Napster - Music Piracy

Napster has the world's largest collection of digital music. Choose from over 500,000 tracks. Buy tracks for only 99Ñž and albums for just $9.95 to burn to CD and transfer to a variety of portable devices. Check out the hottest new artists on Napster's music charts, and find the classics topping the Billboard charts from the last 50 years. Plus, get free access to these exclusive Napster member benefits:

* Use your personal Napster Inbox to share music with friends inside and outside of Napster. Send them tracks and playlists to check out or buy.

* Browse other members' music collections to hear what they're playing.

* Watch on-demand music videos, check out Fuzz (Napster's music magazine), and listen to exclusive tracks and NapsterLive in-studio performances.

Get ridiculous amounts of music for less than the price of a CD. Stream full-length songs instead of 30-second music clips. Choose from Napster's huge music collection. Buy your favorite tracks to burn and transfer for only 99Ñž a track and $9.95 an album. And that's not all:

* Tune in to Napster Radio. Listen to over 45 fully-interactive, commercial-free stations. Create customized stations based on tracks in your music library.

* Share your music opinions with other members on the Napster message boards.

www.riaa.com

Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) will begin gathering evidence and preparing lawsuits against individual computer users who are illegally offering to "share" substantial amounts of copyrighted music over peer-to-peer networks. In making the announcement, the music industry cited its multi-year effort to educate the public about the illegality of unauthorized downloading, and underscored the fact that major music companies have made vast catalogues of music available to dozens of services to help create legitimate, high quality and inexpensive alternatives to online piracy.

RIAA president Cary Sherman. "We'd much rather spend time making music then dealing with legal issues in courtrooms. But we cannot stand by while piracy takes a devastating toll on artists, musicians, songwriters, retailers and everyone in the music industry."

The RIAA expects to use the data it collects as the basis for filing what could ultimately be thousands of lawsuits charging individual peer-to-peer music distributors with copyright infringement. The first round of suits could take place as early as mid-August

Over the past year, the industry has responded to consumer demand by making its music available to a wide range of authorized online subscription, streaming and download services that make it easier than ever for fans to get music legally and inexpensively on the Internet. Moreover, these services offer music reliably, in the highest sound quality, and without the risks of exposure to viruses or other undesirable material.

Federal law and the federal courts have been quite clear on what is not legal. It is illegal to make available for download copyrighted works without permission of the copyright owner. Court decisions have affirmed this as well. In the recent Grokster decision, for example, the court confirmed that the users of that system were guilty of copyright infringement. And in last year's Aimster decision, the judge wrote that the idea that "ongoing, massive, and unauthorized distribution and copying of copyrighted works somehow constitutes 'personal use' is specious and unsupported."

record companies have been educating music fans that the epidemic of illegal file sharing not only robs songwriters and recording artists of their livelihoods, it also undermines the future of music itself by depriving the industry of the resources it needs to find and develop new talent. In addition, it threatens the jobs of tens of thousands of less celebrated people in the music industry, from engineers and technicians to warehouse workers and record store clerks.

Genesis front man

Peter Gabriel, Grammy award winning multi-Platinum artist: "In some ways we are the canary down the mine, the first battle ground, but behind us goes anyone who creates anything that can be turned into data whether its software, films pictures or music. Do people who create material have entitlement to get royalties? That's a bigger question for society. I would argue that you would get better range, better quality and better choice if you do pay the creator something. We live in the luxury of the in between world at the moment where some people pay for the records while others get it for free. It is the part of it that is the market stall, and at a certain point there will be less fruit on the stall if there's no money coming in."

The extent of the Russian piracy problem

New figures released at today's Moscow meetings show that the pirate music market in Russia grew by 25% in 2002 and has nearly doubled in value over the last four years. Sales of pirate recordings total US$311 million, compared to a legitimate music market of US$257 million.

The RIAA has nailed one of the most prolific file-traders in the U.S., filing a lawsuit against 12-year-old Brianna LaHara.

When not at the playground with her friends, "Biggie Brianna" is trading music files from her home in New York. The little girl received one of the 261 lawsuits filed by the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) on Monday, according to the New York Post. She may look like a sweet and innocent child, but the RIAA says it's only going after major copyright violators at the moment. So you make the call

the once-popular Napster cut deeply into 2001 CD sales by between 5 and 10 percent.

Peer-to-peer file sharing advocates received a boost in their ongoing battle against music industry executives Friday, when Jupiter Media Metrix released a study indicating that Internet file-sharing traffic volume actually increases music sales.

The research firm found that 34 percent of