Avoiding Legal Charges
 

I am interested in purchasing the pro copy of LimeWire - with all of the recent talk of people being charged for downloading "free" music, does the professional edition eliminate this threat, since I would, in a sense, be paying for the downloads?

Any assistance or guidance in this matter would be most appreciated.

:rolleyes:

Nope, not in the slightest.

Sharing copyrighted material without permission ain't legal. However, there are a few pay-per-download systems from which copyrighted mp3s can be bought with the copyright holders permission, and there are of course lots of genuinely uncopyrighted mp3s available on P2P networks. I can't claim any great taste in music myself, but some of the genuinely free music is a lot better than some of the stuff churned out by the music industry.

Re: Avoiding Legal Charges
 

You pay ONLY for Limewire - nothing more...

Morgwen

aren't most of the riaa subpoenas against kazaa users anyway, not gnutella users?

The RIAA is attacking Kazaa simply because of the amount of users it has. They could attack any P2P that doesen't require you to pay to download.

deepblue

y r u paying for it if u can download it directly by simple method

if u r intrested i can tell u more :D

you can compile LW for free (open source), download the free installer, download installers others have compiled, etc etc etc.

If you pay, you are giving SUPPORT for the development of the LW project.
http://www.limewire.org/

I wish LW would have kept the idea that it's really a donation, but . . .

Legal For Educational Purposes?
 

Someone told me there's a law somewhere that says you can gack anything and even use it on your website if it's for education and not entertainment. Sounds like urban legend to me but I trust this person (trustwise, maybe not brainwise) and she says her lawyer verified it. If I download a Dead Kennedys song and listen to it to understand the psychology of aggression is it legal?

I'm half joking, half not. I've had to listen to stuff for school in humanities classes (Beethoven, etc.) and besides, I just don't get why it's legal for me to gack pictures for my website but I can't go near music!

Huge corporations like the RIAA, micro$oft, and Wal-Mart, are in a sense above the law. I think the RIAA would persue you just the same. They have the financial backing to do just about anything they want to. It's the sad truth.


deepblue

Quote: 'why it's legal for me to gack pictures for my website'
But is it legal? In my web training we were told we had to stay away from pics we had no given permission to use, ie: copyright breach.
(How do you define gack by the way?) Not that I know much/anything about laws governing the net (which is a complex issue anyway since the breacher could be in any country.) So then whose laws would apply? How do you sue a monk from Tibet (just a clumsy example)? (I guess big money spending co.'s find a way!)

Title 17, Section 107
 

OK I found the actual title. I looked this up on the internet (not that I believe ANYTHING I read on the internet) and couldn't find much in terms of verification but I did find a few other people using it:

"Written material or images copyrighted under U.S. law may be used here without permission. United States Code, Title 17, Section 107, provides for fair use of copyrighted materials for purposes of comment and criticism in a nonprofit manner."

My philosophy on the subject of copyright is, sadly enough, not very helpful to other people. My philosophy is that I'm too poor to be affected. I'm too poor to keep my computer running at night or buy a new one if I run it all the time and the hard drive goes, and therefore I'm probably in the lowest 1% of files downloaded and uploaded. I'm also too poor to bother taking to court if you're Steven Spielberg and you see a picture of Harrision Ford on a website I operate that praises the s*** out of you and your movies anyway.

If Microsoft or any other huge, evil company wanted to make an example out of someone for dressing like a fool in public I'd be their girl; but as far as copyright goes they'd look stupid coming after me. I know this doesn't help saying this, because maybe someday I will have enough money to download zillions of free files....

Wait a minute. Does anyone see the irony in that?

