Call on Congress to Hold Hearings on Media Ownership

Dear Friend,

The FCC has been moving forward with a secret timeline to vote
on sweeping changes to media ownership rules. This is just the
most recent in a long series of outrageous moves the FCC has
made to avoid public scrutiny.

If you go to the URL below you can check out what is at stake
and send your own message directly to your elected officials.
Take action on this campaign at:

http://action.freepress.net/campaign/fcc_oversight?rk=97xhEsM1ufSdW

What's at Stake
Big isn't always bad – unless you're talking about the companies that dominate our country's media.

A handful of companies control most of what we see, hear and read every day. They own our TV stations, radio stations, newspapers, magazines, cable channels, movie studios, music labels – even our favorite Internet sites.

Unchecked consolidation means that Big Media are getting even bigger, giving these firms more control over our news and information. Bottom line? Big Media are bad news – for all of us.

What's So Bad about Big Media?

Big Media fail local communities.

Big Media companies get a sweet deal from the government. They get to use the public airwaves – for free – to make billions in profits. In exchange for this government handout, broadcasters are supposed to serve the public by offering quality programs that meet the needs of local communities. Instead, Big Media companies gut local newsrooms and ignore local issues.

Big Media ignore diversity.

Big Media have limited ownership opportunities for women and people of color, pushing them off the public airwaves and stifling vital voices. Coverage of issues that matter to people of color, women, the middle and working class, and rural communities has disappeared. The result? Media that fail to represent our nation's diversity.

Big Media are bad for democracy.

Democracy can't exist without an informed public. We rely on unbiased news from independent sources to stay informed and to hold our government accountable. But media consolidation means fewer sources of news, opinion and information. Instead of hard-hitting critical journalism, Big Media give us a junk diet of celebrity gossip and sensationalism.

Going from Bad to Worse

The Federal Communications Commission is considering sweeping changes to media ownership rules that would allow media conglomerates to swallow up more local radio and television stations and newspapers. A single company could own the major daily newspaper, and as many as eight radio stations and three TV stations in a single city. That's too much media power in too few hands.

Don't Like It? Do Something.

If we want better media, we need better media policies. It's time to promote local ownership, amplify minority voices, support quality journalism, and bring local artists, voices and viewpoints to the airwaves. The only way to stop Big Media is by getting organized in our communities and demanding our leaders in Washington start listening to the public instead of the industry lobbyists. Use this Web site to learn more about the issues and find out how you can get involved.

RIAA and MediaSentry...

MediaSentry is a company that specializes in the stopping on P2P networks and Copyrighted material being swapped on the internet. They are budded up with the XXAA in their plight to help save Hollywood and the Recording Industry.

Acording to the MediaSentry website:

"SafeNet offers a tightly integrated suite of anti-piracy and digital distribution solutions through its MediaSentry Services™ offering. Leveraging the MediaSentry Services platform, SafeNet helps clients detect and deter unauthorized distribution of copyrighted content and prosecute those who engage in media and software piracy online. SafeNet also offers a full suite of solutions that provide enabling infrastructure to support the successful growth of digital promotion and distribution. All of our services can be deployed as individual components or bundled together for use in an integrated solution"


According to The Wired Magazine article:
They are caught up in the counter suit that was filed by Tanya Andersen, who had been defending herself against a debilitating RIAA lawsuit for about two years before the RIAA dropped its case, has launched a big time offensive against her former accusers, filing suit today against Atlantic Recording Corporation, Priority Records, Capitol Records, UMG Recordings, and BMG Music, the RIAA, MediaSentry, and Settlement Support Center.

Andersen's Complaint (on Internet Law and Regulation ) calls out the labels, their legal prosecution/lobbying arm (the RIAA), and the oft-maligned software it uses to find alleged infringers (MediaSentry). It claims the RIAA's methods are criminal, and that their lawyers are needlessly vicious in pursuing defendants.

From Andersen's Complaint:

"Recently it has been discovered that as a part of this secret enterprise MediaSentry has for years conducted illegal, flawed and negligent investigations of many thousands of private United States citizens. These illegal investigations are then used as the sole basis for pursuit of tens of thousands of lawsuits throughout the US."

Andersen has counter-sued the RIAA before, but this seems to be more about the RIAA's alleged infringer identification tactics being illegal from the get-go. It remains to be seen whether a company posing as a user to monitor data shared by other users on a network is breaking the law, but the RIAA's cookie could be about to crumble. Andersen seems prepared to take her case as far as she can.

I say more power to her!! It is far time that someone stands up to their organization. They have used scare tactics and mob antics for long enough!

