RIAA on the run?

from slashdot:

“We talked about Charlie Nesson of Harvard Law School before, and it may not have been known to you, but he is backing former student and Jammie Thomas’ new lawyer, K.A.D. Camara. Ars is reporting that Nesson is upping the charges against the RIAA. Not only is file-sharing fair use, but the $100,000,000 the RIAA has collected through fear is due back to those wrongly accused. He’s also increasing the number of fronts he’s fighting. On Camara’s website, he indicates that in another case, Brittany English (pro bono), they ‘are asking the courts to declare that statutory damages like these — 150,000:1 — are unconstitutional and that the RIAA’s campaign to extract settlements from individuals by the threat of such unconstitutional damages is itself unlawful, enjoin the RIAA’s unlawful campaign, and order the RIAA to return the $100M+ that it obtained as a result of its unlawful campaign.’”

big brother is storing your e-mails

Internet records to be stored for a year
Details of every email sent and website visited by people in Britain are to be stored for use by the state from tomorrow as part of what campaigners claim is a massive assault on privacy.
By David Barrett, Home Affairs Correspondent
Last Updated: 3:20PM BST 05 Apr 2009
A European Union directive, which Britain was instrumental in devising, comes into force which will require all internet service providers to retain information on email traffic, visits to web sites and telephone calls made over the internet, for 12 months.
Police and the security services will be able to access the information to combat crime and terrorism.
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Hundreds of public bodies and quangos, including local councils, will also be able to access the data to investigate flytipping and other less serious crimes.
It was previously thought that only the large companies would be required to take part, covering 95 per cent of Britain’s internet usage, but a Home Office spokesman has confirmed it will be applied “across the board” to even the smallest company.
Privacy campaigners say the move to force telecoms companies to store the data is the first step towards the controversial central database at the heart of the Home Office’s Intercept Modernisation Programme, which will gather far more detailed information on Britain’s online activities.
Simon Davies, director of Privacy International, said: “I don’t think people are aware of the implications of this move. It means that everything we do online or on the phone will be known to the authorities.
“They are using this to produce probably the world’s most comprehensive surveillance system.
“This is a disgraceful example of the covert influence that Brussels has across our freedoms and liberties. The entire episode has been marked by a litany of secret dealings, vicious political games and a complete absence of transparency.”
Phil Noble of privacy group NO2ID, said: “This is the kind of technology that the Stasi would have dreamed of.
“We are facing a co-ordinated strategy to track everyone’s communications, creating a dossier on every person’s relationships and transactions.
“It is clearly preparatory work for the as-yet un-revealed plans for intercept modernisation.”
Another EU directive which requires companies to hold details of telephone records for a year has already come into force, and although internet data is held on an ad hoc basis this is the first time the industry has faced a statutory requirement to archive the material.
Information held includes the details of who contacted who, and when, but does not involve the content of emails being stored.
The taxpayer will reimburse internet service providers and telecoms companies for the costs associated with storing the billions of individual records.
Thierry Dieu of ETNO, the European telecoms networks operators association, said: “We regret that the legislation has been put through without real consultation with the players in the market.
“The UK is the only country which has decided to reimburse the cost of retaining all the data. It remains to be seen whether this will cover all the costs.”
A Home Office spokesman said: “It is the Government’s priority to protect public safety and national security. That is why we are completing the implementation of this directive, which will bring the UK in line with our European counterparts.
“Letters will go out to communication service providers telling them that it is coming into force. We are talking across the board, to all communication providers.”
He said communications data played a “vital part” in a wide range of criminal investigations, such as the hunt for the killer of Rhys Jones, the 11-year-old schoolboy shot dead in Liverpool in 2007, and the prevention of terrorists attacks.
“Without communications data, resolving crimes such as the Rhys Jones murder would be very difficult if not impossible.
“Access to communications data is governed by Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act which ensures that effective safeguards are in place and that the data can only be accessed when it is necessary and proportionate to do so,” he said.
A European deal on storing data was first pursued by Charles Clarke when he was home secretary in 2005.
At the time, a Home Office spokesman confirmed that a major mobile phone company which had previously stored its data for just two days had agreed to retain the information for a year in exchange for £875,000 in taxpayers’ money.
A report compiled by ETNO in 2004 said that a large internet service provider would need to store between 20,000 and 40,000 terabytes of data – of the equivalent of 40 trillion emails – if it was required to keep all traffic data for 12 months.

