CS 335 Reading for March 17:
Copyright Liability and Computer Networks

On March 17, 2004, Ethan Preston will conduct the lecture for CS 335. Mr. Preston is a attorney with Aronberg, Golgehn, Davis & Garmisa, whose practice includes commercial litigation and computer law. The assigned reading and the lecture for this class are meant to provide you with some familiarity with the issues raised (including liability) by copyright law in the context of networked computers. In particular, this class is intended to provide you with a background in copyright law and peer-to-peer networks.

The reading assigned for this class is substantial. However, a number of the readings ask you to skim the reading except for specific pages or to skim the entire reading. While the readings to be skimmed bear to the subject matter, they are either not central to our discussion or should simply not require a lot of your time. The assigned reading includes a number of discretionary readings. These discretionary readings are intended to provide you with additional resources if a topic is interesting to you, but they will not be covered in class. Some of the readings have questions underneath them. You are asked to think about these questions after you have done the reading and form an opinion. The discussion in the March 17 is class will give you an opportunity to express your reactions to the readings and exchange them with the other students.

I.    Criminal Copyright Infringement and Warez
SKIM the criminal copyright infringement statues:
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/506.html
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/2319.html
(Question: Look at 17 U.S.C. § 506(a)(2) and 18 U.S.C. § 2319(c)(3). How easy is it to be criminally liable under the copyright statutes?)

READ Justice Department's investigation into warez groups (criminal copyright enforcement):
http://cybercrime.gov/ob/OBorg&pr.htm
(Question: What is the typical motivation for individuals in the warez scene?)

READ the federal investigation of "Fastlane" group, which used sophisticated technical measures to avoid identification:
http://www.cybercrime.gov/fastlane.htm
(Question: If the defendants' obfuscation efforts were so sophisticated, how were they identified?)

SKIM to see how a defendant's criminal liability for copyright infringement is calculated under the United States Sentencing Guidelines:
http://www.ussc.gov/2003guid/tabcon03_1.htm
http://www.ussc.gov/2003guid/2b5_3.htm
http://www.ussc.gov/2003guid/5a.htm

II.    Peer-to-Peer Networks and Civil Liability
READ SECTIONS I, II and III of the Electronic Frontier Foundation's analysis of copyright liability in the context of computer networks and summary of recent caselaw:
http://eff.org/IP/P2P/p2p_copyright_wp.php
If you don't read anything else for this class, read this.
(Question: What does the EFF recommend most strongly for staying out of trouble?)

READ PAGES 3 to 5 and 11 to 18 of the 2003 decision of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago on the Aimster sytem:
http://www.ca7.uscourts.gov/op3.fwx?submit1=showop&caseno=02-4125.PDF
(Question: What special feature did Aimster/Deep use to try to avoid copyright liability? Why was Aimster/Deep unsuccessful?)

DISCRETIONARY READING: The MGM v. Grokster decision from a federal trial court in Los Angeles:
http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/MGM_v_Grokster/030425_order_on_motions.pdf
(Question: How are Grokster and Streamcast different from Napster? From Aimster? If Kazaa/Sharman controls Grokster's "supernodes," where does that leave Kazaa/Sharman?)

III.    Technical Responses to Legal Issues on Peer-to-Peer Networks
SKIM a news article on the RIAA flooding peer-to-peer networks with spoofed files:
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/3560365.htm

SKIM an article about the economic problems the Gnutella network faces:
http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue5_10/adar/index.html
(Questions: How many people provide the lion's share of files on the Gnutella network? If you were a lawyer for the RIAA trying to stop file-sharing, who would you sue? If the majority of the files on a particular peer-to-peer network were taken down, how attractive would that network be?) 

SKIM a whitepaper on Freenet's architecture and technical features:
http://freenet.sourceforge.net/papers/freenet-ieee.pdf
(Question: Does Freenet's architecture and technical features insulate Freenet node operators from copyright liability? Think about Aimster.)

DISCRETIONARY READING: A law review on Freenet's survivability in the legal system:
http://www.lawtechjournal.com/articles/2002/05_021229_roemer.php
(Question: If people can be sued for millions of dollars for operating a Freenet node, but know that the Freenet system will continue to operate even if they shut their node down, how many would still operate a Freenet node?)

IV.    Legal Strategies for Peer-to-Peer Networks
READ a news article about Kazaa/Sharman's legal structure:
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/printstory.hts/tech/1759841
(Question: What is Kazaa/Sharman's strategy for staying out of legal trouble?)

DISCRETIONARY READING: A law review on the financial laws of Vanuatu:
http://www.vanuatu.usp.ac.fj/journal_splaw/Working_Papers/Herman1.html
(Question: How might have Vanuatu's laws influenced Sharman's choices?)

DISCRETIONARY READING: My post on how to protect peer-to-peer systems from copyright liability, and a law review giving a more in-depth discussion of arbitration in the context of software (pages 45 through 53):
http://research.yale.edu/lawmeme/modules.php?name=News&file=comments&sid=1259&tid=2996&mode=flat&order=1&thold=-1
http://web.hamline.edu/law/pages/lawreview/ pdf_files/Sandeen.pdf