I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. The RIAA is getting out of hand.
Apparently MIT and Boston College are refusing some RIAA subpoenas. Good for them. Now for the disturbing part. Read the next paragraph carefully:
In a subpoena addressed to MIT, the association is demanding the name, address, and phone number of a student who used the nickname ’’crazyface’’ to download at least five songs, including Radiohead’s ’’Idioteque’’ and Dave Matthews Band’s ‘’Ants Marching.’’
Now read that excerpt again. A student is going to be sued for downloading songs from Kazaa, not for sharing songs with others. I would pay a heavy some of money to be there in the court if this student had proof of purchase of these songs/CDs before he/she downloaded them.
If I had bigger balz and time to spare, I would sit around Kazaa for weeks on end downloading nothing but MP3s of songs on CDs I already own. Fsck the RIAA.
Who’s to say I don’t own what I’m downloading? Maybe my CD is borked and I need to download a track that is scratched? As always, the Slashdot thread is interesting.
Try this question on for size. I posted it to Slashdot.
What’s the difference between:
- I own a CD
- I put the CD in my CD player
- Someone else accesses that CD via Cat5 cable (assuming only 1 person at a time can dowload/listen)
and
- I own a CD
- I put the CD in my CD player
- Someone else accesses that CD via 1/8" headphone cable
They’re both sharing. Will the RIAA come hunt me down because everyone I work with can listen to my CDs using headphones? Will they also hunt down the person using the headphones?