RIAA Doesn't Like the "Used Digital Music" Business 300
An anonymous reader writes "Ars Technica reports on the developing story between the RIAA and music reseller ReDigi, 'the world's first online marketplace for used digital music,' who first came online with a beta offering on October 11th, 'allowing users to sell "legally acquired digital music files" and buy them from others "at a fraction of the price currently available on iTunes.'' If the notion of selling 'used' digital content is challenged in court, we may finally receive a judicial ruling on the legality of EULAs that will overturn the previous Vernor v. Autodesk decision."
Honor system (Score:3)
Re:Honor system (Score:4, Interesting)
Not the honor system, but it relies on the idea that a CD is a license to listen to the music. The RIAA should put their whole inventory online, assign them uuid's hashed with the users uuid, and provide a clearing house so that it's the NUMBER on the cd case that entitles you to the music, not the CD itself. it's a thought... closer to reality then stomping out the practice of selling used music is.
Not that I want to help those asshole culture pimps along or anything.
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Informative)
Ever look at the fine print on an old LP? Same thing applies. You have never "owned" the music, you just have a limited playback license tied to the physical object.
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Informative)
That language is illegal under The Clayton Act of 1914. The Clayton Act was an anti trust act that prevents restrictions on reselling and rentals. Trying to control market of used items with an nda is illegal price fixing.
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Interesting)
I think the RIAA will argue that iTunes, CDs etc are the distribution mechanisms for licensed products.
They can argue that all they want, but a CD, a downloaded MP3, and a book are all identical as far as copyright law is concerned. All are copies of copyrighted content whose ownership has been transferred to the purchaser. The only part of copyright law that concerns licensing is granting rights to material you have copyrighted to another entity (person, business, etc.). For that, I agree that an iTunes sale can also include licenses for things like making limited multiple copies, transcoding to a different format, etc., and those licenses can be explicitly declared as not transferable in the event of a resale of the actual original copy.
Just because a licensed product exists in physical form doesn't mean that you don't need a license to use it.
You have been tricked by the big media companies into believing a lie. Again, there is no license mentioned in copyright law other than the licensing of the exclusive rights of the copyright holder. Once you have a copy of copyrighted material in your possession, you are free to do with it as you wish, as long as you do not violate any of the exclusive rights listed in copyright law, and none of those rights concern simply your personal "using" (reading, listening to, watching, etc.) of the material.
Re:Honor system (Score:4, Insightful)
a CD, a downloaded MP3, and a book are all identical as far as copyright law is concerned
Until the RIAA realize they can't get money this way and a new revision to the copyright is suddenly introduced in Congress.
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It seems they managed to sneek the DMCA in but ever since then they have been struggling. Apparently the internet is starting to rule over the idiot box when it comes to political advertising and that battle is still on going, as the idiot box audience dies off. So it is more likley that if they start reviewing copyright laws too much they might be shocked to find they go in the other direction.
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Informative)
The law doesn't work the way you want it to, I fear.
They can argue that all they want, but a CD, a downloaded MP3, and a book are all identical as far as copyright law is concerned
Wrong. "Phonorecords" are different in copyright. For example, you don't need any special licence to rent out DVDs, but you do for CDs.
and none of those rights concern simply your personal "using" (reading, listening to, watching, etc.) of the material
If you cannot consume the media without a copy of it being made (e.g., in the memory of the player), there's plenty of room for weasels in copyright law.
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Informative)
Transitory "copies" do not violate copyright. There's case law behind that. See here [proskauer.com], for a bit of info.
Beyond that, I'd argue that any "copying" necessary to reproduce the work as it is obviously intended to be rendered (i.e. audio and/or video playback) would be "fair use," as the work would be useless otherwise.
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Various copyrightable items are different in various ways, but copyright law does not grant the copyright holder the exclusive right to control private use of a copy by its owner, for any copyrightable item.
