The RIAA, should they be allowed to do this?

[NrgUser]

You are just not going threw this forum and looking to read something very intresting... Well you might find it in this therad and you might not. I basiclly got some free time and well, I started researching the lwas the RIAA has broken, they have broken a few.

Since march of 2003, the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) has scared well over 10 million americans and some foreigners to think they will sue them. In most cases they are all talk but no action is taken, now in mid-april over 20 people have been issued subpoenas to many americans, some have been fined, some were fined and blacklisted from there ISP and other major ISP's. The RIAA has successfully taken over Kazaa servers, and also will take down Morphues and Grokster's servers and all of there occupients, The kazaa userlist was at an all time high of 100 million plus, you log on now and only a few Million are left (Only if you get lucky). The owner of Kazaa and all of it's activity has claimed no responsiblity for any actions by her software and now wishtes to release new software that is pay to listen. She thinks that this new service can offer major averticeing for many company's in the near future.

The RIAA has gone after many college students, one of them ran a search engine that would bascilly find files on a server and list them for you. He states that he had no idea that this was happening and that the search engine was not meant to be used in that way. The search engine project supposidly turned off by the RIAA, and so they thought they had signed a paper saying his site would close, after they found out they started to appeal casue they say they were "Tricked". These college students get hit very hard, try $15,000 out of your pockets.

Many ISP's have counter-sued the RIAA since they are breaking the internet privacy act in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 2000. Version states that they tactics are brutal and that they should not be allowed information to there clients, even if they are breaking the law. I aswell think there tacktics are brutal and will hurt this econemy very badly, not to mention it will take the RIAA over 2191+ years to sue everyone, now let's do some math:

"I pulled out my calculator to see just how long it would take the RIAA to sue all 60 million P2P music file traders at a rate of 75 a day. 60,000,000/75 = 800,000 days to subpoena each person or 800,000 days/365 days in a year = 2191.78 years to subpoena each person".
By INQUIRER staff: Tuesday 29 July 2003, 10:31
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=10733

Now let's do some more math:

Average $13,000 per case, 13,000 x 60,000,000 = $780,000,000,000

Now how is that not going to hurt the econemy? and not to mention our national debt right now is in the billions.

Want to know the real reason why the RIAA is attacking? The past ten years we have made major bands come from no where and get big fast:
Mettalica
Brittney Spears
Backstreet boys
P-diddy
50 cent
eve
eminem
Dr Dre
and many more

But in the past year these artists have either been on tour or just have not made an album. Not evento start going down mettalica's new CD's. The reason so many people don't buy CD's as much is becasue in the past 2 - 3 years the newiest bands have just sucked. This is due to no talent, most of the newier bands can't even play there own insturments! It's really pathedic. alot of head singers can't even sing there own songs right. and why would you want to waste $20 on a new CD when you can save that $20 for something sles and listen to it, and the go and buy it? That'a another reason why the RIAA is attacking, the lack of samples of the music. only a fre music stores acully carry that but most of the time it's selceted music only.

In conclusion I would like to say that the RIAA is breaking most the laws, they are breaking the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 2000, please discuss ad I want to here opions.

[xNaChOx]

That article is very true, but there are some iffy spots:


The RIAA has promised not to sue people who did minimal downloading. They are not looking to sue every body who has downloaded off of Kazaa. They know that it is impossible. They are not jerks. The people the RIAA are targeting are people who have 75,000 songs from a P2P service. You are not getting sued if you have 200.
Most ISP terms of services, and most of the terms of services from web hosts, state that the ISP/host has the right to disclose of any information to the proper autorities if there is a legal investigation. Plain and simple. Do not agree with the TOS? Don't use the service.
I recently read a very interesting PC World article saying why there is no excuse for content piracy. People always come up with the excuse, "I only want one song, I don't want the entire album." I guess it is alright for you to steal a McDonald's hamburger patty if they won't sell it to you without the buns. People say that the artist should not care about CD sales because they get very little money. Then it is OK to steal meat from a supermarket, because the farmer does not get lots of money from the deal. You think taking songs from Kazaa is ok because people dont make songs available online? Ok, then I guess I can go and steal pizza from the pizzaria when they do not deliver.
You say people dont buy the CDs because the artist stink? If the artists stink, then why do you want their songs? The album has not been released? Wait!

