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Old 31-07-03, 10:57 PM   #1
JackSpratts
 
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Join Date: May 2001
Location: New England
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Default Peer-To-Peer News - The Week In Review - August 2nd, '03

Grave Misperceptions

Archimedes was to have said, “Give me a lever long enough and I can single-handedly move the world.” While undoubtedly true in a sitting around and shooting the breeze theoretical sense, in a real sense it fails miserably on too many counts to mention, not the least of which being a lever that size wouldn’t get out the door of the biggest of Home Depots nor more to the point slip into the back of the most outlandishly oversized (but surprisingly small interior-wise) Hollywood Hummers.

This may be a problem with Hollywood Moguls in general; no matter how big and influential they think they are in reality their power is illusory - Hollywood makes shadows after all - they don’t make the waves; it’s the people who still do that. Hollywood’s lucky if they’re able to stay on top of the swells without falling off and getting drowned, but they forget and all to often fall into the trap of believing that their record or movie is so important they can leverage it into immediate social change. Would if it were ever thus.

It’s not.

That’s never more clear than today as we witness this amazing spectacle of sheer aggressive, self destructive Hollywood hubris play out across the courts and the country. Each day it becomes more apparent that some in Hollywood actually think they can stop file sharing, and do so by suing their customers. Then presumably once that’s accomplished get those same customers to support them by spending money on their products! They’ve got it backwards.

Each day this is allowed to continue creates real and lasting damage to the customer base. Hollywood is alienating customers they will never get back, some of their very best, the biggest spenders, the ones they can ill afford to lose. It’s like they tore a page out of some Stalin era playbook for the loyal party apparatchik facing a decline in the 5-year sales plan – circa 1948. “Number one, Terrorize your customers! Number two, Arrest as many as you can!” Is this anyway to run an industry? Get real people and fast, or you’re going to have as much success as the Soviets did with their system of fear. I can’t repeat this often enough to those executives responsible: You are destroying the music industry. You are dancing on the edge of a razor blade and your customers are getting this close to banning your products from their homes. Permanently.

Beware. Your lever is much smaller than you realize.








Enjoy,

Jack.







Pirates of the Internet

The bill says if you share a single tune with your pals online—as millions do every day—you are a felon. Penalty: up to five years in jail
Steven Levy

Last month I attended a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee with an intriguing title: “The dark side of a bright idea: Could personal and national-security risks compromise the potential of peer-to-peer file- sharing networks?”

I CERTAINLY WAS AWARE that some members of Congress wanted to snuff out the grass-roots phenomena of people’s swapping copyrighted songs on the Net. But I assumed that the crime of file-sharing, joyfully committed by an estimated 60 million pirates, was mainly a problem of lost revenues for the music industry. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, giving the opening testimony, argued otherwise, calling file-sharing networks a grave security risk to this nation. In reality, the hearing was nothing but one of several signs of a new hardball offensive against file-sharing for the same old reasons: protecting the business model of the record labels.

What was the alleged national-security issue? Strictly yellowcake. Researchers testified that because of a confusing interface in file-sharing services like Kazaa, a clumsy user could inadvertently expose private files to everyone on the network. In theory, this could even happen to a government worker using Kazaa for personal use on an official computer —thus exposing our deepest secrets. No one was able to cite an instance where a government secret was actually exposed by this method.

By the end of the session, the only committee member in attendance, chairman Orrin Hatch—himself a songwriter who sells CDs on his personal Web site—zeroed in on what really bugged him: people sharing copyrighted songs on the Internet without paying for them. Then he ran an idea by one of the panelists: what if you had a system that could detect whether people were getting songs without paying for them and could warn those infringers that what they were doing was wrong? And then, if they didn’t stop, the system would remotely “destroy” their computers.

No one’s interested in destroying people’s computers,” said the panelist.

“Well, I’m interested in doing that,” said the senator. “Warn them, do it again, and then destroy their machine! There’s no excuse for anyone violating our copyright laws.”

Fortunately Senator Hatch hasn’t yet codified his Dr. Strangelovean no-due-process piracy antidote into upcoming legislation. But in the House, Reps. Howard Berman and John Conyers have introduced a bill that encourages a different approach: jail ‘em! Among other provisions, the bill lowers the bar for criminal prosecution to the sharing of a single music file and allocates $15 million to go after copyright offenders. Representative Berman says that he anticipates that prosecutors will go only after someone who, knowing the consequences, uploads massive amounts of music. But the bill says in black and white that if you share so much as a single tune with your pals on the Internet—as millions do every day —you are a felon. Penalty: up to five years in jail. (Better fill up your iPod before you go.)

Meanwhile the Record Industry Association of America, the trade and lobbying arm of the big music labels, last week sent out hundreds of subpoenas to Internet service providers and universities to find the identities of those sharing music so it can drag them into court and sue them for thousands of dollars. Is suing your customers the best way to run an industry?

My guess is that the vast majority of those 60 million file sharers would never steal a physical object from the store. In a mixture of self-interest and rebellion they’ve taken the measure of the record industry’s karma (overpriced CDs, a history of ripping off artists), noted that stealing files isn’t like stealing stuff (maybe they’ll buy a disc later) and concluded that file-sharing isn’t that bad.

Carey Sherman, president of the RIAA, and his buddies in Congress think the time for patience is over. “We’ve reached a point where we have a legitimate marketplace for downloading music, and we want to give it a chance,” says Sherman, referring to the spiffy services like Apple’s iTunes Music Store, the new Buy.Com store and subscription services like Rhapsody. But the game is just starting, and the best way to make sure that these services come up with compelling innovations is to match them off against the Kazaas of the world, which are far from perfect (the quality is erratic, they put spyware on your computers, they’re loaded with porn). You can compete against free—ever hear of bottled water?

Ultimately the Internet is going to be great for music lovers, artists and even the record labels, if they are willing to hang loose while new business models emerge. But right now the RIAA and its congressional water carriers are hitting the wrong notes. It makes no sense to bring thousands of people into the dockets—and maybe the prison system—for turning on a friend to the fuzz tones of the White Stripes or the inspirational melodies of Orrin Hatch without a license. There are better things for prosecutors and the courts to focus on.

Like real national security.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/944690.asp?cp1=1


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SBC Fights Back over RIAA Subpoenas
Jay Lyman

Resistance to the subpoenas from ISPs likely will be limited to carriers such as Verizon and SBC -– companies with the deep pockets required to go the legal distance with the RIAA. After receiving nearly 200 subpoenas to turn over information about users of its Internet service, communications giant SBC has filed suit against the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), calling the subpoenas a misapplication of copyright law.

In a U.S. District Court complaint, filed by SBC's Pacific Bell Internet Service in San Francisco, the communications company claimed the RIAA is wrongly using the subpoena powers of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).

The RIAA rejected the complaint and reiterated its intent to use the subpoenas to seek out individuals who are allegedly engaging in copyright infringement over the Internet.

Yankee Group senior analyst Mike Goodman told TechNewsWorld that while larger Internet carriers, such as Verizon and now SBC, are the only ones to have challenged the RIAA subpoenas, none of the Internet providers involved wants to provide the names and information of its customers.

"The bottom line is that no ISP wants to be in the policing position they've been put into," Goodman said.

In an effort to discover the identities of peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing users, the RIAA has sent out an estimated 1,000 to 2,000 subpoenas to ISPs across the country.

The RIAA would not comment on the number of subpoenas served or ISPs contacted, but indicated it will continue to seek user identities through ISPs.

SBC spokesperson Joe Izbrand told TechNewsWorld that the company has received about 200 subpoenas from the RIAA in the past two weeks.

SBC said it filed the complaint -- which seeks a court declaration that the RIAA subpoenas are overly broad and were issued from the wrong district -- to protect the privacy of its customers.

"We're making the argument that the DMCA subpoena power is being misapplied," Izbrand said. "Anyone can request private information of someone over the Internet [using the subpoenas]. We believe it's a threat to the privacy rights of our customers."

SBC said the intent of the lawsuit is to "put the issue before the appropriate court so the safety and privacy rights of customers and the interest of copyright owners can be balanced."

The RIAA, meanwhile, rejected the SBC claims and stood firm on its intent to pursue the names of copyright infringers who use P2P applications and networks, including Kazaa, Grokster and Morpheus.

"We are disappointed that PacBell has chosen to fight this, unlike every other ISP, which has complied with their obligations under the law," the RIAA said in a statement. "We had previously reached out to SBC to discuss this matter, but had been rebuked.

This "procedural gamesmanship," the RIAA concluded, "will not ultimately change the underlying fact that when individuals engage in copyright infringement on the Internet, they are not anonymous and service providers must reveal who they are."

Electronic Frontier Foundation senior staff attorney Fred von Lohmann told TechNewsWorld that ISPs must respond to the subpoenas under current DMCA law. The courts recently sided with the RIAA when Verizon challenged the subpoenas, but that case has been appealed.

Von Lohmann expressed concern that Internet users, who might not be notified that their ISP has been subpoenaed, are "essentially presumed guilty until proven innocent."

He also said the RIAA apparently is issuing more subpoenas than it actually needs for potential legal cases against Internet users.

"The dragnet is being cast much more widely than the actual lawsuit is going to be," he noted.

