Stop It Now!!

[pixiefied]

Music Swappers Get a Message on PC Screens: Stop It Now
By AMY HARMON


he record industry started another campaign yesterday aimed at making life more uncomfortable for online music-swapping fans.

Thousands of people trading copyrighted music online yesterday saw a message appear unbidden on their computer screens: "When you break the law, you risk legal penalties. There is a simple way to avoid that risk: DON'T STEAL MUSIC."


The messages, which seek to turn a chat feature in popular file-trading software to the industry's benefit, reflect the latest effort among record executives to limit digital copying of their products.

"People feel invincible when they're doing this in the privacy of their homes," said Cary Sherman, president of the Recording Industry Association of America. "This is a way of letting them know that what they're doing is illegal."

The association plans to send at least a million warnings a week to people offering popular songs for others to copy. Operated by a company that industry officials declined to identify, the automated system uses a feature in both KaZaA and Grokster, free software commonly used to share music files, that was designed to let users communicate with one another.

A spokeswoman for Sharman Networks, the distributor of KaZaA, said that the tactic violated the company's user agreement, which prohibits making search requests to accumulate information about individual users. Sharman, which is based in Vanuatu, a Pacific island nation, said in a statement, "We strenuously object to efforts outside the law, in violation of user agreements, or in violation of the privacy rights to indiscriminately spam, mislead or confuse" its users.

Until recently, the record industry has been reluctant to act against the several million people who copy music over the Internet from one another for fear of alienating its own customers. But with CD sales plummeting, the record labels have lately taken a more aggressive stance.

The industry filed lawsuits this month against four college students, charging them with copyright infringement and seeking billions of dollars in damages.

Last week, the industry group won permission from a federal judge to force Verizon to turn over the name of a subscriber it suspects of providing hundreds of copyrighted songs through KaZaA.

Verizon is appealing that decision, but analysts said another court decision last week might force the industry to focus on file traders, rather than the software they use. A federal judge in Los Angeles ruled that Grokster and Morpheus, two popular file-trading programs, could be used for both legal and illegal purposes — like a Xerox machine. Because the owners of the software cannot control what people do with it, the judge said, they are not liable for copyright infringement.

"It forces the R.I.A.A. to shift its focus to the actual participants on the network," said Phil Leigh, a digital media analyst at Raymond James. "I would credit them here with taking a step that gets their message in front of users in a fairly obvious way without the terror of a process server at their door."

Record companies, analysts said, are trying to strike a bit of fear in the hearts of file traders without sowing the kind of hostility that could lead to a boycott or even increased music swapping.

Record industry officials emphasized that the campaign was intended to be an educational effort in line with earlier television ads that featured prominent artists. The record companies cannot learn the real name or address of other users simply by using the instant message feature built into the program.

In addition to warning users about the legal risks of their actions, the message explains that file trading hurts musicians and songwriters. The users are also directed to www.musicunited.net, a site created by supporters of the campaign.
But the record labels still need to contend with the insistence of many file traders that what they are doing is justified by what they see as the industry's failure to lower prices and provide an inexpensive system for downloading music legally.

One frequent KaZaA user, who declined to give his name for fear of the legal consequences, said he would simply check the box in the software that blocks instant messages.

"This is an ongoing war between the community of true music fans against the big corporations that control music," said the user, a 34-year-old man in Hicksville, N.Y. "It's possible that this will scare some people, but it won't scare all people."

[SSJ4 Gogitta]

Wont work for me, cause i have messenger disabled.

that, and i dont use Kazza.

[Windude]

CDs contain hidden tracks that have subliminal messages embedded in them.


don't buy cds, MP3's have these removed normally however there are some thousands of MP3's without these removed and thus trancing nations

[pixiefied]

i soooo wanna know what your smokin'.

[SSJ4 Gogitta]

Originally posted by pixiefied
i soooo wanna know what your smokin'.

Jimson weed.

