US Gov't Briefing For All Employees: All Music Downloads Are Stolen, Risky

from the accuracy-not-so-important dept

A bunch of folks have sent over a post on Slashdot detailing how a mandatory US gov't briefing on "information security" uses incredibly hyperbolic and inaccurate information, including the idea that all music downloads are theft and insecure. You can see the (flash-heavy) video briefing. The actual part with the music downloads is pretty far into the presentation (you can jump forward through the chapters), when it hits an interactive bit where you get to go through "real-life scenarios" of "threats." In the bottom left corner, there's a scenario involving a colleague who says he's found a "cool site" from which you can "download music" and asks you how do you respond: The choices?

1. I'd rather download the music from home -- email me the link
2. Is it safe to download?
3. Since we're on our lunch hour, I see no harm. Here's my thumb drive!
4. That's stealing.

Choices one and three seem obviously wrong, but choice two actually does seem like the most relevant. After all, the "cool site" in question could be any number of "cool sites" that offer up legal free music, like Jamendo or CCMixter. But what happens if you select the second choice and ask if it's safe to download? You're told no, that's wrong: And then are scolded, saying that it's illegal and prohibited, followed up by another lecture about how not only is it illegal and prohibited, but unethical and "may result in criminal" liability. Someone should tell the folks at that cool Jamendo site.

Now, to be fair, it's rather obvious that the briefing is designed to keep gov't employees from using file sharing programs and potentially exposing confidential gov't documents via file sharing. And that's reasonable. But why not be accurate and honest about it? Lying about it makes no sense.

Filed Under: briefings, downloading, federal government, file sharing, music, security

Blogger Fixes Its DMCA Takedown Process

from the good-job dept

You may recall earlier this year that Google was accused of invisibly deleting entire blog posts on Blogger when the RIAA would send takedown notices alleging that the blog posts contained unauthorized music. This was troubling for a few different reasons. First, on the RIAA side, there seems to be something of a double standard here, as many of the record labels purposely send MP3s to music bloggers to help promote their music... but then they decide to take some down? But the bigger issue was the way that Google was handling the whole issue. Bloggers were upset that entire blog posts just seemed to disappear entirely without any notice at all. Google claimed that it was alerting the bloggers, but it didn't seem to be doing a very good job of it, and making entire posts completely disappear based on the sayso of the record labels seemed to be a bit extreme. So it's good to see that Blogger has entirely revamped its takedown process for Blogger posts that get takedown notices.

First, for those issuing the takedown, they've switched from a manual (send a fax or letter) process to an electronic one -- which has the side benefit that Google can now get those takedown notices to ChillingEffects.org much faster. Google always passes along takedowns to ChillingEffects, but when the notices were faxed or typed it took a while before ChillingEffects could get them up, meaning that if content was taken down, there was often no way for the blogger in question to understand what happened (Google says it always emails the bloggers, but not everyone's email address is up-to-date).

On top of that, Google not only will notify people via email, but will put a notification in the Blogger admin dashboard, so the next time the blogger logs in they'll see it. Finally, and most importantly, to handle the "takedown," rather than totally deleting the posts as before, the posts are switched to draft mode, which allows the blogger to see the post and change it (if necessary). This seems like a much better policy than what Blogger/Google was doing before.

The one that that still seems to be missing (at least in this description) is the counternotice process. The process described in the announcement says that bloggers can adjust their post... but what if they don't believe it's actually infringing (fair use, authorized copy, different content, etc.)? It would be nice if Google also offered an easy counternotice procedure from directly within the Blogger admin as well -- so that a Blogger who has been falsely accused of a copyright violation can quickly counternotice and get the content back up.

Filed Under: blogger, dmca, music, music blogs, takedowns
Companies: google

RIAA Loses To Yahoo Over Webcasting Rates

from the finally dept

Well, finally. The RIAA has lost its case against Yahoo over what royalties the Launchcast service needed to pay. As per usual, the RIAA kept trying to add on additional fees. Rather than just webcasting fees, it also wanted an additional royalty for being an interactive service. This is a neat trick that the RIAA has been pulling a lot lately. In the past, every time some new technology comes along, the recording industry runs screaming and crying to Congress about how unfair it is, and how it needs a special new royalty for that new technology/service. But here, because Launchcast was online and combined elements of different services, the RIAA simply figured it could lump all the different royalties together and get Launchcast/Yahoo to pay multiple times for each use of a song. The entertainment industry sure does love trying to get everyone to pay multiple times for the same thing.