[Diesel]

Ever stop to think when writing this long-winded post that it just might be helping to propogate the paranoia that the RIAA actually cares about the little guy downloading music?

You know, if people just actually ignored the RIAA, and let the P2P authors continue to write their workarounds, or actually investigate better options than what's fed to them, then they might actually realize that the RIAA is, and always will be powerless to do anything.

The fact is that Kazaa, Napster, etc. were never effective ways to distribute music. Over the past 6 years, I would still say that Usenet and IRC are much more effective, because they simply require one to place the data in a central location, and then it's widely available for anyone who wants it. With P2P services, it requires people to continuously remain online to serve the files.

This is precisely why people continue to try to find better P2P services as they drop by the wayside, falling under due to poor design and lawsuits, while Usenet and IRC sharing continues unimpeded.

[BRiT]

Simplisticly said, Usenet owns. It was useful back in 1987 and it's still useful today. That's well over 16 years without any fundamental changes. With the advent of PAR2 and newer Usenet readers with integrated support, it's getting even easier to use.

My favorite line that applies to the RIAA/MPAA and all other businesses is "Adapt or die". That is the way of technology and evolution. Why should laws be made to protect a business model that is doomed to fail?

[Diesel]

On Today @ 02:49 PM BRiT had this to say in Post #4 (http://www.aliensoup.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=84556#po st84556)

My favorite line that applies to the RIAA/MPAA and all other businesses is "Adapt or die". That is the way of technology and evolution. Why should laws be made to protect a business model that is doomed to fail?

Well, the funniest part of that is that the RIAA hasn't adapted to the fact that they're attacking the weakest links in the music swapping chain. And the very stragety they're following is doomed since they're attacking a system that is constantly adapting to any threat it faces.

Napster was attacked and taken down, so the P2P developers came up with Gnutella, which is decentralized. Gnutella has inherent design drawbacks, so they created Kazaa. Note how the RIAA hasn't really been able to do anything to Kazaa itself, and the biggest threat to Kazaa right now that the RIAA can mount is to make getting the actually songs you want a little more difficult.

These actions may stop a "mom & pop" user who simply expects to get what they want immediately and give up if it doesn't happen, but the regular users who are determined to get the songs they want won't let a little bump in the road stop them so easily.

This is precisely why I say that the best way to deal with the RIAA is to just ignore them. Getting around their methods is a very simple procedure because they're simply out of touch with the way the technology community works. The tech folks are always 5 steps ahead of them, regardless of how many press releases they can produce.

[jadedskies]

I agree with Dan and BRiT.

The RIAA (and their Australian counterparts, ARIA) have been, to put it bluntly, screwing their customers for years. A CD that costs almost nothing to produce, gets sold here for $30. Now, I'm faced with the choice to get an item for free, or pay $30 for this album, with money I don't really have, to support this customer loyalty that they have built up. Not.

And it's simply fighting a losing battle. I used to go around shady trading message boards. Then, I heard of this wonderful new service called Napster. That started to suck, I moved to Audiogalaxy...then Kazaa...and now I just use IRC. It'll never stop.

[Shadow]

I do by cds, but only of bands that I feel are worth the money. If the RIAA either priced CDs at a cheaper cost or only signed bands that are worth the money, then I would most likely buy more music. But until then, I will file share bands that I only like a couple songs of, and also file share to demo albums out and see if I like them, and I buy the CD if so. I have done this many times.

"The RIAA has promised not to sue people who did minimal downloading. They are not looking to sue every body who has downloaded off of Kazaa. They know that it is impossible. They are not jerks. The people the RIAA are targeting are people who have 75,000 songs from a P2P service. You are not getting sued if you have 200."

Not true. I saw somebody that only was sharing 8 songs. And the RIAA slapped them with a 750$ fine.

