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General discussion

(OT)Angry with RIAA tactics, programmer creates mask for file-sharers

Feb 10, 2004 3:40PM PST

Wyatt Wasicek was so outraged by the recording industry's legal assault on users of free music-downloading sites that he decided to ride to the rescue. He created a program called AnonX that masks the Internet address of people who use file-sharing programs such as Kazaa.

Available for $5.95 per month, AnonX sets up a virtual private network, or VPN, between a user's computer and the company's computers. The AnonX computers act as proxies, and actually do the Web surfing for the subscriber.

In theory, no one outside of AnonX can see the subscriber's Internet address -- including the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), which has forced Internet service providers to turn over subscriber information as part of its campaign to sue hundreds of individual song downloaders, including children.

Wasicek, 29, promises not to divulge his 7,000 users' Internet addresses, and believes he can't be forced to do so.

More at http://www.securityfocus.com/news/8006

Discussion is locked

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So, let calculate the cost of downloading music...
Feb 11, 2004 1:25AM PST

Legally .. its about 99cents per song.. compare to 5.95 per month for unlimited number of song..

But the concept of P2P is "Free" ... so I guess this software will fail, unless the P2P user concept (instead of getting a free music) shifted toward defeating RIAA.

This is just something that cross my mind..

Cheers...

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RIAA shot themselves in the FOOT!!!
Feb 11, 2004 8:46AM PST

starting about mis 90's the music industry began signing band after band that put out album after album with maybe one decent song you could actually enjoy listening to...the rest of the cd was not fit for listening to. This was done over and over and over...corporate greed at its finest...large successful companys often forget what got them to the top... just make that $$$....they were counting their profits before they got the $$$...field anything, sales are up...cd players prices had plummeted...all manner of media playing devices were readily available and cheap...the problem was, who wanted to pay 15 to 20 bucks for one song? Or a miniature silver frisbee?
There was a lot of talk about new tech at the record store....burn your fav artist songs that you chose, out of a machine, other ideas abounded...nixed...corporate greed...the best they could come up with was a best hits cd of maybe 5 songs and "bonus" tracks...the bonus songs really sucked and you could hear the best hits all day on radio....there are definetly some exceptions to this...sure their were great artist around...but they werent going to make that much music for that many genres for that many people to keep the recording industry rolling in the $$$. Anyone remember the Boston Tea Party? Well, without any caffeine the american public got a little grumpy and discovered that coffee was a whole lot better, and kicked the British to the curb, in a manner of speaking...people being what they are. I think the next step is for artist and pop cultural musicians to start their own websites and release there own music, 99 pesos a tune...dump the middle man, whos main interest is...corporate greed first and foremost...