RIAA Still Feels Entitled To Scour Everyone's Hard Drives

from the a-neutral-expert-might-not-find-what-we-want dept

Fri, Sep 1st 2006 6:45pm — Mike Masnick

Ever since the RIAA started taking on file sharing, it's always acted as if it were entitled to all sorts of things it isn't: access to the names associated with IP addresses without filing lawsuits, private info on the people they're suing and even the aid of the FBI in what's clearly a civil, not criminal, dispute. What's amusing about this is that the entertainment industry likes to accuse those who push for a fairer balance in intellectual property laws as having a "sense of entitlement" to free stuff. The latest case involves someone accused of file sharing. The RIAA wants to examine her computer, and for very good reasons, she feels uncomfortable with just letting them scour her hard drive. As a compromise her lawyers suggested a neutral expert -- which seems much more reasonable. Instead, as Nick Burns submits to us, the RIAA has filed a response explaining why they will not accept a neutral independent forensics expert. It's difficult to see how they can legitimately complain about a neutral person examining the drive. However, this isn't the first time this has happened. The last time, the judge actually went in the other direction entirely, telling the accused that she could just hire her own expert to examine her drive, and the RIAA should pay for it.

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97 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 1 Sep 2006 @ 7:18pm

wtf mate
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- joseph, 4 Sep 2006 @ 10:06am
  
  Re:
  right on anonimous coward
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ThePengwin, 1 Sep 2006 @ 7:26pm

RIAA
Can i sure the RIAA for privacy infringement??
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- WhiteStone, 1 Sep 2006 @ 8:17pm
  
  Re: RIAA
  As soon as they actually scan your harddrive without your permission, you should!
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Kyros, 1 Sep 2006 @ 7:29pm

....
We really need to just disband the RIAA, MPAA and not allow anything to take it's place.
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AC, 1 Sep 2006 @ 7:35pm

Digging their own grave
With everything that RIAA and their cornies are doing its only a matter of time before they sue someone actually important in the govt. and then RIAA would prolly be declared a terrorist organization in about 300 countries ... and offcourse, they are doing nothing but terrorizing all their consumers with phony court cases.
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heavyw8t, 1 Sep 2006 @ 7:56pm

irony
Irony can be so ironic sometimes. A few years back, I was ordered by a supervisor to fulfill a request my a use to burn all the MP3s her had downloaded onto CDs. I refused, and in doing so almost lost my job for not doing what I was told. Someone eventually did it, and the user was happy, so it shut the boss up.

The irony?

It was a law firm I was working for.

And the lawyer's field of specialty was intillectual property and copyright issues.
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- kc, 2 Sep 2006 @ 12:48pm
  
  Re: irony
  I believe that.... i work in the law field myself and going to law school and they are some ... well... you nailed it.
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- obilesk, 2 Sep 2006 @ 7:27pm
  
  Re: irony
  umm, i couldnt make out what it was u said..sry. could you give it another try? thanks, peace
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  - Anonymous Coward, 3 Sep 2006 @ 9:03pm
    
    Re: Re: irony
    what is the RIAA??
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icepick314, 1 Sep 2006 @ 8:01pm

no public support
does RIAA have ANY public support for their "cause"?

sure stealing copyrighted is wrong but this Nazi Gestapo tactic against people is swaying away from industry support...

sure people will buy music but because they have no choice in alternative music purchases....

if enough people just STOP buying CDs and digital music and support independent artists, i'm sure RIAA will wake up...but only if enough people get together....say 35% of all people in US should make a nice dent in music sales...
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- Chris, 2 Sep 2006 @ 2:10am
  
  Re: no public support
  A drop of 35% in purchasing would undoubtedly make them sit up and take notice. Especially as there is an inner irony at work here; it is the revenue from the sales of music that is funding the RIAA and therefore all of these investigations and court actions. If we know how much the RIAA costs to run then we would be able to identify the cost of this to the members and compare it with the amount of revenue they claim to lose to 'pirates'.
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OWN-the-NWO, 1 Sep 2006 @ 8:02pm

the fight against the RIAA
http://www.downhillbattle.org
http://www.riaaradar.com
http://www.boycott-riaa.com
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Anonymous Coward, 1 Sep 2006 @ 8:23pm

If they scanned my hard drive, we'd have some fun on our hands. I have close to 60000 songs. I'm sure 98% of those would be grounds for a RIAA lawsuit.

Support no one.
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- Tom Funk, 4 Sep 2006 @ 7:00am
  
  Re:
  > I have close to 60000 songs. I'm sure 98% of
  > those would be grounds for a RIAA lawsuit.
  
  Am I the only person who finds this disturbing?
  
  Let's play with some numbers.
  
  Assume Mr. (Ms.?) Coward exaggerates and only 90% of the tunes are "grounds for a RIAA lawsuit." I assume that means they were "appropriated" via the usual file-sharing channels. 60,000 x 90% = 54,000 RIAA sue-able songs.
  
  Now, let's assume that we get roughly 15 tunes on every CD we purchase. 54,000 / 15 = 3,600 CDs.
  
  Further, let's pretend that Mr/s. Coward has a really good place to buy all these CDs and would only pay $10 per CD. 3,600 x $10 = $36,000.
  
  You could buy a new BMW 325 for $36,000. On the other hand, if you stole a new BMW 325, no one would bat an eye when the cops showed up at your door to take you to jail.
  
