who doesn't understand that it's none of their fucking business what I download or why I do it.
Re:IP theft (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually... if it's software that I sell for a living, it *is* my business (in multiple senses of the word) when you download my software and use it for free. But you are right, I wouldn't care *why* you did it because the end result is the same regardless of your rationalizations to ease your conscience.
Re:IP theft (Score:4, Insightful)
It's truly amazing what lengths people will go to in order to justify their wrong acts.
Re:IP theft (Score:5, Insightful)
in every case, you're taking something you didn't earn, didn't pay for, and thus, don't deserve. If you can justify one, you can justify them all.
In that case, I choose to justify them all by pointing out that I didn't earn or pay for the air that I breathe, but yet I still deserve it.
What you are missing is the fact that copies don't deprive anyone of anything. No doubt you are champing at the bit to say that they deprive the copyright holder of revenue, but that was precisely JWW's point: the RIAA has acted in such a way that they will not get revenue from him. Whether he later goes on to make copies illegally is irrelevent to this fact, as long as he doesn't distribute those copies to others.
Who will create the next Unreal Tournament when no one feels like paying for them anymore?
I don't see the makers of UT suing kids and lobbying for completely unreasonable laws.
the fact that we've all turned to stealing our software/games/music/movies rather than paying for it?
Copyright infringement is not theft. I am not stating that copyright infringement is moral. I am stating that it is a completely different offence to theft.
Re:IP theft (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't be so naïve. Clearly these are not the same thing. If that is the best argument you can come up with for not downloading music you are going to have to do better if you plan on actually convincing anyone they are doing anything wrong.
People buy music they like, based on what they can afford to spend on music. They download songs because they like to listen to music on their computers or MP3 players. Downloading music is not affecting industry profits in any way. The industry has yet to demo
Re:IP theft (Score:5, Informative)
This is incorrect. In fact, as a rule, reproducing a copyrighted work unauthorizedly is infringing. There are various exceptions to this, but that's a far cry from being 'entirely legal.'
We have always been alowed to record a friends CD or tape, the radio, TV shows, movies we rent, etc, etc, etc.
Also incorrect. The AHRA is permissive of certain sorts of copying, but is pretty new, and isn't really that expansive. Most copying around here probably isn't AHRA compliant. And there's no blanket exceptions generally that match what you're talking about. The closest you could get would be fair use, but fair use does not permit blanket statements to be made -- each fair use must be justifed anew based on the circumstances that surround it; making a copy of a show on tv for time shifting might have much better chances of success in a fair use argument than copying a rented movie.
Truthfully the only crime (legally) with copying music is not the downloading but the sharing.
Incorrect, and three for three. Downloading copyrighted music unauthorizedly is illegal as it infringes on the copyright holder's exclusive right to reproduce the work. Sharing it is also illegal, since the copyright holder also has an exclusive right to distribute the work.
Man, doesn't anyone read 17 USC 106 anymore?
Re:IP theft (Score:5, Informative)
In Canada it is, in fact, legal and ethically acceptable to download a tune you'd like to hear or borrow a friend's CD and put some tracks on a tape for the car. Legally, as encoded in our copyright laws, and ethically, as culture has a communal element, like it or not. Besides, any time I or my friends shared music with each other (going back to 8-tracks, eh), it resulted in further sales for the artist, since we were engaging in grassroots marketing. Win win.
Now there's a further element: I paid for personal use copying, through levies included in the recording media price when I purchased it. I guess that makes it both ethical and moral, too.
The grandparent's assertion that it is illegal to share is even ambiguous in Canada, and they're still hashing it out: the latest decision is that P2P sharing a la Gnutella is a bit like having a photocopier in a library.
Too bad about that Land of the Free thing, eh?
Re:IP theft (Score:4, Insightful)
It might, but that's not a prerequisite.
Let's look at the actual law, shall we? (emphasis below mine)
As you can see, both copying and distributing seperately qualify as infringing behavior, all else being equal.
ALL the lawsuits, settlements, fines, jail time involve the illegal distribution of said mp3's. Not the downloading of.
Yes, because it's more efficient to go after distributors right now than it is downloaders. You're making a stupid claim on par with 'because he only struck at the head of the snake, the rest must be invulnerable.' Remember, not too long ago, RIAA wasn't pursuing distributors, they were pursuing P2P services; did that mean they couldn't have possibly sued distributors? Of course not, but your 'logic' would've said that they of course could not do something because they hadn't already done something.