There's a circuit
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Interesting)
Not quite... copyright grants the creator of a work the exclusive right to manufacture copies of it and to perform it in public. Copyright doesn't say anything about using a work. For example, if you buy a book, you don't need permission (license) from the copyright holder to read it, cut up the pages and remix it, lend it to your friends, etc, as long as you don't make any extra copies. The same thing applies to, for example, a music record - the copyright holder has no say over when, how or how often you play the music, or whatever else you wish to do with it, and long as you don't manufacture extra copies or perform it in public.
A shrink-wrap agreement can restrict what you can do with a product, but that has nothing to do with copyright. The shrink-wrap agreement is considered a part of the purchase agreement. It only applies to the purchaser, not to anyone he gifts or lends the product to. Even if the purchaser is required to apply the same terms to anyone she sells or gifts the product to, there's not much the producer can do if she forgets or ignores it. The producer can sue the first user, but the second and subsequent users are still not bound by the purchase agreement.
In the case of software, it's generally assumed that you need a license to use it. It's my understanding that this is because using software creates temporary copies of it in the computer's memory, and you need the copyright holders permission to create these temporary copies. To obtain this permission, you need to agree to a license agreement.
The courts don't seem to agree entirely that the temporary copies in the computer's memory should be considered copies in the context of copyright law, though, so I'm not sure how solid these license agreements are.
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The problem with shrink-wrap licences and EULAs is that there is often no opportunity to read them before making the purchase, and once you have opened the outer packaging most shops will refuse to take it back. It is even more problematic for PCs with pre-loaded software. Software is often installed by children too young to legally agree to the license too.
We need new laws to clarify the situation and make sure that customers have the right to refuse license agreements and get a full refund at the very lea
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" 117. Limitations on exclusive rights: Computer programs54 (a) Making of Additional Copy or Adaptation by Owner of Copy. — Notwithstanding the provisions of section 106, it is not an infringement for the owner of a copy of a computer program to make or authorize the making of another copy or adaptation of that computer program provided: (1) that such a new copy or adaptation is created as an essential step in the utilization of the computer program in conjunction with a machine and that it is used in no other manner, or"
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This interpretation, popular among copyright absolutists, does not hold up to the plain language of 17 USC 101. That shiny disk is either a "copy" or a "phonorecord" by the language of 17 USC 101. Which puts it under 17 USC 109, meaning that if you own the shiny disk, you can sell the shiny disk. Ownership of the shiny disk cannot be separated from ownership of a copy or phonorecord. If you merely hold a license, the shiny disk still belongs
Re:Honor system (Score:4, Insightful)
[citation needed] (Score:2)
That doesn't mean the license is not transferable. You can put anything you want in fine print, that doesn't mean it's the law.
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Sadly, with the DOJ talking about violating the TOS of a site as being a crime [slashdot.org] ... what you say may not be true for long.
We're pretty much getting bent over and subject to the whims of copyright holders, and they're getting more clout all the time. It's only a matter of time before hearing someone's stereo or humming a song will be a major felony.
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118 != "almost 150". That's even if you're only talking about the original song "Good Morning to All".
The copyright was registered in 1935, 76 years ago.
Re:[citation needed] (Score:4, Informative)
To be fair, 118 is relatively close to 150. The song may have been copyrighted in 1935... but it was composed much earlier and children were spontaneously singing it for birthdays, even adding the lyrics "happy birthday to you"
The fact that you can actually copyright a song that is >ALMOST 50 years old, authored by someone else is actually even more apalling
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Re:Honor system (Score:5, Funny)
Example? I looked at a few LPs on google images but couldn't see what you're talking about.
My God, I'm old.
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Except that for things that were traditionally thought of as "physical books" - like a difficult to copy book or LP - first sale doctrine has long trumped any aggressive "single party" contracts like these.
C30, C60, C90, go. I wasn't that hard to copy an LP.