How Far, How Much?

Yankee's Goodman said the Internet file-sharing battle highlights the conflicting set of laws that cover copyright protection and privacy.

He noted that resistance to the subpoenas from ISPs likely will be limited to carriers such as Verizon and SBC -– companies with the "deep pockets" to go the legal distance with the RIAA.

"I wouldn't anticipate this triggering a slew of lawsuits," Goodman said. "But from the RIAA side -– how many cases can they run simultaneously? At what point can the RIAA continue to support its legal position? How good is winning all of it if you end up bankrupt?"
http://www.technewsworld.com/perl/story/31236.html


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Earth Station 5 Declares WAR Against the Sex Industry
Press Release

FREE Music, FREE Movies, FREE Software and Now FREE Sex Being Beamed By Earthstation 5 to the Humans for Free

Earthstation 5 today declares war against the sex industry for all the sex located on the internet. "One way to put these sex companies out of business is by giving it away for FREE," said Ras Kabair, president of Palestine based EarthStation 5.

Effective immediately, Earthstation 5 will give away ten FREE sex channels of live sex and the naked news for FREE to the world. There will be no CREDIT cards, no phone dialers, no pop-up ad's, no spyware and there will be no other form of payment required by any user.

Earthstation 5 has grown from a simple P2P network to the largest P2P portal in the world with an average of 11,536,240 simultaneous users online at any given moment of the day or night. Currently, new users are downloading Earthstation 5 software located at http://www.earthstation5.com/ on a average of 500,000 times per day in the 18 languages that Earthstation 5 currently offers.

One-reason users are using Earthstation 5 instead of the other peer to peer (P2P) programs is because of our stealth technology. Other P2P company's claim to have security, but in the end we are the only ones that can't be breached! We wrote our software with security as our top priority. On top of that, all the other P2P companies have to worry about being sued by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Record Industry Association of America (RIAA). At the Jenin Refuge Camp, we don't worry about those kinds of problems.
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/st...2003,+05:02+AM


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Copying Is Theft - And Other Legal Myths
Mark Rasch

Opinion As the war over P2P downloading heats up, and the record companies launch the novel marketing technique of suing their customers, I think it is an appropriate time to settle some of the pervasive myths about U.S. copyright law which fuel both sides of the debate, writes Mark Rasch, SecurityFocus columnist and former head of the Justice Department's computer crime unit.

The current state of the battleground is that the RIAA, having lost a lawsuit against Kazaa, Morpheus and others for copyright infringement, and having won a lawsuit against Verizon, is actively pursuing subpoenas against various ISPs to force them to pony up the names and addresses of the uploaders and downloaders themselves.

Several universities have invoked a federal law aimed at preventing the release of student academic records (and significantly narrowed by both the USA-PATRIOT Act and the U.S. Supreme Court last year) to refuse to provide information on their students' downloading activities to the RIAA. Meanwhile, the P2P providers, large and small, in an effort to provide "customer service," are utilizing a variety of anonymizing techniques -- including proxy servers, encryption, and various UDP ports -- to help prevent the RIAA from successfully subpoenaing these records. Undaunted, the RIAA has vowed a full- scale assault -- even against those who share a single copyrighted song.

All of these battles are against the backdrop of U.S. copyright law, which provides some protection to the "author" of an original work that is fixed in any tangible medium of expression. But there seems to be a great deal of confusion about the scope of protection under this law.

The U.S. Constitution permits Congress "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." Under intensive lobbying by the movie, publishing and recording industries, Congress has nudged that "limited" time from the original 17 years in 1789, to the publisher's life plus 75 years today -- a time limit that the U.S. Supreme Court recently approved.

For this "limited" time, Copyright law essentially grants the author the exclusive rights to copy or reproduce the work, make derivative works, distribute copies of the work (sell, give away, lease or license), and to perform the work, and, of course, to keep others from doing the same.

Simple enough? Not hardly.

The RIAA, MPAA and copyright holders describe P2P users as "pirates" - invoking images of swashbuckling pre-teens hauling up the Jolly Roger and stealing intellectual property in the dead of night. New ads announced by MPAA President Jack Valente impress the idea that "copying is stealing" and that someone who burns MP3s is no different from those who slip a CD under their shirt at the local Tower Records.

But technically, file sharing is not theft.

A number of years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court dealt with a man named Dowling, who sold "pirated" Elvis Presley recordings, and was prosecuted for the Interstate Transportation of Stolen Property. The Supremes did not condone his actions, but did make it clear that it was not "theft" -- but technically "infringement" of the copyright of the Presley estate, and therefore copyright law, and not anti-theft statutes, had to be invoked.

So "copying" is not "stealing" but can be "infringing." That doesn't have the same sound bite quality as Valente's position.

Complicated matters further, copying is not always infringing. If the work is not copyrighted, if you have a license to make the copy, or if the work is in the public domain, you can copy at will. Also, not all "copies" are the same. Say you buy a CD and play it on your computer -- technically, you have already made a "copy" onto the PC in the process of playing it, but that's not an infringement.

Making an archive copy is okay too, as long as your retain the original. What about a transformative copy -- say, making an MP3 out of a CD? You can do that, so long as you retain the original work. If the original CD get scratched, damaged or lost, you can probably burn the MP3 back to a CD (sans the really "sucky" titles), but this is not entirely clear.

So the RIAA and MPAA's claims that all "copying" is "stealing" are much overhyped.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/32004.html


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Consumer Alert: Copy Controls Crackdown

Battle rages on several fronts, but technology offers answers for both sides.
Frank Thorsberg

Multimedia lovers find themselves caught in a digital vise these days, as Hollywood tightens its copyright controls on movies, games, and music on DVDs and CDs--most recently squeezing customers accused of copyright infringement in court. But even well-meaning consumers are feeling pressured (and baffled) by conflicting messages about what is allowed. Meanwhile, the courts and Congress mull legal answers to the ongoing digital rights struggle.

The ISP Verizon Online recently buckled and gave the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) the names of four customers suspected of downloading large quantities of music from file-sharing sites in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. More than 40 privacy groups and ISPs are joining Verizon in fighting procedural aspects of the copyright holders' demands. But it is clear that customer privacy has sustained a hit.

The RIAA also recently settled with four university students who ran Napster-like file-sharing networks campuswide. Each agreed to pay $12,000 to $17,000, although the trade group had originally sought up to $150,000 per song. The RIAA warns that it may not settle on such lenient terms in the future.

For the moment, peer-to-peer networks sporting a copy-for-free business model continue to thrive despite being mired in lawsuits. But the line demarcating the lawful use of file-sharing technology may be shifting.

In April, a federal judge in Los Angeles dismissed an RIAA suit against file-sharing services Grokster and StreamCast Networks (maker of Morpheus), holding that peer-to-peer services are not liable for illegal file-trading over their networks. The RIAA is appealing the decision.

"That's the most important victory of the last three or four months," says Cory Doctorow, outreach director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Doctorow notes that it reinforces the Supreme Court's so-called Betamax decision of 1984, in which the court refused to ban legitimate products or services simply because they could also be used for illicit activities.

Even the act of copying DVD movies has a chance to prevail in court: 321 Studios is taking on Hollywood by claiming the right to market its DVD copying software. Its preemptive lawsuit against the major movie studios challenges the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's constitutionality. At the heart of the case--taken under advisement by a federal judge in May--is consumers' right to make back-up copies of DVDs.

Congress offers the public little hope of quick action, but copy-control legislation is nevertheless in the spotlight.

Several pieces of legislation would require labeling of CDs or DVDs that use digital rights management technology (also known as DRM). Other proposed measures would affirm consumers' right to back up digital material or to donate it, and try to balance fair use and copyright.

Also, the DMCA is undergoing its periodic review, facing several complaints about its regulation of copyright.

Ultimately, technology provides new opportunities for both vendors and users. Only 20 years ago, Hollywood feared piracy with the advent of VCRs--but instead prerecorded videotape has become a lucrative market.
http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,111329,00.asp


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Keeping Up With The Digital Revolution

The European Commission's Information Society DG has published a report containing recommendations on how heritage institutions, such as museums and art gallieries, can keep up with the demand to view their collections in digitised electronic form. National governments are advised to develop a coordinated appraoch to digitisation, while the Commission is encouraged to facilitate the participation of smaller institutions in relevant research programmes.
http://www.cordis.lu/express/summary.htm#aaa


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File-Sharers Fight Legal Moves
BBC

File-sharers can find out if they are being targeted by the US record industry via a website created by civil liberty activists. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, (EFF), has set up an online database which allows people to check if a subpoena has been issued for them by the Recording Industry Association of America, (RIAA).

"We hope that EFF's subpoena database will give people some peace of mind and the information they need to challenge these subpoenas and protect their privacy," said the group's senior lawyer Fred Von Lohmann.

Hundreds of subpoenas have been sent to suspected file-sharers as part of the industry's battle to stop people swapping songs over the internet. Using the EFF site, people can check the name they used for file-sharing against a list of subpoenas issued in a Washington court. If someone finds their name in the database, they can look at an electronic copy of the subpoena. This includes the name of the internet service provider, a list of songs pirated and the internet address of the user. The EFF site takes its information from a US justice system called Pacer. Its online database lets people to gain a wide range of information about ongoing cases.