I call BS (Score:5, Insightful)
"I prefer to steal Babbage's, but thats just me."
Please. You 'theft' nuts are why we're moving to a pre-Statute of Anne conception of copyright. You cannot look at information as property, and not end up at a situation where you advocate anything less than perpetual copyright.
Additionally, if you combine this with the insane but popular concept of creativity being a result of Foucoultian "genius," then you have a situation even worse than Conger-dominated England, circa 1708, where every literary work, like Shakespeare was inherited through a single publisher family and kept from the public for hundreds of years.
You think you are being 'common sense' and 'intuitive' in a lawyer-speak, responsibility-shirking world when you use words like 'theft.' But you of course don't realize that you're just taking an ultimately simple-minded approach that is absolutely inimical to the ideals of copyright that Framers like Madison and Jefferson intended when it was created--to be a civic-minded engine for progress, emphatically NOT a grant of property.
Re:Way to go ! (Score:5, Insightful)
He wasn't confusing the isue, he was actually discusing in a more complete context. But I suppose if the subject was math you would make the same arguement if someon brought up multiplication and long division.
Mycroft
Missing the point (Score:4, Insightful)
Bringing up arguments about eighteenth century "right to publish" is bogus. The first amendment automatically protects your right to publish. It even protects your right to parody a copyright work (although not to gain financially from such parody). As a previous post already said, Whatever helps you sleep at night "
The funny thing is, copyright as conceived in our constitution regards creative works--I said 'information' because that's a more basic designation than 'art' and is the most general subject of the Framer's Federalist paper discussions, but 'artistic' works if you insist-- as already belonging as much to the public who through generations of particapatory culture made current creativity possible as to the authors of that work.
The law does not grant protection to those who create "original" works in the strict sense if not the legal, because there are no original works. Every work is in some way derivative. Instead, the law grants temporary copy privileges to novel expressions, which is certainly tenuous ground no matter how you look at it. If you think there is 'genius' creativity, or are 'original' works out there, then you may be right to some small extent--but as the Framers correctly understood, the far larger influence is public culture that freely available.
You are arguing as if there needed to be some positive impetus in order to 'free' creative productions from their rightful ownership. That is simply wrong in both a historical and conceptual interpretation of copyright. Information and artistic expression already will spread if unimpeded, and copyright's primary function is to make the incentives to produce small enough that that spread will be as unimpeded as possible.
Copyright is a grant to protect one thing and one thing only--progress for the benefit of the public. That's what the constitution says, and you are free to disagree, but you better have better rationale than just an assumption that an author has a vague set of 'rights' that are granted by a spurious conception of total creativity of "original" works. At least the Framers listed their principles.
P2P is many things, but more studies [nytimes.com] are showing that, though the RIAA and copyright 'moral intuitionists' such as yourself don't want to hear it, P2P is culturally enabling a lot more than it is disabling, and regardless of trifling questions of legality is thus more of a boon to the true, real and forgotten purpose of copyright than it is an attack.
But show me the link. (Score:5, Insightful)
P2P based piracy doesn't fit. Selling pirated CDs and Video Tapes does, but unless the school store is selling pirated CDs - then this just doesn't fit.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:4, Insightful)
The bitter sarcasm in the link of organized crime to "piracy"/copyright infringement is that organized crime is behind some of the infringement. However, every infringement can (and it seems like it will) be treated as if organized crime was involved, no matter how stupid. That means: the link has been done, now one is interchangable with the other.
(On a sidenote: it is easier to not go after the organized culprits. It takes too much effort.)
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Organized P2P givaways... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Organized P2P givaways... (Score:3, Insightful)
-> Hard-working artist makes music
-> -> Hard-working record label publishes it
-> -> -> Evil organized criminal comes along and pirates it
-> -> -> -> Music lover #123 pays the evil organized criminal to get that piece of piracy
-> -> -> -> -> Music lover #123 spreads it so everyone can have it
Now, there is obviously a problem with this trail of thoughts. It seems like the FBI is either not able or willing to see it.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:5, Informative)
It doesn't say anything in there specifically about MP3s. I think the link discussed at those hearings probably had to do with the massive quantities of bootleg CDs/DVDs/software that can be bought on the street in a lot of countries. Linking that sort of thing with MP3 file-sharing is a tenuous connection at best.
