You seem to imply that it is not illegal to have music in your possession that you have in violation of it's license. That is not correct.

While you are right that the RIAA is currently pursuing a plan of lawsuits against people who distribute copyrighted works in violation of the license, that does not mean that they will not or cannot sue people who possess copyrighted works in violation of the license.

Do you think that it's legal for someone to knowingly receive stolen goods from a thief? Just because they didn't steal those goods themselves? While it may be easier for police to arrest the thief than the person with the stolen loot, it doesn't mean that that person isn't acting illegally.

Trevor


P.S. Just for the record, I read what I wrote above and it sounds like I support the RIAA's actions. Actually, I think that the RIAA is a bunch of idiots. But they are acting in accordance with the law. Mostly.

And it seems like you're implying that having mp3s means you're breaking the law.

What I am saying is, A) they have no way of knowing that said files are in violation of any license, and B) they have no way of even knowing that you have said files, unless you are breaking the law by distributing.
If the police see you driving a Mercedes they can't assume you stole it without proof.

I have only 4 GB of music on my computer. It's spread across 500 songs, because I rip/acquire music at the highest quality possible. This includes iTunes plus.

About 60% of my music is iTunes purchases. The other portion is stuff I've acquired over the years.

I like it because it's easy to back up and easily fits on a flash drive.

Also, Jasen, I'd like to hear how you stream music from a Mac to a 360. My 360 will not see my Mac at all, even with Rivet or Connect360 installed. (I have a Linksys Wireless Game Adapter installed on the 360, and the 360 sees it as an Xbox Wireless adapter...)

Or, are you using a PC?

trevor you sir are a genius (either that or you have too much time on your hands :P)

er, both. :)
I have a Mac Pro, but when I do the streaming I have it booted into Windows and running the Orb client on it.
I spend a lot of time in Windows because I do software development for work at home often.

Of course I'm not saying that. Where would I have implied such a ridiculous thing? I went to great lengths to specify "music in your possession that you have in violation of it's license."

MP3 is a file format, (well, and a compression algorithm). I couldn't begin to imagine saying that it's illegal to have a file in someone's possession with a specific file extension or one using a specific compression algorithm.

Yes, and what does that have to do with whether something is illegal or not? You're just saying that someone with illegal files can't be easily caught. Not the same.

Uh huh. So are you saying that it's alright to steal a Mercedes if you don't get caught?

Trevor

Hey, you feel free to keep putting words into my mouth. Don't like the feeling when I do it back?

Someone said up above that having a giant mp3 collection opened one up to legal action. You even calculated the potential fine.

I replied that this was not the case.

You somehow translated that into meaning that I thought breaking the law was perfectly fine.

I tried to correct that notion and compared a raid by the mp3 police for having too much music was like a police raid for merely owning a nice car. I.E. that possession of something in no way implies that a crime was committed in obtaining it, even if you have a lot of it.

Perhaps if we can get past the notion that a large mp3 collection is necessarily all pirated we'd agree. I'm not condoning wholesale piracy any more than I'm condoning borderline legal strongarm tactics by large IP rights holders.

responding to several people (including Jasen...)

let's be clear: the right to copy electronic media (or anything) belongs to the copyright holder ('right to copy' is literally where the word 'copyright' comes from). the moment that you make an MP3 (or any other electronic copy in any format) the copyright owner of the material has the legal grounds to challenge you for having done so if he chooses. he doesn't need to know why or how you got that copy, and he doesn't need any other reason to sue you; all he needs to know is that you have a questionable copy of something over which (legally) he has sole copying rights. after that you would be obliged to demonstrate to the court that your making of that copy was legally justified. If you have a large MP3 collection and you're worried about these issues, keep the sales slips for the CDs - otherwise you don't have a legal foot to stand on.

now I doubt that (in most cases) copyright holders will bother the average user even if they have illegal copies. they'd win the case easily, but there'd be no profit in it. the court would force that the illegal copies be destroyed and might impose some smallish penalty, but without some evidence that the illegal copies in question demonstrated a significant impact on the copyright holder's ability to profit from his material there's be nothing more than that. this is why the RIAA tries to force out-of-court settlements where possible, and only goes to court against 13 year-olds with aging grandmothers - anyone with legal competence would argue the damages down to a trivial sum.

