Quotes Of The Week
"They can continue burying their head in the ground and denying the popularity of peer to peer to their customers, but they do so at their own peril." Gigi B. Sohn.
"It's going to really backfire. They have not figured out how to integrate this revolutionary new medium into their business models. And the clock is ticking - tick, tick, tick." - Donna L. Hoffman.
"It's being strategic about the records that you release, and how you release them, that will have the most impact on the business." - Capitol Records President Andrew Slater.
"I have the strong impression it wasn't done with the care and consideration you have described. I think it's a bit of a mess." – Australian Judge Murray Wilcox, referring to the raids he himself ordered against the homes of Sharman File Sharing and ISP executives.
"Today's outcome vindicates our position - that the seizure of materials using the Anton Piller order was heavy handed, unnecessary and indicative of the recording industry's increasing desperation to crush peer-to-peer technology." – Sharman’s Nikki Hemming.
The Zer0Share Project
Here at Napsterites the members are no strangers to file sharing. With a name like Napsterites I may be running the risk of stating the obvious but the familiarity with peer-to-peer networking goes beyond that of the committed enthusiast. Indeed were it not for our members there might not be any peer-to-peer at all. Their lists of accomplishments in the industry is substantial, from work on the original Napster and KaZaa right up through new systems still in the lab. That the boards here reflect mostly social activities is much like a lake on a bright summer day. The water sparkles with invitation but is hard to see through, so it's not until one plunges in that one gets the full measure of the environment. Things in other words are happening beneath the surface. Don't get me wrong. I'm not implying that Napsterites is some hot bed of file sharing intrigue, quite the opposite. Once one gets to know the members they can be very forthcoming about their work, it's just that like many things in life, there are levels of existence that at first glance may be somewhat obscured by more prosaic activities.
I've been thinking about this lately in relationship to file sharing and specifically in relationship to a program called Waste. While not to my knowledge developed by anyone at Napsterites it has been invited and accepted by NU members with enthusiasm, running virtually non stop since the first week it was released in June of 2003. I can't count the number of networks we have connecting members here, not so much because of the sheer volume of them, and there are plenty, but because Waste is a program designed from the start to be stealthy, and unless you're invited into a specific network called a "mesh," you're not going to know of its existence, even if you're already operating on another one. This is a big departure from file sharing programs and as you can imagine, it's one of the most important features Waste offers the user, particularly in these days of uncontrolled legal weaponry aimed at file sharers by an increasingly pathological media industry. Imagine
pockets of resistance populated by content rich, free-sharing users hidden from view and scattered across the globe and you'll have some idea what Waste is about. Though small, with each mesh maxing out at some 50 members, the aggregate is surprisingly vast. But there's the rub, it is by design a disconnected aggregate and to a large extent socially balkanized. Nobody knows what anybody else is doing on these meshes, which from a security standpoint is reasonable, even laudable, but from a societal standpoint it is in my view a step backwards, and a shortcoming I'd like to address.
As of this writing I am a member of an even dozen meshes, most of them small and only occasionally active, but there are four that I connect to each day, and of those four one is of a fairly substantial size. I'm about to add another. Or more specifically, with your assistance, we're about to create another. One with a very different mission.
As someone who has become familiar with this program over many months of usage a couple of things become apparent. The first is that most meshes are simply too small to catch fire. Initial excitement at being able to connect at all leads to determined content mining which leads inevitably to content exhaustion, and one reaches that point in time fairly quickly, when one has transferred all the material worth acquiring from the various mesh members. I am on some fairly substantial ones, content wise, yet I can close my eyes and see all the folders each member has and the names of the files contained therein. It's not to say that new material isn't added, it is, but in the course of human events it's slow process, this adding of stuff, and one can easily become distracted from the quest. Which brings me to the second point. After a while you stop looking. It's true. Unlike gigantic file sharing systems with hundreds of thousands of users and multi terabytes of material, a humble Waste mesh may have a few hundred gigs at most, or perhaps a terabyte or two. After plumbing the depths on a daily basis for a few weeks one can become attuned to the natural rhythms of the acquisitional cycle of the membership and realize from an efficiency angle anyway, you can't really check in each day with a folder by folder census and expect any kind of major payoff. In other words without the excitement of the always new, one can get well, bored. This of course is not news to experienced Waste users and they all seem to do the same thing about it no matter what mesh you happen to find yourself in. As a matter of fact it can happen the very first time someone uses the program. Waste happens to have excellent, encrypted decentralized chat. It's all but uncrackable and it's under no one's control. This isn't lost on Waste users and they immediately put it to fantastic use notifying fellow file sharers of any new content they may have recently added. Conversely users also post requests for content as well. There's a lot of back and forth when the itch gets bad. This brings up another observation. Like an iceberg, most content in the hands of Waste users is not actually on Waste, but parked elsewhere in other files, discs, folders harddrives or machines otherwise inaccessible by the network
search function, but not entirely by members. A simply query will bring about the transfer when one member responds by putting online something that had been parked off, in essence filling an order. This is how it should be in any network where storage and bandwidth are rationed, and indeed name me a network that isn't. The difference with Waste is that the chat functions are so efficient and so good they become dependably a part of the file sharing scheme acting like an uberdrive for the entire network. The interface is human of course, one has to query the owner directly, but it is no exaggeration to say you can get it faster using this system than with fasttrack or, and I hate to say this, Soulseek, my favorite regular file sharing program. I'm not kidding. In my experience if it's available anywhere in any mesh member's possession, online or off, you can get it faster with Waste than with any other program.
What this means is that for all practical purposes after a certain amount of time has passed, one doesn't need to share anything anymore in the normal sense, with folders bursting with tons of content instantly at the ready and hogging untold gigs on pricey harddrives. You don't have to because nobody needs it. If it's up they've either 1, already gotten it or 2, they don't want it. Either way, it's taking up space unnecessarily. It becomes like the famous dog in the Sherlock Holmes story, important for it's absence. We know the goods are offline, we don't need to see what's on. We do need to know when something new arrives and as long as we can get access we don't need to know if the folder it comes in is offline or on. All things being equal of course you might say well so what, you have to put the stuff somewhere so why not just leave it online, members can at least get it faster that way and besides, what difference does it make if it's online or not? Hardrives keep getting bigger and cheaper too, it's not like Waste charges a storage fee by the month. Well, if keeping it online didn't make any difference you'd be right, but as we're finding out, it makes a huge difference, in the eyes of the law. Due to some albeit temporary legal pathology that hasn't worked itself out of the collective cultural consciousness it turns out some poor bastards have been finding themselves in quite a financial spot just leaving digital stuff lying around for any and everyone to stumble over. I know it sounds funny, blaming the victim and all but the copyright laws have been interpreted to suggest that in matters of information, if somebody comes into your house and copies your copyrighted stuff without the permission of the copyright claimant, you’re violating a statute, not the copiers. This is a somewhat simple explanation for a maddeningly complicated issue that even experts have trouble following but basically if you had a store and every time somebody shoplifted your stuff the cops sent you to jail it would be a pretty good analogy how the law - so far - treats downloading. Unfair? You bet. But that's the way it is at the moment. Suffice it to say, for our purposes, there is a huge difference between keeping files instantly available online and keeping them
generally available off. It's not that the law appreciates the difference mind you; it's just that if one is going to participate in file sharing the tactical advantage enjoyed in keeping an offline archive is profound. Which brings us back to Waste.