  Why is it that stealing $36,000 worth of music is brushed aside as inconsequential, or even worn as a badge of honor? (Also, bear in mind that my estimates err on the conservative side. Buying all this music from iTunes would cost 60,000 x $0.99 = $59,400. This is equivalent to a BMW 550i)
  
  I'm all for supporting artists and giving them their due. I've got about 400 CDs in my collection (all paid for). Over the years, I've downloaded 300 or 400 songs, maybe. Those I got mostly back when the file sharing phenomenon was just taking off and the legal issues were less gray than they are now. Others I ripped from friends' CDs (also purchased) -- a *very* gray legal area.
  
  However, 60,000 songs is abusive and excessive -- yet the online community tacitly condones this. Mr/s. Coward has the audacity to chime in on this conversation, obviously flame-baiting the thread (and, yes, I took the bait) and after 70-something comments, no one scratches their heads about this post? The only other comment was "how much space does this take?" Not "Dude, you're a thief!"
  
  These are the people the RIAA should be going after. Not the grandmothers who's wireless portals are unsecured, or the fathers who's children swap and rip CDs -- or the parents of thieves like this, who brazenly abuse the system and, as s/he says, "support no one."
  
  If this person had come here and said "Hey, I stole a BMW 550 this weekend" there would be no moral ambiguity. The community would condemn rather than condone such action.
  
  The RIAA are idiots and are going about this in all the wrong ways, granted. However, they are fighting against millions of people like Mr/s. Coward -- though most aren't this bad.
  
  One last computation. Let's assume that there are a million people around the world who have $36,000 worth of songs that "would be grounds for a RIAA lawsuit." 36,000 x 1,000,000 = $36,000,000,000. That's 36 billion dollars. That's about what Bill Gates is worth. If it were your money, wouldn't you try to get back 36 billion dollars? Or at least try to get people to quit stealing it from you?
  
  I can't condone what the RIAA does. However, neither can I condone the theft of 60,000 songs. Until we, the consumers of music, check our own greed and shun the free music available via file sharing networks, we're as bad as the RIAA. We're just the other side of the same coin.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 4 Sep 2006 @ 11:12pm
    
    Re: Re:
    lol. I love how you place arbitrary values on the songs the kid has. IF he/she has the money and WOULD HAVE OTHERWISE paid for those songs, you're correct. Your problem is that he/she would never have paid for them. Now, let me clarify a bit. You see, if you steal a car, work has gone into building it, marketing it, selling it, etc. In the case of a downloaded song, neither the artist nor anyone else in the recording industry has put anything into that additional copy of the song. In fact, someone who originally ripped the song and distributed it did this for free of his/her own free will. If you really want to set a value, try to think it through first. We're not talking about cars.
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    - Anonymous Coward, 9 Feb 2007 @ 8:08am
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      Actually, his comparison does work, because with the car, like the music, you steal the product because you aren't willing to pay for it.
      
      The logic works both ways, moron.
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      - Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2007 @ 10:08am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re:
        right, because the origonal user lost their copy of the mp3 when he stole it.
        
        oh, wait...
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Anonymous Coward, 1 Sep 2006 @ 8:41pm

wtf?! o.O
60,000?!?!?! damn... how big is that? i have 40 gigs worth and it's only like 5,000+ songs...
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n3o, 1 Sep 2006 @ 9:13pm

Good Job Judge!!!
yes, this lawsuit is total bs, but let's not forget to at least thank the judge for slapping them right in the face by telling her she could hire her own expert. And the cherry on top, the RIAA should pay for it! Music, sweet music :)

RIAA, MPAA, please s*ck my b*llz ........
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VPR, 1 Sep 2006 @ 9:17pm

Rule 706 of the Federal Rules of Evidence allows a court to appoint an expert agreed upon by the parties or of its own selection. Rule 706(d) specifically states that "nothing in this rule limits the parties in calling expert witnesses of their own selection." Because Plantiffs have a right to select their own expert even where another expert has been appointed, it stands to reason that their expert must be given, with an appropriate protective order in place, access to the evidence which needs to be inspected to render an expert opinion. Otherwise, Plantiffs' right to select their own expert would be rendered meaningless

It's not about which one party is going to view the computer. In a court of law, each side has equal rights to call on an expert to inspect evidence.

What's good for the goose...
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- CDB, 3 Sep 2006 @ 1:35am
  
  Re:
  "Rule 706(d) specifically states that "nothing in this rule limits the parties in calling expert witnesses of their own selection"
  
  This is talking about evidence already discovered, NOT the process of scanning through a persons private files and details in the hope of finding something that makes them guilty.
  
  These are two totally separate things as far as I know.
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Mario, 1 Sep 2006 @ 9:21pm

RIAA lawsuits and arbitrary actions
I don't think anyone should make money off his/her intellectual work perpetually, because that stifles competition and innovation. Ideas, songs, inventions are supposed to be good, useful and enjoyable, but not the last word in whatever field of activity they're part of. Otherwise, no one would bother to improve on them. Shame on RIAA's thought police tactics. Are we sure they're Americans?
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- Robert Smith, 2 Sep 2006 @ 8:37am
  
  Re: RIAA lawsuits and arbitrary actions
  Are you joking? If not that is one of the least intelligent arguments I've heard in a while. How does an artist getting paid for what he or she created, stifle the innovation of other people?
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  - Paul Couture, 2 Sep 2006 @ 9:59pm
    
    Re: Re: RIAA lawsuits and arbitrary actions
    Robert - the comment you are referring to stated specifically that copyright terms should not last as long as they do (and if you brush up on your history, did not until very recently) as it is now, if you were able to release a popular item of creativity, the likelyhood is that you would be pushing up daisies for roughly a quarter-century before your copyright expired.
    
