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Tuesday, 15 March 2005 |
The File-Sharing Follies
TechNewsWorld, CA
The music labels claim there's a thriving alternative to file sharing: corporate
online music stores such as iTunes and Napster II. But only an infinitesimal
proportion of online music lovers use such sites. And that's because, in their
greed, the labels wholesale their MP3 tracks for between 65 and 75 cents each,
forcing the retailers to charge around a dollar a track.
With a landmark Supreme Court hearing on online file sharing slated for March
29, Hollywood is stepping up its multimillion-dollar, international PR blitz to
keep peer-to-peer networks in the public eye and to characterize men, women and
children who share music and other files online as hardened criminals.
In the U.S., nearly 10,000 people have been sued. In Sweden the police raided
the Stockholm offices of Bahnhof, Sweden's largest ISP. They were acting on
behalf of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), which is looking for
dirt on the sites it wants to shut down. According to Reuters, "U.S. copyright
protection experts" -- i.e., the movie studio cartel's lawyers -- have
considered Bahnhof a "haven for high-level Internet piracy for years."
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Last Updated ( Wednesday, 23 March 2005 )
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