Hello-
I cannot figure out why this gets around the law and Napster doesn't. I am doing a research paper for my freshman comp class at UMD and I cannot find why it is any different?! PLEASE HELP ME!!!

Napster is not illegal, the way in which it is used is illegal. Gnutella is not illegal unless it is used to download illegal things.

First of all napster is not illegal.
Secondly the way it is used is not illegal.
Thirdly THERE ARE NO LOOPHOLES THAT MAKE FILE SHARING ILLEGAL!!
And finally NOTHING transmitted over the internet is illegal,period! The only thing that is illegal to transmit over the internet,and this goes for everything,is STOLEN military secrets and once it has been made public it is to late for them to do anything about it anyway. And I hardly think mp3's qaulify as stolen military secrets and as for whats going on in europe about security software,it is also not illegal to take apart anything to see how it works!!!!even if it is to build aftermarket part's. Can you imagine not being able to make aftermarket part's for a car because ford won't let you cut into thier profit.NOT BEING ALLOWED TO OWN YOU OWN SET OF WRENCHES! Hacking into other people's computers is illegal. Hacking into your own computer is not. Nor is it illegal to decompile or reverse engineer any program or to own software to do it. The only other thing that is illegal is jamming the internet. That is an attack on freedom itself. It is NOT ILLEGAL for people to pool thier resources together. It's so we can all have much more than we could ever have on our own. It works like this, you buy a couple of cd's I buy a couple of cd's and we all chip in a little because we all aren't freakin rich enough to afford all everything, period! And as for the people that don't have anything to share, eventually they will. Besides even if everybody only contributed one song what's one times a million. BESIDES WHAT WE ALL SHOULD BE ASKING IS WHY WE ARE SEEING A WORLDWIDE CORDINATED EFFORT TO SNUFF OUT INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM'S.

I don't believe both are legal (in the eyes of the Hollywood lawyers). Both are distributing privately produced material freely without legal permission - i.e. music & movies which are owned by private individuals and distrobuted/sold at their discretion.

The trouble arises when their is one individual controling or (in the lawyer minds) prompting the distribution of the material without permission. In this case Napster has one central location acting as a go-between. (And anyone, please correct me if I am wrong) People work through the one central server to connect to their associates to trade files. The safe occurs with Scour and ??? - hmmm, I forgot the third that was reently closed down. Anyways, this "Gnutella" and its bretherin (Newtella, Aimster, Toadnode, ect.) do not work through one source but connect to each other indvidually. There isn't one controlling source for the lawyers to attack and take down.

A good comparison would be Cell phones and CB radios. If you knock out the local Cell tower (where the transmitters sit) you've basically whiped out the Cell phones. On the other hand, there is no central location for CB radios. To knock them out, you have to attack each one individually.

I think the big test will happen when some private group opens a Napster-like server outside the US jurisdication (say like Sealand which is just outside of Great Britian and is famous for "illegal" internet hosting).

Well, I hope I've helped. Good luck on your paper. Bye the bye, what is UMD? Is it the University of Minnesota?

Huck
huckleberryfinn@plopmail.com

OVERSIGHT,
You are right in saying neither Napster or Gnutella are technically illegal, but you are wrong to assume that it is legal to trade copyrighted material. Both Napster and Gnutella ARE LEGAL. They are simply file sharing programs (or the medium) to which millions or people illegally copy copyrighted materials. To say that Napster is illegal is to say that cassette tapes are illegal. People used to make copys of tapes/CD's onto tapes for their friends and that's all Napster is. It is the individuals using Napster that are committing the crime, not Napster.
Notice how Napster doesn't mention sharing all music anywhere on the website. They promote new bands wanting exposure and featured artists, because they can't officially condone what goes on.
The IS something wrong with these programs and something will have to be done in the law to prevent programs like this. Gnutella is nice cause it evades the law. As someone else said, there is no central part to attack, just the users!

simple 1 company owns napster and napster logs who downloads what and can attach personal information to the downloads this makes it easy for the music companies to go after the 1 company (napster) andd make them shut down there servers / reveal the identities of downloaders Gnutella however with it's lack of logins/handels makes it a royal bitch to track someone unless you use a little questionable software to hack them while they download (not cool as far as any US judge is concerned) and they can't attack the servers since no one company owns them all you hit one company and you may take down 2 servers and with in 5seconds 30 more can be up to replace them.

more simply put both are equaly questionable as to legality napster just got hit because it's easy to hit and a bigger name.

The legality of either is not the real issue. The real issue is that Gnutella CANNOT BE SHUT DOWN. There is NO WAY at all, EVER that someone could shut it down. On the other hand, Napster can easily be shut down. And if you want ot talk about illegal stuff, then technically NONE of what you you people are saying is actually illegal. Napster isn't illegal. MP3s aren't illegal. Even cd rippers aren't illegal. The illegal part is the transmission of songs in any form. Therefore since napster ASSISTS transfering illegal files, it CAN be considered illegal. Since gnutella does the same, it also CAN be considered illegal. However, gnutella is not MP3s only, so is it less legal? If there are different degress of lagality, where do you draw the line? Certainly email is still legal if you send mp3s to your friends so what defines lagality? I don't think that the music industries cares. They just want to shut down whatever is costing them money. However, it all goes back to the same original fact that gnutella CANNOT be shut down and Napster CAN.

you all are losers...

just download your porn/mp3's/warez and be happy...

who cares if its not legal...

Neither are illegal, because some of us don't LIVE in "the country of the free", America... therefore we aren't bound by the rules your stupid antiquated legal system makes. .. Napster, Gnutella, DivX, 128bit encryption... Sorry america, can't stop **** like this happening offshore.

Because these are PRIVATE calls via the switched packet network (just like a voice call, it's digitized too), so therefore you have to WIRETAP someone to figure out FOR SURE WITHOUT A DOUBT that they are downloading a copyrighted song.
You can go to JAIL for wiretapping, THAT'S ILLEGAL! so when the RIAA tells you to stop, you ask them to put it in writing and say how they found out you were transfering whatever they thought you were.
IP addresses are no different then a phone number, GET A CLUE PEOPLE! WAKE UP!
The first time a RIAA lawyer goes to jail for wire tapping, this will stop real fast.
THEY ARE THE CRIMINALS!