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iTunes Match and Pirated Music
- Thread starter bro1357
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Okay, throwing my two cents in here to try to clear the air up a bit. Let's say, for argument's sake, you have a library containing 500 pirated songs, all of which iTunes Match matches. You then delete the original files you have and download the iTunes versions. At precisely that point in time, you have just deleted the evidence. The only thing even referencing the original file you had was the information Match obtained when matching your library, and any lawyer in the country would tell you that wouldn't hold up in court (possibility of fabrication/corruption of data, heresy, etc).
Secondly, having you send all your information to the "cloud" just to have them turn around to narc on you would be a bonehead move anyway - first, can you say "entrapment"? Secondly, do you realize the massive PR nightmare that would follow? I do not condone piracy in any way, but I also don't believe there is anything to fear if you let iTunes match the thousand songs you grabbed off of Napster before its demise.
Secondly, having you send all your information to the "cloud" just to have them turn around to narc on you would be a bonehead move anyway - first, can you say "entrapment"? Secondly, do you realize the massive PR nightmare that would follow? I do not condone piracy in any way, but I also don't believe there is anything to fear if you let iTunes match the thousand songs you grabbed off of Napster before its demise.
I wouldn't go that far either. Music you didn't pay for is still music you didn't pay for. If you think about it, it's not like Apple is giving away music you didn't already have before. All they are doing is letting you use a copy of their better quality version so they don't have to use an entire data warehouse just to keep the crappy 92kbps tracks people would be uploading to it. The pirated music has already been pirated - they aren't condoning piracy or even making it easier - you still have to go out and steal the music first. Apple is just not going to waste server space hosting it. What iTunes Match is doing is finally getting some money out of the pirated music (albeit 10 years late).
You guys are missing how this works. iTunes could give a crap if this music is pirated or not. The point is, the pirated music on your hard drive is just sitting there, not making anyone a dime. iTunes has gotten the music biz involved by charging you a $25 per year subscription. Now...whenever you access your music on the cloud they give that particular artist/record label or PRO (ASCAP, SESAC, BMI) a percentage of your $25.00. Its not much of a percent, but hell, something is better then nothing.
The labels are extremely happy if they are getting paid.
The labels are extremely happy if they are getting paid.
The evidence is the record of the download itself. Typically, your IP address is logged when you download the file and then your ISP is contacted to match that addy to an account.
I think you should give up to the Feds and cop a plea ... it is never too late to start over with a new identity
Can you use a simple mp3 file to get every song off iTunes you want? Simply rename the file for what songs it's needed? You don't even have to replace the file itself every time, just change the metadata?
Am I correct? Same for albums? (Just rename 12 files for example, so they match the album you want.)
If this is true: Holy ****.
Am I correct? Same for albums? (Just rename 12 files for example, so they match the album you want.)
If this is true: Holy ****.
No, Music Match looks at the actual music data and can even identify a song with NO meta data at all.
That may be true, but that's why you delete all your illegal tracks and then download and keep the nice new and legal 256kbps iTunes tracks that iTunes Match provides you for paying for the service.
The tracks themselves are not inherently legal or illegal. What's illegal is having them without having paid for them or in some way legally acquired them. Downloading them from iTunes Match when you never legally owned them technically would be a form of fraud, because you certify in the Terms and Conditions that you legally posses the copy of the song that gets matched. Granted, no one's going to come looking for you, but I don't think anyone's arguing that point.
jW
That may be true, but that's why you delete all your illegal tracks and then download and keep the nice new and legal 256kbps iTunes tracks that iTunes Match provides you for paying for the service.
I'm not sure why anyone would care if the files on your disk are so called "legal" or "illegal". Are you worried about "illegal" files being some sort of evidence on your hard drive that could get you in trouble? If you're going to be that paranoid you would be more worried about your ISP's record of you downloading those files, or uploading all that info to Match in the first place.
In the US what law or laws, specifically, are broken by simply "having them?" Keep in mind the "acquired" part is now long gone--we are only talking about simple possession of music. So, sans evidence of downloading or uploading what crime is committed by simply having these files?