My proposal is a simple one. I would like to start a file sharing network with no files. A sort of
nullwork if you will for Waste users. More specifically, I would like to start a Waste mesh that does not contain any remotely accessible copyrighted content that is not under the ownership of the membership. No songs, no movies, no warez. It can actually contain gigs and gigs of downloadable material. As long as it's member created or is distributable with permission fine but if not, it won't belong. Leave that material on the other networks, and there are plenty of them out there believe me. I might be responsible for helping kick off a few of them. But this one will be different. Depending on member’s ambitions it will have rooms, chat, 24 hour socializing, quiet corners and rowdy saloons, but it won't have any copyrighted content. None. It'll have so little content that if the RIAA happens to stop by they'll leave at the first opportunity because their presence will be a complete waste of time.
If there's no content, why bother? Well first of all it just so happens you can do a lot with a mesh even if you're not sharing songs. Users new to Waste can become familiar with the program in an open environment free from any controversy, which in itself is a kind of liberation. They can introduce others to the program in a neutral way, and walk themselves through the steps that enable them to create their own meshes for friends and family. They can use the chat functions like any other system, free in the knowledge that no one's looking over their shoulder reading every word. More experienced users can use it for more complex things. Developers may find it useful for new projects and to test newer versions of Waste, which is now open source. It can become a clearinghouse for all sorts of information, from politics to local events. Since some Europeans have erroneously concluded links are the same as content, link sites are falling by the wayside, so it can and probably will become a place to exchange them. It should although I'm not sure that it will, become a place for artists to announce and distribute their own works. It's been five years since Napster proved conclusively that artists can control their destiny and do their own mass distributing, yet to this day artists still cling tenaciously to outdated media company models and in doing so help perpetuate a system that at once enslaves them and corrupts any and all it touches. This mesh will not end the practice, but it may show some artists there is another way, and they in turn may become emissaries to the larger creative community, and that may prove to be an important step in their own emancipation. In technical terms Waste is not a "resource hog", people can and do leave it on all day long, even several mashes simultaneously without experiencing a drain on their computers. It may be that this new mesh becomes a sort of permanent community ticker, like the news zipper at Times Square in New York City, idling quietly in a corner of the screen and occasionally announcing events of interest, unmanipulated by corporate profit machines. A true
people's network. I can't even begin to think of all the things this mesh might be capable of in the weeks and months ahead, and it's not from lack of trying. I just realize the futility of competing with a million minds.
I know that the time has come to start something new. Something a lot bigger than file sharing, and maybe something a little bigger than ourselves.
To that end I’ve gotten the ball rolling as it were. I’ve started the mesh, given it a name and put up a thread at P2P-Zone. I’ve also placed in my share folder some 600 works from the public domain. You will find that thread
here.
Waste may be a funny name for a program that is anything but, that brings together people from all over the world in a corporate free, protected cybersphere. Justin Frankel its creator, is said to have chosen the name after the underground mail system in Thomas Pynchon's book The Crying of Lot 57. In a society of extreme repression, this was how members were forced to communicate if they wanted their words to remain unmolested. That was fiction of course. Still, without rearticulating the planet's immediate geopolitical history and the headlines thus created, it probably wouldn't be the worst idea in the world if more of us became familiar with such a system, and one that's actually real. Well, here's our chance.
Pass it on,
Enjoy,
Jack -
The Zer0Share Project.
More Lawsuits Filed in Effort to Thwart File Sharing
John Schwartz
The music industry announced a new round of lawsuits yesterday against 532 people accused of illegal file sharing, including people at 21 universities.
"We just put a little more focus on the users of university networks so it's clear that everybody is potentially responsible for infringing acts online," said Cary Sherman, the president of the Recording Industry Association of America, which filed the suits on behalf of record companies.
Swapping music online continues to grow worldwide, though awareness in the United States that there could be legal consequences has grown as well. At the same time, legitimate online music stores from Apple Computer and RealNetworks have emerged, and others are on the way. Apple has sold more than 50 million songs, and Wal-Mart announced its own online music store yesterday.
Of the 532 people accused of illegal file sharing by the industry, 89 were using networks at universities including New York University, Stanford, Georgetown and Vanderbilt. The others used commercial Internet service providers to reach the Internet. Yesterday's new cases bring the number of people sued by the industry to nearly 2,000.
By taking their lawsuits to the universities, the industry is going to the earliest hot spots for file sharing. College students took advantage of high-speed Internet access to bring about the initial Napster revolution, identified by the name of the company whose file-sharing software was first widely used to share music files online. After an initial round of lawsuits by the industry to shut down those file-sharing networks, many universities started education programs and issued restrictions on Internet use.
The industry's method of tracking file-trading activity does not disclose the identity of traders, but it can identify an Internet Protocol number that can often be traced back to an individual user by an Internet service provider. The industry is using a process known as "John Doe" litigation to sue people whose names are not known, using subpoenas to force the providers of Internet service to disclose the defendants' identities.
Representatives of New York University and Vanderbilt said yesterday that they had not seen the subpoenas and could not comment. At Stanford, Debra L. Zumwalt, the university's general counsel, said that if the subpoenas met legal requirements, the university would cooperate. "We believe in intellectual property rights and obeying the law," she said.
Ms. Zumwalt also noted that Stanford sent a memorandum to all students, faculty and staff members last year warning against illicit file trading that said, in part, "Sharing music, videos, software and other copyrighted material in violation of copyright laws may expose you and others to significant legal and university sanctions."
Those involved in the online music wars said that the industry move was disappointing but not surprising. Cindy Cohn, the legal director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, criticized the industry's continued pursuit of lawsuits.
"The R.I.A.A.'s crusade against file sharing is turning out to be a great boon to trial lawyers nationwide - unfortunately, it's continuing to wreak havoc on ordinary people nationwide as well," she said.
