antiGUY's
RANTitorial
The RIAA & Congress Plan to Hack
Your PC.
10-07-02
antiGUY
Posted by the alcoholic: This is kinda unrelated, but I see a lot
post saying that its the democrats that want to take away our rights ?!?!?!
Let's see, republicans want to get rid of abortion, force school prayer,
make flag-burning illegal (hey it's free speech), ban the teaching of evolution,
enforce the teaching of bullsh!t like creationism and intelligent design,
eliminate sex education (abstinence everyone! Ha ha republicans are nuts)!
Come on, I'd rather have goofy democrats trying to edit my speech than
have lunatic republicans try to control what thoughts I have and how I
live my life. OK sorry about that whole post, its totally unrelated to
the rant, but I had to set the record straight.
Posted by
pick: aG, I'm sorry, but the car analogy isn't
very good. Your car is registered with the state under YOUR NAME. It is
your property. An mp3, however, is the property of the artist who recorded
the music and the exec that produced it. Unless my mp3's are all named
"pick" by "pick," they legally aren't mine. If a person actually owns the
right to a song, then he/she may possess that mp3. But it won't fly if
you don't legally own the song.
Posted by
pick: SMIC, mp3's don't fall under Fourth Amendment
protections. Here's why: they are public, and they are shared by people
from around the world. That makes them a public, not private entity. Basically,
the right of protection from illegal searches and seizures come from private
areas and situations. Think of it this way: if you're smoking a doobie
in the town square, that's a public place. P2P sites are viewed in the
same sense. Now, if you have WAV or Microsoft files on your PC, those cannot
be taken away. However, I wouldn't put it past Congress to think of those,
too, and ban music put on a PC from a CD.
Posted by
New_Moral_Saviour: I think someone meantioned it before,
but i would like someone (aG?) to answer this: What about files in other
countries? I am British, and what right does a US Act give the copyright
owners to delete my files? Certainly if they started to attack the files
of people in other countries, there would soon be some sort of legal action
taken against them.
Posted by
Elroy420: Just let em' try it. What happened to
our Amendment Rights? Power hungry mutha's. Can't they catch some "real"
criminals?
Posted by
The Original Jackass: The best thing you can do to prevent hacking
like this is to get a router and do all your interneting through that since
nothing can get through it (to my knowlage).
Posted by
Sam your Uncle: First off just because I'm not in the
arm service to date does not mean I never served. I am a decorated veteran
of Vietnam. And yes I do enjoy a beer often. So KISSMYASS you can in fact
lickmyass.
Posted by
aG: I expected this to stir quite the debate
but I never imagined that people would begin arguing about Iraq, school
prayer and George W Bush. The Lori and ?? debate is amusing. I will have
to give round one to ??, since he does back up his arguments while Lori
does resort to that old Democrat trick of "never defend, just attack" as
he has stated. Sorry Lori, he does have a point. I'm not saying I am agreeing
with what he is saying but he does make a few good points and all you seem
to do is call him names and insult him in response. I do however want to
set the record straight on something; this bill has three co-sponsors-
one Democrat and two Republicans. Being a Libertarian my sympathies lie
closer to Republicans on a lot issues but in this case and in many cases
both sides are wrong. It is true that the Democratic party over the past
few years has endorsed more policies that are aimed at curtailing our rights,
the Republican's are not snow white either. That being said I am rather
frightened at some of the fascist ideas being embraced and pushed by some
Democrats over the past few years, such as the idiotic idea to tax soda
to stop kids from becoming fat. Not to mention the "let's add taxes to
cigarettes until they are too expensive, because we don't believe in smoking,
because the tobacco farmers give money to our opponents. Those policies
are anything but liberal. But both parties will do what they think is in
their best interest. The point that pick brought up about mp3's being public
property, sorry pick but I have to disagree. We had an incident where someone
was posting racist messages on some of our boards and we deleted his messages
and banned him from the sites. He went as far as getting a lawyer to try
and claim we were taking away his "freedom of speech" but the problem is,
the freedom of speech only applies to the government not infringing on
it, but the thing that is applicable here is he claimed since this site
is on a public network it is public property, not so, although the site
is open to the public, it is on a privately owned network and server. It
is not a public machine nor public property. Even if someone opens up their
machine to "share" mp3 files, the machine is still private property and
although he may have opened it up for other to download files off of it,
he only consented for public access for that reason. He has a reasonable
expectation that being on a peer 2 peer system does not give anyone a right
to alter or damage the files on his system, even the ones that are open
for the public to take. So the files may be publicly available, but they
are not public property, that would be the same thing as this analogy;
I park my car in a busy public parking lot and it is filled with things
like CD's computer stuff etc. If I leave my car door open am I proclaiming
that the stuff in my car is public property and anyone can take what they
like and do with it what ever they want? No. I'm sure some lawyers could
argue that point but if it ever got to the Supreme Court I doubt they would
uphold that public property claim and as has been stated, if they use the
public property claim then the copyright holder disclaim their copyrights
to those files, so it wouldn't work in this case.