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:3, Interesting)
It's a system of intimidation is what it is. T
Re:Copyright, Organized Crime and Schools? (Score:4, Interesting)
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/06/27/13 29248&mode=thread&tid=99
The FBI raided about 13 homes and took 23 PCs and modems but I don't think there was ever any arrests or indititments. The FBI had said the amounts exceeded $25,000 stolen but it never was pursued further.
A quote from a comment on that story, "At this stage they say they have not charged anyone with anything, but confiscated systems for evidence. My bet is that the systems will be returned and charges never filed. This is more of a scare tactic."
Might this be a similar situation; have a big profile raid and then do nothing else?
Sad (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sad (Score:4, Informative)
All users signed an agreement, and they have to log on first. Their every move is trackable. It's the same system we use here at this school.
Hehe (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Hehe (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Hehe (Score:3, Interesting)
Locker raids (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Locker raids (Score:3, Funny)
Beer goooooood!!!!!! :)
Wait a minute.. (Score:4, Insightful)
The article pointed out that this school district has every student log in, so that everything that student does can be traced.
In not disagreeing with your point, but I wanted to clarify that one statement.
Re:Sad (Score:3, Funny)
Wow- the 2nd post already enacted Godwin's Law [killfile.org]! This thread is over too soon.
Re:Sad (Score:3, Insightful)
This is the natural logical conclusion of years of special interest lobbying and subsequent legislation that has put a lockdown on anything copyrighted.
Copyright went from a civil infraction to a criminal federal crime. Meaning maybe they'll send some kids to jail. Or maybe some teachers.
I hate to see it, but in a way I hope that they will make arrests here. Then that will turn the spotlight on the real crime here: congressional whoring for corporate i
Re:Sad (Score:3, Insightful)
Clearly you miss the point COMPLETELY.
the RIAA/MPAA doesn't particularly care who did the infringing. it is likely to cost them much more in their own fees than they will ever recover from individual infringers.
What they do want is two things:
this "gestapo crap" does just that. it protects their rights WITHOUT having to go after ind
Re:Sad (Score:3, Insightful)
(scoff!) Schools are daytime-jails for children, designed to keep them out of society's way while the adults go to work. And if you're going to lock them up, you might as well teach them to be good consumers. And if they show signs of NOT being good consumers, send in the FBI.
Re:Sad (Score:3, Interesting)
follow the money (Score:5, Insightful)
Where the answers are [technicalknow-how.com]
Cost. (Score:5, Interesting)
How much does it cost to hire FBI for an afternoon of breaking down doors? Will it cost me extra to have them draw their weapons in a "low ready position" while doing it?
Credit Card Commercial? (Score:3, Funny)
FBI Raid on your enemy: $125,000.
Add agents with guns drawn: $120 each weapon
The FBI Press Relations agent standing outside the door of your enemy ... Priceless
First They Came for the File Sharers... (Score:3, Insightful)
Vote in November.
Oh for fucks sake... (Score:5, Insightful)
"Oh Amnesty International, Help Me! Those Bush Nazi's took away Kazaa!"
Re:Oh for fucks sake... (Score:5, Insightful)
To be fair to the original poster (and I do think he/she is over-egging it slightly), Pastor Niemoeller's quote did not begin with "they" coming for "the Jews". The point of the quote was to demonstrate that Fascism begins in a subtle fashion - "First they came for the Communists " ... (everyone hates commies, right?) ... "then they came for the Trade Unionists" ... (organised labour equals communism, right?)
When armed agents of the state kick down school doors, if they're not looking for real threats to national security they had better expect comparisons with previous examples of state terror.
Re:Free copying of media (Score:3, Insightful)
Woah, there -- back up a sec. There's nothing wrong with P2P use in and of itself. I'll say it again (just for effect): There's nothing wrong with P2P use in and of itself. Unless you're a government like the Chinese government who i
Secretive part scares me (Score:5, Insightful)
I just can't believe that school administrators weren't warned about the illegal activity and given the opportunity to shut it down themselves. All I can guess is that the FBI figured that if they gave the school a big embarrassing black eye it would serve as a warning to administrators of districts across the country to crack down on their own students.
Make An Example (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Make An Example (Score:4, Insightful)
You know, there are words that one could use for a government which has to enforce rule by "scare tactic." And those words get prefaced by other words that Rev. Ashcroft would strongly disapprove of to describe a government that enforces rule by "scare tactic" at the request of private organizations, especially ones membered by companies charged with price fixing [arstechnica.com].
