Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

Good points, and factor in that the downloading will count towards your limit on your "unlimited" service ;) I cant see me giving VM any more hard earned money.

The quality of the downloads will be ideal for background music or loading up an ipod, so its not something I would be interested in particularly when it counts towards the allowance.

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

Something that should be very much considered perhaps is that this is nothing more than PR and vapourware at this time, clearly released prematurely to get there the day before the Digital Britain report.

There is nothing particularly substantive that can be said about it all at this time. Virgin are trying to both impress the industry and impress their customers but right now there is not a massive amount they can provide. Universal may have wanted water marking (has this been confirmed yet?!) and temporary disconnection, other labels may want/demand even more.

This is an unlimited press release download service right now. It is highly, highly unlikely to go live with just the Universal catalogue and should be considered as a future plan which may or may not go live with the pricing, terms and conditions that have thusfar been mentioned.

There's no point in getting too emotional or defensive about this service. The only bit really that can be counted on is the service suspension part - this is something that can only get worse, it's not about to be lightened up through deals with other publishers. With the Digital Britain report in mind this is something Virgin are highly likely to bring in regardless in an attempt to avoid Ofcom climbing over them.

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

in court they have to in most cases show that you intended to do something

as to proving that your computer wasn't breached i can see that being a rather hard one given that most computers in this country are not protected properly any how to show that the mp3 couldn't have been taken with out your consent could be very problematic for them.

if they intend to run it that way it will fail even faster

any service that offers unlimited downloads must if they want to do well base thier modle on the baisis that they are just going to be a storage place to be used when you cant find where you filed that mp3 you wanted or just didnt bother to store as you have unlimited times to down load it and that is so cheap that it makes it pointless to do many searches to find that mp3 you want and check it for viruses and thus pointless having p2p using up your bandwidth storing them on your computer for others

whether or not using p2p to share music is ilegal or not is not the point it will happen until the alternative is easy in one place and cheap enough for a family to include in their budget

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

No you don't.

Which this will be - think about it. Rather than having 2/3/4 people buying CDs or downloads from iTunes or elsewhere which could run into £40/£50 a month - you can pay say £20 for this VM service and everyone would be able to use the music

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

Roger's statement is entirely correct. In most cases, intent has to be established before someone can be convicted on a criminal charge. That's not the case for all offences, but the need to establish intent is still a very powerful principle in English law.

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

yes you do except where an offence has been made absolute like drink driving ( and even that can be mitigated if you can show you didn't know you were consuming alcohol)

even in civil proceeding where you dont have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt you still have to show that they can reasonably be seen as intending to do something

so if you put a knife outside on your wall on purpose you would likely be seen as knowing someone may take it but if its in your draw in your kitchen its unlikely that you meant some one to take it

with a computer they may be able to say its like that wall if you have p2p set to share to all where you had to set it to do that yourself

even then they would have to show you knew how that software worked or that you were negligent in allowing your children to install it ( thats if you knew about it )

and there are just so many ways of it ending up on the net anyhow not from your ip that i really see it as a non runner

for example just yesterday i plugged my mp3 into a friends computer to download a file i had on there am i really supposed to check that he has no p2p set to scan for media running? how do i check what my children do with thier mp3's when they visit friends ?

all of this would cause even the lesser proof needed of a civil action plus the first prosecution would like find many just leaving the service just incase

as to the price i very much doubt anything much over £10 will be seen as a good price as in my experience people will still buy cds as they really like even though i have the mp3s already so its not an alternative to them especially as the quallity is unlikey to be as good as the cd version

if the catalogue is truly unlimited and covers all the major labels then i may go as high as £20 but again if i thought that they would be casing any mps's that escaped my house lol i wouldn't bother

ah well of to check high scores that mini pool is to addictive

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

Because it is your responsibility maybe? This is from Amazon's MP3 service - I would expect similar terms would apply to the VM service