Boycott The Riaa...

Here are a few SWEET posters that can be ordered from this site: www.cafepress.com

What is your opinion?

RIAA Wants to Hack Your PC

This story was on Wired Magizine several years ago by Declan McCullagh, but i thought that it needed to be retold! This just show the absurdity of their actions!!


WASHINGTON -- Look out, music pirates: The recording industry wants the right to hack into your computer and delete your stolen MP3s.

It's no joke. Lobbyists for the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) tried to glue this hacking-authorization amendment onto a mammoth anti-terrorism bill that Congress approved last week.

An RIAA-drafted amendment according to a draft obtained by Wired News would immunize all copyright holders -- including the movie and e-book industry -- for any data losses caused by their hacking efforts or other computer intrusions "that are reasonably intended to impede or prevent" electronic piracy.

In an interview Friday, RIAA lobbyist Mitch Glazier said that his association has abandoned plans to insert that amendment into anti-terrorism bills -- and instead is supporting a revised amendment that takes a more modest approach."It will not be some special exception for copyright owners," Glazier said. "It will be a general fix to bring back current law." Glazier is the RIAA's senior vice president of government relations and a former House aide.


The RIAA's interest in the USA Act, an anti-terrorism bill that the Senate and the House approved last week, grew out of an obscure part of it called section 815. Called the "Deterrence and Prevention of Cyberterrorism" section, it says that anyone who breaks into computers and causes damage "aggregating at least $5,000 in value" in a one-year period would be committing a crime.


If the current version of the USA Act becomes law, the RIAA believes, it could outlaw attempts by copyright holders to break into and disable pirate FTP or websites or peer-to-peer networks. Because the bill covers aggregate damage, it could bar anti-piracy efforts that cause little harm to individual users, but meet the $5,000 threshold when combined. "We might try and block somebody," Glazier said. "If we know someone is operating a server, a pirated music facility, we could try to take measures to try and prevent them from uploading or transmitting pirated documents."


The RIAA believes that this kind of technological "self-help" against online pirates, if done carefully, is legal under current federal law. But the RIAA is worried about the USA Act banning that practice -- and neither the Senate nor the House versions of that bill include the RIAA's suggested changes. Glazier said that the RIAA was no longer lobbying for the language provided to Wired News -- "that's completely out" -- but instead wanted to ensure that current law remains the same. But Glazier said he could not provide a copy of the revised amendment he hopes to include. Legal scholars say that the original amendment the RIAA had been shopping around to members of Congress raises privacy and security concerns.


"It could lead to some really bad outcomes, like a program purposefully intended to delete MP3s that misfunctions and erases everything on a disk -- ooops," says Marc Rotenberg, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "Think a repo man smashing windows and knocking down doors to pull out the 27-inch color TV when you've missed a couple of payments."
Peter Swire, a former top privacy official under President Clinton and now a professor at Ohio State University, says he hopes there would be public debate on any such proposal.


"On its face, this language would allow a deliberate hack attack by a copyright owner against the system of someone who is infringing the copyright," Swire said. The draft amendment is overly broad and poorly-written, says Orin Kerr, a former Justice Department lawyer now at George Washington University. Says Kerr: "It would deny victims their right to sue copyright owners and their agents if they engaged in vigilante justice by hacking or other means in an effort to block online music distribution."


"Another troubling thing is that they appear to be trying to limit their liability for consequential damages," says R. Polk Wagner, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania's law school. "What if their efforts caused your hard disk to become fatally corrupted?" An aide on Capitol Hill who had been contacted by the RIAA was even more blunt, dubbing the amendment the "RIAA's License to Virus" proposal.


For its part, the RIAA is still trying to get a copy of its revised amendment -- that it would not provide a copy of -- included in the anti-terrorism bill called the USA Act. "It didn't make it into the Senate bill," says the RIAA's Glazier. "So the great work of the Senate staff to fix this unintentional problem didn't get through. Now we're in the House with the base language that could have these unintended consequences." On Friday, the House voted 339-79 for the USA Act, which eases limits on wiretapping and Internet monitoring. The Senate approved the bill on Thursday.


Because neither the House nor the Senate versions of the USA Act include either variant of the RIAA's amendment, the association's lobbyists will focus on a possible conference committee, which would be appointed to work out differences with the Senate. Another possibility is that the Senate could enact the USA Act when senators return this week, automatically sending the bill to President Bush for his signature.


