RIAA: Ripping CDs to iPod not 'Fair Use' 830
dotpavan writes "EFF has this article about RIAA saying that ripping CDs and backing them up does not come under Fair use.
Ars Technica also reports on this, by quoting, "The [submitted arguments in favor of granting exemptions to the DMCA] provide no arguments or legal authority that making back up copies of CDs is a noninfringing use. In addition, the submissions provide no evidence that access controls are currently preventing them from making back up copies of CDs or that they are likely to do so in the future. Myriad online downloading services are available and offer varying types of digital rights management alternatives. For example, the Apple FairPlay technology allows users to make a limited number of copies for personal use. Presumably, consumers concerned with the ability to make back up copies would choose to purchase music from a service that allowed such copying. Even if CDs do become damaged, replacements are readily available at affordable prices. Similar to the motion picture industry, the recording industry has faced, in online piracy, a direct attack on its ability to enjoy its copyrights.""
Big surprise (Score:5, Interesting)
No CDs (Score:5, Interesting)
Backup and preservation of investment? (Score:5, Interesting)
I think this has been said before... (Score:2, Interesting)
And to all the people who laugh when you tell them that the record companies would rather have you pay twice or more for music that you already bought, well here's proof. They really, honestly, do believe that what you bought is not yours. It's still theirs to do with as they please.
Starting tomorrow, I'm going to start bringing my CD's back, even old ones. Nothing of this was mentioned when I bought them, and I don't think this is fair. Hence I want my money back. I urge everyone to do the same.
I hope this comes to court (Score:5, Interesting)
The only question that remains then is "which of the two statements is perjury?".
buffering... (Score:4, Interesting)
These people really don't get it do they? (Score:1, Interesting)
However this "belief" is just horse poo poo. Is their goal now to kill the MP3 player market and drive us back to portable CD players? It would seem so.
I realize that this is their opinion, hopefully they won't convince a judge/senator/congressman that they are right.
What are we buying? (Score:5, Interesting)
I can fully understand (assuming that I am only buying the rights) that I can't legally copy the music and give/sell that to someone else, but I'm no longer clear on what 'buying' a CD actually buys me.
Media levy .... (Score:3, Interesting)
The only things I burn to disk are data, and mixed CDs for playing in my car. As far as I'm concerned, I've never stolen anything from them, and they're the ones stealing me by charging me this levy under the assumption I must be comitting theft.
They will never convince me that I don't have right of first sale on my CDs, and they will never convince me that I can't buy a CD and then listen to it on whatever device I wish to.
Someone really needs to stop this absurdity with the recording industries.
This is too much... (Score:5, Interesting)
I understand copyrights and piracy and all the issues around all that. That isn't my focus for this article...
If it is indeed the RIAA's choice to try to prohibit putting one's music on one's portable, this latest thing is lunacy. It IS fair use to listen to one's music on alternate devices that one owns!!! Every artist I know (including myself) WANTS people to listen to their music!!! How is this latest thing going to PROMOTE music? How is it going to create or keep FANS interested?
I don't normally get hot under the collar about this stuff, but this isn't very smart on their part. When you've bought a CD or bought tunes from some service, the listener has every right to want to listen to it! Putting a copy on a portable (or putting it on a backup CD) doesn't amount to piracy - it is normal use.
Many of us give away music in an effort to try to get people to discover our sounds. MOST of us WANT people to jam/groove/listen to our music while doing things that are important to fans (music is a part of daily life for most folks, and me, personally, I'd like to be a part of that - my musical friends feel the same way) and portables are a ubiquitous means of "being there."
You CAN'T forget about fans, RIAA! Period!
[/rant]
Sorry for the rant post, Slashdot. I feel better now.
CD price structure (Score:4, Interesting)
Being able select individual tracks permits you to pay only for the oats, leaving the turd on the road; thus killing another well established profit model.
Re:Backup and preservation of investment? (Score:5, Interesting)
They're killing their base... (Score:2, Interesting)
Vent vent vent...
-jake.
Re:Big surprise (Score:3, Interesting)
if you are talking about the power of money in getting a Senator to vote on a bill, you are at least somewhat accurate (though this has much more to do with the fact that post-Civil War, we have two popularly elected houses of Congress)
If, instead, you are talking about "one dollar, one vote" in actual elections, you are out of your mind. There are many, many examples of political races where the loser had a much better financed campaign (The Forbes campaign is one perfect example of a phenomenally well-financed campaign failing miserably.) Poltical connections and negotiable values are much more valuable than money in our current political system.
crap, there are NOT easily replaceable CDs (Score:4, Interesting)
Replacement CDs (Score:5, Interesting)
Therefore:
If you're not allowed to make your own backups then the music industry should accept that providing you have proof of original purchase they have to provide you with replacments on demand when the original gets lost, scratched or whatever.
Lets not even get into what happens if (like me) you emigrate to a different country and your whole DVD collection (hundreds) won't play anymore because of the purely artificial restriction enforced by region code.
