Over at NewTeeVee there’s an interesting post by Jackson on the struggle that the MPAA et al have had coming up with a specification for allowing you to make “managed copies” of your purchased content. Of course, the fact that each successive specification is cracked within weeks of its drafting would deter the efforts of any organization compelled by logic and customer responsiveness, but this is the MPAA we’re talking about.

The problem is that the RIAA/MPAA cabal have effectively tied their own hands, by petitioning the supreme court in their fruitless pursuit of Peer-to-Peer networks for a judgment. They may have, way back in 2005, gotten more than they bargained for when Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter said:

“We hold that one who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, is liable for the resulting acts of infringement by third parties.”

Oops. Now the MPAA and electronics manufacturers, under such a sweeping definition, could themselves become liable for the copying and redistribution of material. In fact, they can’t produce a standard which they know has been haxx0red and unleash it on the market.

And as EFF’s Susan Crawford has pointed out, they’re in league with even the network carriers to take us all backward in time. In draft language, the FCC is asserting that it:

(a) has authority to adopt such regulations governing digital audio broadcast transmissions and digital audio receiving devices that are appropriate to control the unauthorized copying and redistribution of digital audio content by or over digital reception devices, related equipment, and digital networks, including regulations governing permissible copying and redistribution of such audio content….

This means that they will be ceaselessly back to the drawing board perfecting easily-hacked technologies, and layering their media with difficult to use interfaces, handshakes, and protocols (as I found out when I had my my run-in with HDCP). The result is that media coming through official retail channels such as Best Buy or the iTunes Music Store that you try to watch on your PVR or HD-DVD player will be more difficult to view and manipulate than the DIVX-encoded material you download by fiddling with a BitTorrent client.

P2P has traditionally existed aside from the mainstream by nature of the fact that it’s a fairly high-friction model for obtaining and viewing digital content. You might not have the right CODEC libraries to view your favourite British TV show, or you might have trouble configuring your linksys router so that all the P2P traffic passes through to the right computer in your house optimally, as examples.

Traditional media (DVDs, Cable TV, etc.) have always dominated the mainstream because they’ve been easy to handle, easy to watch, and of course easy to get. For some of us, that convenience in itself is the primary value of such media, and why lots of us still buy stuff at Best Buy even when we can and do also use file sharing networks like eDonkey.

But imagine if the stuff you bought at Best Buy no longer worked together without Herculean effort. Imagine if the HD-DVD you brought home or the Streamed HD Movie you paid for on your PVR were hobbled by characteristics that made them hard to use. Furthermore, ask yourself why, after ten years of Pay-Per-View Movies, we still have video rental stores?

The answer is the consumer market’s innate resistance to difficulty, and our desire to not have the means in which we consume information dictated by the CEO of some sandbagged, heretofore unknown, media company.

When the media companies set the barriers higher and higher for consuming their material the old-fashioned way, they’re practically begging the mainstream, using the Internet, to route right around them. When they make us all experts in HDCP handshaking, HDMI systems integration, and the finer nuances of Dolby versus DTS Surround Sound, they lower the barriers to grabbing and viewing our entertainment and information on that most dreaded of all platforms: the computer, and the internet.

And despite 20 solid years of effort, media companies have been profoundly unsuccessful in combating what we do on our computers once we get their stuff in our hands. And even with a Bush government, the DMCA, and legions of lawyers they have had little concrete impact except to increase the friction and lower the value of the mainstream consumer media.

I can see this through to its logical conclusion. Computers, software, and the internet will increasingly transact our consumption of movies, music, and what we will one day say we used to call “TV shows”. The big media distribution companies will increasingly become unnecessary, and will have cut themselves out of the action.

And in my view, they’d deserve it.

-Ian.

Consumers strike back, sue RIAA By Liane Cassavoy, PC World.com September 12, 2003 9:35 am ET

After taking its antipiracy campaign to court, the music industry is finding itself on the receiving end of a lawsuit that challenges its purported amnesty program as a fraudulent business practice.

The Recording Industry Association of America Inc. announced its Clean Slate program Monday, when it filed suit against 261 people for copyright infringement as a result of excessive use of peer-to-peer services. The Clean Slate program purports to offer amnesty to repentant file-swappers who promise to stop using peer-to-peer services to illegally download copyrighted works and to destroy any copies of downloaded audio files.

To qualify for the amnesty program, applicants must fill out a sworn affidavit that requires a full name, address, telephone number and e-mail address, have it notarized, and send it to the RIAA. In turn, the RIAA agrees not to “support or assist in any copyright infringement suits based on past conduct,” according to the organization.

But the offer is neither clean nor a sweep, says Ira Rothken, the Marin County attorney who filed the consumer lawsuit Tuesday in California Superior Court.

Not the RIAA’s Call?

The RIAA claims the amnesty program “would provide people with a clean slate, but after a further reading of the legal documents, it became apparent that this Clean Slate program didn’t provide any such thing,” Rothken says.

“The legal document provides no release of claims, no promise not to sue you. It offers no promise to actually clean the slate by destroying the data that these people provide,” he adds. “All it says is that the RIAA simply will not cooperate in any lawsuit brought against you. That on its face is a deceptive business practice.”

And the offer is deceptive because the RIAA does not own the copyrights in question, Rothken says. The music labels — RIAA members — are the plaintiffs, he says. But because the RIAA is leading the charge, people think the RIAA has the power to promise not to sue them, when it doesn’t, Rothken says.

