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Bearshare Shut Down by RIAA
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Sat May 06, 2006 01:53 PM
from the another-one-bites-the-dust dept.
from the another-one-bites-the-dust dept.
Pichu0102 writes "According to WebProNews, Bearshare has been shut down by the RIAA." From the article: " Online file-sharing service BearShare, along with operators Free Peers Inc., is packing it up due to a $30 million settlement with the recording industry. The conditions of the settlement were agreed to by the P2P company to avoid further copyright infringement litigation."
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lol (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:lol (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:lol (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:lol (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:lol (Score:3, Informative)
Don't know is this a reason to laugh.
But gnutella network? not even g2? cry....
And in other news..... (Score:2, Funny)
so what you're saying is... (Score:4, Funny)
Why spare the big fish? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Why spare the big fish? (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re:Why spare the big fish? (Score:4, Informative)
The very first drop down box is: Date/Time Format
You can change that &
and if you do a quick search, you'll find references to 2006 in the thread.
Parent
Sometimes /. freaks me out (Score:4, Funny)
- 38 noting you can change date/time format in preferences
- 2 how-to's on doing it.
- 1 freak who actually checked all Feb 22 back to 1995.
- 3 Y2K jokes (I actually laughed at the first one)
- 4 clueless people that wouldn't read any Informative's but still complain about the damn thing
- The other 29 are just ranting about SlashCode
Yeah. It damn feels like home.Parent
Re:Why spare the big fish? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Why spare the big fish? (Score:5, Interesting)
I imagine they see it as being more worthwhile to their cause to moniter these networks and sue users than shut them down and risk a more secure/anonymous service replacing them.
Be very careful what servers you allow your client to connect to; always doublecheck who owns them and their corresponding nameservers.
Parent
Re:Why spare the big fish? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Why spare the big fish? (Score:5, Informative)
Anyways, shutting down these businesses won't actually kill their networks. I can't think of any networks that are centralized like Napster used to be.
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Re:Why spare the big fish? (Score:5, Interesting)
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So ... (Score:5, Funny)
WebProNews (Score:5, Funny)
Re:WebProNews (Score:3, Funny)
AC/DC: "Dirty deeds, done with sheep..."
RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:4, Insightful)
But in fact, what they are doing is a new style of Robber Baron practice.
We need a new Teddy Roosevelt.
Re:RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:5, Informative)
Having Supreme Court Justicies like Ruth Bader Ginsburg [wikipedia.org] doesn't help. She and her mother are outspoken attorneys in favor of unlimited IP rights and unlimited congressional powers. Remember kids, if you extend a law for 50 years every 10 years, ad infinitum, that's not "unlimited"!
Now we're seeing things like the JRMI Model Train SDK [sourceforge.net] project getting sued [lwn.net] (1/2 pg. down) for $300,000.00 for infringing patents. The impact of this kind of suit on small software developers, whether free or closed, will be devastating.
And the DMCA [lwn.net] getting new provisions that treat IP violations like drug crimes...forfiture of property! That's right, if little Bobby downloads a song from the internet, the RIAA can seize your house, car, property, etc.
Yay America! The land of freedom and liberty!
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Re:RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:5, Insightful)
No, what we have now is a classic black market situation. With the price of the goods controlled at artificially high levels through taxation or regulation there will always be an underground trade in the goods in question, whether it be in alcohol, drugs or music. There is really no way to prevent it unless you find a strong technological countermeasure.
Parent
Your view depends on your goals. (Score:5, Insightful)
You have completely missunderstood the purpose of copyright and give undue importance to all the wrong things. If the goal of copyright is to make money for publishers, your reasoning is correct. If the goal of copyright is to "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries" [archives.gov], you are wrong. The original term of US copyrights was 14 years, despite the tremendous cost of publishing at the time. The goal is to spread information and culture, not to make sure a bunch of greedheads have money. As the cost of that spread declines, the time required to recoup costs diminishes and vanishes. The spirit of America is that you are free to do what you want but no one owes you a living. Exclusive franchises were hated then and should be today.
The RIAA are demanding government protection from legitimate competitors and a defacto control of culture. If you don't understand this, you don't understand how the music industry works. It's not so much your ability to get music that matters to them, it's their inability to control what you are exposed to that scares them to death. They seek to perpetuate an empire of control based on the technical limitations of 20th century broadcast and recording technology and a great deal of racketeering. Without RIAA only stores, selling junk sampled on the nations three radio networks, the world's big three music publishers start to look as good or worse than any other music publisher. Musicians and artists would then be able to market themselves freely and keep more of their earnings and the industry would collapse. Make no mistake at the level of control they seek with DRM and broadcast flags. They want the ability to limit what you are exposed to and are willing to pay for and then to squeeze you for every play while paying the artist next to nothing. The riches they earn are based on exclusion and extortion, not on the promotion of excellence and that directly contradicts the purpose of copyright.