But, it appears the court was having none of that, saying that the service didn't provide enough user control to make it an interactive service that would require a different license (though, it still has to pay the basic webcasting fees). The ruling here did not take kindly to the RIAA's argument that being able to choose which station you wanted to listen to (or that you could skip songs) made it somehow interactive beyond regular radio:

"Launchcast listeners do not even enjoy the limited predictability that once graced the AM airwaves on weekends in America when 'special requests' represented love-struck adolescents' attempts to communicate their feelings to 'that special friend'."

Filed Under: music, royalties, webcasting
Companies: launchcast, riaa, yahoo

Rather Than Waiting For Someone Else To Leak Your Music, Why Not Leak It Yourself?

from the connecting-with-fans dept

A couple people have sent in the news about how Simon Cowell apparently has called in the police to go after hackers who supposedly hacked into a computer at his record company and leaked a new song by a singer named Leona Lewis. It's not clear what evidence there is that there was an actual hack, rather than the leak coming from somewhere else, but that seems besides the point. If the computers were broken into, then it seems fair enough to go after those who did the hacking.

But, either way, it seems that more and more musicians are recognizing that they might as well leak the songs first, so that such things aren't even an issue. Last week, we noted that Radiohead had leaked its own track, and it seems that less well-known bands are doing the same thing. The band Kay Kay and His Weathered Underground apparently wasted no time at all getting their new tracks online. Even though they're still working on the details of the actual album release, the band finished the album last week, and put it online almost immediately. Why wait for some artificial "album release" when the music itself is ready to go?

Filed Under: kay kay and his weathered underground, leaks, leona lewis, music

DOJ Doesn't Believe $80,000 Per Song Unconstitutional Or Oppressive

from the tell-that-to-Jammie dept

While this probably isn't a huge surprise, given the fact that the Justice Department is stocked with former lawyers for the entertainment industry (and because it's filed similar briefs before), but it's still worth noting that the Justice Department has filed a brief in the Jammie Thomas lawsuit, in support of the constitutionality of the $1.92 million fine (and, no, none of the former RIAA lawyers are signatories to the brief, though you have to imagine their "expertise" was consulted). The reasoning is quite troubling and appears to include some serious revisionist history.

First, what's stunning is that the brief claims the awards are perfectly constitutional because it is not "so severe and oppressive as to be wholly disproportioned to the offense [or] obviously unreasonable." Really? It seems that an awful lot of people find the idea of being forced to hand over $80,000 per song without any evidence that it was ever actually shared by anyone is severe and oppressive to the point that it's disproportionate to the offense and quite obviously unreasonable. I mean, this is a woman who wanted to listen to her favorite bands, and she now has to pay nearly $2 million. How can anyone claim that's not "severe and oppressive" in relation to the actual "harm" done?

Second, the brief claims that the damages should be much more than the $1.29 price per song found on iTunes, because it "ignores the potential multiplying effect of peer-to-peer file-sharing." Except, if that were the case, shouldn't the plaintiffs been required to show that these songs were actually shared? And should Thomas also be liable for the actions of anyone else she shared the songs with? That seems to go quite beyond what the law states.

Third, and perhaps most troubling, is the Justice Department's sneaky little claim that the statutory rates are obviously fair for file sharing, because they were put in place in 1999, with the explicit statement from Congress that these numbers were there because of internet file sharing. That sounds good, but ignores the fact that this little change in the law was pushed almost entirely by entertainment industry lobbyists (the same folks who now run the Justice Department!) to protect their dying business model, rather than through any empirical evidence. The real original purpose of statutory rates had nothing to do with punishing personal, non-commercial use, but were very much about dealing with commercial harm.

It's a neat, but immensely troubling, trick by the entertainment industry. Sneak through bizarre and totally unsupported legislation through a Congress that's never met a stronger copyright law it didn't love, using your high paid lobbyists. Then, get those same lobbyists appointed to the Justice Department to defend it against Constitutional challenges. Regulatory capture at its finest.

