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Anonymous Declares War On RIAA Over LimeWire

image from blogs.villagevoice.com At 4PM EST today, Anonymous is waging war against the RIAA. Dismayed by the downfall of LimeWire, they have gotten more serious in their threats. Their standard DDoS attack is part of the mix, but they have also published on the office address of the RIAA and their phone and fax numbers, as well as, the home address and phone numbers for CEO Mitch Bainwol and his wife Susan.

Participants are encouraged to bombard the RIAA and their leader with prank phone calls, pizza, black faxes, and other "creative" things they can dream up. This time, the group is blending the cyber world with reality. Anonymous fears future attacks on sites like Demonoid, The Pirate Bay, or HDbits. Therefore, they are calling for an all out attack on their greatest foe, contending that no private entity should have "control over the freedom of information." Take a look:

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41 Comments

  1. This is hilarious.
    Anon-E-Muss . Bwa-ha-ha.
    We are legion blah blah blah.
    These idiots are playing with a government-backed fire; this is a great way to get burned.
    *snicker*

  2. Someone should tell these charming people that creative output is more than “information.” Just cut to the chase and say you want to take stuff. So much easier and more honest than the historically tiresome trick of couching plunder in revolutionary rhetoric.

  3. I am anti-RIAA myself, but I think Annomynous is going too far releasing information about where they live and even his wife’s name.
    There’s working towards a more sustainable music industry and being simply vigilant and over-idealistic.
    Anyone who supports this company is in it for the wrong reasons. It is easy to critisize as a by-stander. If you really care, do something about it.
    http://guerrillaandchalk.wordpress.com

  4. anonymous is from 4chan.org primarily. 4chan is the worst of internet conglomerating in one place with no rules or accountability.
    theyve gone to war with Scientology and have destroyed lives.

  5. Anonymous = Anonymous Cowards
    The tactics employed by this organization are unacceptable. Limewire was certainly guilty. End of story. Anonymous cheap shots and hacking tactics should not be tolerated.
    Why an earth would they target RIAA executive family members? How is Mitch’s wife to blame? No one in their right mind would ever support this kind of behavior.
    Constantine
    .music

  6. why is it acceptable to download songs for free but i can’t get food for free from say example mcdonalds, it’s the same thing, Anonymous should be attacking mcdonalds and mercedes benz and other industry’s / companies that are trying to stop us from having the things we want for free. If the world wasn’t about money in the first place this wouldn’t be a issue. Anonymous are hypocrites if they don’t go after mcdonalds for trying to stop us from eating for free.

  7. Hey Shea i was just using mcdonalds as an example, lets just use the words music and food. what i was trying to get at is why is it okey to not pay for music but WE HAVE TO PAY FOR FOOD, should i not be able to download food for free? but since i cant download it why cant i just go into mcdonalds and take what i want? It’s just hypocritical if you want music to be free, everything should be free. making music is made by people who put alot of man hours into it and have expenses and overheads to pay as well.

  8. Ok, I hear ya. I’m sure anything as vulnerable would feel the damage. Just blows music it easily digitalized and are small files.
    People need to get over this mp3 issue and focus on what we can strengthen I.e. The live sector.

  9. While i don’t fully agree with the actions of this guy nor do i care for limewire. My dislike for the riaa, makes me say “right on”.

  10. Agree with Diego. It’s not about the money or the free tracks. It’s about preventing the corporate machine from developing yet another media stronghold on the Internet.

  11. RIAA does not suppress freedom of information. They are suppressing illegal theft of intellectual property. You are free to share information on where to purchase the music and movies you’d like to watch, but you are NOT free to steal it.

  12. That McDonalds analogy is horrendous. If it were possible to magically create another burger without using anything of cost, then yes, it should be free.
    And on another note, It’s not just about “Getting stuff for free,” it’s about the fact that when you buy something with the current RIAA-recommended DRM, you can have the song, but usually with such ridiculous restrictions that it’s a lot easier to just pirate it and actually have it the way it’s supposed to be when you buy it: Usable on all your stuff.
    Using that hideous McDonald’s analogy: Say you want to take the burger to your car to eat at home. The DRM makes it so that you can take it to your car, but as soon as you get it out of the car at your house the burger dematerializes and you can’t get it back unless you sit in the car. Not the most awful thing in the world, but why should we have this arbitrary rule in place? That’s what this is about. Not just getting free stuff. There will always be those that pirate tons of music and never buy anything, but there are also loads of people out there that will buy the hard copy if they appreciate the material
    In short: If the RIAA wants us to stop pirating, they need to get their heads out of their butts, stop suing people thousands of dollars for pirating individual songs, get some content worth paying for, and stop charging $20 for 8 songs on an album.

