First of many posts regarding the RIAA and MPAA

As this is a very hot issue, and one very central to many a technology-in-politics flavored debate, you will hear from me often on the subject, as there is a lot of ground to cover, and I just so happen to have a lot of strong opinions on the matter.

First off: The premise.

In June of 1999, a little piece of software debuted called Napster. This software allowed its users to trade music files directly, without the need for a central file server, as is customary in most other internet transactions. This allowed for users to trade copyrighted material in a manner that was highly unregulated, and difficult to track. All of a sudden, millions of people (who were not previously members of hardcore newsgroups and private server rings) realized that they could get the music they wanted without having to pay for it. It was, of course, not legal. However the ease of use, and the relative anonymity placed it a far gaze from shoplifting that same CD from the mall.

This led to the advent of what would become a multi-million dollar industry: Litigation of intellectual property for profit. Simply put, record companies used their deep pockets and high connections to figure out who had been "stealing" from them, and then proceeded to sue the pants off of them, in an effort to apply a tourniquet to their hemorrhaging bottom lines.

It is important to note at this point, when there was a revolution in the way a lot of people sought out their favorite music, another revolution was happening simultaneously. People, courtesy of Napster, and the numerous similar download services to follow, were getting used to the idea of obtaining only the music they wanted. In the case where a customer wanted to purchase the song he or she heard on the radio, they would be forced to buy the CD, which had packaged with it a dozen songs that they could care less about. In same cases, they might enjoy these songs, and in some cases, not. When downloading music became popular, consumers realized there was a way to go out and find only the song they wanted, and leave the rest alone.

Napster became very popular, very fast. Particularly in the college demographic, people used Napster to download literally gigabytes of unpurchased music. When one Napster user bought a CD legitimately, they would upload it, and soon the disc would be available to millions of people. Quite expectedly, there was a major backlash from both the recording industry, and also individual artists, who felt particularly slighted from this shift in thinking. Some of you may recall the way that Metallica became villains overnight when they brought forth lawsuits against numerous people; suing them for illegally downloading their songs. While artists such as Metallica had a legitimate beef, their quick and severe brand of justice brought considerable bad PR for them from the consumer base.

Napster was eventually shut down through numerous legal threats. However, as the concept behind the software had also been disseminated in a similar fashion to the songs it delivered, many similar services quickly popped up to take up the slack. Most of these were known as Peer-to-Peer download services, behind a technology called Gnutella. Some of these included Morpheus, LimeWire, Kazaa, and BearShare. These, for the most part, also allowed the trading of virtually any other type of file, well beyond the realm of recorded music. The rate at which pirated software, movies, books, and television shows began to skyrocket.

As these services were systematically shut down (all but LimeWire have been more or less forced out of existence. LimeWire has survived on the intent to "go legit" by offering paid downloads and ad-sponsored links. Coincidentally, LimeWire, and before it, Kazaa, happen to be one of the largest sources of spyware in the world), one new technology rose from the ashes, and became the one force to be reckoned with. The technology is known as BitTorrent, and was developed by Bram Cohen in April of 2001. BitTorrent was everything good about its predecessors, and none of the bad. It more or less perfected the anonymity factor between users, and without a centralized searching function, left no paper trail to follow for investigators trying to catch file sharers in the act. BitTorrent files are traded through use of a "tracker" file, which gives the necessary details to download the file, not from one user, but collecting pieces from potentially thousands of people with identical copies of the sought-after file. Because the tracker files are listed on independent websites, who do not actually carry any of the offending files, the means by which the RIAA and MPAA have used in the past to track their quarry were obscured to the point where ZERO lawsuits have been filed against file sharers using the BitTorrent protocol.

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) quickly became the face of opposition in these matters, where individual artists either bowed out due to the poor image which resulted from striking out at their fans, or for other reasons, such as sympathy for a change in the market. Both organizations began storming the country with threatening letters, demanding settlements, usually in the neighborhood of about $30,000, in exchanging for any alleged downloading that may have taken place. Those who decided to fight these allegations were generally met with astronomical damages in the event of a loss in court.

