Kazaa Lite search Music: Interview With a Kazaa user Victim of the RIANA
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On June 26, 2003, the RIAA began one of the most controversial moves
of its career. Faced with the mounting growth of file-sharing and P2P
networking, the RIAA began what no industry on this scale has ever done
before – it began suing its own customers in the thousands.
September 1, 2004 byThomas Mennecke partly found at slyck
The success of those lawsuits has been a hotly contested item. The RIAA
claims that it has succeeded in informing the public about copyright
violation, while at the same time slicing the FastTrack network in half.
Although both these claims have merit, others point to the fact that while
FastTrack has declined, other more advanced networks have taken up the
slack.
While its fun to watch network statistics go up and down, read the latest
eDonkey2000 change log or tinker with the latest version of BitComet,
there is a very human side to the online file-sharing war that is largely
overlooked. To this day, over 4,680 individuals have been targeted by the
RIAA; a number slightly larger than the entire FileTopia
network. These are not mystical figures or some imaginary force the RIAA
has made up. They are our neighbors, friends, relatives and ordinary
people like you and I.
One of these people is Charli Johnson, a young college student at Kansas
University. Like many others, Charli was attracted to the allure of being
able to listen to her favorite artists from an online source. Also, like
many other defendants in the RIAA’s crusade, her network of choice was
FastTrack. Unfortunately, the FastTrack network has proven to be the
target of choice for the RIAA.
Charli quickly summed up her chain of events for us:
“I used Kazaa, which I downloaded from Kazaa.com. They caught my IP
address on January 9th, and I received the lawsuit notification on July
2nd. We settled on August 15th.”
Charli was using her home computer in the state of Kansas. Her ISP, Sunflower
broadband, was forced to divulge her personal information under the DMCA. Like
many others, she was unaware of the RIAA’s tactics.
“I sometimes left it (Kazaa) running for days minimized. I would say I’ve
been using Kazaa since the beginning of my freshman year.”
Unfortunately leaving the Kazaa application running for an extended period would
prove to be a costly error. Surprisingly, Charli told us that she was sharing
only 592 songs, well short of the “substantial amount” the RIAA claims to be
targeting. In addition, Charli was sharing a variety of music, including
“Nelly”, Jewl”, “Sublime” and some country acts.
In the notification the RIAA sent Charli, it cited every single song she was
sharing – all 592. “It was about 20 pages,” she said.
Leaving an application such as Kazaa running for extended periods, especially
sharing top 40 music, would spell danger to many seasoned file-traders. However,
this knowledge has proven to be less than common.
“I had heard about it (the lawsuits) a few times, but it wasn’t well known.
I never thought it would happen to me. I didn’t take it seriously; I thought
they were saying it to scare people.”
Her optimistic appraisal of the situation would quickly change, and so would her
future buying habits from those represented by the RIAA.
“Well, I don’t plan to buy music from them anymore. I think that there
are other ways to get their point across, especially since people don’t
think it will happen to them. All my fiends know I got sued but I would
bet they are still downloading music. [The lawsuits] only affects those
getting sued, and for those who aren’t getting sued it doesn’t matter.
My roommate is probably downloading right now. Their way probably isn’t
going to work.”
Like virtually all of the RIAA’s targets in its crusade against its own
customers, Charli was faced with a daunting decision; settle for $3,000 or
fight it and potentially owe up to a million dollars.
“The odds were overwhelming against me. My dad is a lawyer, and he said
we are settling. It’s the first thing he said. The only way I would get
out of this is on a technicality. However, the likelihood of them making
an error would be unlikely. Plus, to me there was never any question I was
downloading music. How could I fight that?”
While speaking with Charli, she was surprised to learn that the RIAA is
dumping most of their efforts into the FastTrack network. If you are still
using FastTrack to obtain music, we cannot stress enough the dangers in
doing so. Older versions of Kazaa leave your shared directory wide open to
public viewing, so anyone, especially the RIAA, will know what you are
sharing. There are many other safer networks out there that are less
likely to be targeted by the RIAA.
In the end, actually speaking to someone who was sued was angering
experience. While the RIAA seems indifferent to the struggles of those who
are being sued, reality dictates an enormous anger brewing against them.
Have the RIAA lawsuits been successful? Perhaps. The chain reaction of
distaste towards the music industry seems to be growing every day, almost
to the point where it has become common
Kazaa K++ was an enhanced Kazaa (KMD) with a lot of new features only
available with K++.
Features:
(New!)Block RIAA and other organizations from connecting,
downloading
and uploading to you.
(New!)K++ default options have been changed to protect your
privacy. By default:
[list]
Bad IP ranges, eg. the ones from the RIAA and others, are now
blocked
automatically by K++ thanks to the PeerGuardian IP range file. K++
blocks all these IP ranges from ever connecting to you (both TCP and UDP),
and
the connections are closed immediately without them getting a single bit
from you.
No-one can get a listing of ALL your files through a "Find all
files from
this user" command (you're still able to share, though).
Port 1214 (aka Kazaa's port) is disabled so no-one can scan your
computer
to see if you're using Kazaa K++.
Your search history isn't saved in the registry.
About KLR:
An abrupt end to the Kazaa Lite K++ free file sharing program project...
Sharman Networks, the creators of Kazaa Media Desktop (KMD), the most popular
file sharing program, tried to sue everyone that helped Kazaa Lite K++ gain
popularity (including the popular search engine Google: read the complaint here).
Why they never undertook an action before is beyond my knowledge. Best reason
from their point of view is probably money. As you, all (should) know Sharman
earns a profit by bundling SPYware and ADware with KMD. Kazaa Lite K++ (based on
KMD version 2.02) did not have malicious programs included but other useful
functions like an auto-search-more feature.
Which client do you think became the most popular?
With the end of the Kazaa Lite K++ project, Sharman thought this would
mean the end of Kazaa Lite K++, they were wrong. Out of nowhere, Darth Vikram
arose. Completely outraged by what Sharman had done, he swore to continue the
Kazaa Lite K++ project! Darth Vikram, with some help from other Kazaa Lite K++
users, resurrected the client. Based on the popular Kazaa Lite K++ 2.4.3 (last
release made) and updated with newer and better tools a new file sharing program
was born: read more and find download links at Kazaa
Lite Resurrection (KLR)!
If this trend continues, then I wish the RIAA every success in the world. free-k-lite-downloads
MovieShame.
There have always been lots of movies that show or exploit sex, but far fewer
that try to explore it seriously, as a rich, meaningful subject, whether
psychological or social...
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