    I have no problem with artists being compensated, but they should not be able to be compensated for the rest of their lives. The framers of copyright in America were intelligent enough to grant a "limited" monopoly to the creator of a work, and that eventually the work would become public domain and therefore guarentee it would eventually benefit the public.
    
    Of course, then you get into the fun of the fact that corporations are viewed by the law the same as people - without that pesky lifespan thing to worry about, and corps. own most of the copyrighted music in America, so when should something eventually enter the public domain? In 50 years? 75? Where is the incentive to continue to create and develop (something that the "limited" part was trying to encourage.) Think about someone like the Rolling Stones - they still are getting money everytime someone wants to read the sheet music to something they created when they were in their late teens, and most of the band is in their 60s. They will continue to get those royalties until long after they are dead, where is the "limited" part of the monopoly granted by copyright?
    
    For example, "Happy Birthday" the most well known song in the english language is still protected by copyright and it was copyrighted in 1934 - by a relative of the creator (who had died in 1916.)
    
    I think it would be better for everyone if the limit was closer to the limits created by patents - 17-25 years should be more than sufficient for any artist to live comfortably. Look at the sales charts you'll see that music that is over a quarter century old isn't racking in the sales the way the new music is (they are still significant, but not in comparison with new music) so the artist has been given their opportunity to become successful with their created work, and the public is able to get what was originally intended from the copyright's "limited" monopoly during their lifetime.
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- In College For Life, 4 Sep 2006 @ 7:31am
  
  Re: RIAA lawsuits and arbitrary actions
  I don't agree with your comment about people not being able to make money perpetually. people should be able to make money on something perpetually, its called residual income. without it we would pay $100,000 for a can of coke. coke makes the syrup recipe and then sells it, over and over and over. even look at the pop tab on every can, someone invented that and gets royalties for every can. they are entitled to that and if someone wants to stop paying for it then they can find a better way. that is how competition is spurred. for the music scene, we need to look at where the money goes for every cd sold. i dont know but im willing to bet that the least amount goes to the artist.
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Anonymous Coward, 1 Sep 2006 @ 10:16pm

I encrypt my %hi%/ Goo dluck to 'em.
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- Took a Class, 4 Sep 2006 @ 10:42pm
  
  Re:
  Encrypting your HD would put the RIAA and MPAA in an interesting dilemma, if they break your encryption fo sue you they would be going against the DCMA which they lobbied like MTFs. I think that would be an interesting court case.
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Mike Mixer, 1 Sep 2006 @ 11:01pm

The answer to all of this
I've been thinking about this for some time now and my conclusion is that we need to buy only from indy labels that are not represented by the RIAA. I know that there are killer bands and solo performers who can only get limited distribution from small labels that really kick ass and we all lose when only the big label pablum forces them to quit. I can't remeber the last time a Metallica song rocked and the Simpson sisters should stick to lipstick lesbian porn.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Sep 2006 @ 12:35am

RIAA is a RICO organization
Someone should shut them down for anti-trust activities and for encouraging anti-competative behaviour in the music industry. that will result in treble damages to the group that finally shuts down these illegal crooks.
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James Bond, 2 Sep 2006 @ 3:59am

RIAA
That is why the good Lord made guns...the computer age is not any diferent than days of old when perpetrators of evil deeds got a cap popped in their ass..the modern age has people today sitting in their homes protesting with fast keystrokes instead of taking to the streets..PC non violent protest that the person or organization to whom you protest against just delete your email or comment ...next
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The Mofo, 2 Sep 2006 @ 4:33am

Whats next?
The RIAA even being able to have your hard drive searched by ANYONE is scary, whats next? An RIAA representative being able to search my home for burnt cd's or maybe searching my Tivo hard drive for recorded music videos? When does this all end? And I don't think it's piracy that is hurting music sells, it's the qaulity of music. I go to the music store and all they ever have is punk rock, rap or country. There aren't many good artists out there anymore. And if any of you play guitar I bet you have been to a tabulature site and saw things saying that they could no longer have certain tabs because the RIAA bitched about it. I think alot of people who download end up buying cd's they never would have in the first place. Look at book publishing, books survive off word of mouth and people loaning books out for other people to discover new authors, and I don't see publishers whining and complaining, hell, the sci-fi fantasy publisher Baen, has several of there books online to download in order for readers to discover new authors. I think the music industry would do well to look and learn.
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- cloksin (profile), 4 Sep 2006 @ 8:46am
  
  Re: Whats next?
  I now what you mean about the tab sites. Look at the OLGA, they have been up and running for years, posting tabs written by users as their own interpretation of a song. They just got shut down about a month ago. Why? So guitar players can't learn how to play the songs? What are they gonna do, learn how to play the song and then record it and sell it? I doubt it. The RIAA just wants another avenue to secure revenue. There was never a problem with copy a vinyl albulm onto a cassette, or copying a cd to another cd. But with the new format of music they've decided that its too hard to regulate sales so therefore they are gungho about trying to stop it. And even if they do search a hard drive, what proof are they going to have that those songs found there weren't bought legitemitly, or copied from a cd or cassette and converted to mp3. If they are so concerned with losing money, they should stop spending so much on negative advertising by going after these ridiculous lawsuits.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Sep 2006 @ 7:21am

If anyone from the RIAA comes to my house wanting to search my harddrive is going to be met with two attack dogs and my gun.

