Sony: You're "stealing" even if you burn a copy of a CD you purchased

Danny Tse

:mad:

You heard the news....the recording industry (RIAA) won $220,000 from a file-sharing trial involving a single mom. People who steals music should be puncished. I have no problem with that. However, the one thing that sticks out during the trial was....

According to Jennifer Pariser, the head of litigation for Sony BMG, copying music that you legally purchased is stealing. When asked if it was wrong for consumers to make copies of music which they have purchased, Pariser stated, "When an individual makes a copy of a song for himself, I suppose we can say he stole a song. Making "a copy" of a purchased song is just "a nice way of saying 'steals just one copy'."

She went on to state that consumers have no right to make backups of the music that they have purchased in CD format or digital download.

So if I am getting this right, wouldn't Sony be an accessory to such a "crime" given it's a producer of blank cassettes, minidiscs, and CD-Rs?

VR3

Wtf...

Systems

Ya, I have always thought it funny that these companies sell the media and the burners to burn them. No different then Napster having a file transfer service... Both are used to copy music by a 3rd party. Yet Napster got shut down and Sony didnt

shadowofnight

Danny Tse wrote: »

:mad:

So if I am getting this right, wouldn't Sony be an accessory to such a "crime" given it's a producer of blank cassettes, minidiscs, and CD-Rs?

Interesting view....with blank media being so cheap to produce and a lot of people buying sony branded blank media ( Even if it is more expensive then say generic blank media ) JUST because it says sony on the package, believing it to be of a higher quality. I bet they rake in a pretty penny on blank media , knowing its being used to make " Illegal " copies ( And not caring one bit , because in this instance they are on the money making side of the copy )

Face

F-Sony!

danger boy

boycott Sony, it's very easy for us consumers to make a point. that's why i don't have a PS3 and sold my PS2. Nintendo all the way baby.

TroyD

Sony can SAY that but the fair usage doctrine contradicts that....

BDT

danger boy

DULUTH, Minn. (AP) - The recording industry hopes $222,000 will be enough to dissuade music lovers from downloading songs from the Internet without paying for them. That's the amount a federal jury ordered a Minnesota woman to pay for sharing copyrighted music online.

"This does send a message, I hope, that downloading and distributing our recordings is not OK," Richard Gabriel, the lead attorney for the music companies that sued the woman, said Thursday after the three-day civil trial in this city on the shore of Lake Superior.

In closing arguments he had told the jury, "I only ask that you consider that the need for deterrence here is great."

Jammie Thomas, 30, a single mother from Brainerd, was ordered to pay the six record companies that sued her $9,250 for each of 24 songs they focused on in the case. They had alleged she shared 1,702 songs in all.

It was the first time one of the industry's lawsuits against individual downloaders had gone to trial. Many other defendants have settled by paying the companies a few thousand dollars, but Thomas decided she would take them on and maintained she had done nothing wrong.

"She was in tears. She's devastated," Thomas' attorney, Brian Toder, told The Associated Press. "This is a girl that lives from paycheck to paycheck, and now all of a sudden she could get a quarter of her paycheck garnished for the rest of her life."

Toder said the plaintiff's attorney fees are automatically awarded in such judgments under copyright law, meaning Thomas could actually owe as much as a half-million dollars. However, he said he suspects the record companies "will probably be people we can deal with."

Gabriel said no decision had yet been made about what the record companies would do, if anything, to pursue collecting the money from Thomas.

The record companies accused Thomas of downloading the songs without permission and offering them online through a Kazaa file-sharing account. Thomas denied wrongdoing and testified that she didn't have a Kazaa account.

Since 2003, record companies have filed some 26,000 lawsuits over file-sharing, which has hurt sales because it allows people to get music for free instead of paying for recordings in stores.

During the trial, the record companies presented evidence they said showed the copyrighted songs were offered by a Kazaa user under the name "tereastarr." Their witnesses, including officials from an Internet provider and a security firm, testified that the Internet address used by "tereastarr" belonged to Thomas.