But yes, a book was a pain in the ass, and not worth it unless you were using someone else's copier and paper -- and had nothing better to do and no money to not do it with.
Re:Honor system (Score:4, Informative)
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You just pretty much described the "UltraViolet" locker service; unfortunately the implementation is buggy and laden with DRM.
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Even the honor system won't work. Now that the on-line retailers like Amazon and iTunes have a cloud service that stores your purchases, the concept of deleting local copies doesn't work.
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Not just the honor system. Now that apple allows users to re-download music at any time, there is no way for you to get rid of a song you purchased. You will forever own it unless you completely transfer your itunes account. That point alone may make the case fall appart in court.
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Informative)
Like reselling a physical CD after ripping it...
Actually, ReDigi is quite proud of their "forensic" software which authenticates tracks and rejects ones that are ripped.
From the ARS article:
"ReDigi says that it does this via its "forensic Verification Engine," which the service says analyzes each upload to make sure it is a legally acquired track—songs ripped from CDs are excluded. "
In other words, ReDigi is bending over backwards to satisfy the RIAA, but of course, it's not enough.
Re:Honor system (Score:5, Insightful)
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Homeland Security will be called in to strip search you and go through your house after every sale. If you have a garage sale, you may request a Homeland Security agent to be stationed in your garage for the duration of the sale. For $40 extra, they'll use lube.
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legally acquired? (Score:3)
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Re:Honor system (Score:5, Funny)
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In other words, ReDigi is bending over backwards to satisfy the RIAA, but of course, it's not enough.
That's because the threat to the RIAA is, and always has been, the dwindling of the music industry's hegemony over sales of recorded audio. If an industry arises that threatens their (still!) ridiculously high prices on iTunes etc., then they're in trouble. They do *not* want a race-to-the-bottom for the price of mp3s. It might also make P2P piracy look much more benign (does anyone care about the crime of stealing pennies?), and it could get that dangerous idea of "sharing" into the heads of the general
Re:Honor system (Score:4, Insightful)
And a digital file is a copy, even if it's your only one.
A book is a copy, even if it's your only one. Yet none of the anti-digital arguments work against print media. "You can't sell a book because nobody can prove you didn't photocopy the thing in its entirety before selling it." Nobody at the used book store cares, yet music sellers want selling music to be illegal because nobody can *prove* there wasn't a copy made.
This will be interesting (Score:5, Insightful)
Now the RIAA has flip-flopped by acting as if these digital files are NOT equivalent to physical items...I guess their position will be where the money is, regardless of what's logical or their prior actions.
Re:This will be interesting (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:This will be interesting (Score:5, Insightful)
The hypocrisy is breathtaking, ain't it?
For purposes of RIAA propaganda, making a copy of a song you bought is "stealing", just like physical property.
But for their purpose of destroying the second-hand market, you never really owned the physical property in the first place, so you can't sell it.
Re:This will be interesting (Score:5, Insightful)
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And, if you damage your physical copy, you have to repurchase it, no replacements for you. It's not a license, it's a physical product. I had hoped you included that one as well.
No worries, guys, I put the request in. (Score:2)
from: [ace37]
to: webmaster@google.com
date: Tue, Nov 15, 2011 at 13:38
subject: Digital media and IP Law
--
Dear Google,
Please buy the RIAA and reinvent digital media in a more sane, fair,
and rational fashion.
Thanks,
John
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Not really. I don't think they've been too successful at stopping CD ripping software and hardware (and hell, the whole concept) from being legal.
So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:5, Insightful)
They've already been trying to do this.
In the PC games market, tying games to Steam - I bought Portal 2, and discovered it required me to install Steam to get the install and get the fucking software to run.
What does this mean? Well, I can make it run. But I can't, when done with it, give the copy (serial and all, uninstalled from my computer) to a family member or friend as a gift.
iTunes does much the same thing. You can't buy something and then send it to someone else, in a "deleted from your account, credited to theirs instead" transaction.
