leezard Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 Senator: Trash illegal downloaders' PCs WASHINGTON (AP) -- Illegally download copyright music from the Internet once, or even twice, and you get a warning. Do it a third time, and your computer gets destroyed. That's the suggestion made by the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee at a Tuesday hearing on copyright abuse, reflecting a growing frustration in Congress over failure of the technology and entertainment industries to protect copyrights in a digital age. The surprise statement by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, that he favors developing technology to remotely destroy computers used for illegal downloads represents a dramatic escalation in the increasingly contentious rhetoric over pirated music. Protected by anti-hack laws During a discussion of methods to frustrate computer users who illegally exchange music and movie files over the Internet, Hatch asked technology executives about ways to damage computers involved in such file trading. Legal experts have said any such attack would violate federal anti-hacking laws. "No one is interested in destroying anyone's computer," replied Randy Saaf of MediaDefender Inc., a secretive Los Angeles company that builds technology to deliberately download pirated material very slowly so other users can't. "I'm interested," Hatch interrupted. He said damaging someone's computer "may be the only way you can teach somebody about copyrights." The senator, a composer who earned $18,000 last year in song-writing royalties, acknowledged Congress would have to enact an exemption for copyright owners from liability for damaging computers. He endorsed technology that would twice warn a computer user about illegal online behavior, "then destroy their computer." "If we can find some way to do this without destroying their machines, we'd be interested in hearing about that," Hatch said. "If that's the only way, then I'm all for destroying their machines. If you have a few hundred thousand of those, I think people would realize" the seriousness of their actions. Urging action Some legal experts suggested Hatch's provocative remarks were more likely intended to compel technology and music executives to work faster toward ways to protect copyrights online than to signal forthcoming legislation. "It's just the frustration of those who are looking at enforcing laws that are proving very hard to enforce," said Orin Kerr, a George Washington University law professor and former Justice Department cybercrimes prosecutor. Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the committee's senior Democrat, later said the problem is serious but called Hatch's suggestion too drastic. "The rights of copyright holders need to be protected, but some Draconian remedies that have been suggested would create more problems than they would solve," Leahy said in a statement. "We need to work together to find the right answers, and this is not one of them." Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Virginia, urged Hatch to reconsider. Because Hatch is Judiciary chairman, "we all take those views very seriously," he said. But Kerr said Congress was unlikely to approve any bill to enable such remote computer destruction by copyright owners "because innocent users might be wrongly targeted." Escalating the fight A spokesman for the Recording Industry Association of America, Jonathan Lamy, said Hatch was "apparently making a metaphorical point that if peer-to-peer networks don't take reasonable steps to prevent massive copyright infringement on the systems they create, Congress may be forced to consider stronger measures." The RIAA represents the major music labels. The entertainment industry has gradually escalated its fight against Internet file-traders, targeting the most egregious pirates with civil lawsuits. The RIAA recently won a federal court decision making it significantly easier to identify and track consumers -- even those hiding behind aliases -- using popular Internet file-sharing software. Quote
surefire Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 At the risk of p#ssing off a bunch of folks: 1- I believe that downloading music for free from the internet is stealing. 2- I think that any software that damages another computer is criminal and that this tactic is an improper way to deal with stealing. When you download music for free from the internet that is protected by copyright then you are stealing someone else's property. When someone damages a computer with software (or any other way) then that is damaging someone's property. Two wrongs do not make a right. I'm not allowed to attach a hand grenade to my car to punish would-be-thieves. Quote
leezard Posted June 18, 2003 Author Posted June 18, 2003 I agree with both of your statements, but MP3 downloading is probably going to ALWAYS be around. Destroying someones computer isnt the way to stop it. Macintosh's iTunes sells downloadable liscensed songs for 99 cents each, they claim they sold over 2 million songs in the first 16 days they were in operation. Subscription services obviously dont work, why pay 10-20 dollars a month for being able to download a limited amount of songs per month that CAN'T be burned to a CD? Macintosh has the right idea, most ppl would pay 99 cents for a song, I would. most of the time when i buy a CD it's because i like 1 or 2 songs and I never listen to the rest of the CD. and if you think about it, 99 cents a song on average theres 12-15 songs on a CD if you bought all the songs on the CD 12-15 dollars is a good price. Quote