By the end of last week almost 900 subpoenas had been issued, with the courts granting more than 75 every day. The subpoenas are part of the industry's battle to clamp down on music piracy, spearheaded by the RIAA. They will force telecommunications companies to identify file-swappers, who are usually only known by their online user names. People charged with piracy could face lawsuits for damages ranging from $750 (£480) to $150,000 (£96,100), which are applicable under US copyright laws.

"The recording industry continues its futile crusade to sue thousands of the more than 60 million people who use file-sharing software in the US," said Mr Von Lohmann.

The EFF is also offering advice to file-sharers who are facing legal action. Together with the US Internet Industry Association, it has set up a website called subpoenadefense.org which has details of lawyers and other legal resources. The civil liberties group is also providing tips on how to avoid being sued by the record industry.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/h...gy/3102261.stm


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Experts Sharing Tips To Help Defend Against File-Sharing Lawsuits
Benny Evangelista

As the recording industry tries in unprecedented fashion to enforce copyright laws against individual consumers, legal experts say people can take several steps to try to avoid costly litigation.

For starters, legal experts advise file-sharers to stop sharing any unauthorized files. That action could, though not necessarily, eliminate the need for more costly legal steps if a file-sharer learns he or she has been caught in the Recording Industry Association of America's copyright infringement dragnet.

It's possible the courts could one day rule file-sharing is legal or a consumer backlash could force Congress to change current copyright laws. Before that happens, however, the legal costs for an individual battling the powerful RIAA could be devastating.

"What I think they're going to do is start suing moms and dads and families across America," said San Rafael attorney Ira Rothken. "They could lose their house or lose their ability to send their kids to college. That is not the intent of copyright statutes, to bankrupt a middle-class family."

The RIAA, the Washington trade group that represents the world's biggest record labels, has filed more than 900 subpoenas since June 26 to gather information to file civil lawsuits against hundreds of users of file-sharing programs.

Legal experts say this is the first time copyright law has been used to crack down on average consumers. Previously, copyright battles have typically pitted companies against other businesses, or against people who have intentionally tried to make money pirating copyright-protected material.

Millions of people around the world use programs like Kazaa, Grokster, Limewire or eDonkey to swap free copies of entertainment files via the Internet, including songs and movies.

Surveys have estimated about 60 million Americans have downloaded music into their computers. Proponents of file-sharing defend the practice, arguing a greedy music industry is ignoring its own customers and not taking advantage of a lucrative new revenue source.

But the $14 billion U.S. recording industry labels file-sharing as theft and blames the practice for a 14 percent drop in CD sales in the past three years.

Music industry critics say the RIAA's latest tactic will ignite a consumer revolt.

RIAA spokeswoman Weiss said that while her group expects a consumer backlash, it will press ahead because the record industry believes it has no other choice.

"We won't win any popularity contests. We don't really care what people think, except we want them to know that it (file-sharing) is illegal," Weiss said. "It's unpopular, it's not pretty, but it's the right thing to do for all the people involved in the music industry."
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cg....DTL&type=tech


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GOP Staffer Chosen To Head RIAA
John Borland

The Recording Industry Association of America has tapped a former Republican Senate staffer to replace Hilary Rosen as chief executive, firming up the group's leadership during one of the most controversial moments in its history.

The big record labels' trade group said Monday that Mitch Bainwol, former chief of staff to U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, will replace Rosen at the RIAA's helm. Rosen left the group several months ago, after announcing her planned departure in January.

Although Bainwol has little experience inside the music industry, he brings deep connections to the Republican Party, something the RIAA has largely lacked under Rosen's leadership.

"Mitch brings to the RIAA the consummate insider's understanding of political nuance in Washington," Roger Ames, CEO of Warner Music Group, said in a statement. "I'm confident he has the ability to clearly communicate the issues and challenges the music industry faces and to partner effectively with the computer, consumer electronics and music publishing businesses to help us address those issues in all appropriate forums."

Bainwol joins the RIAA at a critical moment in the group's history, as it plans to launch what could be thousands of lawsuits against individual music consumers who have allegedly traded large numbers of copyrighted songs online. The controversial drive, already under way, has threatened to further compromise the industry's relationship with online consumers.

The new RIAA head has moved in GOP political circles for most of his professional life. He began his career as a budget analyst in President Reagan's Office of Management and Budget and has variously served as a Senate staffer, as chief of staff for the Republican National Committee and as executive director of the Republican National Senatorial Committee.

"I'm delighted to take on this role," Bainwol said in a statement. "What could be more rewarding than helping to promote two great American traditions: music and property rights?"

Bainwol will begin his duties Sept. 1, the RIAA said.
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5056299.html


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BSA Plays Good Cop, Bad Cop
Iain Thomson

The Business Software Alliance (BSA) has built itself a reputation of being heavy handed in its quest to eliminate illegal software use since its inception in 1988.

Tactics include bombarding companies with mail threatening jail sentences for directors, even though the organisation has no legal force, and offering up to £10,000 to whistleblowers whose information leads to offenders being uncovered.

Opponents have criticised the BSA's approach, maintaining that it uses a trawling system to pressure often innocent companies to open their books, despite a lack of evidence of any wrongdoing.

They claim that companies refusing to answer the BSA's letters were treated as guilty of running illegal software until proven otherwise.

Mark Floisand, who was elected chairman of the BSA in the UK in January, explains how the organisation is trying to shift its focus from prosecution to education.

Most IT professionals associate the BSA with threatening letters and the prosecution of software pirates. How accurate do you feel that is?
We are best known for enforcement, but that's really only a third of what we do. The rest of the time is spent raising awareness within companies about what constitutes good practice, and helping them make sure they are legal. The rest of our activities revolve around lobbying on a government level.

Nevertheless, your naming and shaming policy, aggressive audit requests and payments to whistleblowers have won your organisation a bad reputation in the business.
We don't name and shame just for the sake of it. If a company calls us and works with us then they'll have nothing to fear. Don't stay in contact and ignore our mails and you may end up in the papers.

As for whistleblowers, nearly two-thirds don't want any money for reporting; they just have moral problems with what is going on or are disgruntled ex-employees.

The Federation Against Software Theft and the BSA both seem to do the same job, so why are you competing with each other?
The perception is that we fight each other, but that won't be going on during my watch.

Ultimately we've got a lot in common in both aims and methods and you're going to see us working a lot more closely in the future. Matching up our audit procedures would be a good start.

Is there really a need for one organisation, let alone two, when piracy in the UK is the lowest in Europe? Isn't the BSA redundant?
I hope not. Rates are low here but one in four pieces of software in use in this country is still illegal. Rates in the US and Canada are lower still so there's still something to aim for.

It's going to be a lot harder to knock 10 percentage points off our figures than it would be in eastern Europe, for example, but there's still work to be done.

Has the increasing use of peer-to-peer (P2P) networks made your job harder?
To an extent; and we're monitoring the traffic on those networks carefully. But if you're downloading software over such networks it's useless without a key, and it's key trading that's a bigger threat.

We're certainly not spamming P2P networks with useless data; we're in enforcement, not counter-insurgency.

Doesn't the high price of some software encourage piracy in the first place?
It is popularity rather than price that determines how likely it is that software will be targeted. Demand is the key driver in piracy. If someone's pirating software they are already making a huge margin so they'll follow the buyers.
http://www.vnunet.com/Analysis/1142635


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Digital Freedom Campaign Publishes Safe Peer-To- Peer Guidelines
Simon Aughton

An organisation that campaigns for 'freedom in the digital world' has published a set of guidelines for peer-to-peer file sharers wishing to avoid legal action from the record industry.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation recommends several measures designed to repel the RIAA's scanning software, including changing 'potentially misleading' filenames or disabling entirely the sharing or uploading feature of your file sharing software. The full list of guidelines and instructions of disabling features is available at www.eff.org/ IP/P2P/howto-notgetsued.php.

Of course, this defeats the very object of peer-to-peer networks and will not appeal to a great many users. Or, as the EFF puts it, 'Don't like the idea of turning off file-sharing or changing your file names to prevent stupid robots or RIAA employees from mistaking your files for infringements? Neither do we!' The organisation is urging file sharers to join its campaign to both legalise file sharing and find a new system to 'compensate musicians and copyright holders.

The EFF has also set-up a page - www.eff.org/IP/P2P/riaasubpoenas - for anyone concerned that their details may already have been subpoenaed by RIAA lawyers.

Last month the major record labels - in the form of the RIAA - announced they would be seeking legal redress from individual and organisations who made copyrighted music files available over the Internet via peer-to-peer networks such as Kazaa and Grokster.

It should be noted, however, that the RIAA represents only the major record companies and does not have industry wide support, as we reported last week.
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/front_framese...t_bannerad.php


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BuyMusic's Downloads Strike A Sour Note
Posted by xix

Last week Buy.com tried to take a bite out of Apple's successful iTunes Music Store by rolling out a low-priced song-download service said to be simple and reliable.
But in an example of the technological trickiness involved in offering users the freedom they desire while giving music labels the protections they demand, early customers have found they can't transfer the tunes they buy on BuyMusic.com to digital portables.

The Mac-only iTunes has won raves for ease of use, both in burning CDs and transferring songs to Apple's iPod players. But BuyMusic's tracks have started out as unplayable, even on portables lent to the press in a promotional blitz.