[Quack]

Originally posted by pixiefied
i soooo wanna know what your smokin'.

WORD MY FRIEND..

[Raz]

Oh wow, a record sale slump in a time of unbearably shit music. What a strange coincidence. I know, LETS BLAME PEER TO PEER SHARING. Can the music industry possible sell out further? Is that physically/mentally possible?

[dirkdeftly]

okay, which is worse:
x% of the people using kazaa not buying albums at all
0 people using kazaa to find artists that they like and buying their albums; x% of the people buying albums returning them because they don't like the band.

it's like in chess...you don't save your pawn if it means losing the opponent's queen...

man that was a bad analogy

[J_Bloggs]

LOL@Raz

ph33r my USB drive sneakernet! With it's ability to tranfer 2 and a half cd's worth of MP3's in a half hours walk/bus ride! That just plain bets dial-up +p2p anyday.

[edit]@Atero: your point makes no sense, how does people buying a CD from an artist they like only to return it because they don't like the band make sense? It's a contridicion. Someone said reasently that artists release one song to radio/TV that is actually good, and use that to get people to buy there crap CD's. Any music out there that I REALLY like is at least a few years old.

Plus, I think they won't accept returned CD's anyway, because people can easily rip them and return them, effectivly getting the CD for free anyway.[/edit]

[Bizznatch]

the RIAA has been on crack for about 3 years now, shit like this doesnt surprise me

[apollos]

firstly, you don't register your true details, secondly enable the "ignore all incoming messages" option.

Not too hard really, pathetic attempt RIAA

[Joel]

Agree with you Apollos

[eleet-2k2]

Originally posted by Raz
Oh wow, a record sale slump in a time of unbearably shit music. What a strange coincidence. I know, LETS BLAME PEER TO PEER SHARING. Can the music industry possible sell out further? Is that physically/mentally possible?

1) There is no sale slump, it's a hoax to further their war against "music pirates".
2) We are not pirates. Where's the fuckin parrot or peg leg?
3) I will not buy shit music, or a whole album for only 1-3 songs that are actually good. If the cd is quality, then the quality is worth shelling out cash for.
4) Messenger on Kazaa Lite is disabled and I live in Canada. Bwahaha!
5) You CANNOT EVER NO MATTER HOW HARD YOU TRY STOP MUSIC THEFT. If you can hear it, you can jsut as easily duplicate it. Want to stop it? Either cut everyone's ears off, or keep developing deals with MS for Palladium, etc. No one will buy it anyway.

[Fickle]

The music is shit
I'm not paying $22.50 for six fucking songs. What happened to Tenacious D and Rancid? 24 songs a CD--and it's ten bucks!
Internet "thieving" is the same thing as bootleg mix tapes from the 80's. They didn't care then, but they couldn't stop it.
They think they can stop it, but it's impossible. If KaZaA dies another p2p will awaken, and life will be good again. I know there's more out there now, but thier suing KazaA, so thier at the forefront.

The RIAA is incresing it's own failure by pushing this envelope.

[Smeggle]

One answer I have to Them F***S


RAVE

I'll play any sound I like to make my music and a sound cannot be copyrighted..........

[GoldenSphynx]

Fickle has a point that I have been thinking about for a while now. If albums and other cds were cheaper lets say $5, people wouldn't waste the time to download it when they could just buy it. But it's their own fault for making it so pricey. Most people can't buy several cds at once, normally around $18-20. So people turn to P2P programs and hope that they can have the music.

The same goes for software and games. New games start out at $50+. Why waste your money when it's right there for download? Had they been at most $20, I definently would not waste time on my 56k downloading popular games.

[liquidmotion]

Originally posted by pixiefied
Music Swappers Get a Message on PC Screens: Stop It Now
By AMY HARMON


he record industry started another campaign yesterday aimed at making life more uncomfortable for online music-swapping fans.

