“It’s a modern dilemma: That iPod you got last year seems so lame now that a newer version is out. If you’re the type that needs to switch up MP3 players like you change sneakers, one of the easiest ways to unload the devices is by selling them on Websites like eBay or Craigslist,” Gil Kaufman writes for MTV News. “But given all the lawsuits over illegally traded music, you might ask yourself, ‘Is it legal to sell a device loaded with your signature mix of tunes?'”
The Recording Industry Association of America — the lobbying group behind the thousands of lawsuits over unauthorized sharing and downloading of songs — says the answer is definitely no. ‘Selling an iPod preloaded with music is no different than selling a DVD onto which you have burned your entire music collection,’ the RIAA said in a statement. ‘Either act is a clear violation of U.S. copyright law. The RIAA is monitoring this means of infringement. In short: seller beware.'”
Full article here.
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Anythign with RIAA in the CENTER is usually bad, but hey, they have a point on this one. It’s a hard drive with a specialized computer for managing its content. There is no difference between selling the copied music (or software for that matter) on a CD, except that the media packaging is different.
Same with a computer. Erase your music before you sell or have the thought police after you.
BTW. same goes for your walkman and your old Victrola (if you bundle your old 78’s).
So, if someone steals my iPod, rips the songs off and puts them up on Limewire, am I going to be held liable for illegally distributing “my” music?
I look forward to the day when the RIAA has better things to do.
To the grand majority of users, once they dock their iPod, they will sync with their own copy of iTunes and have those songs erased.
This is pretty much a stupid article in general.
If people know how to unload those songs and then manually sync with iTunes, then they’re well aware that they’re not supposed to be doing that anyway.
The RIAA can suck my iPod.
The RIAA is so fucking stupid. Even though I buy practically all of my music, those guys want me to go out and steal music. They just don’t get it. I you ever meet someone who works for/with the RIAA, punch them in the face for me. Thanks.
Nice.
In a couple years, you won’t be even able to ride in my car and listen to music off of my digital music player unless you pay the RIAA.
The RIAA has better things to do every day. They just don’t care that much about wiping their asses.
I hardly see comparison between the “burned” DVD and an iPod with your music left on it as legitimate. A DVD can’t be recorded over once it’s burned. An iPod however can be erased and re-recoreded.
And to the point. If someone buys a DVD with a library of music on it, it would be very hard to argue that the actual DVD was worth – $200.00 (without the music). However, the iPod without music could arguably be worth $200.00 (depending on the iPod). The music could be a freebie – an incentive to buy a used iPod. Not to mention that Apple won’t let you easily take the music OFF the iPod if it isn’t registered to the original iTunes Library.
But having said all of that. It really doesn’t matter what I think when dealing with the RIAA Gestapo. They make up their own rules and I’m just one of the “little people”.
“And if you ain’t police – you’re little people” – Blade Runner
Ron, you ignorant putz. If you sold your old Victrola and bundled the 78’s with it you would be transferring the original media so there would be no problem.
For the rest of you who seem to think the RIAA is on a witch hunt, get over it, unless you really just believe that stealing the creative works of others without paying for them is just fine. Probably the same group who’s sniveling and whining about trusted computing and DRM. Stealing intellectual property is a crime. Perhaps since it’s so easy and so many people do it, you just feel it’s ok. As an artist struggling to make any return on my investment I think that kind of attitude sucks.
If you’re paying for your tunes then you have nothing to worry about. If you’re one of the folks with thousands of bootleg music files then I hope the RIAA burns you HARD!
Close down the music industry in its entirety and make all musicians earn their living from live concerts. Make music free…
hey, if you’re making an extra profit by selling your iPod preloaded, that’s not right and even though i hate the RIAA, they do have the right to prevent you from making a profit by selling their music with your ipod.
granted, this makes no sense for you and me selling our old 3rd gen iPod with music on it. but the article talks about a guy on ebay selling iPods with 6000 songs loaded for extra $. the RIAA has every right to go after him.
in a broader sense, their stategy of suing to keep their profits up makes them look like the bad guy – and i think in many ways they are.
if the RIAA took a more benevolent stance, not about stealing music, but about suing consumers, i think they’d ultimately end up selling more music. nobody wants to support the lawsuit machine of the RIAA nowadays.
in short – they should be on the consumers side working to get them the music they want, where they want it, when they want it for a reasonable price. then it would feel like the RIAA was on our side instead of a secret police.
stealing music is wrong in any form, but the RIAA has allowed this to happen since ( until iTMS ) stealing was the best way to get new music.