Filed Under: constitutional, copyright, file sharing, fine, jammie thomas, lawsuit, music, settlement
Companies: doj

Morrissey: Don't Buy My Music

from the no-royalties dept

We keep hearing from the big record labels and the RIAA how they're doing everything they do "for the artists." Yet, everywhere we turn, we see artists who are anything but happy by what's being done to for them. The latest, sent in by Bryan Colley, is that the singer Morrissey is going on fan sites, warning fans not to buy the new box sets of his music that EMI is putting out, noting that not only did he have nothing whatsoever to do with them, he won't see a penny in royalties from them. But it's all for the artists, right? These days, when artists are finally learning to connect with fans directly, those fans want to know that when they choose to spend money on an artist, that money actually goes to the artist.

Filed Under: morissey, music

Hurricanes Sue Hip Hop Artist For Promoting Team; Artist Sues 'Canes For Not Paying Him To Promote The Team

from the bangs-head-on-desk dept

You would think that with so many such stories, it would be difficult to surprise us on ridiculous intellectual property lawsuits, but every day there's something new and equally mind-blowing. The latest involves both sides in a dispute jumping to their intellectual property guns, in a situation that seems silly no matter how you look at it.

It starts with the Carolina Hurricanes hockey team suing a hip hop singer for trademark infringement after he wrote and recorded a song promoting the 'Canes. No. Seriously. Tyrone Banks apparently is a big 'Canes fan, and so he made a song singing about the team, and made a video with himself wearing a Hurricanes jersey. At first the team seemed to respond smartly to it. They played the song at games, and even gave Banks free tickets to a game. But, now they're suing, saying that he's violating their trademark by calling his song the "official Carolina Hurricanes song" and also demanding that he stop wearing Hurricanes jerseys in any promotional materials. Considering the song is about the Hurricanes, and the team sells its jerseys to the public to wear, I'm having a difficult time understanding how it can stop him from using it to promote the song.

That sounds crazy, right? But... there's a flip side that makes Banks equally questionable.

That's because Banks also sued the Hurricanes claiming copyright infringement. He's claiming that some of the times they played the song, it was infringement, because he only authorized the song's use during games "so long as the team displayed his name, song title, and name of his record company while the song was playing." He's also upset that the song was used in a commercial without compensation. Basically, he's decided to start demanding payment for the use of the song, saying the two sides had a verbal agreement. On the venue stuff, it's difficult to see him having much of a legal leg to stand on. I assume the venue pays its basic performance rights fees, which allow it to play any song without having to get the specific permission of the artists. Tye Banks appears to be an ASCAP member, meaning as long as the venue pays its ASCAP fees, he's probably got no case on the live performances.

The use in commercials... however... may be a different story. That would require his authorization, and it's surprising the team would use the song without any official agreement in place beforehand, but it still seems like quite a leap to then sue for copyright infringement.

Either way, the competing lawsuits seem pretty silly. It's yet another case of entitlement society. Both sides benefited nicely from the original arrangement: Banks got a lot of free publicity for his song, and the Hurricanes got a song that promoted the team. Win-win. Until everyone started freaking out over intellectual property rights and trying to squeeze more money from each other. Even if Banks sued first (the timing isn't entirely clear), it seems particularly brain-dead for the Hurricanes to shoot back with an equally questionable lawsuit that pretty much guarantees bad publicity. If you look at most of the current stories and headlines about this, most don't even mention Banks' lawsuit, but focus solely on the Hurricanes picking on Banks for promoting their team. This is a PR nightmare that could have (and should have) been easily avoided.

Filed Under: carolina hurricanes, copyright, music, theme song, trademark, tye banks, tyrone banks
Companies: carolina hurricanes

Moby Explains RIAA Mindset: Please Make The Future Die

from the moby-and-mossberg? dept

It's a bit of an odd pairing, but musician Moby was recently interviewed by Walt Mossberg, and among other things they discussed issues like file sharing and the RIAA's strategy. Moby, of course, has complained about the RIAA's strategy in the past, calling for it to be disbanded following the Jammie Thomas verdict. He's also found success experimenting with giving away his music, so his positions probably don't come as a surprise. He says he has no problem with people downloading his music (though he likes it when they buy it as well), as he's "honored" that people want to listen to his music, and if they download an unauthorized copy: "more power to you." On the RIAA, he can't understand why they're doing something that so clearly alienates fans, but then does a pretty good job explaining why, noting that the current business model of major labels:

"underpins the failure of major labels--they think, it used to be this way, so it ought to be this way." Their ethos is, "Please go away. Make the future die."