“Any of the RIAA’s members could file suit against these individuals who have participated in the Clean Slate program, and subpoena the information they need from the RIAA about this person’s guilt,” Rothken says. “So, in the end, the person who supplies all this information to the Clean Slate program will have a dirtier slate than they would have if they never participated.”

RIAA Stands Firm

The RIAA disputes this interpretation, saying the affidavit form, which is available on MusicUnited, is not deceptive.

“Read the form, it’s pretty clear what’s being offered and who’s offering it,” says Jonathan Lamy, an RIAA spokesperson.

“Apparently no good deed goes unpunished,” Lamy adds of the criticism. “It’s also unfortunate and ironic that some lawyer would try to prevent others from getting the assurance that they want, that they won’t be sued.”

Rothken’s law firm is not the first organization to warn people about potential danger in the RIAA’s amnesty program. Last week, before the RIAA formally announced its plan, the digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation warned users against accepting the RIAA’s amnesty offer.

“Stepping into the spotlight to admit your guilt is probably not a sensible course for most people sharing music files online, especially since the RIAA doesn’t control many potential sources of lawsuits,” Wendy Seltzer, EFF staff attorney, said in a statement last week.

Murky Music

Cary Sherman, the RIAA’s president, addressed these concerns Monday when announcing the copyright crackdown and amnesty deal. He rebutted suggestions that participating in the Clean Slate program could prove costly.

“We have pledged to keep this information solely for our use, for our records of people who should not be sued,” Sherman said. He said the RIAA would not release the data to copyright holders who might intend to sue.

Unconvinced, Rothken went a step further than simply warning consumers about the program’s potential pitfalls and filed a complaint under the California Business and Professions Code. His lawsuit asks the court to end the RIAA’s program as “unlawful, unfair, and deceptive.” The RIAA’s “guarantee not to sue file sharers” is designed to mislead the public into incriminating themselves by giving the RIAA “admissions of wrong-doing.”

The RIAA’s intentions remain unclear, says Deborah Peckham, a partner in the Patent and Intellectual Property Practice Group at Testa, Hurwitz & Thibeault in Boston.

“It’s really too soon to say whether these people are putting themselves at risk by participating in this program, but the allegations made in (Rothken’s lawsuit) are not without some merit,” Peckham says. “In essence, what the RIAA is doing apparently is collecting these affidavits and storing the information somewhere. The concern is that that information is going to be spread among the music companies, and there’s nothing in the agreement that would bar those companies from suing the users.”

Peckham has reviewed some of the suits filed Monday, and confirms that the RIAA is not named as plaintiff in any she has seen.

California’s Standards

Rothken’s complaint cites California law that says fraud may exist not only if a consumer is injured by the business practice in question, but if there is the potential for injury.

“The only standard is that the business practice in question is likely to deceive reasonable members of the general public,” Rothken says.

This law also allows one citizen to be named as a plaintiff to represent the general population. In this lawsuit, that citizen is Eric Parke, a former paralegal who has not used peer-to-peer networks to download music illegally, according to Rothken.

“In California, our law allows people who are unaffected by the business practice in question, people who would not have traditional standing to sue, to serve as the plaintiff,” he says. One reason for this, Rothken says, is that people who stand up against large organizations could be retaliated against, and may be unwilling to come forward.

The lawsuit now goes to the California Superior Court, but Rothken cannot guess when the case might be heard. He does expect the court will insist that the RIAA make good any amnesty offer.

“The court will likely tell the RIAA that if they’re going to promise amnesty and a clean slate, then you have to do something that delivers on that promise; for example, you have to offer a release of all claims. Or, if you can’t do that, you have to stop the promise, don’t call it amnesty,” Rothken says. “It’s likely the RIAA will have to admit that they don’t have the authority to release all claims, because they don’t have the power to stop these lawsuits, because they don’t own the copyrights.”

The RIAA attacked the Peer-To-Peer networks as supposed havens for Kiddie Porn, including a slickly-produced video showing how easy it is to find naked Britney Spears and Pokemon characters on Kazaa.

Clearly they’re increasingly nervous about the state of the playing field with regard to their own case against music pirates, and are attempting to delevel the playing field by making a full-court press against all of the illicit sins of Peer-To-Peer technology.

Kiddie Porn is the greatest thing ever invented for politicians — it’s an issue that no rational person can side against, and therefore allows blowhard politicians to stand atop the mount and pound desks and tables and get all red in the face without fear of retribution. Let’s see one of those lazy pricks take such a strong stand against Tobacco, Poor Education, or Child Poverty.

The reality is that there are a lot more starving, nicotine-addicted kids with no education out there than there are victims of grainy secret photo sessions.

-Ian.

PS – The RIAA is REALLY pissing me off.

Give people choice and freedom and they’ll pay. Try to sue your own frickin’ customers into oblivion and we’ll see you in bankruptcy.

-Ian.

—— http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/washpost/20030909/ tc_washpost/a47297_2003sep9&e=1 RIAA vs. the People Tue Sep 9,11:06 AM ET

By Cynthia L. Webb, washingtonpost.com Staff Writer

The Recording Industry Association of America ( news -web sites )made good on its promise to prosecute Americans who engage in the illegal downloading and trading of pirated music, filing 261 copyright violation suits yesterday.

“Legal actions have been taken on a sporadic basis against operators of pirate servers or sites, but ordinary computer users have never before been at serious risk of liability for widespread behavior. The RIAA said that’s the point it’s underlining with the unprecedented legal action,” CNET’s News.com reported.

