RIAA: so now we have a legal precident

news.yahoo.com.../ap/20030909/ap_on_en_mu/downloading_music_11&printer=1

Defendant: "I'm sorry, I thought that if I used the file sharing software, I was entitled to download all the music I wanted."
RIAA: "Oh, okay.... that'll be $2,000 then... never mind the millions."

Public relations fiasco aside, this is a major legal screw-up for RIAA. Everyone else reading this decision will use it as the basis for their defense.


Now...

I've made my position very clear, even two years ago, bulk swapping of music is wrong (as compared to trading CD's with your buds). It's unfortunate that the record labels are screwing artists, but currenlty, it's the primary system for artists to get promoted and paid. It's not unexpected that the music publishers would fight back... and this method is not unexpected. There's no such thing as a free lunch, and hacker the mentality that spread to file-sharers is resulting in this disruptive fallout... it's only going to get worse and more chaotic before it gets better.

I don't like how the RIAA is attacking supposedly "anyone" at random... it's the wrong response.

Eventually, they're just going to have to accept that their industry has changed forever. There's no way this is going to stop. They're foolish to waste time trying to stop it, instead of trying to figure out how they can use it to their advantage.

More than anyone else, the recording industry has themselves to blame. They charge extra for CDs (when it is now the cheapest way to package music) they charge very high prices while giving very little to artists, they bombard us with advertising for flavor of the minuite artists, while ignoring talented and or established artists. They recently announced drastic price reductions that we as consumers are unlikely to see since the entire price drop is absorbed by the store selling the music.

I don't condone stealing copyright material. I feel that most people will pay, if the price is right. The RIAA needs to realize that their drop in sales is the markets way of saying, "you are charging too much".

i dunno why the riaa never did this before with people and taping stuff from whereever to whereever, i think the only reason is that now artists really suck and they may only put out one er 2 cds and the artist will not make money like they would've in the old days when artists released many albums
also cds cost like 2 cents fer them to make the #ers should sell'em cheaper if they want ppl to buy them fer the album art which is basically what it is nowadays

[Edited on 10-9-2003 by banjoechef]

Actually, artists get far more money from live concert performances than they do for the actual CD sales (which is hungrily gobbled up by the labels).

I still dont understand how the labels expect to stay in business when they decide to sue and/or arrest thier very consumers... I guess they believe themselves to be the new version of the IRS? (Give us your money, or rot in prison)

I have said many times, its time for a

BOYCOTT!!!!!!

What we really need is the Sam Phillips of online music marketing. The industry is poised for a radical change, and the RIAA is doing everything they can to block it.

Originally posted by copcorn
What we really need is the Sam Phillips of online music marketing. The industry is poised for a radical change, and the RIAA is doing everything they can to block it.

In other words, the RIAA is hell bent on committing industrial suicide, and is interested in soaking every man woman and child that listens to music in the process. I wonder how long it will be until we have to pay royalties just to listen to music on the radio?

Let them sink like a log in the toilet...

lol yes boycott, but u'd have to get everyone to boycott, have fun DR

Originally posted by dragonrider

I wonder how long it will be until we have to pay royalties just to listen to music on the radio?

I know one country where you have to pay tax for listening to the radio or watching tv. Ask Zion...

They call it "kijk en luister geld". Watch & Listen (tax) money...

But anyway...


Boycott!!!

the RIAA is doubly screwing over the file shares....first off...they're secretely using them as marketing tools and then they turn around and sue their customers. I dont condone stealing in anyway shape or form...but this article gives you an idea of the tactics deployed by the RIAA..so go ahead...keep buying those cd's I for one think the music being put out is nothing but crap anyways.

"using them as marketing tools"

That article really has to come out into the mainstream!!!

Originally posted by WilliamI've made my position very clear, even two years ago, bulk swapping of music is wrong (as compared to trading CD's with your buds).

Well maybe you should get a job working for the RIAA.

Well i really think that talking about things like these at this site isnt good, as it can make this whole site to look bad..

But i must say one thing about this:

I will never stop. as long as it can be downloaded, i will download it.

"100011110000111100010010" this is not something that i will ever pay for. no matter what the 1:s and 0:s add up to.

# RIAA

Everything in life is free...we have only been deluded into thinking that living on this planet in this solar system costs money. Then we spend our precious little time here trying to get it.

This is the final secret of the Illuminati -



[Everything is permissable]

Originally posted by Voice_of Doom
Everything in life is free...

So... I can come and take your TV then?

Only if it's not a gas plasma... If it is, then I'll take it...

I have ONE question, how is TAKING something that doesn't belong to you NOT considered stealing?!

Don't tell me it's because it's on the web and it's there to be had for free.

If my Harlley-Davidson was sitting in a parking spot (Completely analgous to a music file "parked on someone's harddrive) at the diner would you walk up and drive it off?

If you did so without my permission you are a THIEF and will be arrested and prosecuted as such.

What is it about music files, that are OWNED BY the Record Company through a contract with the artist, that makes people think they can take them without paying for them?!

Would you walk into the record store and simply take the CD out of the store without paying? That's called Shoplifting and is a crime.

Ok now you are thinking, well the guy who has the computer ALLOWED me to "take" it from him. Well that doesn't fly either... HE STOLE IT before YOU did.

If you go buy a stolen car KNOWING it was stolen (that's called fencing) you go to jail.

You can't say you "didn't know" the music was stolen because if YOU don't have the CD - YOU STOLE THE MUSIC.

When Napster first came out I used it, before realizing this was ALL STOLEN music, then I QUIT. The minute I was informed that the music was pirated, the artist/label WERE NOT in the income stream from ads or whatever I QUIT downloading. I am NOT a thief.

I know it seems trivial because it is such a small amount of money we are talking about here on any ONE song. But theft IS theft.

If you have thousands of songs on your harddrive that you downloaded you are WELL into FELONY valuations (anything over $50.00 is a felony) under U.S. law.

Knowing we have many posters here that are not from the U.S. I will say that everything I have expressed here is based on U.S. Law.

If your country does NOT consider this theft than you are legal and shouldn't worry about from that aspect. But I would hope that you would consider the fact that there are THOUSANDS of poeple who have to feed their families off of income generated by cd SALES and go buy the cd instead of downloading it for free.

My last bit here, the audio quality SUCKS on these anyway! Everyone I have listened to sounds like it is in a tin box. I can spot a "former" MP3 translated to "Wave" in the first few seconds of hearing it play...

My $.02

PEACE...
m...

^^^

it'd be more like making a copy of your bike :p

I don't know what the situation in the US is, but here in Holland, your are allowed to download, not upload. It has somehting to do with a certan copyright law from 1917 So as long as I don't share anything I can't get in trouble.
About the price of cds, may people think they are too expensive, I agree. But if you only purchase albums of band you really like then most people won't have anyhting to complain. Unfortunately many a too damn spoiled and just want more and more music, I know people who have 500 cd's full with mp3's (!!).
I support the band I like by buying their albums, I bought the new Iron Maiden album for 25,50 euro's (DVD-audio version) a few days ago, I hope to get it tomorrow, is was released yesterday.
As long as I like the band I really don't care what I have to pay for the album

Anyway, commercial so-called 'artists', like britney spears, should burn in hell

[Edited on 10-9-2003 by Zion Mainframe]

same in Germany. It's ok if you download, so long as you dont have any shared media. I dont know how and why that's legal, but it is.