Gigi B. Sohn, the president of Public Knowledge, a policy organization in Washington that focuses on intellectual property issues, said that it was time for the industry's litigation strategy to give way to a more positive effort to encourage legitimate file sharing and even to develop businesses based on the technology.
"They can continue burying their head in the ground and denying the popularity of peer to peer to their customers, but they do so at their own peril," Ms. Sohn said.
"While I'm sympathetic to the problem they have protecting copyrights, they haven't done enough to get people off of illegal systems."
An expert in online business at Vanderbilt University agreed. "It's going to really backfire," said Donna L. Hoffman, a co-founder of the university's eLab research center. "They have not figured out how to integrate this revolutionary new medium into their business models. And the clock is ticking - tick, tick, tick."
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/24/te...y/24music.html
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Record Industry Sues 532 Downloaders In Colo., Other States
Alex Veiga
The recording industry sued 532 people today in Colorado and several other states, including scores of individuals using computer networks at 21 universities, claiming they were illegally sharing digital music files over the Internet.
The latest wave of copyright lawsuits brought by the Recording Industry Association of America on behalf of recording companies marks the first time the trade group has targeted computer users swapping music files over university networks.
The RIAA filed the "John Doe" complaints against 89 individuals using networks at universities in Colorado as well as Arizona, California, New York, Indiana, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Wisconsin and Washington.
Lawsuits were also filed against 443 people using commercial Internet access providers in Colorado, California, Missouri, Texas and Virginia.
The recording group did not name which Internet access providers the defendants were using.
http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,...036562,00.html
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“Mmm, cereal uploading!”
BPI Launch Legal Action Against P2P Users
The British Phonographic Industry is set to following the RIAA as they launch a new campaign threatening legal action against people who illegally use P2P or uploading music to the internet.
Its the first move by an industry trade association outside the US.
The BPI plan to send instant messages to peer-to-peer filesharing networks warning users that if they do not stop they may face legal action.
The message will warn that offering music to others is illegal without permission of the copyright owner “Such actions damage everyone involved in creating and investing in music,” the message staes.
The BPI do stresses it will be focusing its campaign on heavy uploaders and not individual downloaders.
“The target of this campaign is the serial uploader,” says BPI executive chairman Peter Jamieson. “These are people making available literally hundreds and sometimes thousands of files available to allcomers.”
http://www.dancefrontdoor.co.uk/article2767.html
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Search 'Mess' Leads To Kazaa Delay
Simon Hayes
THE music industry will have to wait until at least May before being granted access to material siezed in raids on the headquarters of peer-to-peer network Kazaa, with a Federal Court judge describing the execution of civil search orders as "a bit of a mess".
Justice Wilcox ordered the material - including documents and computer files siezed in raids on the office of Kazaa owner Sharman Networks and the homes of several key executives - be held until a hearing in May.
He rejected an application by counsel for Sharman Networks to have proceedings stayed pending an application for leave to appeal against the orders. That application is not likely to be heard until August.
Justice Wilcox ordered the documents be sorted after claims some irrelevant material was taken during the raids, with an independent solicitor and a forensics expert to oversee that process. The sorting process would ensure only documents covered by his orders was included in the siezed material, he said.
"I have the strong impression it wasn't done with the care and consideration you have described," he said of the search process. "I think it's a bit of a mess."
While the music industry has agreed the documents be sorted, the orders are a blow given it had sought immediate access to the sorted documents, arguing the material was essential in determining how Kazaa worked.
But Justice Wilcox declined to make that order.
"Once we have access to more detailed (information) we may talk about a plan (for access)," he said.
"There's a lot to be said for the view that it should be part of the discovery process."
It is likely lawyers representing Sharman will attempt to postpone that access until after the company's appeal is heard.
"We would seek a stay of access (to the documents) until our appeal rights are exhausted," counsel for Sharman Francis Douglas QC said outside the court.
Justice Wilcox ordered five other respondents - US companies Altnet Inc and Brilliant Digital Entertainment Inc, Brilliant Digital Entertainment Pty Ltd, Brilliant Digital chief executive Kevin Glen Bermeister and employee Anthony Rose - be added to the action.
Proceedings were stood over until May 14.
http://www.news.com.au/common/story_...E15306,00.html
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Music Industry Fails to Obtain Access to Material
Sharman Press Release
Justice Wilcox of the Federal Court of Australia today gave directions to "sort out" the material seized at the premises of Sharman Networks, owner and distributor of the Kazaa file sharing application.
In doing so, Justice Wilcox acknowledged that Anton Piller orders are about preserving evidence and stated the recording industry would not be obtaining access to any of the material seized at this time. The directions give Sharman and other parties raided an opportunity to review the material and identify irrelevant and privileged material, which falls outside the Anton Piller order. This process will take place in consultation with independent solicitors, a forensic expert and solicitors representing both sides.
In handing down his decision, Justice Wilcox told the applicants they were "flogging a dead horse" in their attempts to get immediate access to material currently being held by an independent law firm.
"Today's outcome vindicates our position - that the seizure of materials using the Anton Piller order was heavy handed, unnecessary and indicative of the recording industry's increasing desperation to crush peer-to-peer technology," stated Nikki Hemming, CEO of Sharman Networks. ''We have complied fully in US proceedings and will continue to do so this case under appropriate legal procedures.
"We are pleased with the outcome of today's decision and are continuing to prepare our applications for leave to appeal," stated lawyers for Sharman Networks.
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/st...2004,+03:57+AM
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Forget The Spin! It's A Record Record
Peter Martin
The Australian recording industry should be congratulating itself. Both for pushing CD sales to an all-time record high and for keeping this fact out of the initial news reports.
The announcement from ARIA is (perhaps deliberately) hard to read.
For one thing, there are no comparisons with past sales going back more than a year.
But late last year ARIA blessed me with a spreadsheet showing sales by category going back to 1982.
Reading that, together with its latest press release, it is clear that:
Total sales (in all formats) climbed to a record high in 2003: 65.6 million, easily topping the previous record of 63.9 million set in 2001.
And the sales of actual CD albums climbed above 50 million for the first time (well above 50 million actually).
It's a real cause for celebration. Back before the advent of Napster and home CD burning the industry was selling fewer than 40 million CD albums per year.
In its announcement ARIA makes much of a decline in the sales of its (reportedly unprofitable) CD singles - down from 11.3 million to 9.4 million.
But if the industry reflected for a moment - it might see this as a good thing. CD singles were never an end in themselves. They were a promotional device - designed to feed listeners into buying the entire album.
Music downloads may be (slowly) replacing the CD single in this role.
They appear to do it much better (creating record sales of CD albums) - at virtually no cost to the record companies themselves!