Except as set forth in Section 2.1 above, you agree that you will not redistribute, transmit, assign, sell, broadcast, rent, share, lend, modify, adapt, edit, sub-license or otherwise transfer or use the Digital Content. You are not granted any synchronization, public performance, promotional use, commercial sale, resale, reproduction or distribution rights for the Digital Content. You acknowledge that the Digital Content embodies the intellectual property of a third party and is protected by law

So that basicially says by downloading the file in the first place you agree in full that you are responsible to what happens to it, even if you didn't know.
Remember this is against the backdrop of government legislation that all ISPs are going to have to follow - that illegal sharing will have action taken against it. Leaving this sort of service doesn't mean that things still won't happen - it will just mean you lose the legal option

It seems to be that that they will be between 256 and 320Kbit MP3s

Well that is your choice - but they may well be casing your house anyway if the Digital Britain report is anything to go by

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

It says nothing of the sort. It is a list of things you are not allowed to do with the mp3. Nothing more, nothing less.

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

Where is your information coming from regarding the mobile versions of Spotify being premium only? The advertisement model would work just as well for mobile as it does the the desktop version. I follow the Spotify blogs and forums pretty closely and I've never seen it suggested but I'm happy to be corrected.

MP3's are transient quality recordings in my opinion. Over the years I've lost thousands of MP3's due to hard drive crashes and lost CD's and such. They're disposable. If I like a piece of music enough I'd buy the CD (or download a flac copy), MP3's in my opinion are a portable medium, streaming ogg on Spotify is also portable, only you have the whole record label library and there's no download wait, no storage or library worries, just click and play and add to a server stored playlist if needed. If Virgin were to offer CD quality, i.e. FLAC or WAV formats it would be a whole different matter.

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

From the horses mouth:

http://www.spotify.com/blog/archives...le-android-io/

we don’t have any more details on when it will be available, etc except that you will need to be a paying subscriber in order to access Spotify on mobile

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

despite the new legislation which i expect will have to reflect that no action could be taken against ISP's who follow legal routes taking action against anyone with out them being found guilty by a court will lead to who ever takes that action being sued i epect very few in real terms will be affected by the proposed speed limits

as to the contract saying i am fully responsible that would be laughed out of court under the unreasonable terms legislation as businesses are not well enough protected expecting a higher standard of of consumers wont get them very far

and expecting me to inspect any system i come in contact with to that standard would likely mean i would have to carry a great deal of software with me to do so again i cant see that getting very far

and as most ISP's have been pushing to keep them out of policing this ( hence the disappearance of the 3 strike thing lol even in France it seems now)

as to casing my house they are free to do so lol though they will be severely disappointed :angel: me

good articles on this and piracy in todays "Micromart"

bbl have to go set-up someone's laptop as they are having severe facebook withdrawals

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

The 3 strikes law was deemed unconsitutional in France because it went no-where near the courts and assumed guilt straight away - not because of the objections of the ISPs

In addition Virgin have made it quite clear - again in the press release - that they themselves will NOT be monitoring anyone's connection. But if it came to court action (civil or criminal) over copyright infringments relating to the Music service, I'm sure Virgin would be a interested party

There is no such proposal in the UK AFAIK - but we will have to see the powers OFCOM are given

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

And that is what is going to make a mockery of the whole thing. I will be sitting at home, listening to a track, and i will think that one of my friends in the USA might like the song, so i send it him, and in doing so, i will be breaking the T&C of the agreement. Or i could be making a home video of one of my nieces playing about, to upload to youtube, and have a track playing in the background, again technically, i will be breaking the T&C of the agreement.

This is going to be the big test for the government. Can they crack down on illicit file sharing, while giving the consumers more rights and protections? If they get the balance wrong, there will be 7 million file sharers in the UK not voting for them at the next election.

We, the consumers need more rights to what we want with media which we legally purchase. The right to rip CD's to our ipods, the right to upload home videos to youtube, without the music industry threatening to sue us, the right to convert DVD's to which ever format we want, so that we can play them on a device of our choosing, the right to backup games we buy.