Toder said in his closing argument that the companies never proved "Jammie Thomas, a human being, got on her keyboard and sent out these things."

"We don't know what happened," Toder told jurors. "All we know is that Jammie Thomas didn't do this."

Copyright law sets a damage range of $750 to $30,000 per infringement, or up to $150,000 if the violation was "willful." Jurors ruled that Thomas' infringement was willful but awarded damages in a middle range; Gabriel said they did not explain the amount to attorneys afterward. Jurors left the courthouse without commenting.

Before the verdict, an official with an industry trade group said he was surprised it had taken so long for one of the industry's lawsuits against individual downloaders to come to trial.

Illegal downloads have "become business as usual. Nobody really thinks about it," said Cary Sherman, president of the Recording Industry Association of America, which coordinates the lawsuits. "This case has put it back in the news. Win or lose, people will understand that we are out there trying to protect our rights."

Thomas' testimony was complicated by the fact that she had replaced her computer's hard drive after the sharing was alleged to have taken place - and later than she said in a deposition before trial.

The hard drive in question was not presented at trial by either party.

The record companies said Thomas was sent an instant message in February 2005 warning her that she was violating copyright law. Her hard drive was replaced the following month, not in 2004 as she said in the deposition.

"I don't think the jury believed my client regarding the events concerning the replacement of the hard drive," Toder said.

The record companies involved in the lawsuit are Sony BMG, Arista Records LLC, Interscope Records, UMG Recordings Inc., Capitol Records Inc. and Warner Bros. Records Inc.

Shizelbs

I just hope the record industry puts this money towards promoting bands and groups that make music worth purchasing.

treitz3

***zip*** ***drops trou***

Sony knows what to do.:rolleyes:

bobman1235

This is barely worth commenting on. Sony has long ago proven themselves to be against the consumer in every possible way. All of their products ignore standards and insist on proprietary formats (MemoryStick over SD/MMC, for example). Their debacle with root-kits on CDs a couple of years ago. Etc etc. Just a horrible company.

aaharvel

if they made software more affordable and pushed SACD hybrids like they deserved to be, this problem would be relatively mute. It's Sony's fault they and other corporate big guns don't properly educate "normal folks" about the great technology that's out there and instead promote the use of CD-R's. imo.

BaggedLancer

boycott them....only way to prove a point

aaharvel

can't. i'm digging their "technology" way too much
btw, this is for Jesse Danny - you're right. the DSD 2ch. of Avalon is incredible.

RuSsMaN

The whole thing makes me ill. How long until we see a stickered 'license agreement' on cd's as we do software. The one that you have to tear to open the product thus 'agreeing with the terms and conditions set forth in the........'

What they need to do, is go back and bust everyone that had dual cassette decks, especially the ones with high speed dubbing.

PolkThug

Lets get the artists together and sue Sony for making high-speed dubbing dual cassette ghetto blasters.

As for that lady in the case above, she was really playing with fire by making 1700 songs available.

RuSsMaN

I agree, file sharing is a no no, and we ALL know it. Everyone knows it by now.

wingnut4772

That's a bit harsh for her but she wanted to take it all the way to trial. Is anyone familiar with the BitTorrent site? My roomie uses that and I don't want the F.B.I. busting down my door.:eek:

BaggedLancer

wingnut4772 wrote: »

That's a bit harsh for her but she wanted to take it all the way to trial. Is anyone familiar with the BitTorrent site? My roomie uses that and I don't want the F.B.I. busting down my door.:eek:

no where is safe anymore

bobman1235

Wow Darla, a police officer living with a pirate. I can almost hear the odd couple theme.

At least you and your roommate should install PeerGuardian.

Willow

Darla, your room mate wears a patch on one eye and has a wooden leg ! Oh that that bird noise you hear is the parrot.

So wouldn't that make Sony an accessory to stealing ?

