RIAA or no RIAA?

[Steve W]

I will agree that if you buy an omni wheel and give it to a friend then that is OK. I also do not have a problem with you buying a CD/Video and giving that to a friend as long as you don't keep a copy. It says that unauthorized copying is strictly forbidden. Unless I am mistaken, and I have been before, you are legally allowed to make a copy for your personal use as long as you own the original. If you give away the purchased copy then you are required by law to remove any and all copies.

Mike said " My friend purchased the CD, is it not for him to do what he wishes with it? If this includes giving out free (not for profit) copies to his friends, and the RIAA has a problem with that, they should not have sold him the CD."

Again, on the CD it states that you are not allowed to copy. If your friend has an issue with not distributing music that he has no right to distribute, then he/she should not purchased the CD. The rights to the music belong to the recording company or maybe musician not the person that purchases the music.

[Mike]

Originally Posted by Steve W

Again, on the CD it states that you are not allowed to copy. If your friend has an issue with not distributing music that he has no right to distribute, then he/she should not purchased the CD.

I think the OP was questioning if it should be legal, not if it is legal.

All of us in this conversation know downloading and sharing music is illegal, however (as of now) 23 of us believe that it should be legal. Civil disobedience is thus far the prevailing method of attempting to get it legalized.

[Steve W]

Originally Posted by Mike

I think the OP was questioning if it should be legal, not if it is legal.

All of us in this conversation know downloading and sharing music is illegal, however (as of now) 23 of us believe that it should be legal. Civil disobedience is thus far the prevailing method of attempting to get it legalized.

So if I can find people that are willing to say that we should be able to print money then this civil disobedience is OK. Laws are written to prevent anarchy. Why does everyone think that it is OK as long as it doesn't effect them. For example, I see that your team has lots of money.Sitting right there in front of our poor team is 6 laptops. We ask to use one of the laptops for price of a box of Krispy Kreams.We all agree that your team has too much money so we should have the the right to the laptop. We leave the event with the laptop and feel good that we have equaled the playing field some what.

Are you OK with this?

[Mike]

Originally Posted by Steve W

So if I can find people that are willing to say that we should be able to print money then this civil disobedience is OK. Laws are written to prevent anarchy. Why does everyone think that it is OK as long as it doesn't effect them. For example, I see that your team has lots of money.Sitting right there in front of our poor team is 6 laptops. We ask to use one of the laptops for price of a box of Krispy Kreams.We all agree that your team has too much money so we should have the the right to the laptop. We leave the event with the laptop and feel good that we have equaled the playing field some what.

Are you OK with this?

If a majority of the population thinks it is ok, then it should be legal. That is democracy.

If my team and your team both agree that you can have a laptop for a box of Krispy Kremes, then go right ahead. The problem lies in the fact that only your team agrees, not mine.

I'm pretty sure the 18-25 demograph that wish to download music outnumber the population of artists and whatnot.

Welcome to the democratically capitalistic society we call America. Heres a 1,200 calorie burger and 25g sugar soda.

[Tristan Lall]

Just for interest's sake, here's a Canadian perspective on this. Canadian law (and especially case law) is very different than U.S. law. There are no longer any grounds to sue for simply copying music in Canada, because the copyright authorities impose a levy on recordable media to account for any potential financial losses due to copying. It amounts to several cents for a single recordable CD (i.e. most of the cost of a blank CD goes toward this levy). Now, because they're already being compensated, and since they're the only ones with standing to sue for infringement (other than individual artists themselves, who can't be troubled to appear in court over a few dozen copies of their songs), music copying for personal use is pretty much unlimited, even if it might technically be a violation, because they're already being compensated in lieu of damages. (Provided that you use media on which the levy was paid.)

I'm not touching whether it's objectively right or wrong, though...copyright law here is bad enough, but look at the "Mickey Mouse" amendment to U.S. law if you want to see real depravity.

Originally Posted by Mike

If a majority of the population thinks it is ok, then it should be legal. That is democracy.

Or, alternatively, it's called tyrrany of the majority. If 50% + 1 of the U.S. population decided, "hey, we outnumber the Whites now, let's oppress them", would you agree in principle, that it should be legal? And what happens if you can't get a majority (say, there are 3 distinct points of view, or worse, a continuum of views)? What to do about the deadlock? Sorry, but this is no way to run a government.

