Sooner or later in this discussion, someone will raise their hand and say, “But copyright is FALSE! It is not FAIR that it is forbidden to duplicate CDs and copy music! The law should be changed! I am just one person in a long line of people who engage in civil disobedience to change an unjust law. I`m a modern-day Rosa Parks – she thought segregation was wrong, so she broke the law by not giving in. She started a movement that brought about great change. This is my motivation to “rip” CDs and “share” tracks. Rosa Parks and I – we`re making changes! MR. FISHER: You know, the bottom line here is that the record industry continues to use the courts as its primary arena in its fight to protect the business model of its industry. It`s a business model that, like all the old media, is collapsing. It is a real struggle, a real struggle for the future. And yet, instead of innovating, they pursue students and others with legal things. The article noted that the RIAA`s case against Arizona-based Jeffrey Howell refers to Howell`s copies of his legally acquired music as “unauthorized copies.” This view seems to echo statements made by Sony executive Jennifer Pariser during Jammie Thomas` file-sharing trial, in which she described the act of making a copy for personal use as “a nice way of saying you just have to steal a copy.” The article cited the RIAA website as follows: In other words, “We believe that making copies for personal use is illegal, we simply haven`t prosecuted anyone for it.” MR. SHERMAN: But not a single case has ever been raised by someone to do the kinds of things you`re talking about. We cannot speak for all copyright holders and say whether it is legal or illegal, and it will vary from case to case anyway. Well, that`s an argument.
But I think it`s a bit of an exaggeration to equate the justification of people stealing property, infringing copyright, and depriving artists of their just rights in terms of royalties and revenue with Rosa Parks protesting an unjust law that violates their civil rights. Rosa Parks called for justice on the basis of HIGHER laws: the country`s founding document, the Declaration of Independence, which declared, “All men are created equal,” and the Bible, which says, “All are equal in the sight of God.” Kazaa and those who illegally “share” files by promoting theft, on the other hand, seem to invoke LOWER laws: the laws of selfishness, “me first”, “who cares about the rights of others”. In addition, “there is no legal right” to copy copyrighted music from a CD to a CD-R. But burning a copy of a CD to a CD-R or transferring a copy to a computer hard drive or portable music player will generally not raise any concerns as long as the copy is made from an authorized original CD that you legally own and the copy is for your personal use only. “I couldn`t believe it when I read this,” said Ray Beckerman, a New York lawyer representing six clients sued by the RIAA. “The basic principle of the law is that you have to distribute actual physical copies to be guilty of copyright infringement. But lately, the industry has stated that even a personal copy on your computer is a violation. “Copyright protects the value of creative work. If you make unauthorized copies of someone`s creative work, you are taking something valuable from the owner without their permission. Most likely, you`ve seen that the FBI warned against unauthorized copying at the beginning of a movie DVD. While you may not find these messages on every CD or music you`ve downloaded from the Internet, the same laws apply. Federal law provides severe civil and criminal penalties for unauthorized reproduction, distribution, rental or digital transmission of copyrighted sound recordings.
(Title 17, United States Code, Sections 501 and 506). MR. SHERMAN: No, it`s not in the prosecution at all. If you read the sentence, you specifically omitted to put it in the shared folder, which made it illegal. And this, by the way, has been commented on by many blogs. What`s interesting is that we certainly have our critics in the blogosphere. MR. SHERMAN: Well, the problem is that the story is simply false. First of all, we have not taken the position that ripping CDs to your computer or digital music player like an iPod is illegal. This case concerned illegal downloading.
This is one of many typical cases we`ve raised against downloaders and downloaders on Kazaa, a peer-to-peer file-sharing service. And the problem is where the defendant infringed our copyright when he placed the music files in the shared folder that allows millions of other people on the network to download the music. Professional musicians who make a living from releases or recordings should receive the contribution due to them. They get it by investing their own hard-earned money in releasing their music in various formats that people can buy. If others photocopy it, record it or “share” it (there is still this “beautiful” word…) and then distribute it freely or for their own profit, it is, quite simply, false, false. And evil is always false, no matter what they say. Nevertheless, there is a newspaper article that says that we are looking at it. And CNN picked up this story, TV networks all over the country, blogs, everybody thinks we`re suing people for copying, for copying CDs to their computers. It`s really unfortunate. This misleads consumers and is simply not true. And, you know, it`s a very complicated issue, these copyright issues, and you expect you to try to get expert advice to make sure you`ve done it right.
Unfortunately, the only expert opinion I saw cited in the article came from a lawyer who specializes in defending the people we prosecuted for this peer-to-peer file sharing. He even runs a blog site called The People – The RIAA vs. the People. That said, there is something more. If you are a person who illegally copies music – recorded or printed – and your conscience begins to bother you, there is something you can do. Perhaps you are beginning to realize that the protection of concrete and intellectual property is an important issue. You may see that copyright is a law like any other that must be enforced in order to maintain a just society. You can see that if the problem is customized, and you start to see that ripping a CD is no different than putting your hand in my wallet (or a cash register at your local CD store) and pulling out $15.00, you feel a little uncomfortable.