Never mind the debate over "copyright infringement" vs. "theft"; it's not just a matter of who's not helping the RIAA and MPAA roll around in a big pile of money any more. If the government has to resort to measures like this to enforce unpopular laws, if they have to infringe upon everyone's rights (especially those that weren't even thinking of violating those rules before) in order to inconvenience those responsible, then the law, the FBI, and quite possibly the government itself has to change.
I'd like to think that the Founding Fathers (yes, I'm invoking those hoary old bastards; this doesn't bode well for my Karma) intended that bit in the Constitution about restricted "search and seizure" so that people don't get their rights all infringed and trampled on with jackboots unless there's sufficient probable cause against specific individuals. It would also be useful so that the innocent-but-accused don't get victimized by the authorities that are supposed to be protecting them.
In this case, everyone got their access cut because of the actions of a few. As a precedent, it'd be pathetic if it weren't so scary.
(I also have very specific ideas about "freedom of speech" and "freedom of religion," but those are off-topic for this discussion.)
Re:Secretive part scares me (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm just guessing, too, but since the FBI isn't normally running around dragging filesharers out of study hall, I'm thinking this isn't about some illegal copy of In_Da_Club.mp3. It's about some warez crew using the school's computers for heavy-duty sharing, either by an insider (a la the Boston arrests a couple of years ago) or by compromise.
We'll see, and if I'm wrong -- yeah, this is a ludicrous misuse of FBI resources. But I'm thinking the vagueness of the story isn't secrecy, it's from the rushing of a half-understood story into press.
Re:Secretive part scares me (Score:5, Insightful)
That's an interesting thought. Windows computers can be horribly comprimised with trojans. Which means the actual lawbreakers may not be even on the campus!
We all know how underfunded and overworked sysadmins don't get around to patching the machines, so they could be confiscating these machines purely for evidence. Not that anyone at the schools are committing a crime.
We all might be jumping to conclusions here. Not that slashdotters would ever do such a thing.
Another thought, I wonder what role "carnivore" is playing in this.
Good to hear! (Score:4, Insightful)
Pisses me Off (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Pisses me Off (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Pisses me Off (Score:4, Interesting)
Instead of investigating how companies like Ticketmaster rape millions of American wallets each day, lets focus on copyright infringement so that the 10-20 top execs in the movie and music biz don't see their personal income drop from $30M/yr to $28M/yr.
Lets raid schools.
I'm not saying copyright infringement is right, but there are so many other fucked up things in this country that affect more than 20 people. It makes me fuckin sick.
And I don't want to hear about the starving artists and movie stars. MTV Cribs won't have a shortage of people to profile anytime soon. If there was a magic bullet to completely stop all forms of piracy tomorrow, do you honestly believe prices would come down? No fuckin way! Instead, those execs would pocket it all and blame the high prices for CDs on something else.
When will the masses be protected from the few wealthy elite? Never.
BTW, what ever happened to the Ticketmaster congressional investigations?
Re:Pisses me Off (Score:5, Insightful)
Welcome to the New World Order! Now where did I put my jack-boots?
Max
Re:Pisses me Off (Score:3, Interesting)
It is as ridiculous as trying to use 9 women to have a full pregnancy in one month.
Some things must be done in serial, yet some things can indeed be worked parallel. There are many, many problems in Arizona(I'm a resident) that can definetly be helped simply by the re-allocation of law enforcement resources.
Arizona has serious immigration and a drug trafficking problems. Some parts of Phoenix, Tuscon, Mesa, and others cities could be cleaned up with the help of the FBI.
There wi
Did I mis-read the article? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Did I mis-read the article? (Score:3, Informative)
I don't recall reading anything in the article that stated the FBI was looking for pirated music and movies.
I thought the same thing at first, until I reread it and came across this:
They couldn't give
What exactly got poured? (Score:3, Funny)
"Agents poured through data and records at a computer command center for the Deer Valley School District in the northwest Valley and blocked the office from the public."
I certainly hope that no evidence was destroyed by whatever was poured through those data records :-O
Aren't we at war right now? (Score:5, Interesting)
Disclaimer: I do not support copyright infringement. Nor should anyone who wants to see things like the GPL actually be enforced. But given our supposed National Security situation I'm a little disturbed that the Feds are devoting this much in the way of resources to something that's really inconsequential in terms of protecting American lives and livelihood.
weekend? (Score:5, Interesting)
It wouldn't be nearly as good a scare tactic.