Land of the free? Let's start acting like it.
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Tony R., 2 Sep 2006 @ 7:33am

Too Optimistic
"if enough people just STOP buying CDs and digital music and support independent artists, i'm sure RIAA will wake up...but only if enough people get together....say 35% of all people in US should make a nice dent in music sales..."

I hate to put a damper on things, but the RIAA would just blame the sales losses on piracy, and would do worse things.
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Heywood, 2 Sep 2006 @ 8:21am

Instructions
Step 1) Encrypt your data truecrypt

Step 2) Install TOR and run it as a node so you have plausable deniability when they monitor your traffic.

Step 3) Answer the door with a loaded .45 if the RIAA knocks on it.
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mumbler, 2 Sep 2006 @ 8:40am

too much time on my hand
Something is not kosher, if you're not planning on doing something questionable to the accused hard drive or you're not accusing people randomly without any initial proof and doesn't want other neutral agency tell it to the world that that is your tactics in suing these folk of copry right violation, why would you turn down offer that increase your credibility & possibly your chance of winning the case?? We need another Einstein to solve it.
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mumbler, 2 Sep 2006 @ 8:41am

too much time on my hand
Something is not kosher, if you're not planning on doing something questionable to the accused hard drive or you're not accusing people randomly without any initial proof and doesn't want other neutral agency tell it to the world that that is your tactics in suing these folk of copry right violation, why would you turn down offer that increase your credibility & possibly your chance of winning the case?? We need another Einstein to solve it.
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Chris, 2 Sep 2006 @ 8:49am

Lets be real for a minute...
The only way we're ever going to see a change in the trend of RIAA suits, is to get a judge who actualy knows what they're doing. In many instances none of the RIAA suits should have ever come this far. There have been many cases already regarding fair use clauses, and the rulings on them should render any other suits along similar lines immediate dismissed. However in this day and age some judges will simply take a case like this because of media exposure. I'm not saying whoever's presiding over these cases are incompetant in doing their jobs, but it's more than likely they're out of tocuh with the reality of the situation.

Blog protesting is never going to have an effect on the final decision whichever way it goes. You actualy have to put your body outside that courthouse and cause a big enough scene to get people to notice what's really going on. The only problem with this is the RIAA or MPAA are going to get media attention as well, and since we all know the meida just loves to spin stories to whatever gets them ratings, they'll only interview 14yr old morons saying "Hack teh plaent yo!" and make our righteous fair use protest to come off as un-educated banter.

Write letters to your congressmen, or assemble protests (peaceful mind you, otherwise you're just making yourself out to be an idiot) to get enough attention to help push this thing in the right direction. If every campus across america had 1 protest that got any media attention it would hopefully blow the fair use side of this argument out of the water and put the RIAA to shame. But like I said the meida is a two-way sword and whatever's in their best intrest will get the spotlight.
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johnny thunder, 2 Sep 2006 @ 11:47am

what did she do?
why did sony decide to sue this chick out of all the file sharers? she probably had half the songs on the network downloaded. i don't really agree with that to be truthful. i hear about new artists, download a few songs to get a feel for them and if i really like them i want to buy their cd and support them. artists can't survive if you download all their music, its not just about the RIAA not getting money
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Craig Betney, 2 Sep 2006 @ 12:44pm

Copyright
Copyright was never intended to be the way it is now. Originally it was like a patent: intended to give the author a chance to make a bit of money before it entered the public domain. Today, largely thanks to Disney and their obsession with milking Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs for every last cent it seems to be heading towards perpetuity instead of being a few years. I mean come on, everyone who made the film is probably dead by now, and Disney has made enough money to pay its production costs many many times over, it should belong to everyone now.
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Craig again.,,, 2 Sep 2006 @ 12:55pm

RIAA
... forgot ro add: a recent case in Holland was thrown out of court after the Dutch courts basically said that the evidence the record companies provide is simply not solid enough (funny that this is the same type of evidence the US and UK courts are accepting). Gave the impression that the RIAA go waving around a load of technical looking bits of paper hoping to baffle the court with all their IP logs, hoping that no-one will point out just how hard it is to actually prove someone was filesharing, and how much harder it is to prove a specific copyright file was provided, let alone the thousands of files the RIAA are accusing people of sharing.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Sep 2006 @ 1:22pm

I think most artists (especially new artists or artists that aren't as popular) realise that allowing people to listen to their music increases CD sales because if people like the sound, they will buy the music from the artist.

Here's the catch: I think the industry knows this as well. And I think they're threatened by the concept that people would be able to cut out the middle man.

What we need is both sides to want to cut out the middle man. Consumers need to stop buying CDs unless the money is going directly to the artist. Artists need to stop signing with record labels that take huge cuts of their money and start allowing people to buy music directly, which isn't hard in an online medium.

