Phyrfight Intel

Wired 13.09: A Rotten Ruling

“…The Grokster ruling in June was just the latest example. The Court decided that “one who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright … is liable for the resulting acts of infringement by third parties.” Pundits bathed the Court in praise for its “sensible balance” between the demands of Hollywood and the pleas of technologists. The pundits are idiots. The Grokster case revealed the worst in Supreme Court ivory towerism. Astonishingly, hardly anyone noticed…

…Apple has sold about 15 million iPods, each capable of holding between 1,000 and 15,000 songs. Its iTunes music store has sold about 500 million songs for 99 cents each. That works out to only 30 songs or so per device. Does this surprise Apple? Did it really expect that people would buy a 60-gig iPod for $400 and then put $14,850 of music in it? No. Apple expected precisely what it advertised – that people would “Rip. Mix. Burn.” music from CDs to iTunes and, in turn, to their iPods. After all, as the ads say, “It’s your music.”

Well, is it? That’s still unclear. Congress passed a law to give consumers the right to copy music to analog devices – cassette tapes. But courts have held that that law does not extend to digital devices – iPods.And if it took a law (rather than the principle of fair use) to give you the right to make a mix tape, then, as many have argued, it takes a law to authorize transferring songs to an iPod…”