Karma begone! (Score:5, Insightful)
What next? Will your house be raided on suspection of IP infrigement? Could SCO ask the FBI to raid your house if you are using Linux?
Umm...? (Score:3, Insightful)
FBI agents do not need to "RAID" schools. They can set up dates and times with administrators to go over records. One has to believe that someone is pushing this (MPAA, RIAA) with what they belive is evidence against the school system.
The US is supposed to be a government of the people for the people. It is clear now that we no longer elect people "like" any of us, and they certainly do not do much for us anymore. It is time we stood up and took back our lives.
The RIAA/FBI/GOVT has no fucking right to do the things they are doing. File charges, build evidence, take people to court. Fsking Nazi raids on school districts will get you pitch forks and torches in the streets.
I have a question (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean I understand about the RIAA having huge lobbying power and all, but if you do the math, you'll no doubt find that there is more money lost to software piracy every year than there is to MP3-trading.
A song has been valued at 99 cents recently, but a Windows license is typically 300 dollars, and I'm sure there are millions of pirated copies of Windows out there.
Even if software piracy ISN'T as big as music-piracy, it must still be huge.
Why aren't there more software-audits?
Why are governments placing a disproportionate amount of emphasis on something like music-piracy?
Re:I have a question (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I have a question (Score:3, Interesting)
The price per item is not an appropriate measure of the loss. You also have to consider whether the people copying would have bought
Re:I have a question (Score:5, Insightful)
Computer software vendors have gotten used to the idea that no matter what copy protection schemes they use, a cracked/pirated version of their software will be all over the internet within days of release. They've been getting used to this idea since sometime in 1970 when it first became an issue. I'd also say that all parties involved have just about given up on the idea that they have a chance in hell of stopping it, and have accepted it as a cost of doing business. After all, the legitimate users of the software still make them a profit. No one has ever proven that one download of a program is equal to one loss of a sale, because it isn't, and never will be. For some, it's like trading baseball cards.
The RIAA/MPAA and other entertainment providers have not gotten used to this idea yet, because to them this piracy problem (at least the internet one-to-many part of it) is completely new. It'll take decade or two of every copy protection scheme they invent being craked overnight, and every release appearing on the internet the instant it hits the theaters before they end up giving up the same fight and accepting it as the cost of doing business. In the meantime, we will see these kinds of raids from time to time just like we did with the FBI raiding the warez scene during the late 1980s and early 1990s.
It'll probably be a lot worse for the media industry. They've got more to lose, and their product is popular with everyone, everywhere, unlike software which is only popular with computer users. Computer use is a lot more widespread today than it was when this was happening in the software world, as well, and that is surely a contributing factor. Add to this the moral and legal ambiguity of the entire problem, and you end up with a lot more users who are willing to engage in this behaviour. After all, how can recording a copy of a song from the radio be legal, while downloading it from the internet is not? TV shows from a TiVo that are shared and downloaded are somehow different from TV shows recorded on a VHS tape and dubbed? Are they really? Fundamentally, they are the exact same activity. The big difference is that one is distributed through a channel controlled by the Big Money(tm), and one is not. That difference, to many, is no basis for a law regulating the trade of human culture, since government has no business and no right to pass laws to ensure the continuance of corporate profits.
It's a losing battle, and everyone knows it except the corporations. The ones that figure it out and adapt will survive, the ones that don't, won't. Same goes for countries... those that allow the freedom will have a major advantage over the ones that don't. Sadly, it looks these days as if the USA is going to be one of the least free in this area. Fundamentally this is a battle over who has the right to control and distribute human culture. The existing control structure is being severely eroded by a new distribution mechanism that is controlled by no one and answerable to no one, and it is as titanic in implications as any social change in human history, make no mistake. This is about your right to broadcast, your right to be heard.
Bottom line is, as always, to do as your conscience demands. What the law demands is negotiable, because law has seldom followed conscience in letter or enforcement, especially these days. The more unconscionable laws that pass, the less respect people will have for the law itself, and the more eroded the base of society becomes. Someday it'll end in a revolution, as always, and when we pick up the pieces we can build something better from the mess. It'll sort itself out in a few decades just like all other major societal changes do, and the world will end up a better place because of it.