The industry has fought, it has screamed, it has arrested, it has litigated. But it may just be stuck with the best device for promoting its product it never wanted invented.
http://petermartin.blogspot.com/
Listen to Peter Martin discuss the rising sales on Triple J’s
Hack, ABC radio’s current affairs half hour news and information program from Australia, you’ll also hear a convoluted denial from Steven Peach, CEO of the ARIA.
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File Traders Face Jail Time, Fines with California Law
Jay Lyman
"This is a natural extension of what's on the books for hard goods - - DVDs and videocassettes -- in virtually every state," MPAA senior vice president of state legislative affairs Vans Stevenson told TechNewsWorld.
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Internet civil libertarians are raising red flags over parallel bills in the California state legislature that would punish file traders of copyrighted materials with up to a year in jail, US$2,500 in fines or both if the users do not provide their real names and addresses with the title of the work.
A California State Senate bill introduced by Sen. Kevin Murray (D-Los Angeles) -- the same lawmaker who authored and promoted California's spam law that punishes illegal spammers with up to $1 million in fines per incident -- and a corresponding California Assembly bill from Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield) both would impose the penalties on Internet users who share commercial recordings or audiovisual work electronically.
Electronic Frontier Foundation legal director Cindy Cohn said the bills -- which she described as "incredibly corrosive to basic privacy and security" -- would require even children to offer their names and addresses to share something that might arguably be fair use of a copyrighted work.
"The bills are essentially trying to create criminal liability for sharing even a single commercial audio or visual work on the state level -- something that was denied on the federal level," Cohn told TechNewsWorld.
Painful P2P Penalties
Cohn indicated the biggest concerns about the legislation center on its harsh penalties and its potential effect on anonymity, which historically has been preserved on the Internet.
"As a society, do we really want to give people a year in prison for sharing a single song?" she asked.
Cohn added that the bills are "counterproductive to privacy" in their requirement for users, including children, to share real names and addresses. She said the bills contradict policy goals designed to prevent the growing problems associated with identity theft, spam and protection of children's identities.
"All of the other customs and precedents on the Internet go the other direction," she said. "Here, California is mandating that minors provide [names and addresses]."
Natural Extension of Law
Both bills are sponsored by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), which contends that storing of a copyrighted work on a shared hard drive is the same thing as theft of a DVD from a brick-and-mortar store.
The movie industry group also claims the legislation is a normal state-level legal supplement to federal copyright law, which prohibits electronic sharing of protected works.
"This is a natural extension of what's on the books for hard goods -- DVDs and videocassettes -- in virtually every state," MPAA senior vice president of state legislative affairs Vans Stevenson told TechNewsWorld.
Failing Business Model
However, critics of such legislation and of the music, movie and entertainment industries' legal efforts to crack down on peer-to-peer (P2P) Internet file-trading sites and services repeatedly have pointed to U.S. and other court rulings that have found them to be legal.
Cohn said "fair use" allowances for sharing copyrighted materials -- such as a parody -- are in jeopardy because of the proposed California legislation.
The MPAA's Stevenson took issue with the idea of fair use as a right, telling TechNewsWorld that it is only a defense against charges of copyright infringement. "I can bring a case against anybody," he said.
Cohn -- who questioned the need for such legislation when copyright holders such as the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) claim their lawsuits against individual file traders are working -- said the real copyright issue lies in the entertainment industry's effort to hold on to its old way of doing business.
"The problem is that the entertainment companies are trying to force a rejected business model down the throats of their fans," she said. "The realistic thing is people aren't going to abide by this law, and then, suddenly, everyone will be a criminal."
http://www.technewsworld.com/perl/story/33174.html
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Fox Fires 2 After Finding Film Downloads on Server
Patrick Day
Two employees of Fox Entertainment Group have been terminated after the company's discovery of illegally downloaded movies and software on a Fox computer network server.
The titles found on the server included "Bringing Down the House," "Daddy Day Care," "Old School," "Daredevil," "Deliver Us From Eva," "The Matrix Reloaded" and "X2: X-Men United."
Lisa Yamamoto, an employee of the company's information technology department, was linked to use of the server after the in-house investigation of an unrelated computer security issue in November 2003, according to an affidavit posted to the Smoking Gun website.
Fox alerted federal authorities, who traced access of the server to Yamamoto's Los Angeles apartment, according to the affidavit, which was verified by investigators. Agents searched her apartment last month and seized computer equipment.
Kevin Sarna, identified in the affidavit as a Fox contract employee, was also terminated in connection with the investigation, according to a person familiar with the case. Neither has been formally charged, although Fox said in a statement that it intended to prosecute any individuals implicated in the case.
"We are outraged that individuals within our own company not only engaged in this behavior but also used our technology to do so," Fox said in a statement released Wednesday afternoon.
Yamamoto and Sarna could not be reached for comment.
James Todak, the Secret Service deputy special agent in charge, said the investigation was ongoing.
Yamamoto and Sarna allegedly were members of an online "warez" file-sharing group. Such groups compete "to gain a reputation as the fastest, highest quality, free provider of pirated computer software … and DVD movies," according to the search warrant affidavit.
Fox's antipiracy team was able to identify 14 movies — not all Fox films — available for other members of the "warez" group to download for free from the Fox server.
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la...,4351880.story
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Korean Controversy Erupts Over Online Political Parodies
Kim Rahn
The arrest of a university student Tuesday for circulating images on the Internet parodying opposition parties and their leaders has sparked a backlash from netizens who believe the police are limiting their freedom of expression.
Police arrested a 21-year-old college student, identified as Kwon, on charges of posting on his homepage and other 14 Web sites manipulated images indicating that the opposition parties would lose April 15 general elections.
Some 70 circulated images include a parody of an online game Starcraft that portrays opposition parties’ defeat by the Uri Party. Another image changes the words from a cartoon published in a sports daily to show the chairmen of the opposition parties as homeless after losing the elections.
Online debate has been running hot since the opposition parties’ impeachment of President Roh Moo-hyun ahead of the April 15 general elections.
Police said Kwon is charged with publicizing false information. ``Kwon’s parodies conclude that the opposition leaders become homeless after losing the elections and Roh returns to office with the Constitutional Court’s dismissal of the impeachment. It is false information aiming to prevent opposition parties in the upcoming election,’’ police said.
Kwon violated the election law by posting the pictures on several Internet sites other than his own and letting other users download the images, the police said.
With the revision of election laws on March 12, the National Election Commission (NEC) has gained more authority to regulate violations on the Internet, demanding Internet service providers to provide the names, addresses and registration numbers of suspects.
The election watchdog earlier announced that it will regulate all words and images which attack specific candidates. It plans to shut down Web sites carrying such content.
