Comment

Comment by Flip on January 8, 2009 at 11:12pm

First off Join and support the EFF (eff.org)

The attack from the RIAA is not about limiting crime or saving the artists...
it only about making money. That is what the RIAA does.. it's racketeering (and that's illegal).
The lawmakers have been bought off with the courts to allow this as a revenue source drawn from the easiest targets of our society.

The fact is that the actual recording artist that these lawyers are suing people on behalf of
have never seen a single dime of the money awarded and we're talking about millions of dollars
The lawyers gobbled it all up along with the "recording industry" and then never bothered to contact anyone with what was left.

I'd rather pay someone a gift for a direct download
and know that the money is going to them for a job well done.
Instead of going through something like iTunes or some other virtual storefront I'll mail them a check if I like their music.
Record companies are simply not needed nor wanted and should die.

Comment by Brenan on January 7, 2009 at 6:07am

The Recording Industry of America has had a choke hold on artist rights since the early 50's. With the advances in technology over the past 10 years, music has become far more easy to access and discover, and most importantly obtain (Legally or not). The result was a violent backlash from the RIAA. Claiming they have artists and recording label best interests at heart, they take full legal control over music use and distribution rights. When someone crosses the RIAA, they get hit hard.

Their special target, as most people know, has been college students, with some seeing their very education come under threat for what used to be a time-honored tradition -- copying their friends' music. That copying, of course, has taken on a much larger scale with the Internet, which allows students to share songs and albums by the thousands -- often without paying a dime.

The RIAA can monitor IP addresses and bully the Internet Service Providers into issuing cease and desist orders. "This is a form of tough love," said Jonathan Lamy, a spokesman for the RIAA.

Being taken to court is often a very real and scary possibility for illegal music downloaders. The RIAA had its first big win last October when a jury in Duluth, Minn., found Jammie Thomas, a single mother of two, liable for copyright infringement and ordered her to pay $9,250 for each of the 24 shared songs cited in the lawsuit, or a total of $222,000.

Sad...

I started this group so people could talk together about their opinions and views on pirating music.