Not much new, but the quote is definitely a succinct way of explaining the position held by some at the major record labels over the past decade. Rather than deal with reality, they just want it to go away.

Filed Under: moby, music, recording industry, riaa

Musician: Any Aspiring Musician Should Download As Much Music As He Can

from the well,-that's-one-view... dept

I recently listened to an interview with a famed old school reggae musician, who's been in the business for 42 years. The interviewer asked him what kind of music he liked to listen to himself, and the guy said: "All kinds." He explained, by saying that any serious musician should listen to as much music as possible, just to learn from it and build your own skills. So even if he doesn't play country music or symphonies, he tries to listen to them just to gain a better appreciation of them so that he can take some of that and bring it back to his own music. This is a key point in the creative process, which is often missed by those who insist that musical creation is some sort of individual effort that doesn't involve outside influence.

It's also a point highlighted by musician David Hahn, writing a response to a mother concerned about her son file sharing. She sent in a note to The Working Musician, a blog by and for working musicians, saying that her son file shares, and she wants him to stop, saying that he would feel differently if it was his music being shared. Hahn replies, however, by telling her that he feels exactly the opposite: and that her son should download as much music as possible (found via EFF):

My perspective on file-sharing is probably different that you would expect. I think that your son should download every track he can find. I mean it. Download every song out there and sift through them one by one. And not just the genres he likes -- but everything -- Creole bandeon playing, French rap, hymns, metal, classical, South African jazz, samba -- whatever he can find.... If you're son is really going to be a musician -- I mean make a real, professional try at it -- he's going to need to know every one of those genres.

He goes on to give a number of other reasons to support this position, and it makes for quite a read. Obviously, plenty of musicians disagree with this, and we're not posting this to suggest it's a representative view of musicians. But it's yet another well-argued explanation for why locking up music isn't necessarily in musicians' best interests, despite what some might tell you.

Filed Under: david hahn, downloading, music, musician

If Robert Johnson Died In 1938... Why Is His Music Still Covered By Copyright?

from the life-+-70 dept

Michael Scott points us to a fascinating post by Sage Ross, talking about a rather ridiculous copyright situation faced by his father, a professional musician. There are two worthwhile points to discuss in the post. The first concerns how many jazz and blues musicians view copyright law:

My dad is a professional musician; he plays blues and jazz and original piano music, and has made five records. For professional musicians outside of pop music (and often in in pop as well), copyright law is already simply a burden to the point that it is almost universal ignored. Gigging blues and jazz musicians have long used "fake books", unauthorized charts of the melodies, lyrics and chord structure of jazz standards. No one is worried about other musicians infringing on their copyrights, because jazz and blues (among other genres) are rooted in a culture of borrowing and adaptation. It's inimical to creativity to draw sharp lines between what can and can't be borrowed or adapted, and indeed in academic jazz programs one learns to improvise by practicing the great "licks" on classic recordings.

That's a great description of how music works -- and how copyright often gets in the way of basic creativity in music and goes against the traditional means of creating new and wonderful music. The second point is explaining how Ross has realized that a Robert Johnson song his dad covered might still be covered by copyright, despite the fact that Johnson died in 1938, and the song itself was recorded in 1937. The situation helps demonstrate how screwed up our copyright laws are (yet again):

One classic he put on a 2004 album is "Love in Vain Blues", a Robert Johnson tune that was first recorded in 1937. Johnson died in 1938, and the original recording was published on vinyl in 1938 or 1939 (without a copyright notice) and not renewed after the then-standard 28-year copyright term had ended.

But as the result of a series of utterly insane laws and court decisions, it turns out that the song may be under copyright through 2047. Today, issuing as sound recording is considered publication. But according to the 2000 decision in ABKCO v. LaVere, sound recordings published before 1978 don't count as publication. So despite the publication, re-publication, and widespread adapation of Johnson's "Love in Vain", it was never "published" before 1978 because there was no sheet music. And because it was created earlier but "published" first between 1978 and 1989, the crazy rules go into effect.

Yup, but there's no problem at all with copyright, right?

Filed Under: copyright, music, robert johnson