Have to agree on this one...

Now, it's true, what she was doing was stealing; but her explanation about paying the fee to Kazaa and thinking that it covered the d'ling of songs is entirely plausible for a 12-year-old (not too sure about the mom here).

I think the stories about the RIAA getting bad press on this one may be on the mark.

did the person who posted that read the WHOLE article? like the part about how the girl's family lived in subsidized housing and how settling for two grand was probably better than running up a much larger bill with legal counsel to fight it?

if the RIAA is so concerned about the injustice of theft, maybe they should start paying their artists better, rather than taking an 80-90% cut of the profits.

i am starting to agree with the folks who say this is the death knell for the RIAA...they don't control the means of distribution anymore, so there is no need for them to exist really.

it's fun watching bloated dinosaurs go extinct.

I agree that this is totally out of control, however, stealing is stealing. It's very black and white. If something is not yours and you take it and use it, that is theft.

Would it be ok if I came over to your house and took your car (bike,computer,etc,etc) and decided to bring it to my house and use it for a while? Maybe when I'm done with it I'll throw it away. Does that make it ok?

Granted, I think the recording industry is quite out of control, but, let's be real here. Stealing is a crime. Always has been.

And...for the record, I am not making any judgements about this little girl or her mother. They may have thought what they were doing was ok, since they paid a fee and all...my statements are more of an overall thought on the state of the recording industry vs. those who download music.

Theft is a most certainly a crime, but I think punishments should fit the crime. And in the case of juvenilles, there should be some leniency for error. As much as black-and-white/right-and-wrong moralists (who are perfect in every way and never do anything wrong and never make mistakes) howl about it, kids mess up.

Furthermore, comparisons of theft of real objects and theft of data are not equivalent despite said moralists' equivocations. Theft of data does not deprive the victim of the object. It is a different crime. What the RIAA is insisting is that theft of intellectual property is simultaneously the same crime and a _worse_ crime. They cannot have it both ways. And they are afraid of actual legal tests - this is why they'd rather just use the threat of expensive litigation to extort money.

Extortion is a crime too. Black-and-white aint it?

Record companies over-price their goods, and then wonder why people don't want to pay for them.

of course, the problem with the theft argument is that the RIAA has not yet been able to prove that file sharing is indeed theft. we have something in this country called "fair use" that is being horribly trampled by the RIAA's corporate reign of terror. if i make a CD mix, and i send it off to someone else (something i have done thousands of times) have i committed a crime? usually my actions result in a SALE for whoever happens to be distributing the CD. the problem is that with P2P networks, the RIAA has lost their iron grip on the only means of distribution. now a smart band will ask, "why sign with a corporate monolith that will rip us off, when we can do it ourselves and make a small amount of cash for ourselves?" the smart bands already do this and have affiliated themselves with reputable indie labels who aren't associated with the RIAA. since these bands are usually the ones producing the quality stuff, the RIAA are forced to come up with formula acts like Britney Spears and N*Sync. since the formula acts all sound the same, why would a consumer buy Britney AND Christina Aguilera? if the cash can be spent on something else, then the consumer will probably spend it elsewhere.

that's why their sales have dropped...not because some 12 year old downloaded a few files.

The whole problem is lack of real information on the part of the general public. Last night I was watching a teenager (17 years old) and his mom on MSNBC. They were asked if they knew what they were doing was stealing and they said no because they paid $30 for it, and because they thought that if it was illegal it would get shutdown like napster was.

The whole problem with that arguement is that P2P can be used for both good and bad things. I've used it to find obscure drivers and stuff. Bit Torrent is becoming more and more popular for distributing those large game demos that people often pay places like Fileplanet or Fileshack money to download. People need to think of P2P more like a car. You can use your car to go buy and pickup a Subway Sandwich, or you can use it to go rob a bank. They never shut down the automobile industry because people used cars to escape from crime scenes or to run people over.

Funny car analogy:

Of course don't say that to the anti-gun lobby :) You can use a gun for target practice or for killing; but they still think guns kill people.

Oh man...now that's OT.

Just a little technical point: The recording industry has been creating bands like Britney Spears and N*Sync for decades, don't go waving them around like they're some sort damning evidence. You can do much better than that if you try.

Stealing is a criminal offence. These words have been usurped by the RIAA to make file sharing seem evil. Copyright infringement (not for profit) is a civil offence.

The real crime is that the RIAA are able to use their power to threaten members of the public into admitting their guilt and paying a fine because they are too afraid of the cost involved of going to court.

Ah yes. It's not stealing. It may be wrong, it's not stealing. I bitched about this abuse of the language a few moons ago.

http://www.danisaacs.com/blog/archives/000029.html

RE: "stealing"

From a forum where this has been back and forward too many times:

--begin quote--
I've been meaning to do this for ages. If nothing else, it should save a lot of typing in endless circular debates. First one up now, lots (and lots) more to come.

Friendly Help For F*cking Idiots #1 - http://ds.dial.pipex.com/thumbs_aloft/ffi/ffi1.htm
-- end quote --

:)

For anyone who hasn't seen it, someone is taking up a collection to reimburse the girl her $2000. http://funkbunny.com/datatype/archives/000076.html

There's quite a few of those collections now, actually.