surefire Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 I think this (99 cents per song) idea is a great one too and was kinda hoping that it was already available for regular pc's Does anyone know of sites where individual songs (popular songs) can be downloaded for a small fee? I'd use a site like that all day long! Quote
leezard Posted June 18, 2003 Author Posted June 18, 2003 Macintosh is working on a PC useable iTunes, no idea when it will be available. Quote
borfast Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 As always, I like to look at these things from different angles than most folks do, so I must ask this: how the hell are they going to develop software that remotely destroys a computer??? Unless a computer is wide open, there's no way to destroy it just like that. And being wide open means having no firewall, no anti-virus AND having some way to trigger the destruction of the computer... so unless the computer's operating system already had a way to allow that (Windows, anyone? ), I don't see a way for them to do it. Another way I can think of is they'd build some kind of trojan horse to do their dirty work but come on, who are they kidding? Are they going to stop criminals by turning themselves into even worst criminals?? I don't know what you think but as far as I'm concerned, destruction of private property is far more severe than stealing. And there's also another point to look at in this whole story: why do people steal music?? Is it just because it's fun? I don't think so. This is the big question that the music industry is not looking at. They only think about punishing those who steal their precious money. Why don't they question themselves about the reasons that lead people to steal music? Well, perhaps they're so blinded by the shining coins that they can't see people steal music because people don't want to pay the prices they ask for it! I'm not saying they should just give it away. I'm saying they could reduce the prices and everyone would be happy! Yes, everyone, because if the prices were lower, people would buy more and they'd get more money! But I don't think they will ever understand that... people who only see money in front of them are just like that, selfish and don't care about others. Heck, let's forbid everyone to use CDs. Hey, you can make pirate copies of copyrighted music with those things, you know?! Wasn't that the argument they used when they started the battle against P2P networks?... OK, I guess I'm starting to go a little off-topic so I'll just shut up. I always get excited when talking about stuff like this. Quote
TCH-Don Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 As always, I like to look at these things from different angles than most folks do, so I must ask this: how the hell are they going to develop software that remotely destroys a computer??? Ah maybe Bill Gates can help LOL He could call it ME, Seriously, I think the idea of the 99 cents per song is a good idea. If the artist does not earn money for their effort, why would they continue to produce songs for our enjoyment. Not just for the pleasure it give them, they can't eat that or provide for their familys. And where does it stop, what will the public decide is theirs for the taking just because they think it should be free, pehaps something that you make a living from? It may be that the Cd's are overpriced because of the way they are marketed, too many middle men? I guess if you can sell for a reasonable price you will do well. Hey kinda like TCH does, Quote
leezard Posted June 18, 2003 Author Posted June 18, 2003 how the hell are they going to develop software that remotely destroys a computer??? It's the US government, I bet they have some pretty smart people working for them. Quote
Twisted Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 It's the US government, I bet they have some pretty smart people working for them. haha i doubt it.... maybe they will hire hackers to work for them & then arrest them after they destroy the user's computer system. The US Government is corrupt. Anybody who watches the news would know that one. Besides how can the US say what goes for the whole internet which is worldwide?? Um i don't think they can. Since for one they don't own it. The internet is just a big network of servers and wires basically. Nerd Quote
TCH-Andy Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 It's the US government, I bet they have some pretty smart people working for them. No, I used to work for them - which says it all really Quote
natimage Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 It's the US government, I bet they have some pretty smart people working for them. I work for them now...and wish I didn't. I also spend time around many others who work for them...and YOU'D wish they didn't! woooot Tracy Quote
borfast Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 Well, about the being able to destroy the computers or not, believe me, it's not possible. At least not in the way they're trying to make it sound. As for the overpriced CDs and the poor musicians not being able to feed their families... that's the part that pisses me off. Hey, don't buy airplanes, don't buy cars that cost a fortune, don't buy mansions all over the world! And that goes for the publishers too, perhaps even more than for the musicians! If they weren't so greedy, they would be glad by getting paid 1000 instead of wanting 100000 and THEN they could lower the CD prices. But please, note that I'm not saying people should go for piracy! I'm just trying to show my point of view of why this whole story of the music industry is a big fat joke and we don't do anything about it. Quote
