Why cant file sharing of divx and mp3 be legal

[conda]

ok

[Batman]

...because it's illegal.

[conda]

PLS vote

[grif_mcrenolds]

The obviouse and legal answere is to prosecute those who upload copyrighted materail without consent of the copyright owner. It is wrong and unfair to punish Fast Track or KaZaA when they aren't actually distribute the files.

There is alot of confusion about what these p2p networks really are. These office bound democrats and lawyers, who haven't spent a second on these netwroks or thier forums, believe that KaZaA and Morpheus are sites that offer free movies. WRONG! KaZaA is mearly a network client system that aids you to find servers, or peers, that offer certain files. KaZaA as no control over what is being shared because these files never go through any of thier servers! They don't even monitor the network connections that take place... because they can't.

Shutting down p2p programs isn't a solution to warez distribution anyway. Even without the aid of the KaZaA networking application, I could still connect to other peers out there - I'd just need thier IP adress or URL. Hell, that how the whole internet works in the first place. KaZaA by definition is legal. If you were to read thier license agreement, you will find that they disclaim any responsibility of any illegal content on thier networks, and they even condemn any copyright infringement used with thier software. KaZaA isn't even a true network; it's just a piece of software that safely searches though IPs to find a specific file. KaZaA isn't the network - you are creating your own.

Since KaZaA disclaims any responsibilty, it is soley the responsibilty of the user to follow the law of the land and use that software for legal use only. And there ARE ways to use KaZaA legally. What about the art of indie films? P2Ps are a great way to get your work out there without spending hard-earned money on over-priced domains and web space. All you have to do is correctly label you indie DivX film on you HD and wait for some hits, nad in a matter of hours... you have viewers!

KaZaA is a tool, not a pirate. If the DMCA is really serious and wants to protect the constitution, then they would get up up off thier fat asses and find the ones who truely break the law. Instead, they sue innocent programmers like DivXNetworks and opensource guys, simply because it's easier.

[Batman]

As Grif explained Kazaa is merely a sharing network. As such, it has both "illegal" and "legal" uses. However, it is unlikely that the RIAA will be deterred by this arguement. They move swiftly to close anything they see as a "threat" to the music industry.

[grif_mcrenolds]

Which is exactly why oorganiztions like this must be stopped. The MPAA and RIAA is made up of bureaucrats who will do anything - illegal or not - to protect thier income. The MPAA especially is treated as a government agency even though they are union of private studios.

The federal government kisses thier ass all the time with those stupid laws that minors must be accompanied by an adult to attend an R rated film. But how can a PRIVATE union punish me for a rule that they made up? It's like the government is saying "If this company says you can't say or hear this then you must obey them." That is unconstitutional. How? Because the federal government gives the power of censorship to a company whose only goal is to make more money. Government censorship is bad engouh, but now just any corporation can do it?!

If the MPAA can influence the government that way, what else can they do? Well, they can shut down anybody who threatens thier wallet. If the MPAA wanted to shut down this very web site because of links to DVD rippers, they could do it in a heartbeat, and judges would ask any questions. The copyright laws are out of control. I mean, you can't do anythign these days that technically isn't a violation of copyright laws.

Just the other week, my english teacher rewarded our failing grades with a movie - Braveheart. Do you think he got written permission from the MPAA, all of the studios, and the cast and crew? No. So becasue I sat in class and watched the movie - I'm a thief! I'm dirty, dirty thief who stole from these poor, struggling actors who can't afford to live like us! These poor actors like Mel Gibson are poor, downtrodden people who need our eight bucks. They aren't as rich as we think, no. Some of them need our money because they can't afford the necessities of life! Some of them can't even afford a fifty foot HD projection TV made of gold! And how can a human being possibly survive without a laserdisc player in every room of thier house? Ted Turner can't!

We gotta get rip of guys like the DMCA, MPAA, and RIAA. Becuase soon entertainmnet is gonna be on lockdown. You won't be able to rip a goddamn CD without some SSSCA spyware reporting you to the DMCA. You won't be able to take a shit without the MPAA bitching about how you must have ripped that stlye of shitting from a DVD.