The cartels salivate at killing the used market because they think it means more sales.
Re:So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:5, Insightful)
The cartels salivate at killing the used market because they think it means more sales.
It can mean more sales. If used book stores burned every book they bought, the sales of new copies of those books would increase at least a tiny bit...and that sliver is what they're after.
That's what I'm assuming anyways. If they think that 1 used book sale = 1 lost new book sale, as with piracy they'll be sorely disappointed.
Re:So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:5, Interesting)
It can mean more sales. If used book stores burned every book they bought, the sales of new copies of those books would increase at least a tiny bit...and that sliver is what they're after.
That's what I'm assuming anyways. If they think that 1 used book sale = 1 lost new book sale, as with piracy they'll be sorely disappointed.
If they thought that, they'd just buy the used books at 30% and destroy them.
The problem with digital content, is that when properly cared for it doesn't degrade. Vinyl disks wear out with use. Cars rust. Even books get cruddy. Unless a digital recording is released in a higher fidelity, a 20 yo used copy doesn't sound any worse than a new one.
I'm waiting for a sub-culture, a digital Amish, as it were, of people who only consume media that's at least N years old. People who band together with the latest hardware, but only content that's old and used. Device drivers will have to be open source and blessed by a software shaman. Maybe I'll start it for tax purposes....
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Re:So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:4, Insightful)
Sadly, I think we are headed more towards a "100 years from now" future where copyrights have been extended to 250 years (after all, that's "limited", right?) than a future where copyrights were kept at 95 years and content was allowed to fall into the public domain.
Then again, a hundred years is a long time. A hundred years ago, movies were vastly different than they are today. They didn't even have sound. It's possible that 100 years from now, watching a 2011 movie would be as interesting to the average American as watching a silent movie is to the average American of today.
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A hundred years ago, movies were vastly different than they are today. They didn't even have sound. It's possible that 100 years from now, watching a 2011 movie would be as interesting to the average American as watching a silent movie is to the average American of today.
It's come close to reaching that point for me already; I spend more time here than I used to watching media.
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Until used books stores realise used books aren't a very economic fuel source and stop buying them.
Then all book lovers realise they have infeasible large piles of books building up which they will never be able to get rid of, and re-reading them becomes more attractive then buying new ones.
Re:So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:5, Insightful)
But purchasers of books take resale value into account, so destroying the used book market may well mean that demand for books *decreases*:
I've known people who buy (low brow) books to read once and then re-sell. It is a cost/convenience trade off. They could go to the library, but that's a hassle. Say the hassle is worth $8 bucks to them. They buy a book for $12, read it, and sell it back for $4.
They are paying $8 in order to not deal with the library.
Destroy the used book market, and now they need to pay $12 to read that low-brow book once. If it's not worth it, then they don't buy, and overall book demand may decrease. Detroit learned this lesson the hard way when they had the bright idea of building cars that weren't meant to last long enough to have a high re-sale value. The net result was *not* an increased demand for the product.
Re:So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:5, Insightful)
They've already been trying to do this.
In the PC games market, tying games to Steam - I bought Portal 2, and discovered it required me to install Steam to get the install and get the fucking software to run.
What does this mean? Well, I can make it run. But I can't, when done with it, give the copy (serial and all, uninstalled from my computer) to a family member or friend as a gift.
iTunes does much the same thing. You can't buy something and then send it to someone else, in a "deleted from your account, credited to theirs instead" transaction.
The cartels salivate at killing the used market because they think it means more sales.
Gotta be perfectly honest here: Going by volume of whining alone, I'm apparently the single, solitary person left on this planet who doesn't sell every damn thing he owns the very picosecond I get bored with it*. No, seriously. I've never looked at a game I've had and thought to myself, "Man, it's absolutely vital that I get about 10% of the money I paid for this back; I mean, COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY VITAL, to the point where my inability to do so, coupled with my apparent lack of reading comprehension and research and a video gaming mindset stubbornly stuck somewhere in the 16-bit era where it was most convenient for me, renders this purchase nothing but a mistake".
