Via 25 Hours a Day:
it seems that the RIAA has decided to start nipping in the bud those beloved gray areas of copyright infringement: mixtapes.
I recall when Napster was first causing waves with Metallica and Lars Ulrich was quoted to say that they didn’t consider mix tapes to be a big deal, but peer to peer was hurting them.
Quoth the RIAA:
Brad A. Buckles, executive vice president for anti-piracy at the Recording Industry Association of America, said, A sound recording is either copyrighted or its not. And he said the DJ Drama case, like most piracy cases, began with illegal product, which was then traced back to the distributor. Chief Baker said that before the raid, DJ Drama and Mr. Cannon were sent cease-and-desist letters from a local lawyer.
It sounds as though the RIAA is indirectly endorsing rap stars to utilize Creative Commons licensing. Using a Attribution Non-Commercial license, a performer could allow mix tapes (provided they weren’t sold) and still allow for their album to be sold at a profit (and protected by some degree of copyright).
The RIAA thinks that copyright is an all-or-nothing issue. This is good for them, but not for the creative persons who they depend on. If artists begin embracing these alternatives to all-or-nothing copyright they can enjoy the free publicity (without making a sex tape or getting arrested) without pissing off their fans.
Josh, you might want to check this (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7661663613180520595&q=23c3) out.
I meant to do this:
link
I’ll have to check it out later when I’m at home, but generally speaking Lawrence Lessig is the man.
His book Free Culture was incredible.