danajohnhill.org | Hard Times Come Again No More

I have read recently that the hated RIAA is now targeting a website called Usenet.com, and that actual newsgroups may not be far behind.  Newsgroups are a largely unknown region of the internet where copyright infringement is rampant.  Certainly, there are many thousands of text-only discussion groups, like rec.music.classical.recordings, which I visit every day.  But there are also thousands of binary groups containing millions and millions of copyrighted movies, pictures and recordings.  Presumably, only those groups with sound recordings would be affected, but that makes up an astonishing number of groups, and might, conceivably include my own most-favoritest group, alt.binaries.music.springsteen.

Frankly, I am surprised it took the RIAA this long.  Usenet is like the Wild West of the internet, and, most amazing off all, unlike services like Napster, Usenet is hosted by individual servers, so there are central computers containing all of these files.  I wouldn’t be surprised if the MPAA was far behind in filing their own suits.

Filed under: Current Events, Technology on October 18th, 2007