surefire Posted June 18, 2003 Posted June 18, 2003 Maybe the eventual outcome will be similar to other industries... middle man dissapears or their role changes completely. In other words, what does a musician need a record company for? Promotion and distribution. Maybe a new business model would enable musicians to make a good, even great pay... but by going direct to us via the web. Or, maybe I'm totally naive about the music industry and how it works... equally as plausible. Quote
leezard Posted June 18, 2003 Author Posted June 18, 2003 Well, about the being able to destroy the computers or not, believe me, it's not possible. Thats not true, for every technology for preventing hacking, theres another technology for getting around it. The person that says something is foolproof is only fooling themselves. When i worked at microsoft i had friends that were ex hackers that worked for microsoft just trying to break in to stuff. I garantee any system can be cracked with the right resources. Besides, the system the government would be "hacking" if they tried something like this are mostly 15 year old kids that as far as they know there netgear router with a built in firewall is top of the line. Anyway thats not the point, IF the government tried to implement something like this they would be breaking the anti hacking laws that THEY set up. sorry if it sounds like i'm singleing you out, i'm not....i just have a few ummmm....."friends" that know a little more than they should about cracking systems Anyway my post has done what it was intended for, stirred up some friendly debate /go me!! As far as musicians go, they are devided pretty equally. some feel MP3 sharing is bad (thats mostly the ones that already have more money than god but there popularity has slipped *cough* Metallica *cough*) and then theres the new struggling musicians that feel "Hey, i dont care how you get it, listen to my stuff" I find it kind of funny, that Metallica, the band that pretty much started all this MP3 business back with napster used to THANK their fans for passing around tapes they recorded at home because it made their popularity spread across the country seemingly over night. Then after a few albums that only sold 3-4 million instead of 15-20 they start suing ppl. do i have MP3's? yeah...thousands of them, but i own a copy of EVERY CD that they are all from. Quote
borfast Posted June 19, 2003 Posted June 19, 2003 I also know quite a lot more about breaking into computer systems than I should... but let's skip that part of the conversation before Bill starts asking about the incidents at TCH... (just kidding, of course! ) Anyway, I'm not saying I know more than your friends. I'm not even saying that something can be foolproof - it can't. I believe in the old "saying" "The only safe system is the one disconnected from any wires, locked in a safe, burried in a cave some hundred meters deep surrounded by poisonous gas, with a minefield above it and guards and dogs watching over it day and night - still, I wouldn't trust my life to it." What I meant is that you don't break into a computer system just like that. You just don't. If you want to remotely break into a system, it means you want to gain remote access to it. But in order for you - or anyone else, for that matter - to gain remote access to a comptuer system, that computer system must be running a server of some kind. Be it a mail server, an FTP server, a telnet or SSH server... basically, any software that allows remote interaction of some sort. And you do it usually by exploiting a bug in the software or weak security measures imposed by the system administrator. If the system doesn't allow any remote interaction, be it by means of not having any server software running or simply by being unpluged from the network, you just can't get in - unless, of course, you have physical access to the machine, but that's a totally different story. If you can't get in, you can't execute commands. If you can't execute commands, you may go home and watch cartoons. In such a situation, at the very best you can crash the system but you can't destroy it. You could only destroy it if you had a way to remotely instruct the system to destroy itself, by issuing a "format c:" command or something like that, or by executing some software that would erase the contents of the hard drive. Look at it this way - a computer system is a house. Server software serves as it's only windows and doors to the street - the network it's connected to. If the house doesn't have any windows or doors, how do you expect to get in, be it legally or illegaly? Yes, there are other ways, like trojan horses or even social engineering but I don't think they'd want to call up everyone who downloaded an MP3 file and try to convince them to execute "rm -rf / " or "format c:"... Trojan horses would be a possibility but it's already too late and I'm too tired to discuss it. Maybe tomorrow. Or maybe never, since I'm already way off-topic, here.... I'll just say something you said yourself allready - if something doesn't work like people want it to work, they'll get a way to make it work as they want. Meaning that if somehow they make up a trojan horse or whatever that screws up people's computers, people will, sooner or later, find a way arround it By the way, I must also say that I'm writing all this in the assumption that by "destruction" they meant erasing all the data on the computer's hard drive or, at the very best, screwing up the BIOS, because if they were talking about physical destruction... well, beam me up scotty and call Fox Mulder Quote
