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No, not spouses (we don't deal with that here), but iPod tunes. Declan McCullagh comments:
There is a nice story today on page one of the Washington Post about iPod parties, where folks bring their iPods to play their favorite tunes, and even swap tunes. The article describes how one featured individual downloaded the files he was playing using a file-sharing program, SoulSeek. The Post does not declare its opposition, indeed you might say the Post is actually glorifying the participants and the process. But, I have to wonder whether the RIAA is going to file suit against the club and all its participants for stealing music. I would note that a couple of years ago the Post was a major participant in legal efforts to shut down a website that reprinted news stories in the interest of stimulating political discussion, so one might expect a bit more sympathy for the importance of IP rights.
Once again, people who do this sort of thing are cheating their fellow iPod users because they are avoiding payment of their fair share of the costs of the service. If everyone engages in such activity, then the service will cease to exist, and there will be weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth -- plus politicians blathering about corporate greed. How about a few lectures on consumer greed?
CORRECTION (10:40 a.m.): Declan did not author the quoted comment; he was forwarding to his ListServ an email from Public Citizen's Paul Levy.
posted by James DeLong @ 9:17 AM | Internet: P2P, Search Engines...
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