Looks like the RIAA found an ally in Obama

[Wheezer]

Text

President Obama is continuing to fill the senior ranks of the U.S. Department of Justice with the copyright industry's favorite lawyers.

Donald Verrilli announced Wednesday that he had been named associate deputy attorney general. Verrilli is the lawyer who pulled the plug on Grokster, sued Google on behalf of Viacom, and represented the Recording Industry Association of America against a Minnesota woman named Jammie Thomas who's accused of illicit file sharing.

This follows a string of other pro-copyright industry picks that Obama has made. Last month, there was Obama's selection last month of a top RIAA lawyer--currently squaring off in court with Harvard University's Berkman Center--to be third-in-command at the Justice Department.


Vice President Joe Biden has long been an ally of the recording industry, urging the criminal prosecutions of copyright-infringing peer-to-peer users and trying to create a new federal felony involving playing unauthorized music. And another senior Justice Department post has gone to the top antipiracy enforcer for the Business Software Alliance, a strong supporter of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's anti-circumvention rules.

Obama's latest choice, Verrilli, is a senior litigator in the Washington, D.C. offices of the Jenner & Block law firm.

In technology circles, he's probably best known for arguing the Minnesota case called Capitol v. Thomas. In that case, the RIAA convinced the judge to accept jury instructions saying that the "making copyrighted sound recordings available for electronic distribution on a peer-to-peer network" violated the law, even if none had actually been transferred.

errilli won the first round, with a federal jury saying in October 2007 that Thomas had to pay $220,000. But then the judge threw out the verdict, concluding the jury instructions he approved were misleading; the RIAA is hoping to hold on to the initial verdict and is currently appealing.

One reason why this case is especially relevant to Verrilli's new job is that the Justice Department intervened in the Thomas case on behalf of the RIAA.

That has already caused some tech lobbyists to wonder privately about whether or not Verrilli will recuse himself from matters that affect their former clients. Another example of a relevant case involves the Supreme Court asking the Justice Department for input on a case involving Cablevision--another lawsuit that Verrilli was part of on behalf of copyright holders. (Disclosure: the film studios and television networks that brought the suit against Cablevision include Time Warner, News Corp., Walt Disney, and CBS, which owns CBS Interactive, publisher of CNET News.)

A Jenner & Block press release says that Verrilli "led the Jenner & Block team that is pursuing a $1 billion copyright case on behalf of Viacom Inc. against Google and YouTube, alleging massive violations of Viacom's copyrighted motion pictures and television shows." Last year, Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman even called YouTube a "rogue company."

The lawsuit filed in New York in March 2007 accuses YouTube of "massive intentional copyright infringement" and seeks more than $1 billion in damages. Other plaintiffs include Country Music Television, Paramount Pictures Corporation, Black Entertainment Television (all of which are Viacom affiliates).

From a legal perspective, Verrilli's zealous defense of large copyright holders reached its apogee in the Grokster case.

MGM had sued Grokster, saying that it effectively induced its users to commit copyright infringement. When the Supreme Court heard arguments on March 29, 2005 in the most important copyright case that decade, MGM chose Verrilli to represent its side.

"The recording industry has lost 25 percent of its revenue since the onslaught of these services," Verrilli told the justices. "And that's particularly critical, because, remember, this is really... a venture-capital business. Most of the records we put out don't make money. A few make a lot of money. Well, what do you think's getting traded on Grokster and StreamCast and the rest of them? It's the few that make all the money."

It worked, or at least worked pretty well. The Supreme Court ruled that operators of peer-to-peer networks could be held liable for copyright infringement, and Grokster quickly settled with Hollywood studios and the record labels.

During the campaign, when CNET News asked Obama for his views on copyright, he replied: "As policymakers, we are in a constant process of examining our laws to ensure that the protections we place on intellectual property are sufficient to encourage invention without hindering innovation that builds on previous work or unfairly limiting consumers from using the goods they purchase in a way that is fair to creators."

That was, unfortunately, rather vague. Now it's a bit more clear where he stands.

No wonder Hollywood fought so hard for this guy.

 

[GoPackGo]

Nice!

 

[Corn]

Biden wants to charge you with a felony just for "playing unauthorized music" on your ipod. I wonder how many theiving BDS lefties will end up facing the music? (pun intended) I say lock 'em up. This is a change I can believe in!

 

[bozack]

Gotta love change.

