Has RIAA Finally Crossed The Line?

[jpeyton]

Text

The industry's lawyer in the case, Ira Schwartz, argues in a brief filed earlier this month that the MP3 files Howell made on his computer from legally bought CDs are "unauthorized copies" of copyrighted recordings.

No joke; the defendant did not download or distribute music illegally. He purchased a CD legally, then ripped the CD onto his computer to have a digital copy for personal use, and RIAA is suing him for it.

The industry wants to scare the American public into double-dipping. They already reaped the profits when you bought the CD, and now they want to buy the same music again digitally (preferably sugar-coated with DRM).

 

[Pepsi90919]

I'm pretty sure you're allowed to do that

 

[ed21x]

was he sharing the music online? How did the RIAA find out he had the music on his computer?

 

[Capt Caveman]

How can one get caught if it's just on their computer?

 

[jpeyton]

Originally posted by: Pepsi90919
I'm pretty sure you're allowed to do that

Have you talked to Ira Schwartz lately?

 

[pyonir]

How did they find out? if he had it only on his personal computer? I don't see the article point out how that happened...

 

[Evadman]

please let it go to court.

 

[Pacfanweb]

I'd also like to know how anyone could possibly know you have ripped songs on your computer that you don't share. There's more to this story, it seems.

 

[Pepsi90919]

Originally posted by: jpeyton

Originally posted by: Pepsi90919
I'm pretty sure you're allowed to do that

Have you talked to Ira Schwartz lately?

 

[Evadman]

Originally posted by: pyonir
How did they find out? if he had it only on his personal computer? I don't see the article point out how that happened...

Originally posted by: Capt Caveman
How can one get caught if it's just on their computer?

Originally posted by: Pacfanweb
I'd also like to know how anyone could possibly know you have ripped songs on your computer that you don't share. There's more to this story, it seems.

Originally posted by: ed21x
was he sharing the music online? How did the RIAA find out he had the music on his computer?

Easy. How many people here have said that they have an MP3? There are only 3 ways to get it. Download it illegally, download it legally, or rip it. 2 out of 3 are apparently illegal according to this suit, so that leaves downloading legally. A few calls would answer if he had an account at any of the major places.

Plus, how many of us have said that we rip our own mp3's?

<-- Rips his own MP3's. Every CD he ever bought, which is a lot. Hell, I don't even know where most of the CD's are any more. You don't need them once in MP3 format anyway.

Bring it on RIAA!

 

[thepd7]

I accidentally voted yes, obviously you own the music and can do whatever you want with it.

Didn't the supreme court uphold a copy of a dvd if you own the original or something like that? This is the same thing just the copy is electronic.

 

[rgwalt]

Originally posted by: Evadman
please let it go to court.

No kidding... I would love this to climb as high as the courts will allow it, even all the way up to the Supreme Court, if they'll hear the case. There needs to be a ruling on what really constitutes "stealing" versus fair use in this digital age. If the RIAA had it their way, everyone would buy a CD, and then would pay to download the music onto their computer. They would make us pay twice for the same good, just in different formats. Of course this makes sense to the RIAA because, in many cases, their members would have a double dip of the profits.

I will always buy CDs. I will never buy an album online in leiu of buying the CD. The reason is that I want the hard, physical copy of the media. I don't want to worry about losing my music collection to a hard drive failure. I have a digital copy of my entire music collection, and if I take a CD out of the house, I almost always take a burn rather than the original copy. Am I violating the law according to the RIAA? Personally, I don't think that I am.

What about a case where a man and his wife share a CD collection. They both love a certain set of artists that they listen to in their car CD players and on their iPods while working out. Would this couple have to buy 4 copies of this music?!? One CD for each car and one MP3 for each iPod? That sounds absurd to me.

R

 

[1prophet]

If the RIAA has its way you wouldn't be allowed to resell your cd's, they actually tried to go after stores selling used cd's in the late 90's.

 

[Tiamat]

RIAA needs to be shut down.

 

[TechKnight]

I think he bought the CDs after they sent him the notice.

 

[3chordcharlie]

Originally posted by: rgwalt

Originally posted by: Evadman
please let it go to court.

No kidding... I would love this to climb as high as the courts will allow it, even all the way up to the Supreme Court, if they'll hear the case. There needs to be a ruling on what really constitutes "stealing" versus fair use in this digital age. If the RIAA had it their way, everyone would buy a CD, and then would pay to download the music onto their computer. They would make us pay twice for the same good, just in different formats. Of course this makes sense to the RIAA because, in many cases, their members would have a double dip of the profits.

I will always buy CDs. I will never buy an album online in leiu of buying the CD. The reason is that I want the hard, physical copy of the media. I don't want to worry about losing my music collection to a hard drive failure. I have a digital copy of my entire music collection, and if I take a CD out of the house, I almost always take a burn rather than the original copy. Am I violating the law according to the RIAA? Personally, I don't think that I am.