Get ready for hard times (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe it will be too late when they find out that laws don't fix problems? That problems shouldn't happen in the first place? And that laws shouldn't be viewd as "the truely correct thing", which can be used as an excuse to do all kinds of weird and crazy things (because the law says I have this "right")? Even if the industry technically has the "right" to fight piracy, did they think about it first? Do the artists understand what's going on? Surely they don't. They just believe what they are told... That "the evil people are taking away their money, and that they'll be doomed if nothing is done".
OK, I feel better now that I said this... But I'm still pessimistic.
Across the Seas! Beware! (Score:3, Insightful)
"Some of the stolen copyrighted material being sought in the raids is suspected as having been distributed from overseas sources."
Ooooh... Overseas! I hear that's where the terrorists are too. This is a pretty poor excuse for a news story.
How to keep the RIAA from raiding you (Score:5, Interesting)
Evidently someone in the Deer Valley school district must be running a file sharing supernode with lots of recent stuff
Check out Eff's site [eff.org] for guidelines on how to keep the RIAA sniffers at bay. And use common sense! If you are sharing the Usher, "Confessions" album, the current Billboard #1 selling album [billboard.com], you are directly competing with record stores and radio stations. You should get shut down IMO. However, sharing ISOs to FreeBSD is a Good Thing. (You could probably, illegally, share the Perry Como Christmas album and not get noticed....IANAL)
FLT (Score:4, Informative)
Some pictures from Utwente Campus:
http://undying.by.ru/flt.JPG [undying.by.ru]
http://mjrider.student.utwente.nl/gallery/politie [utwente.nl]
http://www.swecheck.net/bust/index1.html [swecheck.net]
USA becomes a police state (Score:5, Interesting)
Now I see that your country becomes a police state at dangerous speed. My life began in Soviet Union (not in Soviet Russia, I was born in Soviet Latvia). We couldn't even imagine anything like KGB raiding our schools!
Re:USA becomes a police state (Score:3, Insightful)
I wonder to what extent is freedom in the former USSR states and Eastern Europe due to more democratic laws versus limitation of enforcement resources. There could be a law against sneezing, but it enforcement would be limited by budgets and priorities.
As our executive branch and their mechanisms of power (CIA, FBI, ATF) get more budget and latitude
Re:USA becomes a police state (Score:4, Funny)
Two Sides to this (Score:5, Insightful)
1. The police used a warrant under seal. This is a bad thing. How exactly are one's constitutional rights to be secure in person, house, papers (electronic documents) and effects protected if one cannot even review the warrant? Is it justified by an FBI argument than they don't want to reveal the source? If so we've got bigger problems, like the FBI using that justification for to seal ANY warrant. Then of course you have your right to face accusers... Lots of work for the lawyers here.
2. We might actually get some real, hard, law out of this case. If you get enough people into the court system with large scale raids, eventually you'll catch a person with a lot of money and the intestinal fortitude to fight you rather than settle out of court. Then we can finally learn what fair use is, whether your rights to confront an accuser include a computer accuser, and whether these sealed warrants are... warranted.
IAAL, and as my tax professor always used to say, "I don't mind playing by the rules as long as I know what the rules ARE." - (F. Slagle, USD School of law.)
Agents poured through data and records (Score:3, Funny)
Shouldn't it be "pored through data and records"?
I was picturing liquid FBI agents that act like the Sapphire liquid that can sumberge books and computers without damaging them.
More criminalization of civil laws... (Score:5, Insightful)
crackdown related to Dutch raids? (Score:5, Interesting)
> country raided schools and other targets in
> a national crackdown on pirated music CDs and movies.
Dutch news site NU.NL reports [nu.nl] that the FIOD-ECD (Economic Crime Unit of the Dutch IRS) raided twenty locations on Wednesday, mostly campus locations in Groningen, Utrecht, etc in search of illegal software. This was done at the request of United States Customs Service (emphasis mine).
Dutch news sites often confuse one Federal service with another. Could this be related to the raids in Arizona and the "national crackdown"?
Are we sure they are after music? (Score:5, Insightful)
"Federal agents in Phoenix and elsewhere in the country raided schools and other targets in a national crackdown on pirated music CDs and movies."
Notice, however, there are no statements from the FBI about the nature of this raid. It is possible they are looking for pirated software more than pirated music. I used to work in the Office of Technology for a school district, and I know for a fact that at least 25% of our software was unlicensed. Just innocent little things like 1 Windows 98 CD and key for a 25-computer lab and so forth. At one point, we did order 25 copies of Win2k but they were sent with no product keys. We were told to wait for the keys to come in, but we installed with one of our existing keys anyway. If I had to estimate, I would say that we had no less than 300 computers running off of the same product key with no site license.