If one side or the other is not on the same page, however, the problem still exists on some level.
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Ray Beckerman, 2 Sep 2006 @ 1:29pm

Why RIAA Won't Trust Independent Expert
I do think it's highly suspicious that the RIAA wouldn't trust an independent expert, but only wants to use an expert that is on its payroll.
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Ryan, 2 Sep 2006 @ 2:01pm

F the RIAA
i have many songs on my computer that may have been aquired in a somewhat non-legal way...but i think it should be okay artists are already filthy rich from tours and concerts plus all the t-shirts and merchandise. if i can listen to it on the radio for free then ima listen to it on my computer for free simple as that. the RIAA shud leave and never come back.
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Loon in Tune, 2 Sep 2006 @ 2:27pm

RIAA Sue Happy
The RIAA is a 'dinosaur looking for a museum'. The marketplace will render them, and their ilk, irrelevant with the new bands bypassing the traditional distribution channels to get to thier fans. The digital revolution will not be plagiarized or compromised by a crowd of non-creative parasites living off of other's talents. I do believe artists have the right to protect their intellectual property, but the RIAA is the worst form of a fox in the hen house. The natural selection process of competition will find a more efficient and fair means of protection that everyone can live with. The train has left the station and the RIAA is upset because they refused to check the new schedule.
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RIAA would love my name, 2 Sep 2006 @ 2:44pm

Boycot and Protect Yourselves
Don't buy music except from second hand music stores.

Store all your mucis on external hard drives, and turn them off when not in use. Encript them so no one can view the contents.

Turn off your router when you are not using your computer
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john, 2 Sep 2006 @ 4:16pm

we need to send the NRA...
....after the RIAA
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Sep 2006 @ 5:14pm

SOUNDS LIKE THEY ARE VIOLATING THE RICO ACT
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Sep 2006 @ 5:34pm

wtf a forensics!!!
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Sep 2006 @ 5:47pm

To hell with the RIAA...
...and their illegal monopoly, their invasion of privacy, and their illegal searches.
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me, 2 Sep 2006 @ 5:51pm

I had a Jar of Riaa...
and they said I could not fly with my bullshi%T
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Sep 2006 @ 5:56pm

RE: RIAA sueing somebody important
I thought they had already done that, it was some rich guy - who decided to fight back and said he is willing to pour tons of money into the case. BTW - how is that going? I havent been following it, but it would be interesting to see something about the standing of the guy's situation...
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Mike, 2 Sep 2006 @ 6:37pm

RIAA
The RIAA has long been an organization that claims to be "protecting the artists", but their intentions have always been suspect. Most artists don't condone what they do, but when you are trying to make a living, hey, you do what you gotta do.
These guys love to litigate! Just give 'em a reason and they will sue the hell out of ya!
My point is this: Why should the artists pay to have the low-life, hated, assholes RIAA "stand up for their cause" when they could do much better just hiring a business manager take care of their affairs?
As far as royalties are concerned, most artists realize that the majority of the $$$ is going to the RIAA and their teams of asshole lawyers.
Computers can manage the royalty issue better than lawyers! Royalties could even be paid on those "file sharers" instead of trying to peep into their private lives.
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Grant, 2 Sep 2006 @ 6:44pm

Wow..
The RIAA is a big scam for money. There's a big crew of canadian artists banning together that are against the RIAA sewing their fans. They don't mind that their fans are downloading their music.

If you look at it from a *logical* perspective...

If you're a big famous rich artists, you really have enough money to risk a couple hundred downloads, and people are still buying your albums, and you're better off than a lot of people...

If you're a struggling artist, the more people download the wider-spread your name is and the further you get in life...

Sounds like a win-win to me? The RIAA just gets money themselves and think they should but into other people's buisiness to "help them."
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Doug Karr, 2 Sep 2006 @ 6:45pm

It's economics
Honest people do not steal when the price they pay is equitable to the quality of the service or product they are purchasing. What RIAA and the music industry fail to understand it that the 'worth' of music is now changing. With the internet, we know longer have to listen to what we were told was great music... we can now select the music we wish to hear.

That means greater competition and with greater competition often comes improved efficiency and prices. RIAA can continue to sue everyone in sight, but the fact remains that the pricy carpet under their feet is beginning to be pulled out.

No longer can they command the money they want. This is great news for talented artists constantly rejected by the industry - they can distribute themselves and make an honest living off of the money they make. Meanwhile, the RIAA is trying to suck every last penny it can from consumers and the technologists that are bringing great entertainment to the masses for less money. I suppose they don't have a choice, the only other option is to start minimizing their profit margins.
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Cantalwayswin, 2 Sep 2006 @ 6:47pm

People need to learn to encrypt their sensitive or "questionable" data.
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Ed, 2 Sep 2006 @ 6:53pm

RIAA
It's a bunch of liberal lawyer's that want to take your freedoms away!As far as downloading music and movies!They were trying it in the 90's and before that!
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curtins, 2 Sep 2006 @ 7:23pm

While violating copyrights by burning cds other than personal copies, downloading music illegally etc is stealing I think these recording industry groups are going way over board and getting a bit annoying. They just like outlawed guitar tabs. Thats overboard if you ask me.

