Let me be clear, piracy is wrong. But the RIAA’s response is way over the top. What needs to happen is for RIAA to sued into an abyss so that they can’t get out. A reasonable approach would probably gain alot sympathy and compliance. But that is not their approach. Instead of using candy, they wish to use storm troopers with the assumption everyone is guilty.
When reading proposals like this, it is important to remember that people will often make extreme, ridiculous demands as the starting point for a negotiation, because they know that later when they offer a compromise that eliminates the most extreme demands, it will be seen as being moderate and acceptable. The goal was never to actually achieve the original demands; it’s the compromise position that’s the actual goal and the initial demands are simply a tactic to soften up the opposition into accepting the resulting compromise position.
@GregS: If this was coming from normal people, I’d agree with you. But the history of the RIAA and their tactics against consumers (keeping in mind all the innocent people swept up in their net), I have little doubt that their demands are their actual desires. They don’t want a middle ground, but would certainly take it as the continue to get all their demands met. I don’t recall the RIAA speaking out against the draconian measure of installing a rootkit a while ago, and that turns out to look exactly what they’d like to do.
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Let me be clear, piracy is wrong. But the RIAA’s response is way over the top. What needs to happen is for RIAA to sued into an abyss so that they can’t get out. A reasonable approach would probably gain alot sympathy and compliance. But that is not their approach. Instead of using candy, they wish to use storm troopers with the assumption everyone is guilty.
When reading proposals like this, it is important to remember that people will often make extreme, ridiculous demands as the starting point for a negotiation, because they know that later when they offer a compromise that eliminates the most extreme demands, it will be seen as being moderate and acceptable. The goal was never to actually achieve the original demands; it’s the compromise position that’s the actual goal and the initial demands are simply a tactic to soften up the opposition into accepting the resulting compromise position.
@GregS: If this was coming from normal people, I’d agree with you. But the history of the RIAA and their tactics against consumers (keeping in mind all the innocent people swept up in their net), I have little doubt that their demands are their actual desires. They don’t want a middle ground, but would certainly take it as the continue to get all their demands met. I don’t recall the RIAA speaking out against the draconian measure of installing a rootkit a while ago, and that turns out to look exactly what they’d like to do.
Let’s not forget the “U.S. Copyright Group” who’s sued 20K people and planning on suing another 30K.
So is this to stop piracy, or simply an enhanced blackmail scheme where people who can’t afford to defend themselves are driven to pay off lawyers?
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