RIAA Sued By MP3Board.com Over Right To Link

Puck3D writes: "The RIAA is the one being sued. Mp3board.com is suing the RIAA to keep them from shutting their site down for linking to sites that carry illegal MP3. " The article notes that nobody has ever been held liable for linkage. Sure seems like there sure are a lot of lawyers getting paid trying to take that right away.

Re:Types of Linking?

Yes, but can you check and insure the legality of EVERY link you have EVER posted? What if the file change. Say you put up http://slashdot.org/images/title.gif [slashdot.org] and claim it to be the logo for slashdot and that it is copyrighted and you can't use it. Say tommorrow rob replaces title.gif on his web server with a naked porno pic.

Can you guarnette that the image with be rated for all ages? What if someones mother tries to sue you because they 5 year old kid seen a porn pic that was linked off your site, and you didn't offer a warning of a "you must be 18" disclaimer?

You can not verfiy the content you link to, no one really can. Who then should be help responsiable for this? The person that linked the content, or the person with the actucally content?

Selling crack is illegal (atleast in the United States), but you can legally say "If you want crack, go down to 6th street and ask for Tony, he will set you up". Say this user goes and buys crack and gets busted. Who commited the crime here? The person that sold the crack? The person that bought the crack? You?

The person that bought the crack will be aresseted for possieon of an illegal substance. The person selling the crack will be arrested for distrubating an illegal substance. What the hell are the going to arrest you with, talking about an illegal substance? Fuck, go arrest half the media and you could even charge cops if "talking about crack" was illegal. %90 of the populas has talked about crack in one form or another.

Say they did make linking illegal, who would decide what was legal and what wasn't?

If someone has illegal content on there web site, then the person responsiable for posting this illegal content should be tried in a court of law for his acts, not the person that was talking or linking to it.

Linking IMHO is a form of free speech. I have the right to say, hey check out this Junk [stileproject.com]. But that is not my web site, just my words, who is responsiable for the stile projects acts? Me or the webmaster of that site?

Everyone is free to Link [microsoft.com] to what ever you fucking want [windows2000.com]. It may be in really bad taste, but it is not illegal.

Slashdot links to illegal sites here

Slashdot links to many illegal warez sites at this link [altavista.com]

Simply put, type in the name of a few commercial programs, or song names, plus keywords like "serial" and "crack" or "mp3" into the Altavista Advanced Search Form [altavista.com] and you'll be on you're way to being an 31337 d00d.

So is the BSA and SPA and RIAA going to crack down on Altavista?

Mike

Tilting at Windmills for a Better Tomorrow

Duty != Right

The RIAA, a industry association, has a job to do everything they can to make sure everyone in the music industry gets paid.

True. But does that mean we have to do what they say? Example: Let's say Ford was making cars with cheap parts that made them monumentally unsafe. Ford isn't doing this because they want to kill people--they are doing it to save money. They have a duty to "increase shareholder value". Does that mean that I have a duty to buy their cars and get horribly mangled? No, on the contrary, I have a (moral) duty to inform others of the problem and lodge complaints with consumer protection orgs.

Similarly with the RIAA. They have a duty to make money (because they are a business or a business consortium). But they DON'T have a right to make money. Which means that I don't have a duty to GIVE THEM money (although I have that right).

It's all about understanding rights vs duties.

"I never understood why Slashdot always has to attack businesses!!"

Some (although by no means all) of Slashdot's "attacks" on businesses can be seen as consumer protection.
--
Have Exchange users? Want to run Linux? Can't afford OpenMail?

Re:Linkage

Well, I've heard a story about a guy approaced by an undercover officer at a party and asked if he had some ${ILLEGAL_DRUG} to sell. He said "no, but that guy has some, I think". He was then charged as an accessory when the guy he led the officer to sold him some. I also heard that this story is a well known urban legend and anyone who believes it should try to lower their gullability index. I don't know if it happened or if it could happen. Does anyone else?

The biggest problem I see with making people responsible for the things they link to is that it places a big burden on linkers. In order to be sure they're not doing anything illegal, they have to set up a system where, whenever the linked-to content changes, the link is disabled until the linker can verify that the change didn't make the content illegal. Tools could be created to make this less painful, but it's still a pain. Or you could just take your chances, but then we'd have the occasional Slashdot story about an innocent web author thrown in jail when the site he linked to started serving up kiddie porn or something.
--

There HAVE been injuctions covering linking, cite

See "Intellectual Reserve, Inc. v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry, Inc., Jerald Tanner, Sandra Tanner, et al., U.S. District Court, Utah, Case No. 2:99-CV-808C." [techlawjournal.com]

Nature of the Case. The Mormon church's intellectual property arm seeks to stop critics of the church from publishing online material from the Church Handbook of Instructions, and to stop these critics from providing information about other web sites which publish the Handbook.