 

[MovingTarget]

Well, maybe they'll get a better "direction" from their higher-ups. We can only hope. I'm holding out that the Obama administration won't be so crazy when it comes to the **AAs, but thus far it doesn't look very promising.

 

[SneakyStuff]

Nothing will change, the RIAA has been trying to intimidate people for years and illegal distribution and downloading of copyrighted material is still running rampant. One service is shut down, another service that uses a new loophole pops up. Call me crazy but it seems that people don't want to pay $20 for a CD or spend $1 per song online that they can't do what they want with it.

 

[manowar821]

The **AA are fucking criminal scum, and so are their supporters.

 

[Craig234]

I strongly support copyrights/royalties as essential to our society's creation of art.

I strongly oppose the abuse of them for the excess profits of corporations.

People should pay for the art they consume. I'm in favor of encouraging and incenting the creation of art, through private and public efforts.

If people steal the products, fewer will be created. The technology for digital reproduction is the largest threat to the business of art in human history that it seems to me.

We need to not only accept but demand digital copying potections in technology, while also blocking the excesses such as century-long copyright protections for corporations.

 

[Harabec]

Craig, are you saying artists only make "art" for profit, and there will be no "art" without strong copyright protection?

 

[Craig234]

Originally posted by: Harabec
Craig, are you saying artists only make "art" for profit, and there will be no "art" without strong copyright protection?

No, I'm not saying that, any more than I'm saying teachers teach *only* for the money, and that if we stopped paying them, there would not be any teaching.

I don't know why you are raising an issue I did not mention - the 'complete absence' of art - when what I said was that "fewer will be created".

There will be a decrease in the creation of art roughly proportional to the decrease in money, in my view, with some remaining art created for free or low compensation.

Note I'm not saying there aren't problems with the current system too, as if music is being made today that's as good as in the 70's.

But then again, look at other areas of commercial art, such as where TV has evolved too - compare the current 'Battlestar Galactca' to the 70's version or to "Lost in Space".

Compare "Lost" to "Gilligan's Island".

Compare "The Wire" or "The Shield" to "Dragnet".

Show me where those products are created for free or low budgets - as they are threatened too, with the advent of the DVR to skip the commercials that pay for them.

And hence the increase of low-budget 'reality' tv shows, preparing for the problem.

The bottom line is that digital repruction can copy and almost without cost distribute moview, music, television, books and more.

We need to ensure that the artists and the industry supporting the creation and distribution of art are adequately funded to protect the creation of art.

 

[miketheidiot]

 

[ZzZGuy]

I used to pirate and burn off music CD's then I'd buy, but years later those pirated CD's fell apart and where more prone to scratching and I lost interesting in spending hours sorting through a few hundred music files to find some decent ones. So I no longer bother to pirate music, but I check the Boycott-RIAA.com site to see if my money is going to those crooks or not. So I end up buying 3 to 5 CD's a year.

Now if there was a online service that cut out the big record companies and got the price down to like 10 cents a song and offered either a low quality or 1/2 of the song preview to see if I like it or not then I'd be all over that and just find really good quality CDs to use.

The biggest problem is breaking the record companies hold over the music industry.

 

[MotF Bane]

Let the money go to the artists, not the record companies.

 

[Craig234]

Originally posted by: ZzZGuy
I used to pirate and burn off music CD's then I'd buy, but years later those pirated CD's fell apart and where more prone to scratching and I lost interesting in spending hours sorting through a few hundred music files to find some decent ones. So I no longer bother to pirate music, but I check the Boycott-RIAA.com site to see if my money is going to those crooks or not. So I end up buying 3 to 5 CD's a year.

Now if there was a online service that cut out the big record companies and got the price down to like 10 cents a song and offered either a low quality or 1/2 of the song preview to see if I like it or not then I'd be all over that and just find really good quality CDs to use.

The biggest problem is breaking the record companies hold over the music industry.

There are big problems with the recording industry; but they're caused in part (only in part) by the increased pressures piracy puts on their business.

The solution is not to pirate, any more than the solution to bad quality in the US car industry was to start massively stealing cars.

 

[ZzZGuy]

Originally posted by: Craig234

Originally posted by: ZzZGuy
I used to pirate and burn off music CD's then I'd buy, but years later those pirated CD's fell apart and where more prone to scratching and I lost interesting in spending hours sorting through a few hundred music files to find some decent ones. So I no longer bother to pirate music, but I check the Boycott-RIAA.com site to see if my money is going to those crooks or not. So I end up buying 3 to 5 CD's a year.

