It seems like we hear about bad Copyright suits a lot more often than we hear about sensible decisions from the court.
I'm glad that "innocent until proven guilty" has held up, here. The safe harbor provision was the one good thing that came out of the DMCA, and if we're going to get beat over the head with legal protections for DRM, I'm glad that safe harbor is (somewhat) holding up here.
And don't get started on Mega... the stuff the government has already released says that Mega was soliciting infringing content. There's no safe harbor for people who solicit or knowingly host infringing content.
This is going to become a bigger and bigger issue for MMO's... and there's always a simple solution: let players host their own shards.
Players have reverse engineered Ultima Online, for example, and even when UO is finally shuttered, you'll still be able to play it. The same goes for the non-game Second Life; there are free servers that can interact with the official SL client, or you can go a step further and use one of the open-source third party SL clients.
When a company un-publishes a game in this manner, I wonder if they shouldn't have some obligation to make the server available for users to set up player-run shards.
and the cool thing about those MUD's is that they tend to be public domain, so you can easily start your own if you want. And since Telnet uses so little bandwidth, you could host it on just about anything.
I hosted a MOO for a while, just for fun. We were going to create a graphical overlay client for it, but I never quite finished it. I keep thinking about going back and doing that...
Anti-SLAPP laws are one thing, but they currently only apply to public figures. If I was criticizing Governor Brown, and he sued me, I could apply the California Anti-SLAPP statutes. But if the allegedly embezzeling former officer of a non-profit sues me, the Anti-SLAPP stuff doesn't apply.
I have an idea I like better: if as a private party, you're going to sue another private party, you should have to post a bond before you can file your papers. The amount of the bond doesn't matter: $1,000 or $100,000. But That bond will get split in half, and that pays for the lawyers. At any time, the plaintiff can raise the bond amount, but he can never lower it. Likewise, the defendant can waive the bond and pay for his own lawyer - freeing both parties to spend whatever they want on legal fees.
If the plaintiff wins, then the defendant pays back the legal fees. If the defendant wins, then the fees are already paid.
This gives an indigent respondent a fighting chance in court. What happens right now is that he simply gets steamrolled with no chance of really defending himself - and that's not justice.
Yes, this strongly biases the case in favor of the defendant - but isn't the justice system's catchphrase "Innocent until proven guilty?"
this case has more twists and turns than that mountainside road where James Bond always gets attacked by bad guys whenever he's showing off his new car to the Bond Girl of the week...
I was just talking to someone last night about the "nuisance suit" phenomenon, and he said that lawyers routinely get disbarred for exactly the kind of behavior Prenda is engaging in. If that's true, I want to see it happen sooner, rather than later.
I've been threatened with a defamation suit, twice, for telling the truth - and it's no fun.
And a friend of mine is currently fighting a defamation lawsuit; he found someone embezzling from a non-profit, and the embezzler is getting the last laugh by taking my friend to court.
I realize we need defamation laws to keep people honest in their public speech, but I'm back to the opinion that our legal system is sorely in need of overhaul; specifically, my friend can't afford a lawyer, and so he's trying to represent himself. And that's not going well.
Our legal system really needs to better support respondents who can't afford expensive lawyers.
You do realize, of course, that without legal protections for Copyright, movie companies will just enforce draconian DRM schemes similar to the stuff we're seeing on computer games?
You won't be able to copy a movie anyway, because your movie player will have to "phone home" before every playback of a disc. Portable media players will be practically non-existent, and every media imaginable will be wrapped behind so many layers of DRM and encryption that it will be hard to even use legally, let alone illegally.
What I love is how the freetards want to sit around and scream "BUT MY RIGHTS" when they're not the ones creating this stuff. They're not the ones putting money, blood, sweat, and tears in to it.
And it's even more amusing that you do it as "anonymous coward." I'm just going to stop responding to anon posts. If you're afraid to put your name behind something, then you must not really believe what you're saying.
No one is forcing you to buy a ticket for that $100 million movie.
And people are free to release things to the public domain if they want: if you want to create a movie or a book and relinquish all rights to it - then go ahead.
The same people that thought slavery was A-OK also liked little things like free speech, freedom of religion, a free press, the right to bear arms, the right to be secure in our possessions, the right to be free from search and seizure without reasonable cause... just to name a few things that people thought were important back in 1776.
And Copyright wasn't even an amendment. It was in the body of the Constitution, so the founders must have thought it was even more important than the right to free speech.
Okay, I can understand there are a lot of edge conditions, but let's use a clear-cut example:
Back in the late 80's, maybe 1988, I heard a mix of "Died In Your Arms Tonight" that incorporated clips from Star Trek and several other television shows.
Each of these clips was maybe 2-3 seconds long. And each of them was from shows that had a clear owner. I don't see any legal ambiguity here: it's either legal to use or it's not.