It was during this phase where the water got muddy. While the sharing of copyrighted material is against the law, there are numerous important issues that are generally cast aside by the recording/motion picture associations. First of all, there have been numerous stories about full-out raids of people's homes in which SWAT teams have sometimes been deployed, as part of the investigation of file sharing cases. This is something that should be taken of particular note, as trading copy-protected material is a CIVIL offense, not a CRIMINAL offense. The difference being that CIVIL matters are handled by individual entities, and generally result in financial punishment, whereas CRIMINAL offenses are handled by the state or federal government, and generally result in jailtime. To raid a person's house in relation to a civil matter shows a grossly weak willed, and misinformed local authority, and worse, a potentially corrupt one. The use of potentially deadly force was never intended to resolve civil matters. Period.

Also, the RIAA in particular began to send threatening letters with less caution, sending letters, and at times bringing charges against people to whom there was little or no evidence of file sharing. Because the **AA had a team of crafty lawyers, often these notices were served with little or no time in which to mount a legitimate response, even in the event of innocence, before a summary judgement was rendered against them. In other cases, people were forced to pay the ~$30,000 settlement because they could not afford to adequately defend themselves against a well funded adversary.

The **AA legal teams continued to display questionable legal morals, apparent when challenged with any sort of public discovery of evidence, cases were summarily dropped to avoid revealing any lack of evidence on their part.

While the act of sharing copyrighted material may be illegal, the **AA has proven themselves to possess considerably looser morals. This can be seen in the many instances in which the **AA has been investigated by local authorities for RICO offenses (tactics punishable under legislation to prevent Mafia and organized crime activities). There have also been recent victories by the consumer to force these organizations to stand trial, as opposed to their usual tactic of cutting and running anytime a reasonable opposition is mounted.

Also to be noted is the fact that there are several legitimate uses for file sharing. The Linux operating system exists under the umbrella of Open Source Software, that is, in most cases, designed to be freely distributable. Because Linux programs and operating systems can vary in size from a few megabytes to a few gigabytes, BitTorrent is an ideal technology in which to convey free software to numerous users. However, BitTorrent as a whole has been vilified by the **AA as an illegal act, and many actions are now taking place in Congress and many major telecommunications companies to disable or discourage the use of the BitTorrent protocol.

This has led to intense lobbying my the **AA associations as well as partnering organizations to get large internet carriers such as Comcast and AT&T to either throttle down the bandwidth they offer to their customers, to "shape" the bandwidth in such a way that it blocks the specific traffic originating from BitTorrent connections, suspending service for users with high bandwidth records, or monitoring of internet traffic. Or, some or all of the above.

There are numerous ethical and legal reasons why these various techniques are being fought by consumers. The most apparent one is in the case of monitoring as it violates many, many laws enacted both to protect the privacy of consumers, as well as keep telecom carriers immune in the event that illegal or actionable activities occur over their lines. If an email passes from one person to another containing company secrets, the people involved are at risk, and not the carrier who allowed the email to go from one party to the other. This is for everyone's benefit.

Also, many carriers have been caught throttling down the bandwidth of users who have the tendency to use higher amounts of bandwidth on a regular basis. This has also caused a great deal of outcry from the public, as many carriers have advertised certain available speeds (e.g. 7Mb per second) which is marketed as unlimited. These carriers have then gone and suspended service to people that operate their internet connections at their peak for sustained periods. In essence, they are being penalized for utilizing the bandwidth they were promised by the internet provider. Comcast has been in the news lately for this topic, as well as attempting to disable use of the BitTorrent client without notifying their customers. The FCC is currently investigating them for this, as among other things, it is a direct violation of their own Terms of Service agreement.

This is a good stopping point for now. I will continue this series later this week, speaking both of the history of the debate, as well as the legal and ethical issues, and my personal opinions. Stay tuned!