Discussion of all things related to Public Domain

[tom poe <tompoe AT amihost.com>]

The "labels" are way beyond control, if I read this right.  I wonder if
the day is coming, when bands and musicians will be castigated by their
audiences for uploading their songs to these sites?
Tom

WalMart’s way to the future
http://www.lessig.org/blog/archives/001647.shtml

But the real devil here is not that the service doesn’t (yet) work. It
is the details of the TOS [ed: terms of service]. These are among the
most restrictive in the business, authorizing 10 burns from 3 machines,
but requiring you promise:
“You may not reproduce (except as noted above), publish, transmit,
distribute, display, broadcast, re-broadcast, modify, create derivative
works from, sell or participate in any sale of or exploit in any way, in
whole or in part, directly or indirectly, any of the Products, the
Service or any related software. You may not reverse engineer,
decompile, disassemble, modify or disable any copy protection or use
limitation systems associated with the Products. You may not play and
then re-digitize any Products, or upload those Products to the Internet.
You may not use the Products in conjunction with any other third-party
content (e.g, to provide sound for a film). You may not sell or offer to
sell the Products, including but not limited to, posting any Product for
auction, on any Internet auction site. All Products are sublicensed to
you and not sold, notwithstanding the use of the terms “sell,”
“purchase,” “order,” or “buy” on the Service or in this Agreement.”

So, the “Rip,Mix,Burn” culture has now been cancelled. Want to sync a
song with the home movie of your kid? You can’t. You’ve promised you
won’t. Want to display a slide show of pictures taken at Christmas? you
can’t. You’ve promised you won’t. Any derivative use if banned by this
agreement (and by the code built into WM9) — and remember, if you use a
tool to crack those protections, you’ve violated the DMCA.