Now as to works that can't be identified and orphaned works: I have a pretty strong opinion there. My opinion is basically, if the Copyright holder doesn't care enough about the work to keep up with its registration, then he should lose his rights. I've talked elsewhere about this in more depth, but basically I think that Copyright holders should have to maintain a clear point of contact, and if they fail to do so, or if they fail to respond to licensing requests in a timely manner, they should lose the protection offered by Copyright. This has nothing to do with sampling, and really addresses the larger problem of distributing and using works for which the owner can't be reached for permission.
As to sampling and remixing: getting permission just seems like the right thing to do. I don't see why anyone would want to use someone's work when they know that someone doesn't want it used.
True, moods, harmonies, and even some melodic bits get re-used a lot. I mean, who originally played the standard 4/4 drum kit rock beat? You probably couldn't identify the drummer if you tried.
But that's not sampling.
Sampling is literally taking a piece of audio from one song and sticking it in something else.
Perhaps the original song is about the beauty of the great outdoors, and the new song is about pimpin' some ho's. Would the original performers like their folk music being used to describe the sublime beauty of selling women's services by the hour?
It's only fair to at least get permission when using someone else's work to make money yourself.
Look at the "standards" for remote controlling TV's and home theater equipment: rather than getting together and developing a single standard, every manufacturer has something different - so a Sony TV can't share remote control signals with a Pioneer receiver which can't control a Panasonic DVD player.
What can you say about someone that does something exactly right?
MIDI is one of those things that was the perfect tool at the right time... and no I don't think we would have ended up with a single standard for connecting musical instruments together if someone hadn't come up with a free (or very inexpensive) standard.
I think the lack of comments comes more from the fact that people simply don't know what MIDI is and don't fully appreciate how useful it is in the music studio. After all, nobody jumps up and sings the praises of USB, even though we all use USB devices every day.
On the post: EA Shuts Down Social Media Games Without Refunding Money
Re: Re:
On the post: EA Shuts Down Social Media Games Without Refunding Money
Re: Re: Re: Re: Common MMO problem...
On the post: YouTube Wins Yet Another Complete Victory Over Viacom; Court Mocks Viacom's Ridiculous Legal Theories
Some good sense. Finally.
I'm glad that "innocent until proven guilty" has held up, here. The safe harbor provision was the one good thing that came out of the DMCA, and if we're going to get beat over the head with legal protections for DRM, I'm glad that safe harbor is (somewhat) holding up here.
And don't get started on Mega... the stuff the government has already released says that Mega was soliciting infringing content. There's no safe harbor for people who solicit or knowingly host infringing content.
On the post: EA Shuts Down Social Media Games Without Refunding Money
Common MMO problem...
Players have reverse engineered Ultima Online, for example, and even when UO is finally shuttered, you'll still be able to play it. The same goes for the non-game Second Life; there are free servers that can interact with the official SL client, or you can go a step further and use one of the open-source third party SL clients.
When a company un-publishes a game in this manner, I wonder if they shouldn't have some obligation to make the server available for users to set up player-run shards.
On the post: EA Shuts Down Social Media Games Without Refunding Money
Re:
I hosted a MOO for a while, just for fun. We were going to create a graphical overlay client for it, but I never quite finished it. I keep thinking about going back and doing that...
On the post: Med Express Sues Marginally Dissatisfied Customer For Posting Accurate Feedback On eBay
Re: Re: Yay for bad defamation suits...
I have an idea I like better: if as a private party, you're going to sue another private party, you should have to post a bond before you can file your papers. The amount of the bond doesn't matter: $1,000 or $100,000. But That bond will get split in half, and that pays for the lawyers. At any time, the plaintiff can raise the bond amount, but he can never lower it. Likewise, the defendant can waive the bond and pay for his own lawyer - freeing both parties to spend whatever they want on legal fees.
If the plaintiff wins, then the defendant pays back the legal fees. If the defendant wins, then the fees are already paid.
This gives an indigent respondent a fighting chance in court. What happens right now is that he simply gets steamrolled with no chance of really defending himself - and that's not justice.
Yes, this strongly biases the case in favor of the defendant - but isn't the justice system's catchphrase "Innocent until proven guilty?"
On the post: Prenda, Prenda, Prenda, Prenda, Prenda
Talk about drama....
I was just talking to someone last night about the "nuisance suit" phenomenon, and he said that lawyers routinely get disbarred for exactly the kind of behavior Prenda is engaging in. If that's true, I want to see it happen sooner, rather than later.
On the post: Med Express Sues Marginally Dissatisfied Customer For Posting Accurate Feedback On eBay
Yay for bad defamation suits...
And a friend of mine is currently fighting a defamation lawsuit; he found someone embezzling from a non-profit, and the embezzler is getting the last laugh by taking my friend to court.
I realize we need defamation laws to keep people honest in their public speech, but I'm back to the opinion that our legal system is sorely in need of overhaul; specifically, my friend can't afford a lawyer, and so he's trying to represent himself. And that's not going well.
Our legal system really needs to better support respondents who can't afford expensive lawyers.
On the post: White House Petition Launched To 'Recast Copyright For The Digital Age'
Re: Re: Re: Re: Agree but disagree
Oh wait. You're afraid to put your name on your post. Never mind. I'm no longer talking to Anonytrolls.
