Sony BMG Pays $4.25 million Settlement

[Audioholics]

<A href="http://www.audioholics.com/news/pressreleases/SonyBMGsettlement.php"><IMG style="WIDTH: 125px; HEIGHT: 30px" alt=[SonyBMG] hspace=10 src="http://www.audioholics.com/news/thumbs/SonyBMG_th.jpg" align=left border=0></A>Sony BMG Music Entertainment will pay $4.25 million as part of a settlement with 39 states (including Washington DC) to resolve investigations into problems caused by music CDs loaded with hidden anti-piracy software. Under Thursday's deal, Sony BMG will "reimburse" consumers whose computers were damaged while trying to uninstall the anti-piracy software. It will be interesting to see how this is quantified or proven. Possibly more important is the result that Sony BMG stated it will no longer manufacture CDs with these particular flavors of copy-protection (they did NOT, however, deny themselves the ability to come up with other methods of securing their products.)

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[stratman]

If you surreptitiously insert harmful or possibly harmful components into software, the least you can do is warn the consumer with a sticker in front of the jewel case. Publishers (music, research, books, etc.) have the right to copyright protection, but they're also responsible for their published material. Sony should get slammed on this one. But, how will you prove that this software killed your hardware????? Another problem started by attorneys to be fixed by attorneys to be regulated by attorneys and mediated by attorneys, vicious huh?

 

[allsop4now]

Sony should get slammed on this one. But, how will you prove that this software killed your hardware????? Another problem started by attorneys to be fixed by attorneys to be regulated by attorneys and mediated by attorneys, vicious huh?

The Sony "rootkit" did not destroy your hardware, but it did install a type of software often used to spy on you to get your credit card information. Of course, this was just a Microsoft Windows problem only.

What the Sony incident showed is that you avoid going to prison if you have alot of money and good political contacts. Those Sony executives making the decision to use the rootkit for DRM (Digital Restriction Management) are nothing but criminals.

Note: I buy all my music and movies, and have little respect for those that violates the authors' copyrights.

Edit: I avoid buying Sony products for this reason, unless they are an extremely good value. You bet Sony has lost several sales from me.

 

[stratman]

One thing that always turned me off about SONY was their proprietary mind set (MEMORY STICK, MINI DISC, BETA),don't get me wrong Beta was good, Memory Stick does it's job, but none of this stuff is interchangeable, forces you to buy Sony peripherals, and if the format fails, then you're up the creek.

 

[skizzerflake]

4 and a quarter million is nothing to Sony. That much cash drops slips through the floorboards everyday there. Individuals should be able to collect damages for what was done to their PC and get a settlement for what it cost to wipe the drive and reinstall Windows. That would be a couple hundred each for millions or people. Sony deliberately wrote a piece of stealth software that allowed them to spy on people who were doing the right thing by buying their music instead of pirating it and made that software almost impossible to detect and remove. The rootkit also allowed hackers to use the same kit to to whatever they want, so damages should be awarded to anybody who suffered because of other's use of the rootkit. These people ought to rot in hell but, being a big corporation, they will pay a little bit of money and walk away, with the publically stated intention of doing the same thing somehow else.

These are the same guys who introduced the new Playstation and didn't make enough of them for Christmas. Not only are they evil but they aren't good at business. Lightning hit my Sony HT receiver last summer and blew it up. That's the last piece of Sony hardware in my house.