Stop crying you . . . crybabies. You don’t have any right to steal music. Buncha assclowns. The RIAA may go overboard, and artists may not get enough of the pie, but two wrongs don’t make a right.
Stop f*cking stealing music that should be PAID for.
Christ, I swear you sound like the French.
Dear Legal Eagle;
The biggest theft of intelectual property in the history of mankind is the one perpetrated by the members of the RIAA on the actual content creators.
Selling CD’s for $15 to $25 and giving the artists, musicians and song writers mere pennies on the dollar is the real crime here.
The RIAA is just showing the rest of us the way.
“Close down the music industry in its entirety and make all musicians earn their living from live concerts. Make music free..”
That’s not all that far off, considering that huge acts like the Rolling Stones, 50-Cent, U2, and Green Day are among the list of artists who have generated hundreds of millions of dollars just through touring.
“If you’re one of the folks with thousands of bootleg music files then I hope the RIAA burns you HARD!”
I’m one of those people. However, I have 10x as much music I purchased. Many of the “bootleg” music files (mostly from CDs my friends burned for me) have lead directly to me buying CDs of the artist or going to see them play. In most cases, I would not have spent the $ to hear the artists without getting these CDs for free. Did I do this for all of them? No. I usually don’t listen to those songs, but sometimes one comes on in shuffle and I decide to I like it and need to own more music from the group.
Are there legal methods to achieve this? Radio? No thanks. Sites with free downloads? Nice idea, but overwhelming selection. Subscription service? Selections from the majors and Apple do not really have enough of the music I like to make this appropriate. Overall, none work as well as a friend giving me the CD and telling me I have to listen to it.
I agree that people need to pay for music. I understand that sharing music with thousands of strangers has an adverse impact on income for artists. However, not all sharing of music is equal and there are many plausible scenarios by which it can help musicians economically.
What if the iPod is erased and someone uses an undelete program to recover what was erased?
Who would be liable? The person who sold the iPod since he gave the music or the person who recovered the data which was still physically on the iPod?
Even if you erase everything a good forensics program can recover what was deleted.
Hey Legal Eagle –
Ever consider that you might be struggling to make a return on your investment because you suck?
The whole system is royally goofed up. Illegally downloading music ain’t good, but neither are the tactics that the RIAA and major labels are using. Thanks for that CD that won’t play in my car! Thanks for planting spyware on my machine without permission!
I admit…I think I’ve downloaded 5 songs off of Napster when it was still Napster. Better throw my butt in jail.
I buy from iTunes. It’s nice that I don’t have to lay down $15 for one song I heard on the radio, and 10 more songs that are nothing more than filler.
We of the RIAA really don’t have anything better to do, except to come with creative ways to make you pay for the same old songs over and over again, and to make sure the government and all its deparments (i.e. FBI) slobber at out heels.
We need to make more money. We need to feel like we’re in control. We must be in control. Our pockets must always be full. The RIAA must dictate to the peon masses that beg to pay for our substandard products.
Thank you from the bottom of full packets.
Someone has to clip his wings…
“For the rest of you who seem to think the RIAA is on a witch hunt, get over it, unless you really just believe that stealing the creative works of others without paying for them is just fine. Probably the same group who’s sniveling and whining about trusted computing and DRM. Stealing intellectual property is a crime. Perhaps since it’s so easy and so many people do it, you just feel it’s ok. As an artist struggling to make any return on my investment I think that kind of attitude sucks.”
I’m not sure what law school the Eagle attended, but he misses the entire point. It isn’t about protecting the rights of the IP owner, its about unfettered enforcement by the RIAA and similar trade associations. Currently, they have been given leave to take actions against individual citizens (and even underage children) that law enforcement cannot do. By utilizing loopholes that their lobbists had Congress create in DMCA and other statutes, they are essentially doing the same as wiretapping users computers to see what they can find that might be incriminating. In many cases, what they find isn’t even illegal, but that hasn’t stopped them from firing off civil action after civil action, knowing full well that the average citizen can’t afford to pay the costs of discovery to defend such an action. Case in point. When an individual purchases a cassette or CD of a song, they legally own the right to that song. That includes the right of use as well as the right to backup the material. Is there anything illegal occuring where the owner of a tape goes online to download the MP3 of a song he alreadys owns the right to have? No. Does that deter the RIAA? No.