The entertainment industry won't like that, but hey, i don't like the idea of the music industry, which makes £100's of millions profit each year, suing the public.

Services like this won't stop illicit file sharing, but it may well reduce it. People download for many reasons, not just because they don't want to spend money.

From my own point of view, i download the TV show "Lost", even though i can watch it on Sky. The reason being, that "Lost" doesn't air in the UK until the Sunday after it airs in then USA, when it's broadcast on a Wednesday night. I am not willing to ruin the risk of the show being spoiled, just because Sky choose to broadcast it 4 days later. I am also part of an international community which likes to talk about the show, after it airs in the USA. So watching it on a Sunday night, is absolutely no use to me at all. I know that, that's not an excuse to download the show, but it is the reason i download it, and i am unapologetic for it.

Until the various sectors of the entertainment industry get their acts together and starts delivering content who the consumers want it, there will be occasions where i will download from illicit sites. Even with the super sleuthing powers of my ISP on my case.

Welcome to Darknet.

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

And in that case you would also be breaking the law - not just the T&Cs.
Of course that was is a bit tricky. The T&Cs of the download may have been broken, but you would probably then be covered by the agreement Youtube has/had with the PRS. If not - you would probably find the audio deleted
Not denying that but at the same time, why should people have the right to do what on earth like without any responsibilities on the consumer? I grew up knowing that we should know the consequences of our actions. Today the default view is 'It's not my fault I did X - its someone/something elses'
Why shouldn't they? It is their revenue the public is stealing. If you don't like the profits they are making, don't buy their products. Just because they make lots of money is no excuse for stealing
And by doing so, you are probably guaranteeing that eventually the TV networks won't take the risk of commisioning the next 'Lost' or 'Fringe' because the more people download it rather than watch it on TV, the less profit those shows make. The less profit, the less risk the studio will take on new drama and instead default to the easy money shows instead - the X Factors, BGT, Big Brother types
At the end of the day we currrent defending something that is illegal - which I just do not get.

At what point does that become acceptable? If I stole 50p from everyone in a town and said 'well no-ones going to miss it, and they shouldn't have that much money anyway' would that be acceptable?

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

ben the industry has been in the press often here and abroad moaning that they didnt want to be the police on this and the 3 strike thing was dropped mainly because of their objections ( just do a few searches if you dont belive me )

as to the copying of mp3's meaning lost revenue i have to laugh even in the USA where this idea came from its now not even seen that way by the courts see http://www.p2pnet.net/story/18189

in fact research done by Frank N Magid suggest that copying actually make the industry money as those doing it buy more DVD's and go to more movies and rent more movies than the average person by quite a bit and although this research was mostly about film it applies equally to music

see http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/tech...asing-dvd.html

any company that wants to make this work needs to consider what ever they sell as sold and that those who bought it can do with it as they wish

once they grasp that idea they may find that people will buy and they may even make some money ;)

as to downloading of tv shows killing off them that to is laughable the reason lost ect are so big is because they got downloaded and shared and hence talked about

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

This is from the EFF http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/06...dead-in-france - nowhere in the report does it say the ISPs had any issue with it

In fact the French law doesn't seem to have required ISPs to be monitors in the first place - but for people to allege copyright infringement to a government body who would then issue the disconnection order

And according to this http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...trikes-law.ars - the EU is still interesting in such a law, as long as the proper legal body is first consulted

TBH that seems to be more about the calculations used to calculate the lost revenue - based on the total number of times it had been shared - rather than something slightly more sensible

BTW he got still ended up in jail for 18 months http://www.sbytes.info/wp/?p=284

Yes I agree that that it says that, but it doesn't excuse it. That article is also trying to make the point that the main reason for illegal downloads is because there is no sensible legal alternative - which is part of what the Virgin Media Music service (along with things like Spotify) is trying to address.

Yes, people should be able to do stuff with it as they like for their own personal use - they doesn't mean copying to anyone else.