COPYRIGHT OFFICE FEES TO CHANGE AUG. 1, 2009

Copyright Office Fees Set to Change on August 1

The Copyright Office has submitted to Congress a proposed new fee schedule that will go into effect on August 1 unless Congress rejects the schedule. The fee for registration of a basic claim to copyright filed electronically will remain $35. Filing on a Form CO, which is filled out online, printed with 2D barcodes that contain the information from the application, and mailed to the Office, will increase to $50. Filing on traditional paper forms without barcodes will be $65 to reflect the higher cost to the Office of processing these forms. The $65 fee will apply likewise to paper filings of applications for group registration for database updates, contributions to periodicals, and published photographs. To read the complete report and see the entire proposed fee schedule, go to the Copyright Office website at www.copyright.gov. (Read further information.)

artists oppose RIAA tactics

For years music industry lobbyists, headed by the RIAA, have gone after illegal file-sharers – supposedly in the best interests of the artists. Unexpectedly, a group of top musicians has started its very own lobby group to avoid being exploited by these very same record labels, who tend to abuse copyrights for their own sake.

The music industry and its lobbyists often claim they protect the right of artists with their copyright extension plans and anti-piracy efforts. In reality, however, they tend to ignore the people who actually create the music, while making sure that a steady flow of cash goes into the pockets of the label’s bosses.

In an attempt to have their voices heard, a group of leading musicians have started their own lobby group, the Featured Artists Coalition (FAC). The group includes members such as Robbie Williams, Radiohead and Travis and aims to end the extortion-like practices of the record labels and allow artist to gain more control over their own work.

Last year, Travis experienced the aggressiveness of the labels first hand. When the band encouraged fans to share one of their songs with friends, IFPI went after a fan who posted the song on his website. The IFPI realized that it made a mistake and backed off, but it clearly shows that the labels are out of touch with reality.

Unfortunately, the example above is just the tip of the iceberg. In Europe, music industry lobbyists have managed to strike deals with Internet service providers to go after those people who download music illegally. The artists were never involved in these negotiations though, and many of them oppose the aggressive stance of the labels which turns fans into criminals.

“The digital landscape is changing fast and new deals are being struck all the time, but all too often without reference to the people who actually make the music. Just look at the recent MoU on file-sharing between labels, government and the ISPs. Artists were not involved,” Brian Message, co-manager of Radiohead said.

Similarly, Europe is currently planning to extend copyright on audio recordings from 50 to 95 years, gently pushed by music industry lobbyists of course. Again, the musicians prefer a lowering of the current copyright term to 35 years instead.

The artists feel that the record labels are using copyright on the artists’ work to their advantage, restricting free access. “It’s like taking out a mortgage on a house, paying off the mortgage and you still don’t end up owning the house,” Radiohead guitarist Ed O’Brien said.

Another worry for the artist is the revenue on digital sales. Quite often, the deals record labels make for selling music online are vague and the artists don’t get paid at all. Last year we already reported on one such artist who found his music on iTunes, but never received a penny. Frustrated, he decided to upload his music onto BitTorrent sites so people could download it for free.

According to Radiohead’s Ed O’Brien, who’s also a member of the newly formed lobby group, this is not an isolated incident. “The music companies did a deal with Nokia recently, so they could launch phones with access to all sorts of music. We think they all received advances from Nokia, but nobody is saying who got what – and we think some of that money should go to the artists,” he said.

The newly formed lobby of top musicians hopes to set the record straight, and is demanding fair compensation for all artists. They believe musicians should have control over their own work instead of being the puppets of record label bosses. We can’t say that we blame them.

infringement is not theft! enough already!

Tell me how you steal an intangible concept.

Theft is the taking and carrying away of the personal property of another which has value.

Let’s take a download: if someone gets a download without permission, they haven’t stolen your music because you still have it. And they haven’t stolen any money to which you were entitled because you cannot prove that entitlement with any certainty. You never had the money in your possession. “Stealing” is an emotional word to make the act look evil. Copyright infringement is copyright infringement, not theft. It is actionable but it is not criminal unless the law says so (and that’s only defined as done for pecuniary gain. Here’s how the code described when infringement becomes criminal:

§ 506. Criminal offenses4
(a) Criminal Infringement. —

(1) In general. — Any person who willfully infringes a copyright shall be punished as provided under section 2319 of title 18, if the infringement was committed —

(A) for purposes of commercial advantage or private financial gain;

(B) by the reproduction or distribution, including by electronic means, during any 180-day period, of 1 or more copies or phonorecords of 1 or more copyrighted works, which have a total retail value of more than $1,000; or

(C) by the distribution of a work being prepared for commercial distribution, by making it available on a computer network accessible to members of the public, if such person knew or should have known that the work was intended for commercial distribution.