Posted by
SMIC: PICK If mp3's are "public property" how
does that give record companies the right to destroy them. If they are
public than they are no more the propery of the artist or lable than they
are of the person who's computer they are on. Further if they do not discriminate
as to what mp3's they destroy what about all of the legal mp3's on a person's
computer. More than half of the mp3's on my hard drive are from artists
who give thier music away. My feeling in general is that the trend is too
far progressed and if they kill the mp3 p2p thing those clever computer
folk will find a new and more efficient way to trade music over computers.
Posted by
??: I apologize to Lori for the second part
of that last post, I know it will probably be over your head. Ask your
professor to explain it to you, after he tells you what a hero Chi Guevera
was.
Posted by
??: Lori, another post that is a short cut
to thinking for you. See you never defend your position just attack. And
the phrase in your case is nip in the butt. I went to college (it's not
capitalized unless it is a proper noan) and I sat through shallow minded
professors who used unclear circular logic like you do, they never really
established their position, just put a fog a smoke and attacked anyone
who disagreed with them. Again, you fit that profile to the T! Back up
your arguements if you wish to take a stand on something don't throw out
mindless attacks to try to divert attention away from that fact that your
logic is faulty. Of course, you could be a hypocrite and call me brain
dead again, but isn't you who is not thinking here and resorting to childish
name calling? True, I have suck into the that low level where people such
as you propagate only to further my point. God bless you and God bless
your freedom to believe that shallow BS you spout! Isn't America great!
For the record I am an agnostic, but I also don't like the idea of government
taking away any of my rights even ones I do not exercise because today
it may be God in the pledge but tomorrow it could my right voice my opinion
(although I try to only voice opinions backed up with facts, you should
try that, you wouldn't look like such a dimwit next time). Pick, thank
you for your post on the first Admendment, it is nice to see someone actually
researches their political positions. On the mp3 issue, I wasn't aware
that mp3's would fall into a definition of public property, correct me
if I am wrong but if that is the case then wouldn't the RIAA not be able
to take any action to protect their copyrights, since the files in question
are public property wouldn't that negate the RIAA's claim of copyright
infringement? If they are indeed considered public property, then the RIAA
couldn't take these actions because they don't have a claim to them. Also
they still can not go into a private network or PC, even if it is open
to the public and change or delete things without the owners permission
or a court order. I think if the courts took this one there would be some
loopholes like you brought up but there is enough law on the books to counter
it and the public property claim actually hurts the RIAA's case.
Posted by
pick: I work for a Congressman. I've studied
up on this bill, and Congress has every right to wipe files out of one's
computer. Why? Because mp3's, believe it or not, are considered public
property due to the frequency of sharing. In Article I, Section 8, paragraph
3 of the Constitution, Congress is given the power to regulate commerce
(AKA the "Commerce Clause"). And, under the case of Schechter Corp. v.
U.S., only Congress has the power to regulate commerce and do what they
see fit to insure the health of our economy. What does this mean? This
bill, like it or not, is constitutional. If taken to court, Congress (or
Berman in this instance) would win. There is no way the Supreme Court would
side with the petitioner. Also, this is not covered under the Freedom of
Information Act. Sorry, people, the RIAA has found it's loophole. Be prepared
to lose music.
Posted by
pick: First of all, Lori, it's liberals who
want to limit free speech, not conservatives. Ever hear of political correctness?
