wiredsafety.org is the world's largest online safety and help group

I have over a thousand music files on my computer, but I didn't get them from file sharing agents such as Napster, Kazaa, or any of the rest. I go to sites that offer Internet radio and or invite the public to listen. I then record these off of the desktop or through a hardlines mp3 encoder. There is no way short of going into my home to even know I have these files. I wrote the FCC and asked them if this was illegal they told me to reread the copyright law (I got the impression they didn't want to spend the time explaining the legalize to me or didn't know themselves). Instead of recording off the radio I record off public Internet sites. Is this wrong?

Dear Music Downloader:

I know it’s hard to understand how what we used to do with the radio is now illegal when we do it online. It was illegal then too, but no one did anything about it. When we used to tape music from the radio, the quality was never good enough and it was too time consuming for the practice to really affect the music industry’s bottom line. With digital music the quality is very good and no one has to wait for the song to be played on the radio and hit the “record” button at exactly the right moment to catch the whole song to record hundreds, even thousands of songs.

While we may question the extent of the lost revenues, there is no question that music downloads have adversely affected the recording industry. That means they are willing to enforce their rights, no matter how much it costs them. And since we leave a trail of cyber-breadcrumbs behind us whenever we surf, finding those who are downloading the music is easier than finding those of us who taped the music off the radio.

I suggest you read the “Frequently Asked Questions” section of our Talking to Your Children About Downloading Music – A Parent’s Guide to understand more about the law and what we can and cannot do legally with music online.

Good luck,
Parry

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]