For me, long before "I MUST SELL THIS BACK VERY VERY SOON TO RECOUP MONEY" comes into my mind, the thought of "I most likely don't need this luxury item in the first place" wakes up and stops me from wasting my apparently precious money on this sort of thing if I need said money that badly.
But apparently, again going solely on how loud the whining gets, that's just me. Guess I'm a "tool of the cartels", or whatever label the entitled generation wants to attach to me, because I'm actually responsible with my money BEFORE I spend it.
Hint: Failing to get 10% of the price you paid for a game back by selling it is NOT what is keeping you from being rich, nor is failing to get gifted games a few months after release what is keeping your friends or family from being rich (especially since, given time on Steam, that same game will be around 75% off anyway).
*: Solely because modern physics has yet to determine if time itself has granularity.
Re:So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:5, Informative)
The fact that you personally don't want to sell it (or trade it) is irrelevant. The fact that other people do want to do that affects the market and ultimately the price.
Also, even if you may not want to sell your games used, you can certainly *buy* your games used. If you want a 10 year old game that's pretty much going to be the only way to get one.
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Re:So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:4, Insightful)
You do realize that Valve made Portal and Valve runs Steam, yes?
So? He bought it in a box, but when he tried to install it found that the box is really just a gift certificate for a game tied to an online ID.
That's why you need to install steam the same as you need to install Origin to run an EA game. It's their distribution system just like iTunes.
No, actually it's why the last Valve game I bought was the original Half Life. They might think being their customer means that they get to control how I use the game that I purchased, but I disagree. Other people seem to be happy with it, so they stay in business, but I'm not going to help them (and no, I'm not going to pirate their stuff either - if they don't want to make it available in a form that I want to buy then I'll spend my money on something else).
Re:So this is different from prior attempts how? (Score:5, Insightful)
So? He bought it in a box, but when he tried to install it found that the box is really just a gift certificate for a game tied to an online ID.
Just like it says on the back of the box. Kinda hard to see in that picture, I know. It's not like he shouldn't have known exactly what he was buying, had he done due diligence.
Now, that doesn't address the key point about whether you should be able to resell the games. I can definitely understand Valve's reluctance to allow it, however. For physical objects, used reduces the quality, and can be difficult to find and sell (usually occurs at extremely high premiums - say hi, Gamestop!). Digital copies don't degrade and can be bought and sold easily (instantly, and with no third-part premiums). Basically, it isn't impossible to imagine that a developer would sell only half (actually, that may even be optimistic) as many total copies as they otherwise would. Essentially, it would turn into game renting - except that with a sufficiently established system, the "renting" would be almost free (you could resell the game for, theoretically, exactly or only cents less than what you paid for it).
It's really hard for me to get angry at Valve for not allowing that, especially with the insanely good sales they have on nearly constantly.
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Meaningless (Score:3)
Re:Meaningless (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Meaningless (Score:5, Insightful)
There's no way to stop a user from retaining a copy of the file without yet *another* level of some nasty DRM
How is this any different from used CDs? There's nothing stopping you from copying the CD and then selling it. In fact, there's nothing stopping you from just downloading the music and skipping the buying step altogether except the idea that you need to own a license to the music, and that license is what they are selling, the file itself is largely irrelevant.
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The RIAA hates used CDs also and would stop them from being sold if they could. Unfortunately (for them in some ways, for us in others), selling a piece of plastic that you bought is a lot clearer ownership transfer than copying a few files and saying "you own these now."
This is a very important fight for many reasons. (Score:5, Insightful)
Lots of considerations should go into this. What happens when someone passes away, does their mutli-thousand dollar music collection somehow become magically worthless? What about someone going through a divorce or a bankruptcy? Can these be considered assets and taken from one person and granted to another?
