Digital Copyright Wars – Page 22

Pepsi/Amazon May Give Away a Billion MP3 Tracks (and Other Bad News for DRM)

According to Billboard, Pepsi and Amazon may start a promotion campaign during the upcoming Super Bowl that could give away as many as one billion MP3 tracks. It is also rumored that Wal-Mart will soon drop DRM-protected tracks in favor of the MP3 format. In reaction to these developments and the current availability of MP3s from EMI and Universal Music Group (this is a test), the Warner Music Group and Sony BMG Music Entertainment may consider distributing MP3s as well.

Here's a U.S. Export Canadians May Not Want: DMCA-Style Copyright Laws

There are persistent reports that the Canadian government will introduce copyright legislation that is modeled on the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act as soon as next week.

MPAA Toolkit May Allow Internet Users to See Internal University Network Traffic

The Washington Post reports that the Motion Picture of Association of America is trying to persuade universities to utilize its new MPA University Toolkit, which uses Snort and ntop to provide detailed internal network use statistics that may identify possible copyright infringers.

Security experts have determined that, in its default configuration, the MPA University Toolkit sets up a Web server that provides use statistics to any Internet user unless it is blocked from doing so by a firewall. There is a user/password option, but network administrators are not prompted to set it. Moreover, the software "phones home" to the MPAA upon setup, providing the organization with the IP address of the server.

Read more about it at "MPAA University 'Toolkit' Raises Privacy Concerns."

Two Strikes and You're Out: France Plans to Disconnect Digital Pirates from the Internet

The French Ministry of Culture has proposed a number of measures to deal with illegal downloading on the Internet, including a controversial proposal to terminate accused pirates' Internet access after two downloading violations.

Here's an excerpt from "French Gov't Plans to Disconnect Content Pirates":

The government has won agreement for its latest proposals from the French media industry, which will implement the watermarking measures and make legal downloads of films more widely and rapidly available. Albanel signed the agreement Friday with TV channels, Internet service providers (ISPs), and groups representing filmmakers, authors and musicians rights groups.

In return for the support of these organizations, the government will create a new agency to monitor Internet traffic for the presence of watermarked files and handle complaints from rights holders. Anyone whose Internet connection is used to download such files could receive an official warning from their ISP. A second offense could result in their contract with the ISP being terminated and their name being added to a registry of offenders.

Goliath Just Got Smaller: Free Software Foundation Establishes Expert Witness Defense Fund to Fight RIAA Lawsuits

The Free Software Foundation has established an Expert Witness Defense Fund to "help provide computer expert witnesses to combat RIAA's ongoing lawsuits, and to defend against the RIAA's attempt to redefine copyright law." Ray Beckerman and a group of selected attorneys will advise the fund. You can make tax deductible contributions to the fund, which is a registered 501(c)3 organization.

Infringement Nation: Does Typical Digital Technology Use Made Us All Infringers?

John Tehranian, Professor of Law at the University of Utah, has written a paper for the Utah Law Review titled "Infringement Nation: Copyright Reform and the Law/Norm Gap."

Here's an excerpt from the paper where Tehranian summarizes the infringement activity of a hypothetical U.S. law professor during a single day:

By the end of the day, John has infringed the copyrights of twenty emails, three legal articles, an architectural rendering, a poem, five photographs, an animated character, a musical composition, a painting, and fifty notes and drawings. All told, he has committed at least eighty-three acts of infringement and faces liability in the amount of $12.45 million (to say nothing of potential criminal charges).

If copyright holders were inclined to enforce their rights to the maximum extent allowed by law, he would be indisputably liable for a mind-boggling $4.544 billion in potential damages each year. And, surprisingly, he has not even committed a single act of infringement through P2P file sharing. Such an outcome flies in the face of our basic sense of justice. Indeed, one must either irrationally conclude that John is a criminal infringer—a veritable grand larcenist—or blithely surmise that copyright law must not mean what it appears to say. Something is clearly amiss. Moreover, the troublesome gap between copyright law and norms has grown only wider in recent years.

Analysis of the the Intellectual Property Enforcement Act of 2007

Public Knowledge's Alex Curtis has written a useful section-by-section analysis of the Intellectual Property Enforcement Act of 2007.

In a Win for the MPAA and RIAA, the College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007 Is Approved by the House Education and Labor Committee

Despite the opposition of higher education officials, the College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007 was approved by the House Education and Labor Committee with an illegal file sharing provision intact.

Urgent EDUCAUSE Call to Action on Illegal File Sharing Provision

EDUCAUSE has issued an urgent call to action regarding an illegal file sharing provision in the College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007.

Here's the text of the provision:

Section 494: Campus Based Digital Theft Prevention

(a) IN GENERAL—Each eligible institution participating in any program under this title shall to the extent practicable—

(2) develop a plan for offering alternatives to illegal downloading or peer-to-peer distribution of intellectual property as well as a plan to explore technology-based deterrents to prevent such illegal activity

For further information, see EDUCAUSE's P2P or File Sharing page, especially the talking points and the suggested templates for calls and letters. You can use Congress Merge to find contact information for your Congressional representatives.