But in an editorial today, the San Jose Mercury News said the RIAA’s legal campaign is bad policy: “Suing your customers, as a long-term strategy, is dumb — even if they bring misfortune upon themselves. … The suits are the unfortunate, but predictable response of an industry that failed to see the Internet until it stared it in the face. Since Napster ( news -web sites ) first appeared four years ago and declared the death of the compact disc, music CD sales have fallen more than 25 percent. A generation of music fans don’t think twice about copyrights, which they associate with overpriced CDs and parasitic studio execs.”

According to the Mercury News editorial board, the music labels “won’t win back many of those customers until they make their full catalog of tunes easily accessible over the Internet, in formats that people want, at prices they’re willing to pay. That’s starting to happen — Apple Computer ‘s iTunes Music Store and BuyMusic.com are offering songs from 49 cents to $1 — but the offerings are limited. The music studios are still dragging their feet. For now, the big labels hope to scare people straight, particularly parents, since copyright owners can sue children for theft.”

The New York Times pointed out an even larger implication of the RIAA suits: “With the club of lawsuits and the olive branch of an amnesty program, the music industry is waging a campaign against online piracy that relies on both public relations and economics to attack the idea that everything in cyberspace can be free,” the article said. “That will not be easy. The Internet sprang from a research culture where information of all kinds was freely shared. That mentality still resonates with the millions of Internet users who routinely download music onto their computers. But the emphatic message of the music industry’s two-step program announced yesterday is that the days of plucking copyrighted songs off the Internet without paying for them are numbered.”

An Escalating Fight Against Ordinary People

Thousands more lawsuits against fileswappers are expected in the coming months as the RIAA looks to make examples of the worst digital pirates: People accused of downloading and sharing on average more than 1,000 illegally downloaded songs, thanks to Gnutella ( news -web sites ),Kazaa ,Grokster and other popular file-trading services.

The Washington Post said the “legal offensive aims to stem the tide of online song sharing launched by Napster in the late 1990s, and it is likely to strike fear into the hearts of parents who have not closely monitored their teenagers’ computer habits. That’s because the lawsuits were filed against the holders of Internet service accounts, regardless of who in the household was responsible for swapping the songs.”

The Los Angeles Times said the “cases — the first of thousands the labels expect to file in federal courts — mark a turning point in the music industry’s four-year battle against rampant piracy on the Internet. For the first time, the recording industry is training its considerable legal firepower on individuals, not the companies profiting from the public’s hunger for free music,” The Los Angeles Times said. “One quirk in the process, though, is that the defendants named aren’t necessarily the people using file-sharing networks. That’s because the Recording Industry Assn. of America’s investigation identified only the people whose Internet access accounts were being used to share files. They might be the parents, roommates or spouses of the alleged pirates.”

The RIAA suits hit the young and old and stretched across economic lines too. Among those sued is the Bassett family from Northern California. ” Scott Bassett said neither he nor his wife used the family PC in Redwood City, Calif., for music, but their teenagers and dozens of their friends do. Had he known what was going on, he said, ‘I would have pulled the plug,'” The Los Angeles Times reported, quoting the former junkyard operator who, like other targets of the suits, was confused about what to do. “Do I really need to hire a lawyer? Can I just call them up and say I’m sorry and give them back all the music that was downloaded? I’m just a little guy,” Bassett told the paper.

The Bassetts were darlings of the media yesterday, appearing in a number of articles, perhaps since they illustrated so nicely the ironic twist of the suits, which can target people who own the ISP accounts, not necessarily the file-swappers themselves. “I can’t believe this,” Vonnie Bassett , mother of a 17-year-old file-swapper, told The San Jose Mercury News. “To think I might actually have to pay money to these people. I think it’s the stupidest thing that the recording industry would do this.”

Lisa Schamis , a 26-year-old New Yorker, “said her Internet provider warned her two months ago that record industry lawyers had asked for her name and address, but she said she had no idea she might be sued. She acknowledged downloading ‘lots’ of music over file-sharing networks,” the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. “This is ridiculous,” Schamis said. “People like me who did this, I didn’t understand it was illegal.” Neither did Nancy Davis , a Sanol, Calif. schoolbus driver. “From what I understood — and I’m not the most computer-savvy person in the world — I thought it was becoming legal,” Davis told The San Francisco Chronicle. “I’m completely shocked by the whole thing,” Heather McGough , a single mom of two children from Santa Clarita, Calif., told The Los Angeles Times. She “figured that the music-sharing services that survived after Napster was shut down must be legal. She said she let a friend install a program for the Kazaa file-sharing network on her computer so that she could listen to music — songs she already owned on CDs — while she worked.”

Paying the Piper

So what’s in store for those snared in the RIAA lawsuits? “The RIAA suits seek an injunction to stop the defendants’ file sharing, as well as damages and court costs. Copyright law allows for damages of up to $150,000 per infringement — in other words, per swapped song,” The Washington Post noted. More from The Boston Globe: “Accusing the defendants of copyright infringement, the music association is requesting statutory damages of $750 to $150,000 for each song, bringing the potential liability of some file-sharers into the millions of dollars.”

“Individuals, I’m sure no matter who they are, simply don’t have that kind of money,” Atlanta attorney Doug Isenberg , who specializes in Internet law, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “And there’s no way possible the RIAA can sue even a meaningful number of people, because there are tens of millions of potential defendants.”