Small Change needed to Copyright Law (Score:3, Interesting)
Although this may kill most "Software Licenses" since most of them rely on the "Distributing from the CD to your computer" (or "Distributing from the Hard Drive to the Memory") to add ungodly amounts of restrictions "over and above" copyright law.
Baloney. How did that get modded up? (Score:5, Interesting)
Your whole point about CDs costing less than iTunes is also bunk. Nearly every album on iTunes that can be bought as an album costs quite a bit LESS than any copy I can find in the stores on CD unless they are clearencing them out.
Your DRM tin foil hat theory is disturbing.
Speak to the RIAA with your wallet... (Score:3, Interesting)
But back to my point - this is a capitalistic country (mostly, friggin gov't.. but I won't get into that here) and in such an economy the consumer can best voice displeasure with a company by no longer purchasing their goods. We, in the US, take this power too lightly.
Stop buying CDs. Tell the RIAA you don't like their business practices by reducing their bottom line.
Re:I hope this comes to court (Score:1, Interesting)
Not Fair Use to rip CD to MP3? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Buy it again, Sam. (Score:2, Interesting)
CDs are non-physical now? Cool!
Good to know that walking out of a store with a dozen under my coat isn't theft of physical property.
Or perhaps I should stand in the middle of the shop aggressively rubbing the shiny side of their stock with a sheet of 50 grit while explaining to the irate staff that "replacements are readily available at affordable prices"? Hey, it ain't physical damage, you know!
Re:Big surprise (Score:3, Interesting)
DRM is irrelevant really; at least for some of us. Until they change the entire format and insist everyone in the world must chuck their CD players for a new format (good luck), the CDs must still work on the installed base of CD players, as you pointed out.
While it may be true that a Windows PC will try to execute the extra crap they have for DRM, my FreeBSD box keeps happily ripping CDs to MP3 for me. Usually, a new CD gets put into a CD player maximum of three times -- to sample it at the store, maybe on the way home from the store, and then into my FreeBSD machine to be ripped. Thereafter the CD goes into the rack, and the MP3s are what I use for playback -- either by burning mixed CDs or playing on my iPod.
As I've said elsewhere, the media levy here in Canada (which was applied to my iPod, and any recordable media I buy) says that I don't give a crap about how they think I can use their songs. Because I've already been charged for the right to use the tracks on alternate media. I buy a fair amount of music, and being treated like a child who might steal from his mom's purse doesn't impress me much.
It appears that the RIAA have backed into a corner (Score:5, Interesting)
They've sued their customer base.
They've spent millions on ineffective marketing campaigns.
They've pushed labels to cookie-cutter their music and bands.
Now they wonder how they're going to raise profits?
If they move forward with restricting our right to backup a flimsy media so that we can listen to the music that we've purchased the right to listen to, then we the community need to fire back.
ie - counter-sue the RIAA/MPAA on the grounds that we pay money for a product that is INTENTIONALLY DEFECTIVE.
They produce a products that are brittle, easy to break. They produce products which require a scratch free surface to play properly, yet the products are made of a material that scratches almost by air flowing over it. They produce products which illegally extend copyright, by making the encryption never ending.
I'd say there's enough there to start a massive world-wide class-action lawsuit and force them to refine their product, at no additional cost to us, so that they are scratch resistant, and have an encryption method that turns itself off after the legal copyright limit.
If they cannot do that, then they'll have to retract their position, and allow us to make backups of their defective products.
Running at Cross Purposes (Score:5, Interesting)
The downloadable music companies like Apple have always tried to argue that deep down we knew there was something "wrong" with using the illegal download services... that it was not just marginally illegal, but immoral. The RIAA's ever broadening definition of what violates their copyright keeps cheapening that concept.
To be honest with you, once affordable legal downloads became available I started switching over to them for convenience sake, and also for the added bonus of not being in violation of any laws. But now the RIAA comes along and says "guess what, that Culture Club CD you bought 10 years ago and ripped onto your hard drive because you don't own any audio CD players anymore... that was a crime". Well, at this point I'm breaking the law anyhow. So my choice is to either shell out a few grand to replace ever cassette tape and CD I ever bought with iTunes, or to keep playing the ripped, but legally owned stuff, knowing that the RIAA is still going to bitch.
But you know what? This probably does have an effect on how I'm going to buy music in the future. If the RIAA is going to argue that downloading a bunch of Bjork songs off a P2P service is the legal equivalent to going to Best Buy and buying the CDs and ripping them to my hard drive... there's no good reason for me to shell out the money anymore, is there?
If you can't listen to music anymore without being a criminal, then why pay for the priviledge?
I think we *should* give the RIAA what they want. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Big surprise (Score:3, Interesting)
Most popular music doesn't require high fidelity for people to get the highest quality of it. Take most pop music for the last 10 years as an example. A compressed 128kb MP3 of that sounds like the original, at least to 99% of the population. The remaining 1% I'm willing to bet don't listen to that crap. The main types of music that (to me) need the higher fidelity are Classical and Jazz. Few others need high quality music. Actually, most of the beatles songs probably sound fine in MP3 as well.
I myself prefer music in high quality. However, outside of Classical/Jazz I can't tell the difference. This is mostly due to a poor frequency hearing range.