Thousands of people trading copyrighted music online yesterday saw a message appear unbidden on their computer screens: "When you break the law, you risk legal penalties. There is a simple way to avoid that risk: DON'T STEAL MUSIC."


The messages, which seek to turn a chat feature in popular file-trading software to the industry's benefit, reflect the latest effort among record executives to limit digital copying of their products.

"People feel invincible when they're doing this in the privacy of their homes," said Cary Sherman, president of the Recording Industry Association of America. "This is a way of letting them know that what they're doing is illegal."

The association plans to send at least a million warnings a week to people offering popular songs for others to copy. Operated by a company that industry officials declined to identify, the automated system uses a feature in both KaZaA and Grokster, free software commonly used to share music files, that was designed to let users communicate with one another.

A spokeswoman for Sharman Networks, the distributor of KaZaA, said that the tactic violated the company's user agreement, which prohibits making search requests to accumulate information about individual users. Sharman, which is based in Vanuatu, a Pacific island nation, said in a statement, "We strenuously object to efforts outside the law, in violation of user agreements, or in violation of the privacy rights to indiscriminately spam, mislead or confuse" its users.

Until recently, the record industry has been reluctant to act against the several million people who copy music over the Internet from one another for fear of alienating its own customers. But with CD sales plummeting, the record labels have lately taken a more aggressive stance.

The industry filed lawsuits this month against four college students, charging them with copyright infringement and seeking billions of dollars in damages.

Last week, the industry group won permission from a federal judge to force Verizon to turn over the name of a subscriber it suspects of providing hundreds of copyrighted songs through KaZaA.

Verizon is appealing that decision, but analysts said another court decision last week might force the industry to focus on file traders, rather than the software they use. A federal judge in Los Angeles ruled that Grokster and Morpheus, two popular file-trading programs, could be used for both legal and illegal purposes — like a Xerox machine. Because the owners of the software cannot control what people do with it, the judge said, they are not liable for copyright infringement.

"It forces the R.I.A.A. to shift its focus to the actual participants on the network," said Phil Leigh, a digital media analyst at Raymond James. "I would credit them here with taking a step that gets their message in front of users in a fairly obvious way without the terror of a process server at their door."

Record companies, analysts said, are trying to strike a bit of fear in the hearts of file traders without sowing the kind of hostility that could lead to a boycott or even increased music swapping.

Record industry officials emphasized that the campaign was intended to be an educational effort in line with earlier television ads that featured prominent artists. The record companies cannot learn the real name or address of other users simply by using the instant message feature built into the program.

In addition to warning users about the legal risks of their actions, the message explains that file trading hurts musicians and songwriters. The users are also directed to www.musicunited.net, a site created by supporters of the campaign.
But the record labels still need to contend with the insistence of many file traders that what they are doing is justified by what they see as the industry's failure to lower prices and provide an inexpensive system for downloading music legally.

One frequent KaZaA user, who declined to give his name for fear of the legal consequences, said he would simply check the box in the software that blocks instant messages.

"This is an ongoing war between the community of true music fans against the big corporations that control music," said the user, a 34-year-old man in Hicksville, N.Y. "It's possible that this will scare some people, but it won't scare all people."

nothing like pasting the entire article, rather than a paragraph or two and a link :P

[zootm]

the bottom line is that there are people who download music who would buy it otherwise. the record companies are not entirely in the wrong. the problem is the system - they've been able to control music completely through having lots of resources for too long... now it's getting to the stage where the artists and the fans don't need the companies. they're losing their grip, to a degree.

[ArmedJimmy]

Music Swappers Get a Message on PC Screens: Stop It Now

gee that must really convince people to go spend £15 on an album.

I think if CD's were better value for money less people would be willing to pirate it. I can go to a concert for less than I can buy a CD. I can buy a DVD for the same price.

The music industry should also be looking at ways of making money off of downloads. I know there is a lot of talk about being able to download personal albums from shops like Vrigin but its never really taken off. Look at how quickly P2P clients sprung up compared with shops allowing you to d/l albums.