Perhaps some good news for those being sued: The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that the “RIAA has been settling for less: Yesterday, it announced $3,000 agreements with fewer than 10 people whose Internet service providers had received subpoenas.”

RIAA President Cary Sherman told The Los Angeles Times “he would welcome cases going to trial because it would help establish for the public that file sharing is illegal. The proceeds from any trials or settlements will be kept by the RIAA to cover the cost of its anti-piracy campaigns, he said, rather than being used to compensate labels and artists. Several lawyers warned that the RIAA’s amnesty offer may be a bad deal. Those who apply for amnesty from the RIAA must confess their past transgressions, but that won’t protect them from being pursued by music publishers, independent labels or even federal prosecutors.” The RIAA is offering amnesty to those who admitted to file-swapping, erase their digital libraries of songs and sign a notarized promise not to do it again.

Criticism From the Usual Suspects

Critics of the RIAA’s move were vocal in their objections to yesterday’s developments. The Electronic Frontier Foundation clearly hates the idea of the lawsuits. “Does anyone think that suing 60 million American file-sharers is going to motivate them to buy more CDs?,” EFF Staff Attorney Wendy Seltzer asked in a statement . “File sharing networks represent the greatest library of music in history, and music fans would be happy to pay for access to it, if only the recording industry would let them.”

Bill Evans , founder of Boycott-RIAA.com , told The Baltimore Sun that the lawsuits amount to a witch hunt. “They are trying to intimidate people and to stop file-sharing because they can’t control it,” Evans said. “If that’s the case, we believe they should take over a portion of the market and make it more affordable to people.”

Elan Oren , chief executive of file-sharing site iMesh , told The New York Times that “rather than filing huge lawsuits, record labels should work with file-sharing services to devise a method of compensation in exchange for legally distributing their music over the peer-to-peer networks. But record companies say creating a compensation system for file sharing — for instance, imposing a tax that could be redistributed to copyright holders — would be extremely difficult.”

“Michael McGuire , research director at the GartnerG2 research firm, said the threat of legal action needs to be just one part of a more widespread effort by the recording industry to deal with illegal Internet music swapping,” The Chicago Tribune said. “Are hard-core traders going to see the light and see the error of their ways?” McGuire told the paper. “I don’t think so.”

RIAA Strategy Paying Off

The music industry’s tactics, while controversial, have made a dent to some file-swapping. “Still, there is little agreement about whether the industry’s tactics are having much impact on music piracy. The recording industry has cited data from research firm NPD Group that estimated the number of households downloading music from the Internet declined 28% to 10.4 million in June from 14.5 million in April, around the time music companies began publicizing a campaign to target individual file sharers. Music companies have also been trying to wean music fans off file-sharing programs by licensing their songs to commercial music sites like Apple Computer Inc.’s Music Store,” The Wall Street Journal reported. “But services like Morpheus, LimeWire and Grokster all report that usage of their services has grown, especially as students have returned from vacation.”

But the music industry has a long way to go before it stamps out piracy. “From the rise of Napster until today, tens of millions of people have started trading songs, movies and software online through services such as Kazaa with little thought for the legality of their actions,” News.com noted. “Even as the threat of Monday’s lawsuits loomed, more than 2.8 million copies of the Kazaa software were downloaded last week, according to Download.com , a software aggregation site operated by CNET News.com publisher CNET Networks . Indeed, a recent study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project found that 67 percent of people downloading music said they did not care whether the music was copyrighted or not.”

The Future of E-Music?

Apple’s iTunes is being held up as a successful, legal alternative to secret file-swapping. The pay-for-play service has been a hit with music fans and everyone from Sony to Microsoft is looking for a comparable match to compete with the service. Apple’s service has sold 10 million songs since its launch in May. “Legally selling 10 million songs online in just four months is a historic milestone for the music industry, musicians and music lovers everywhere,” Apple head Steve Jobs ( news -web sites )said, according to BBC News Online, which noted (how ironic, in light of the complications of the RIAA’s legal suits) that the 10 millionth song sold on the service was “Complicated,” by Avril Lavigne .

-Ian.

———-

Music Industry Ad Snipes at Downloaders 24 minutes ago Add Technology – Reuters Internet Report to My Yahoo!

By Michele Gershberg

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Music industry groups turned up the volume in their fight against song-swapping over the Internet on Thursday, warning Americans in a full-page newspaper advertisement that they could face legal action.

The advertisement is part of an aggressive initiative announced Wednesday by the Recording Industry Association of America (news – web sites), which said it plans to sue hundreds of individuals who illegally distribute copyrighted songs over the Internet.

The legal plans marked a sharp escalation in the battle against Internet piracy that until now had concentrated on shutting down the “peer-to-peer” services used for swapping.

Some experts said the group’s latest tactic will only alienate the general public.

“Next time you or your kids ‘share’ music on the Internet, you may also want to download a list of attorneys,” a bold print headline said in the advertisement in the New York Times, signed by 13 different music trade groups and associations.

The RIAA was a signatory to the Times ad, which argued that music can be bought online legally without harm to musicians.

“Stealing music over the Internet is no different than shoplifting CDs out of a record store,” the ad said. “It’s also a very public activity — meaning that offenders can easily be identified.”

More than 2.6 billion songs, movies and other files are copied over computer networks every month, according to industry estimates. Executives believe such trading has led to a 14 percent slide in revenues since pioneering service Napster (news – web sites) opened in 1999.

The RIAA, whose roster includes the five top record labels, has shut down Napster and several similar networks but failed to stem the tide of Internet sharing. It hopes the lawsuits and advertising might deter people in their own homes.

