US woman to pay 1.92 mln dlrs in music piracy case

[Urlik]

would it be illegal to download mp3s of songs you own on vinyl?

[Teresa Edgerton]

Originally Posted by Rinman

Spend that time that you could have used charging that one person downloading the music looking for killers and child preditors (spelling?) rather than something like this.

By that logic, we should ignore all other forms of theft as well. Hey, let's just forget the whole personal property thing altogether. If I want to walk into your home and take away anything and everything that strikes my fancy (your computer and your ipod for starters -- hey, wouldn't that be ironic), why involve the police? They have better things to do. Let's just legalize larceny and free up the authorities so that they can concentrate on other, more important, things.

Or wasn't that what you meant?

[Rinman]

@Teresa:

In a way, yes.

Theft is still an issue yes, but it (physical item) can be controlled. It's simply by locking your doors, closing your windows, and if even needed, having a security system installed.

With the music files, this can also be controlled - simply disable them from being downloaded period. If someone cracks the code or whatever, make it tougher and tougher and so on.

[Teresa Edgerton]

So if someday you forgot to lock your door it would be OK to go inside and help myself to your possessions, because you had made it possible for me to do so?

[chopper]

Originally Posted by Rinman

@Teresa:

In a way, yes.

Theft is still an issue yes, but it (physical item) can be controlled. It's simply by locking your doors, closing your windows, and if even needed, having a security system installed.

With the music files, this can also be controlled - simply disable them from being downloaded period. If someone cracks the code or whatever, make it tougher and tougher and so on.

but how does this impose a penalty on the thief? after all, there must be a punishment for a crime, right, rather than inflict further restrictions, security etc on the victims. when somebody steals stuff from my shop, should they be allowed to walk away simply because it is unfair to stop them? i'd rather make sure they're ready to soil themselves in fear before i hand them over to the police*. and that's the effect i'm sure the record companies are hoping for in this instance.


*although by law i'm not allowed to. but the mere presence of three silent, heavily tattooed, heavily muscled and generally physically imposing security guards with the shoplifter in a very small room has much the same effect. we don't get many repeat offenders.

[pyan]

Originally Posted by mosaix

Nor me.

Ditto...

But then, I can't understand this need to have "music" all the time, wherever you are or whatever you're doing, either...I'm afraid I belong to a generation where you paid attention and listened to music, not treated it as aural wallpaper...

[Teresa Edgerton]

Originally Posted by pyan

I'm afraid I belong to a generation where you paid attention and listened to music, not treated it as aural wallpaper...

As another who was born during the late Jurrasic, I feel the same way.

Perhaps that's why I feel so very little sympathy for those poor, poor teenagers, with their pitiful little ipods clutched in their hands, so starved for music that they're forced to steal it.

In my day [waves cane, then hobbles back to rocking chair], we had transistor radios and had to eat whatever the disk jockeys put on our plates.

[chrispenycate]

My very first pay packet (I was fourteen, and legally allowed to get a summer job for the first time) went as a down payment on a tape recorder – reel to reel, single speed, mono, not a machine I would even bother to sneer at today. I had soon modified my bedside radio (valves, {tubes for the transatlantics} not a transistor in site) to give a direct output and hooked in a turntable so I could listen to friends' discs; there was too much music bursting out in England at the beginning of the sixties to buy it all…

I wonder if I could be considered a harbinger of the present trend of propertyless society?

[Pyar]

Originally Posted by pyan

Ditto...

But then, I can't understand this need to have "music" all the time, wherever you are or whatever you're doing, either...I'm afraid I belong to a generation where you paid attention and listened to music, not treated it as aural wallpaper...

Lol I do listen to music most of the time. But I do like to have it in the background occasionally. I know a lot of my friends tend to have music playing all the time, and they just tune it out in their mind. But its just something we all live with constantly. Music may have been a luxury for you but it is a necessity for us.