Coverage of the Intellectual Property Enforcement Act of 2007

Yesterday, DigitalKoans reported that Senators Patrick Leahy and John Cornyn introduced the Intellectual Property Enforcement Act of 2007, which is sometimes called the "PIRATE Act."

Here are some of the most interesting articles about the bill:

Intellectual Property Enforcement Act of 2007 Introduced in Senate

Senators Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas) have introduced the Intellectual Property Enforcement Act of 2007.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

The Intellectual Property Enforcement Act introduced Wednesday by Leahy and Cornyn would strengthen law enforcement capabilities and resources in thwarting copyright theft. The bill would give civil copyright enforcement powers to the Attorney General and the Department of Justice, and it would authorize additional funding to investigate and prosecute intellectual property crimes involving computers and the Internet. The bill also requires the Federal Bureau of Investigation to assign a minimum of 10 agents to work on intellectual property crimes, and it classifies both the importation and exportation of pirated works as infringement.

Lessig on How Creativity Is Being Strangled By the Law

Lawrence Lessig's TED presentation on "How Creativity Is Being Strangled By the Law" is now available. Lessig is a Professor of Law at Stanford Law School and founder of the school's Center for Internet and Society.

Jefferson Airplane Member, RIAA Director of Communications, and Others Discuss P2P File Sharing at Ohio University Forum

Ohio University has released a digital video of its October 30, 2007 P2P File Sharing: A 360° Perspective forum. Among others, the speakers included Jorma Kaukonen, member of the Jefferson Airplane and Hot Tuna, Jonathan Lamy, Director of Communications of the RIAA, and Vijay Raghavan, Director of Digital Freedom University and the Digital Freedom Campaign.

EFF and Public-Interest-Group Coalition Issue Fair Use Principles for User-Generated Video Content

The Electronic Frontier Foundation and a coalition of public-interest groups (the Center for Social Media, School of Communications, American University; Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property, Washington College of Law, American University; Public Knowledge; Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School; and the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California) have issued "Fair Use Principles for User-Generated Video Content."

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

Fair uses have been mistakenly caught up in copyright enforcement dragnets in the past. For example, earlier this year blogger Michelle Malkin's video about rapper Akon was erroneously taken down from YouTube after Universal Music Group (UMG) claimed copyright infringement. In that case, two excerpts from Akon music videos were embedded in a longer commentary about the rap star. Although UMG ultimately admitted its mistake, automated content filtering raises the possibility that commentaries like this might be blocked preemptively in the future.

With cases like this one in mind, "Fair Use Principles for User-Generated Content" describes six steps that service providers and copyright owners should take to minimize damage to fair use during copyright enforcement efforts. One key principle is "three strikes before blocking" — verifying that the video matches the video of a copyrighted work, that the audio matches the audio of the same work, and that nearly all of the clip is comprised of that single work. In addition, if a video is blocked by a content filter, the creator should be given an opportunity to dispute the filter's determination.

Six Steps to Digital Copyright Sanity: Reforming a Pre-VCR Law for a YouTube World

Gigi B. Sohn, Public Knowledge President, has released the text of her speech to the New Media and the Marketplace of Ideas Conference Boston University College of Communication titled "Six Steps to Digital Copyright Sanity: Reforming a Pre-VCR Law for a YouTube World."

Canadian Public Domain Music Score Site Forced to Remove All Scores

The International Music Score Library Project, which offered music scores that were in the public domain in Canada, has been forced to remove all scores because it can not afford to comply with the terms of a second cease and desist letter from Universal Edition. The publisher's letter indicated that some scores were still under copyright in Europe, where the term of protection is 20 years longer than in Canada, and that some unidentified works were still under Canadian copyright.

The IMSLP Website remains, but it now consists only of a lengthy open letter and discussion forums.

Michael Geist, Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-commerce Law at the University of Ottawa, commented in a posting on the case:

In this particular case, UE demanded that the site use IP addresses to filter out non-Canadian users, arguing that failing to do so infringes both European and Canadian copyright law. It is hard to see how this is true given that the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that sites such as IMSLP are entitled to presume that they are being used in a lawful manner and therefore would not rise to the level of authorizing infringement. The site was operating lawfully in Canada and there is no positive obligation in the law to block out non-Canadians.

As for a European infringement, if UE is correct, then the public domain becomes an offline concept, since posting works online would immediately result in the longest single copyright term applying on a global basis. That can't possibly be right. Canada has chosen a copyright term that complies with its international obligations and attempts to import longer terms – as is the case here – should not only be rejected but treated as copyright misuse.

