6 ms·

Ever Downloaded a Copyrighted Song? You Owe Infinity Dollars

26 points by winanga 17y ago

cousin_it 17y ago
Uh, due to exponential discounting, $15 a month over infinite time adds up to a finite and not especially large amount of money. Think as much money as you'd need to have in the bank to receive $15 a month in interest.
- dinkumthinkum 17y ago
  I think you passed the point a few miles back. It seems like the issue is that this is really a ridiculous a verdict and the I think that the idea that the RIAA is happy about this really shows how little they understand about PR. Considering that their primary targeted demographics, I wonder if the RIAA should sue their lawyers and PR firms for malpractice!
- swombat 17y ago
  That's really just being pedantic about a humorous Penny Arcarde comic, though. Perhaps there are more important points to debate in this article?
  - seertaak 17y ago
    > Since the music is DRMed, if you ever stop paying, you lose all your music. So? That's what Spotify does, and I have absolutely no problem with that. > It’s just a joke, but it makes a good point. How much is one song worth to you? How much is it worth to the author? How much is it worth to the recording industry? I don't see this relates at all about the howler ("point") regarding infinity dollars. In any case this is a confused mess passing for deep thought. How much is a song worth to you? However much you're willing to pay for it, I would have thought. How much is it worth to the author? However much he sold the rights to his music to the record industry for. How much is it worth to the music industry? Well, it's worth precisely the price they set for an album! > ultimately you can always claim that a song never fully loses its value and it can therefore be set to an arbitrary, insanely high amount of money. Another non-sequitor. My well-kept 1980s casio watch will never fully "lose its value". Would you like to buy it for USD 100,000.00, sir? And anyways, the claim can't be set "arbitrarily" high -- the law sets a limit of between USD 300 and USD 150,000 per song. It is impossible to know the financial damage wrought by making a song available on a P2P network. However, it worth stating two points: 1. It is the jury that sets the amount of damages per song, not the plaintiffs. This should have been obvious to anyone who had actually read the court case, as the author claims to have done. 2. While it is impossible to determine a precise value for the damages, you can make a reasonable, conservative estimate based on the expected number of times a song has been downloaded once made available on P2P, what the expected price of said download would be if it were effected through legal channels, etc. It's not going to be perfect, but this is far from being "arbitrary". Finally, the title of the article just reeks of demagoguery. Ever download a copyrighted song? You owe infinity dollars? Does the author take us for complete idiots? I frankly don't understand why there's this rush to defend a woman who repeatedly lied about her activities. She could have settled for a reasonable sum. She instead had the chutzpah to claim that she never even knew about KaZaA despite having written a paper about Napster (her conclusion: it was legal). She lied about the hard drive she handed in for depositions. She, simply put, doesn't have a foot to stand on. Defending her just makes the anti-copyright movement look like a bunch of loonies.
    - randallsquared 17y ago
      My well-kept 1980s casio watch will never fully "lose its value". Would you like to buy it for USD 100,000.00, sir? The phrase "never fully lose its value" in this case means month-to-month value. Are you really still paying some amount every month for a watch you bought in the '80s?
      - seertaak 17y ago
        > The phrase "never fully lose its value" in this case means month-to-month value. Sorry; no. It presumably refers to the fact that music, in electronic form, can be copied arbitrarily and stored indefinitely, at no loss of quality. I don't see how the mode of payment, whether one-off or monthly subscription, is relevant at all. > Are you really still paying some amount every month for a watch you bought in the '80s? No, and irrelevant. See above. EDIT: It occurs to me that the poster might have meant the "value of the song seen on a month-to-month basis", in connection with the claim that this value never changes. This is of course a ridiculous claim; it is well-known that popular single in the Top 20 cost more than less popular singles. This could quite easily be factored into a calculation of damages.
        randallsquared 17y ago
        The "never fully lose its value" refers to DRMed pay-every-month schemes like the Zune: """ It reminds me of a recent Penny Arcade comic which mocks Microsoft’s Zune Pass, which offers unlimited selection of music for 15 dollars per month; since time never ends, this technically amounts to infinity dollars. Since the music is DRMed, if you ever stop paying, you lose all your music. It’s just a joke, but it makes a good point. How much is one song worth to you? How much is it worth to the author? How much is it worth to the recording industry? You can push arguments to favor each side, and ultimately you can always claim that a song never fully loses its value and it can therefore be set to an arbitrary, insanely high amount of money. """ So, in context, it's talking about month-to-month plans, not resale-of-copies value.
        seertaak 17y ago
  - cousin_it 17y ago
    I make a principle of exposing careless arguments even when they support a good cause. I hate the RIAA as much as the next guy, but Penny Arcade's "infinity dollars" line didn't attack the outrageous fines of the RIAA, it (unfairly) attacked Microsoft's price point which is actually very affordable. Then the linked article took that already faulty argument and made a faulty logical connection on top. Think about it: even if Penny Arcade had been right, what does Microsoft's pricing model have to do with the article at all? Unless you subscribe to the view that all bad things in this world are intimately connected: "Microsoft, DRM, RIAA, boo".