"We're working on this," says Buy.com's Scott Blum, who says the company will have the glitch fixed today and that customers who have bought tracks will receive an e-mail offering free re-downloads.

The problem: Unlike MP3 music tracks plucked from the Net from pirate sites such as Kazaa, music on BuyMusic is encoded in Microsoft's Windows Media Audio format. The "digital rights management" coding limits what can be done with the files. The files will be recoded to allow for transfers, Blum says.
http://www.geeknews.net/?info=287

More in this issue – js.

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Secret Networks Protect Music Swappers
Powell Fraser

They are the country clubs of the file-sharing world, exclusive Internet networks that require knowing the right people and having a wealth of
content on your hard disk to get into the clique.

These private file-swapping networks have surfaced just as the music industry has been granted dozens of subpoenas seeking the names of those who trade copyrighted material on popular services such as Kazaa, Imesh, and Gnutella.

The private networks are open to smaller groups of perhaps 20 to 30 people who liberally share music, television shows, movies and computer programs. Members of such networks believe they can avoid legal consequences because their identities and actions are masked with the same technology used to protect online credit card transactions.

"You've got the right set of early adopters, people that are involved in the community who are evangelizing it," said Travis Kalanick, whose MP3 search engine Scour was sued and shut down by the music industry. "It's going to be there if and when there is a mass exodus from networks like Kazaa and Gnutella."

Kalanick and others say the private networks are the future of online music swapping.

Not if the music industry can help it, said Jonathan Lamy, a spokesman for the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

While he would not reveal specifics of which services would be targeted, Lamy offered a warning for private network users.

"If users think that any particular service guarantees their anonymity, they're wrong," he said. "There are ways to determine a user's identity."

But Jim Lowrey, an expert in network encryption, said it would be difficult for outsiders to break through the encryption to see who is using the private sharing services.

"You'll know they're talking, but you won't know what they're saying. It's quite impossible to crack the algorithms," said Lowrey, whose company, Endeavors Technology, is designing a file-sharing system for corporate clients.

The rise of one of the private networks earlier this year shows how eager people are to trade media files online and to do so with impunity.

When wildly-popular Napster was ruled illegal by a judge in 2001, users flocked to other public file-sharing services. However, those services are mired with problems.

Aside from the threats of lawsuits from the music industry, groups such as MediaDefender have begun flooding Kazaa and Gnutella with "spoofed" files, which claim to be songs but turn out to be blank or filled with anti-piracy messages.

Users of Kazaa and Gnutella also are stymied by others in the network who choose not to share the files in their collection. A study done by the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center in August 2000 concluded that 70 percent of Gnutella users engaged only in downloading, providing no files of their own for their peers on the network.

Private networks such as Waste, DirectConnect, and even basic chat clients promise to remedy all these issues. The difficulty is finding them.

Some message boards help users find each other and set up networks. Others turn to chat rooms or recruit friends on college campuses to form a network.

And even when a user finally charms his way into getting an encryption key, giving him access to a network such as Waste, other members' identities are not revealed until they also decide they trust the newcomer, Kalanick explained.

"You essentially will have to 'socialize' your way into a network," Kalanick said.

Kalanick said the extreme focus on security is meant to keep outsiders -- and copyright lawyers -- out.

"RIAA may be better off penetrating al Qaeda," he said.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/interne...are/index.html

Click To See Our Very Own P2P-Zone Waste Thread.


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Labels Charged With Price-Fixing – Again
Ashlee Vance

A pair of major music labels have been hit with another round of price-fixing charges courtesy of the FTC - a decision which raises the question as to who exactly is to blame for falling music revenue.

In a unanimous decision, members of the U.S. FTC (Federal Trade Comission) chastised Vivendi Universal and Warner Communications for restricting competition in the sale of "The Three Tenors" - Jose Carreras, Placido Domingo, and Luciano Pavarotti - audio and video products. It seems that PolyGram (a company later bought by Vivendi) conspired with Warner "to curb discounting and advertising to boost sales of recordings that the two companies jointly had distributed based on the tenors' concert in Paris during the 1998 soccer World Cup."

Based on these practices, the FTC has arrived at a stunning ruling.

"The Commission's order bars PolyGram from agreeing with competitors to fix the prices or restrict the advertising of products they produced independently."

The labels deny any wrongdoing, which should not come as a shock. The labels also denied earlier charges from the FTC of a much larger price-fixing scandal that cost consumers an estimated $480 million. The pigopolists agreed to settle that little incident by paying 41 suing states $67.4 million in cash and offering $75.7 million in CDs.

How many price-fixing scandals will it take before the government begins to question how serious the labels' losses to P2P file trading really are? Do grandparents and children pose more of a threat to the music industry than its own executives?
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/32048.html


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RIAA Will Take 2191.78 Years To Sue Everyone
Sum hope

READER MICHAELA STEPHENS says that if the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is right and that 60 million US folk are file sharing, it's going to take the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) a mighty long time to get round to them all.

She said: "I pulled out my calculator to see just how long it would take the RIAA to sue all 60 million P2P music file traders at a rate of 75 a day. 60,000,000/ 75 = 800,000 days to subpoena each person or 800,000 days/365 days in a year = 2191.78 years to subpoena each person".

Michaela points out that it's unrealistic to suppose that the RIAA will have any money left in 2191 years, and she even wonders whether the trade association will exist then.

Plus, she points out, given the rate of tech advancement, it's likely that we'll have moved on to many different types of music media in even a hundred years.

She continues: " So let us consider more realistic numbers. The RIAA plans to sue thousands of file sharers. Working in increments of 5000: 5,000 people/75 subpoenas a day = 66 days How are they going to keep track of all these lawsuits going on? 10,000 people/75 subpoenas a day = 133 days or about 2/3 of a year.

"Keep in mind suing 10,000 people is still only going to impact only one six thousandth (1/6000) of the file traders out there. And who is getting rich off of this? The lawyers. Betcha not a single musician will see a cent of this money.

"15,000 people/75 subpoenas a day = 200 days (1 out of every 4000 affected) 20,000 people/75 subpoenas a day = 266.6 days (1 out of every 3000 affected)

"When might this actually start affecting us? When 1 out of every 10 is affected? That would mean they'd have to sue six million people. That would take,...(6,000,000/75 = 80,000)... 80,000 days.. or 219 years! They'd have to sue our great grand children!"
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=10733


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Everyone Is a Target in Music Subpoenas
TED BRIDIS

Move over, college kids. Grandparents and roommates may be the first ones to pay for downloading songs on the Internet.

The music industry's earliest subpoenas, issued as part of a high-stakes campaign to cripple online piracy by suing some of music's biggest fans, are aimed at a surprisingly eclectic group: a grandfather, an unsuspecting dad and an apartment roommate.

"Within five minutes, if I can get hold of her, this will come to an end," said Gordon Pate of Dana Point, Calif., when told by The Associated Press that a federal subpoena had been issued over his daughter's music downloads.

The legal papers required an Internet provider, Comcast Cable Communications Inc., to hand over Pate's name and address.

Pate, 67, confirmed that his 23-year-old daughter, Leah Pate, had installed file-sharing software using an account cited on the subpoena. But he said his daughter would stop immediately and the family did not know using such software could result in a stern warning, expensive lawsuit or even criminal prosecution.

"There's no way either us or our daughter would do anything we knew to be illegal," Pate said, promising to remove the software quickly. "I don't think anybody knew this was illegal, just a way to get some music."

The president of the Recording Industry Association of America, the trade group for the largest music labels, said lawyers will pursue downloaders regardless of personal circumstances because it would deter other Internet users.

"The idea really is not to be selective, to let people know that if they're offering a substantial number of files for others to copy, they are at risk," Cary Sherman said. "It doesn't matter who they are."

Over the coming months this may be the Internet's equivalent of shock and awe, the stunning discovery by music fans across America that copyright lawyers can pierce the presumed anonymity of file-sharing, even for computer users hiding behind nicknames such as "hottdude0587" or "bluemonkey13."

In Charleston, W.Va., college student Amy Boggs said she quickly deleted more than 1,400 music files on her computer after the AP told her she was the target of a subpoena. Boggs said she sometimes downloaded dozens of songs on any given day, including ones by Fleetwood Mac, Blondie, Incubus and Busta Rhymes.

Since Boggs used her roommates' Internet account, the roommates' name and address were being turned over to music industry lawyers.

"This scares me so bad I never want to download anything again," said Boggs, who turned 22 on Thursday. "I never thought this would happen. There are millions of people out there doing this."

In homes where parents or grandparents may not closely monitor the family's Internet use, the news could be especially surprising. A defendant's liability can depend on their age and whether anyone else knew about the music downloads.

Bob Barnes, a 50-year-old grandfather in Fresno, Calif., and the target of a subpoena, acknowledged sharing "several hundred" music files. He said he used the Internet to download hard-to-find recordings of European artists because he was unsatisfied with modern American artists and grew tired of buying CDs without the chance to listen to them first.