The issue here is not enforcement, but how it is done. Whereas in the past in the early days of Napster, IP owners had no protection. Now that RIAA and MPAA have gone to Congress and had their way, the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction. There is no federal agency that monitors the RIAA’s compliance with either the DMCA or federal wiretapping statutes. Perhaps Legal Eagle might be willing to consent to have monitoring software put on his computer so that the RIAA, the state government, his creditors and anyone else who wants to know can tell when he buys something, what he buys, if he pays all applicable taxes, who he talks to, etc.? “I hope the RIAA burns you hard!”? I’m guessing that if you lived back in the day, you’d be one of the first to turn your Jewish neighbors over to the Gestapo – because you’re a good law-abiding citizen, right?
It’s not about what is or isn’t legal. Just because it might be legal doesn’t make it right. If Congress wanted to protect artists and IP owners, they need to reform DMCA and not only put more teeth into the law for those caught stealing, but also hold accountable groups like the RIAA who abuse it.
That’s just my opinion – I could be wrong.
Is this news? It’s common sense. If you see an add ‘iMac preloaded with Adobe CS2 and over 200 Applications *note: Applications are on hard disk only, no box is provided”, would you be dumb enough to think that the Apps were legitimate and licensed? Maybe they had some different licensing system or they bought downloads. FINE, but you’d check or it’s just the same iMac as any of the other ones except it comes with a bunch of pirated software you could just go pirate yourself.
It’s the same with and ipod. Ipod with a bunch of bundled songs? If they are given away free by the artist fine, but unless you can transfer the license for them; you’re just giving people a preloaded device w/o the legal rights and opening yourself up to getting reamed.
Your purchases have your personal atoms in the song. Take a look at jhymn or hymn and you’ll see the deal. Someone strips the DRM and distributes it with your name in the song…yeah, the RIAA might come knocking.
Obviously it’s just dumb to sell your ipod or computer w/o formating it. What’s the news? It’s common sense. Why not post a news article:
“People pirate music. RIAA says it is illegal. We’re mad says some guy”
Big Al
The RIAA is not the organization that determines royalties. The statutory rate for writers affiliated with BMI is around 9 cents per song but that does not cover the mechanical rights of the performers which are negotiated between the artist and their recording company. Newer artists can get a buck a CD while established acts can command $5 per CD.
Record companies often advance (invest) money based on anticipated demand so it’s a good deal for an artist that goes from netting $200/week to managing a $100K or more advance. Unfortunately, too many artists send that advance money quickly up their noses.
I doubt seriously you’ve ever paid $25 for a CD. If you did it was your choice, nobody held a gun to your head and forced you to spend that much.
Personally I like compilation CDs and rarely pay more than $10 each for them. These usually have 12 or more songs on them so the price per song is even lower than iTunes plus I get the uncompressed master CD to put on the shelf as a legal backup.
It’s up to the artists to negotiate their royalties. It’s called the “Music Business” not Lotto.
It’s been awhile, but I remember back in college there were a lot of used record shops close to campus.
If you sell an iPod with the songs pre-loaded (or a ‘Creative’ Zen for that matter) and include the albums on CD/DVD/What have you, how is this different from a “used” record shop? Or are those illegal now?
Just wondering.
used record/CD shops are kind of a grey area. But since they are only selling the original item, it’s hard to prove that there is more than that copy around. Of course with CDs and burners, it’s easy to buy the real thing, burn a copy and resell the original. Nice way to subsidize a collection.
MW-kept: I done kept all my CDs, even the shitty ones
“If you sell an iPod with the songs pre-loaded (or a ‘Creative’ Zen for that matter) and include the albums on CD/DVD/What have you, how is this different from a “used” record shop? Or are those illegal now?”
The difference is that there is a physicallness to the record; if you have it, that means I don’t. And unless I illegally copied the record or CD before selling it, the ownership for the content on that one record remains intact.
However, with digital music (CDs included) it is easy to make multiple copies for easy distribution. In addition, having the music on my iPod usually means that I am keeping a copy on my computer. Thus illegal distribution of intellectual content.