(2) Evidence. — For purposes of this subsection, evidence of reproduction or distribution of a copyrighted work, by itself, shall not be sufficient to establish willful infringement of a copyright.

(3) Definition. — In this subsection, the term “work being prepared for commercial distribution” means —

(A) a computer program, a musical work, a motion picture or other audiovisual work, or a sound recording, if, at the time of unauthorized distribution —

(i) the copyright owner has a reasonable expectation of commercial distribution; and

(ii) the copies or phonorecords of the work have not been commercially distributed; or

(B) a motion picture, if, at the time of unauthorized distribution, the motion picture —

(i) has been made available for viewing in a motion picture exhibition facility; and

(ii) has not been made available in copies for sale to the general public in the United States in a format intended to permit viewing outside a motion picture exhibition facility.

A teen-ager downloading a song for himself without permission (or for his friends) is not engaging in a criminal act as defined by the law. Period, end of story.

Creators need to wrap themselves around the law as it is, not as they imagine it.

All the bullshit to the contrary,  is just simple minded nonsense.

Louis B. Mayer once said something like: I love the movies,
even when you sell it, you still own it.

change the copyright code

Allow private civil lawsuits for infringement by the original owners asnd asuthorsd of the creative property, but only allow actual
proven damages like any other injury lawsuit.

RIAA laying off emloyees

It’s been reported that the RIAA is firing people. Do a google
search for news on RIAA; these articles should show up.

real pirates don’t download muic; they kill and steal

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — With an alarming number of tankers and cargo ships getting hijacked on the high seas, the nation’s maritime academies are offering more training to merchant seamen in how to fend off attacks from pirates armed not with cutlasses and flintlocks but automatic weapons and grenade launchers.
Colleges are teaching students to fishtail their vessels at high speed, drive off intruders with high-pressure water hoses and illuminate their decks with floodlights.
Anti-piracy training is not new. Nor are the techniques. But the lessons have taken on new urgency — and more courses are planned — because of the record number of attacks worldwide in 2008 by outlaws who seize ships and hold them for ransom.
At the California Maritime Academy in Vallejo, Calif., professor Donna Nincic teaches two courses on piracy. Students learn where the piracy hotspots are and how they have shifted over the years.
“If I’ve done anything, I’ve shown them that this isn’t a joke, it’s not about parrots and eye patches and Blackbeard and all that,” Nincic said. “It’s very real and it’s a problem without an easy solution.”
Emily Rizzo, a student at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy in Buzzards Bay, Mass., worked aboard a 760-foot cargo ship last year as part of her training. As the vessel sailed the Malacca Straits in Southeast Asia, she served on “pirate watches,” learned to use hoses and took part in drills with alarms indicating the ship had been boarded.
The training “brought to light just how serious it is,” said Rizzo, a 22-year-old senior from Milwaukee. “The pirates can get on board these huge ships and they know what they’re doing. It’s not like the old days.”
The International Maritime Bureau reported 293 piracy incidents in 2008, an increase of 11 percent from the year before. Forty-nine vessels were hijacked, and 889 crew members were taken hostage. Eleven were killed and 21 reported missing and presumed dead, according to the bureau.
Piracy hotspots have been identified off East Africa and in Southeast Asia, South America and the Caribbean.
Typically, small numbers of pirates — as few as two and up to 15 or 16 — draw up alongside ships in motorized skiffs and use grappling hooks and rope ladders to clamber aboard. Some of the biggest ships might have no more than two dozen crew members.
Often the pirates are armed with knives and guns. Pirates off the coast of Somalia have taken to firing automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades.
In the old days, ships were armed with cannons to guard against pirates. But nowadays, crew members for the most part do not carry guns. And maritime instructors say that arming crews is not the answer.
It is illegal for crews to carry weapons in the territorial waters of many nations, and ship captains are wary of arming crew members for fear of mutinies, Nincic said. Also, some worry that arming crew members would only cause the violence to escalate.
Instead, the best defense is vigilance, Nincic tells students.
“If you demonstrate a culture of awareness, that you look like you know you’re in pirate waters and are clearly standing watch, patrolling, etc., the pirates know you’re going to be more difficult to board and are possibly going to wait for the next ship and board the one that’s easier,” she said.
The Maine Maritime Academy in Castine, Maine, is putting together a new anti-piracy course on nonlethal defense for ship crews, said Ralph Pundt, chairman of the school’s marine transportation department.
The course would teach how crews can use observation techniques, lights, fire hoses and evasive action. The best way to combat pirates, Pundt said, it to keep them from boarding in the first place.
Michael Durnan, a 42-year-old senior at Cal Maritime, was working on a tanker filled with soybean oil in 2001 when he confronted four pirates standing on the ship’s stern in the Bay of Bengal off Bangladesh.
Durnan approached the men with a 2-by-4, but they threw some equipment overboard and then jumped over themselves, escaping into the darkness in small fishing boats.
“They take everything and sell everything,” he said. “Anything on a ship can be sold to somebody for something.”