leezard Posted June 19, 2003 Author Posted June 19, 2003 well, beam me up scotty and call Fox Mulder I dunno why but that seriously cracked me up! anyway, i dont claim to know much about hacking, just that there is a way around everything. I agree with you about having to actually have access to a system to do anything to it but trojans get spread every day on all of the p2p sharing programs already. If the government wanted to it wouldnt be hard to get some of their own trojans out there on those networks, not that the government would ever do something sneaky like that. to me the real issue is not whether they COULD do it, but that they even consider it. Hmmm lets make all these anti hacking laws and throw people in jail for hacking, but then lets do the same thing (breaking their own anti hacking laws) to stop teenagers from downloading music. Personally i think the opposition will shoot it down and it will never happen, but who knows. Quote
gacain Posted June 19, 2003 Posted June 19, 2003 Greetings: As a musician and holder of several registered copyrights, I've always found this dicussion fascinating. Sit back, close your eyes, and imagine how it feels when you find out that someone is selling a CD that contains YOUR copyrighted material without your knowing it was ever even recorded! Can't quite understand it? Ok, say one day your car is stolen, and then the next day the person who stole it tries to sell it back to you. I have the most amazing discussions with people about the concept of intellectual property and the most important thing I've learned from them is that it's really, really pointless to argue with idiots. For the record, downloading "pirated" music or software is stealing, and it doesn't matter what you think or how you feel things "should" be - it's stealing according to the law, and it's a good law. Maybe you don't agree with the law or maybe you're ok with breaking the law - that's ok, but it's still the law. I ride a motorcycle that is very fast and I break the law all the time. Who's fault is it if I get a ticket? The bottom line is, "I will take responsibility for my own actions." My advice is, "Don't Steal." It's crappy karma. There's a thread on another forum here that was started by a former subscriber who is upset because he was kicked for tranferring warez. He's funny. Should there be a law that says someone can "destroy" your computer? I remember someone saying once, "Burning the American flag is dumb. The only thing dumber would be passing a law that says you can't." Orring Hatch is a musician??? This is the most amazing thing about this whole thread. Love, Greg pontification> Quote
imadsurfer Posted June 19, 2003 Posted June 19, 2003 Boy oh boy...this one could just keep on going.......I have mixed emotions about the whole thing. I also have a copyright on several songs, and have been involved in the music business for the past 19 yrs. I've seen it from the baby band (just getting started) view, and from the big star view. I'm the first one to say that anybody who d/l's music to make CD's to sell needs to have his mp3 ripper stuck up his...ummm... well.... you get the idea. On the other hand, I really don't have a problem with an individual who makes the occasional CD for his own use. I personally know two big time bands who got started by allowing people to d/l their music for free. I also have a good friend in upper management at ASCAP who told me that the only place they could tell Napster was having an adverse effect on sales was around college areas, and he also siad that when Napster was going music sales were actually UP as a whole. I recently was on tour with a major artist, and his Front House Engineer was on the bus one night ranting about people downloading music. It was the usual rant about people stealing, and he also does studio engineering so he takes it very personally. The next night, I was out front before the show started, and the usual pre-show music was playing through the PA. I casually remarked that it was some good music, and he thanked me and went about setting the board up for the show. Then I said, "You got permission from all those bands to use their music....right"? He tried to back pedal, stammered, got red in the face, but eventually he had to admit that he indeed had not done that. I made my point. He was upset about some people d/l music for their own use, and yet he was using music without permission to play in front of thousands of people...... Anyway, everybody has their own idea about what is right, or moral, and what it all comes down to is this. The law says don't do it. The law also says don't speed on your motorcycle or in your car....... hmmmmmm Regardless of the way anybody feels about this, if they try to get into my computer...there's gonna be a showdown! lol ImaD Quote
TCH-JimE Posted June 19, 2003 Posted June 19, 2003 Hi, Hmmm I will add my little input. Note that I have several friends who are musicians who have registered music and I know several people inside of Record companies, and hence these all help me to shape my opinion. 1) Stealing music is wrong and musicians loose out, however..... 2) I will not pay £4 for a single when it actually costs £0.60 in total to the music record label, however..... 3) Record labels do not pass on the huge amount of royalty they get to musicians like they should do, however.... 4) The music industry is the biggest fix/fake scheme I have ever seen. After Micro$oft that is. Hence I own and do download occasionally MP3 music because I do not agree with the extortionate cost of the music which I know does not get passed on to the hard working bands and musicians. End of rant! jim Quote
Lianna Posted June 19, 2003 Posted June 19, 2003 gacain is my hero! Thumbs Up ditto ditto ditto (my opinion, not necessarily that of TCH and TCH cannot be held responsible for my opinion....and all that other disclaimer stuff. ) Quote
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