"If you don't like it, you can't take it back," said Barnes, who runs a small video production company with his wife from their three-bedroom home. "You have all your little blonde, blue-eyed clones. There's no originality."
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/sto...MPLATE=DEFAULT


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How to Tell if the RIAA Wants You

File sharers can check a new online database to see if they are wanted by the recording industry.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has created a site where users can plug in their file-sharing user names. That name is checked against the list of those subpoenas filed in the Washington, D.C., district court.

The group, which is gleaning its information from the publicly available Pacer database, said it will be an important resource for those who are concerned that the recording industry might be seeking their identities.

"The recording industry continues its futile crusade to sue thousands of the over 60 million people who use file-sharing software in the U.S.," Fred Von Lohmann, senior attorney with the EFF, said in a statement. "We hope that the EFF's subpoena database will give people some peace of mind and the information they need to challenge the subpoenas and protect their privacy."

The EFF said the database includes 125 subpoenas issued through July 8. The group will update the tool as the records become available.

If a user name is located in the database, this does not confirm that the Recording Industry Association of America has issued a subpoena against that person, since user names on file-sharing sites are sometimes shared by multiple individuals.

But if a person's user name is in the database, the EFF site provides a link to a PDF file of the actual subpoena, which includes the name of the ISP, a list of representative songs pirated and the IP address of the user.

For those who have been subpoenaed by the RIAA, a list of attorneys and other legal resources are available at the Subpoena Defense Alliance website, a joint effort between the EFF and the U.S. Internet Industry Association.
http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,59785,00.html


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Music Services Jump On Itunes Bandwagon
John Borland

In a rush to market that's reminiscent of the dot-com bubble's headiest days, a stampede of companies is following Apple Computer pell-mell into the online music sales business.

Napster's new owner, Roxio, is scheduled to launch a legal version of the service by Christmas. Musicmatch said Monday that it will soon sell songs through its jukebox application. RealNetworks, America Online, Amazon.com and potentially even Microsoft are planning to sell digital downloads.

For consumers torn for years between downloading music illegally through file-swapping services or signing up for complicated monthly subscription services, the impending flood of available music may be little short of overwhelming. And having hundreds of thousands of songs just a mouse-click away from listeners could dramatically change the distribution and consumption of music, and potentially even alter recording practices, music industry insiders say.

But even before most of the new services launch, analysts are saying the online market is looking a little too crowded for comfort.

"In 10 years, the market might be able to support this many (stores)," Yankee Group analyst Ryan Jones said. "Right now, there are more than can really survive over the next few years."

The near-daily announcements of new music services that have followed the April launch of Apple Computer's iTunes music store are a sign that the logjam of music label licensing restrictions has finally burst, creating what some analysts are calling a genuinely new stage for online music.

Still, the new services are experimental at this point, with few having actually opened their doors yet and most operating on still-unconfirmed assumptions about consumers' likely online music-buying habits. And projections for the market aren't entirely rosy.

According to new estimates from Jupiter Research, spending on online music will total less than $1 billion in 2003. The analyst firm downgraded earlier projections but said spending would rise to $3.3 billion, or about 26 percent of all U.S. music spending, by 2008.

The current stampede was largely prompted by the release and the seeming success of Apple's iTunes service. The combination of an elegant interface, simple 99-cent-per-song pricing and unprecedented cooperation from music labels in providing songs without obvious restrictions on their use allowed iTunes to stand head and shoulders above anything that had previously hit the market.

MP3 jukebox company Musicmatch, which said Monday that it would launch its own digital download service though its software by the end of the year, may be the company following most closely in Apple's footsteps. Musicmatch said it would use the jukebox music player as the gateway into the music store--as Apple has--and, at least for now, the company is avoiding the kind of all-you-can-eat monthly subscription plans that Listen.com, America Online and Roxio's new Napster will offer.

"We think generally people want to own music," Musicmatch senior vice president Bob Ohlweiler said Monday. "An a la carte service has a lot more to offer to the masses, and the potential for a much higher adoption rate."
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5056162.html


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Online Music Sales To Be Muted

Online music sales are expected to be weaker than analysts earlier forecast because of overall sluggishness in the industry and lackluster digital services, according to Jupiter Research.

The research firm, however, still expects Net music sales to grow to $3.3 billion in 2008 from less than $1 billion in 2003. Jupiter, which released its updated estimates Monday, said it expects Internet sales to account for just over 25 percent of U.S. music spending by 2008.

Sales of CDs over online outlets will remain flat in 2003 at about $750 million, according to the study.

"The industry is suffering from competition for entertainment dollars, changing demographics, the end of the CD upgrade cycle, and piracy," Jupiter analyst Lee Black said in a statement.

Services such as Apple Computer's iTunes and BuyMusic--launched last week by Scott Blum, the founder of Internet retailer Buy.com--have created some new buzz for digital download services by offering songs from major labels and independent recording companies.

However, "while Apple has rekindled interest in digital downloads, total digital sales--downloads and subscriptions--will not surpass $80 million this year," Black said.

Jupiter has repeatedly lowered its online music forecast over the past few years, each time citing an under-performing market and the failure of digital music services to meet consumer expectations. Last year, the research firm projected that the online music market would grow to $5.1 billion in 2007, a downward revision from the $5.5 billion it expected in 2006.

Legal issues are proving to be a stumbling block for online music services. The recording industry last month said it would step up its efforts to crack down on individual file-swappers who illegally trade songs online.

BuyMusic's Blum last week said his goal is to have 1 million downloads a day by the end of the year. In contrast, Apple's iTunes service soared when it was launched in April, selling 5 million songs in the first eight weeks of operation.

The picture for Europe is no better, according to Jupiter Research. "Europe's online music market has been stuck in the starting blocks for the last few years, but the tide is finally beginning to turn," Jupiter Research analyst Mark Mulligan said in a statement, citing EMI Recorded Music's decision to make most of its catalog available online.
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5056020.html


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New Napster Gets Set To Rock And Roll
Reuters

Roxio says its revamped online music service, Napster, will debut in time for the holiday season and will give people access to music through a subscription or via an a la carte option.

The new service, Napster 2.0, will likely debut with the largest legal music catalog in the world with close to half a million songs, Chris Gorog, chief executive of CD- burning software company Roxio, said Monday.

He declined to comment on the price of a subscription or of the per-song option for the relaunch of Napster, the song-swapping pioneer shut down by copyright infringement lawsuits in 2001.

The details of the launch come amid plans later this year for online music services from several other players including AOL Time Warner's America Online and services from retailers such as Amazon.com.

People who use Napster's new service will be able to search for music, listen to preprogrammed radio customized to their tastes, and burn CDs and download music to devices, Gorog said.

"It will be very reflective of the key characteristics of the original Napster...independence, innovation and freedom of choice," Gorog said.

Roxio bought the assets of Napster last year for about $5 million at bankruptcy auction and bought the Pressplay music service this year.

Gorog said about 97 percent of online music users recognize the Napster brand, and half of those have indicated they would be interested in paying for a service.

Industry players have said that music labels have been more receptive to recent digital music plans but that some artists are still resistant to the online movement.

"We have found the labels have been much more liberal in terms of usage rules. Certainly there are some artist holdouts, but we are finding the holdout artists to be very receptive to the new Napster," Gorog said, adding that it has not yet started testing the new service.

He also declined to comment on when Roxio expects to make back its investments in Napster and Pressplay.
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5055891.html


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Record Industry Trade Group Names New Chief
Reuters

The music industry's leading trade group on Monday named Mitch Bainwol, a former top congressional aide with contacts in the Republican party, as its new chief executive and top lobbyist in Washington.

Bainwol, a former chief of staff to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, will start Sept. 1 as head of the Recording Industry Association of America, the trade group said in a statement.

Bainwol is also a former executive director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. Music industry executives had said the association was looking for a well-connected Republican to increase its leverage with Congress as it battles digital piracy.

The RIAA represents the major music companies, including the music arms of Sony Corp., Vivendi Universal, AOL Time Warner, Bertelsmann AG and EMI Group .

Speculation on the replacement for Hilary Rosen, who stepped down earlier this summer, had centered on a number of high-profile Republican names, including members of Congress like Mary Bono and Billy Tauzin, and former Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke.

The RIAA has been increasingly in the public eye in the last few years, as the music industry's fight against digital music piracy has spilled into courts of law and the court of public opinion.

The record industry has seen CD sales slump for three years, a decline it blames on online file-sharing sites where music can be traded freely and sometimes before it is even released.

"What could be more rewarding than helping to promote two great American traditions: music and property rights?" Bainwol said in a statement.
http://reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml...toryID=3173482


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Cyber Sleuths Hunt File-Swappers
Maggie Shiels

They have been described as Hollywood's digital detectives and they have a warning for anyone illegally trading music or movies:
"You can run but you can never hide."

Mark Ishikawa, a former hacker, is the CEO of BayTSP, arguably one of the most recognised and biggest companies working in the business of patrolling the web to unmask violators of copyrighted music. From his Silicon Valley base he told BBC News Online: "There is no lock that can't be picked and our technology ensures that there is not a rock in the world you can hide under if you are sharing files.

"If you have an active internet address or connection and you are actively sharing files, our spiders will find you." With the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) turning up the heat on illegal file-sharing and issuing hundreds of subpoenas, the role of these copyright cops is central in that fight. "We are very successful at what we do," said Mr Ishikawa, who says he is not working directly for the RIAA but does have three of the top five record labels as clients. "We find between 1.5 million to two million copyright infringements a day and we have a very high effectiveness rate. About 85% of the people we send notices to go away and we never see them again."