Don't steal. Advocate change but dont steal.
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amacd, 2 Sep 2006 @ 9:04pm

Counting losses
The RIAA counts as a loss every song that is downloaded, when in reality they can only count those songs that would have been purchased had it not been available on the Internet, or neighbors or friends or whatever. I would be willing to bet that the actual loss of income is less than one percent of the total downloads. I know people that have downloaded more than their lifetime net worth.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Sep 2006 @ 11:16pm

Maybe if they actually made music instead of crap like Jessica Simpson or American Idol crap people might buy more stuff.

The good music has already been bought and paid for 100x over.

Come on Neil Peart of Rush has his drums in 24k gold plated, I am sure he is not hurting for money.
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Music Pirate, 3 Sep 2006 @ 12:20am

If the RIAA wanted to scour my hard drive, I'd let em. Just tell me which directory to share at the lanparty! ;)
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Hingegrab Brakenbuud, 3 Sep 2006 @ 2:17am

Golden instruments
Yeah and James Galway has a golden flute.
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kungfoos, 3 Sep 2006 @ 7:21am

Just a thought
I read an article by Steve Albini about once you sign with a major label your pretty much screwed money wise. That most money goes to the label and very little to the artist by way of cd sales. Touring is the way most bands make money. So i kinda always saw it as stealing the music hurts the labels and in turn the Riaa. So by spreading the music around for more people to discover and then going to see them in concert would help alot more. And if you wish at the time by the cd at the show which i am not positive but i think all that money goes to the artist directly.
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hmm, 3 Sep 2006 @ 7:42am

perhaps every one should stop purchasing products that the RIAA supports for the next few years then we can all enjoy the downfall of such a useless entity
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jhay, 3 Sep 2006 @ 7:56am

reply
Just goes to show how greedy the RIAA is. tsk tsk tsk
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likes to eat glas, 3 Sep 2006 @ 8:51am

time to add a 3rd firewall....
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RIAA is..., 3 Sep 2006 @ 8:53am

RIAA...

Really Irritating and A$$holish
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karmon, 3 Sep 2006 @ 9:51am

just a heads up
there isn't an encryption in the world that can't be dissasembled...and most of the encryption methods available to the common person can be worked through in a matter of mere minutes.
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C Diesel, 3 Sep 2006 @ 10:18am

Idiots
The dumbest thing on here is when someone says oh we should just not buy this or that anymore. Your an idiot if you think any amount of people are going to just come together like that and boycott something. Our country is a running water not a standing pool. You have to innovate to change. People are just too busy and care just not enough to make any kind of change. Personally, I havn't been sued nor has anyone I know. That means this problem isn't that crazy. Yes they are wrong and things will work out. Financially they can't survive by lawsuits alone. They will figure out something new that doesn't involve corruption and control.
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Engleburt Slumberdunk, 3 Sep 2006 @ 11:10am

You Come to Me on the Day of My Daughter's Wedding
The RIAA has greased (i.e.: "bought off") politiitians on the left and right so they will sponsor bills favorable to them. They ignore the law and use heavy-handed tactics.

Sounds a lot like Don Corleone to me. The only difference is that...wait, there isn't any difference.
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Fredagar Balderfinger, 3 Sep 2006 @ 11:16am

Musicians Don't Need Labels Anymore
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.09/nettwerk.html
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- V, 5 Sep 2006 @ 3:06am
  
  Re: Musicians Don't Need Labels Anymore
  fucking amazing.....check the link this guy posted earlier...
  
  http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.09/nettwerk.html
  
  just wow the man is a genius.
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WhooTAZ, 3 Sep 2006 @ 1:00pm

RIAA - Have Gov't declare they are Terrorist
Gov't will wipe them all off without a second thought and no more problems with trying to get their grimmy hands on the Hard Drives........
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A concerned person with a Brain, 3 Sep 2006 @ 1:08pm

Hmmm....
RIAA is worried about file sharing content.... What about if I play the song in my mind, does the RIAA have the authority to erase that memory? Wow, I am playing it over and over again. Does the artist deserve some sort of royalty? I think not. What about all the songs those artist sing or play? Do they pay a royalty to the person of origin? What a CROCK of SHIT, they feel they are not wealthy enough and we are infringing on their means of supporting their lazy asses.... On another not, all the peole who have died in the wars to sustain our Freedom, do we all owe them a royalty fee for dying for what they believe in? If wo then we all owe about a few million men and women (Americans) a royalty for the Freedom we enjoy now. Anothe suggestion is to stop purchasing all this sometimes crappy music and stop going to the concerts. If we all boycotted the industry, then the industry would be beggin us to file share and then we might buy their music and attend their concerts again. If they are going to try to stop it then they will have to prosecute about 85 to 90% of all Amercans who listen to music....
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Brandon Payne of NRH, TX 76180, 3 Sep 2006 @ 2:43pm

Complete BS
I think that if the music that is being recorded right now sounded atleast half as good as it used to i would buy cd's but it does not so i just download shit here and there. I think that if they want to fix this "piracy" problem, (which will never die) they should just stop. Just stop caring. Look at every fucking one of the bands/artists that gets downloaded the most, now look at the band/artists that are worth the most. What do you get? The bastards with all the money are getting downloaded. Show support for local and indie bands fuck all the others and download like crazy
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Sep 2006 @ 2:51pm

industrial espionage
What about those employees who have company information on their hard drives that is confidential. The RIAA could then with their scanning of hard drives get their hands on another company’s confidential information and steal it. So you going to say well what can they get their hands on so that would be of use to them Example a company is developing cutting edge technology in let’s say the music field the RIAA then takes that technology develops their own product and Bam they have stolen technology (in other words “industrial espionage”)