    - seertaak 17y ago
      Exactly, it was poorly argued, replete with falsehoods, non-sequitors, and generally just muddled thought. It was almost juvenile. I think the anti-copyright campaigners would be wise to distance themselves from this brand of "argumentation". It weakens the argument against copyright.
    - ggchappell 17y ago
      > I make a principle of exposing careless arguments even when they support a good cause. Good for you. (See also: http://www.liberalrevolt.com/article/the-10-signs-of-intellectual-honesty http://www.liberalrevolt.com/article/the-10-signs-of-intelle... )
pierrefar 17y ago
Hey, finally the recording industry has cracked the new business model they need. To compensate for the declining sales, all they need to do is win a lawsuit once a month or so and they'll be fine! Woohoo!
cabalamat 17y ago
If like me you think this is ludicrous, join the Pirate Party -- see http://www.pp-international.net/ http://www.pp-international.net/ for your national PP.
- Deestan 17y ago
  Thanks for the final nudge; I'm now a member of the Norwegian PP. :)
  - cabalamat 17y ago
    Now go and give the final nudge to 10 of your friends...
quoderat 17y ago
I am glad when things like this occur. Ridiculous verdicts like this actually harm the record industry, and shake people's faith in the court system being fair and equitable. The RIAA couldn't have found a better way to discredit themselves in the eyes of the public, except perhaps by condoning child rape or re-uniting the Backstreet Boys.
robryan 17y ago
Just after a general opinion, what would people rate as a fair penalty in this case?
- htsh 17y ago
  24 tracks, how about $24 dollars? I'd even give them double, or $48. For the 1700 tracks (that she allegedly downloaded but was not tried for), $3400. The extra dollar for each song goes towards the administrative costs of tracking them down.
  - seertaak 17y ago
    To be fair, I think the original settlement proposed was around USD 10,000 certainly more than your proposal, but a far cry from the USD 1.9MM the court awarded her. In any case, your arithmetic seems to me to measure the wrong thing. The problem is not that she downloaded the songs. The problem is that she made them available for downloading. If all she had done was burned 24 tracks from a friend's collection and listened to that in her car and gotten caught, then your calculation makes sense. But each time someone downloaded the songs she made available, that person no longer need to buy the album from the artist. That's why two dollars per track, IMHO, is far from being a fair figure from damages. It's the viral aspect which makes P2P different, from, say, copying cassettes like we did when we were kids.
    - htsh 17y ago
      Again, if we're talking crime, you have to have an intent to commit that crime. If she wanted to listen, she gets punished for it. If she shares unintentionally (which is likely the case as most p2p applications share everything you download), then punish her a little more on top of it but don't treat her like she's some organized bootlegging ring.
      - deleted 17y ago
        [deleted]
      - gambling8nt 17y ago
htsh 17y ago
It seems pretty gutless of the "artists" on this list, like Gwen Stefani, to sit by and watch someone's life get ruined for downloading their music. I would love to hear their take on this. We can blame the extortionist middlemen all we want, but this is not going to change unless the artists say something. In my mind, to stand by while folks' lives are ruined for downloading your over-marketed/overpriced music is far worse than what Lars did when he simply said he didn't like Napster.
- sili 17y ago
  As of late one can see a disapproval of this withing artist community. There are musicians, who are dropping major labels and opting out of traditional music distribution routes. But that only works for those who can prove their hype by their talent. For many other musicians, a label contract and a PR machine behind that is all they got to support their stardom.
- seertaak 17y ago
  > It seems pretty gutless of the "artists" on this list to sit by and watch someone's life get ruined for downloading their music. That is at best an incorrect, at worst disingenuous, characterization of what occured. The defendant did not just "download" the music. She made it available. She, in effect, distributed it. Two different things. Also, she refused to settle when it was painfully obvious that she had been caught red-handed. This is not some mouse of a victim. She displayed considerable chutzpah, conveniently forgetting that the hard disk she handed in as a deposition was the wrong one. She is at the very least co-responsible for her current situation.
  - tptacek 17y ago
    She didn't just refuse to settle. In two seperate trials, she mounted what jurors determined was a remarkably dishonest defense, and got slapped hard for pulling that. People are talking like this case is about the insanity of monetary damages for individual music tracks. And that's what it would have been about, if this person hadn't instead made it about whether she downloaded and published tracks at all.
hellweaver666 17y ago
I reckon the music industry profit margins must be plummeting like crazy since online music downloads became popular and they're just trying to recoup their losses through legal cases!
sili 17y ago
To play a devil's advocate, I don't think RIAA is really thinking that $80,000 per song is a fair amount. They are trying to force her to finally agree to a settlement and get this over with.

