Well, not really. But during testimony in a file-sharing legal case today, Jennifer Pariser, Sony’s head of litigation, made some odd statements (which close aids have attributed to an overly tight necktie). The story on Ars Technica goes like this:
Pariser has a very broad definition of “stealing.” When questioned by Richard Gabriel, lead counsel for the record labels, Pariser suggested that what millions of music fans do is actually theft. The dirty deed? Ripping your own CDs or downloading songs you already own.
Gabriel asked if it was wrong for consumers to make copies of music which they have purchased, even just one copy. Pariser replied, “When an individual makes a copy of a song for himself, I suppose we can say he stole a song.” Making “a copy” of a purchased song is just “a nice way of saying ‘steals just one copy’,” she said.
According to Pariser, we should all be paying for every copy of the same song we have. So let me sketch out a possible situation here. Let’s say you have a computer, a CD player, an iPod, and a PDA you can play song on. If you want the song to play on all of these sources, you must buy the CD, and download and pay for the song 3 online additional times.
Furthermore, these statements were made in a courtroom, meaning Sony feels that the best way to achieve this goal is to attack consumers with the legal system. The enforcement mechanism of the legal system is the State and its storm troopers. No sane human being that doesn’t have a direct link to the RIAA/MPAA cartel thinks this view is correct morally or legally. But I guess we should expect immoral and illegal behaviour from a corporation which at one point installed rootkits on their consumers’ computers in violation of numerous privacy laws.
In other news, the world’s best band, Radiohead, is offering their latest record for free, in a strange and inexplicable break from the music industry’s war on consumers. These dangerous cretins must be brought back into line. Sue them Jennifer! sue them now!
