I admit I used Napster and a Peer to Peer a few times but an attorney buddy warned me against broke musicians who snorted all of their money are going to be suing people for download their "art". The hungry lawyers and collection agencies will take the load and the musicians will still be broke.

Verizon Corp. must reveal the identities of two high-speed Internet subscribers accused of illegally trading music online, a federal judge ruled today.

U.S. District Court Judge John Bates denied Verizon's request for a stay of his January ruling ordering the company to turn over the name of one of the subscribers to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Bates said that Verizon has 14 days to convince a federal appeals court to grant a stay of his ruling.

If Bates's ruling ultimately stands, it would give the recording industry and copyright owners a powerful weapon to stop the illegal trading of copyrighted files that they say eats away at their revenues. The RIAA, many musicians and other copyright holders have argued that the increase in file-sharing during the past several years has seriously eroded music sales.

Verizon had argued that turning over subscribers' names would violate their constitutional right to privacy.

The RIAA cited the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act -- or DMCA -- in its legal effort to force Verizon to reveal the names. The DMCA gives movie studios, record companies, software makers and other copyright owners the right to subpoena Internet service providers without getting a judge's approval.

Verizon originally argued that it is unfair for the music industry to be allowed to obtain subpoenas without judicial approval, but Bates threw out that argument in a January ruling. Verizon then turned to its argument that the DMCA is unconstitutional.

RIAA President Cary Sherman praised the ruling today in a written statement.

"If users of pirate peer-to-peer sites don't want to be identified, they should not break the law by illegally distributing music," Sherman said. "Today's decision makes clear that these individuals cannot rely on their ISPs to shield them from accountability."

Verizon will appeal the ruling, said Associate General Counsel Sara Deutsch.

"The case is not over and we intend to immediately appeal the decision and seek a stay in the U.S. Court of Appeals," she said. "It's virtually unprecedented in U.S. law that someone can use a form to find out your identity without any judicial process."

Spybot is great for hunting down and eliminating spyware and adware. It's a free program and has software updates to keep up with the nasty critters. I forgot what the website is, but if you go to a search site and type in "spybot," you'll find it. I downloaded it and started using it after I read about it in PC Magazine. It's been really great, I didn't know how much crap was lurking in my machine.

Alex

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1983 300D (parked for four years)
2012 VW Sportwagen TDI Manual
2001 Miata SE
1962 Chevrolet Corvair Rampside

May want to take a look at this.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20030425/wr_nm/tech_music_dc_10

I get all my music free from the radio.

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Jim

kinda reminded me of this...
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news/juno_rent.html