Why should Music and TV/Film be different to a book or anything else where someone has invested time, effort and money to make it and expects something in return? Or are you arguing that anything anyone creates should be copied?

Once they grasp that people won't pay for anything if they don't have to, so they stop asking them to, they will make some money? How does that work?

There is certainly an element to that, and maybe Lost was the wrong example. But you only have to look at ITV to see what a loss of revenue will do to programming

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

ISP's and policing

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/bits/20...e-internet-p/1


there loads more like this over the last few years including ones from virgin / ntl

as to the French their upper court ( i forget its name ) struck it down because there was no checking by the courts

see http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...ses-it-out.ars

but in anycase Europe seems to want to insist that a court would have to rule and even then most likely still wouldn't be disconnection as they pushing for it to be a fundamental right

http://www.betanews.com/article/EU-P...ght/1241651104

with which the french courts seem to agree

as to the figures quoted for losses they are complete fiction they are based on every download being a lost sale which is daft and based on guessed figures of how many downloads there were

they are as about as useful to a discussion on this as a guess on how many grains of sand there are in the world, and in anycase as spending on music is going very well compared to other industries and probably completely pointless as these downloads most likely are the reason that that spending is so high as its free advertising

where their money is coming from is changing trying to fight this is imho as futile as commanding the tide not to come in

see http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/...ried-wolf.aspx

as to the why should it be different what difference are you talking about if we are talking about books i can read them for free with out ever paying an author a penny completely legally ( Library any one ? )

may be we should lvl the playing field and get the same laws for books applied to DVD's and CD's

in fact books are a good way to show it works for despite there being a perfectly free way to access them people still buy books ( lol i should know there are about 2k of them in my house i love reading ;) ) and when i buy a book i can share it with anyone i want i read it my wife my friends my mum etc i can even sell it on and keep all the money i get for it ;) and before you moan that thats not the same as i cant keep a copy as i can with an MP3 i can still get it again free from the library or often rebuy it from a second hand book stall extremely cheaply often just months after its been released ( and i still buy lots as they are released lol i must learn to wait and get them cheaper )

if you make the music good people will buy it again personally i think a big reason for lack of sales is that most of it now is just repackaged and plastic bands made by advertising companies ( no its not me just thinking all new music is crap lol ) some is great and i have those CD's and so did a lot of others but there is tons released every week that no one buys and i would suggest they downloaded it and didn't like it and Not thought that their MP3 was such good quality they didn't need the CD

back to the point ( yep i know i go off at odd angles lol blame my dyslexia ;) )

with the library for any of these services to work they must be like the library and cover all books i mean music tracks if i had to go to different libraries for each book publisher i don't think they would have survived same goes for this because even though we may only be talking about switching web addresses people just wont they want a one stop shop

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

Yes I believe I said that already

Yup - but that isn't to say there shouldn't be some form of civil liability

Indeed - but that is still just one purchase. Not one purchase and then copied lots of times

Er - they already are? If fact I would guess that is exactly the same law - it is just everyone decides to ignore it for music, TV and films.

The difference is with a book is it one edition that has been purchased. If you then pass it on, you not making a copy of it and keeping it yourself.

It is different, because the book you lend out from the library has also been paid for at some stage - it isn't a photocopy, it is an original.

And in fact, you have a library of music. It is called Spotify and it works in roughly the same way.

You can browse the library, select something want to experience (read a book/listen to a track) and once you have finished with it you no longer have it. But you can always experience it again if you want to

The Virgin Media service will also allow this.

You argument is 'because commercial music is rubbish it's ok to copy it without paying for it'?

Have you ever considered that because of the culture of 'free' music, that people won't buy music when it really matters - to support those artists that rely on that revenue. That may have paid for their CDs to be made to try and make some money? And that the lables won't take the risk on up and coming artists?

Look at what happened when Radiohead tried an 'honest' download for their music http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/04...d_in_rainbows/ No-one paid for it - and that was a direct link between the artist and the listener, no 'big bad label' involved.