However, these moves and Kwon’s arrest have drawn a huge backlash from Internet users. They argue police can’t apply the election law to Kwon as his images satirized the whole political arena, not specific politicians.
They also claim that a crackdown on parodying the present political situation and social issues infringes on freedom of expression.
Internet users are developing countermeasures to enable people to post manipulated images without violating the election law, such as naming politicians or the Assembly with aliases or argots and using other people’s IP addresses.
``People who post manipulated images on the Web merely express their opinions on political issues rather than aim at seating or unseating specific politicians in the April polls,’’ said Choi Nae-hyun, editor-in-chief of Web site Mediamob. ``In these times when even the NEC collects publicly parody posters to boost voting for the election, charging Internet users for expressing their opinions is nothing but oppressing free participation in politics.’’
http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/nati...6522011980.htm
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Massive German Sweep Targets Pirates
John Borland
German authorities conducted raids on more than 750 locations on Tuesday and Thursday this week, seeking evidence of Internet movie piracy operations.
The raids resulted in more than 15 detentions and confiscation of 19 servers, more than 40,000 CD-Rs and DVD-Rs, and more than 200 computers, according to the Motion Picture Association of America. Authorities' two- year investigation targeted online and offline distributors, Net-based "release groups," and a group that had hacked into university and corporate computers to store movie files.
http://news.com.com/2110-1025_3-5175777.html
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Neo-Nazi Music Sharers Raided
Reuters
German police have raided the homes of more than 300 people who they suspect of posting neo-Nazi music files on the Internet for others to download, the Federal Crime Office says.
Police said the nationwide raids on Wednesday followed investigations into 342 people who had posted songs by skinhead bands on the Internet. The songs contained lyrics inciting racial hatred, the crime agency said.
Police said they would carry out 333 raids by the end of Wednesday at the homes of people who posted songs on a music sharing Web site.
"Inciting racial hatred is more than just a petty crime," said Federal Crime Office President Joerg Ziercke. "Skinhead music groups create an enemy image and help propagate extreme right ideas."
Inciting racial hatred, displaying Nazi emblems like the swastika and performing the stiff-armed Hitler salute used under Adolf Hitler are crimes punishable by imprisonment in Germany, the country which carried out the Holocaust.
The Federal Crime Office started clamping down on Internet trading of music inciting neo-Nazis to hate and attack Jews and foreigners in 2001.
The songs convey Nazi ideology and contain lyrics such as these from the group Tonstoerung (Sound Interruption):
"Sharpen your long knives on the pavements;
delve them into Jewish bodies."
More than 100 people have been killed in racist violence in Germany since unification in 1990. Most of the attacks are random and involve skinheads picking on foreigners in the street.
Property has also been attacked. Swastikas have been daubed on Jewish gravestones, bricks thrown at Turkish kebab shops and firebombs hurled at asylum hostels. Most synagogues have 24-hour police guards.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040324/80/epdwr.html
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Music Giant Targets New Zealand Laws
The music industry is outraged that the government is considering making it legal for people to copy a CD they've bought.
The proposal is being considered by the government as part of a review of digital technology under the Copyright Act.
Associate Minister of Commerce Judith Tizard says the proposed amendment would allow one person to make one copy of their CDs.
But one of the world's biggest record companies, Universal Music, says only record companies can decide who can copy their music.
Its local managing director, Adam Holt, says it should remain illegal to make copies of any music CD.
Universal has recently moved to combat music trading over the internet by offering pay-per-download music tracks for $1.52 per song.
http://onenews.nzoom.com/onenews_det...57-1-7,00.html
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Skype vs. FBI?
Leigh Phillips
P2P telephony company Skype has announced it has added a conference-calling feature to its P2P telephony software in its latest beta version. Cool, cool.
The company says that this latest feature is free to download, as is the rest of the system, which offers free telephony over decentralised, Kazaa-style broadband peer-to-peer networks. However, with the company’s business model predicated on up-selling users to premium services like call-waiting and voice-mail, expect the new conference-calling feature to migrate over to the fee-for- service side of the ledger at some point in the future.
Skype is an interesting venture: just as P2P file-sharing is driving broadband uptake, P2P telephony, so long as it can begin to deliver comparable or superior sound quality to fixed-line, could be another string in broadband penetration’s bow. Further, if Skype takes off virally as P2P music downloading has, then traditional telcos should be as concerned about the Estonia-based company as record companies are of Skype’s file-sharing cousins (indeed, the Swede who devised Kazaa is the guy who’s behind Skype).
However, there could still be a couple of potholes in the road for Skype. First of all is the delivery of voice services over MSN and Yahoo’s instant messaging products - something that surely must be on their way sometime in the next year. The market dominance of the two internet giants means that a voice IM product from either one could eclipse the still relatively unknown Skype. The question is: Does Skype have the momentum to establish or maintain itself beyond the advent of such competition?
The second bit of bother for the company - although at the moment this is more of a concern to different VoIP and other non- traditional communications providers in the US - is the demand by US authorities that online communications providers comply with wiretapping laws.
The US department of justice, the FBI and the DEA last week requested a clarification of 1994’s wiretap law, the Communications Assistance to Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), and are seeking a ruling that internet service providers and, indeed, any non- traditional communications service providers (Xbox Live anyone?) must provide a back-door to communications for law enforcement purposes.
Now, Skype’s services, it seems, are just not wiretapable. Calls are end-to-end encrypted. Skype itself has no access to the data stream. In the old days, the flatfoots would just call up the local telephone company and get a tap, which was no problem because the telco owned the whole dog and pony show, the entire infrastructure. In a decentralised, P2P world, this is not the case any more.
Now, the move by US law enforcement officials will surely be replicated in other jurisdictions, forcing Skype into a less-regulated jurisdiction. No problem for the company, or for downloads. But then US (and other national) authorities still don’t get their wish: wiretapping of non-traditional communications. Would this provoke the banning of such software in their jurisdictions? Surely not - such a move would be far too draconian.
Oh, wait, I forgot that John Ashcroft is the US Attorney General.
I certainly don’t have a crystal ball, but one thing is clear: non-traditional communications mediums - like Skype - and anti-terror- jittery law enforcement authorities are on a collision course.
http://www.infoshop.org/inews/storie.../03/25/3369319
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Indie Record Stores Say They're Weathering New Challenges
Matt Joyce
A group of independent record store owners made a field trip earlier this week to a Central Texas Wal-Mart to see how the mega-store merchandised its compact disc
selection.
"I had more than one of the store owners turn around and ask 'Why would anybody buy a record here?" said Don VanCleave, president of the Coalition of Independent Music Stores. "But there are a lot of people that buy records there."
Record store owners from across the country gathered at the South by Southwest Music Conference on Friday to discuss ways to deal with challenges they face in the retail music industry.
