Isle of Man proposes file-sharing fee

Music fans and record labels have long fought over the rights and wrongs of file-sharing, but now an island tax haven in the Irish Sea says it has come up with a way to keep the peace.

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House Panel Scrutinizes File-Sharing

A diagram of a Pentagon computer network that includes passwords to defense contractors' systems is one of hundreds of classified documents accidentally available online, a House panel was told Tuesday.

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Wholesale copying of music on P2P networks is fair use. Statutory damages can't be applied to P2P users. File-swapping results in no provable harm to rightsholders.

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Millions continue to use the filesharing service as verdict is appealed. Access to the site remains open and the Pirate political party has seen a surge of support.

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Google has waded into the worldwide debate over disconnecting file-sharers after repeated copyright infringement.

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I had a surprisingly candid lunch conversation last week with a big music label executive, and a good part of our talk focused on the future of music.

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Remember back in December all the fanfare around that WSJ article claiming that the RIAA was abandoning its litigation strategy? In retrospect, the whole thing is looking like a huge PR campaign rather than anything significant.

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2008 Software Application of the Year: Dropbox

This time of year, everyone makes "best of" lists. I'm going to keep mine short. My absolute favorite bit of technology for 2008 is Dropbox.

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The music industry's requests for more personal information regarding the identity of several accused file-sharers have been shot down by a federal judge. Judge Nancy Gertner quashed a subpoena this week in the infamous London-Sire v.

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Watch out! Here they come again. Even those folks that don't file share are getting into trouble.

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Law enforcement officials from several German states have told local press in recent days that they won't pursue the vast majority of file sharing lawsuits anymore.

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The old-fashioned rock star has gone the way of the dodo and the dinosaur.

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The music industry should embrace illegal file-sharing websites, according to a study of Radiohead's last album release that found huge numbers of people downloaded it illegally even though the band allowed fans to pay little or nothing for it.

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This month's announcement of a back-room deal between ISPs (internet service providers) and the big record companies to spy on suspected copyright infringers and reduce the quality of their internet connections is just the latest paragraph in the record industry's long, self-pity …

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The government has set a secret target to reduce illegal filesharing of music and films by up to 80% over the next three years, MediaGuardian.co.uk can reveal.

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Six of the UK's biggest net providers are believed to be backing a government plan to tackle music piracy online. The plan commits the firms to working towards a "significant reduction" in the illegal sharing of music.

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The Motion Picture Association of America has helped convict an administrator for EliteTorrents.org, a peer-to-peer site, of felony copyright infringement and conspiracy, the U.S. Justice Department announced Friday.

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The Motion Picture Association of America said Friday intellectual-property holders should have the right to collect damages, perhaps as much as $150,000 per copyright violation, without having to prove infringement.

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A federal judge quashed an RIAA subpoena seeking the identities of students at Boston University accused of copyright infringement.

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Sweden plans this week to charge the people running Pirate Bay, one of the world's most visited Web sites, with being accessories in breaking copyright law.

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Congress is attempting to pass a law which will remove ALL federal support/funding for educational facilities that allow ANY student to share files.

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According to Robb Topolski, Cox is in fact using traffic shaping to degrade p2p traffic. In analyzing a user log, he has concluded that Cox is using traffic shaping hardware to send forged TCP/IP packets with the RST (reset) flag set -- with the goal of disrupting eDonkey traffic.

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In August, we reported on a University of Tennessee student targeted by the RIAA for file-sharing who had attempted to quash a subpoena by arguing that the Federal Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) prevented the release of his name, addresses, and phone numbers.

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I legally own 19% of the music I've downloaded this year. I should be the RIAA's best friend.

And yet I am almost positive I am not. In light of today's shutdown of the popular bit torrent tracker "OiNK," a few thoughts:

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As I wrote earlier this week, the Recording Industry Association of America has now expanded its campaign against illicit file-sharing to students at George Washington University.

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Jammie Thomas, a single mother of two, was found liable Thursday for copyright infringement in the nation's first file-sharing case to go before a jury.

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This is not the first lawsuit filed for the RIAA since setting out on their "zero-tolerence" campaign in late 2003. However, due to the number of labels involved, many say this trial could set legal precedent for online copyright infringement in the future.

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