OT: An Interesting Read About Bit-Torrents

[Atrocities]

There Under Fire

And the Tracker Sites

For those of you who may use Bit-Torrents for lagit purposes, the linked to sites might be of interest. I don't think they are going after lagit uses, but are going after pirate crap. Just interesting news that I thought I would post.

[Aiken]

Jailers against pirates. It's amuzing, that both are natural attributes of the world of proprietary content. Endless story.

[Atrocities]

It is always better to own the DVD than to say just have a boot leg copy of it on your PC. Duhhhhhhhhhh. What are they so damn afraid of? Next thing you know, they will be going after the hard drive industry for making HD's that can hold large numbers of ripped DVD movies. LOL this will never end.

OBTW, do you ever wonder if the play writes and composers of the 19th century were alive today what they might say about copywrite and intellectual properties pirating? (Since their works have been pirated so heavily by the same corporations that are now crying foul.)

[Aiken]

RIAA can certainly jail or fine kazaa, emule, BT creators and server owners. But they will never be able to disallow programmers all over the world to write something like this.

[Jack Simth]

Attempting to sue the makers of a product that has both Leagal and illeagal uses when somebody uses the product for an illeagal end is a VERY VERY BAD IDEA.

Consider a kitchen knife. It can be leagally used to cut animal flesh (steak), vegetables, or tough pLastic packaging. It can also be illeagally used to mug people. Should a mugging victim (or the family of a dead mugging victim) be able to sue the knife manufacturer for the illeagal use of a knife by a mugger?

Consider a rope. It can be leagally used to secure loads, restrain animals, or play with. It can also be illeagally used to restrain people. Should a kidnapping victim (or the family of a dead kidnapping victim) be able to sue the rope manufacturer for the illeagal use of a rope by a kidnapper?

Consider Bittorrent (and similar stuff). It can be used leagally to distribute large demos, home movies, or even put on a fee-based system for distributing large, fully-functional software programs. It can also be used to illeagally distribute ripped DVD or CD images. Should a copyright infringement victim (or their representitives) be able to sue the Bittorrent programmers for the illeagal use of Bittorrent by copyright violators?

Consider a handgun. It can be leagally used to stop a rapist, stop a murderer, or hunt food. It can also be illeagally used to shoot (relative) innocents. Should a shooting victim (or the family of a dead shooting victim) be able to sue the gun manufacturer for the illeagal use of a gun by a(n attempted) murderer?

Is there really a way to say "yes" to one or two of the above, without giving lawyers room enough to make the other two or three stick? What do you think would happen to ANY economy if suddenly everyone that made anything that was could be used for an illeagal purpose suddenly got sued for the illeagal actions of THIRD PARTIES? I can understand making stuff that doesn't have any significant leagal use illeagal. But you know, it's reasonably simple to turn a microwave into a maser for arson where you don't need to be within 100 feet of the target to set it on fire (Added features! Invisible beam! Accelerant free - no traces at the arson site! Easy to make it look like an electrical fire!). It's trivial to bypass the safties on a pneumatic nail gun so that it fires nails through the air at people rather than through wood. A college textbook makes a dandy club. There is very little that can't be turned to illeagal use. I don't like the precident RIAA's trying to re-set.

[Suicide Junkie]

Don't forget to sue the makers of that ever-popular shoe-grade cement.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Uh, from the sounds of it, they aren't suing the makers of bittorrent, only sites that offer illegal movie downloads.

[Timstone]

Jack:
That was one of the best Posts since a while. I really like how you illustrated things. Thumbs up for you.

[dogscoff]

OK, so suppose they somehow stop everyone from using P2P apps. What will people do?

Why, they'll burn all those mp3s on to a DVD and mail them to their friends, of course.
Is the RIAA going to outlaw the postal service? How many mp3s can you get on a DVD anyway?

Or maybe ppl will just meet up and swap the contents of their ipods.
Should they outlaw ipods?

Pretty soon wireless technology will be so seamless and pervasive, and mobile storage so great, that you'll be able to run local file-shares with nearby phones, laptops and mp3 players - You'll step onto a crowded train or bus, and half a dozen people on there will have files up for swaps via bluetooth or similar and your own device will start sharing automatically (and more-or-less anonymously). What they gonna do about that?

They can't fight technology, technology moves too fast.

[Timstone]

Before I start this post, I want to stress that I'm not trying to make anyone angry or annoyed.

Okay, everything said and considered about the rediculous moves of the RIAA. But what about their side? What would you do if you were in their place? They have to protect their livelyhood, their job and their future.
I think we have to place ourselfs in their shoes for once and look at the possiblities they have. We (the people who use the extensive technology available to share their music and such) are condeming them, the music (just one of the examples of course) they produce and the bands they represent to death. We're ruining a whole branch of industry.

At the same time we're giving live another new branch of industry; a branch to prevent the swapping, exchanging and sending of the protected goods.

Edit: Typo's!