Congress mulls prison terms for KaZaA users

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That's what's wrong with the world - that people do things for money, not because its the right thing to do.
 
Downloading mp3s is the 21st century version of listening to music on the radio.

Are we going to send people to jail for listening to the radio? Or even for taping songs from the radio? Get things in perspective here.

This week, I saw a man in a job center who had put himself in a wheel chair because he has been injecting drugs into veins in his legs until they died and his legs rotted and had to be amputated off....

....Is it just me, or shouldn't we as a society be more interested in stopping that, than in someone listening to some good tunes?
 
Originally posted by Nic
mp3's suck!

Try burning a CD from mp3s and the playing it on your HiFi, the sound quality just doesn't compare to an original CD.
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Damn son, your living in the old age. Come to the 21st centry, we have MP3 players! Yes, 256MBs (or 128MBs for that matter) can hold more then 15 MP3s at cd quailty. 64MBs can hold about 12 at cd quailty (128kbps).
 
the quality of mp3's depends on many factors, encoder, bit rate, encodering type. Ive tried most if not all. At the moment ive stuck will the lattest lame encoder using 256kb/s VBR (alt preset command) and it sounds great on my IPOD.
 
This is simply ridiculous. Doesn't the Congress has other better things to do? Like cleaning up the streets, helping out the poor and homeless and etc. Arresting kazaa users = arresting half the population i believe thus overcrowding prison cells.

What a coincidence, I have just discovered from the papers that the download of mp3s is illegal in Australia but almost everyone is doing it. Well anyway, i agree that CDs are way priced higher than what they should be. I have just got a CD for first time in a very long time because they are on sale now not that expensive as they are use too. They goin cheap now around $12 to $13...so i m planning to get a few more (good ones offcourse) i the next few months. Down here one CD would cost $20 or more. All i know is that the local RIA is there to earn money. If only they could lower the CD price...i m pretty sure there will be a sudden surge in CD-sales. All CDs sold here are made in a way that they can be copied directly into a CD-R.

RIA stop thinking that p2p softwares are the main cause of decline in sales. We all you know you are after money...this case aint worthwhile to fight for, ya most probably end up losing money. Stop before its too late.
 
If you download the correct quality MP3 then the sound will actually surpass CD quality. CD quality is actually kind of low.

Although your CD player may not be capable of playing but a certain quality of MP3, actually reducing it to a bit lower than it is when you actually hear it. Also if your playing the MP3 on your PC I believe it depends on the sound card, and speakers that you have and what they are capable of playing.

A 192kbps MP3 is pretty much beyond CD quality, and is VERY common. It is no problem to get a 192kbps mp3. 192kbps is what I recommend. I am a musician and all demos that I record are in 192kbps.

If you've had problems with low quality MP3's then it is because you *downloaded* a low quality mp3. Just pay attention to the quality.

Q. I know that higher bit rates produce better sound quality in MP3 files. What bit rate will yield something close to CD sound quality without taking up vast amounts of hard-drive space?

A. Opinions vary among audiophiles, but many consider the 128 kilobits-per-second bit rate for converting music into the MP3 format to be "CD quality."

The 128-kbps rate generally creates MP3 files that take up one megabyte of space per minute of music. So a CD recording of the allegro movement of "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" by Mozart lasting 5 minutes and 26 seconds will take up around five megabytes of hard drive space when encoded as an MP3 file at 128 kbps.

A rate of 160 kbps provides better sound quality, but the resulting MP3 file takes up about 1.5 megabytes per minute of music. The 96 kbps rate, described as "near CD quality" by some audio experts, produces an MP3 file that takes up only 700 kilobytes of space per minute of music.

taken from: http://www.jsonline.com/bym/tech/news/nov02/93072.asp




And yes, the RIAA is wasting money hiring employees to work for them. Unless they are actually suing enough people and actually GETTING PAID by those people.

If the RIAA was successfull in the fact that they sue enough people, they literally have OVER 3.5 million Kazaa users that they could sue, so you think about that. $10,000 per Kazaa user is a lot of money. (Thats if they sued all 3.5 million).

As far as being successfull in stopping MP3/music shares, they will never ever ever succeed. There are too many ways to share MP3's which the RIAA has no control over. To control this would be to eliminate the Internet period as Phant has said.

Before Napster, and Kazaa, and all other P2P programs MP3's were shared, as sort of an "underground" operation on networks such as IRC (which is you think about how large IRC networks are, there are much much more than 3.5 million people using IRC), personal FTP servers, from friend to friend, etc.

Napster only made it easier to do and paved the way for other P2P's such as Kazaa.

RIAA I have one thing to say to you. It is this. Mess with the best die like the rest.
 
I agree with much you said Acid.

On my MP3 player, I dont know if its the player or headphones, but 128kbps sounds REALLY good! Much better then cd quailty.
 
