:: Vile sharing ::

Monday, May 12, 2003

More insight into the RIAA and similar industy groups' desired telos, from Declan McCullagh:

Pay attention to the endgame. In the 1994 U.S. v. LaMacchia prosecution, a judge dismissed charges against a 21-year-old MIT student who ran a pirate Internet site, saying that it was not a criminal offense to do so under current federal law. Criminal penalties "should probably attach to willful, multiple infringements of copyrighted software, even absent a commercial motive on the part of the infringer," Judge Richard Stearns wrote. Stearns suggested that Congress step in.

Congress obliged. Three years later, President Clinton signed into law the No Electronic Theft Act, which makes--as I've written about before--copyright infringement a federal crime even if not done for commercial purposes.

Watch for the same thing to happen here. In a little-noticed part of his decision a few weeks ago, Judge Wilson said current copyright law does not prohibit the creation of P2P networks--and then suggested that Congress might want to rewrite the law. "Additional legislative guidance may be well-counseled," Wilson said.

For now, at least, the RIAA will appeal its loss in the Grokster and Morpheus cases to the 9th Circuit. If the appeals courts uphold the lower court's ruling and nothing else changes, the RIAA will immediately ask Congress for a law against P2P networks, which is where the real endgame would take place. (Bolstering the RIAA's position is a January ruling from the Supreme Court in the Copyright Term Extension Act case, in which the majority decided: "We are not at liberty to second-guess congressional determinations and policy judgments...")

Posted by morland @ 06:28 PM

:: Comments ::

"he's a complicated man, and no one understands him but his woman" Indeed, sir.

I, for one, challenge your claim that the Monroe Doctrine is to blame for the current conflict among technology, media and property rights. Whereas President Monroe stated that any political effort of Europe to extend into the dealings of the United States would be met with dire consequences, the legal quagmire of this new century has nothing to do with forign relations of the USA.

Is it not true that the VCR has "malleable uses"? The machine is capable of recording and playing video cassettes, unlike it s puny compatriot, the VCP. Many VCRs also act as television receivers.

Posted by: Adams, John on May 13, 2003 02:36 PM

indeed it does - my point was that while technology continues to have flexible applications (with P2P networks carrying on the legacy of the VCR) the law has grown less accepting of this.

the Monroe doctrine reference was a joke, Mr Sheets.

Posted by: morland on May 13, 2003 03:14 PM

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