at the risk of sounding obscene...
I see a tad bit of line-blurring between "pirating", "sharing", "broadcasting" and "distribution" of music going on here... (and I think the RIAA/Music Industry is itself partially responsible for this blurring...)
These are each distinct and specific categories, and at the end of the day, it's all about Distribution...
But we have to get one thing straight... "Sharing" is NOT "Piracy". The term Piracy is (was?) specifically reserved for those who duplicate, resell, redistribute, or broadcast illegitimate copies of 'Prior Art', for a FEE, without paying license or performance royalties to the copyright/patent holder.
So, a Chinese merchant who makes 1,000 copies of a music CD, and sells them in a street bazaar for $5 a disc, and puts the proceeds in his pocket without paying the artist/publisher a royalty is a Pirate.
"Pirate Radio" is not any old broadcast stream, but those that have ad revenue, or other sources of income derived from the broadcasting of music, AND they are not paying royalties...
Sharing: the person who plays a CD at a party (or "broadcasts" private streams over the Internet) is NOT a Pirate. Unless that person is charging a FEE related to that 'broadcast' (either to the listener, or to advertisers, etc.).
When "for profit" radio stations broadcast, for YOU the listener it's "free" (you pay by listening to the advertising), but the station pays performance royalties for every song it plays. Thus the reason for advertising revenue.
But there are stations that don't pay such royalties (certain college stations that are "non-profit", etc.), and these can broadcast freely... this IS technically equivalent to the average "streamer" who sets up a portal, and privately 'broadcasts' music over the Internet. Non-profit, right?
The problems come when you make a COPY of a CD and give it to your friend. That falls into the category of Distribution (yep!). And here is where the whole industry turns rabid.
It isn't like a book that you share after reading it (since generally only one person uses it at a time... making a photocopy to "share" IS illegal -- it isn't sharing, it's DISTRIBUTING)...
Of course, there would be no issue if you handed over the original CD for them to listen to for awhile... "private" small-scale 'distribution' has always been tolerated, cos it's really pointless trying to enforce it.
So, in summary....
- Pirating is clearly wrong (and clearly defined!).
- Sharing by itself is not a crime.
- Broadcasting isn't really criminal either, unless you do it for profit, and don't pay royalties.
However, *Distribution* is the big one, and that IS the reason things keep getting so sticky.
It's always been a grey area, and particularly with the advent of the Internet (the courts are wrangling over it, Kazaa is dancing around it, and it always comes down to this ONE thing. Distro...).
There are two primary ways of disseminating recorded music: Broadcast and Distribution.
The rules are pretty clear about Broadcasting -- or were, until the CDMA where all lines blur. Even the grey areas introduced by the Internet have been fairly manageable... The fact is, iTunes Sharing was possible at the outset because it provided a means of Broadcasting, but didn't technically equal Distribution.
The moment that audio stream becomes a "distributed copy" (a FILE on a second hard drive), the trouble begins... and that's the main issue the industry has with P2P, Napster, Kazaa, and the like... Those aren't "Broadcasting" music, they are Distributing it...
The issue of "recording a broadcast" has always been an "thorn" for the industry, but they regard it as a necessary evil... because as noted before, broadcasting has actually been GOOD for sales. And how many recorded radio broadcasts form the core of your listening library? Not many I'd bet... instead, they invariably lead to further purchasing.
Internet broadcasts (in the form of 'private streams') aren't really at issue, and fundamentally I don't believe it's the reason Apple has just pulled the plug on it...
It's when that stream becomes the functional equivalent of Napster or Kazaa, a *distribution* mechanism, that we see the hackles raise...
So, they need to turn it off, until it can be fairly well assured that it isn't just another Kazaa in Apple clothing...
And that's MY 2 cents on the topic, obscene as it is
tribalogical