The first sale doctrine needs to apply in common sense situations like this. If you buy something, including a license, it is only common sense that you would be able to resell it. That being said if a license is sold the original terms should also be accepted. I'm not advocating simply sharing it, I'm talking about removing it from one place putting it in another.
People would never tolerate the loss of first sale doctrine in any other aspect of their life as it would be absurd. Can you imagine toyota demanding a transfer fee or the right of first refusal when you want to sell your car?
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The problem being that you *can't* really even pretend to 'give away' digital content without DRM. In the event of death, I think you can easily say the previous owner will not likely use their copies again, so inheriting makes sense (though should not count in any way in terms of 'estate tax'). In a divorce, I think practically both get the 'property' (maybe a *smidge* unfair to the music industry, but I doubt this constitutes much 'loss'). For purposes of bankruptcy, I'd say it's fair to call the music
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That is not my problem. If the business model they have set up is not technically and realistically workable then come up with another model. Part of that new model will ahve to accept that the value of a digitial music license for which I have no transfer rights is then much less than the value of a physical music license which i can transfer via selling the phsyical storage medium.
That is the real crux of this whole issue and one of the many reasons the ??AA like to play both sides of the fence. It pre
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They have a workable business model in which they do not allow you to resell your music. You are trying to get them to come up with a business model that suits your purposes and asking them to find ways to cater to your whims. You are the one who needs to come up with a workable business model. As far as we can see, allowing people to resell music violates copyright, because you do not have the right to create new copies to sell. Reselling digital music necessarily involves creating new copies of the media.
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Well, if the seller does not remove his copy and the buyer get's the copy, then the seller is actually pirating music and profiting from it. Secondary market can exist and it is way better then what we have now — a lot of filesharing networks. Allowing people to resell what they rightfully bought will be a step towards the end-users and might actually decrease the numbers of those people who don't buy digital music because there is no way of recouping the cost of buying it in the first place.
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The problem being that you *can't* really even pretend to 'give away' digital content without DRM.
I agree. But given that I have already agreed to DRM in many cases (e.g. Steam), allowing resale/lending would at least give me some benefits to offset the costs of DRM.
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What happens when you tell your wife to give that box of CDs to charity, and she grabs the wrong box? Do you still have rights to that music that was given away by mistake?
Fire? Scratched DVD?
I can borrow a DVD from my public library for free, for 2 weeks. Much better than the Redbox. Should they be able to make a copy of a rare DVD, lend the copy, a
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Here's how it would work. A figurehead would be nominated and if elected, would contractually agree to vote the way the People want. Electronic voting would be used to transmit the will of the people to the figurehead. Voting may or may not be secret ballot. (TBD)
Question. Would the "People" be defined as any voter, or just the register
Re:This is a very important fight for many reasons (Score:5, Insightful)
What happens when someone passes away, does their mutli-thousand dollar music collection somehow become magically worthless?
I always thought that it would be instructive for someone to stand in front of congress, hold up an MP3 player or phone and say, "There are 30,000 songs on this device. The Recording Industry insists that every one of those songs is worth at least a dollar. I have a great deal here for some lucky congressperson today - who wants to buy $30,000 worth of music for just five hunnert dollah?
"Do I have any takers?"
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In Capital vs. Thomas, the verdict was for $2,250 per song. So your 30,000 MP3 player/phone would be worth $30,000 if the songs were legitimate and $67.5 million if they were pirated. That makes the $500 sale price even better. It'd be 99.999% off!
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That wasn't the value for the music, that was the lost sales due to uploading. Physically stealing something, you have to pay restitution for not buying it. Uploading, you have to pay restitution for everyone else for not buying it.
The original example would probably draw questions such as, how did you acquire $30,000 worth of music legally? If you ripped it from CDs then it's not yours to sell, without supplying the original discs. If you downloaded them individually and paid 0.99 per track, then you s
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Can you imagine toyota demanding a transfer fee or the right of first refusal when you want to sell your car?