“We hope that parents will pay attention to what their kids are doing … that corporations will pay attention to what their employees are doing,” RIAA President Cary Sherman told Reuters.

Adam Cohen, a partner in the litigation department of Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, said the music industry in its battle shows “a lack of concern with alienating the consumer … It’s hard to imagine that this would really spur people to buy more records.”

Cohen, who has represented online radio and Webcasting services on copyright issues, noted the Napster case ended with a bankruptcy but left open the legal debate on targeting individuals who copy music for non-commercial purposes.

RIAA members include AOL Time Warner Inc.’s (NYSE:AOL – news) Warner Music; Vivendi Universal’s (NYSE:V – news) Universal Music Group; Sony Corp (news – web sites).’s (6758.T) Sony Music; Bertelsmann AG (news – web sites)’s (BERT.UL) BMG and EMI Group Plc (news – web sites) (EMI.L).

Bertelsmann is also the subject of lawsuits from EMI, Universal Music and music publishers for allegedly perpetuating online piracy with a previous investment in Napster.

> From: Gregory Alan Bolcer
> Date: Sat May 31, 2003 3:57:02 PM US/Pacific
> To: FoRK
> Subject: Re: waste testbed
> Reply-To: gbolcer [at] endeavors [dot] com
>
> Wow. Deja Vu all over again. Those dang
> Nullsofter’s causing the exact same problems they
> did 3 years ago.
>
> Greg
>
> Elias Sinderson wrote:
>>
>> Part 1.1 Type: Plain Text (text/plain)
>> Encoding: 7bit
>>
>> AOL pulls Nullsoft file-sharing software
>> By Jim Hu
>> > e-sharing%20software>
>>
>> Staff Writer, CNET News.com
>> May 30, 2003, 2:06 PM PT
>> http://news.com.com/2100-1032-1011585.html
>> <3189 https://ianbell.com/2003/03/27/fbi-seeks-ip-telephony-surveillance/ Thu, 27 Mar 2003 22:13:37 +0000 https://ianbell.com/2003/03/27/fbi-seeks-ip-telephony-surveillance/ http://www.securityfocus.com/news/3466

FBI seeks Internet telephony surveillance

The Justice Department and the FBI ask regulators for expanded technical capabilities to intercept Voice Over IP communications… and anything else that uses broadband. By Kevin Poulsen, SecurityFocus Mar 27 2003 1:11AM

The FBI and Justice Department are worried that Voice Over IP (VoIP) applications may become safe havens for criminals to communicate with one another, unless U.S. regulators make broadband services more vulnerable to lawful electronic eavesdropping, according to comments filed with the FCC this month.

The government filing was prompted by the efforts of telecom entrepreneur Jeffrey Pulver to win a ruling that his growing peer-to-peer Internet telephony service Free World Dialup is not subject to the regulations that govern telephone companies.

Free World Dialup has been called “Napster for Phones.” It’s a free service aimed at developing Internet telephony as a mainstream alternative to the public switched telephone network. After an initial investment of about $250 for a Cisco SIP telephone — a device that functions much like a conventional analog phone, but plugs directly into an IP network — users can “dial” each other over the Internet anywhere in the world at no cost. Free World Dialup provides a directory service that assigns each user a virtual telephone number, and sets up each phone call. Since it was launched in November, the service has gathered over 12,000 users.

If it catches on, FWD could be a nightmare for old-fashioned telephone companies. Those companies were likely agitated further when Pulver asked [pdf] the FCC in February for a “declaratory ruling” that his service is outside the commission’s jurisdiction. Pulver argues that FWD is not a telecommunications service, but is just an Internet application, no different from e-mail or instant messaging. Verizon, SBC and other phone companies filed comments in opposition to Puliver’s petition.

And on the last day of the public comment period, so did the FBI.

It turns out that one of the regulations from which FWD would be incidentally exempt is the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), the federal law that required telecommunications carriers to modify their networks to be wiretap-friendly for the FBI. Crafted in 1994, before the Internet was a household word, it’s not entirely clear that CALEA even applies to Voice Over IP , but the government has had some success persuading companies that it does, or soon will, according to Stu Baker, a partner in the Washington law firm of Steptoe and Johnson. “Right now, I think Justice would lose a case trying to apply CALEA to VoIP,” Baker wrote in an e-mail interview. “But eventually… VoIP will be a mainstream substitute for the switched network. So a lot of companies are complying now to avoid a hassle later.”

The government worries that Free World Dialup’s petition could buck that trend: if the FCC finds that FWD is free from the plug-and-play wiretap requirements, other Internet companies handling VoIP traffic might start thinking they’re exempt as well. “The DOJ and FBI are concerned that if certain broadband telecommunications carriers fail to comply with CALEA due to a misunderstanding of their regulatory status, criminals may exploit the opportunity to evade lawful electronic surveillance,” reads the government filing.

Pulver says it’s the government that misunderstands the situation. “My hope is that the DoJ/FBI did not take the time to fully understand what Free World Dialup is and isn’t, and after some proactive education it will be clear that we don’t fall under the definitions,” says Pulver. “It is much easier to build the wiretap function into the access method, which is infrastructure based, rather than on every Internet application that comes along.”

Easier Broadband Surveillance Sought Indeed, extending CALEA to cover Free World Dialup and services like it would likely be futile, says Orif Arkin, founder of Sys-Security Group and an expert on IP telephony security. Arkin says users determined to skirt surveillance could easily set up their own ad hoc directory services on the fly. “It’s like a buddy list on instant messaging,” says Arkin. “They just have to build up such a server, and give everyone access to it.”

