I can't believe we vote these people into power

[DukenukemX]

Guess what they have a new law out thats actually pretty old. Chances are you could be convicted of a federal crime no matter how good you are of not using kazaa. It's called the NET or (No Electronic Theft). Our former U.S. President Bill Clinton signed this bill in 1997. How do these bills get signed in without me knowing? First the DMCA and now NET.

What this law does is it makes peer-to-peer (P2P) pirates liable for $250,000 in fines and subject to prison terms of up to three years. Of course now the RIAA, MPAA, and BSA all want to enforce it. I've seen killers get off easier then what the NET law will do to people if they get caught.

You can all read it here (http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1107-982171.html).

[Paradox]

the internet - the biggest example of freedom we have - is being strangled and suffocated by politics and laws.

[stormwatcheagle]

Fuck it, when we go to war, p2p searching will be like litering, no one will care about such a minor crime

[gdorf]

Fuck it, when we go to war, p2p searching will be like litering, no one will care about such a minor crime

I'd say it is already. I'd much rather a cop see me put a burned cd into my cd player than a cop see me throw trash out the window of my car. The latter bothers me much more.

[Tygore]

Especially since burned CDs aren't necessarily illegal. Only if you stole the music that's on them.

[Axel]

if I understand the law, its only illegal if you start selling the burned CD's.

[AtmaWeapon]

No, it's illegal to download songs if you have not purchased the CD that the song is from.

Why do we vote these people into power? I don't know. Politicians that make laws that send people to prison for doing illegal activities piss me off. Oh wait.

Think about it for a minute. If this NET act has been in effect since 1997, why hasn't anyone been publicly arrested? The government most definitely would have found a posterboy pirate and ruined him like they did with Kevin Mitnick.

Do you really think the government has enough money, room, and time to try every person who uses file sharing? No. As said above, it's the same as littering. It's illegal and carries consequences, but unless you do it right in front of the RIAA, odds are no one will catch you.

The biggest people that the industry is worried about are people who frequently sell the burned CDs. IMO, if they'd lower CD prices, it wouldn't be as bad. Take a look at this scenario:
In my town, there are people in the ghetto who decide that instead of using their welfare for beer and car audio they will spend it on a PC. They have 56k connections, but every night they set up a download list and let it download overnight. They take their list of songs with them, and for $10 a CD you can pick songs off the list to make a CD. (No, I'm not joking, they do this in the ghetto with welfare money. One of them came into the place where I work trying to peddle CDs.) I know people that haven't bought a CD in a store for almost 2 years. These people are the reason why the RIAA is so pissed off. I would estimate that the average customer of these pirates gets one CD a week. They've all got to have the new Li'L Wayne or P. Diddy or Simon T. Pedophile or whatever the new rapper of the week is.

Bottom line, filesharing is illegal. But right now, there are more than 3,000,000 users on Kazaa. Is there room in the courts and prisons for 3,000,000 people? No.

[BebyGoku]

I like to burn cd's but i buy cd's also. its the people like the well fair people atma is talking about that is gonna get something like kazaa or winmx shut down.

[Ich]

I don't wish to be a the next Kevin Mitnick (go read Cyberpunk), but I'm not going to stop sharing files until the music industry caters to my taste in music. Therefore, I will never stop downloading music. Without the internet, I would be listening to crappy pop and hip hop, a scenario that I am glad has been averted. Visit http://www.boycott-riaa.com to find out about DMCA and various other acts of questionable ethics that they have done.

[Axel]

CD's? lots of the things I download I've got on records. I mean, it's hard to have the full Thick as a Brick put on a cassette, so I download it, and burn it. alot easier than dubbing it.
speaking of which, did anyone ever get in trouble for dubbing cassettes?

[Mystery-Q]

Ya know they really are idiots. Take out the p2p services. No problem for me. I got a radio, blank tapes, and a record button. If they close down kazaa then they might as well close every radio station that *shares* music with its listeners on a daily basis. It comes down to this. Stop paying the artists and execs so much money for the crap they produce. As long as there are 18 out of 20 songs on a CD that suck don't expect me to buy one. If they were smart they would take advantage of current technology and do away with CD's all together. Put up a web site and charge $1 per song downloaded, then ppl can buy only the songs that they want. Now that would be fair since a CD costs $14 to $20. Theres no way in hell I would ever buy a $7 Single with 5 remixes that usually suck too. Now I'm sure some jackasses would still "steal" the music but I know alot of ppl wouldn't mind only pay $1 per song. Oh and BTW just so they know that I'm not biast against artists I'm a musican myself. As a recording artist I see no problem with the RIAA putting my plan into action. The artists would get what the deserve, music piracy would go down, and the avarge joe gets to keep his musical freedom. Maybe there wouldn't be enough money to go around for the high saleray of the execs, but those bastard get paid too much anyway. If don't like it they should find another carrer or write there own damn music instead of leeching off the artists. Oh ya one more thing. Stop dumping money into crap like American Idol. We have enough "singers' already spend the money on people with real talent. Not some azzhole that sings what somebody else wrote.

And that my 2 cents!

[Paradox]

what they're starting to try to do is take random big-file-sharers to court and throw them in jail, scaring some people (who think "omfg what if i'm next") away from pirating. it'll certainly work, but won't solve the situation.

[Ich]

In response to your original statement, "I can't believe we vote these people into power," I would like to say that I can. The people of the US have been manipulated to vote for politicians who have been corrupted by corporations through campaign donations. This isn't a good thing. The politicians have agendas, like Howard "In your pocket" Berman (http://www.boycott-riaa.com/rogues/hberman.php) that are in the interests of the people who supported them (http://www.opensecrets.org/races/indus.asp?ID=CA28&cycle=2002&special=N) and through their support they are able to be in office. Through that, they are "endebted" and push legislation that is unconstitutional but in favor of their industry.