High Court to Rule on File Sharing

When I was a kid, sharing music meant that I would lend a friend one of my 45 RPM records so he could listen to it at his house for a few days. If I was lucky, I would actually get it back eventually.

Sharing a movie meant that a group of friends and I would go down to the Pixie Theater in Edinburgh and watch a comedy flick together. We usually took in a Sunday matinee.

Those definitions of music sharing and movie sharing remained fairly constant until about six or seven years ago when the Internet gave the terms a whole new meaning. Today everybody knows that song swapping, movie sharing and peer-to-peer connections mean that copyrighted material is being downloaded from the Internet to someone’s personal computer.

Computer uses may be downloading them legally, meaning they have either purchased the rights to download and use them, or the material has been offered free to the public by the copyright holder. But the vast majority of file sharing, as it is generically called, is done illegally, without the copyright owner’s permission, through such online services as Kazaa, Grokster, and others.

A few years ago, the software company that started it all, Napster, lost a court battle over its song swapping service. Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in another case brought by the motion picture industry and the recording industry against two file sharing companies.

The difference is that, unlike Napster, neither of these companies have a centralized list or collection of illegal files. They are decentralized, meaning they have no control over who uses their services or what the users do with it. They can download legal copies of any type of file, or they can use the services to download illegal copies of music and movies.

The justices seemed divided during the hearing. Mostly, though, they questioned how an adverse ruling against the file sharing companies would curtail future research and development of new technologies. For example, one justice wondered what would have happened to the ubiquitous copy machine if companies such as Xerox had been prohibited from making them simply because they can be used to make illegal copies of documents or publications.

Another justice wondered why the entertainment industry isn’t suing Apple Computers over the iPod, which can also be used to download illegal copies of music files. Most iPod users download songs legally from Apple’s Web site. But they could also use it to play illegally downloaded music.

Still, some of the justices were concerned that the file sharing companies were making big bucks through advertising revenue off people’s illegal activity, even though they have no control over it.

The High Court will decide by June whether file sharing services can be held liable for the illegal activity of their users. Lower courts have always sided with the file sharing companies, citing earlier Supreme Court cases such as the one brought against Sony years ago for selling VCRs.

Video recorders can also be used to make illegal copies of copyrighted material, but the High Court ruled that just because something can be used for illegal purposes doesn’t mean it should be banned if there are also legitimate uses.

The same reasoning should apply in this case. If fairness and logic prevail, the recording and motion picture industries will lose their appeal.

Will France be Able to Abridge Yahoo's Rights?

Can laws in foreign lands limit free speech rights of Americans or American companies? Can foreign courts fine American companies for listing items for sale in American catalogs if those items are illegal to buy in the foreign countries?

The obvious answer to both those questions is, no. But what if the “catalog” where the prohibited items are listed happens to be on the Internet where residents of those foreign countries can easily purchase them and have them shipped overseas?

Again, the obvious answer still should be no. But a French court four years ago fined Yahoo.com, a U.S. company, for listing and selling Nazi memorabilia on its American-based Web site because people in France are able to access it.

Yahoo’s French-based subsidiary, Yahoo.fr, complies with France’s laws. In fact all its foreign subsidiaries comply with the laws of each country in which they are based. So where does a Paris judge get the gall to levy a fine against an American company for exercising its free speech rights from American soil?

A San Jose federal judge ruled in 2002 that the French court was out of bounds and that Yahoo owed nothing. But on appeal, the French human rights groups who originally filed the suit won. A three-judge appeals court panel said that the lower court judge ruled prematurely, since the plaintiffs had not yet sought to collect the fine, which has now grown to $15 million.

Now, Yahoo wants the full court to re-hear the case, and it has agreed to do so. At issue is whether or not Yahoo will ever be liable for the fine, if the plaintiffs should decide to collect. A ruling will also let other companies in a similar situation to Yahoo’s know what they may face from foreign court intervention in American capitalism.