In a world of cheap publishing there should be as many publishers as there are artists. Why not? Anyone can set up a web page. There's no longer a technical reason to reject any manuscript and not offer it to the public. The previous legitimate purpose of publishers, to chose and promote excellence, has been also co-opted by web. Copyright laws, based on paper and mechanical copy are insanely restrictive and obsolete.
Parent
Re:Your view depends on your goals. (Score:4, Interesting)
Diminishes, perhaps. But it will never vanish, because you have to take into account the cost of production as well as the cost of distribution. Music and movies and books do not spring into existence fully formed: somebody needs to sit down and expend a considerable amount of time and effort -- and hence money -- creating them.
Limited copyright is essential as a means of enabling them to recoup that. The GP's point is that as the cost of copying diminishes, it becomes easier and easier for society to say "I like that song, but I can copy it for free, so I don't have to pay you for it." And at that point, the incentive to write another great song is gone... and society is the poorer.
Therefore, as the cost of copying diminishes, it becomes necessary either to enforce copyright law more strictly, or to find another means of compensating artists for their work. Right now, however, copyright is the best means we've found to compensate artists. It's not perfect, any more than capitalism and democracy are perfect; it's just that all the other systems anyone's ever proposed are even worse. If you have a better idea, of course, do pray share it with us.
The spirit of America is that you are free to do what you want but no one owes you a living.
Nobody owes you one, sure. But if society doesn't allow you to make a living doing something, you aren't going to do it. So you could say that society owes it to itself to provide artists with a living...
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Re:Your view depends on your goals. (Score:4, Insightful)
No it's not and it's only part of the problem. The current system does not pay artists [jdray.com]. Exclusive franchises never pay anyone but themselves and they are entirely clueless [salon.com]. People have been making, sharing and profiting from music long before mass production and insane copyright laws. They will continue to do so. These guys [wikipedia.org] figured out how to make plenty of money and let people share their music a long time ago. You make money doing things for people. The music industry does very little of that but keeps the rewards for itself. Copyright is only one of their tools. Creative Commons [creativecommons.org] is trying to pull something useful from copyright laws. You can be sure they are on the RIAA hit list.
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Re:RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:5, Insightful)
You hit the nail on the head - back when the social compact of copyright was created - we, the people, did not give up much on our end of the bargain. Since, as you said, it wasn't easy to make copies back then, so giving up the inherent natural right to make copies was no big deal.
Now that copying is easy for anyone and everyone, that bargain is no longer so favorable to us, the people and we want to renegotiate.
The problem is, the entrenched copyright cartel thinks they don't have to renegotiate, that they can just dictate terms. That is a severe denial of reality on their part.
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Re:RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:4, Insightful)
Putting more precision on it, the effect is to make copyright less enforceable and proportionally more expensive to society at large.
An unenforceable law is a plague and a cancer. It spreads fear and encourages contempt for the law. Attempts to enforce an unenforceable law lead to the DMCA, the War on Drugs Used By Nonwhite People, and the like.
The burden of copyright didn't show up when you needed a press more expensive than a house to publish a book. Suppose it's 1940 and suppose I don't know the real numbers so I gasify that a book costs $2 to print and $.05 in royalties. The royalties don't stop publication. Fast forward to now. What does it cost to move an ebook from New York to Los Angeles? Unmeasurable. What happens when someone demands a fifty-cent royalty? That poor ebook probably doesn't get out on the Internet.
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Re:RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:3, Insightful)
The high prices that the products were sold by then were justified - it was an ethical profit on top of the cost. However it is not now. The prices are the same, but the cost is too little.
Its no logic to propose 'it is free market, if you choose so you buy it if not you do not, and invisible hand adjusts the prices' - no !
Its free market when the market is free. And with the publishers, RIAA, their money greedy extravagantly living 'artists', and their purchased sen
a new Teddy Roosevelt (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:3, Insightful)
The RIAA (unlike, say, Standard Oil back in the day, etc) is just a trade association, acting on behalf of its member companies, who in turn act on behalf of the people who hired them to handle a portion of their business affairs: the artists who want to publish their music and get paid for it. Your "robber barons" are Bono, KT Tunstall, Celine Dion, Slipknot, 50 Cent, and every other artist that uses an RIAA-member company to deal with the money side of their publish
Re:RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes.
Because that trade association is comprised of approximately 5 large companies that together account for over 90% of the market for all media in the western, and most of the eastern, world.
That makes them an oligopoly, who is just as cut-throat and abusive as his neighbor, monopoly.
It's up to the musician to decide if they agree with you, and want to give their work away, or sell it through a different pricing model?
That's tantamount to asking if it is up to Boeing and Airbus to decide if they agree with gravity and want to make planes that work with gravity or if they should purchase a law that makes gravity illegal instead.
It is human nature to make copies of stuff we like. People have been making mix-tapes since they first invented reel-to-reel recorders and people have been making copies of books since pen and ink were first invented.
Now that the tools to make millions of digital copies for effectively no cost at all are in the hands of hundreds of millions of people, trying to outlaw human nature's desire to copy is like outlawing gravity.