Doesn't "Fair Use" give you rights to make copies for playing? Consider: eons ago, when I had a CD player in my home but only a tape player in my car, I routinely made tapes of the CDs so I could play them in my car. That may be technically illegal, but I can't imagine that I'd be in danger in court. Similarly, my kids routinely copy CDs intended for their kids so the kids won't trash the original. Again, by my standards, that's fair use.

oh, no doubt. like I said, neither the copyright holder nor the courts are going to pursue something like this that's obviously fair. but if you push them, both will insist that this is a privilege they offer to you on a case by case basis, not a right that you have with respect to the material. big difference, legally speaking.

Fair enough. What's bothering me about Fair Use these days is the continual efforts by music and movies to restrict what I can play a copy I own on.

yeah, I hear that. classic case of Little Boy Blue dementia. sticking your thumb in a hole doesn't really stop the dyke from leaking, not when it's leaking this bad; but the entertainment industry is getting so OCD about it they are effectively sticking their thumbs up everyone's b...

err... you get the picture. :o

I think the pallet of CD's I cart into the courtroom will be proof enough.
I would only hope the judge orders plaintiff's counsel to go through every single one and account for it, just to waste about 6 months of their time and accrue ridiculous costs for harassing a customer who's spent ridiculous sums on their products.

What is the license of which you speak? I've purchased hundreds of CD's over the years, and I have never had to agree to any license. (I don't use the iTunes store.) The closest thing to a license is the copyright mark.

In most jurisdictions, possession of music in it's electronic form is perfectly legal, even if obtained illegally. Distribution of music without rights to do so from the copyright owner is, on the other hand, illegal. What makes downloading music via bittorrent illegal is that the nature of bittorrent (in theory) requires the downloader to make the files available for upload. (Note that the judge in the RIAA case previously mentioned in this thread has questioned his own jury instructions equating making available for others to download and actually uploading, so it remains to be seen what sort of precedent that case will actually become.)

Some countries, explicitly differentiate between uploading and downloading files. It is wholly legal to download, but illegal to upload. In practice, that is the way the law is in the US, also. I've never heard of anyone being charged with possession of stolen music files, stolen CD's perhaps, but not files.

No matter how many times you make this statement, it is still incorrect. You seem to be confusing copying with distributing. The former does not violate copyright law. The latter one does.

Yes, Fair Use gives you that right (not to be confused with privilege), provided you do not have to circumvent encryption/copy protection to make the copies. Fair Use does not give you the right to make copies for anyone else.

and you seem to be confusing the letter and practice of law. according to the letter of law, only the copyright holder is entitled to make (and yes, distribute) copies of something. in practice, no one really cares if you make a copy so long as it doesn't interfere with their commercial interests. this means that you won't get hit with a lawsuit, but it doesn't mean the act is legal. e.g., no cop is likely to give you a ticket for doing an illegal u-turn at 3am on an empty road, but that doesn't make 3am u-turns legal, either.

a lot of people assume that the fact that they get away with something means that they are entitled to get away with it, but in fact: no. and trust me, a false sense of entitlement does not make for a very good legal strategy.

Legal precedent is contrary to your assertion. In other words, the judicial branch has interpreted the law differently than you have. The reality is that only the judicial branch's opinions, not mine or yours, matters. So, currently, the letter of the law clearly allows copying by persons other than the copyright owner.

tw does have at least one very valid point: anyone can sue you for any reason they want, whether they have valid grounds or not.

Now in this case, copying a CD you own for personal, backup, or archival use, is in fact legal, as that right is specifically granted by the fair use laws someone linked earlier. So while the copyright holder could sue if they somehow found out, they would be stupid to do it, as you have a de facto affirmative defense in that law. Just as JK Rowling would lose if she tried to sue you for making a photocopy of a Harry Potter book from the library for a school report.

The license on music CD's is a statutory license, that is, only granted by virtue of copyright law, which provides a very specific set of rights to the copyright holder and prohibitions on the purchaser/end user.
To retain additional rights to their work, company's must use contractual licenses, either by explicit contract in which parties agree to terms and sign, or by implied contract, such as click-through EULA's in software. The actual legality and enforcement of click-throughs is still a gray area, as it's rarely been challenged in court.
As such, software products have a much more controlled and restrictive usage license attached to them. CD's and DVD's have only the statutory restrictions placed on them.

So yes, there is a license of sorts, but it is limited to what is laid down in law. So while a software title can say "You do not have permission to copy this CD, or use it on more than 1 computer, nothing else", and enforce that, a music CD is only constrained by copyright law and the fair use clauses therein. So Sony BMG cannot one day just declare that no one can ever copy their CD's for any reason. It'll be defeated the first time they try to enforce it.