Microsoft and Cisco do it. That used router you bought? Its firmware was fully licensed, but since it's non-transferable you have to buy it all over again. (And since the router is a brick without firmware, they have you over a barrel on pricing.) I always thought it was unfair that such practices are allowed when they only hurt businesses even though people would scream were they applied to consumer goods.
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Just don't leave your MP3 player in the car
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Can you imagine toyota demanding a transfer fee or the right of first refusal when you want to sell your car?
I'd be quite surprised if Toyota were to do that, since i own a Nissan.
However, for the RIAA, that's just business as usual. They're quite happy to charge money for something they don't own.
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Can you imagine toyota demanding a transfer fee or the right of first refusal when you want to sell your car?
I'd be quite surprised if Toyota were to do that, since i own a Nissan.
To complete the analogy, Toyota in this case would be the RIAA, or UMG/whatever....can you honestly tell me that you would be surprised about the RIAA demanding a transfer fee on something they had no part of?
If only.... (Score:2, Informative)
I wish there were such a thing as used digital goods. If only someone would have thought of a way to make that work...I don't know maybe a major game retailer with their own digital distribution site/application. I don't get what the big deal is. DRM has made enough people sick of buying music, and when they do buy their "license" to the music, they can't do anything with it. People that pirate can do anything they want with their music. Wonder who's winning this fight. My solution to the problem is s
I don't understand (Score:2)
So publishers are allowed to sell copies of CDs, but the people who bought them are not? Besides, I don't think there is much money lost here, people won't sell music they actually like.
Oh goody (Score:2)
Don't worry, our President will save us!! (Score:5, Funny)
I'm sure he'll be standing up to the RIAA any minute now....
gonna be soon.....
he's probably on his way....
just be patient.
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Sure, the reason why Obama will never take a stand on this issue is because it's not his job to take principaled stands on issues & thereby encourage the legislative branch to move in the desired direction...
Except that that's exactly what he does on other issues & should be doing here but won't because then the Dems would lose the record labels patronage.
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Sure, the reason why Obama will never take a stand on this issue is because it's not his job to take principaled stands on issues & thereby encourage the legislative branch to move in the desired direction...
Except that that's exactly what he does on other issues & should be doing here but won't because then the Dems would lose the record labels patronage.
He has taken a strong stand on this issue by appointing several RIAA lawyers to high positions in the DOJ and then having that department, which is directed by the executive branch, mind you, submit friend of the court arguments that call for harsh penalties in virtual property cases.
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RIAA wants to have cake, sell it, eat it. (Score:5, Insightful)
Either intellectual property is a physical good that can be legally acquired, owned, and resold as a used item, or it is not, in which case stop fucking calling it theft.
Re:RIAA wants to have cake, sell it, eat it. (Score:5, Funny)
It's like the wave particle duality. The intellectual property exists in two mutually exclusive states.
1. it is physical good that can be legally acquired, owned, resold, discarded and stolen
2. it is also intangible, can't be owned, can't be sold, can't be discarded nor stolen.
Just like the quantum world, the wave function collapses only when you try to make a measurement. Until you try to measure you can't be sure if it's physical or intangible. Until it is measured, it exists in both mutually exclusive states concurrently to maximize profit for the copyright mafia.
MIND = BLOWN
If... (Score:3)
The main issue is that people don't actually own the music they purchase, they own a licence to the music and the licence is flagged non transferrable. That is why I believe the first step is for a country to precisely describe in law what digital property is and also through some means encourage its adoption in a fair and universal fashion.