'US' 'Law' has a major play on what gets displayed on the net as such, but their laws are not universal, & copyright laws vary from country to country as to their 'real' control. (It can take quite some effort & time (& a lot more money) to muster an attack upon individuals in countries where the copyright laws don't apply (or even apply for that matter!) It ends up of course on a national political level & man can money walk hand in hand with politics when major political financial supporters kick up the dust! And dust ends up in everybody's eyes (propaganda.) But, when the US is paly with another country, favors can be done. ('Who' was it 'talking' again?) [One way or another it equates to the same language!] I have a friend who had political influence indirectly put upon him via the US to closedown his site in 'more ways than one'. He still publishes his works, though on a more lower level. Requests for his works pm me (do NOT email me!) So much for 'Free Speech'! I wonder why .... So much for democracy & the country of the free. (Free to do what exactly?)

As for me, I think as long as you aren't using the music you're sharing to earn profit, it should be legal. But, the govt always has different views.

So basically. use LW and hope you don't get caught.

Interesting point of view. Which brings me to answer a previous point in a post about utilising pics on websites. Apparently in USA you can utilise pics on your website that don't belong to you so long as it's not for profitable purposes (I can't remember the specific law no. but can locate it if necessary.) That's certainly different to my country's laws. No wonder people are keen to set up websites in the US. However as for music... if there's copyright then it generally applies to playback for public issues that must be followed.

Bosnianheat26 using p2p for accessing music you might otherwise have bought is an issue. But if you would not have bought it, but just dwnlded it out of curiousity or to try it out so to speak, then (as another opinion) arguably it shouldn't be considered as bad. If you decided the music inspired you, then you could go out & buy further recordings of that artist. Try before you buy type of thing. And then of course there's those music lovers who can never get enough of the music they buy & are forced to find alternative sources for recordings such as live concerts that would never be commercially released to the public. I know people who fall into that category.

That One Law About Pics In the U.S.
 

Saw this on a website. Hi Lord!
TTYL

COPYRIGHT ISSUES AND FAIR USE
This site may contain copyrighted material, the use of which may not have been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making this material available in efforts to advance the understanding of different issues related to this subject of the site, talented and attractive xxxxxxxx actress xxxxx xxxxx. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. If you wish to use such copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use' you MUST obtain permission from the copyright owner.

IN OTHER WORDS this is a non-profit site, and if you see your material here:

(1) thanks! and (2) you're getting a free plug, so chill.

If this is not your material and you plan on borrowing it, that's cool with us, but you do it at your own risk, and we would appreciate it if you'd be polite and give credit to the actual owners because unlike you and me they have a real job.

In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml

United States Code: Title 17, Section 107
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/unframed/17/107.html

It's a good law because....
 

Besides the obvious reasons, many fansites for actors and actresses come and go. Because of this law, you can go around and gack pictures from existing fansites and keep them handy to post on your own site if the site you got them from disappears.

Jacq

There are plenty of services available where you can listen to all the music you want to by anyone. The new Napster, for one. But if you want to download the song to burn to disc then you have to pay a dollar per song. I guess that isn't such a bad deal. And supposedly there is no danger of viruses and stuff like that.

Still, I think it should be free.

Settings Info From My WinMX
 

Well, yes you cannot take pictures and use direct links for websites for thats copyright laws BUT if you SAVE the pictures and host them yourself through something like Imageshack or photobucket, then it's completly legal. Like proboards will shut down sites if they see a single direct link through the smilies because you cxan customize smilies, I almost got busted for that once

Did you realize that the last post was over 3 months ago? :D :D ;)

Newbie here,

But wanted to comment, what is the difference in hearing Free music on Yahoo, or going into a Music store, or even WallyMart and listening on the headgear, or for that matter. Video Stores owners get free screeners even before movies hit the rental shelves. And there free.

Its obvious that the motive behnd that is the all mighty dollar. But I doubt Yahoo WallyMart etc, are paying each time I put on a set of phones and listen to a new GreenDay song?

I see wya to much double standard here.

Cozmo

Ps copying and piracy I get .....but free listening ? Isnt that what AM Radios started doing over 50 years ago ?

How does greenleaf have that attatched to his WinMX files? I want to do that too...ya know as a precaution.

