Mixing It Up

Thursday, May. 12, 2005 - 9:15 a.m.

I have a friend whose wife is taking law courses at a community college.

She's just now discovered the myriad subtleties of the 'fair use' section of Title 17, and yesterday she announced to her husband that the mix CDs that exist in their household are illegal and must be destroyed. Likewise for the VHS tapes of television programs. Her argument is that if the authorities discover these items, they could face jail time and fines, and then she'd have a police record and be unable to have a successful law career.

I went to Toren Smith with this dilemma, and I said I had read Title 17 Section 17 until my eyes were gonna fall out, but due to being overwhelmed and undereducated I didn't understand most of what I was reading. Toren, who has been a publisher and who never hesitated to go to court to protect his own copyrights, very graciously took pity on me and sent me the following two links:

http://www.hrrc.org/history/riaa.html

http://www.hrrc.org/history/betamax.html

The above links lead to decisions that emphasize and protect the rights of consumers and how they are allowed to use their digital media.

Since producing -one- mix CD from material they already own falls within the parameters of reasonable personal use, it's my opinion that her suggested course of action does not need to be followed.

Unless of course she can produce the text of a court decision in which a law student was prevented from taking bar exams due to possessing a mix CD.

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Jamie turned me on to this link related to Jennifer Willbanks, the runaway bride.

Ewwwww, creepy. Reminds me of the Erasure Impostor.

At least SHE is receiving help.

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Well SHIT! Goddammit...

NEW YORK (AP) - CNBC is canceling comic Dennis Miller's low-rated political talk show after less than 16 months, replacing it with a business show rerun.

Miller's prime-time program, featuring a mixture of comedy, interviews and his conservative political opinion, was seen by an average of 168,000 viewers since its January 2004 launch, according to Nielsen Media Research.

That number has dipped to 114,000 this year with the presidential election campaign over.

His show, seen at 9 p.m. EDT, will be replaced by a rerun of ``Mad Money with Jim Cramer,'' three hours after its original airing.

Told of the cancellation, Miller ``has let me know that his strong preference is to leave the program immediately,'' CNBC President Mark Hoffman wrote in a memo to his staff.

Miller's last episode will be Friday, he said.

CNBC, which has struggled to find an audience for anything in prime-time, will introduce a new business program at 7 p.m. later this year and continue with ``The Big Idea with Donny Deutsch'' at 10. The network airs reruns of NBC entertainment programming at 8.

Why are the most cerebral shows ALWAYS the ones on the chopping block???

Grrrr.

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Okay. That's enough. (Feel better soon, Dave Chappelle.)

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