The RIAA claims that around 57 million people have downloaded music in the United States alone and as a result sales in the last four years have fallen 14% to $12.6bn

The process of finding the pirates is down to what the BayTSP's CEO calls "matching technology" and some old-fashioned electronic gumshoe work.This involves launching robotic searches across the internet, on all major peer-to-peer networks, in 65,000 newsgroups, FTP sites, Internet Relay chat channels and auction and retail sites. "Using our matching technology, we identify the user name, the protocol they're using, which file-sharing protocol if it's just a web protocol or not. But the most important piece of information we detect is their IP address," explained Mr Ishikawa. "The IP address is unique at the given point of time that they're connected to the internet."

He says once BayTSP has collected all this information, the copyright holder can use the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to force an internet service provider (ISP) to reveal who is on that particular IP address.

Users charged with piracy, or ISP's refusing to reveal the identity of an IP address, could face lawsuits for damages from $750 to $150,000 under US copyright law.

Thinking of hiding behind nicknames like "hottdudeXXX" or "bluemonkey13" or even installing new software to cloak your identity? Think again, says Mr Ishikawa.

"We got an e-mail last week from someone saying 'How did you find me? I used Peer Guardian' and he thought that would save him from our spiders. There is nowhere to hide."

Mr Ishikawa says the company's "digital fingerprinting" enables BayTSP computers to identify songs and movies, even bad copies made with camcorders, based on 30 second snippets.

While most of the focus has been on trading music, Hollywood is becoming increasingly concerned about the number of movies now being shared illegally. Two of the industry's top seven movie studios have engaged the sleuthing services of BayTSP, but because of contractual arrangements they can't be named.

A snapshot of illegal movie downloads by BayTSP's chief technology officer Evelyn Espinosa was revealing.

"This is just over a few hours and I have almost 14,000 records with a variety of different titles ranging from Daddy Day Care to Anger Management and Charlie's Angels." She says the growing availability of broadband connections is the main reason movies are being targeted for illegal swapping. "These connections are now so fast that you can download a whole movie in just a few hours."

Software infringement has also been described as ripe for abuse and the Business Software Alliance says it has increased by 20% the number of notices and warnings it issues.

For BayTSP's Mark Ishikawa, the illegal file-swapping sector has been good for his business. He says the privately traded firm is "cash- positive, venture-backed and doubling its revenue every quarter". As well as making money, Mr Ishikawa's vision for BayTSP is to become a hi-tech version of Pinkerton, the legendary detective agency that protected presidents like Abraham Lincoln and hunted outlaws like Jesse James. "We are just like a private detective firm. We have no law enforcement capability. What we do is capture the information to help bring down the bad guys," he said.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/h...gy/3104281.stm


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Former Zeus entrepreneurs raise $2m from Pentech and Gateway
Press Release

Saviso Group, which is focused on developing solutions for the Internet infrastructure market, has raised its first institutional round of $2 million from early stage technology specialists Pentech Ventures and the Cambridge Gateway Fund.

Pentech led the round, which also included investment by the company’s existing angel investors.

The funding will allow Saviso to further develop its position as one of Cambridge’s leading technology start-ups and specifically provide funding for CacheLogic, the group’s intelligent routing and caching subsidiary.

CacheLogic’s flagship product, the Cachepliance, is currently in advanced field trials by many of the Tier-1 Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and is positioned to be the most compelling solution available to one of the most immediate concerns for the ISP community.

It greatly reduces the financial challenges created by network usage resulting from the meteoric growth in Peer-to-Peer (P2P) usage.

Bryan Amesbury, Saviso’s chief financial officer said: “We are delighted to have such a strong group of investors supporting Saviso in its next phase of growth.

“This round of funding will allow us to further capitalise upon the market opportunities that we continue to develop.”

Alasdair Greig of The Cambridge Gateway Fund, added: “The Saviso team provides a wealth of expertise in the development of technology businesses and we are confident that our investment will allow them to make CacheLogic a success.”
http://www.businessweekly.co.uk/news...rticle_id=7798


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Pentagon Deploys GridNode for RosettaNet B2B Process Automation
Press release

GridNode, the leading provider of trading partner enablement solutions, today announced the successful RosettaNet implementation for Pentagon Technologies Inc., a leading provider of process yield enhancement products and services for the semiconductor fabrication and manufacturing equipment industries.

Pentagon Technologies' continued adoption of cutting-edge technology demonstrates the company's drive to exceed total quality requirements and achieve greater operational efficiencies. It implemented the GridTalk for RosettaNet business-to-business integration software to automate order management with the company's key customers.

Leveraging GridTalk's Linux-based version, Pentagon maintained the company's stringent network security using the Apple's OS X Server. Pentagon was also able to expand the suite of processes automated and achieve backend connectivity by using GridMapper, GridNode's any-to-any mapping tool, to convert XML document formats to SPARKY, Pentagon's Filemaker-based home-grown Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) System. "Pentagon requires an integration solution capable of supporting our evolving strategic business initiatives. GridNode's GridTalk software provided the flexibility and reliability to enhance our operational efficiencies, with minimum disruption to our existing network environment. Pentagon has reaped significant return on investment through streamlined business processes, improved data quality and improved customer service quality," said Ross Lindell, Chief Information Officer of Pentagon Technologies. Through our support of open-standards, GridNode's suite of business process automation software provides companies with the ability to increase efficiencies throughout the organization without disruptive changes and increases in the total cost of ownership," said CheeTong Leow, Managing Director of GridNode. "This allows for more scalability and generates greater implementation value quickly."

GridNode provides businessware for extended enterprise management and web services. Using a highly-optimized, distributed architecture for B2B integration and collaboration, GridNode's peer-to-peer (P2P), XML-based product suite enables critical supply chain data to be exchanged, synchronized and analyzed in real-time via the Internet infrastructure, reliably and efficiently. http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/st...2003,+10:24+AM


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Fur To Fly Over File Sharing
Nathan Cochrane

Music lovers from both sides of the copyright divide will be ringside for a knock-down battle of wits when the recording labels square off against the man they regard as a modern- day Blackbeard at an industry conference next month in Sydney.

Stephen Peach, chief executive of the Australian Record Industry Association (ARIA), will face down his bete noir, Australian entrepreneur Kevin Bermeister, the man rumoured to pull the strings of music file-sharing phenomenon Kazaa.

Bermeister, who established the Sega-Ozisoft software distribution company (which was later acquired by the French entertainment software maker Infogrames), returned to Australia this month after spending five years in California. Kazaa chief executive Nikki Hemming declined the initial invitation to speak at the Australian Music Business Conference, which is sponsored by Apple Computer, because of pending US litigation.

Conference organiser Phil Tripp, an outspoken critic of the recording labels' slowness to embrace digital distribution of music, says it is time for compromise. The labels have to move into the 21st century but consumers must also be honest, he says.

"The music industry has to face tough questions in challenging times," Tripp says.

"The consumer doesn't realise that sharing is illegal and they don't care because they believe it's their God-given right to sonically shoplift. Hopefully they will grow up and realise
it is valuable and not musical toilet paper they can wipe across their computer."

Tripp is critical of research released this month by ARIA that says, based on a sample of 1000 phone interviews, that 3.6 million Australians illicitly burnt music in the second half of last year. Tripp says the figures are flawed because they most likely include people who have paid for CDs but copied them as a back-up or downloaded the music onto a portable music player.

The analyst at Quantum Market Research in Melbourne who conducted the survey admits that burning for personal and otherwise non-infringing uses was lumped with piracy. Those who compose and perform their own music but burn it to CD will also have been trapped by the question's ambiguity.

Peach says it's "undoubtedly the case" that music buyers making personal back-ups or downloading to devices have been lumped in with pirates. But even though ARIA touts these figures as justification for further crackdowns, the more important statistic, Peach says, is that just 20 per cent of consumers who receive a burnt disc ultimately buy the music from a legitimate source.

The revelation that innocent consumers could be classified as pirates places further pressure on the international recording industry to justify its claims that wholesale piracy threatens its economic base.

Studies of the US music industry conclude that an increase in the price of CDs, the economic downturn and the reduction of labels' stables of artists have contributed to the decrease in sales. ARIA further acknowledges that stiffer competition from DVD movie and music sales as well as game consoles, pay TV and mobile phones has contributed to the fall in CD sales.

Music producer turned industry whistleblower Moses Avalon says the labels have ripped off artists for years.
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/20...244550640.html


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Napster, the RIAA and File-Sharing
Thomas Mennecke

Thoughts of Napster reflect the early golden age of file-sharing. If you were part of the original P2P revolution, you'll remember when the RIAA was just a bunch of letters, Napster was about the only thing around, and most downloads chugged along at 56K!

Those days are long gone. Now, the RIAA and its agents of evil are stalking Internet users, Napster has been replaced with dozens of P2P networks, and we demand nothing less than a 500K high speed connection.

Napster died a long time ago, and there's nothing that will ever recreate that experience. Its death was a slow and agonizing process, being shut down initially, then remaining on life support until its final deathblow in late 2000.