Now if there was a online service that cut out the big record companies and got the price down to like 10 cents a song and offered either a low quality or 1/2 of the song preview to see if I like it or not then I'd be all over that and just find really good quality CDs to use.

The biggest problem is breaking the record companies hold over the music industry.

There are big problems with the recording industry; but they're caused in part (only in part) by the increased pressures piracy puts on their business.

The solution is not to pirate, any more than the solution to bad quality in the US car industry was to start massively stealing cars.

I don't quite get the last statement.

Anyway, my biggest problem with record companies is how much money they take from artists and how they support the RIAA who likes to make examples of people who are unable to defend themselves properly (poor or seriously sick) along with trying to tell me I can't put the music I bought onto my computer or MP3 player. Their strategy is to scare people into accepting their current model so they can make more money for themselves, the artist be damned. There are alternatives but god forbid the artists start seeing most of the profits. It is sound business sense to continue and promote what gets you more money, but it doesn't mean that it is right.

Imagine a music industry that promotes more good songs from artists rather then more top selling CDs with one or two good songs they hype, the rest being filler. Having artists make more money so there is less pressure to sell huge numbers which will lead to more artists getting into the industry. Digital distribution sites that let you sample music easier then if you pirated them, cheap songs and constant promotions of new and favorite artists in a wide range of genres.

As it stands if you don't like the latest "thing" you have to either take someones word for it, be overcharged for downloading songs, pirate them or just buy random CD's you think you might like wasting a lot of money in the process. Internet radio helps in this but not that much.

 

[Red Dawn]

The fuck should I care, I haven't pirated movies or music in years, well since you could get into trouble for it. Besides I already got all the good music worth having years ago and the cost of Itunes or MP3 downloads @amazon is so cheap that I haven't a problem paying for it plus you don't get stuck paying for a whole album/CD when there's only 1 or 2 decent songs on it.

This is a major non issue with me and most honest people.

 

[smack Down]

Originally posted by: Craig234
I strongly support copyrights/royalties as essential to our society's creation of art.

I strongly oppose the abuse of them for the excess profits of corporations.

People should pay for the art they consume. I'm in favor of encouraging and incenting the creation of art, through private and public efforts.

If people steal the products, fewer will be created. The technology for digital reproduction is the largest threat to the business of art in human history that it seems to me.

We need to not only accept but demand digital copying potections in technology, while also blocking the excesses such as century-long copyright protections for corporations.

There is no stealing go involved. Just reclaiming of a right stolen by cooperate lobbyists. The cooperation have made it so no new works will enter public domain in my lifetime so it is not morally wrong to share it now.

 

[BoberFett]

Originally posted by: Craig234
We need to not only accept but demand digital copying potections in technology, while also blocking the excesses such as century-long copyright protections for corporations.

No, I need not demand a damn thing. I'll do whatever I want with the media I've purchased. If that means ripping DVDs to my server then so be it.

For someone so self-proclaimedly liberal, you sure are a fascist when it comes to the freedom of the media consumer.

 

[theeedude]

I am all for rights holders getting their day in civil court against real copyright infringement, but making it a felony and turning DOJ into a legal terrorist wing of the RIAA and MPAA is just nuts. I will permanently boycott any studio that cooperates with DOJ in such a felony prosecution.

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: senseamp
I am all for rights holders getting their day in civil court against real copyright infringement, but making it a felony and turning DOJ into a legal terrorist wing of the RIAA and MPAA is just nuts. I will permanently boycott any studio that cooperates with DOJ in such a felony prosecution.

Wow the Studio that produces Abba must be skeered:shocked:

 

[theeedude]

Originally posted by: Red Dawn

Originally posted by: senseamp
I am all for rights holders getting their day in civil court against real copyright infringement, but making it a felony and turning DOJ into a legal terrorist wing of the RIAA and MPAA is just nuts. I will permanently boycott any studio that cooperates with DOJ in such a felony prosecution.

Wow the Studio that produces Abba must be skeered:shocked:

They should be, if they like money.
...money ... money

 

[Bitek]

I like to buy albums as there are gems you my never find if you just buy the pop songs, but they are too fraking expensive.

$14+ for a new CD is bullshit. If CDs were around $5-6 then I'd buy more/some, but spending that much on a CD that may suck is ridiculous. I'll just continue listening to Sat radio or online or whatever. F the record industry.

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: Bitek
spending that much on a CD that may suck is ridiculous.

That's why you buy individual songs for $.99 each instead.