Going a title off topic, aren't we?

But I guess there is not much else you can do with the headline post.

Get angry at how stupid and backward looking RIAA are, get more angry, get over it and hope it all goes away.

I think it will all go away. I really do.
 
Originally posted by Phantasm66
Going a title off topic, aren't we?

But I guess there is not much else you can do with the headline post.

Get angry at how stupid and backward looking RIAA are, get more angry, get over it and hope it all goes away.

I think it will all go away. I really do.
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When I realized we we're getting off topic as I posted, I thought what the heck, as I realized what you said above. Just get more angry.....no point in that. I hope your right, and it does all go away.
 
Thats the good thing about topics, they always lead to another topic, thus making more discussion. It gives us all something to talk about so the forum doesn't get boring :)
 
i started with napster

i download about 50 songs, simultaneously...........currently about 10,000 burned to disk, in data format...........i'm using the kazaa vacumn for everything plausible, and, sort out the junk.....currently focusing in on dvd's.......i've considered the outcome of these scenario's...........so, just make hay while the sun shines............if they shut me down tomorrow, no skin off.........i have a lifetime of digital treasure :grinthumb
 
Nice JSR!

(btw, what is that, your 2nd avatar today :rolleyes: )

And your exactly right acid, about one topic leading to another :) Nice isnt it.
 
RIAA nails 1,000 music-lovers in 'new Prohibition' jihad
By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco
Posted: 19/07/2003 at 11:26 GMT


The Recording Industry Association of America's attack on US culture has escalated at an alarming pace this week.

On Friday the lobby group that works on behalf of the large, mostly foreign-owned, music conglomerates that own the music copyrights and distribution channels confirmed that it was serving subpoenas at the rate of 75 a day on US citizens for the crime of sharing the music they love.

This signals a change of tactics for the RIAA: as now each individual file sharer is potentially responsible for thousands of dollars in damages. Once they were shielded by ISPs, but in the wake of the Verizon case, individuals are now exposed to direct intimidation. The RIAA is beside itself with glee: and boasted that a thousand music-lovers had already been busted.

The escalation in violence threatens to bring the US criminal justice system to an impasse: although the prison industry is already full to the brim, the RIAA's actions make new criminals out of tens of millions of ordinary US citizens. As Boycott-RIAA's founder Bill Evans notes, "there are more file-sharers than voters for either candidate at the last Presidential Election".

When Evans dubs the 'Recording Incarceration Industry of America' he's only half-joking. If the RIAA was to be indulged in its whims, the statistics suggest that the USA would rapidly become a vast, continent-wide penal colony. And that's hardly a beacon of liberty to shine on the rest of the world. Particularly when, with the backing of the much-maligned US military, the RIAA is ripping up liberal social copyright laws and replacing them with its own.

Not surprisingly, this has provoked a deep counter-reaction which is finally, and belatedly, taking to the streets. On August 1 and 2, Boycott-RIAA and affiliated groups will be holding anti-RIAA rallies across the country.

Well, here's your alarm call. While it may seem to be invincible, the RIAA is desperately vulnerable: and it knows it. It's under threat of anti-competitive lawsuits, its key DC placemen are under fierce scrutiny ... and the mass criminalization of innocent US citizens is a most coercive step citizens have seen since the Prohibition era.

But can you compel your neighbor to give up lawnmowing, or weblogging, for long enough to make a real difference? Well, read them this attack on family values

I cannot accept that the "Land of the Free" is accepting the nonsense propounded by the RIAA.

This desire to fine and litigate is becoming pervasive and foolishly assumes that you can modify normal human behaviour with LAW.

Firstly - all art forms are like children in that the creative urge is similar to the urge to reproduce. If we accept this analogy then it follows that as you do not own your children for their entire life you cannot expect to own your art for it's entire life. In fact, if the rules currently in force where in place in the earlier part of the last century then many films could not have been made and much music could not have been produced. Music belongs to us all.

... so wrote Jean Barnard.


From: Gene Mosher
To: ashlee.vance@theregister.co.uk
Subject: RIAA

My great grandfather was born in 1870. He learned to build crystal radio sets to listen to the earliest radio broadcasts in the 1920's. He would invite the whole town of about 500 over to listen to them.

My grandfather was born in 1899. He purchased one of the earliest tape recorders to make copies of radio broadcasts for his friends in the late 1950s.

My dad was born in 1924. He had a collection of 78's that he passed around for many years until he died last year.

And now I am using the Internet to assemble an MP3 collection of all the tunes on all those LPs, cassette tapes and CD's that I've been buying since 1959.

I'll be damned in hell before I accept the notion that I and my ancestors who love to listen to the audio arts are in any sense guilty of anything that is illegal, wrong, evil, immoral or improper.