Real democracy (as in, every citizen gets a vote on everything) is not a stable or an ethical way to run a government, because, simply put, most people do not become sufficiently informed to vote on every single issue with any sort of eye to the larger picture. Even if they were sufficiently informed, that 50% + 1 scenario, or something like it, could easily become reality.

Fortunately, nobody lives in a real democracy. We have levels of government that, if nothing else, exist to make sure that craziness like the above doesn't happen easily, because the representatives must cater to the whims of all people, and not just those in the majority. It's also why a representative's duty is not simply to act in accord with the majority of his constituents—he's supposed to be the one who distills the many disparate points of view into a reasonable solution. While this rarely works perfectly, it's better than mob rule.

[Lil' Lavery]

Originally Posted by Mike

If a majority of the population thinks it is ok, then it should be legal. That is democracy.

Even if it is democracy, last time I checked, the United States of America was a Republic...

I am against the RIAA, currently. The music backing up, etc, is obviously one of the biggest flaws. Also, free music sharing, to a limited extent, can also serve to help increase profit. You hear some music you like, you go buy it. etc.
But, there are those who do pirate vast quantities, and even profit off of the illegal distribution of music. I think the RIAA needs to focus it's efforts on those who use pirating as a means of income, or those who seriously do cause a financial dent in the recording companies, not those of us who own 2 or 3 burned CDs.
Encoding CDs, etc, to prevent us from "ripping" songs from them, only stops those who are not determined, aka the "little guys". The more determined, often those who stand to profit from it, will just evolve their technology as well.

[thegathering]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

Even if it is democracy, last time I checked, the United States of America was a Republic...

a federal democratic republic.


It's amazing how heated these debates can get.

Current ratio ~ 9-1 no-yes

[Astronouth7303]

It's simple for me: If they were quiet and didn't sue the **** out of whomever they felt like, I wouldn't mind.

But since they are being ***-**** to the customers that buy their ****, they can sit on a tack. (Don't argue the point - Sony's rootkit affected more honest people than pirates. They've classified copyright infringement as theft, equal to shoplifting. Most counter-measures affect the buyers and not the freeloaders.)

(Pardon the language.)

[sciguy125]

Personally, I think we're on the verge of a paradigm shift. I have a feeling that intellectual property laws will drastically change over the next few decades.

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/08/19/0342256

You have to realize that laws and morals are up to the people that enforce them. Each generation seems to change what it feels is important. As people change their attitudes toward social issues, laws change to reflect their new ideals. That's why women can vote and we don't have slaves.

[thegathering]

Originally Posted by sciguy125

Personally, I think we're on the verge of a paradigm shift. I have a feeling that intellectual property laws will drastically change over the next few decades.

I see the change happening much sooner. Over the next half decade, we'll see drastic changes to laws concerning intellectual property.

That's why women can vote and we don't have slaves.

Also why a Hutu minority controlling the people were able to commit genocide against almost a million Tutsi.

I share a similiar vision of the future as William Gibson, a future of revolutionaries and extreme polarities in culture. I want to believe that educated people will soon care enough to stop dangerous organizations such as the RIAA the same way Linux and GNU is fighting the Microsoft monopoly.

This poll so far has shown that the stunning majority of educated people who care about our future also care enough to want the reign of the RIAA to end.

This poll helps to confirm my vision of radical changes appearing in the near future brought by victims of the RIAA.

This also helps to support my theory that politics and free knowledge to do not match well. As we see politicians get more involved with the internet, we see the quality of the internet decrease with proposed regulations on internet traffic, content, and services.

Perhaps I'm crazy or perhaps I just want to see the internet restored to it's less threatened state 5 years ago, but I do not believe citizens' rights can be protected when there is an organization that has become so radical that has suggested students drop out of school to pay the RIAA fees, filed lawsuit against deceased grandmothers, and even tried to sue people who have never used computers without even the slightest suggestion of a crime.

[Mike]

Originally Posted by thegathering

This also helps to support my theory that politics and free knowledge to do not match well. As we see politicians get more involved with the internet, we see the quality of the internet decrease with proposed regulations on internet traffic, content, and services.