Anyone that has done any course on business management or something similar knows that if companies can't keep up with changes in the way that industry works they go out of business. I can see this happening to a lot of record labels.

[zootm]

Originally posted by ArmedJimmy
The music industry should also be looking at ways of making money off of downloads. I know there is a lot of talk about being able to download personal albums from shops like Vrigin but its never really taken off. Look at how quickly P2P clients sprung up compared with shops allowing you to d/l albums.

the problem with downloading albums for money is that you're not getting any advantage. you'd be paying for something that so many people already get for free.

[ArmedJimmy]

agreed but very few people want to break the law, or do people out of money that they deserve. So if you give people a cost effective, wasy accesable way of buying the music then they are far more likely to buy it than they are now.

I'm not saying doing that will get rid of sharing of music but people will be more willing to buy it and so it will cut it down(giving yet another reason for people to buy rather than steal).

[eleet-2k2]

RIAA are asshats.

Which sounds more appealing to you, assuming you have broadband net connection:
1) Spending $16-20 USD on domestic albums, and close to $24-6 for imported albums per disc

-OR-

2) Turn on computer, launch P2P app, get track list from music store site, download songs all for FREE for as many albums as you can think of.

If albums in Canada only cost $10 (CANDIAN funds) and imports say $15, then I'd buy em. Not for twice that thank you.

[Vie]

There going to sue you for singing there tunes next....

[zootm]

i don't believe a paid-for download system will take off while free p2p services are widespread. there's just no way they can market it.

i do believe selling albums for a reasonable price would help, though. i prefer having the CD to downloading it (my CD collection is testament to this: nearly all of the ~1500 tracks on my computer are ripped from my own CDs - and i have a lot of CDs i haven't ripped). the problem with CDs is that they are hideously priced.

another problem with P2P services is the potential for the future - everything's going digital now. with new near-lossless and lossless formats, advancing internet connections, and the home entertainment systems of the future moving to more and more digitised media, it doesn't look like it'll be long before the computer, or a system like it, becomes the centre of all the music etc. in many homes. at this point, tracks downloaded on the internet - for free - could become the native format of a sitting-room entertainment system.

now, i'm all for these systems taking the emphasis away from the companies and towards the artists (a fantastic thing), but who will pay them? when media is free, those who create it are doing it at their own expense. whether that is a good thing, i'll leave up to you people to debate over, for now.

[Merlin]

going to sue you for singing there tunes next....

In the case of my flatmate, I wish they would. Dogs howl and glass shatters when he opens his fat squeaky mouth, and he couldn't hold a tune to save his life.

[Vie]

you live with Andrew?

[Merlin]

funnily enough, his name is in fact Andrew...

[Avalon]

My two cents.

Are the RIAA still making a profit? Yes... are the artists still getting MORE FUCKING MONEY than I ever will? Yes. Are these people thinking of new and innovative ways to listen to their music? No. If I just want one song, do I have access to it without paying $10? No. If I want a cd, should I be OVERCHARGED FOR IT as the music industry has stated they are doing? No.

Now here's the biggist shit... some of these hip hop artists talk about how napster and kazzaa are stealing from them... yes a whole bunch of them started out as bootleg artists and stole music to make their own mixes and *gasp* make money from it...

My my, how have the tables turned.

[zootm]

rap artists are not the whole industry. here's a good example of the flip side, the gist of something (i.e. as i remember it, with the swearing removed) that J.S. Clayden, lead singer of pitchshifter, said onstage when i last saw the band:

"right, you guys, i want to be serious now. have you seen our new release? we wanted to give you guys the best of both worlds - we wanted a bonus CD on our live CD, to reward you guys for all these years*. so we went to the record companies, and they were like 'great! we can make this a double CD, we could sell it for £20! it's a great idea!'. but we didn't want that. we said to them, that we wanted to sell the album for the price of a normal CD. the second, remix CD was a bonus, we wanted to sell it for the price of a normal albums. but none of them would support us. they wanted to charge more. so we all put in our own money, and started our own record company, just so we could sell you this CD at the price we want to sell it to you for. now, we have a lot of our own money in this, so if you could just do us a favour and not download off of the 'net?"