For me, i noticed many RIAA-sued is a sharer. As long i dont share the folder or file, then i get a low chance to sue by RIAA or a low chance for RIAA to see what i download.

I already disabled any sharing in Limewire, even i removed all the extension in Sharing option.

There a another tricks i use. I have two emtpy folder. For sharing, i use folder 1 (even the sharing is disabled). for downloading, i use folder 2. I know Limewire is very tricky with sharing. once in a while, i noticed my uploading was about 30KB, i see that i am sharing a file, even i already disable the sharing, and put file not to be shared. So i create folder 1 only for that. so far, my upload never got past 2KB. once in a while, it got to 1KB bu tthat it

Limewirer ----- I try to share my files and a meagre amount of knowledge on the Gnutella Network and on these forums, to the extent that I answered one of your posts earlier, and may well have uploaded files to you. Is it right that you should refuse to share on the network and still use it for your own needs? Or have I missunderstood your post?

There's lots of non-infringing content to share, so there's no excuse for being a leech.

If someone doesn't want to share, then set up a really good connection to run 24/7 as an ultrapeer and share bandwidth. You can contribute 1 GB a day that way.

If neither of the above is an option, then such users should remove filesharing apps and join a newsgroup or something like that.

Sheesh. I hate leeches who rationalize. There's no excuse for not sharing.

IF you share the file, and it cpoyrighted, RIAA can sue you. so without the sharing the file, RIAA have no proves that i have the copyrighted file.

Have to agree with Stief!
 

It's a pity that there are those who go on file SHARING networks who won't share any files. I'll keep this one short and say that if I had the hard drive space, I would more than likely share more than I do already. I can only share not much more than 100 files. And really, I do hate to have to delete some of them for drive space.

Thanks Stief, I concur most heartedly!;)

Even in the US I can legally share my own pictures
Or my friend's songs that he made himself
Or all the files from the Internet Archive
Or all the Creative Commons files
Or the files from www.magnetmix.com
Or all the other public domain files
Or many more

The RIAA, CRIA, MPAA, BSA, and all the other copyright cartels, do NOT control filesharing around the world (though they would be happy if you think so).

If you are in the US, time to visit http://www.eff.org/share/

Hey, thanks for the link!
 

Went to the magnetmix link and found some interesting stuff!

Thanks Stief.

Im sharing 800+ files, but if you ask me which of it is copyrighted and which is freeware I could not tell you because I just don't know how to tell. However I figure that is a small amount next to how many files the majority is sharing.

I honestly believe RIAA would be wasting their time looking at peers who share under 1k.

The one thing that seems to get overlooked in all this discussion is Quality.

Take a music CD you bought at the store. Now download the .mp3 version of those songs. Now listen and compare.

Your download doesn't even get close to CD quality (unless you have real crappy speakers) till you get up into the higher bitrates (256 and 320).

So why pay $0.99 cents for inferior quality?? What a good scam for the recording industry. Music is like software. You make the product once and sell it many, many times... over and over again. And then you find out you can eliminate the ongoing cost of blank CDs and recording costs with the costs of some computer servers. Sure, they cost money and so does maintaining them--but folks, they could use the same old server software forever (Debian GNU Linux for FREE) and never incur an upgrade cost.

What you think you get here for FREE is really inferior quality. If you like the music, invest in the CD--don't waste your money paying for inferior downloads.

That's my opinion, anyway.

This Thread is Myoptic?
 

Well, I guess it's true that most of the "developed world" has the most of the bandwidth (along with everything else of monetary value) but I think that for the large majority on the planet, there is no need to worry, yes?

My point is that these discussions are very narrow in scope, and apply only to those in reach of Litigating parties, which is covered by a very short arm of the law. Example: in most of Asia, none of this applies, and in countries like India, Nepal, Afganistan, and surroundings, boot-legging is legal and state sanctioned: legal in the sense that valid tax-paying companies sell copied software, music, whatever, and that's just fine, as some of these countries have not even considered WTO's intellectual property agreements, and the local goverments just see this activity as everyday commerce, like selling a chinese rice cooker.