Major Internet and Media Companies Sign Off on Agreement about Third-Party Copyrighted Materials in User-Generated Content

Major Internet and media companies, including CBS, Dailymotion, Fox, Microsoft, NBC Universal, Viacom, and Walt Disney, have agreed to abide by a new set of principles (User Generated Content Principles) for detecting and regulating the use of third-party copyrighted materials in user-generated content.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

The principles, which are attached and available in full at www.ugcprinciples.com, call for a broad range of constructive and cooperative efforts by copyright owners and UGC services. They include:

Implementation of state of the art filtering technology with the goal to eliminate infringing content on UGC services, including blocking infringing uploads before they are made available to the public;

Upgrading technology when commercially reasonable;

Cooperating to ensure that the technology is implemented in a manner that effectively balances legitimate interests, including fair use;

Cooperation in developing procedures for promptly addressing claims that content was blocked in error;

Regularly using the technology to remove infringing content that was uploaded before the technology could block it;

Identification and removal of links to sites that are clearly dedicated to, and predominantly used for, the dissemination of infringing content; and,

Promotion of content-rich, infringement-free services by continuing to cooperatively test new technologies and by collaboratively updating these principles as appropriate to keep current with evolving developments.

The RIAA Sues Usenet.Com

The RIAA has sued Usenet.Com, a Usenet service provider. Usenet.Com offers SSH access with its Secure-Tunnel option from SecureTunnel.com, and indicates that it does not log user activity.

There are a wide variety of Usenet service providers, including universities and colleges.

Here's an excerpt from Usenet.Com's Mp3 Newsgroups Page:

Today’s hottest way of sharing MP3 files over the Internet is Usenet; forget about all the peer-to-peer software applications, which quickly become outdated. . . . MP3 Newsgroups are the ultimate way of sharing as they are well organized and allow the users to find what they are looking for quickly and effortlessly.

The Jammie Thomas Appeal and More Follow-up

Jammie Thomas has filed a notice of appeal to the Capitol Records v. Jammie Thomas verdict based on the premise that the statutory damages awarded were excessively large and constitute punitive damages. Thomas would like to have a new trial or to have the damages to be adjusted to $151.20 from $222,000.

Here's an excerpt from the motion reported in "Appeal in RIAA Case to Focus on 'Unconstitutionally Excessive' Punishment":

"In the instant matter, defendant Thomas urges the Court to consider the statutory damages to be tantamount to an award of punitive damages, since it is based not upon plaintiffs' losses, but rather defendant's conduct," concludes the motion. "Whether the Court recognizes actual damages of zero dollars, $20 or whatever figure plaintiffs suggest is a fair measure of their actual damages for the 24 subject recordings, the ratio of actual damages to the award is not only astronomical, it is offensive to our Constitution and offensive generally."

Further coverage of the motion is available in "RIAA Says Thomas Shirking $222,000 Payoff" and "RIAA's $222,000 Defendant Asks for a New Trial."

Here's further commentary on the verdict:

A Capitol Records v. Jammie Thomas Juror Speaks Out and More Verdict Reactions

Michael Hegg, a steelworker who served on the Capitol Records v. Jammie Thomas jury, has revealed what went on in the deliberations in "RIAA Juror: 'We Wanted to Send a Message'."

Here are more verdict reactions and follow-ups:

P2P Users Who Don't Use Blocklists Can Be Tracked by Media Companies

A study by Anirban Banerjee, Michalis Faloutsos and Laxmi N. Bhuyan ("P2P:Is Big Brother Watching You?") has shown that peer-to-peer file sharing users who do not employ blocklists can be tracked by media companies or their agents.

Here's an excerpt from the paper:

A naive user is practically guaranteed to be tracked: we observe that 100% of our peers run into blocklisted users. In fact, 12% to 17% of all distinct IPs contacted by a peer are blocklisted ranges. Interestingly, a little caution can have significant effect: the top five most prevalent blocklisted IPs contribute to nearly 94% of all blocklisted IPs we ran into. Using this information users can reduce their chances of being tracked to just about 1%.

Source: Anderson, Nate. "P2P Researchers: Use a Blocklist or You Will Be Tracked. . . 100% of the Time." Ars Technica, 10 October 2007.

The Capitol Records v. Jammie Thomas Appeal and Further Reactions to the Verdict

Jammie Thomas will appeal the Capitol Records v. Jammie Thomas verdict. More on this and further reactions to the case in the articles and posts below:

EDUCAUSE Urgent Call to Action on McKeon-Keller Bill’s File Sharing Provisions

You might recall that back in July, EDUCAUSE issued an urgent call to action about a file sharing amendment that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid intended to make to the Higher Education Reauthorization Act.

It's déjà vu all over again. Virtually the same proposal has been incorporated into Rep. Howard P. McKeon and Rep. Ric Keller's College Access and Opportunity Act of 2007, and EDUCAUSE has again issued an urgent call to action. Get the details at EDUCAUSE's P2P or File Sharing page.

Also read "A Controversial Antipiracy Measure Re-emerges." Here's an excerpt:

Like Mr. Reid’s amendment, the House proposal calls on the U.S. secretary of education to identify the 25 institutions that received the most notices identifying cases of copyright infringement of both music and movies. The colleges appearing on those lists would then be required to devise “a plan for implementing a technology-based deterrent” to illegal file swapping.

Source: Read, Brock. "A Controversial Antipiracy Measure Re-emerges." The Wired Campus, 8 October 2007.