These artists need to realize that the market has changed if they don't figure out how to change with it, the new gravity is going to crush them. Just like any other business that has had to deal with revolutionary changes in technology. Keep making buggy-whips and try to outlaw cars, or start building engines instead - their choice.
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Re:RIAA = New entourage of robber barons (Score:3, Interesting)
Indeed !
The difference in formation/nature of an organisation from another is not much important, if the two entit
Why I'm not afraid of the RIAA (Score:4, Insightful)
I first learned about BearShare and LimeWire aroud the same time. Mid-2000 if memory serves. Napster had recently "gone down" and I was still in the middle of my "wow- I missed 100's of years worth of awesome music" phase.
Ok, so here come the "RIAA is evil" rants. I can accept that (after all, this is /.). However, please consider:
One of the major anti-RIAA arguments around these parts is that they don't actually do anything to benefit anyone. I agree 100%. But that said, how can we cry over a company which made ad revenues based on pirated content? Scum versus scam: who cares who wins? We are the losers.
In six years, I could have downloaded more music than I will ever have the time to listen to. Long before BearShare went down, tons of new p2p services appeared. The RIAA can keep playing "whack-a-mole" for the next 100 years (and I'm sure they intend to) but "Joe User" will *still* be "illegally" downloading and sharing the "Black album" no matter how many times the drummer of Metallica cries about it.
Re:Why I'm not afraid of the RIAA (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Why I'm not afraid of the RIAA (Score:5, Insightful)
No they can't but when nearly everyone is guilty of something, then they can selectively enforce the laws on those they dislike. Cause enough trouble and the law will be enforced, just for you.
Best fight the new laws every which way you can. That said though, you do have a good point. A law is what certain people think. It isn't something you have to obey.
Parent
Re:Why I'm not afraid of the RIAA (Score:5, Insightful)
No, my friend, you would have to pay a large retainer up front. Very large. And chances are, you would not see anything from any of that. Technically, you could win your case, but you will ultimately lose money. Yes, the system is screwed up and unfair, and the **AA knows that. Unfortunately, they are smart, and that's why they use these tactics.
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Good ridance to the malware! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Good ridance to the malware! (Score:4, Informative)
BTW, I haven't RTFA but BearShare is still alive and kicking [bearshare.com] and you can even still download the installer [bearshare.com]. As long as people still have the client, the RIAA hasn't "shut down" anything.
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Never Never Never give up ..... (Score:3, Insightful)
It is the same with the RIAA. These and DEA "folks" will keep on busting some high profile targets, but the iceberg like underground trading will forever go on
It has always been like this, and will be, even if the "boston strangler" steps in
Actually it's easy to stop this illegality (Score:3, Insightful)
A valuable lesson (Score:3, Insightful)
Nice work... (Score:3, Insightful)
New Business Plan... (Score:3, Funny)
Keep this one in mind kids, it's not everyday you get a 4-step solution to easy money with all 4 steps included :)
Re:New Business Plan... (Score:3, Informative)
3. Pay $30M to prevent further copyright infringement lawsuits.
4. Loss.
Although step 4 could be profit if can you manage to clear more than your settlement in subscription fees, ad revenue and then selling on the personal details of your subscribers once all other operating expenses are taken into account. That probably didn't happen here though, and is unlikely to happen to the next "business" to try using this
Not in fact true (Score:3, Interesting)
Uh oh, not Yogi Bearshare! (Score:3, Funny)
Yogi Bearshare "Of course, Bonzi Buddy, how else can I afford to keep buying Picnic Baskets full of food? All I have to do is help people pirate music files and show advertising in their faces as they use my malware designed application."
Bonzi Buddy "But Yogi, Ranger RIAA won't like it."
Yogi Bearshare "Forget the Ranger, Bonzi Buddy, we are going to make a fortune."
Spiney Shyster "Excuse me, are you Yogi Bearshare?"
Yogi Bearshare "Of course, are you an advertiser who wants to advertise on my P2P file sharing network?"
Bonzi Buddy "Uh oh, I don't like the sound of this Yogi."
Yogi Bearshare "Nonsense, Bonzi Buddy, so whadda ya want Mack?"
Spiney Shyster "Here is a subpeona to appear in court, Ranger RIAA is suing you for $30 Million."
Re:Is it centralized? (Score:5, Insightful)
If the management of the RIAA's member companies were to take a long, hard look at what the RIAA has actually accomplished (e.g., alienated the customer base, eliminated profitable new recording technologies, and given the whole business a black eye, PR-wise) they might begin to wonder about the RIAA's relevance to the modern world. Although, in truth, companies like Sony have management that is just as sleazy, and are perfectly capable of alienating customers without the RIAA's dubious assistance.
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Given the spyware and malware... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Someone ought to see Xerox (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Artists shouldn't surrender rights (Score:3, Interesting)
Music is just the vessel. If something else would have to be done to get the big bucks, they'd do that instead.