Arkin says the FBI’s best bet for spying on VoIP users is to eavesdrop directly on a target’s broadband connection, perhaps using the Bureau’s “Carnivore” DCS-1000 network surveillance tool. With access to the raw traffic, VoIP phones become exceedingly easy to listen in on. “Those phones don’t have a lot of CPU power, so the communication between the two ends is not encrypted,” Arkin says. “Whoever was to sniff the information on the uplink or downlink or between those two can hear whatever is said.”

That point isn’t lost on Justice and the FBI. The government is asking that, should the FCC not reject FWD’s petition outright, the commission at least delay its decision until after it’s ruled on two other broadband proceedings that the Justice Department filed comments on last year.

In those proceedings, Justice is asking the FCC to reinterpret CALEA as extending to DSL and cable modem service — not just telephone calls. It’s also asking the commission to expand the scope of the law to include raw data communication — Web surfing, e-mail, and anything else that crosses the wire. Broadband providers are already obliged to cooperate with court-ordered surveillance requests; the government’s FCC proposals would go beyond that and require companies to reengineer their networks to make Internet eavesdropping easier technically, and dirt cheap on a case-by-case basis. “It would be a major expansion of the CALEA requirements,” says David Sobel, an attorney with the Electronic Privacy Information Center. “It would really obliterate the distinction between voice and data.”

Opponents of the CALEA expansion include AT&T and the National Cable and Telecommunications Association. But the government’s argument for the additional capabilities is the same one that persuaded Congress to pass CALEA in the first place eight years ago, and it only carries more weight today. “Although we cannot describe in this forum the particular circumstances, the FBI has sought interceptions of transmissions carried by broadband technology, including cable modem technology, in terrorism-related … investigations involving potentially life-threatening situations,” the Justice Department wrote [pdf] in one of its filings last year. “Unless carriers are required to ensure such access, law enforcement surveillance capabilities will suffer a serious and dangerous gap.” If the FCC adopts the government’s position, then broadband’s last mile will be the FBI’s listening post, and Free World Dialup will be off the hook.

The semantic debate over whether or not Free World Dialup is a telephone service is ultimately fruitless — of course it is! And to exist in an unregulated status simply because it does not interconnect with the PSTN clips its wings before it is even able to get into the air. We need to be able to call the billions of telephones worldwide from our SIP phones or they are useless.

The DoJ/FBI objections and the unsurprising support from ILECs (who, quite frankly, needed an excuse to thwart services like FWD) underscores a key weakness of SIP and of services like FWD. It’s the same problem suffered by file sharing services like Napster and MP3.com … that problem is the fact that within the network hierarchy there is a single flashpoint that serves as a lightning rod for regulatory and legal wranglings. In short, there is someone to sue, someone to stop. When the telecom gestapo arrives and asks to be taken to our leader, there is ultimately one place for them to go to.

Jeff Pulver has bravely stepped forward to serve as this lightning rod, but his resources are ultimately limited when compared to the forces that are aligning against him.

The battle lines are being drawn not between IP Telephony and Regulators; they are being drawn between Decentralized Telephony and the Incumbents. The BattleFront is SIP, and though SIP was conceived of as a Peer-to-Peer technology, it is not being utilized as such. There is still a parent-child relationship between the SIP Proxy and the SIP Agent.

For the technology to survive regulatory and legal wrangling intact, it must address the forces that oppose it with a technological fix. When there’s no one to sue — no single body to regulate — there is no practicable way to stop the spread of a truly peer-to-peer technology. The economics of trying to control it simply make all resistance futile. When the genie’s out of the bottle you must learn to co-exist; to adapt; to evolve.

“The Internet sees censorship as damage and routes around it.” The axiom applies here, too. Regulation and impingement by incumbents is censorship and now we, as technical minds, must help to adapt technology to route around it. Propagating the technology of the so-called “softswitch” from a hub-spoke model to a mandelbrot is that next step.

We stand poised at an opportunity; not an obstacle. A global interconnected network of simple, lightweight softswitches run by enthusiasts (and supporters, and eventually all of us), each functioning as peer to the other, allowing seamless calling and registration, redundancy, and transparency, will represent the survivability of truly decentralized telephony.

In order for this to work, of course, someone has to give away their technology: much as the folks at Nullsoft gave away GNUTella, and much as a community is growing around projects like eDonkey and BitTorrent.

As Sting said (I sound like Jeff here) “If you love something, set it free.” For us to truly realize the potential of decentralized telecommunications, for the technology to impact the lives of hundreds of millions of people, and in order to stir service innovation in the telecommunications industry for the first time in its history, we need to set the softswitch free.

-Ian.

I use LimeWire.

For the uninitiated, all of the clients we’re discussing use the same GNUtella code base which was developed by the the WinAmp guys, NullSoft. Ironically, they released GNUtella six months after they were bought by AOL, which became AOL Time-Warner.

Here’s a quick Ascii Diagram to help you out:

[LimeWire] [BearShare] [Morpheus] [XoloX] [Shareaza] \ [Swapper] | [Gnucleus] | [Phex] | [Qtella] / \ \ \ | | | / / / \ \ \ \ | / / / / \ \ \ \ / / / / / \ \ \ \ / / / / / \ \ \ \ / / / / / \_____\______[GNUtella]__/____/____/

🙂

It’s all the same thing…

-Ian.