I had to search for cracks for a few utilities a couple of times, as well. When the librarian's database was backed up on 8 floppies and disk 4 went bad, I needed something to repair a corrupted
Was it so wrong, though? The kids needed computers for education. Our department's budget was very small, and we had to maintain dying hand-me-down servers and PCs with next to nothing. Microsoft was willing to give free copies of Win2k, but only if we had been given donated machines and only if those donated machines had blank hard drives.
I'm waiting for the press release before I grab my pitchfork and torch. It could very well be that our villains are not the RIAA but the ever-unpopular Microsoft and other software companies.
Fsck sake... (Score:4, Insightful)
We won already? (Score:4, Insightful)
Just seems like the FBI has their priorities a bit out of place, here...
Pisses me off... (Score:5, Insightful)
Spending my tax money on having the fucking FBI literally raid the place my children go to learn to insure the RIAA and the Movie industry pad their yearly record breaking sales numbers is beyond ludicrous.
Absolutely insane.
Meanwhile, we have 12,000 gun murders a year, education budget keeps getting cut, we still don't provide health care for our children (at LEAST), employee production has skyrocketed and large corporations apparenlty can use the FBI to break the balls of our kids, in school, to quelch loss of profit.
No wonder the world fucking hates us. Our priorities are so fucking whacked, I wouldn't want our brand of "freedom" to spread either! We don't want to spread freedom, fuck, if that was the case then we would have invaded Saudi Arabia, a "great" ally and one of the worst human rights abusers in the world, years ago. But, they have things we need, so we leave them alone and call them our friend. In the case of George W., actually very good friends.
No, what we really want to spread is the idea of property rights, capitalism, greed, wants, consumerism, you know, to make a few people rich, because that's what matters most!
Nice (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Er, what??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Propaganda. Record company propaganda regurgitated by journalist who doesn't actually know how mp3s get pirated.
Re:baby boomers, lay off already (Score:3, Informative)
I think about December of 2003, when numerous Australian schools, at the behest of the Australian version of the RIAA, advised parents not to video tape their children's Christmas musicals [todaytonight.com.au] -- and in some cases having guards confiscate parents' cameras --, because the parents might film their children singing copyrighted songs, thus violating the rights of the copyright owners.
Yep. You and your kids don't have a right to keep
Ludicrous! (Score:5, Insightful)
To be so ignorant as to imply that the FBI doing its job in domestic affairs will deter its ability to prevent terrorism (by any organization) is amazing to me.
The FBI is not an entity with one sole investigative purpose. It is an entity that is the federal government's ability to make sure that federal law is respected and upheld. They are a law enforcement group. Copyright infringement is just one of their purposes - they've been tracking down copyright infringement even before the popularity of trading music on the Internet (have you ever seen one of those big FBI warnings at the start of a movie).
The FBI states that its priorities [fbi.gov] are as follows:
1. Protect the United States from terrorist attack.
Top priority would mean that most of the agents working for the FBI would be dedicated to preventing another attack from a terrorist organization.
2. Protect the United States against foreign intelligence operations and espionage.
What good is freedom if foreign governments get to decide what happens with our government? I can completely understand why this ranks #2 on their list of priorities.
3. Protect the United States against cyber-based attacks and high-technology crimes.
Although it may be a highly debated topic, exchanging software, music, or other digital data that is a copyrighted work without the permission of the publisher or author is illegal. The fact that it is the third priority means that this would also have quite a few agents to investigate these crimes. In my opinion, I believe that they are probably understaffed for this particular task.
4. Combat public corruption at all levels.
This would include state officials. Imagine the scope of work that is necessary to fulfill this priority.
5. Protect civil rights.
6. Combat transnational and national criminal organizations and enterprises.
7. Combat major white-collar crime.
8. Combat significant violent crime.
9. Support federal, state, county, municipal, and international partners.
10. Upgrade technology to successfully perform the FBI's mission.
If you have any doubt in the FBI's ability to investigate possible terrorist threats, go their website [fbi.gov] and do the research for yourself. I would hate to think what would happen to this country if our sole purpose was to defeat terrorism while neglecting our domestic issues. A crime is a crime - and affects us all, in the end.