Gene Mosher

With so much at stake, I can't see how Americans can fail - except through apathy. But can you and your neighbor make a difference? ®
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http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/31833.html
 
Re: boy, phant

Originally posted by JSR
i'm gettin' close to becoming a criminal :eek:
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And you strike me as precisely the sort of one who will be caught. I hope you like getting married to your new wife, Bruno. I am sure you will have many happy nights together in your cell discussing how he once chopped his wife and kids up because he didn't like how his dinner had been cooked.
 
The RIAA is beside itself with glee: and boasted that a thousand music-lovers had already been busted.
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Hmm sounds like an odd thing for a musicians rights accosiation to say but hey these are the crazy times we are living in.
 
not, bruno

:eek:.......phant, you should know then........how he likes his chicken :grinthumb
 
You'd think California of all places would ACCEPT MP3 SHARING. :)

Downloading music for FREE against the wishes of artist/record label is obviously wrong on some level... Surely no one can argue this? The music was never intended to be free and should not be freely distributed no more than retail software etc... It's common sense.

Despite this, I believe it is the music industry's fault for not embracing digital distribution. Instead they try to stamp it out like some big dumb animal scared of a simple, clever idea. It's the fault of their failing business model and they need to adapt to it.

I honestly cannot support sharing copyrighted music as 100% legal, but it is something that is not going away and the RIAA is too stupid and slow to work with it... Or even around it.

Yes, I copy music and I blatantly admit I do this instead of buying CDs. And I am sure there are many, many others out there that do this as well. 7281 mp3s and counting....
 
As many have said already, if stores such as SoundShop (which went out of business months ago) weren't charging $18 per CD then people would not be so apt to download music illegaly. Just like you said Rick, it is their own fault's.
 
Rick is right. We are "stealing" the music in the sense that we aren't paying for it. And because of that obvious reason, the RIAA will not embrace the digital world.
Lots of people say if they lower the price of cds... Maybe to an extent, but its still simplier to fire up kazaa and get a full album in a matter of minutes than it is to go drive to your nearest store and buy it. Espically when you live in a rural area like I did in HS (and to a slightly lesser extent in college) you can even justify dling an entire 16 song album over a 56k.
 
Yea, I wasn't really saying everyone would buy CD's if the prices were lowered, just that people would be much much more apt to.

I know a lot of people like the idea of getting the nice little cover design with the CD. Plus the CD is also already recorded in the correct order + any "secret" tracks. Those aren't exactly thing's worth spending cash on, but we all like eye candy compared to blank CD covers so I think in some really small way that to would make some people consider paying for a CD as compared the hassle of sometimes going in and trying to download MP3's. 95% of the time it's a very simple process (especially for people like you and me), but for someone that isn't computer literate it can be very time consuming.

It is kind of like how company's set prices like $29.95 or $9.99.
The basis behind this is that we see $9.99, which looks much better to us than $10.00. It is a sort of marketing psychology. If something is priced at $9.99 we are much more likely to buy it than if it is $10.00. So in sort of the same way, a nice looking CD cover would also help CD sales.

Coming from someone who deals with customers every day that can't even figure out how to double click or locate a single icon on their desktop. And the fact is the majority of the public isn't computer literate so, if CD prices were decreased to a reasonable amount then the recording industry would be able to make a decent amount of profit off of CD sales.

Though never again will they make the millions upon millions that they are used to making, in turn giving the bands pennies and ripping them off. Unless somehow they eliminate most of the P2P networks and put us all back to where we started with using IRC, webpages, and other means to get our MP3's.
 
Audio CDs contain copy protection these days, it's no wonder people have to obtain songs from elsewhere if they want to listen them in their cars / MP3 players etc..
 
Listen, there's no way it will be stopped as long as the internet stays. There will always be a way. They cannot stop us all but they can limit the majority of us.

They cannot stop us as long as the internet stays. There will always be that 'nerd' (no offense to anyone) that will discover or crack a new way putting a good handfull of many people back into file sharing.

Yes, I agree with Rick. Music downloading is completely illegal, we all know it, and we can't argue that fact.

But-- go to the store, walk around, find a CD, pay the price, go back home, etc.--- or open Kazaa on your computer and download? Money and time are big issues here, we're always looking for shortcuts. Who'd rather waste alot of time at the store and pay on top of that when music can be obtained for free and at the simplist click of a button?

Like i've said before, here, this will be the cause of a huge riot, uprisings and civil battles or even World War 3.

The world is inevitably doomed, we cannot stop it, time is our enemy once again. We are victims of our own technology, we have soared too high, we will take a grand fall. Humanity's fall can be postponed at the termination of the internet--yet, there's no stopping, we will be doomed--again, it is only a matter of time.

Take some time to think about this, and imagine what would happen for the prosecution of every simple person who knows not much about computers but downloads a few songs.

This is all boiling under the lid of a pot and is all ready to explode. Time is our enemy and humanity has its own enemy now--itself.
 
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