Along with pressure from the basement prices of mass-market retail stores such as Wal-Mart and Best Buy, independents are challenged by shrinking compact disc sales, the popularity of downloadable music and the widespread use of CD burners.
Album sales have been decreasing since 2000, when a glut of compact disc sales partly related to people replacing their vinyl collections came to a crashing end. Album sales dropped 16 percent from 2000 to 2003, according to Nielsen SoundScan, an industry tracker of music sales.
The decline showed signs of leveling off in 2003, when sales dropped 4 percent from the previous year. By comparison, 2002 sales were down 11 percent from the year before.
VanCleave said the glut of the 1990s has resulted in an inaccurately dire portrayal of the health of music retail stores.
"We have very optimistic people that are thriving," he said.
Record store owners said that music retail now involves more than just selling compact discs.
Lisa Teger-Zhen, owner of Uncle Sam's music store in Miami Beach, Fla., said she supplements her music sales with gift items. Music sales make up only about 65 percent of her sales.
"We just try and keep up with the trends," she said. "In order to stay alive you've got to get into the lifestyle stuff to get the good margins, and that's the only way I can continue to buy all the music."
For Paul Epstein, owner of Twist & Shout in Denver, it's all about making his store part of the community. He said he makes television and radio appearances, and maintains an active Internet presence with regular e-mailings.
"You've got to become such a cultural Mecca or cultural validator for your community that you can't go away, that people would be sobbing or begging you not to," he said.
Steve Wiley runs Hoodlums Music on the Arizona State University campus in Tempe - presumably among a demographic noted for its active downloading of music. But he said his store has expanded by feeding off the buzz the Internet can create about music.
"We've never treated the kids like enemies, and we don't talk down to them about downloading or burning," he said. "What we see is if the prices are reasonable, then they will buy CDs. The Internet, file-sharing, the whole digital process that goes on, just makes them music junkies, and it makes them go out and get more music."
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/8230087.htm
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Law Professors Examine Ethical Controversies Of Peer- To-Peer File Sharing
Ray Delgado
The practice of peer-to-peer file sharing has reached a crossroads and has the potential to take off as an increasingly popular and vital method of sharing information. Or it could collapse under the weight of its own controversy as lawyers and politicians try to negotiate the intricacies of copyright protections and the legality of certain file-sharing networks.
Innovation in file-sharing technology is threatened by the recording industry’s stepped-up crackdown, according to law Professor Larry Lessig, who spoke last week on a panel with law Professor Deborah Rhode. Lessig expressed support for loosening copyright rules for "private, non-commercial ventures." Photo: L.A. Cicero
That was the message put forward by law Professor Larry Lessig, founder of Stanford's Center for Internet and Society, during a panel last week on the ethics of peer-to-peer file sharing. Lessig was joined on the panel by law Professor Deborah Rhode, founder of the Stanford Center on Ethics.
File-sharing technology is expanding in creative and intriguing ways that could allow an almost limitless ability to obtain and manipulate just about any kind of electronic content and then redistribute it. But that technology is threatened by the recording industry's stepped-up efforts to crack down on illegal file-sharing networks and individuals who engage in such practices, Lessig said. He said the recording industry is engaged in a war of prohibition with escalating penalties and has put too much emphasis on stigmatizing those who engage in illegal downloads as criminals.
"Should the legal system take the lead in shutting down this kind of communication?" Lessig asked. "Historically, we have taken this [kind of public debate] much more slowly and not labeled the other side criminal."
An estimated 70 million people engage in online file sharing, much of it illegal. Illegal downloading, mostly of music, took off in the late 1990s with the popularity of file-sharing programs like Napster and Kazaa. But the backlash has been intense, with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) successfully suing file- sharing networks and bringing much-publicized lawsuits against individuals accused of illegal downloading.
By engaging in downloads that they know are illegal, many people have made themselves magnets for the lawsuits, Lessig said. Rhode cited a survey of 16- to 28-year-olds who engage in illegal downloading that showed that although most were aware that they were engaging in illegal behavior, only 16 percent considered their actions morally wrong. She said her teenage nephew, when asked about the subject, told her, "Well, there's illegal and then there's illegal."
Within the past couple of years, the recording industry has dedicated considerable resources to cracking down on file-sharing networks and has filed suit against many large-scale and individual programmers, prompting many to settle their cases rather than engage in a costly legal battle against an opponent with deep pockets, Lessig said. Some of the lawsuits would almost surely fail a legal challenge, he said, but the intimidation factor has stifled development of file-sharing techniques that could actually benefit the recording industry.
"What is the RIAA doing aside from suing people?" Lessig asked. "It's an industry organization trying to use the law to protect themselves against competition."
Lessig said the industry should explore other kinds of file-sharing platforms and models that would be easier for consumers to use -- and pay for -- and that would also set up a better structure for artists to receive a cut of the profits. He cited a Harvard study that proposed a tracking system similar to the Nielsen television ratings system that would make as much music available at a cost to consumers and then pay artists based on their popularity.
Lessig said copyright laws that were created more than 25 years ago -- long before anyone had a sense of recent technological advances that allow mass manipulation and redistribution of online content -- are in dire need of an overhaul. He didn't advocate doing away with copyright laws altogether, but he expressed support for loosening up the rules to allow for "private, noncommercial ventures."
"All of the great technologies coming out now are technologies that will allow people to do stuff with your stuff," Lessig said. "That's an extraordinary opportunity that we should allow our culture to take. We wouldn't produce the same laws had we known about the technological advances."
http://news-service.stanford.edu/new...share-317.html
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Cop Copyright Cell Revived To Fight Piracy
Staff
With complaints pouring in from manufacturing units and information technology (IT) firms, the police have set up a wing to combat piracy.
According to Soumen Mitra, deputy commissioner of police (detective department), the special wing should start functioning within a couple of weeks.
“Frankly, such crimes had not been our priority. We concentrated on dacoities and murders and were not really aware of how to go about implementing the laws associated with intellectual property rights (IPR). Our officers need to be trained and educated on the basics of these laws, to ensure conviction of the culprits,” Mitra added.
However, raids in recent months have yielded a large number of music and film compact discs (CDs), which proved that the earlier methods had become obsolete. Now, any person equipped with a CD-writer can copy music and films with the aid of a personal computer, and sell the pirated versions at far-below-par rates. This creates quite a dent in the purses of the production companies and government tax departments.
At a workshop organised jointly by the detective department and Manufacturers’ Association of IT (MAIT) companies, the detective chief observed that the existing laws for trademarks, copyrights, counterfeiting and piracy should also figure as a priority on the agenda.