[nethgilne]

"Now how is that not going to hurt the econemy? and not to mention our national debt right now is in the billions. "

First and foremost, by putting big money back into the hands of record producers, this money will in turn be funneled back down and actually help the economy. These lawsuits would essentially reduce consumer savings and forcibly increase spending for goods which consumers ought to have been spending on for the past 2 years - a time during which instead they were pirating these goods.

Don't get me wrong, I am by no means a fan of the RIAA. Unfortunately, I am a criminal, in that I have downloaded 2,000+ songs and movies and performed many other acts of internet piracy. Downloading music is illegal, and it should be illegal. What, however, I think peeves consumers - the unspoken truth about the RIAA and motion picture industry and these other Hollywood-based entertainment businesses- is their lack of a meritocracy. You advance within the recording and motion picture associations through connections and not through hard work. Inefficiencies run rampanat throughout the RIAA and movie studios, and although we do and ought to place a price on creative visions and talent, we have to face facts: The recording industry and motion picture industry do *NOT* abide by the concepts of a free-market economy. Think about it, there is little if ANY educational overhead in pursuing an acting or singing career. As Kelly Rowland clearly exhibited, only massive amounts of publicity achieved through a focused multi-million-dollar advertising campaign are required in order to turn talent (of which there is plenty) and good looks (good genes run rampant within the euroblooded americans) into platinum success. What therefore is occuring, is that we Americans are being MILKED for our entertainment. This includes music, the advertising industry, and the motion picture industry. Although the motion picture industry is an entirely different story, my case is more easily validated when examining the RIAA. Something like 30% of Bad Boy Entertainment's executives graduated college? Surely business and creative direction and expertise for PDiddy's corporation would be more expediently advanced by CEOs with MBAs and analysts with decades of analytical experience. Instead a lukewarm but emotionally receptive public is being forcefed medicore ideas and concepts at an alarmingly slothish rate.

So, what I'm really saying here is this: Don't try to circumnavigate the intellectual property laws in place, they are there for very good reason. Instead be vocal and push for anti-trust maneuvering against the motion picture and recording industries. Actors, actresses, and musicians - and more importantly producers, directors, and executives, are reaping huge *uncompetitive* benefits due to a network of 1980s blow-buddies and the remnants of Richard Gere's giggalo swinger group. We pay 14$ a CD and 10$ a movie ticket not on the margins of a lengthy education or intellectual overhead (the reasons why legal, health, and engineering costs are so great), but instead we are paying on the margin for the ultimately unwarranted, uncompetitive services of a few GenV/X tennis buddies. Oh, and they also control public opinion via our media outlets and vote 98.5% democrat according to a 2002 sample census conducted by Cato? **** that, let's revolutionize.

[Shadow]

"vote 98.5% democrat"

If that's a fact, the RIAA has my full backing.

ANYTHING it takes to boot the Bush

[Diesel]

"the Bush"
:lol:

[nethgilne]

Well, Shadow, chances are that your disdain for Bush is ENTIRELY unfounded, and unlike most conservatives out there (actually, I'm more of a liberal leaning centrist than anything), I am all ears as to why Bush is a bad president, and who would be better. Either way, you are a complete idiot if you would endorse the RIAA solely because its backers vote against Bush. That's pathetic and shows partisanship idiotry at its worst.

[Diesel]

First off, knock off the name calling. It won't be tolerated on Alien Soup, and this is your last warning on the issue.

Second, chances are you have no idea why Shadow feels his way about Bush, so for you to say that his "disdain... is ENTIRELY unfounded" is probably way off base. I'm sure he has his reasons, and for him, they are completely valid. He is perfectly entitled to his opinions, so please don't try to invalidate his *opinion* with assumptions and name-calling. It doesn't benefit either side of the discussion.

Personally, I can say my disdain for his administration is completely founded in real issues, at least to me. You may disagree with my reasons, but that does not make them any less valid.

