Here’s another good reason to live some place other than the USA. A woman has been ordered to pay 1.92 million dollars for downloading 24 songs! The RIAA took her to court when she refused to pay when the RIAA showed up and requested cash to prevent the filing of charges.
More then 35,000 other cases have already been settled. out of court. It is widely believed that the downloading 
and sharing of much online has hurt music industry sales. It is also widely believed that this kind of action is not going to stop it. Virtually everyone is downloading music and movies. These kinds of actions have not stopped it.
It may require new legislation to stop it. Until the RIAA and others can go after the systems that aid in file sharing, the ability to share files will remain.
However, I often say the “WWW” really mean the “Wild Wild West” instead of the world wide web. The Internet is a new frontier, much like the old American West where there was often no or under developed law. Instead of the fastest gun, the person with the better lawyer usually wins.
Going after mom and pops and their children, does not appear to be a very productive way to control this. It does need to be controlled. The artist need to be paid. No doubt that is a problem. Megadeath sued their fans for downloading their music. That doesn’t appear to have been productive for them. They lost fans in the process. Suing “Joe The Plumber” is not the way to go either. It wont stop much but I don’t know what the answer is.
There are services out there that will hide your IP address. The problem with those is that they might be able to capture your passwords as you log in. It is easy to find open proxies these days, free ones but they are likely setup to do just that, capture your passwords and steal your identity. So you’re better off just downloading and hoping you wont get caught. There are some services out there that I consider trust worthy. Strong VPN is one I would trust. There are many of them out of Russia and I would NOT recommend those. To the good people in Russia, I apologize in advance but there are a lot of seedy characters on the net from Russia. However, I don’t know if Strong VPN will allow you to use their service for that kind of activity.
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I could be wrong, but my understanding is that the lady was sued not for downloading those songs, but for sharing them.
I read an article that indicated it was for sharing. If that is accurate, Then its a new twist as the RIAA was always suing for downloading only. I don’t really know, it really doesn’t matter.
On those networks, you have to share in order to download. When you download and the download completes, most of the time they automatically go in the upload que.
Most of that software is eat up with spyware. It was also way to slow. Way to slow for me. There is a much better way. :)
This article says it was for downloading songs: http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Web-Services-Web-20-and-SOA/RIAA-Copyright-Fine-Totals-192-Million-326370/
From my prior research they can’t sue for sharing, only downloading which doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.
Here is another one from the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/20/arts/music/20arts-192MILLIONFI_BRF.html?ref=arts
Rusty,
Don’t even get me started with theses corrupt bastards…the RIAA. They have been, since the end of 2008, lobbying Congress to pass a “Performance Tax” on all radio stations in America for music they play. In 2007, the RIAA tried to pass a bill through Congress that would have all radio stations who stream on-line to pay 7 tenths of $1.00 for each song streamed multiplied by the # of streams. BUt, luckily that bill did not pass. So, now they are trying this Performance Tax Bill. But, it will not even see the light of day because over 230 members in Congress voted to support the “No Performance Tax” bill instead.
But, you know, I lay some of the blame on Congress in the 1st place for, shall we say, allowing the RIAA to get there ‘foot-in-the-door’ to begin with back in 2003 when Congress passed the Millenium Act.
This Act, for radio stations who streams music on-line, states that a radio station can not play more than two songs by an artist, from the same album, in a row; you can not play more than three songs in a row, from different albums either, and you can’t play four song throughout a single show (shows are usually 4-5 hours). This bill allowed the RIAA to get their grunbby foot wedged inside to think they could keep wedging the door open and Congress would give them anything they asked.
What these idiots do not realize is that in the lobg run it would do more damage to their business and the artists they represent if the “Performance Tax” were to pass.
You can read all about the “Performance Tax” vs. “No Peformance Tax” battle @ http://www.nab.org.
I am on the side of the radio stations as I work in the business. I manage a station by day (www.myspace.org/wdbk) and spin music one night a week (www.myspace.com/wbzc)
Well, I’m off to chat with my lovely filipino girlfriend whom I will be meeting in two weeks in Ozamis, Mindanao.
Rock on,
Greg G on the Z
PS: Alice Cooper is an awesome radio DJ! I miss his show; which was broadcast via simulcast here in Philadelphia on WMGK from 10pm to 1am.
Hey Greg,
I’ve run a couple of online radio stations.
Perhaps the tax your talking about after I had shut mine down or maybe before.
One of the organizations ramped up prices to a level that would put almost all such stations out of business. But the providers pretty much thumbed their nose at the rule and said sue us.
A better way to avoid the entire mess is use a provider that is not based in the USA.
PS Alice is still on the air, google Nights with Alice Cooper. I loved his show.
Severe winter weather is also a good reson to move abroad…
I will try to show you a picture (with me on it) if I can.
http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/6343/meinfrontofhousewinter2.jpg
Here is a photo of my street in the middle of winter.
http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/6128/sacrecoeur.jpg
The same street in spring.
http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/442/inspringtime.jpg
Severe “winter” weather here is 24C LOL
Where do you live? Canada? Mt. Everest?
Canada, Québec that is.
I have lived in all Canadian provinces including British Columbia and Newfoundland and I can assure you that our climate is perfect for migratory birds.
I’d be more worried if Canada had a serious lack of cold. Dude when you move to the north pole don’t complain about the ice. LOL
I had the pleasure to visit Canada once, went during late December and it barely snowed at all. I was so disappointed. I went to a small town about 150 miles north of Toronto. Can’t remember the name of the town, had a mountain and skying but I went for a girl, of course. I ended up throwing her out about 10 years later, out of Memphis, and she said to me “can’t you find a girl in the US?” That’s when I told her I was going to the Philippines. :) i really didn’t want to toss her out but she kept making plans to leave me with her online boyfriends. I finally got tire do that, was hard at the time but turns out she did me a favor. Still sad though. Oh well, its what she seemed to want.
Even though no real snow I did have the coldest moment of my life in that little town, the wind was blowing of the lake at what seemed gale force right down the main street. It was about -10C. I couldn’t freaking breath!
I like cold weather over hot but that’s too cold!