Indeed, and that is why - in the press release (Again) - that VM already stated that the are trying to get as many labels on board as is possible before the release date

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

the book thing is valid especially if we take it like a album as i can quit legally photo copy part of that book say a chapter ( one song ) and keep it they even set up the photo copier up for you it may cost a little though not much but i still get to keep it permanently

plus staying with the book comparison i can get old books at greatly reduced prices and as a lot of the downloads out there are old its a good comparison but the industry seems to think all downloads should be cunted at the same very high value as new ones

as to trying to get as many as possible misses what is needed and i am not having a go at virgin untimely the music industry lets all their songs from all the different labels be accessed this just wont work

its not virgins fault but that's the way it is


as to radio head any one trying to go it alone will not succeed that goes just as much for those who though maybe well intentioned just give away their stuff separately from others in just the same way as tose charging for thier stuff ringfenced from all others will not succeed either



what i will have a go at virgin and any other company is the use of words that make it seem they have every thing or they are unlimited when they are not

as to me saying that its ok to copy music that's crap yep in a way i am as i bet that crap music lasts for a very little time on anyone's MP3 player they try it they don't like it they don't buy the cd ;) there will always be the collectors who collect just to collect but nothing will stop them any way and its good to have the odd eccentrics ;)

and why do i say its ok because its the new radio i never paid to listen to records before i bought them when i was young i often heard the whole album on the radio many times before buying it, now loads of these kids just listen to their downloads instead to pick what they want and they are out there buying online more than ever before and still buying the cds

the music industry must start to see this as advertising and find ways to use it to their advantage rather than trying to criminalise a generation who wont care about what they think anyhow the idea that every downloads is lost cash must if they want to progress instead be see as another chance someone will buy

if i was them i would start chucking out even more stuff unfinished songs and ones that they didn't think should make the cd ect see what the buying public like!

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

That exemption is for research for a non-commercial purpose or purposes of private study - know as fair dealing. If the exemption covers Music,TV and Film, then you would be talking about portion of a track, TV show or film.

You could not copy a whole track nor could you pass the copy you had made onto anyone else - as that would break the exemption
Then why do the oldest books get sold for so much? Shouldn't they be really cheap or free because they are so old? Sometimes something being old holds more value than something new
It will hopefully work to a point. You are never going to be able to get every song or every label on board, but at least you hopefully will get to a tipping point
So if the labels do something like the Virgin Media thing then it is 'them trying to hold on their vast profits'. If a band does something without the labels then its futile because they are doing it on their own?
Virgin haven't said they have everything - and as for the unlimited thing - we don't know what that meants. It could really mean unlimited
Maybe if they don't like it they shouldn't listen to it full stop?
But when radio plays a record then the artists get paid!
And they are trying. Which is why things like Spotify and the this VM product need to work.

If you can get people to use streaming to browse music - for which the artists will get paid - and the download the tracks they want legally, for which the artists will get paid, then there wouldn't be an issue

That is exactly what the labels that everyone hates do! They see which albums make a lot of money, drop the bands that dont and everything sounds the same.

To have vibrant culture you need to have a range of music and influences. To do that you have to get people to want to perform music, and for them to do that they have to be able to make a living out of it

---------- Post added at 23:15 ---------- Previous post was at 23:03 ----------

Oh and this may prove interesting reading http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-102...=2547-1_3-0-20

Jammie Thomas-Rasset, the Joan of Arc of file sharing, was found guilty of willful copyright infringement on Thursday in a Minneapolis federal court and must pay the recording industry $1.92 million.

And that was in a Civil court for 24 songs

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

Crivvens, will you two get a room ... this is like the Ramrod & Graham show all over again ... :erm: :D

Re: Virgin Media to Launch World's First Unlimited Music Download Service
 

only if its got sky1 on the tv ;)

i wil conceed some old books are more expensive though lol 1 first edition upstairs ;)but i have loads of old ones i got for 5p at the school fair lol

anyway i have to play mini pool and find another game to come top of before Julian does ;)