Mitra plans to revive a defunct cell — the press cell, which since the Raj dealt with copyright laws — to counter the threat of illegally duplicated intellectual property. “We will upgrade the facilities to match present-day demands,” he added.
Officers of the sub-inspector level will qualify for the training programmes. “With the help of organisations like MAIT, the officers will be given an orientation on the new developments and amendments of laws. Sub-inspectors of the detective department, as well as from the police stations, will be told how to implement them,” Mitra added.
A key part of the workshop dealt with defining the various IPR crimes. “Ideas, designs or inventions that are illegally copied and circulated for commercial gain by any individual is counterfeiting,” explained Vinnie Mehta, MAIT executive director.
Counterfeit rackets also serve as fund-raisers for terrorist outfits, and findings by international agencies point out that militants in Asia generate capital by circulating fake money and pirated products.
“We have been told by the central investigating agencies that the eastern region has become a major hub for counterfeit products churned out by extremist forces. This is why we have revived the cell. It also explains our involving police station-level officers in the drive,” said a detective department source.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/104031...ry_3003492.asp
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Low-Tech Case Has High-Tech Impact
Michael Geist
While the public's attention has been focused this month on the Canadian Recording Industry Association's lawsuit against 29 unnamed file sharers and the related issue of whether Internet service providers should be compelled to disclose the file sharers' identities, Canadian copyright law was hit recently with a decision of far greater import.
The Law Society of Upper Canada v. CCH Canadian, a Supreme Court of Canada decision released by a unanimous court several weeks ago, instantly ranks as one of the strongest pro-user rights decisions from any high court in the world, showing what it means to do more than pay mere lip service to balance in copyright.
The case involved a dispute between the law society — the body that governs the legal profession in Ontario — and several leading legal publishers.
Unlike many high-profile cases that involve the Internet, this case centred on the use of a distinctly old-style copying technology: photocopiers.
The law society, which maintains the Great Library, a leading law library in Toronto, provided the profession with two methods of copying cases and other legal materials.
It ran a service that allowed lawyers to request a copy of a particular case or article. It also maintained several photocopiers that could be used by library patrons.
The legal publishers objected to the law society's copying practices and sued for copyright infringement. They maintained the materials being copied were subject to copyright protection and the law society was authorizing others to infringe their copyright.
It is worth examining the outcome of the case as well as the court's analysis from four perspectives, each of which is progressively more significant.
First, the case can be examined from the perspective of the litigants. The law society emerged victorious on most counts in this regard as the court ruled it had neither infringed the publishers' copyright nor authorized others to do so.
The case, however, was not a complete loss from the publishers' perspective.
The court affirmed that although the legal decisions themselves were not subject to copyright, its test for originality ensured the value-added material supplied by the publishers, including summaries of the cases and the specific compilation of decisions, was sufficiently original to warrant copyright protection.
Second, the case can be examined from the perspective of the court's interpretation of several important aspects of copyright law. The court provided a detailed discussion of the fair dealing exception (the Canadian counterpart to the U.S. fair use doctrine), and concluded the exception should be granted a large and liberal interpretation. In fact, the court remarkably fashions exceptions to copyright infringement as new copyright rights — users' right — that must be balanced against the rights of copyright owners and creators.
The court also adopted an important new standard for authorization, which has long been used by copyright owners to hold parties accountable for allowing others to infringe copyright. On this issue, the court ruled authorization should be taken to mean "sanction, approve or countenance" and concluded "a person does not authorize copyright infringement by authorizing the mere use of equipment (such as photocopiers) that could be used to infringe copyright."
This finding will have an immediate impact on copyright issues involving the Internet.
By adopting an approach that allows the providers of equipment to presume their equipment will be used lawfully, the court has opened the door to Internet service providers and even peer-to-peer providers to argue they legitimately presume their subscribers act lawfully and thus cannot be said to authorize copyright infringement.
Third, the case can be examined from the court's broader perspective on copyright law. Just two years ago, the Supreme Court's view on copyright law was that it was there solely to benefit creators. Today, the court now speaks openly of users' rights and the need to balance rigorously the interests of creators and users.
For example, in arriving at its interpretation of authorization, the court concluded that the "mere provision of photocopiers for the use of its patrons did not constitute authorization to use the photocopiers to breach copyright law" since taking the opposite approach "shifts the balance in copyright too far in favour of the owner's rights and unnecessarily interferes with the proper use of copyrighted works for the good of society as a whole." Similarly, its liberal interpretation of fair dealing is based on the analysis that "it is a user's right (and) in order to maintain the proper balance between the rights of a copyright owner and users' interests, it must not be interpreted restrictively."
Balance as the central goal of copyright is likely to cause a significant reinterpretation of Canadian copyright law. As the court demonstrated in this case, taking users' rights seriously requires a careful examination of the effects of any copyright test on both users and creators. Moreover, the need for balance will affect not only the current version of Canada's Copyright Act but also any subsequent amendments.
As Canada considers copyright reform similar to that found in the United States, those reforms will be interpreted and applied by Canadian courts with the overarching goal of maintaining an appropriate copyright balance.
Fourth, and perhaps most important, this case signals a societal shift in views on copyright.
This case may have been seen by the judges as a very personal one since the work at issue was their own and the conduct called into question — the copying of cases — something they themselves likely had done throughout their careers.
These facts point to the growing personalization of copyright.
Copyright is no longer viewed as being primarily about large-scale commercial infringement claims that do not resonate with the average person. Rather, copyright is now very personal, focusing on the work, creativity, and activities of millions of individuals — including judges — who will increasingly question standards of what is right and wrong through the lens of their own actions.
As society has shifted in its view of copyright, so, too, have Canadian courts. The result is a genuine revolution in the state of Canadian copyright law that will manifest itself long after the current battle over peer-to-peer file sharing has been resolved.
http://www.torontostar.com/NASApp/cs...l=969048863851
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ILN News Letter
Court Asserts Jurisdiction Over Imesh In Copyright Suit
A federal court in New York has asserted jurisdiction over iMesh, an Israeli-based file sharing company, in a suit launched by several music recording companies for copyright infringement. iMesh argued that either Israel or California were more appropriate forums for the case but the court ruled that there was sufficent ties to the state to proceed with the case there.
Case name is Motown Record Company v. iMesh.com Inc.