Yahoo executives claim they are caught in a Catch-22 situation, not knowing whether to abide by the judges order, meaning they would be caving in to foreign censorship, or just let the fines continue to mount. The fine grows by $15,000 for each day that the Nazi merchandise remains on Yahoo’s American site.

Attorney’s for the plaintiffs say they do not intend to collect the fines. But they could. And, besides, Yahoo and other companies need to know if American courts will allow such invasion of free speech rights by foreign laws.

The Internet, with its worldwide access, is forcing lawmakers to rewrite the books on many points of law that were once clear-cut. And if they haven’t started to adapt yet, as the French apparently have not, then maybe it’s time they did.

What if, for example, a nation like Saudi Arabia filed suit against an American Web site for promoting women’s rights? It’s kind of scary to think about.

As long as Yahoo’s foreign-based subsidiaries obey the laws of the lands in which they are based, the courts in those countries have no basis to rule against the American-based parent company. To do so is the epitome of arrogance.

And if U.S. courts allow the foreign courts to abridge the First Amendment rights of U.S. companies, they have surely not given the matter enough thought. That’s why I fully expect the appeals court to reverse its former ruling and clarify things for Yahoo and other Internet-based companies that sell things abroad.

Nowhere to Go to Escape Threat of Weather

Winter is finally over; many schools are in the middle of spring break, including the one where I teach. And the weather has been, well, March-like. It gets warm, then cold. The sun shines, then it rains.

Springtime brings the rebirth of grass and flowers. But it also marks the return of severe weather season in Indiana. I’ve already heard a few rumbles of thunder this year.

Weather fascinated me when I was younger. For much of my childhood, I remember being very apprehensive about the weather. Most kids ignored it completely, unless it interferes with their outdoor play schedule.

But I remember being terrified of storms. I also really hated the wind, even if it was blowing on a clear day. If the wind was blowing strong enough to make the leaves rustle, it was blowing too hard for me.

It seems silly, looking back on it. But, although I became less concerned about the summer breeze, I still retained my anxiety about storms well into adulthood.

It probably stemmed from the fact that my aunt, who cared for my siblings and me while my parents worked, had a phobia about storms herself. We had quite a ritual every time it thundered, piling up on the bed because it was supposed to protect us from lightning somehow.

Anyway, with storm season at hand, I find that I’m not nearly as apprehensive about this time of year as I used to be. But I still don’t like wind storms. Lightning doesn’t bother me much, because I know I’m safe from it as long as I remain indoors, or in a car.

Wind is still the main threat from storms. Wind can blow your house down, or blow a tree onto it. Simply being inside does not protect you from strong winds.

My early fear of tornadoes and severe storms caused me to consider ways to avoid them. I knew all the safety rules, but the only sure way to avoid them was to move to a place where they did not occur.

There are many states which have a lower occurrence of tornadoes than Indiana, but they still happen. To escape them, I would have to move to the west coast. Even the west coast doesn't escape tornadoes completely, but they are very rare there.

Of course, if I moved to the West, I could rest easier about tornadoes, but I would have to start worrying about earthquakes. And earthquakes have no season, so I'd need to be on my toes all year.

I started thinking where in the entire country I could move and not have to worry about natural disaster striking. The Midwest and South have tornadoes; the West has earthquakes and the east coast has hurricanes. Is there a place I could go to escape?

Probably the safest region to go would be somewhere around Wyoming or Montana. They have a slight predisposition to earthquakes, but then, so does Indiana. They are more prone to droughts, with hot, dry temperatures in the summer.

After concluding that there really is no truly safe place to go, I concluded that Indiana wasn’t such a bad place. It is moderate in almost everything, including its risk of tornadoes. It doesn’t get as hot as the Great Plains or the South. It doesn’t get as cold as the upper Midwest or New England. And it never gets hit by a hurricane.

So, it looks like I’m staying put for awhile.