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Your idea is flawed for one simple reason: as soon as the content can be played — it can be copied. Hardware locks and TPM hardware can make it really difficult, but still, there is no way to stop people from copying and sharing. Humans are social animals and and such they have an intrinsic need to find and share information. What RIAA and the likes of them try to do — trying to change the human nature so that a very small percentage of population can profit (the RIAA, MPAA and their publishing
No Musician Wants to Feel Used (Score:2)
I don't like it either (Score:2)
I haven't pondered this long enough to form a complete opinion, so I'll hold off on that a little. But what is clear and has been repeated numerous times is that the music and movie industries are late and reluctant to enter the digital age. Their knee-jerk reactions have been to block, restrict and limit all new media. By doing so, they are hurting themselves badly. Worse, they are hurting their customers and any other business that wants to participate in new and emerging markets.
They REALLY need to g
Gotta love Slashdot (Score:5, Funny)
Latest entertainment industry power grab ... ... ...
Slashdot: "Down with the stupid evil corrupt entertainment industry!! Dirty lying evil bastards!!"
They're making a "Dr. Who" feature film
Slashdot: "Oooooh - shiny!!"
Re:RIAA Kicking Itself? (Score:5, Insightful)
No. The hint is in the name: copyright, i.e. the (exclusive) right to make copies of a work. The copyright owner has the right to make copies. When you buy a CD, you may get (either implicitly or explicitly, depending on your jurisdiction) the right to make a single backup copy and the right to copy portions of it into the memory of a playback device as required to listen to it, but you don't get the right to make arbitrary copies. Whether you sell the copy or give it away makes no difference. When you buy a track online, a copy is created, but by someone who is authorised by the copyright holder to make copies.
It's going to be an interesting legal case because (practically) every 'move' operation on a computer is really a copy-and-delete-the-original operation, so the idea of selling the original doesn't really make sense because the original was an ephemeral copy in your network stack - the version on your hard disk is a copy of that, the version on your media player or on a backup disk is a copy of the copy.
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It's going to be an interesting legal case because (practically) every 'move' operation on a computer is really a copy-and-delete-the-original operation
So you're saying when I defragment my hard drive, I'm violating copyright for any music file that's partially (or wholly) moved during the defrag? And here I thought I was doing a pretty decent job of playing by the rules.
Taking it that far... (Score:3)
I've actually talked to a copyright lawyer who said with a straight face that every router between me and someone I send a copyright-laden file to is guilty of violating the "mechanical copyright" of the rights owner. The settled case law on the matter revolves around radio stations making mix tapes in preparation for broadcast; the stations pay for a license to do so, and the idea of a transient mechanical copy needed for replay is held to be identical to the copying of a .mp3 file into memory as part of
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The copyright owner has the right to make copies.
This is correct, but it's about the last place you are.
When you buy a CD, you may get (either implicitly or explicitly, depending on your jurisdiction) the right to make a single backup copy and the right to copy portions of it into the memory of a playback device as required to listen to it, but you don't get the right to make arbitrary copies.
First, I'm speaking about the US unless otherwise stated, as I know that law best.
That said, there is nothing in copyright law that says you are allowed to make backup copies of audio recordings...only software has this right. But, you do have the right to make as many copies as you want of any copyrighted material as long as you don't distribute them. So, like you could make 1000 copies of the latest Harry Potter book and store them in your basement,
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The RIAA doesn't exist simply because of wishing.. Artists themselves pay and support them to help keep channels of content monetized - it's their livelihood. I understand that artists may have newer ideas about distribution, but so far new channels are considered off-limits until thoroughly examined. This new method is simply too new for them to accept, IMO.
Your sweeping suggestion implies that content should be free. That may or may not be true, but building a career in making the content could be vas
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Don't forget just using digital music to reproduce non-digitally
- performing commercial music with a backing track from the original and charging for it
- charging to go on a camping trip, and during that time singing along wearing earbuds some commercial music.
- host a party, acting out in front of a movie screen showing a commercial movie, having charged for tickets to the party.
- paying to place my car in a parking lot, but playing a CD to others. someone records a video of it and sells it, with the audi