Using the Search engine inside Emule will usually get
hundreds of hits so it would appear that the Emule search index function is
working as advertised. (Um, NOT.)
Last month I identified that there were a lot of fake
Lugundum servers whose role was to interdict your file requests with spam (fake
files).
In Australia with monopolistic phone carriers lowering the
user broadband experience bar down to 20-30 GB per month ($34.95 – $79.95)
every bit/byte costs money and needs to be budgeted.
So if you live in
Stop using Fake Servers.
Stop using eMule Search.
What are the options?
Use Kademlia search – not perfect but less fakes…. If
everyone maintains a high standard of personal downloading etiquette and
deletes fake files the moment they are discovered.
Find an index that suits your methodology of entertainment
grazing.
Where?
There are quite a few. For ED2K networks there are
http://forum.hell-spawn-inc.com/
And what do they do?
Well, like Google, they are an index to content.
However, aren’t all those files copyrighted?
Many are. However this is a debate yet to be tested in our courts, I.e.: that once a Television program airs, it is released into the Public Domain by virtue of the advertising that it carries.
Does that mean that all the files on the indexes have advertising?
Actually, no, they have had the advertising cut out with programs like Videoredo.
The conundrum comes, when a copy of the file is shared, after having videoredo editing applied. It could be argued successfully, that the current person watching the “space/time shifted” content hasn’t viewed the advertising and therefore hasn’t “paid” for the content.
In his defense, he could argue a number of mitigating responses;
1. The PVR/TIVO/IQ has a fast forward button.
2.
Much of the content is also eventually
transmitted via other broadcasters like ABC (
3. The advertising payment from the sponsors is what enables the content to be aired and therefore it is paid for, regardless of if anyone watched the advertising or not. i.e.: The Broadcasters do not have a contract with the viewer to ensure that their advertising is actually viewed (Yet).
This topic, has in part, been argued by the
Although this was in part overturned on appeal, it was only by a slim majority and the judges appeared to have some considerable trouble reaching the decision to overturn the original ruling.
Unfortunately,
overturning the Betamax decision entirely would have immediately allowed the
content creators to go after Intel, Sun, IBM and Microsoft, for surely their
hardware and software solutions are equally capable of creating “infringing
copies”.
As one Judge espoused:
If there are millions of owners of VTR's who make copies of
televised sports events, religious broadcasts, and educational programs ... and
if the proprietors of those programs welcome the practice, the business of
supplying the equipment that makes such copying feasible should not be stifled
simply because the equipment is used by some individuals to make unauthorized
reproductions of respondents' works....
When one considers the nature of a televised copyrighted
audiovisual work ... and that time-shifting merely enables a viewer to see such
a work which he had been invited to witness in its entirety free of charge, the
fact ... that the entire work is reproduced ... does not have its ordinary
effect of militating against a finding of fair use.
Combined with noncommercial, nonprofit nature of time-shifting, he concluded that it was indeed a fair use.
In summary, the premise is that if a Television program was
produced for the sole purpose of being transmitted over free to air networks in
the
In Recording
Indus. Ass’n of Am. v. Diamond Multimedia Sys., Inc., 180 F.3d 1072, 1079
(9th Cir. 1999), the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals
applied the "space shifting" argument in the context of the Rio
device (a portable MP3 player). "
A&M Records, Inc. v.
Napster, Inc. 239 F.3d (9th Cir.
2001), the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a fair use "space
shifting" argument raised as an analogy to the time-shifting argument
that prevailed in Sony.
In
August 2004, in the case of MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd.
[1], the Ninth
Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Grokster's favor due to its "substantial
noninfringing uses". The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case on
In June the following year, the Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Ninth Court of Appeals "Because substantial evidence supports MGM on all elements, summary judgment for the respondents was error. On remand, reconsideration of MGM's summary judgement motion will be in order." Pp. 23-24 380 F.3d 1154, vacated and remanded. The Supreme Court unanimously concurred that Grokster could be liable for inducing copyright infringement. In the opinion, Justice Souter stated that "[t]he rule on inducement of infringement as developed in the early cases is no different today. [A]dvertising an infringing use or instructing how to engage in an infringing use, show an affirmative intent that the product be used to infringe, and a showing that infringement was encouraged overcomes the law's reluctance to find liability when a defendant merely sells a commercial product suitable for some lawful use…"
However, in that summary, he has identified the problem both
in copyright law and in assessing damages and possible defendants.
In other words, selling iPod’s is okay, but advertising that you can fill up your new iPod with free music from the P2P networks is not OK.
One of the most interesting cases in the USA was Fortnightly
Corp. v. United Artists 392
(We can think of a few cases currently before the courts where this might have some application.)
The poor consumer is still mainly in the dark about TV programs, unfortunately. What can he/she do or not do?
(Good luck finding a solicitor that can give you a one line answer on that one….)
In
The Act is surprisingly negligent in addressing Television programming. This is possibly due to successful lobbying by Foxtel, (or by IQ ownership by several cabinet members.)
In closing, an item of curious trivia….. In
References:
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
List of copyright case law
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_copyright_case_law
The following is a list of cases that deal with issues of
concern to copyright
in various jurisdictions. Some of these cases are leading English cases as the
law of copyright in various Commonwealth jurisdictions developed out of
English law while these countries were colonies of the British
Empire. Other cases provide background in areas of copyright law that may
be of interest for the legal reasoning or the conclusions they reach.
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