RIAA and MPAA seek ruling in P2P case

RIAA, MPAA, and NMPA seek summary judgement in the case against P2P "giants" Kazaa, Grokster, and MusicCity. The three organizations charge that the massive “vicarious and contributory copyright infringement” facilitated by the Kazaa, Grokster and MusicCity services is abundantly clear and an accelerated ruling on the merits of the case is warranted. The initial lawsuit was filed last October. With the summary judgement they seek to close down the networks before even going to trial.

According to the music and movie groups Kazaa & others have developed a network to emulate Napster in almost every respect, and "are earning millions of dollars from the service."



Read the full press release at RIAA.org.


Written by: Jari Ketola @ 14 Sep 2002 11:49
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  • 1 comment
  • vudoo

    It is time for the government to stop being a push over for these big corporate identities such as the RIAA and NPAA. They make false claims without representation of the facts to back those claims of loss of sales and revenue despite the fact that other research companies and organizations have proven exactly the opposite. Some people with any sense of intellect just might constitute this type of action as outright fraud. Just who the hell do they think they are kidding or what type of lame excuses are they going to pull in the next few meetings in court. Let these organizations be forced to do their homework and I mean be forced to talking to record stores about how their business was affected since the invention of the MP3 recorder/player and also getting actual sales records from businesses and then submitting a full report with facts and figures to back their claim or be held in contempt of the courts and all law suits towards P2P networks thrown out till they can learn to back such claims. Let the NPAA be forced to do research of how business has been since the invention of the DIVX DVD ripper, or for the matter any device capable of recording video be it analogue or Digital. Let them be forced to prove their claims of loss of sales and revenue or have their case thrown out of court and told not to show up in court with these kind of ridiculous claims again or be forced to pay restitution in the millions just for wasting our brain power on such nonsense.
    If the NPAA and RIAA can make claims of loss in sales then why don’t computer manufacturers start making claims of loss in sales after the death of Napster and present that to the government to try and make the RIAA an unlawful organization? After all I’d be almost forced to sell my computer and I am sure others would buy less expensive computers if it were not for file swapping. And why don’t manufacturers of VCR’S, CD recorders, players and DVD players and burners follow suit? After all they could definitely back those claims because whenever you ask an average person what they do with there computer, the answer almost always is to play music, or watch movies, or play video games. Together we could get red of these groups FOREVER. The only people the RIAA helps are the record companies and not the artists themselves in which KazaA and Groakster has been working very hard to promote. I think the it is not fair to punish over 100 million people and maybe even the new artists that KazaA promotes. If the employees of all the record and film industries are not making enough money, maybe it’s time they should look into their own lives more closely and plan better budgeting. They are no different then any other American citizen holding 2 jobs to make ends meet. Poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on behalf of the general public, and certainly not an emergency on behalf of the United States Government and last but not least the governments of other nations.
    Big corporations have been found to be money laundering, doctoring the books, screwing people out of their stocks, and basically getting away with what an average person might spend a lifetime in prison for doing. The government has no room for even letting this bill get out, especially after what MCI and maybe other large companies might be still practicing in. Since they now have to look into big companies more closely then why aren’t the RIAA and NPAA being under investigation as well? It may be because it would be under best interest of certain politicians to pucker up and suck up to them.
    Allowing these organizations to have free reign to hack into peer-to-peer sites is asking for a conflict between the United States and other countries (something the RIAA AND NPAA has not thought about when proposing to do this act of cyber warfare against the nations of the world that don’t see things their way). Suppose another country such as Iran had an organization that decided Christian belief’s were against their Interest and passed a law that any website that had the mention of God in it would be Defaced or Impaired using anti blasphemous technology (hacking). Wouldn’t that be reason to start a war against Iran? And in return we would hack and deface the Iranian websites with whatever we wanted. The conflict would go on and on. And of course allies would soon move in and the conflict would get bigger and bigger. It is the same way with what the RIAA and NPAA are trying to get away with. KazaA is not necessarily written in the US and even if it were people in other nations use it. Neither is Gnutilla and Imesh. Starting such Hack attacks against computer users of other nations constitutes War against the United States same as if another country had an organization that would push their beliefs down our necks by hacking into our computers.
    Don’t take this crap from the NPAA and RIAA lightly. It is time for the general consumers to regain our powers to persuade these organizations that we matter too. Boycott the record companies by purchasing used CD’s and tapes. Only attend concerts that are sponsored by unsigned studios and artists. And to show the NPAA what a loss of sales really can be, let us stop purchasing new DVD’s, videocassettes, and stop attending theaters altogether (this will be hard since I’d rather be at a theater watching a great movie then to Download it and watch it on a tiny 21 inch computer monitor). I enjoy real surround sound (something that is hard to duplicate at home). Even if copy protection stops us from file sharing, we can still enjoy new releases by purchasing them used when college students need money and pon their wares. Then we all can cause these organizations to fall to the ground and cry “I wish I’d never have done that”. Of course by then it will be too late because they’ve managed to make a lot of people mad and that will be something that is never salvageable in the first place. Take a look at Sony’s web site ware people had Limited Downloads. What is wrong? Why are you now changing the rules and letting people have unlimited Downloads? Could it be your little plan isn’t working?
    Also notice that KaZaa and Grokester have been making deals with the RIAA, NPAA, and other organizations to save themselves. They have all proven that us users are a big asset to the NPAA, RIAA, and other organizations since the biggest share of consumers are the people Downloading and sharing what you so call Pirated files.
    And while I am on the subject, hasn’t it occurred to the government and the organizations that there is a leak in their own organization? Some of the movies that are passed around even before they hit the theaters can only be distributed by your employees of your own organizations you schmuck. So before you shoot down file swapping, maybe you need to take a better look at what is going on in your own back yard. You say Piracy is a problem, when employees of your organization may have passed the files out in the first place? Funny I laugh all the time about it. There seems to be a lot of disloyal and back biting employees of your organization, why do you suppose that is? Could it be because they really see how stupid they really are, and how greedy they are? After all the saying goes “there is no honor among thieves”.

    Voodoohippi
    (Defender of Free cyberspace)

    19.9.2002 10:49 #1

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