  13. What gets tricky is the fact that there is no material substance that they are stealing. They are not making any profit off of what is pirated. Then you have to look at what defines theft. Is it theft if the file is copied? The original file is still there. The pirate just copies said information. The real theft is the amount of money the recording industry makes off of the artist. What really needs to happen is the bypass of record companies by the artist making the music available for download.
    Also, if the RIAA did not think that this form of backlash would come they are stupid. They all know or should know about previous attacks like this on other members of the RIAA. People are expecting anon to play by the rules and that just isnt in their coding. I am amazed that this guys kids arnt signed up for the military yet.

  14. Those words are from Anomynous’ mouth not mine. I completely agree with you.
    The problem I find though is as a society using Torrents and LimeWire does not feel like stealing. The fact there are these gates for consuming music so obvious and publicized it doesn’t really conjure up the wrong-doing that we would expect from the word theft of stealing.

  15. I think the problem RIAA and IFPI lack is a of communication on the ground levels such as here, forums etc. I think the RIAA is trying to do good after many years of acting retarded.
    I think Anonymous are acting more like a group of little punks than a mature collective. I think even leaving the families out of this prank would of gained the group a lot more respect.

  16. To add to that. There is this huge presumption that because an album was illegally downloaded it would have been purchased if it wasn’t for piracy. I doubt the ratio is even as high a 1:10 albums.

  17. I think the important thing to remember here is that the song or video that was downloaded was already payed for originally, otherwise it would not exist in file form. Should it be illegal for me to burn my favorite CD’s and give them out to my friends? Of course not. Its the exact same principle. And yes, the McDonald’s analogy does not fit. It’s the equivalent of taking pictures of your burger and handing them out, or in a more unrealistic comparison, making material copies of the burger at not cost.
    The word ‘theft’ is completely out of place in the pirating argument. Its called sharing, and we were all encouraged to do it as children. File sharing is just the polite thing to do.

  18. Have you ever burned a CD for someone? If so, you should probably be sued for thousands of dollars for stealing intellectual property, since you obviously prevented that person from purchasing the music.
    It’s no where near theft. The original copy of the information was paid for and then shared. I suppose I’ll stop inviting my friends over for movies so that they will go buy the movie themselves. If that sounds stupid, its b/c it is. It’s also the logic that you are using to rob people of their freedom to share the property that they own.

  19. The argument that stealing digital information is the same as stealing food or (as I’ve seen with the movie industry advertisements) a car is deeply flawed.
    If I steal food or a car or something else of a real material fiber, then the person I’ve stolen from now doesn’t have it. The cannot be said of someone downloading an mp3. Regardless of where one stands on the issue of downloading, that argument needs to go away, it’s silly.
    In the end, as someone who works not only as an artist and musician but also as an engineer and producer, I have no sympathy for the record industry, who shot itself in the food with its own greed and desire to move to cheaper and easier to reproduce formats.. I also have very little sympathy for the ‘poor’ artists who are the victims of having their art appreciated without maximum compensation (though it’s debatable how much an artist actually loses when you consider the increased audience they reach that often times wouldn’t have bought the album and this never heard the music and thus never become a fan).
    While I find 4Chan to be a bit stale these days, I hope they give the RIAA hell. The RIAA is a despicable organisation and truly embodies the worst of art and music.

  20. The RIAA doesn’t care about the artists they represent. The money they have made suing individuals for downloading music rarely makes it into the hands of any of the artists they represent, most of it goes to paying the exorbitant salaries of the RIAA staff and lobbying the government for more control over their industry.
    I do not condone illegal downloading of music but, the RIAA deserves everything they get from this and I wish Anonymous the greatest success imaginable in their attacks.