Well you see, the internets is a series of tubes. Its not just something you dump information on, not a truck.

I just the other day got, an internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday and I just got it yesterday. Why?

Vast amounts of information, vast amounts of information.

[Steve W]

Originally Posted by thegathering

This poll so far has shown that the stunning majority of educated people who care about our future also care enough to want the reign of the RIAA to end.

I am sorry but you are a bit flawed in your presumptions. At the time of this post there were a total of 36 votes. You do not know who voted, the level of their "education" or their knowledge of the subject. In this thread there have been a lot of things said with no back up with facts. As you will learn, the "majority" is not always right.

As I have said before, I cannot find enough data on the RIAA to make an educated decision. Because of that I cannot condemn or condone their actions. Most of what I read here is that people want things for free. It doesn't matter that others are hurt in the process as long as they get everything for free. I cannot see this happening in the near or distant future.

[artdutra04]

Originally Posted by sciguy125

Personally, I think we're on the verge of a paradigm shift. I have a feeling that intellectual property laws will drastically change over the next few decades.

It's the Internet Effect.

Nowadays anything you can ever imagine is just a few clicks away, and most of it can be obtained for free. (Even if illegally.)

As the number and extent of Internet usage continues to climb, we are shaping the future of the Internet. But at the same time, the Internet is shaping our own future. Instant knowledge and gratification are now becoming increasingly part of our daily lives. A decade ago having Internet access was a privledge. Nowadays I can take my laptop, walk down my street, and come across nearly half a dozen unprotected Wi-Fi networks. In my house I can pick up two other networks, besides my own.

This Internet Age does not necessarily mean that society is taking a turn for the worse; rather is means that we are simply redefining our values. Any many of these values, although different, may quite have positive long-term benefits to society. Information and getting it quickly to people is the way of the future. Larry Page and Sergey Brin saw this in the late 1990s, and only a few years later Google is one of the world's biggest technology companies.

Living in Connecticut, I saw first hand how quickly blogging and the Internet caused Ned Lamont (who was totally unknown) to rise to popularity and win in the Democratic primary over the three-term Senator Joe Lieberman. The more people utilized the Internet, the more they seemed to like politics, and the more passionate they were for supporting their canidates. Because of all this, there was an extremely high voter turnout (as compared to historical primary attendence) in the Connecticut primaries.

Is democracy not the government of the people, by the people, for the people? Is the Internet not increasing public awareness and passion towards politics and being involved in shaping the future of the United States, and ultimately the world?

When other people look at the Internet, they may see anarchy. But I see freedom, democracy in action. Here is finally a global virtual world of the people, by the people, for the people. Here is our future. Some say war and forceful occupation of foreign countries is the best way to spread democracy. I say just give all six billion people on this planet one-hundred percent unadulterated and unfiltered Internet access, and anti-democratic governments will crumble faster than the Berlin Wall in 1989.

[Ryan Dognaux]

As long as the internet exists, there will always be filesharing that is considered illegal. Burning CDs / DVDs for friends, P2P transfers, torrenting - it cannot and will not be stopped. As you can see, the RIAA has had to take some pretty extreme measures against people. Suing individuals will do nothing in the long run, it's only being used as a scare tactic that's failing horribly. They don't need the money, they're just trying to discourage people from downloading. Tristan's post on the Canadian law is probably one of the best solutions I've ever heard.

It really is sad though in this day and age that the only way that artist's music make it on the radio and TV is if they sign with a large record label. Sure, there are some bands that have made it pretty well and are independants, but they're few and far in between. And those labels usually dictate what the band can and cannot do. And those labels are usually under the RIAA, so the artists usually don't see a dime of the money the RIAA is supposedly getting from their actions.

I do not support the RIAA in any way, shape, or form. Viva La Revolution.

[sanddrag]

The way I see it is that many of the popular artists today are absolutely aweful performing live (and I affirm my conclusion with Nelly Furtado's and Timbaland's performance on tonight's Teen Choice Awards). Thier success and immense profit is probably due mostly to some unknown guy in front of a fancy computer at the recording studio. Many of today's popular artists have such horrible voices (when performing live) and poor performing skills that they are lucky to sell any CDs at all. They should be happy that people actually want to download their music.