that is exactly what they had done. they started their own record company (P.S.I. records), and their first release was a double album of live and remixed tracks by pitchshifter. i think his request not to download the tracks off of the internet was quite reasonable. these aren't people who make CDs so that they can buy more gold chains and diamond rings to show how "bling" they are. these are ordinary guys who want their music to be heard, and were in a position where they could avoid people getting ripped off while doing it. i know there's hip-hop artists who fall into the same category. while most of the RIAA companies are just faceless corporations, try to remember how much music is made by small companies, trying to get music heard, who could lose out if you don't draw the distinction between them and the corporations who effectively take the work of artists and call it their own.

*pitchshifter announced before the tour that it would be their last, they have split up to go their own ways. they were well known for having a very strong fanbase.

[Avalon]

See, Pitchshifter is doing something entirely different though. They are saying that the establishment is messed up and that they went outside of their lines to make up their own.

It's the heartless bastards in the music industry (rap or not), that want to act like rich fucks and want to make as much money as possible. I'm sorry but they aren't going broke anytime soon. And they have food on their table. So...

[ryan]

Whats so bad about a 10% drop in sales? Most people don't even live off of 1/4 of what most artists make.

[zootm]

most artists don't make a lot of money. the companies get rich, and the artists don't get a hell of a lot, in most cases. the ones you hear about are very successful. but, again, it's the companies who lose out from the drop in sales. but they'll just pass the losses on to the artists, so that they can continue with their record profits.

[White Raven]

Originally posted by 31337-2k2
RIAA are asshats.

If albums in Canada only cost $10 (CANDIAN funds) and imports say $15, then I'd buy em. Not for twice that thank you.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA TEN DOLLARS FOR AN ALBUM??? HERE??? CANADA??? WHAT PLANET ARE YOU FROM?

A typical album is about thirty dollars, not ten. I wish it were ten.

And I agree with Raz's statement, they always blame something other than themselves.


/edit
OH. If. Christ I'm blind. Sorry about that.
//edit

[EnDurA]

zootm, its gone as far as signed bands have day jobs aswell, not very good

white, same here, bloody rip off, $25 - $30 just for an album, it's insane the price they expect us to buy them at, Meteora was $25 on special, which was alright cus you got the dvd and extra content, but really, it's just gotten outta hand

[pixiefied]

get with the times people! albums are way out of style....we now have "c.d's"

[zootm]

Originally posted by EnDurA
zootm, its gone as far as signed bands have day jobs aswell, not very good

this is my point - will haven are a good example. is the music industry any good for artists? critically, would the internet be better?

[White Raven]

I still hold strong to the point that I do not want to pay 30$ for an album with 3-5 songs on it I like. That's just ridiculous.

[zootm]

Originally posted by White Raven
I still hold strong to the point that I do not want to pay 30$ for an album with 3-5 songs on it I like. That's just ridiculous.

yeah, that's the reason i download songs. i'm not paying the highly inflated price of a whole album when only a small percentage of it is actually any good.

[Avalon]

You know, I love how the industry had a SPIKE in sales (upward) when Napster first came out... and I still buy cd's... funny.

Btw if you look at it, NOT everyone has boradband there are still plenty of people who still have dial up.

And let me add it with this comment... say I'm at my computer and want to listen to a cd but can't because of copy protection and afraid that my computer will go down the tube, do I feel like getting another cd? Nope.

[EnDurA]

Originally posted by zootm
yeah, that's the reason i download songs. i'm not paying the highly inflated price of a whole album when only a small percentage of it is actually any good.

in most of the album's i've bought latley, i've liked all the songs, though, it may take 6 weeks to relize