Whatever happened to free speech? Oh, right, the liberal Warren Court took
that away from us. With the God situation, if you read popular late '50s,
early 60's literature, which was released around the time of the "Under
God" insertion, God is meant to be anything a person wants Him to be. He
can be science, nature, Buddha, etc. As for the one religion, that was
put into the Constitution because of King George III and the Anglican Church,
not because of Christianity. If you remember the good old days, people
actually worshipped God, worked hard and prayed instead of running around
and whining about oppression and unfairness. Grow up and take responsibility.
Oh, and if you're offended by my post, please contact the local ACLU, the
same organization that defends pedophiles and terrorists.
Posted by
Lori: Dear "??", you may want to consider "College"
as an option to assist you with your reasoning and overall coherence issues.
By the way, I believe the phrase is "nip it in the bud", not "butt".
Posted by
KISSMYASS: I don't give a f*ck if you're in the armed
services or not. If you want a war, and are complaining about "whiny" people
who disagree with it, then get your f*cking ass out there and fight for
what you believe in you f*cking hypocrite. I can picture you now with your
big, fat, pot belly drinking beer and yelling "Yeah! let's kick Saddam's
ass!!"
Posted by
Sam your Uncle: KISSMYASS your fogot 2 key points. One
I'm not in the armed services. Two I'm not stupid enough to join the armed
services. I leave that for the fuk ups(joining the army is like a get out
of jail free card) and the people who like the idea of getting a gun to
kill somebody. ?? you are definitly on the right level of thinking. Hey
they don't call us right wingers for nothing.
Posted by
??: Oh yeah, the last time I checked the word
God was used by far more than ANY ONE religion. So that ACLU arguement
won't work.
Posted by
??: lol at Lori, OIC, you have a flimsy argument
and I'm brain dead because YOU read it as a free speech argument and I
laid out the 1st amended explicitly to back up my argument. I know the
liberal way, make it up as you go along, and divert attention away from
facts by calling people names. Typical, did they teach you that in College?
Again if the Supreme court and Senate are not public institutions I don't
know what is. God is pretty universal, It's not like saying Jesus or Jehovah
but that's ok go on thinking it says "freedom FROM religion". BTW who said
I was a Christian? Mighty presumptive of you. Saddam? You're right I like
what this article said at the beginning because it applies here, should
we sit back like the Europeans did in the 30's and watch Hitler take over
other countries? Saddam has used weapons of mass destruction on his own
people, the Kurds? I guess genocide against a non-Jewish people don't count
as much. He has proven he will use those weapons, so we should sit back
and wait for him to develop or obtain a nuke and give it to terrorist who
will kill over a hundred thousand people down the line? That's sounds like
a plan. Tell you what we have a perfect legit reason to attack IRAQ right
now, Saddam broke the treaty he signed to end the Gulf War. We don't need
any other reason than that. We can do like western Europe did with Hitler
and bury our heads in the sand and suffer a worst fate or nip this problem
in the butt right now.
Posted by
LithiumBliss: You know, Sam, I could almost get behind
this war if we would harvest all the oil. But no, that's not how America
does things. America whips countries asses, but then helps to build them
up to be more powerful in some ways than America - like with Germany and
Japan, economically. When other countries invade lands, they reap the spoils
of victory. If past history is any lesson, all going into IRaq and whacking
Huseein will do is allow another Iraqi regime to take power, which the
US will gladly support, until the day comes when that regime decides to
hate us too and blow something up here. Heed your history, people - the
US government actually funded and armed BOTH SADDAM AND OSAMA in the past,
Saddam when he was fighting Iran, and Osama when he was fighting the old
USSR. But does America ever learn to keep its mitts out of other people's
business? Hell no! So go ahead, bomb Iraq. I guarantee that the events
of Sept. 11 will seem like only a flesh wound after the next retaliation.
Posted by
KISSMYASS: Sam your Uncle, you are the first one
I elect to send over to Iraq to fight Saddam Hussein...GO SAM GO!!!
Posted by
Raliegh Thedore Sakers: I'm a fukin american and fukin proud of
that. I'm arrogant and i'm better than everyone of you that's not an american.
think about it, us americans are like the romans living in the ancient
roman empire. except with in a different time era where we are free to
roam almighty. GOD BLESS AMERICA.