Michael
Only if you keep paying them $25 every year. A lot of that money is going to the record labels and is more than they would have gotten for the stolen music anyway, so in their minds I'm sure it makes perfect sense.
You don't have to keep paying to continue use the matched tracks you downloaded while you were a subscriber.
Michael
I'll jump straight to the point: For the paranoid among you I can almost guarantee that Apple could have a good idea what music uploaded is pirated or not however it is unlikely that this kind of "evidence" could ever be used in a court of law.
People often seem to forget that ripping an audio file from a CD is a surprisingly difficult to reproduce identically. There are many reasons why this is the case and I'll only list a couple:
But basically the point I'm getting at is if your Apple and you receive an unusually large number of people matching an identical copy of said song that you can basically assume that this file was shared illegally.
Just my 2 cents,
Adam
People often seem to forget that ripping an audio file from a CD is a surprisingly difficult to reproduce identically. There are many reasons why this is the case and I'll only list a couple:
- Bit-errors often occur when reading the original waveform from the CD
- Different encoder settings can be used
- Different versions of the encoder can be used (e.g. different version of iTunes)
- Audio tracks can be ripped with or without additional silence
But basically the point I'm getting at is if your Apple and you receive an unusually large number of people matching an identical copy of said song that you can basically assume that this file was shared illegally.
Just my 2 cents,
Adam
Look, it's boneheaded to worry about this. Almost everyone has some music on their computer that they acquired "illegally", if only from having ripped a friend's CD or using a flash drive to swap songs.
Similarly, if you go back in time, it would be hard to find a music collection that didn't have some cassette copies that weren't strictly speaking legit.
And downloading copyrighted music from the internet was not always illegal everywhere. When I lived in Canada, it was judged to be legal (although the law has since been changed). That means it will be impossible to in practice judge what is legit and what is not.
Given these fact, the point is that no company is going to offer a product that entraps almost all of its users and subjects them all to legal action and massive fines. Ask yourself whether you would ever again purchase anything from a company that did that to you or allowed that to happen to you. Work out how much money you have given Apple over the past ten years, and then ask yourself whether any sane company would want to lose that income just to enrich lawyers and the recording industry.
It's not going to happen.
In addition, there are different kinds of "illegal" music, including:
Music that is no longer offered for sale anywhere. For example, I have quite a few of copies things that you just can't buy any more, and which I would immediately buy if I could (since I would rather have the CD in most cases). This includes music that people have digitally copied from LPs that they owned.
Music that was never officially released, such as bootlegged concert recordings. The internet has made these much less of a big deal to musicians than they used to be. In the old days, you had to pay the bootlegger for them, and the bootlegger would not pay the artist. Now nobody pays, so musicians don't care as much (many did not care about non commercial concert taping anyway). Moreover, the people who collect these things tend to be the rabid fans, who have all the commercially available material anyway, and who would instantly buy it if it were officially released. Case in point: Led Zeppelin released a triple disc set of one of their concerts that had been widely bootlegged for years (because it was a really good concert). Everyone I know who had the bootleg bought the official release on the day it came out (it's sitting in my CD rack, along with every other CD they ever released).
It's just not worth anyone's time chasing this stuff up, even though it is technically illegal.
iTunes Match is a sign that the music companies are finally getting it. What we need is a model where people who are willing to pay for music buy it, and where the amount of piracy that goes on is offset by charging users a yearly fee. I thought a small broadband tax would solve this, but Apple appears to have hit on a smarter solution. I bet it isn't costing Apple anywhere near $25 a year per user to back up your library (given the way that Match works). What we are doing is paying the record companies a small fee to look the other way when it comes to small time non-commercial piracy. It's in everyone's interest for it to be this way. They get paid and we get a decent backup service and left alone.
And before anyone calls me a pirate. I own about 1700 CDs and have bought about 4000 tracks from iTunes over the past few years. Like most people I have some music that is "illegal" in the various senses described above. I thought it might be a lot, but getting iTunes to count it revealed that it was a very small percentage of the music I own. In this I don't think I'm too different from most people who like music.
Similarly, if you go back in time, it would be hard to find a music collection that didn't have some cassette copies that weren't strictly speaking legit.