On the post: White House Petition Launched To 'Recast Copyright For The Digital Age'
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Oh really?
You won't be able to copy a movie anyway, because your movie player will have to "phone home" before every playback of a disc. Portable media players will be practically non-existent, and every media imaginable will be wrapped behind so many layers of DRM and encryption that it will be hard to even use legally, let alone illegally.
What I love is how the freetards want to sit around and scream "BUT MY RIGHTS" when they're not the ones creating this stuff. They're not the ones putting money, blood, sweat, and tears in to it.
And it's even more amusing that you do it as "anonymous coward." I'm just going to stop responding to anon posts. If you're afraid to put your name behind something, then you must not really believe what you're saying.
On the post: White House Petition Launched To 'Recast Copyright For The Digital Age'
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Oh really?
And people are free to release things to the public domain if they want: if you want to create a movie or a book and relinquish all rights to it - then go ahead.
On the post: White House Petition Launched To 'Recast Copyright For The Digital Age'
Re:
The same people that thought slavery was A-OK also liked little things like free speech, freedom of religion, a free press, the right to bear arms, the right to be secure in our possessions, the right to be free from search and seizure without reasonable cause... just to name a few things that people thought were important back in 1776.
And Copyright wasn't even an amendment. It was in the body of the Constitution, so the founders must have thought it was even more important than the right to free speech.
On the post: White House Petition Launched To 'Recast Copyright For The Digital Age'
Re: Re: Agree but disagree
See, here's the part I don't get: if I want to use a song in a movie, I have to pay for it - that's not just a legal thing but an ethical thing.
But if I want to use a 3 second audio clip in a song, is that any different ethically? I'm still using someone else's work.
So leaving out the legal issues for a second, how is sampling different from an ethical perspective?
First figure out what's right. Then figure out how to make that legal.
On the post: White House Petition Launched To 'Recast Copyright For The Digital Age'
Re: Re: Agree but disagree
Back in the late 80's, maybe 1988, I heard a mix of "Died In Your Arms Tonight" that incorporated clips from Star Trek and several other television shows.
Each of these clips was maybe 2-3 seconds long. And each of them was from shows that had a clear owner. I don't see any legal ambiguity here: it's either legal to use or it's not.
Now as to works that can't be identified and orphaned works: I have a pretty strong opinion there. My opinion is basically, if the Copyright holder doesn't care enough about the work to keep up with its registration, then he should lose his rights. I've talked elsewhere about this in more depth, but basically I think that Copyright holders should have to maintain a clear point of contact, and if they fail to do so, or if they fail to respond to licensing requests in a timely manner, they should lose the protection offered by Copyright. This has nothing to do with sampling, and really addresses the larger problem of distributing and using works for which the owner can't be reached for permission.
As to sampling and remixing: getting permission just seems like the right thing to do. I don't see why anyone would want to use someone's work when they know that someone doesn't want it used.
On the post: White House Petition Launched To 'Recast Copyright For The Digital Age'
Re:
Statutory damages should be similar to the kinds of damages that would be levided in an act of physical theft.
IMO, Copying a 99c song should not result in a $100,000 fine.
On the post: White House Petition Launched To 'Recast Copyright For The Digital Age'
Re: Re: Agree but disagree
But that's not sampling.
Sampling is literally taking a piece of audio from one song and sticking it in something else.
Perhaps the original song is about the beauty of the great outdoors, and the new song is about pimpin' some ho's. Would the original performers like their folk music being used to describe the sublime beauty of selling women's services by the hour?
It's only fair to at least get permission when using someone else's work to make money yourself.
On the post: Here's Another Inventor Who Willingly Gave Away His Greatest Idea In Order To Establish It As A Global Standard
Re: MIDI was and is also basically a FLOP
Tell that to every composer ever who uses sequencers to put together music for an entire orchestra, then transcribe the whole thing automatically.
Or did you think that people still have to write out music by hand and imagine it in their head like Beethoven did?
On the post: Here's Another Inventor Who Willingly Gave Away His Greatest Idea In Order To Establish It As A Global Standard
Re: Cassette
And, of course, it's why Sony did everything they could to win the format wars between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray.
On the post: Here's Another Inventor Who Willingly Gave Away His Greatest Idea In Order To Establish It As A Global Standard
Re: Re: Shame
Look at the "standards" for remote controlling TV's and home theater equipment: rather than getting together and developing a single standard, every manufacturer has something different - so a Sony TV can't share remote control signals with a Pioneer receiver which can't control a Panasonic DVD player.
On the post: Here's Another Inventor Who Willingly Gave Away His Greatest Idea In Order To Establish It As A Global Standard
Re: A story with philanthropic bent
MIDI is one of those things that was the perfect tool at the right time... and no I don't think we would have ended up with a single standard for connecting musical instruments together if someone hadn't come up with a free (or very inexpensive) standard.
I think the lack of comments comes more from the fact that people simply don't know what MIDI is and don't fully appreciate how useful it is in the music studio. After all, nobody jumps up and sings the praises of USB, even though we all use USB devices every day.
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