... Issues. The Complaint alleges two counts: copyright infringement, and removal of copyright management information. Copyright infringement is a very common claim. However, the copyright management information claim is based on a new provision which was enacted into law in October 1998 as part of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. This provision is codified at 17 U.S.C. 1202. It makes removing, altering, or providing false, copyright notices a separate offense.

The Defendants have raised the issue of whether the Handbook is a copyrighted work in their Motion to Dismiss. Defendants have not yet raised the affirmative defense of fair use, but may do so, when they file their answer to the complaint.

However, the most interesting issue in this case is whether, and under what circumstances, contributory infringement can be invoked to prevent a web site from linking to, or provide information about, another web site which is engaged in copyright infringement.

(emphasis added)

Advance Warning!

Do not click on a "This is more informative" link in a post entitled "More information" if you have Javascript enabled. It links to a script that posts a copy as you!

Linkage

Is it illegal for me to tell you where to buy crack? Where the 'corner-girls' can be purchased?

What about if I draw a map to these places? Give driving directions?

I'm all for treating the web as a new medium, but come on. If this sets a precident, will it be illegal to link to questionable content? What if I link to a link to this content. What if I link to google on my homepage, and google 'accidentally' links to questionable content? Is my link illegal, because it's obscurely linking to illegal content?

When will this stop?

OT: Motives for trading MP3s and Smoking Pot

(Likewise, proponents of legalizing marijuana sometimes argue that marijuana use would drop if it were legalized because it would no longer be "forbidden fruit." Whatever you think of the drug laws, honesty compels the conclusion that the main reason people smoke pot is to get high, and all other reasons come in a distant second.)

With all due respect, I suspect you were never a regular user of illegal substance and, based on what you say, probably never hung out with people who were.

What you say may be true of adults, but it is certainly not true of teenagers. When I was young and started smoking pot it was primarilly the lure of the forbidden and a burning desire to rebel that led very directly to it. A distant second was the desire to fit in with my peer group. Getting high was an even more distant third, quite often an irritating side effect of rebelling and being cool that interfered with my other social interests, like suavely sweeping a girl off her feet (hard to do when you get side tracked by a really cool pattern of shadows on the wall). Of the friends I've spoken with in recent years who were partaking at the same time, most have indicated that rebellion was their initial reason for trying pot as well.

Now, in college it was different. I was an adult, with nothing to rebel against and no desire to do so. Finding acceptance amongst a group of likeminded peers was also remarkably easy -- lifestyles on college campuses are much more diverse and much less conformist. There I smoked to get high, and gave little thought to what my peers would think, or my parents (who remained disapproving as ever, of course).

Now the stuff bores me, and I no longer smoke at all. Most of the people I know have followed a similar path, some quitting earlier, some still occasionally getting high for entertainment. In all cases, our motivations for doing it (or not) changed over time.

Statistics in Holland indicate that legalizing marijuana has dramatically decreased usage among young people. Yes, there are dutch who chose to get high, but not as many per capita as their are british, american, and germans who do so (many of whome inundate Amsterdam for such purposes). Based on the experiences of myself and my friends, the same would appear to apply to the united states. In the face of anectdotal evidence on one hand, hard research and well considered (read: not cooked) statistics on the other, it is difficult for me to understand the persistence in the United States in persuing the drug policy it does, with all the detrimental effects in terms of our civil liberties, fundamental rights, economy, and the greater drug use it encourages.

Clearly there are powerful interests who benefit, but at such a cost to society it amazes me we still put up with it.

Trading mp3's is similar -- amongst those I know who do it, "sticking it to the man" ranks as high or higher than collecting the actual music. This would indicate the rebellion is playing a pretty large role in people's motivation for violating copyrights. Whether it is the primary motivator or not (as it often is with drug use) it is there, and is significant.

What is even more striking is that these are adults who are acting out feelings of rebellion they haven't felt since high school. Getting an affluent adult with a wife and three children riled up in this way takes real talent, the kind only the lawyers at the RIAA and MPAA could display. The fact that many adults are feeling so angry, dissillusioned, and, yes, rebellious should have the RIAA, the MPAA, and their lackeys on Capitol Hill very concerned indeed.