Re:Baloney. How did that get modded up? (Score:4, Interesting)
Not to rain on your parade, but does anyone really care about artist's notes and track listings? I can make a track listing myself, one that doesn't include 90% crap music like most CD's released today.
The only thing I ever wanted to find in a CD case was some freaking LYRICS!
It's so annoying to have a song stuck in my head and not even know what the words are, just a few scrambled words and a tune. So, you'd think the best place for the words to the song would be the artists themselves, right? You can't exactly call them on the phone, the best you can do is buy the CD. The last four CD's I purchased did not contain the lyrics to the songs inside. That was about six years ago.
Now, if a song gets stuck in my head, I download the MP3 and look up the lyrics in google, then play it a few times until I learn all the words, and *poof* it's out of my head.
As a side note: I seriously think the only reason songs get stuck in my head is because I get stuck on a verse and don't know what comes next, so it backs up and tries again. Once I learn all the words, I stop thinking about it.
Re:Backup and preservation of investment? (Score:1, Interesting)
Hypocrits (Score:1, Interesting)
I then buy a Sony Vaio PC.
I then buy a Sony CDR Burner.
I then buy a Sony CD-R AUDIO 50 pack.
I then use my Sony Vaio to make a backup of my Sony Music CD with my Sony CDR Burner onto a Sony CDR AUDIO cd which I then play in my Sony Car Radio.
And now they say I'm not allowed to do this? They ENCOURAGE it. They give us all of the tools to do it. Hell they even make those bullshit "audio" CDRs for it.
The EFF should just walk into the court room with all of the above "devices" and submit them as evidence.
Re:Big surprise (Score:4, Interesting)
You're not going to like this [boingboing.net] then are you.
(Emphasis mine). This basically means that it's your job to ensure that you CD player can play non-CDs which are nobbled to within a hairs breadth of not playing. They will only replace it if it's been pressed improperly not if the DRM causes it not to play.
not really (Score:2, Interesting)
Hard currency (e.g. silver coins) is another matter, and in that case it is real physical property with inherent value, but that's a very small proportion of currency these days.
Re:Congress was not impressed with their arguments (Score:2, Interesting)
Seems that someone noticed that Senators with iPods ask tougher questions when faced with "content industry representatives" at hearings. This group is asking people to donate money to buy your senator an iPod. From their site:
Plus, we're going to pre-load each one with examples of the cultural richness made possible by sharing and collaboration - public domain content, Creative Commons content, and audio messages about the importance of balanced copyright policy. It will be engraved with the words "listen to the people." And it will arrive at each Senator's campaign office with a letter of explanation and a list of all the people who helped pay for it.
Interesting idea.
SharkJumper
I think the problem is that existing DRM sucks (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Big surprise (Score:3, Interesting)
http://www.bl.uk/collections/sound-archive/record
And:
http://www.arancidamoeba.com/mrr/whoownswho2.html [arancidamoeba.com]
This one is THE best single not-so-independent "independent" label family tree I have seen. There are yet more "independent" labels owned by the big guys that are not in this diagram, but from this you can't assume that an "independent" label is independent.
Another page on that site ( http://www.arancidamoeba.com/mrr/ [arancidamoeba.com] - "Some of your friends are already this fucked" ) is a great read.
If you want to get into music, you're best off fronting the cash yourself to record, produce, and master your record, and then find a good independent PROMOTER and work out a contract on that basis. That way, you go into it making money (not an advance, another word for "loan") right away and the record company cannot charge you inflated costs for recording, engineering, and mastering your music - and this is also the best and sometimes ONLY way to retain full ownership of your work.
Queen didn't set up Queen Music, Ltd. for no reason. Pink Floyd didn't set up Pink Floyd Music Publishers, Ltd. on a whim. They got fucked over at first, then got smart about how they dealt with the record companies. Acts like MC Hammer, Vanilla Ice weren't so savvy - especially Vanilla Ice. Because he was in hock to the record companies, they called the shots, and when they made up the whole "gangsta" bit he had no choice but to go with it. A lot of artists who hit it big on the charts are getting f'd over royally in the process, and generally only the ones who produce hit after hit become savvy enough to know how to deal with the record companies. Heck, Prince was in so bad with the record companies (on the creative control aspect, not so much financial in his case) he changed his name and pulled a lot of other crap in order to try to get his label to drop him so he could work out a better deal with a different label.
Re:Backup and preservation of investment? (Score:3, Interesting)
The answer is the acidic dyes they used to print the discs early on. Anything prior to 1991 (afaik) used inks that were not safe and started to eat the discs after 10 years or so... later discs used more benign vegetable dyes. That's why you noticed the pinholes, probably starting around 2000 on, I'm guessing?
Re:CD price structure (Score:3, Interesting)
Royalties say how much the publisher is willing to pay per CD and how much the artist (and others) agreed to accept. I wouldn't call that "IP value".
I am also not sure where the figure of $5 per CD for royalties comes from. Maybe it's pretty close, maybe not, but I'd like some hint of how it was calculated or where it was published.