[iansales]

I have music playing almost all the time - I'm currently listening to Opeth's Morningrise album as I type this - although I suspect I'm quite close to Teresa's generation.

As for "piracy"... according to figures in The Sun, put together by some thinktank at UCL, 4.73 billion downloads a year has cost the entertainment industry £120 billion. Which is about the same as the GDP of New Zealand. It also works out at £25 an item, which is patently wrong. The figures were later amended to 473 million downloads costing £12 billion - which is still £25 per item.

The so-called losses from downloading thrown around by record labels and Hollywood studios are nonsense. The only thing they prove is that their business models simply cannot survive in today's environment. They need to change, not introduce stupid laws that cannot be policed or demand insane amounts of compensation for minor infringements.

[Fried Egg]

Originally Posted by iansales

I have music playing almost all the time - I'm currently listening to Opeth's Morningrise album as I type this - although I suspect I'm quite close to Teresa's generation.

As for "piracy"... according to figures in The Sun, put together by some thinktank at UCL, 4.73 billion downloads a year has cost the entertainment industry £120 billion. Which is about the same as the GDP of New Zealand. It also works out at £25 an item, which is patently wrong. The figures were later amended to 473 million downloads costing £12 billion - which is still £25 per item.

The so-called losses from downloading thrown around by record labels and Hollywood studios are nonsense. The only thing they prove is that their business models simply cannot survive in today's environment. They need to change, not introduce stupid laws that cannot be policed or demand insane amounts of compensation for minor infringements.

Indeed, and they also assume that each and every download is a lost sale (meaning they would have paid if they could not have downloaded it for free) which is also very wrong.

And this persistance with calling copyright infringment "theft" is really silly and all part of a cynical attempt to elevate the perceived seriousness of the crime.

[Dave]

Originally Posted by iansales

The so-called losses from downloading thrown around by record labels and Hollywood studios are nonsense. The only thing they prove is that their business models simply cannot survive in today's environment. They need to change, not introduce stupid laws that cannot be policed or demand insane amounts of compensation for minor infringements.

I was reading an editorial in one of the newspapers (sorry I forget which one) but it was noting how bands have changed in the last few decades. Once bands played concerts simply to promote albums, and made their money from album sales. Now bands release albums and singles (often for free) to promote tours, and make their money from the concerts. The record companies make little money from the concerts. They should have caught on to this change sooner.

[Lacedaemonian]

And there was me thinking this discussion was over....

I am sure we all agree that a law that is impossible to enforce is a pretty pointless law. Well, I hope we all agree.

Chris - almost every kid I knew whilst growing up would record the music charts from the radio every Sunday night.

[Pyar]

Here is the definition of law: law definition | Dictionary.com. This is one of the definitions listed: "any written or positive rule or collection of rules prescribed under the authority of the state or nation, as by the people in its constitution". Thus agreeing with Lace if a law isn't really in line with the people then it really makes no sense why it even exists since laws are supposed to govern the relationship between people based on society's norms and expectations.

[Lacedaemonian]

Originally Posted by Pyar

Here is the definition of law: law definition | Dictionary.com. This is one of the definitions listed: "any written or positive rule or collection of rules prescribed under the authority of the state or nation, as by the people in its constitution". Thus agreeing with Lace if a law isn't really in line with the people then it really makes no sense why it even exists since laws are supposed to govern the relationship between people based on society's norms and expectations.

Pyar, you summed up the root of this argument so perfectly (in my opinion). People will argue (now) that the people working in that industry need that law to protect their livelihoods. I refer to people like Chopper and his staff team who work in a music store, not necessarily the artist or the label. We could argue that if everybody bought their music legally over the net then Chopper and co would still be screwed. Of course docking stations for music downloads could be introduced in music stores etc etc but I still think the bulk of the business will be lost. The sad fact is, very few industrys lasts forever. I am sure the miners thought their jobs were safe prior to 1984.