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Australian Record Industry Goes After the Red Cross 23
cavaroc writes "Wired is reporting that the Australian record labels are now threatening the International Red Cross for being a beneficiary of Sharman Networks. They said they'd politely ask them to cooperate, but that if they didn't cooperate, 'It would be incredibly disappointing if we had to sue them.' My favorite quote from the article: 'We never take a case against technology, we will take cases against people who use technology to take away our artists' property.' They're expected to sue themselves sometime early next year. ;-)"
ACCC's link to the mentioned body (Score:3, Informative)
Watch for them to sue tin-shaking collectors (Score:4, Funny)
Sue Themselves (Score:3, Interesting)
I assume you are trying to be cute in saying that the *AA takes away the artist's rights. Well, when you make a deal with the devil, you are gonna get burned.
If you don't like the contract, guys, don't fucking sign it. Don't pull a "The Artist/Prince" on them AFTER you get your millions. That's right, Courtney Love, I'm fucking talking about you...
Re:Sue Themselves (Score:3, Insightful)
My guess is no - I haven't either. If either of us did, though, we would inevitably find 1 of 2 possibilities to be true.
Possibility 1: The contract is designed to confuse the artist into signing away rights that they naturally own, or to simply be so unreadable that the relevant terms are lost in the legal gibberish. This enforces the view that the contract is bad, but exonerates the artist of any wrongdoing as they were intentionally decieved.
P
Re:Sue Themselves (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Sue Themselves (Score:2)
If you are so ignorant that you would sign a document without even reading it, then you deserve what you get. People can say anything. If it's not written down
Re:Sue Themselves (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Sue Themselves (Score:4, Insightful)
As soon as you need to have a record deal, or a publishing deal, you've lost any bargaining position whatsoever.
Re:Sue Themselves (Score:1)
The documents are fairly easy to understand. The real issue is that no one is offering any better deals. You want to retain rights to your work? Fine. Go home and do it yourself. For the greatest part you can't even get involved with the major industry without knowing that, at the end of the day, any rights that you didn't sign away at first can be easily taken by thei
Re:Sue Themselves (Score:2, Interesting)
It was pretty easy to understand.
What wasn't easy to understand was the other contract that came along with it that included the part "if you sell X number of albums on this label you're signing to, you automatically became an artist on this major label"
Re:Sue Themselves (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course, as I understand it, book publishers don't generally expect perpetual world-wide rights to anything. Writers generally sell limited term limited rights in specified countries, like two years hardcover US publishing rights, reserving, e.g., paperback rights in Europe.
Am I missing something? (Score:1)
Re:Am I missing something? (Score:4, Informative)
The order allowing this is called a Mareva injunction, and it is available when the plaintiff demonstrates a significant chance that the defendant will move assets out of the jurisdiction to avoid having to pay any judgement against them.
Who's watching who? (Score:4, Interesting)
Seems like me they only paid attention to those parts of the law that wouldn't benefit the US corporations and have them changed through the trade agreement.
I wouldn't be surprised to see them sue the Red Cross because they've already sank so low they can't go any deeper.
Whew! (Score:3, Funny)
It's refreshing to think that my country isn't the source of ALL evil in the world.
A step too far (Score:2, Interesting)
Ok...they can get rid of Kazaa, they can get rid of the Windows suite, but it'll be a cold day in hell before they can have my photocopier!!!
Re:A step too far (Score:1)
Re:A step too far (Score:2)
"Will all consumers please report to the nearest RIAA/ARIA/CRAA center for a finger-ectomy? Thank you."
The Recording Industry Hypocrisy (Score:2, Insightful)
If they were actually protective of the artists, they would make sure that those who actually create the music are protected not only from technology, but also from te nefarious management personnel whose sole task it is to make as much money from someone else's work as humanly pssible.
To the best of my knowledge, artists are not members of the industry associations. That belongs to the lab
Can we mod the story up? (Score:1)
I am ashamed (Score:1)
International Red Cross (Score:4, Funny)