And downloading copyrighted music from the internet was not always illegal everywhere. When I lived in Canada, it was judged to be legal (although the law has since been changed). That means it will be impossible to in practice judge what is legit and what is not.
Given these fact, the point is that no company is going to offer a product that entraps almost all of its users and subjects them all to legal action and massive fines. Ask yourself whether you would ever again purchase anything from a company that did that to you or allowed that to happen to you. Work out how much money you have given Apple over the past ten years, and then ask yourself whether any sane company would want to lose that income just to enrich lawyers and the recording industry.
It's not going to happen.
In addition, there are different kinds of "illegal" music, including:
Music that is no longer offered for sale anywhere. For example, I have quite a few of copies things that you just can't buy any more, and which I would immediately buy if I could (since I would rather have the CD in most cases). This includes music that people have digitally copied from LPs that they owned.
Music that was never officially released, such as bootlegged concert recordings. The internet has made these much less of a big deal to musicians than they used to be. In the old days, you had to pay the bootlegger for them, and the bootlegger would not pay the artist. Now nobody pays, so musicians don't care as much (many did not care about non commercial concert taping anyway). Moreover, the people who collect these things tend to be the rabid fans, who have all the commercially available material anyway, and who would instantly buy it if it were officially released. Case in point: Led Zeppelin released a triple disc set of one of their concerts that had been widely bootlegged for years (because it was a really good concert). Everyone I know who had the bootleg bought the official release on the day it came out (it's sitting in my CD rack, along with every other CD they ever released).
It's just not worth anyone's time chasing this stuff up, even though it is technically illegal.
iTunes Match is a sign that the music companies are finally getting it. What we need is a model where people who are willing to pay for music buy it, and where the amount of piracy that goes on is offset by charging users a yearly fee. I thought a small broadband tax would solve this, but Apple appears to have hit on a smarter solution. I bet it isn't costing Apple anywhere near $25 a year per user to back up your library (given the way that Match works). What we are doing is paying the record companies a small fee to look the other way when it comes to small time non-commercial piracy. It's in everyone's interest for it to be this way. They get paid and we get a decent backup service and left alone.
And before anyone calls me a pirate. I own about 1700 CDs and have bought about 4000 tracks from iTunes over the past few years. Like most people I have some music that is "illegal" in the various senses described above. I thought it might be a lot, but getting iTunes to count it revealed that it was a very small percentage of the music I own. In this I don't think I'm too different from most people who like music.
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What happens when you delete pirated music, and in 1 year you stop paying for iTunes Match? Will you loose the music? Or if already downloaded you will be able to keep them forever in the higher quality format?
I'm not lying, from the last 4 years I've been buying all my music, but before that most were illegally downloaded. Of my 2500 songs, around 1,000 fall in this situation.
I'm not lying, from the last 4 years I've been buying all my music, but before that most were illegally downloaded. Of my 2500 songs, around 1,000 fall in this situation.
Tim Cook personally comes to your home and deletes the downloaded songs from your devices. So yes you will lose them,
Tim Cook personally comes to your home and deletes the downloaded songs from your devices. So yes you will lose them,
No, but really, how does this work?
No, but really, how does this work?
OK how about this plausible explanation.
In one year you receive a email. If you don't renew then access to Match is cut off. You will then probably receive a warning email that you must renew in 30 days (or whatever) that your account will be deleted.
As with ALL data files on your computer nobody can delete/modify them but you unless you grant remote access (or have a virus).
What would make you think that Apple would/could delete files on YOUR computer?
What would make you think that Apple would/could delete files on YOUR computer?
That maybe the files had some kind of key that made them only work when you are still paying iTunes Match.
If you think of it this way...
If you have a load of pirated music on your computer, let's face it you were never going to pay for it. Apple have come up with a cleaver way to get you to pay for it (granted £20 isn't much, but it's more than they would have got). They have also got you to pay for music you have also already paid for.
So think of it this way, it's not such a bad deal for the music companies.
If you have a load of pirated music on your computer, let's face it you were never going to pay for it. Apple have come up with a cleaver way to get you to pay for it (granted £20 isn't much, but it's more than they would have got). They have also got you to pay for music you have also already paid for.
So think of it this way, it's not such a bad deal for the music companies.