You’re Probably A Thief
In what Rob Beschizza of Wired is calling a fatal act of self-destruction”, the RIAA is now considering it illegal to copy songs from your own CDs to your own computer for any reason whatsoever.
In other words, if you purchase a CD and want to listen to it on your iPod, the only way for you to keep from breaking the law would be to purchase a second copy of each track through a music download service (such as the iTunes Music Store) and transfer those copies to your player. Importing the songs straight from the CD would, according to the RIAA, put you at risk of being sued for thousands of dollars.
Now that most of you are thinking, “Great, I guess that makes me a thief,” are you now going to start buying duplicate-but-legal copies before filling up your MP3 players? I seriously doubt it. In fact, I’ll bet what faith you had (if any) in the RIAA’s case against music piracy probably just fizzled to nearly none.
[UPDATE] :It looks like this story is getting more skewed each time it’s presented. From the looks of this post on Ten Reasons Why, it seems as though the RIAA isn’t saying that it’s planning on targeting anyone who copies their CDs to their computer. Instead, it’s those who copy the files into a folder that shares files with others. There’s a big difference between the two.
Discussion
The Fayetteville Flyer doesn't necessarily condone the comments here, nor does it review every post. Read our full policy.
By DBartho on January 1st, 2008
That is ridiculous. That’s gonna hold up on court…
By Don McGregor on January 2nd, 2008
I once tried copying tunes from a CD to an 8 track cassette, and felt the Earth actually begin to spin backwards on it’s axis for a couple of minutes. I got scared, and turned it off. Never tried that again. Sheesh! No wonder they want laws.
-=the Don=-
By JTrain on January 2nd, 2008
Here’s what I took from this: If the RIAA asks to see my iPod, I’ll say “No” and then turn and run.
By mr twig on January 2nd, 2008
Good plan JTrain.
Don, you should have stuck with it. I did that a few times and had the same experience. It was a crazy sensation that became addictive. I went to rehab.
Now that I know copying to my computer of my own cd’s is illegal, I’ll probably start doing it again. Something about my generation I suppose.
Anyway, it will be much more exciting now!!