[Batman]

The RIAA or MPAA is hardly a model of a fair organization---a small amount of people become ludicrously rich.

File-sharing is not damaging the industry financially, dvd sales are up, way up. The people, they should target are the professional pirates situated throughout the world. Not the average joe who wants to watch a movie on his small monitor, with a club soda in his hand

However, government is now basically an extension of industry.
The people with the money make the rules

Privacy is a big problem, and the problem will only get bigger. There are numerous companies, dedicated to solely creating fool-proof spyware.

[grif_mcrenolds]

I think that the only way be can get some leverage is to start some sort of boycott against the industry. Maybe we could say we'll boycott DVDs until they lower the price to something sensible. They can't charge us $30 for a P&S version of Ace Ventura. They just make it harder and harder to find entertainment at a reasonable price.

And you have a point that file sharing isn't hurting the industry. Remember Napster? The news media made them look like the anti-christ when CD sales only dropped about 2%. In science class, they made us read this stupid Scholastic magazine article on Napster that demonized hackers like us, and then made us take a quiz that proved that these news guys don't know what they're talking about. One of the questions on the quiz was "How did the music get on computers?" like it was some crime investigation. I answered "PCM audio is extracted from the CD tracks and then encoded in MPEG Layer-3 compression." The supid teacher marked me wrong! she said the right answere was "Music is turned into little ones and zeroes and stolen by hackers." I wanted to vomit. They tried to make advanced audio encoding look like a magical spell. These are the people educating our youth.

[Batman]

Lousy teachers. I've seen a lot of teachers that are just plain scared about the PC (especially those in the computer labs)---because they don't know much about it. Then again, it's easy to impress them with mundane things.

The industry has launched a pathetic media campaign to tell everyone that file-swapping is illegal, immoral, (sort of makes you feel like Hitler) or they try to scare the hell out of you with strict penalties.

These industries should be like others---pay the artists or semi-talented (mostly high school drop-out) actors less---so you can get some reasonable price.

[grif_mcrenolds]

Soeaking of penalties, wanna see something really scary? Goto http://www.stoppoliceware.com . It seems that now they're trying to pass a law that says you have to install government spyware on your PC that makes sure you aren't violating copyright laws. I have this one teacher who's the only guy in the high school who knows about this stuff. In class, we usually discuss different methods of hacking hotmail.

[dene]

Part of the problem lies in the costs of distribution (particularly of Music). The retailer takes a fairly large slice of the retail price. The music publishers are keen to protect the position of the retailer because they know that they will shift copies of new albums quickly. However, this is an extremely inefficient way to distribute. Many units are returned unsold after the initial hype dies down. Also retailers tend to be conservative and only stock a relatively small range (and who can blame them - they are running a business after all). If the record industry did not have so much money tied up in distribution, marketing and inventory (It costs to have all those CDs sitting on the shelf) - they would be able to sell a much wider range content over the net at one third the price. I would be a buyer (which I'm not at the moment). Why should I reward my local retailer with 30 -50% of the list price of a CD that he's doesn't stock, has never heard of, and has to order for me (wait one to three weeks). My guess is that much the same constraints apply to the sale of DVD's - only let's face it - copying DVDs is much less of a threat to the industry than copying CDs is. I listen to my CDs time and time again. I rarely watch a film more than twice - and for that I'm usually happy to rent it.

[conda]

[Batman]

The current method of distribution is ineffective and expensive. maybe these new music and video services may allow for more efficient distribution of entertainments, bringing down the cost.

[grif_mcrenolds]

VOD services could solve this. The only problem is that the industry is trying to illegalize the very thing that would save them millions.

[Batman]

With VOD they wouldn't be able to bundle garbage with what you actually want to see. Sort of like what happens with cable packages---you only like 4 or 5 channels the other 10-15 you don't even watch but you have to pay for all---and music.