[nethgilne]

Well, let's hear it. I want to hear the reasons behind your "opinions" as to why the Bush administration is bad, or why it pushes your buttons in all the wrong ways. The more "real" the disputed issues are, the more our discussion can be founded in rational thought - *edit* mind you, I don't agree with a lot of the things that the Bush administration does, but by no means does that make any Democrat, independant, Libertarian, or Green a better candidate - or at least according to my interpretation of their platforms; however, to base one's opinion on the RIAA's controversial decision on a PARTISAN platform (two entirely separate spheres), I mean, perhaps I did go overboard with the 'idiot' insinuation, but you have to admit, that is at least a little bit ridiculous.

[Alyth]

On Today @ 03:08 AM nethgilne had this to say in Post #13 (http://www.aliensoup.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=85915#po st85915)
Well, let's hear it. I want to hear the reasons behind your "opinions" as to why the Bush administration is bad, or why it pushes your buttons in all the wrong ways. The more "real" the disputed issues are, the more our discussion can be founded in rational thought - *edit* mind you, I don't agree with a lot of the things that the Bush administration does, but by no means does that make any Democrat, independant, Libertarian, or Green a better candidate - or at least according to my interpretation of their platforms; however, to base one's opinion on the RIAA's controversial decision on a PARTISAN platform (two entirely separate spheres), I mean, perhaps I did go overboard with the 'idiot' insinuation, but you have to admit, that is at least a little bit ridiculous.

nethgilne: It sounds to me like you want to start a new debate and that is fine. Might I suggest you start a new topic in the debate forum and see where it goes? :) Everyone's opinions are welcome here and everyone has a right to voice them, so why not start a new thread where you can explain your point of view and let others agree or disagree with their opinions too. :D

[Diesel]

I'm gonna agree with Alyth on this one.
If you want to start a discussion on the pros/cons of the Bush administration, start a new thread. It's outside the scope of this one.

Personally, I won't be getting involved in any political discussions. I have my opinion, others have countering opinions, and my experience is that neither side will sway the other because they typically spew out the same arguments heard on late-night TV, and they ALWAYS revert back to the same arguments when countered with something that attacks their beliefs and opinions.

It's usually just better to agree to disagree, but political arguments never end up that way. However, as long as it's kept civil, mature, and intelligent, I have no problems. :)

[LinuxGeek]

Personally, I find that the RIAA is taking this matter to far and shouldn't go out suing parents, and kids as I find this completely wrong. However, I can understand completely why they're doing this which is to stop people from downloading music and make them buy a CD. But, If you noticed it is only scared very few people and they're still going to continue to download music and burn CD's and even sell them.

There really isn't much way to stop this period besides shutting down the entire internet which isn't going to happen due to the fact they be shutting down way to many people..

Bush has nothing to do with that and I appreciate if you didn't ditch him. Bush is a good Christian man and is doing the right thing on the world today and he has made the world a better place then any democrat will ever.

If you want a democrat, in the office then you are going to run into nothing but whores, and sluts and two timing bitches.

Vote For Bush 2004!!!

Now, back on top here. The RIAA will never win and they will only loose and try to take others down with them in the process. I hope Mircosoft does buy Kazaa, and then Mirco has enough money to make File Sharing Legal, and has the ablity to fight the RIAA.

From what I know, I believe that Bill Gates, is wanting to implent File Sharing into the Windows Media Player new version.

[Diesel]

There's a really interesting discussion airing on TechTV. It's called 'Music Wars: Open Mic', and it's a town-hall forum discussion with people from the recording industry, file sharing industry, and multimedia industry, as well as consumers and end-users.

After watching for about 45 minutes, and specifically, listening to the opinions and viewpoints of the representatives of EMI and Maverick Records, I am now thoroughly convinced that the record companies are interested in adapting to the new marketplace with the sole purpose of finding a new business model that will do nothing more than put money into their own pockets by screwing consumers.

They've been spouting off about how there are alternatives out there which are viable outlets, such as Real's Rhapsody service, or Apple's iTunes. Yet, when someone disagrees with them by saying that the service is sub-par, or perhaps that it doesn't address the issue in a suitable manner, instead of defending the product with valid counterpoints, they simply try to invalidate that persons opinion by stating the same points over and over again, and ignoring any objections that are raised.