26 points by winanga 17y ago

Uh, due to exponential discounting, $15 a month over infinite time adds up to a finite and not especially large amount of money. Think as much money as you'd need to have in the bank to receive $15 a month in interest.

dinkumthinkum 17y ago
I think you passed the point a few miles back. It seems like the issue is that this is really a ridiculous a verdict and the I think that the idea that the RIAA is happy about this really shows how little they understand about PR. Considering that their primary targeted demographics, I wonder if the RIAA should sue their lawyers and PR firms for malpractice!
swombat 17y ago
That's really just being pedantic about a humorous Penny Arcarde comic, though. Perhaps there are more important points to debate in this article?
- seertaak 17y ago
  > Since the music is DRMed, if you ever stop paying, you lose all your music. So? That's what Spotify does, and I have absolutely no problem with that. > It’s just a joke, but it makes a good point. How much is one song worth to you? How much is it worth to the author? How much is it worth to the recording industry? I don't see this relates at all about the howler ("point") regarding infinity dollars. In any case this is a confused mess passing for deep thought. How much is a song worth to you? However much you're willing to pay for it, I would have thought. How much is it worth to the author? However much he sold the rights to his music to the record industry for. How much is it worth to the music industry? Well, it's worth precisely the price they set for an album! > ultimately you can always claim that a song never fully loses its value and it can therefore be set to an arbitrary, insanely high amount of money. Another non-sequitor. My well-kept 1980s casio watch will never fully "lose its value". Would you like to buy it for USD 100,000.00, sir? And anyways, the claim can't be set "arbitrarily" high -- the law sets a limit of between USD 300 and USD 150,000 per song. It is impossible to know the financial damage wrought by making a song available on a P2P network. However, it worth stating two points: 1. It is the jury that sets the amount of damages per song, not the plaintiffs. This should have been obvious to anyone who had actually read the court case, as the author claims to have done. 2. While it is impossible to determine a precise value for the damages, you can make a reasonable, conservative estimate based on the expected number of times a song has been downloaded once made available on P2P, what the expected price of said download would be if it were effected through legal channels, etc. It's not going to be perfect, but this is far from being "arbitrary". Finally, the title of the article just reeks of demagoguery. Ever download a copyrighted song? You owe infinity dollars? Does the author take us for complete idiots? I frankly don't understand why there's this rush to defend a woman who repeatedly lied about her activities. She could have settled for a reasonable sum. She instead had the chutzpah to claim that she never even knew about KaZaA despite having written a paper about Napster (her conclusion: it was legal). She lied about the hard drive she handed in for depositions. She, simply put, doesn't have a foot to stand on. Defending her just makes the anti-copyright movement look like a bunch of loonies.
  - randallsquared 17y ago
    My well-kept 1980s casio watch will never fully "lose its value". Would you like to buy it for USD 100,000.00, sir? The phrase "never fully lose its value" in this case means month-to-month value. Are you really still paying some amount every month for a watch you bought in the '80s?
    - seertaak 17y ago
      > The phrase "never fully lose its value" in this case means month-to-month value. Sorry; no. It presumably refers to the fact that music, in electronic form, can be copied arbitrarily and stored indefinitely, at no loss of quality. I don't see how the mode of payment, whether one-off or monthly subscription, is relevant at all. > Are you really still paying some amount every month for a watch you bought in the '80s? No, and irrelevant. See above. EDIT: It occurs to me that the poster might have meant the "value of the song seen on a month-to-month basis", in connection with the claim that this value never changes. This is of course a ridiculous claim; it is well-known that popular single in the Top 20 cost more than less popular singles. This could quite easily be factored into a calculation of damages.
      - randallsquared 17y ago
        The "never fully lose its value" refers to DRMed pay-every-month schemes like the Zune: """ It reminds me of a recent Penny Arcade comic which mocks Microsoft’s Zune Pass, which offers unlimited selection of music for 15 dollars per month; since time never ends, this technically amounts to infinity dollars. Since the music is DRMed, if you ever stop paying, you lose all your music. It’s just a joke, but it makes a good point. How much is one song worth to you? How much is it worth to the author? How much is it worth to the recording industry? You can push arguments to favor each side, and ultimately you can always claim that a song never fully loses its value and it can therefore be set to an arbitrary, insanely high amount of money. """ So, in context, it's talking about month-to-month plans, not resale-of-copies value.
        seertaak 17y ago
- cousin_it 17y ago
  I make a principle of exposing careless arguments even when they support a good cause. I hate the RIAA as much as the next guy, but Penny Arcade's "infinity dollars" line didn't attack the outrageous fines of the RIAA, it (unfairly) attacked Microsoft's price point which is actually very affordable. Then the linked article took that already faulty argument and made a faulty logical connection on top. Think about it: even if Penny Arcade had been right, what does Microsoft's pricing model have to do with the article at all? Unless you subscribe to the view that all bad things in this world are intimately connected: "Microsoft, DRM, RIAA, boo".
  - seertaak 17y ago
    Exactly, it was poorly argued, replete with falsehoods, non-sequitors, and generally just muddled thought. It was almost juvenile. I think the anti-copyright campaigners would be wise to distance themselves from this brand of "argumentation". It weakens the argument against copyright.
  - ggchappell 17y ago
    > I make a principle of exposing careless arguments even when they support a good cause. Good for you. (See also: http://www.liberalrevolt.com/article/the-10-signs-of-intellectual-honesty http://www.liberalrevolt.com/article/the-10-signs-of-intelle... )