Demiurge

Sony can say whatever it wants, it doesn't mean they can do whatever they want. Not bothered by this in the least.

madmax

With all aspects of recording becoming easier, cheaper and of higher quality I expect most artists to start releasing their own stuff off of their own websites, leaving the recording industry in a pickle. I look forward to it.
madmax

shawn474

While I don't even remotely agree with Sony on this particular case, I can say that the majority of the free world knows that file sharing is illegal. People have been busted many, many ,many times before and it still doesn't register with some people. Don't do it and you don't have to worry about the repercussions. But, why all the hatred for Sony? There have been other recording labels and companies that have fleeced the commonfolk and they are not getting the backlash that Sony gets. I suspect that this is because Sony had for so long produced a good quality low cost consumer product that everyone fell in love with. When their standards began to slip, people noticed. You know what? People still buy their stuff and Sony makes more money per unit. I can almost guarantee that their stockholders haven't seen a slip and their profit isn't suffering all that much. If you want to fault them, fault them for being smart business making a lot of money. We may not agree with it, but I don't think there is a business out there (electronics or otherwise) that wouldn't pounce on the opportunity to make more money and spend less on producing it.

As for selling the multimedia with which to burn the discs or songs, that's a viewpoint I have never thought about before. Interesting to think about....................but again, they are just maximizing their money making opportunity. Who knows, it may come to the point where buying and selling cd-R and DVD-R discs will be illegal. That would make much more sense to me than having these companies sell the multi-media and make money off of it, but then say it's illegal to use these!

Shawn

Danny Tse

wingnut4772 wrote: »

Is anyone familiar with the BitTorrent site? My roomie uses that and I don't want the F.B.I. busting down my door.:eek:

Last year, some guy in Hong Kong was busted for using the BT site to upload a number of movies for distribution online. He got fines and 3 months in the "big house".

cfrizz

If we all just stopped buying music all together, & stopped going to concerts within 6 months all the ripoff labels would be singing a different tune! They would be begging us to buy music again & drop the exhorbitant prices to accomodate us!

We did it years ago with the Tuna industry. Once people found out the way they caught tuna & dolphins & whales were getting caught in the nets as well, we stopped buying any brand that didn't ensure the safty of other speicies of fish. Within months all changed the way they fished for tuna!


We the consumers really do have the ultimate say, we just have to work together to accomplish the goal.

Face

Danny Tse wrote: »

Last year, some guy in Hong Kong was busted for using the BT site to upload a number of movies for distribution online. He got fines and 3 months in the "big house".

If that was here, he'd be sent to a Federal or county jail. Not really the "big house". Regardless, it's still not a enjoyable experience.

shawn474

cfrizz,
I agree wholeheartedly with the power of the consumer. But, let's not lose sight of the fact that the people being sued actually broke the law. You can't fault Sony for actually enforcing their rights as a company no matter who it's against. Anyone who downloads files knows they are breaking the law and are subject to prosecution. You roll the dice when you do it that you aren't going to be caught. Should we really boycott Sony for doing this or should we lay fault with the single mother who knowingly and illegally downloaded 1,700 songs? I read an article that said that the artists make 1 dollar from every cd that they sell. The rest goes to the marketing, publication, materials, etc. Should those artists be deprived of working that hard to make a 1 dollar profit only to have someone steal the songs for free?

Shawn

sucks2beme

Interesting how Sony goes after those least able to defend themselves.
Instead of going up against the big guns, they make examples of little guys.
I have heard of them harrassing used CD chains. I wonder how they feel about music servers?
I don't download music, so that isn't a problem.
The other question is, with downloaded stuff like ITunes, how do they propose we protect our investment?
I have seen people blow away their music library with one mistake.
Don't make copies? NOT A GOOD IDEA.
I think I'll stick to music on cd. AT least I can haul in my collection to
prove I paid for it.

cfrizz

Hell I bought some tunes from Buy.com & before I had a chance to copy them onto cd, I upgraded to Media Player 10. After which I couldn't play those songs or any of the other 40+ songs I bought!

EFF all of them!

jakelm

What the hell kind of idiot still uses Kazaa?????:eek: :eek: