Discordia || Comments || Jesse Jordan vs the RIAA

Information InFiltration. Mediaculturistic artistic dissent-o-mania.

[new] how many people get it? (Avg. Score: 3.00 / Raters: 1) (#1)
by amy on Sat Jun 14th, 2003 at 09:42:31 AM EURODISCORDIA TIME
(User Info) http://plagiarist.org

this seems like a slapp suit to me... (i wonder if this can be defined as "public participation" under new york's anti-slapp legislation?

still, as the RIAA well knows, having laws to protect people from bullying is one thing; their being in a position to take advantage of the laws is another. if the ABC news story is even roughly accurate, the RIAA has simply used intimidation tactics to make jordan buckle under in an out of court settlement - in a situation where they probably wouldn't have had a prayer in court. jordan can't afford to be wrong, and the RIAA know it. in many cases, public embarrassment of the bully in question is an effective defense. but the RIAA has such a monopoly on the music industry, they don't care HOW evil the public think they are.

the RIAA is a trust, and should be broken up. probably the current DOJ isn't going to do that. it may take awhile for things to change in that direction.

but - what's really disturbing here is that jordan's project really ISN'T about swapping music files. it's a general purpose search utility, a better mousetrap - not the type of thing a person would be on guard about releasing, even in the post-napster hysterical climate.

but, the RIAA can get away with calling it stealing because not enough people can understand the difference. there's a general apathy about censorship among the non-tech population - even activists - when it comes to censorship imposed upon technology. we see causes from stuff like this to fighting government Internet surveillance taken up by the EFF and techies, but somehow, it doesn't seem to sink in as important outside of tech specific groups. Perhaps the issues seem too technical? Perhaps they don't seem important outside the "virtual" world?

Maybe the obvious thing the tech community sees isn't so obvious outside it: that being told what you can and can't say and do with your computer is the same as being told what you can and can't say with your pen or your mouth.

Thoughts?
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Jesse Jordan vs the RIAA | 6 comments

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