Archives Challenge "Effectively Perpetual" Copyright Term
Two archives, including the Internet Archive, have launched a suit that asks a federal court to find that the Berne Convention Implementation Act (BCIA)is unconstitutional under the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment, and that the BCIA and Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA) together create an "effectively perpetual" term with respect to works first published after January 1, 1964 and before January 1, 1978, in violation of the Constitution's Progress Clause. The complaint, which is supported by the Stanford Center for Internet and Society, asks the court for a declaratory judgement ruling, stating that copyright restrictions on orphaned works -- works whose copyright has not expired but which are no longer available -- violates the constitution. Case name is Kahle v. Ashcroft. Complaint at
http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/about/c...%203-22-04.pdf
German Court Rules Metatag Use Not An Infringement
BNA's Electronic Commerce & Law Report reports on a recent German appeals court decision in which the court ruled that the use of trademarks and firm name in Web page metatags did not constitute a violation of trademark law or competition law. The court reasoned that the use of the trademark and firm names in meta-tags was not an "exploitation" of the designation and that the practice of using the metatags to attract new customers was not an unfair or deceptive diversion. Article at
http://pubs.bna.com/ip/BNA/eip.nsf/is/a0a8f7h5b1
Italian Gov't Issues Decree Banning Movie File Sharing
EDRI reports that the Italian government recently issued a decree that punishes Internet file sharing of feature movie. The decree includes a 1,500 euro fine, possible seizure of computer equipment, and the publication of the sentence in one national daily newspaper. The Parliament must convert the decree into law within 60 days for it to take effect. Decree in Italian at
http://shorl.com/bostudystobopi
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Web Access at 75 Percent
Reuters
Nearly three of four people in the United States have Internet access at home, Nielsen/NetRatings said on Thursday.
In a February telephone survey, an estimated 204.3 million people, or 74.9 percent of the population above the age of 2 and living in households equipped with a fixed-line phone, had Internet access, up from 66 percent in February 2003.
"In just a handful of years, online access has managed to gain the type of traction that took other mediums decades to achieve," said Kenneth Cassar, director of strategic analysis at Nielsen/NetRatings.
Women were slightly more likely to be Web surfers than their male counterparts, the company said.
Internet penetration for women aged 35 to 54 was 81.7 percent, compared with 80.2 percent for men in the same age group. For the 25 to 34 age group, Internet usage was 77 percent for women and 75.6 percent for men.
"Women make the majority of purchases and household decisions, so it's no surprise that they are utilizing the Internet as a tool for daily living," Cassar said.
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,62712,00.html
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Tired Of Trolling For Phish?
There's a point-and-click solution to that nightmarish CD clutter.
Adam Tschorn
You know that ugly pressboard behemoth lurking in your living room? The one sagging under the weight of the hundreds, maybe even thousands, of music CDs you've collected since college? That you paw through like a bear in a campsite every time a party guest wants to hear the "Grease" soundtrack? Imagine replacing it with a device smaller than a cereal box that connects to your computer and lets you access any song from any album you own, display it on your TV screen and stream it through your stereo.
Or maybe you got an iPod for Christmas that's still sitting on the stereo on the off chance that 10,000 songs will migrate there by osmosis and save you the weeks you'll need to stock it. (At roughly a minute a song to convert your audio CDs into MP3 files, it would take roughly 20 eight-hour days to top off your tune tank.)
College students, computer geeks and hard-core audiophiles have been transferring — or "ripping" — CDs for years and enjoying the simplicity, portability and compact storage space of music stored in MP3 files. But for the rest of us, enjoying those benefits has been hampered by the need to reconcile our day jobs with the time-consuming task of ripping thousands of CDs, one at a time.
Where some see frustration, others see business opportunity. Within the last year, three companies — including one in Los Angeles — have started offering a service to help music lovers bridge that digital divide. Spurred in part by the popularity of the iPod and the lowering costs of computer storage, they've been moving thousands of CDs a week out of dusty jewel cases and onto portables, hard drives and DVDs. Each recordable DVD can hold about 100 CDs' worth of MP3s.
"We did our market research," says Dick Adams of New York's RipDigital, which launched in November 2003. "And we found that there are a lot of people out there who will spend money to save time, and some people who will spend time to save money. We're focusing on that first group."
Doug Strachota, founder of Indianapolis-based Get Digital, likens ripping CDs to changing your car's oil yourself: "Not too many people do it; they'd just prefer to take it somewhere." Aaron Grosky of L.A.-based Shift Music is even more emphatic: "What am I doing that you can't do? Nothing. It's just a service to make your life easier."
Though geographically disparate, the three companies offer very similar digital music conversion services and pricing (see accompanying article). There is one major difference for Angelenos, though: Get Digital and RipDigital are mail-order only, and Shift will pick up and deliver your discs.
A friend told me about Shift one night after she watched me burrow through the dark recesses of my entertainment center looking for the "Grease" soundtrack with a flashlight clutched between my teeth. At her suggestion, I called and explained my current setup to Grosky:
I have a 4-year-old Dell Dimension desktop with 2-gigabyte hard drive, with software that allows me to play music and display photos from the computer through the TV using my TiVo as a conduit. The sound for my TV and TiVo are already routed through the stereo. I told him I wanted to access my 375-disc catalog through the TV screen to play it through my stereo.
Grosky arrived with cardboard boxes, a printed estimate and a few suggestions. With such a small hard drive and no DVD player, he recommended putting my music on an external hard drive (I chose one for $140). For a format, he suggested MP3s.
As he boxed up CDs, Grosky evangelized about the possibilities of my all-MP3 music library. "Do you want to synchronize your house so every room is playing the same song at the same time? How about sending your entire collection wirelessly to your car just by pulling into the driveway?" He left me with visions of technological sugarplums dancing in my head and promised to return in five to seven business days.
He was back in six, carrying a gray 5-inch by 8-inch hard drive that he plugged into the back of my computer. Within 20 minutes the installation was done, and I was scrolling through my entire music collection on my TV screen in the living room.
My new system has been in operation for a week, and I've learned a few important things (apart from the fact that I actually own a reggae album titled "Zungguzungguguzungguzeng" by someone who calls himself Yellowman). TiVo will access a music collection only alphabetically and by the first word. This takes getting used to — Liz Phair is nestled in between Living Colour and Louis Prima instead of sleeping with the Phish.
The bigger concern, at least with the current TiVo software, is the alphabetizing of tracks within a given album. This may not sound like a problem to the casual listener, but for albums on which bands jam and song tracks often lead into one another — think Pink Floyd or the Grateful Dead — the flow is noticeably altered. If you want to preserve the original album order, the files should be labeled with the track numbers in front (i.e. "Hopelessly Devoted to You" is labeled as "03 Hopelessly Devoted to You.mp3").
When it was all over, the final cost of having Shift Music convert 375 discs to MP3s, archive them on four DVDs and a new hard drive was $566.55 (about $1.51 per disc). But getting John Travolta to croon "Greased Lightning" as fast as greased lightning without leaving my La-Z-Boy?
That's priceless.
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la...nes-technology
Previous coverage, at end.