Leave it to corporate America, however, to figure out how to resurrect the dead.

So now we have Roxio, who bought the intellectual property rights to Napster back in 2002 (hypocrisy aside). Now they are set to dig up this fossil for release by Christmas. The situation calls for their current purchase of PressPlay to be renamed Napster. The great debate remains whether or not Roxio can make this project work.

According to Chris Gorog, CEO of Roxio, they will attempt to recreate the Napster experience to the greatest legal extent possible. That translates to a limited catalog (500,000 songs) and the most critical aspect of all, a fee based service.

In the arena of free P2P networks, the ability of fee-based services to compete is virtually non-existent. MusicMatch and PressPlay are prime examples of this failure. The exception in a limited sense is Apple's iTunes, which has witnessed a healthy reception by music fans. However, its long-term success remains to be seen as major record labels refuse to allow their big named artist to be cataloged.

The big question is whether the 'legitimate' music world's umpteenth attempt to crack free P2P's shell will work. If the RIAA can change the climate of the current online music world with continued legal persecution, then perhaps. They very well may be able to frighten and bully the populace into legitimate alternatives.

However, that scenario is counting on the RIAA's success. The very real possibility exists that their witch-hunt can backfire terribly, and further alienate the online population. Considering the initial public reaction, this may already be underway. This latest battle is the most critical for both sides. We have reached the climax of the online copyright war, and both sides have a tremendous amount at steak. If the RIAA's last-ditch attempt succeeds, then much of file-sharing as we know it may collapse. Conversely, if P2P weathers the storm and the RIAA's legal pursuit backfires, then file-sharing's greatest victory may be only months away.
http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=205


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Sweden To Outlaw Peer-To-Peer File Swapping
Ketola

The implementation of EUCD will have staggering consequences to Swedish computer users. Not only will it limit the consumers' rights to make copies of CDs and DVDs for personal use, but it will also criminalize peer-to- peer file sharing.

The Swedish government is proposing a law which would require the permission from the copyright owner before any music, video, photo or text material can be spread on the net. P2P software, such as Kazaa will be outright outlawed, as will software intended for bypassing copy protection on movies and audio CDs.

Also the right to make personal copies will be further limited, but it will still be legal to make copies for personal use.

According to the minister of justice Thomas Bodström the new legislation doesn't radically change the current attitude towards copyrights.

"The new law has not been tailored to satisfy the needs of large record companies. Essentially it retains the earlier views on copyrights. As technology develops, the legislation must also be kept up to date," Bodström commented.

Distributing or downloading illegal copies on P2P networks can lead to a sentence of up to two years in prison. Usually only those sharing illegal files have been made liable in court. The Swedish law will also prohibit downloading.
http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/4345.cfm


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Leave P2P Users Alone, Says Publisher
Iain Thomson

Concentrate on the organised pirates and release better albums

A leading music publisher has claimed that internet file sharing could actually improve the quality of music in the long term. Ellis Rich, chairman of the Independent Music Group, suggested that the music industry is making a mistake by equating piracy with downloading by peer-to-peer users.

"Ultimately this could be good for the music industry," he told an industry roundtable.

Genuine piracy, which involves organised syndicates making multiple copies of music for resale, is causing direct damage to the music industry, said Rich. Downloaders, on the other hand, hurt the industry less but are more high profile.

"Songwriters will have to produce albums full of good songs rather than a few good tracks and filling the rest of the album with padding," stated Rich.

"As for piracy most small MP3s [on the internet] are too low quality to be used in pirated media. I'm more concerned with attacking pirates than students."

At the roundtable, security access company Clearswift warned that companies should protect themselves against litigation, in case content providers turn their attention from individuals to companies that allow staff to download copyright material from the internet.

"The biggest threat to companies these days is copyright infringement," warned Paul Rutherford, chief marketing officer at Clearswift.

"Spam and viruses are offensive tactics and are highly visible, but IP isn't seen this way. But wait until you see the first executives in handcuffs and that attitude will change."
http://www.vnunet.com/News/1142697


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Windows XP Peer-to-Peer Design Finalized
David Worthington

A stealth distribution on Windows Update let loose the final version of Microsoft's P2P designs for Windows XP late last week. The update has also been released as a standalone download, with the plumbing of a software development kit in close quarters.

The upgrade for Windows XP Service Pack 1 repositions the operating system's Internet underpinnings to the next generation IPv6 networking stack. The download also bridges together legacy network standards through NAT traversal technology known as "Teredo."

Service Pack 2 for Windows XP will include the technology, and close ties have also been cited with Microsoft's Live Communications Server -- formerly code-named Greenwich -- product team.

February saw the release of a beta peer-to-peer update for Windows XP, coinciding with the release of Microsoft's threedegrees IM client, intended to connect people to do "fun things together."

The premise behind threedegrees is to enable social interaction within a group of friends or family by extending standard instant messaging with music, group chats, digital photos and personal desktop animations that Microsoft calls "winks."

In order to bypass the myriad of networking issues caused by firewalls and routers hampering peer-to-peer connectivity, Microsoft turned to IPv6, which features enhanced traffic management.

However, the beta caused a flood of problems that Microsoft engineers worked to iron out, including restricting some customers from being able to access certain Internet sites.

The Advanced Networking Pack for Windows XP, which includes the updated IPv6 stack and new IPv6 firewall may be downloaded via FileForum.
http://www.betanews.com/article.php3?sid=1059825399


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UK P2P Users May Face Legal Action
Dinah Greek

BPI waits for European law to come into force before deciding on legal action

The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) is waiting until the new European Union copyright directive is implemented before it decides whether to take legal action against UK peer-to- peer (P2P) users.

The BPI has no current plans to follow the actions of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and sue individuals who download music from P2P sites, saying that it prefers to educate people rather than take a heavy handed approach.

But it has warned that the legal route has not been ruled out.

A BPI spokesman told vnunet.com that, although it felt able to issue legal proceedings against file sharers under current law, it preferred to wait until the directive is enforced so that copyright laws are clarified.

The directive came into force in June 2001 and is expected to be implemented sometime in October.

It follows heavy lobbying by the film, TV and recording industries, which are concerned about the effect of digital technologies on their ability to profit from intellectual property rights.

"Our position from the outset has been to educate and inform. But there is one misconception that needs clearing up," a BPI spokesman said.

"People have this perception of P2P users as poor students, but there are some people who download seriously large amounts of files.

"While it is not our intention to sue it is not something we would rule out once the directive is enforced. The heavy users are the ones we would go after."

Ellis Rich, chief executive of the Independent Music Group, is against the idea of suing individual P2P users because, he argues, piracy and downloading music from these sites are not the same thing.

If the industry made online music buying easier the problem could be solved, he said. He said record companies need to realise what they own is the copyright, not the manufacturing rights.

"I hope the BPI doesn't start legal actions against P2P users. People don't mind paying, but it's about access," he explained.

"The industry could easily put every recording ever made online and it would be much better for everyone if the industry just dealt with it."
http://www.vnunet.com/News/1142728


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Quality Will Beat Illegal File Sharing - Apple
Macworld staff

The only way to tackle illegal file-sharing networks is to provide legitimate, quality competition, an Apple executive said yesterday.

Speaking at Jupiter Research's Plug.IN music conference yesterday, Apple director of marketing for applications and services Peter Lowe said: "The way to go after illegal file- sharing services is to compete with them – go after their weaknesses.

"People use these services for instant gratification: for most people who use file sharing it is more about flexibility and not about it being free. We aim to take advantages of the weaknesses of illegal sharing services: unreliable encoding; bad connection; no previews; wrong music; no album cover art; and at the end of the day it is stealing – which is bad karma!"

Lowe said Apple iTunes Music Store is aiming to create a legal service that offers simplicity and consistency. Looking at other emerging music services,such as BuyMusic.com, he explained that Apple does not believe the Web "is the best interface to enjoy music".

Lowe confirmed Apple is "on track" to launch a Windows version of iTunes by the end of 2003, adding that 46 per cent of sales so far have been entire albums: "The disintegration of the album has not happened, contrary to what people are saying."

Apple added a host of new artists to its online catalogue yesterday, including Junior Senior, Diana Ross, Billie Holiday, David Bowie, Peter Gabriel, New Order, Aerosmith, Alice Cooper, Beyonce, Bob Marley and the Wailers, Black Uhuru, and David Holmes.

An exclusive Moby track was also added to the roster – Love of Strings, a remix of a track from the artist's album, 18.

Marketing experts expect that Apple's determination to develop the best digital-music download service will help it consolidate its position before other services appear.

An article in AdAge warns that the "competitive landscape for online subscription music services is likely to heat up over the next six to nine months because of Apple's success so far".

Senior Jupiter Research analyst Lee Black said that Apple's success "proves if you give consumers the rights to the downloads they want, they'll buy them". he added: "Consumers have said as long as they can own it and copy it to other devices, they'll pay for it. Give them usage rights and they'll buy it."
http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/main_...fm?NewsID=6665


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Canadians Look At U.S. Litigation Against Music File Sharing
Sandra Abma

As the American recording industry steps up its fight against the illegal sharing of music online, Canadians are starting to look at the U.S. model.

Peer-to-peer file sharing, or downloading, of music has cost the North American recording industry billions of dollars. In Canada, CD sales have dropped 20 per cent in the past three years.