Posted by
Sam your Uncle: Jebus, I've never seen so much bickering
about something so unimportant. Granted the bill is gonna pass, even if
it get's past Bush's veto pen and signed into law the courts will eat it
up. This will never become law in the United States or anywhere. So quit
worrying...LithBliss you aren't a crazy conspriacy freak, you are a paranoid
one. Also, why should we let Suddam attack us first. Why must innocent
Americans shed blood before we destory his regime. Ladies and gentlemen
it's only a matter a time before the U.S. declares war and implements it's
plan of let's face it, getting a shi.t load of oil and getting rid of a
dangerous man to boot. All these liberals are crying, start the economy
again, then worry about war. Well duh people war is good for the economy.
This war in particular will be very good because of the amount of oil we
will recieve in the end. The world runs on petrolium and until somebody
thinks of a better and viable energy source that's the way it is. SO you
can either bitch about it (that gets nothing done), or actually put some
kind of effort into making this country a better place. Alas, all I see
here is a bunch of whiny bitches. Except ?? i like you.
Posted by
Lori: First of all, the word "God" is not universal.
Buddhists believe in Buddha, for example. Different religions have different
names for higher powers, and some religions believe in more than one higher
power. Not all of them call the higher power "God" as so many of you Christians
would like to believe. And "??", once again, "liberals" as you call them,
do not "disallow" the use of the word "God" in public. Obviously, you can
use the word "God" wherever and whenever you want to your heart's content.
The issue, and I repeat, is that a federally subsidized institution should
not ordain any ONE religion. This is the essence of separation of church
and state as stated in the Constitution. The reason I think you are brain-dead
is that you continue to pursue this argument in a free speech context when
it has nothing to do with free speech.
Posted by
??: And saying "under God" could hardly be
constituted as " respecting an establishment of religion" I guess if you
had half a brain in your head you would see that.
Posted by
??: Lori, typical liberal response. Someone
disagrees with you, you attack them personally. The First amenedment reads
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof" disallowing the use of the word
God in public could be taken as "prohibiting the free exercise thereof"
and god is pretty universal name for a supreme being. No one was forced
to say "under God" but now they are forced not to say it. That's not right,
no matter how you try to justify it. Until the Senate and the Supreme Court
stop starting their session with a pray, I think they show allow people
who want to say God in public to do so, you can go around proclaiming your
gay but you can't say "god". Makes a lot of sense, that does.
Posted by
Joe Gorrello: Why the hell should people who write songs
care whether or not people are buying the CD or downloading the MP3. Thats
why they are writing songs so people can hear them, not buy them.
Posted by
Nag: "But God is Universal"
Posted by
Lori: I meant to say should not espouse or give
credence to any one point of view or religion.
Posted by
The Original Jackass: I just want to know what happens to people
in other countries. Being in Canada I am not governed by this law nor am
I under any obligation whatsoever to abide by it. yet I am effected by
it because the law as is states that the US goverment gives large corporations
permission to f@ck with peoples harddrive's anywhere in the ENTIRE world
and that is wrong. Damn wrong.
Posted by
Lori: A good firewall will keep them out. And
to "??": Interesting take on "separation of church and state". You state
that "liberals want to keep us from saying "God" in public. The real issue
if you had a brain in your head is that federal public entities such as
the public school system ("public" in the U.S. means ALL OF US, by the
way, not just Christians) should not espouse or give credence to one point
of view or religion, i.e., Christianity.
Posted by
ritalin: ok me and my ADD/stoner self am slightly
less confused. are they gonna f*ck up the whole peer to peer thing? or
are we gonna still be able to download some artists who think that it is
ok?