International tourists come to my hood all the time and fill suitcases full of CDs at 1USD (75 rupees) a pop. So I suppose this is file-sharing on a global scale, where the transfer methoud in this case is the Shop (vs. Limewire) and the files shared are with citizens of the planet and not within some small jurisdiction within a restrictive legal boundry (small portions of the internet).

BTW, whatever happenned to that upstate NY housewife charged, as her teenagers where using the computer to download files? We hear of things like that here over the internet radio, and think wahthefa.

Anyway, this is an interesting thread. Now I just wish I could get limewire to work and ditch Azureus. There are some things ya just can't find in the shops of Kathmandu...

jigs

Reply to herojig
 

I read a lot of the newsletters and am very involved with this one . I have found it most interesting in such things as the garbage that the RIAA is dishing out.

If you want the information on Patti Santangelo, that is the place to find it. They are asking donations for her legal costs, as she does live on Social Security Disability, as do I.

The cartel is constantly finding new ways to harrass and intimidate file sharers. They have gone the way of Microsoft, but I don't want to get into that here, I'm stuck with a Windows computer. My little check just can't handle a new one at the present time.

Back on the subject, just go to that link above. I think you'll find a lot on the goings on with the case there.http://users.pandora.be/eforum/emoticons4u/sad/1011.gif

Actually I purchased LW Pro under the same assumption that downloading music would then become legal, because I was paying for something. Alas, I guess I don't mind supporting the developers.

There is a slight difference in quality but not a big difference. the listening pleasure via mp3's opposed to CD's bought is just as good in my opinion. i have noticed that you need to turn the volume on the cd player to around 16 or 17 to get a decent volume with mp3 music but thats not a problem.

Live in Canada.

File-sharing is legal here.

We're far less stupid than America.

Ooops--correction:

May I suggest you say "our judges make more sensible decisions"? ;)

Re the legality of filesharing in Canada, the best source for info that I've found is http://www.cippic.ca/en/faqs-resources/file-sharing/

Quote:

According to the Federal Court, in a decision issued by Justice von Finckenstein on March 31, 2004, neither downloading a song for personal use nor merely making that file available to others to download from your computer (without some more active sharing activity) amounts to infringement under Canadian copyright law. The court ruled that "the mere fact of placing a copy on a shared directory in a computer where that copy can be accessed via a P2P service does not amount to distribution" or "authorization of the reproduction of sound recordings" under the Copyright Act. However, this decision has been appealed to the Federal Court of Appeal, so the issue remains in legal limbo.

The legality is under pressure and could change, so we need to keep informed. So far our courts have been quite sensible, but the copyright collectives like the CRIA have been working hard to get our politicians to change our laws.

illegal downloading
 

I just heard on the news today that LimeWire is being sued over the free music downloads and that really sucks. I have about 800 songs and videos that I have downloaded. does anyone know what to do to keep from being sued?:mad:

Again? RIAA sued LW a little less than a yr. ago...
... you sure?


*burns music into cds...*
*deletes files from computer*

I saw it on the 5:00 pm news today. They did a "Special Investagation" on it and how to tell if the download site was lajidament.

Legal? NOPE !! Not in the USA!!
 

I live in Dayton Ohio. 2 of my 4 local TV stations just reported about several people from our area being sued for downloading music. One of these people was using Limewire. This person is being sued by the National Association of Recording Artists for 70,000 !! She has only used Limewire and has downloaded a little over 6,000 songs. Needless to say, she is devastated! The reporter said this is happening more and more everyday and that the Recording Artists are generally setteling out of court for 3 to 4 thousand dollars. Do any of us have that kind of money lying around. This woman thought she was "protected" from any type of legal action because she had paid 18 dollars to limewire for their "pro" version. Not so. Beware !