On Thursday, September 5, 2002, at 11:49 AM, Adam Wood-Gaines wrote:

> Curiously, I decided to check out Morpheus.
> But it doesn’t look like it’s getting good reviews.
>
> http://download.com.com/3302-2166-10141574.html
>
> And what’s the deal with it being flamed “spyware”?
> That’s seems tres uncool. Are these accusations founded?
>
> I have little experience with file sharing networks, but
> I’m curious to check ’em out on my OSX box.
>
> –Adam
>
>
> — Mark Bussanich wrote:
>> Of course, I would never do anything illegal like download copywritten
>> materials but, in response to Mark’s question regarding alternatives,
>> I am
>> told that Morpheus is a pretty good service. http://www.morpheus.com
>>
>> After all, it’s good to share.
>>
>> Mark (the other)
>>
>> —– Original Message —–
>> From: “mark winder”
>> To: ;
>> Sent: Thursday, September 05, 2002 10:46 AM
>> Subject: Re: @F: [GEEKS] Napster Goes Unmourned to the Grave
>>
>>
>>> I hvae to disagree somewhat – companies dying that had no business
>>> plan is
>>> old news – SO 2000 ;o)
>>>
>>> Personally, I think that what’s really noteworthy is that by going
>>> to the
>>> Napster website (http://www.napster.com – for those of you who need
>>> the
>>> reminder…) one can still find utility in the site. For instance,
>>> the
>>> “Napster was here” image can really spruce up an otherwise drab
>>> desktop
>>> pattern on you PC. You can also… well… actually, I guess that’s
>>> about
>>> it, really…
>>>
>>> …so Napster was fun – what are people now using to get tunes and
>>> videos
>>> off the net?? Any front runners??
>>>
>>> okbye,
>>>
>>> – Mark.
>>>
>>>
>>>> From: Ian Andrew Bell
>>>> To: foib [at] ianbell [dot] com
>>>> Subject: @F: [GEEKS] Napster Goes Unmourned to the Grave
>>>> Date: Thu, 5 Sep 2002 10:40:34 -0700
>>>>
>>>> The death of Napster is not so much a signifier of the victory of
>>>> the
>> RIAA
>>>> over the infidels as it is of the defeat of companies which had no
>>>> identifiable business plan..
>>>>
>>>> -Ian.
>>>>
>>>> ———–
>>>> http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20020904/wr_nm/
>>>> media_napster_reaction_dc
>>>>
>>>> Napster Goes Unmourned to the Grave
>>>> Wed Sep 4, 1:38 PM ET
>>>>
>>>> By Bernhard Warner, European Internet Correspondent
>>>>
>>>> LONDON (Reuters) – Like so many one-hit wonders before it, the
>>>> demise of
>>>> the once iconic online song-swapping service Napster ( news – web
>>>> sites)
>>>> has failed to stir much sympathy.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> “Really, who cares?” Sebastian, a student at the Technical
>>>> University of
>>>> Darmstadt, Germany, told Reuters as he heard that Napster would
>>>> likely
>> be
>>>> forced into Chapter 7 liquidation as early as Thursday.
>>>>
>>>> “Everybody’s moved on to other file-sharing (services). The
>>>> interest for
>>>> Napster in the Internet community just wasn’t as high as everybody
>>>> originally thought,” said the 28-year old student of IT engineering.
>>>>
>>>> During its heyday in 2000, Napster attracted tens of millions of
>>>> music
>>>> fans who traded all manners of recorded music from Eminem ( news –
>>>> web
>>>> sites) singles to rare concert recordings of the Dave Matthews Band.
>>>>
>>>> To the chagrin of the media establishment, Napster introduced the
>> concept
>>>> of file-trading to a generation of youths who now exchange a wide
>>>> range
>>>> copyright-protected materials from feature-length movies to video
>>>> games,
>>>> drawing Hollywood and lawmakers into the fray to corral the
>>>> activity.
>>>>
>>>> NO CHANCE
>>>>
>>>> While the legacy of Napster thrives, the service itself became a
>>>> non-entity as it shut down a year ago amid mounting legal troubles.
>>>> Thursday, Net discussion groups were largely devoid of commentary
>>>> on the
>>>> online service that major music labels once considered to be public
>> enemy
>>>> number one.
>>>>
>>>> “Well, it’s official,” read one discussion group posting, summing
>>>> up a
>>>> demise that has long had an air of inevitability — as an
>>>> underground
>>>> service it was a hit, but as a business it had no chance.
>>>>
>>>> The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, one of
>>>> Napster’s chief nemeses, gave a bitter-sweet obituary to the defunct
>>>> service.
>>>>
>>>> “Napster had a great technology but it was never going to be
>>>> successful
>>>> until it managed to turn that technology into a legitimate business
>> model
>>>> that respected the copyright of artists and record companies,” the
>>>> IFPI
>>>> said in a statement.
>>>>
>>>> Napster’s fate was sealed Wednesday when a U.S. bankruptcy court
>> rejected
>>>> German media group Bertelsmann’s bid to buy Napster. Record labels
>>>> and
>>>> songwriters had opposed the deal, saying the price was unfair.
>>>>
>>>> IMMINENT LIQUIDATION
>>>>
>>>> The decision leaves Napster, which had been grounded since July,
>>>> 2001,
>>>> with no choice but to pull the plug on the operation.
>>>>
>>>> Napster, which still has a large copyright-infringement suit hanging
>> over
>>>> its head from the labels, is expected to file for Chapter 7
>>>> liquidation
>>>> Thursday, sources said.
>>>>
>>>> A statement from Napster Wednesday said the company had fired staff
>>>> and
>>>> shut down the operation. A trustee will auction off Napster’s assets
>> that
>>>> include its globally recognized brand name, Web addresses and
>> proprietary
>>>> technologies.
>>>>
>>>> The Napster Web Site now consists of two pages — “Napster was
>>>> here” on
>>>> the home page, linking only to a crude tombstone bearing the
>>>> trademark
>>>> headphone-wearing cat and the legend “Ded kitty.”
>>>>
>>>> Wednesday, officials at some of the music labels told Reuters they
>>>> did
>> not
>>>> think the fall of Napster would have any meaningful impact on the
>>>> file-sharing and music piracy craze.
>>>>
>>>> The labels may have triggered Napster’s demise, but it leaves
>>>> behind a
>>>> more powerful crop of imitators including Morpheus MusicCity,
>>>> Grokster
>> and
>>>> Kazaa, sites which have succeeded in driving the activity further
>>>> underground.
>>>>
>>>> As a posting by a person nicknamed “PianoMan” said: “They will never
>> stop
>>>> it. Or even slow it down. And as you may have guessed, I’m not
>>>> sympathetic.”
>>>>
>>>> Henry Wilson, founder of Grokster, a peer-to-peer network named in a
>>>> lawsuit by Hollywood and the labels for copyright abuse, pointed out
>> that
>>>> Napster went out of business before the courts could make a final
>>>> ruling
>>>> on the legitimacy of file-sharing networks.
>>>>
>>>> “I don’t think you can say this is a win for (the labels) on the
>>>> legal
>>>> front,” Wilson told Reuters.
>>>>
>>>> ———–
>>>> FoIB mailing list — Bits, Analysis, Digital Group Therapy
>>>> https://ianbell.com:8888/foib.html
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> – Mark
>>>
>>> —
>>> Mark Winder
>>> me [at] markwinder [dot] net
>>>
>>>