Posted by
aG: Like I said, read the actually bill! There
is a link above. It's all in there. You don't have to take my word for
it or be a shyster lawyer to see the loopholes in the language of this
bill and what theoretically will be allowed if it is enacted. They need
to put exact language in the bill that clearly defines what the copyright
holders are allowed to do, if it was passed as it is written they could
theoretically go out and flood p2p networks with viruses and destroy all
the mp3 files they come across, without any repercussions because the damage
per file is far below the threshold liability and even then your only recourse
is to file a complaint with the Attorney General and hope his office takes
some kind of action (doesn't the AG office have better things to do than
push paperwork the is the result of a badly defined law?). Remember under
the copyright laws you are allowed to have copies of songs if you own the
CD. How is the RIAA going to determine that? What if their means of fighting
copyright infringement means putting viruses out on these peer to peer
networks that delete every mp3 on the users system? Just read the contradictions
in the bill as written and you will see what all the uproar in the press
has been about. Hey you can believe a politician's explaining it away all
you want but a bad law is a bad law. They need to find some kind of middle
ground that allows copyright holders to battle piracy while at the same
protect individual rights and privacy. The fact that anyone could find
this ok, just scared the hell out of me and shows that people really don't
look too deeply into the things they support, including politicians!
Posted by
ritalin: i agree with smic. i dont buy any cds
without listening to them, so i personally think that mp3's help the music
industry. the stuff they play on the radio is usually to mainstream to
me. mp3's really speed up the passing around of music. if u read this months
issue of rolling stone a bunch of the musicians are complaining about the
mp3 issue, i.e. britney spears and the such. not only is the mp3 trading
stuff going to be shut down, this enables the musicians to sell their cd's
at super expensive prices. if you read the article here at antimusic.com
about price fixing at the stores, youll remember that the musicians won
the lawsuit and are now able to decide whatever price they want for the
damn cds. haha this is kind of like what afganistan did to ban music. congressman
berman is just asking for a bomb in his car.
Posted by
the alcoholic: wow, i'm really confused...according to
aG, this bill allows for the hacking of computer hard-drives by the RIAA
or whatever for no good reason; according to that Rick dude (a few posts
down) you have to either send out or solicit illegal (i.e. copyrighted)
material over the internet before any action can be taken against you...if
aG is right then this is pretty sh*tty (ok, REALLY sh*tty), but if Rick
is right, well, as much as I hate to say it, the members of the RIAA do
have a right to protect their products and soliciting or distributing illegal
material pretty much invalidates privacy rights (I'm hopefully assuming
that something like a warrant is required before accessing hard-drives.
But since nobody here would have such bad taste to download music from
major record labels, we don't have anything to worry about, right?
Posted by
Kevin: I thought that after 9-11, hacking was
considered a form of terrorism....what makes it ok for major record labels
to be terrorists? The fight on illegal music trading needs to turn a different
head. I don't agree with it, but being a terrorist to stop it is absurd
Posted by
aG: Rick, as always read the fine print. That
sounds good and all but look at the values placed on the damange they must
make before they can be "liable" and that value is for each file, like
I said each file is worth far less than the $50 and then $250 threshold.
They need to adapt real language and REAL GUIDELINES about what is allowed
in this bill, it's too open ended and gives far too many outs for the record
companies. Click on the link above and read the text of the bill and then
read your congressperson's response to it and see if that adds up?
Posted by
SMIC: Mr Bliss preaches the truth
Posted by
SMIC: Wow I am hardly a libertarian but this
is totally invasive gorvenment at work. Point 1 that is goddam terroism
unleasing virusus that will damage files on personal computers without
any proper knowledge that they are illegal. FIRST OFF - I fully support
artist's rights to profit from their music, however action like this is
only going to cause people to hate record companies even more. SECONDLY
- I still buy cd's even though I download suff, if i like it enough I go
out and buy the cd. The ability to download music gives the opportunity
to check out alot of new music that otherwise you wouldn't hear. I have
bought countless cd's because I downloaded stuff and liked it. THIRDLY
- I think the lables could make some other pro-active efforts to make it
attractive to purchase music. ie some kind of added value to the cd beyond
what can be downloaded, they like everyone else need to find a way to make
their product marketable in a new way. While Peer 2 Peer file sharing is
definitley a threat to album sales they need to find a way to counteract
this threat without further alienating their potential consumer base. This
is a further example of the general lack of innovation and foward thought
in the recording industry that is the reason for their pending downfall
to begin with. FINALLY - It is really hard to have any sympathy for an
industry that is dominated by greed I am somethimes loathe to buy CD's
because my feeling is that the artists are generally getting screwed while
some fat cat who dosent give a crap about music to begin with is raking
in the dough.