The record industry clearly has no intention of putting out a better product that consumers would actually be interested in buying. The entire issue is simply about control: they have no control over their product at the moment, and they want to wrest that control from consumers so they can keep feeding us the same mindless pap that they've been shoving down our throats over Top 40 radio for the past 25 years.

PS. Seriously, the politics discussion belongs down the hall. This is not an issue that involves Bush or his detractors, so either keep things on topic, or open another debate thread.

[LinuxGeek]

I'm a fan of TechTV myself :)

[Diesel]

http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2003/20030912l.gif

[hi02]

I did watch Music Wars. Everytime a valid question was presented the record company representatives just gave the audience a complete run around stating the same alternatives: "Rhapsody, Apple iTunes etc." In my opinion,
Chuck D was the best speaker along with Barlow.

In my opinion, the record companies must adapt or die out. Its the survival of the fittest. iTunes is the only thing I can think of that has come close to it.

I think the companies are suing to get back the money THEY THINK they have lost. There is no way to track how many people have bought a CD of an artist they discovered on Kazzaa. I think Kazzaa becoming a paying service is just a matter of time even Napster is coming out with a paying service.

If the record companies are looking for someone to sue, why don't they try Kazzaa and try to knock the out like they did Napster. I think they are just trying to send a message.

Another thing, I've heard people say when you download you hurt the artist but the artists rarely make their money from record sales, its from touring, merchandise etc.

I'm not going to discuss if downloading is right or not because that would open another can of worms.

[Diesel]

For one thing, they can't sue Kazaa. They sued Morpheus and the judge ruled that file sharing software is legal. So, now there's legal precedent protecting Kazaa. Also, Kazaa is incorporated abroad in some South Pacific island nation, so they're not subject to the same laws that Napster, an American company, is subject to. FWIW, that was done intentionally by Kazaa for this specific purpose, and was very smart from a legal perspective.

With iTunes, Barlow noted the biggest problem. With DRM, the file becomes completely invalidated when you switch computers or upgrade to a new computer. DRM only allows you to play the file on the computer it was downloaded on.
That's like saying "I bought this CD for $18, but it will only work in this particular CD player. When this breaks or I want a new one with more features, I'll have to buy another copy of the CD."

Obviously, it's another solution that screws the consumer, which is why the record companies are so willing to back it.

The problem with Rhapsody is that you're paying $10 up front to hear nothing more than mediocre quality streaming content. If you find a song you like and want to keep it, it's $.79 per song, so you're getting hit twice. Again, not a valid solution, IMHO.

After hearing Music Wars, I'm convinced that it's not at all about the legality of downloading. It's about control. The music industry is trying to control what you're able to listen to through terrible pay services, DRM, and bad distribution methods. They're not interested in helping the artists or the consumers. They're looking to fill their pockets... nothing more.

[hi02]

YES, control is a very big issue and I'm inclined to agree with you Diesel. At the end of the day, its about the money for the record company. That's it.

This is just evolution-- I for one want to see what happens.

If the record companies can't find an easy way to distribute the music , then I don't know.

[LinuxGeek]

I would guess the RIAA will try to sue Kazaa again, but Mircosoft is actually buying them out which I have a feeling they will be monitoring all file transfers just to see what people is downloading the most.

I find it funny though, Mircosoft products are the most pirated products and yet they're buying the system . LOL. and going to make downloading there products legally...

[Diesel]

Again, the RIAA has never sued Kazaa. They sued Morpheus, and lost. My guess is that the RIAA will never sue Kazaa because a) the company is not subject to most US laws, and b) Kazaa has the Morpheus legal precedent on their side.

[jadedskies]

Kazaa is always going to be a pain in the ass to sue.

Its offices are in Australia.
Its registered in Vanuatu.
Its servers are in the Netherlands (a filesharing haven anyway).
And the source code and its creators were last seen somewhere in Estonia.

Quite clever, really. This is why they've never been able to sue Kazaa.

I guess it's simply a matter of waiting for the record companies to get a clue. At the moment, I'd have to pay $30 for a CD. That's just not on. As soon as I can pay a reasonable price, without too restrictive DRM, I'd be happy to start paying for as much stuff as I can afford.