-Ian.

———– http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20020904/wr_nm/ media_napster_reaction_dc

Napster Goes Unmourned to the Grave Wed Sep 4, 1:38 PM ET

By Bernhard Warner, European Internet Correspondent

LONDON (Reuters) – Like so many one-hit wonders before it, the demise of the once iconic online song-swapping service Napster ( news – web sites) has failed to stir much sympathy.

“Really, who cares?” Sebastian, a student at the Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany, told Reuters as he heard that Napster would likely be forced into Chapter 7 liquidation as early as Thursday.

“Everybody’s moved on to other file-sharing (services). The interest for Napster in the Internet community just wasn’t as high as everybody originally thought,” said the 28-year old student of IT engineering.

During its heyday in 2000, Napster attracted tens of millions of music fans who traded all manners of recorded music from Eminem ( news – web sites) singles to rare concert recordings of the Dave Matthews Band.

To the chagrin of the media establishment, Napster introduced the concept of file-trading to a generation of youths who now exchange a wide range copyright-protected materials from feature-length movies to video games, drawing Hollywood and lawmakers into the fray to corral the activity.

NO CHANCE

While the legacy of Napster thrives, the service itself became a non-entity as it shut down a year ago amid mounting legal troubles. Thursday, Net discussion groups were largely devoid of commentary on the online service that major music labels once considered to be public enemy number one.

“Well, it’s official,” read one discussion group posting, summing up a demise that has long had an air of inevitability — as an underground service it was a hit, but as a business it had no chance.

The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, one of Napster’s chief nemeses, gave a bitter-sweet obituary to the defunct service.

“Napster had a great technology but it was never going to be successful until it managed to turn that technology into a legitimate business model that respected the copyright of artists and record companies,” the IFPI said in a statement.

Napster’s fate was sealed Wednesday when a U.S. bankruptcy court rejected German media group Bertelsmann’s bid to buy Napster. Record labels and songwriters had opposed the deal, saying the price was unfair.

IMMINENT LIQUIDATION

The decision leaves Napster, which had been grounded since July, 2001, with no choice but to pull the plug on the operation.

Napster, which still has a large copyright-infringement suit hanging over its head from the labels, is expected to file for Chapter 7 liquidation Thursday, sources said.

A statement from Napster Wednesday said the company had fired staff and shut down the operation. A trustee will auction off Napster’s assets that include its globally recognized brand name, Web addresses and proprietary technologies.

The Napster Web Site now consists of two pages — “Napster was here” on the home page, linking only to a crude tombstone bearing the trademark headphone-wearing cat and the legend “Ded kitty.”

Wednesday, officials at some of the music labels told Reuters they did not think the fall of Napster would have any meaningful impact on the file-sharing and music piracy craze.

The labels may have triggered Napster’s demise, but it leaves behind a more powerful crop of imitators including Morpheus MusicCity, Grokster and Kazaa, sites which have succeeded in driving the activity further underground.

As a posting by a person nicknamed “PianoMan” said: “They will never stop it. Or even slow it down. And as you may have guessed, I’m not sympathetic.”

Henry Wilson, founder of Grokster, a peer-to-peer network named in a lawsuit by Hollywood and the labels for copyright abuse, pointed out that Napster went out of business before the courts could make a final ruling on the legitimacy of file-sharing networks.

“I don’t think you can say this is a win for (the labels) on the legal front,” Wilson told Reuters.

———–