What about a case where a man and his wife share a CD collection. They both love a certain set of artists that they listen to in their car CD players and on their iPods while working out. Would this couple have to buy 4 copies of this music?!? One CD for each car and one MP3 for each iPod? That sounds absurd to me.

R

Not 4 - asuming this suit fails under 'fair use' as it should.

But technically you would have to buy 2 - just because you're married doesn't create a shared licence

 

[Evadman]

Originally posted by: 3chordcharlie
But technically you would have to buy 2 - just because you're married doesn't create a shared license

Actually, it does. At least someone who is a real qualified copyright lawyer told me so.

/me not a lawyer, don't sue me!

 

[DrPizza]

Originally posted by: Pepsi90919
I'm pretty sure you're allowed to do that

I posted this before, and I'm not 100% certain, but I've been informed numerous time by the copyright gurus at our school that it's a copyright violation to shift forms. Fair use allows a legal copy in the same form. But, you may not backup a cassette to CD, or VHS to DVD. "Format shifting" is what I believe it's called.

 

[Wuffsunie]

Originally posted by: Evadman

Originally posted by: pyonir
How did they find out? if he had it only on his personal computer? I don't see the article point out how that happened...

Originally posted by: Capt Caveman
How can one get caught if it's just on their computer?

Originally posted by: Pacfanweb
I'd also like to know how anyone could possibly know you have ripped songs on your computer that you don't share. There's more to this story, it seems.

Originally posted by: ed21x
was he sharing the music online? How did the RIAA find out he had the music on his computer?

Easy. How many people here have said that they have an MP3? There are only 3 ways to get it. Download it illegally, download it legally, or rip it. 2 out of 3 are apparently illegal according to this suit, so that leaves downloading legally. A few calls would answer if he had an account at any of the major places.

Plus, how many of us have said that we rip our own mp3's?

<-- Rips his own MP3's. Every CD he ever bought, which is a lot. Hell, I don't even know where most of the CD's are any more. You don't need them once in MP3 format anyway.

Bring it on RIAA!

Actually, I was going to say "Well, what do you think rootkits are for?"

This is just beyond absurd. Holy crap. I have no words for the blatant theft and stupidity of that organization.

On kind of a related note, I just rented the movie This Movie Not Yet Rated, it's a documentary about the movie rating process by the RIAA in the United States. It does a wonderful job of showing just what a demented, corrupt, worthless, hypocritical, and fascist organization they really are. And it does some nice work on the whole sex/violence paradigm in Hollywood. Really good movie (which would have been rated NC-17 BTW)

 

[frostedflakes]

Technically it is against the law, but IMO this does fall under fair use.

But as others suspected it looks like this guy brought attention to himself by sharing the files over KaZaA. Seems like RIAA can't prove that he actually shared the files, so they are trying to go after him for this?

 

[DaveSimmons]

Nope, this is another P2P case.

ArsTechnica
They were sharing via Kazaa, then claimed it was just for their own use. Suuure it was.

The "CD ripping is unauthorized" was an opinion stated in the case, but is not what they were sued for.

 

[Colt45]

fair use

end

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: Evadman

Originally posted by: pyonir
How did they find out? if he had it only on his personal computer? I don't see the article point out how that happened...

Originally posted by: Capt Caveman
How can one get caught if it's just on their computer?

Originally posted by: Pacfanweb
I'd also like to know how anyone could possibly know you have ripped songs on your computer that you don't share. There's more to this story, it seems.

Originally posted by: ed21x
was he sharing the music online? How did the RIAA find out he had the music on his computer?

Easy. How many people here have said that they have an MP3? There are only 3 ways to get it. Download it illegally, download it legally, or rip it. 2 out of 3 are apparently illegal according to this suit, so that leaves downloading legally. A few calls would answer if he had an account at any of the major places.

Plus, how many of us have said that we rip our own mp3's?

<-- Rips his own MP3's. Every CD he ever bought, which is a lot. Hell, I don't even know where most of the CD's are any more. You don't need them once in MP3 format anyway.

Bring it on RIAA!

Wait... what? They're all asking how the RIAA found out he had ripped his purchased CD to his computer. And your answer is.... ______?

 

[jpeyton]

Originally posted by: mugs
Wait... what? They're all asking how the RIAA found out he had ripped his purchased CD to his computer. And your answer is.... ______?

MediaSentry

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
Nope, this is another P2P case.

ArsTechnica
They were sharing via Kazaa, then claimed it was just for their own use. Suuure it was.

The "CD ripping is unauthorized" was an opinion stated in the case, but is not what they were sued for.

Figured as much