The RIAA can not be allowed to get away with this
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CaptainOfTheDigitalSea, 3 Sep 2006 @ 3:27pm

Boring Weekend...
well, i figured i'd post one more one here. i'll stop pirating music when the recording industry puts out music that's on par with a mozart piano concerto or a beethoven sonata... or a symphony from either of the two aforementioned composers... until then... arggghhhh me maties...
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Sep 2006 @ 3:43pm

Re: just a heads up : To... karmon
actually, you're wrong on two parts... 128 bit encryption with a sufficiently large key can only be decrypted by a long brute force hacking process (don't believe me, try to find something to "crack" an encrypted rar file through means other than brute force. what, you can't? big surprise)...

more importantly though, is photon encryption... this CANNOT be decrypted except by the device it is being sent to... if anyone "listens in" anywhere in between the device that sends and the device that recieves, i.e. taps the fiber optic line and examines the photons , they'll have disrupted the quantum state and will have effectivly destroyed the data that was encrypted into it. granted, the original data is destroyed... but it will never "fall into the wrong hands". this is completely bullet proof. its entire basis (that is, not being able to examine the photons without disrupting it) lies in the uncertainty principle... of course there's the issue with the distance information can be sent over fiber optic lines without node points in place, and it could theoretically be tapped at a node point but that's just a little detail that will certainly be worked out. i'm sorry to burst your bubble karmon... but photon encryption is one means that can never be "disassembled"...

from the sounds of it... you're some kid who'd like to sound big yet you have no background with cryptography and, frankly, no clue what you're talking about.
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Grandfather Time, 3 Sep 2006 @ 8:08pm

and this is new news,...how? this has been going on for ages...
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Sep 2006 @ 9:13pm

Re: Grandfather Time
ages? really? hard drives have been around for ages?
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- Grandfather Time, 4 Sep 2006 @ 5:08pm
  
  Re: Re: Grandfather Time
  the fact that you take something so blatantly stated in a way that exagerates the amount of time the hard drive has been around, simply proves you were not concerned with the article, but, rather, making an ass of yourself by picking on said comment........
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Sep 2006 @ 11:31pm

An Unsigned Artists view
On a personal level, I am extatic when someone downloads one of my bands tunes. Free advertising at its finest!

On a professional level I am still extatic when someone downloads one of our tunes! Having seen the big contracts offered by the the labels, I can personaly tell you that artists who are new to the buisness get screwed hard. That 12-15 dollars your paying for the cd translates to roughly about 2-3 dollars for the band. Divide that by the number of memebrs in the band and you can count on about 35-50 cents each before taxes.
The real money artists make is on merchandising and ticket sales for shows. If you really want to support your favorite artists go to their shows, buy a t-shirt and enjoy the fact that they are close enough to see and hear you. Hell, wait after the show near the back gate of the venue and you can usualy meet them in person.... I personaly love meeting all the fans face to face.
In closing , feel free to download a song or even an entire album..... spread the word.... tell your friends ..... burn them copies, but I expect to see you at the shows!!!!
ARRRRGGGGHHH !
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- rob, 27 Oct 2008 @ 2:42pm
  
  Re: An Unsigned Artists view
  That 12-15 dollars your paying for the cd translates to roughly about 2-3 dollars for the band.
  Really? You make 20% of retail? I've been reading about the RIAA and problems associated with it for years and agreeing that something should be done about them, but 20%? After retail markup, distribution costs, advertising, etc? That's incredible. What the hell are you complaining about?
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WhiteStone, 4 Sep 2006 @ 1:19am

get real
Offering music for download is illegal in most countries, dont defend it with arguments like "the are rich enough already". Theft=theft.

RIAA claims she wants to scan the harddrive for existence of p2p programs and for the existence of copyrighted music.
Alas for them, that doesnt prove much.

a) Having a p2p program installed doesnt prove that you downloaded copyrighted material, though the logs might prove this.

b) existence of copyrighted songs on the hard drive doesnt prove it either, she may have legally bought the cd in the shop and copied them to het harddrive, something acceptible in many countries.
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simon, 4 Sep 2006 @ 7:24am

this makes me laugh, the record companys have for years targeted teenagers for their music sales, and now with filesharing and teens having better access to fatter connectins, its only natural that they will share files, albiet music or games, or even apps. this is partialy the record companies own doing. its time to embrace file sharing.

record companies are just pissed cos kids arnt getting ripped off anymore. its karma comming back at ya, you thieving bastiches.
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DASL Emith, 4 Sep 2006 @ 8:08am

dont agree
I my self do not agree to the fact of any one in any business get in to my comuter for any reason at any time. It is my stuff in there no one ealses'. If i wanted other people to know what is on my comuter i would have a web site that says "HERE IS MY IP ADDRESS PLEASE COME AND TAKE A LOOK." So all these companies out there that think that they have a rite to my stuff that i put in there are sadly mistaken. Furthere more anyone that gets in to my computer without my concemt as far as i am concerned is a thief and should be prosecuted as so.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Sep 2006 @ 9:17am