pirating? a myth is afoot

Music Piracy Not That Bad, Industry Says
Written by Ernesto on January 18, 2009
The Internet has been a blessing for the music industry. Although the RIAA and IFPI frequently complain about piracy, their own research shows that only 10% of all illegal downloads are considered to be a loss in sales. Meanwhile, piracy has shown them how to monetize music online, and turn it into profit.

Every year, RIAA’s global partner IFPI publishes a digital music report, which can be best described as a one sided view of the state of digital music consumption. For several years in a row the report has shown that the sales figures of digital music have gone up, but still, the industry continues to blame piracy for a loss in overall revenue.

One of the key statistics that is hyped every year, is the piracy ratio of downloaded music. Just as last year, IFPI estimates that 95% of all downloads are illegal, without giving a proper source for this figure. Interestingly, those who take a closer look at the full report (pdf), will see that only 10% of the claimed illegal downloads are seen as a loss in sales.

Contrary to the RIAA’s arguments in court, the BPI and IFPI don’t believe in the “every pirated download is a lost sale” myth. Matt Phillips, BPI’s Director of Communications wrote in an email to TorrentFreak: “No, we don’t think every illegal download is a lost sale (and never, ever, have, if my memory serves me correctly). The estimates for lost sales revenue is [sic] not calculated on this basis.”

To come up with a ‘best guess’ of the real losses for the UK market, the music industry have commissioned Jupiter Research. For two years in a row, Jupiter estimated the losses are to be about equal to the revenue that comes from digital sales. If we combine this with the ‘only one in 20 downloads is paid for’ guesstimate, only one in 10 illegal downloads is seen as a loss in sales.

Of course we will be very reluctant to draw conclusions from research that is commissioned by the music industry itself, however, it would interesting to know what the effect is of those downloads that are not seen as a loss. Could they perhaps used by consumers to discover new music, and generate revenue in the long run?

What is clear from the report is that ‘pirates’ have shown the music industry what consumers really want. The music industry is slowly starting to recognize that they have to compete with piracy, by offering high quality products. In the 2009 report, for example, IFPI proudly reports that many services now sell DRM-free music, while they themselves are the reason why these restrictions were implemented in the first place.

In the report IFPI writes: “An important development in 2008 was the licensing of more online stores to sell downloads without digital rights management (DRM), meaning consumers can play the music they acquire on any portable device. In January 2009, Apple announced it had signed deals with leading record companies to offer eight million DRMfree tracks at flexible price points. The move is expected to significantly boost download sales.”

Besides the usual anti-piracy ramblings on how ISPs should help to disconnect pirates from the Internet, the report documents another interesting trend. The music industry clearly recognizes that they’ve done something wrong in the past, and is now promoting unlimited download services, either ad supported or for a low monthly fee. If done right, this ‘piracy inspired’ model might just be the future of music consumption, or at least a worthy competitor to piracy. But then again, they will find something else to complain about sooner or later.

RIAA changes its abusive tactics

The Wall Street Journal and Ars Technica are reporting that the RIAA has announced a fairly dramatic change in its strategy to fight piracy.

Beginning immediately, it will no longer sue individual file sharers or do dumb things like harass universities.

Instead, the RIAA will report suspected infringers to ISPs, who will then investigate their customers and issue warnings or implement restrictions as needed. The benefit to ISPs who play along (participation is voluntary) is they’ll be able to better control congestion by applying this policy—something they’ve been trying to do for a while now as their customers keep using more and more bandwidth.