pierrefar 17y ago

Hey, finally the recording industry has cracked the new business model they need. To compensate for the declining sales, all they need to do is win a lawsuit once a month or so and they'll be fine! Woohoo!

cabalamat 17y ago

If like me you think this is ludicrous, join the Pirate Party -- see http://www.pp-international.net/ http://www.pp-international.net/ for your national PP.

Deestan 17y ago
Thanks for the final nudge; I'm now a member of the Norwegian PP. :)
- cabalamat 17y ago
  Now go and give the final nudge to 10 of your friends...

quoderat 17y ago

I am glad when things like this occur. Ridiculous verdicts like this actually harm the record industry, and shake people's faith in the court system being fair and equitable. The RIAA couldn't have found a better way to discredit themselves in the eyes of the public, except perhaps by condoning child rape or re-uniting the Backstreet Boys.

robryan 17y ago

Just after a general opinion, what would people rate as a fair penalty in this case?

htsh 17y ago
24 tracks, how about $24 dollars? I'd even give them double, or $48. For the 1700 tracks (that she allegedly downloaded but was not tried for), $3400. The extra dollar for each song goes towards the administrative costs of tracking them down.
- seertaak 17y ago
  To be fair, I think the original settlement proposed was around USD 10,000 certainly more than your proposal, but a far cry from the USD 1.9MM the court awarded her. In any case, your arithmetic seems to me to measure the wrong thing. The problem is not that she downloaded the songs. The problem is that she made them available for downloading. If all she had done was burned 24 tracks from a friend's collection and listened to that in her car and gotten caught, then your calculation makes sense. But each time someone downloaded the songs she made available, that person no longer need to buy the album from the artist. That's why two dollars per track, IMHO, is far from being a fair figure from damages. It's the viral aspect which makes P2P different, from, say, copying cassettes like we did when we were kids.
  - htsh 17y ago
    Again, if we're talking crime, you have to have an intent to commit that crime. If she wanted to listen, she gets punished for it. If she shares unintentionally (which is likely the case as most p2p applications share everything you download), then punish her a little more on top of it but don't treat her like she's some organized bootlegging ring.
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]
    - gambling8nt 17y ago

htsh 17y ago

It seems pretty gutless of the "artists" on this list, like Gwen Stefani, to sit by and watch someone's life get ruined for downloading their music. I would love to hear their take on this. We can blame the extortionist middlemen all we want, but this is not going to change unless the artists say something. In my mind, to stand by while folks' lives are ruined for downloading your over-marketed/overpriced music is far worse than what Lars did when he simply said he didn't like Napster.

sili 17y ago
As of late one can see a disapproval of this withing artist community. There are musicians, who are dropping major labels and opting out of traditional music distribution routes. But that only works for those who can prove their hype by their talent. For many other musicians, a label contract and a PR machine behind that is all they got to support their stardom.
seertaak 17y ago
> It seems pretty gutless of the "artists" on this list to sit by and watch someone's life get ruined for downloading their music. That is at best an incorrect, at worst disingenuous, characterization of what occured. The defendant did not just "download" the music. She made it available. She, in effect, distributed it. Two different things. Also, she refused to settle when it was painfully obvious that she had been caught red-handed. This is not some mouse of a victim. She displayed considerable chutzpah, conveniently forgetting that the hard disk she handed in as a deposition was the wrong one. She is at the very least co-responsible for her current situation.
- tptacek 17y ago
  She didn't just refuse to settle. In two seperate trials, she mounted what jurors determined was a remarkably dishonest defense, and got slapped hard for pulling that. People are talking like this case is about the insanity of monetary damages for individual music tracks. And that's what it would have been about, if this person hadn't instead made it about whether she downloaded and published tracks at all.

hellweaver666 17y ago

I reckon the music industry profit margins must be plummeting like crazy since online music downloads became popular and they're just trying to recoup their losses through legal cases!

sili 17y ago

To play a devil's advocate, I don't think RIAA is really thinking that $80,000 per song is a fair amount. They are trying to force her to finally agree to a settlement and get this over with.