But... But... If they hire someone neutral than the RIAA can't plant the stuff into the harddrive to incriminate them!
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Frank Montana, 4 Sep 2006 @ 11:27am

It's time for a change...
A revolution. That's right. Civil revolt has changed society for the better. The French Revolution. The Civil War. Civil Rights. It's time for the people to stand together and fight for human rights and throw down the likes of the RIAA, MPAA, etc and in blood if neccessarry. Because it's to late if some goof from Austria who is Governor now becomes the President. Hear me now. Believe me later.
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- Anonymous Coward, 4 Sep 2006 @ 1:03pm
  
  Re: It's time for a change...
  Unless something does change, some goof from Austria can't become president, unless you are not talking about the US.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Sep 2006 @ 3:13pm

Re: Re: Tom Funk
I was the person who asked how much space this took up, because chances are the person i lying about having 60,000 songs. Let's take your tact and do some math (not exact, a lot of rounding and some estimation, but this is just to give a picture). I have about 5,000 songs (some purchased, some illegally downloaded, some classical that the riaa doesn't care about) and that takes up 40 gigs. The average file size is 40,000 mbytes / 5,000 songs = 8 mbytes per song... assuming this average would hold for mp3s on any person's computer he'd have 60,000 songs x 8 mbytes = 480,000 mbytes... or 480 gbytes ... chances are nobody has 480 gigs worth of music considering the 750 gig hds have JUST been developed and last i checked aren't being distributed yet and 500 gig hds haven't been around for too long... i could be wrong... but i doubt it (before anyone chimes in, yes... i know a gig is 1024 megs and not 1000 megs...)
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- LDøBë, 19 Aug 2008 @ 9:03pm
  
  AAC....
  They don't have to be MP3s. An AAC-HE v2 encoding with a quality of 3.5 sounds just fine, and takes up around 2.8 megabytes for a 3:30 minute song. Keeping with that average, then (2.8Megs * 60,000Songs) = 168,000Megabytes, or 164.0625 Gigabytes of music. This is easily held on a consumer level hard drive. It's not prohibitively expensive. OGG vorbis has a bit higher of an estimate at 3.18Megs per song at a quality level of around 4. This equates to about 186.3281 Gigabytes for 60,000 songs, still easily within reach of consumer storage applications.
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Phil Canyon, 4 Sep 2006 @ 3:22pm

They don't and won't get my money
I never buy any music but if it came down to the real shizznit I'd get the portable sirius radio and save it to that and get my music and continue to not pay RIAA directly
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Bignumone, 4 Sep 2006 @ 7:31pm

Isn't this a violation of our civil rights
The last I heard, the RIAA is not a criminal justice unit. Nor is it elected or appointed by the people of the United States or their elected representative...or even by appointees of the elected representatives.
Doesn't this amount to one citizen demanding to search the private property of another person because the searchee might have stolen some property?

Come on, the police can't do that with-out a warrant. Why would we let these wing-dingy people do it. We need to put our foot down now, or we will all be subject to the whim of very wealthy people!
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Sep 2006 @ 8:59pm

Re: Re: Re: Grandfather Time
rofl... what a douche... way to make an ass out of YOURSELF with such a whiney retort, it's called sarcasm you moron. you used a common expression that when taken literally denotes hard drives to be old enough to have lasted through several ages. people obviously don't take expressions as such literally and obviously hard drives haven't been around for that long, but it's amusing when someone uses an expression that sets up a contradictory setting. and no, i wasn't concerned about the article because this isn't anything new to me, and hopefully it isn't for you neither.
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Mila, 5 Sep 2006 @ 10:26am

Perhaps if they take the girl's computer, they can be held responsible for safekeeping of whatever sensitive data or personal information that might be on her machine... The fact that they won't let a neutral expert examine the files on this computer just screams "FISHY"!!!!
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Anonymous Coward, 5 Sep 2006 @ 1:00pm

a couple of responses

first, most mp3's are between 3 and 4 mb @ 128 coding. most of the stuff off the net is between 112 and 168. with that in mind, say a song is 3.5 megs, and take that by 60k, that's about 210 gigs. so maybe 300 at the most. it is quite possible to spread that over 2 drives.

next, i doubt all 60k songs came from one record company. sure, the "value" of those songs can be from 32 to 60k. but they are all "individual" so they aren't a new BMW. it would be more like "stealing" the different parts of the bmw. but they aren't put together to form a complete car, because well...songs just aren't like that. would bmw be out? no, their manufacturers would be.

plus IT IS NOT...I REPEAT NOT stealing. it is a violation of copyright issues. when you steal a bike, the original owner no longer has the bike. you are stealing the content of an intellectual property. that's why it's COPYRIGHT INFRINGMENT (i may have misspelled that). i.e. the unauthorized posession/use of a work not created by you.

now, where can you beging to claim the "burned off the air" defense? that's quite logical. mr. riaa, you put the stuff ont he air, and i copied it from there, which is legal...

i do agree with the limits on copyrights, before they enter the public domain. you shouldln't be entiltled to royalties on evereything you create. I made a big mac at mcdonalds years ago. does that mean that i should get royalties for everyother bigmac that is made? or just the ones that people i've trianed have made...and what if they train people, am i still able to collect royalties? if the RIAA can, i should damn well be able to.
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