Types of Linking?

I think the problem with linking from a legal standpoint is that it is a way to do something very much like hosting files on your site, without actually having the file there. I can put up a 10k page containing links to hundreds of cracks and mp3s and the like, all linked to external sites.

Why is this a problem? For the end user, it's irrelevant that the content (the crack or the mp3) is hosted elsewhere. He went to that one 10k page to get it. It's just as if it WERE on your site.

However, what's the problem with this from a legal standpoint? Well, what does one do about linking to a page that has illegal content, without the author's knowledge? Should an author be required to check the "legality" of all information containted in sites he links to? What about links to links to content?

I think the problem is that there are really two types of links. The first type links to another site, ie, people that post a href="http://www.slashdot.org". The second type posts a link DIRECTLY to a piece of content, ie href="http://download.sourceforge.net/slashcode/sl ash-1.0.4.tar.gz"

While the problems are similar with both types of links (if you can accept that there are two distinct types of links), I have a difficult time justifying linking DIRECTLY to illegal content. ie, if DeCSS is declared illegal, I don't see how you can justify a link to http://www.dvdccaisbad.org/files/decss.zip. That is almost the same as hosting the file yourself, indeed, for the user, it IS the same.

However, links to a site containing illegal content are something that MUST remain legal, for the web to maintain its open and dynamic nature, even if that means illegal content will still be available. It's just not fair to the author of a site to require him to check to ensure http://www.gskp.com/free/ changed it's name from Great Shots of Kids Playing to Gimme Some Kiddie Porn.

However, do we think the law could recognize a distinction between the types of links? I don't think so. The line is too finely drawn, and any rule would either be too broad, and thus have a dampening effect on the web, or would be too narrow, and easily circumvented.

As such, I think linking must remain legal.

How stupid is RIAA?

Okay, I'd like to tell everyone how my day went:

1. Got up.
   
2. Ate breakfast.
   
3. Check /.
   
4. Read about mp3board.com lawsuit
   
5. Went to mp3board.com, which I'd never heard of before
   
6. Downloaded even more MP3s than I previously have
   

I realize RIAA isn't actually the plaintiff in this case, but it illustrates a point: these lawsuits are stupid. Remember when RIAA sued Diamond for the Rio? That little device got more publicity than Diamond could have bought with a Superbowl ad! Everyone heard about it and wanted one.

I'm sure that my.mp3.com's hits went through the roof as soon as RIAA sued them. And Napster - my god. Between RIAA, Dr. Dre, and Metallica, they have put Napster/Shawn Fanning on the cover of Newsweek! Talk about mass appeal! How many millions of new clients have been generated just from that alone?

I think mp3board.com knows this. This lawsuit is a masterstroke of public relations - as soon as any major news outlet picks this story up (and they probably will), mp3board is gonna get huge increases in page impressions. All that PR for - what - the $50 it costs to file a civil suit? (At least where I live)...

--

Don't try this in your home town...

Selling crack is illegal (atleast in the United States), but you can legally say "If you want crack, go down to 6th street and ask for Tony, he will set you up".

The person that bought the crack will be aresseted for possieon of an illegal substance. The person selling the crack will be arrested for distrubating an illegal substance. What the hell are the going to arrest you with, talking about an illegal substance?

(IANAL, so let's see if I get the terms right...)

Facilitating. Accessory before the fact. Conspiracy (if they can show you and the dealer had some kind of agreement - even a trivial one that gives you nothing - and they can construe almost any contact or information transfer as agreement).

Seems to me these laws and interpretations need to be struck as well. As I read the Constitution such speech is protected. But that won't keep you out of jail while you're waiting for the courts to agree.

Re:"99.9% usage"

but I would expect that 99.9% of the links that are followed are for pirated music.

It's still not illegal.

I can go two blocks over to the local tobacconist, and pick up a bong, a hash pipe, and various types of rolling papers with certain leaf logos printed on the package. It's not illegal to sell this 'paraphenalia' (sp?). Everyone knows that people use this stuff to smoke pot, but if you say the words 'bong' or 'hash pipe' in the store, the tobacconist quickly informs you that these tools are 'Tobacco Sampling Devices'.

Sure, 99.9% or people use them to smoke pot, but it's not illegal. (Selling these devices, not smoking pot).

Now, if he were marketing these as tools to help you get high, he'd most likely get busted tomorrow.

It's all a matter of context.