Bush has asked Congress for the additional surveillance and detention powers as a response to the deadly Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.The text of the original RIAA amendment says that "no action may be brought under this subsection arising out of any impairment of the availability of data, a program, a system or information, resulting from measures taken by an owner of copyright in a work of authorship, or any person authorized by such owner to act on its behalf, that are intended to impede or prevent the infringement of copyright in such work by wire or electronic communication."

It also immunizes from liability actions that "are reasonably intended to impede or prevent the unauthorized transmission" of pirated materials.


What is your opinion?

Internet Radio...RIAA Style

Radio's Tangled Web

April 30, 2007 - As you read these words on your monitor, there is a decent chance that you’re also streaming a little online radio. After all, with an estimated listenership of approximately 50 million Americans per month, Internet radio has become a go-to destination for a fuller spectrum of music, an alternative to FM’s mind-numbing monotony. And if you are one of those listeners, mark May 15 on your calendar: it might well be the day that the music dies.

The RIAA NAZIs are at it again. I reported a story on this a few months ago. Well, it looks like they are going to go and turn the music off. The average person running a web station will not be able to pay the HUGE fees that are being leved aginst them. A lot of people just stream music on the internet from their houses and if this happens, This will block many people from music that they would have never have listened to otherwise.

"Last month the trio of Library of Congress judges that oversees copyright law’s statutory licenses decided that May 15 will be the date royalty fees owed by Web radio operators will be recalibrated. The Copyright Royalty Board changed rates from a percentage of revenue to a per-song, per-listener fee—effectively hiking the rates between 300 and 1,200 percent, according to a lawyer representing a group of Webcasters. "If this rate does not change, it will wipe out the vast majority of Web radio," Tim Westergren, founder of the music discovery service Pandora, tells NEWSWEEK. "If this stays, we’re done. Back to the stone age again." (Royalty Board Chief Justice James Sledge declined to comment on the case, which lawyers say they intend to appeal.)

What is your opinion?

The Music industry...

How many people remember way back around 1985 when Compact Discs came out. Remember how much they cost? The were around 10-13 dollars. Then remember in the 1990s? The price was raised to around 16-19 dollars a disc. What a dramatic increase. Well several years ago, there was a class action lawsuit filed against the RIAA for price gouging. If you went online, you could sign that petition and join the lawsuit.

Well, i did and the other day, i received a check from that suit! IT was about $14, but the case was won. I know that was not much money, but divided out between several million people, think about it.



Here is part of the ruling:

The Defendants have agreed to pay a combination of cash and non-cash consideration. Defendants' combined cash payments total $67,375,000. In addition, Distributor Defendants will provide $75,700,000 worth of prerecorded music compact discs. This will take place in the 41 states that filed the suit.

I was a member and i filed a claim in Texas.

You are a member of the Settlement Group if you are a person (or entity) in the United States or its Territories and Possessions who purchased prerecorded Music Products, consisting of compact discs, cassettes and vinyl albums, from one or more retailers during the period January 1, 1995, through December 22, 2000.

Tell Me What You Think...

RIAA...Part The second

I welcome Comments to my BLOG.

This battle has been going on with the RIAA for over 7 years. The music industry missed the boat on this issue long ago. Way back when Napster first came on the Internet scene, they could have put an end to the file/music swapping by making pay sites back then. They DID NOT.
I remember back in the late 1990s, Camelot Music was going to put in their stores Cd burners that would allow you to make a personal CD to purchase. That would have been a great idea! You could have gone i and made a comp of your favorite artists for around $20. I mean, let’s face it, Most people purchase an album for 3-4 GOOD songs, the rest of the music is just filler unless you are like me and i am a completists and i like to get *everything* from the artist i like even if it is bad.
The P2P Internet trend is now unstoppable. It would take a complete shutdown of the Internet to stop the music/file swapping from happening and that will not happen. Too many people and businesses depend on the Internet for their livelihood. IF the RIAA shuts down a site, it will pop back up in another country. Period Point Blank!! I have seen it happen.

IF the Artist would have just agreed to let Napster sell their music for say $20 a month, they would have all been RICH! But they got greedy and now they suffer the outcome.

1. Better Technology
2. Declining Compact Disc sales
3. Declining Movie Sales(Not Good Products)

The RIAA can sue the entire world and it will not stop. Most people that download the tracks use them for personal use and do not *Sell* them to make a profit. In fact, a lot of people use downloading to sample the music beforehand to see if they like it.

IF you are in the middle of this RIAA/Music Downloading mess, a good place to go and join is the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation)

Well, enough of this mess...
Back to life.

RIAA is at it again....

This is for you that have not heard this story yet or read about it.

I welcome Comments to my BLOG.