The American recording industry's latest attempt to squash music piracy is a two- pronged approach: sanctioning a number of online music services and intensifying litigation against what they call "music pirates."

Americans can legally download music online - paying from US $0.79 per song on sites like Buymusic.com and Apple's iTunes music store - but those who continue to do so illegally are being singled out by harsh legislation.

A new bill before the House of Congress proposes a five-year prison sentence and a fine of US $250,000 for the sharing of just one music file on a peer-to-peer network.

The Canadian Recording Industry Association has so far taken a softer approach to online music sharing, choosing an education program aimed at young music fans. However, the apparent success of U.S attempts has prompted CRIA president Brian Robertson to look into the American model.

"There's been quite a substantive drop in peer-to-peer activity," Robertson said. "Particularly young people, who possibly didn't know it was illegal before, now know it's illegal and now are getting a little bit intimidated by subpoenas being served and penalties."

And now Canadians will be able to legally download music too. This fall, both Buymusic.com and the Apple iTunes service will be made available to Canadians. A Canadian service, called Puretracks.com, is also being introduced.

Customers have been eagerly looking forward to this, said Puretracks.com co- founder Alister Mitchell. "Technology moves like lightning. It takes a lot longer to work through the labyrinth, the copyright ownership, that's involved in any one particular track, in any one particular CD."

Music lovers will pay for online music if the service is easy, the music of high quality, and the process legal, Mitchell said.
http://www.cbc.ca/artsCanada/stories...download300703


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NPD Group: Apple ITunes Successfully Translates Brand Awareness Into Usage
Press Release

According to The NPD Group, there is strong consumer awareness for paid music download sites, but convincing consumers to actually use them appears to be a more difficult proposition. Among companies that have entered the paid download arena, Apple‚s iTunes has been the most successful so far at translating consumer awareness into actual usage. On the other hand, companies like Rhapsody and Pressplay that boast a longer history in this arena and a broader base of potential users have less awareness and very low usage rates.

NPD reports that Apple iTunes reached 20 percent awareness among all consumers aged 13 and over based on a survey conducted in June of this year. Among Apple Macintosh users, the initial target for the iTunes Music Store, consumer awareness jumped to 46 percent. In addition, six percent of Mac users have actually paid for a song or album via iTunes. Conversely, Pressplay and Rhapsody, which have been in the market much longer than iTunes, both showed a 14 percent awareness among all consumers. Less than one percent of individuals age 13 and older reported downloading music from either site; future usage intent was not any higher.

"Obviously Apple iTunes has struck a chord among consumers - especially Mac users," said Russ Crupnick, VP of The NPD Group. "Half of this audience is aware of the Apple Store, which is borne out by the fact that iTunes's usage is higher only two months after launch than that of other music sites that have been around for over a year. It remains to be seen whether existing fee-based sites can leverage their offerings to meet or exceed the success enjoyed by iTunes as well as whether they can begin to pull users from free file sharing services like Kazaa and Morpheus."

The business model for Apple iTunes may provide clues as to what other paid sites can do in order to raise awareness, build consumer equity and convert browsers into buyers. They include the following:

- Rethinking the subscription model - A case can be made that Apple‚s higher conversion rate might speak to consumer preference for a fee-per-song/album model as compared with subscription offerings.

- Ability to purchase full albums at a discount - By providing consumers the choice of downloading single tracks or full albums, iTunes provides greater breadth of offering and ease-of-use.

- Built-in portability - By leveraging the success of its successful iPod music player, Apple has leveraged a group of users that are ready to download and go. "NPD research shows that music buyers increasingly demand file portability, and that‚s something early music buying services didn‚t address very well," Crupnick said.
http://www.mi2n.com/press.php3?press_nb=55033


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dividing The Spoils
Guy Dixon

Those in charge of music copyrights don't mince words when it comes to music file sharing.

''You mean theft?'' said David Basskin, president of the Canadian Musical Reproduction Rights Agency Ltd., a group that collects royalties for songwriters in Canada.

For Basskin, there's no murkiness, no room for the argument that file sharing can help promote an artist or create something decidedly more far out, like free music as a new form of communal free love.

No, the facts are these. The right to copy a recording belongs to the owner of that recording. Usually, that's the record company. The right to the song itself as a composition belongs to the music publisher. Not paying for those rights is an infringement of copyright.

"So there is no doubt," Basskin explained, "that every day a large volume of illegal activity goes on. It is both a criminal offence and a civil matter. There is no point trying to dress it up with a name that it is not -- it's on-line shoplifting." (Actually, in the U.S. it’s not theft, according to the Supreme Court, - js.)

So forget the idea of music belonging to the people. It belongs to the people who own it. But as long as a teenager plugs into an amp and plays Blitzkrieg Bop, a conductor overindulges with Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 or a programmer finds a new way to download music anonymously, there will always be rule-breakers. The only solution then, some say, is to legitimize the new technology, just as old record- copying technologies have been legalized, and to license file sharing itself, while also offering pay services that are far superior to peer-to- peer networks such as Kazaa.

"The trouble right now is that technology companies like Kazaa have been trying to get licences for this music. They want to do it legitimately. They want to pay artists. The trouble is that the five multibillion-dollar record companies have refused to give them licences for the past five years," said Ren Bucholz, a grassroots activist on staff with the San Francisco civil-liberties organization Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The EFF is among those trying to push for collective licences for file- sharing services, either through voluntary licences or compulsory licences mandated by governments. It's not hard, argues the EFF. Every medium, from radio to player pianos, has been able to come up with some form of licence to compensate the rights owners for publicly performing or copying music.

The issue gets more complicated with digital distribution since, as is the case with Internet radio, music is being, in a sense, broadcast to listeners on the Web, but it is also being copied on computer servers. Still, licensing issues for Internet radio broadcasts are being addressed, particularly in the United States. File sharing, so far as the industry and licensers are concerned, remains taboo.

No matter how hard free-speech advocates and the tech community push for peer-to-peer licensing, the recording industry only sees it as a last resort, said Michael Geist, technology counsel based in Ottawa for the law firm Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt.

"In a sense, that kind of licensing scheme is an admission that the current set of legal rules and the current marketplace is not able to adequately create the compensation schemes that copyright law is in part based on," he said. "But if we are still debating this issue three, four or five years from now, it may be that the best way for compensation is through a compulsory licence."

One of the things needed to satisfy rights-holders is a way to measure roughly how many times a song is distributed over peer-to-peer networks. Blanket agreements allow for licences in effect to be replicated over and over again depending on how many times the song gets played, but there has to be some kind of accounting process. "Of course the devil is in the detail, but those issues can be addressed," Geist said.

Meanwhile, record companies are slowly coming up with on-line alternatives to file sharing that are beginning to catch on. Apple's successful iTunes service in the United States charges per song or per album, although it limits the number of times a user can copy songs to other devices in order to prevent outright piracy. PC-based imitator BuyMusic.com has also now come on to the American market, and services are expected in Canada by the fall.

Their major selling point is convenience. While file sharers swear by Kazaa, peer-to-peer networks can be a Class-A hassle. They are strewn with poor-quality music files and intrusive spyware that monitors users' movements and bombards them with pop-up ads, along with decoy files that artists and record companies put out to trick downloaders. For many, the idea of spending time negotiating through peer-to-peer networks is pure hell. The more popular Kazaa gets, the more it could become its own worst enemy.

The industry sees another solution, but it's proving to be unpopular. A number of major releases, such as Radiohead's Hail to the Thief, have come out on copy-protected discs that also limit the ability to copy the music. Audiophile formats such as Sony's SACD and DVD-Audio also have copy-protection technology embedded into the discs. The strategy so far has been to see whether consumers will accept this, although Toronto's independent label Arts & Crafts used it, but then regretted it when they initially put it on the Toronto collective Broken Social Scene's latest widely acclaimed album.

"It was our first release as a label, and our distributor used copy protection. They talked to us about it and in theory we went, 'It sounds like a good thing. Let's put copy protection on the record.' And we regretted it almost immediately after doing it," said Jeffrey Remedios, the label's co-owner.

"If someone has gone out and bought the record, you are then saying to them you can't go put that on your iPod [portable music player] or you can't take that and make an extra copy for your car. You actually penalize the wrong person, whereas you can go download those songs off the Internet and they're not copy protected."

And that's precisely what many believe the industry has to get away from -- blame, intimidation and the idea of limiting consumers. Think of it: Legitimizing file sharing and creating better on-line alternatives could have a world of benefits.

It could entice labels to put even more effort into the mastering and presentation of the CDs they sell, following the example of Columbia records and its outstanding Legacy series. It could even push record companies to make available entire back catalogues on the Internet in order to compete with the vast selection on peer-to-peer networks.

It could mean allowing musicians to record what they want, when they want, creating music that depends less on business and distribution decisions and more on talent and audience tastes. It could eliminate the nagging feeling that record buyers live with that the industry is ripping them off by limiting selection. It could move the recording industry into the unimaginable -- a pure heaven for audiences.

As Geist said, "This is too big of a marketplace and too big of an opportunity for the recording industry to completely ignore or treat only as an avenue for lawsuits."
http://www.globetechnology.com/servl...ry/Technology/
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