 

[1prophet]

Originally posted by: Craig234

Originally posted by: ZzZGuy
I used to pirate and burn off music CD's then I'd buy, but years later those pirated CD's fell apart and where more prone to scratching and I lost interesting in spending hours sorting through a few hundred music files to find some decent ones. So I no longer bother to pirate music, but I check the Boycott-RIAA.com site to see if my money is going to those crooks or not. So I end up buying 3 to 5 CD's a year.

Now if there was a online service that cut out the big record companies and got the price down to like 10 cents a song and offered either a low quality or 1/2 of the song preview to see if I like it or not then I'd be all over that and just find really good quality CDs to use.

The biggest problem is breaking the record companies hold over the music industry.

There are big problems with the recording industry; but they're caused in part (only in part) by the increased pressures piracy puts on their business.

The solution is not to pirate, any more than the solution to bad quality in the US car industry was to start massively stealing cars.

No the solution was import cars which woke the big 3 up to quality, the equivalent was stopped dead in its tracks by the RIAA by their claim to ownership of <all music distributed through internet music stations, like the mob requiring protection money whether or not you belong to their organization and using the law instead of loui the legbreaker to enforce their actions.

Is the RIAA Pulling a Scam on the Music Industry?

There has been an understandable public outcry against the RIAA?s attempts to more than triple the sound recording copyright royalties on Internet radio. (See Save Internet Radio from Corporate Money Grab) One solution proposed by Webcasters is to just not play RIAA-member songs under the assumption that then they don?t have to pay the royalty to the RIAA?s collection body, SoundExchange; Webcasters would then just pay the independent artist the royalty.

This sounds just and fair because it is. However, the RIAA is not about being just and fair. The game is rigged and the RIAA has rigged it in their favor. The strategy of playing only non-RIAA songs won't work though because the RIAA has secured the right to collect royalties on all songs regardless of who controls the copyright. RIAA operates under the assumption that they will collect the royalties for the "sound recording copyright" and that the artists who own their own copyright will go to SoundExchange to collect at a later date.

Look at the information on SoundExchange.com (RIAA created SoundExchange) and see how it works. The RIAA has secured legal authority to administer a compulsory license that covers all recorded music.

"The recent U.S. Copyright Office ruling regarding webcasting designated SoundExchange to collect and distribute to all nonmembers as well as its members. The Librarian of Congress issued his decision with rates and terms to govern the compulsory license for webcasters (Internet-only radio) and simulcastors (retransmissions)." (http://soundexchange.com/faq.html#b4)

"SRCOs (sound recording copyright owners) are subject to a compulsory license for the use of their music...SoundExchange was established to administer the collection and distribution of royalties from such compulsory licenses taken by noninteractive streaming services that use satellite, cable or Internet methods of distribution."
(http://soundexchange.com/faq.html#a4)

SoundExchange (the RIAA) considers any digital performance of a song as falling under their compulsory license. If any artist records a song, SoundExchange has the right to collect royalties for its performance on Internet radio. Artists can offer to download their music for free, but they cannot offer their songs to Internet radio for free. (http://soundexchange.com/faq.html#a7)

So how it works is that SoundExchange collects money through compulsory royalties from Webcasters and holds onto the money. If a label or artist wants their share of the money, they must become a member of SoundExchange and pay a fee to collect their royalties (http://soundexchange.com/faq.html#b6). But, and this is a big "but," you only get royalties if you own the sound recording copyright. If you are signed to a major label, chances are you don?t. Even if you do own the copyright to your own recording of your own song, SoundExchange will collect Internet radio royalties for your song even if you don?t want them to do so.

Go to the SoundExchange site: http://plays.soundexchange.com/... and take a look at the hundreds of indie labels for whom SoundExchange claims they have collected royalties. Enter some of those label names on http://www.riaaradar.com/... and notice how few are actually members of the RIAA. Contact the label and ask if they are a member of RIAA and they almost certainly aren?t and may not even be aware that SoundExchange is collecting royalty fees on their music.

And what exactly is SoundExchange doing with the money they have collected for those hundreds of labels that must have thousands of songs???

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: BoberFett

Originally posted by: Craig234
We need to not only accept but demand digital copying potections in technology, while also blocking the excesses such as century-long copyright protections for corporations.

No, I need not demand a damn thing. I'll do whatever I want with the media I've purchased. If that means ripping DVDs to my server then so be it.

For someone so self-proclaimedly liberal, you sure are a fascist when it comes to the freedom of the media consumer.

It was his hero who signed the DMCA.