  21. How did songs get around before copyright law? Word of mouth. Was that theft? No. Songs are like naked pictures. If you don’t want it out there, don’t publish it. Getting the government more and more involved just leads to various invasions of privacy; i.e., ISPs snooping into customer’s accounts, which now occur on a regular basis with copyright violations as their excuse just as in totalitarian regimes. The founding fathers never intended copyrights to be permanent, no more than a dozen years (tax free, by the way). The RIAA has extended this license to 99 years through political campaign contributions. The value of music and other media has been exponentially increased via mass communication — a product of taxpayer funded research and subsidy. Think TV, radio, internet. To presume to own the full value of this package without regard to the society which nurtured it is morally bankrupt.

  22. F*ck you, Nose-boy.
    ‘End of story’? It’s all that simple is it? I hate conceited idiots like you that just throw your ill-informed opinion at a topic and then try to close it by saying ‘end of story’.
    Why is it? Because you said so? Some jerk that clearly doesn’t know or understand the bigger picture.
    You sir, are a dick.

  23. What a load of rubbish.
    If you take a burger from Mac D’s then you’re physically removing it, meaning that no one else could buy or enjoy that burger.
    If you ‘COPY’ music then you’re not physically removing the owner’s property, nor are you stopping them from selling it elsewhere.
    If I lost the ability to download music tomorrow the record companies would not make another penny more than they would currently. I download music because I can, if I had to buy it then I’d just go without, as would many others.
    I’ll tell you who it hurts in the music industry shall I?
    Greedy Execs. F*ck them.
    The artists are doing fine, the rich are all still rich and the poor just aren’t paying for over-priced music any more, it’s no biggy.
    If only you all spent your time worrying about more pressing topics.

  24. haha okey, ill try n cover everything as quickly as possible,
    1. okey yes you are making a copy of the product but what you’re actually taking away is not the product itself but the money from that copy that would of been spent on buying it.
    2. 7th commandment is right on the money
    3. The music has a business side which it needs to monetize i mean imagine the movie business without any hustlers behind the scene on the grind doing the deals some people want to work in a office building but enjoy music so much want it to be in a music context. Some people want to do something with their life that’s about music in some way why shouldn’t there be a business side to support this instead of just people in their rooms making music only? and these people have to work at crappy jobs.
    4. try and think of music as a share on the stock market, based on Itunes prices lets just say for this story that the price of music/music industry is at $2us a share(mp3)for the sake of everyone involved in the industry not just those looking out for themselves lets not let that value of that share drop to $0 and we have a generation thats has it in their head its okey not to pay for music.
    5. Yes there are other ways to make money from music but music sales (physical or digital) are bread and butter for alot of people.
    6. For those against greedy record executives okey so do you feel the same way about oil and bank companies trust me they’re way greedier why do you think the world is all about money why not steal fuel from petrol stations FUCK oil companies right? they’re greedy, and banks… lets steal atms, i mean these guys go broke and you gotta bail them out but when your broke they take your house? if you strongly hate greedy record executives hate all coporate business that are greedy.
    7. If the world wasn’t about money this wouldn’t be a problem in the first place noone would care about downloading and “sharing information” even tho you’re sharing someones product that they have created.
    8. Yes artists don’t need record labels and can easily hook up with a digital distribution company, use social networks for marketing and spend coin on a publists and music videos.
    9. Sueing people for stupid amounts is really tarded i don’t agree with that about the riaa and it does make them look really bad and makes artists n the industry look bad.
    10. Instead they should just stop the main stream torrent sites and other ways/sites, p2p, yes people will always be able to download some way n thats okey but jeez lets not make it so easy, at least lets stop the everyday newb that cant be bothering digging a lil further n would rather buy it online or through their mobile phone. (where you text a number and they send u a mp3 and deduct it from the phone credit).
    11. Sorry couldn’t cover everything but its 3:25am, peace

  25. Sick point. I would like to see more people come to this realization. Honestly, illegal downloading helps artists more than it hurts, because it encourages the spread of their music to fans who WILL purchase it. It’s only the greedy major label CEO’s who think they are losing out on “units” that really give a sh*t.

  26. Freedom of information isnt getting everything for free…
    If i hear about Denny’s giving away free breakfast.. WHO should have the right to censor that information? Thats what this is about. Not “music should be free” . If i want to give away something for free then i should be able to without ANYBODYs interference; REGARDLESS of whether i am legally allowed to… Freedom of information people not free music

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