So, no doubt most of you know about the anti-piracy software on Sony CDs — such as My Morning Jacket's Z — since it appeared on Pitchformula® this morning. They're a little behind on the story, since this unfortunate development was reported by the BBC. I'm glad I have a G5.

(The 'Fork folks read the boards here, so expect an updated story.)

Kudos to Sony for giving people another reason not to buy CDs.

Note to Sony if they're reading this: Psst...hey guys..you're supposed to encourage people to pay for music. Screwing up their computers probably isn't the best plan for that.

Sony now carries the honor of 'First company to be caught doing what several companies do'.

I hope the law does what it's supposed to do and sets a strong example for other companies not to put malware in their software. Corruption now won't serve anyone.

I sent 2 albums from amazon.com back for a refund.. but I'm still going to boycott Sony CDs for a while.

dubs provides some excellent links and poses some good questions here.

In addition, Damian Kulash of OK Go wrote a good editorial on the subject for today's New York Times.

Now Playing: To Kill A Mockingbird on AMC

yeah my bust for starting a new topic when this one was already up... I just didn't look hard enough. Here's what I wrote:

I've been sort of tracking this rootkit fiasco ('scandal' might be more appropriate) and just today I read this timeline of the whole thing: Sony Rootkit Timeline

Is there anyone out there who was hit by the rootkit and who can give a first-hand account of what happened? Another important question: how, if at all, has this changed your opinion of illegal file-sharing? I used to just not like major labels because I think most pop music sucks, but now they actually appear evil. In attempting to curb file-sharing, they have caused a huge amount of damage. Within that link you can find the RIAA's response to the rootkit. Instead of openly condemning Sony, the RIAA applauded the company's insufficient response (their uninstaller actually compounded the damage to computers) to their own mess. If the music industry wants to stop illegal file-sharing, shouldn't they stop punishing music buyers? Seventeen dollars has always been too much to pay for a CD, but now you also risk the obliteration of all your files when you make a purchase.

Here is a list of known infectious CD's. There's a couple on there that I would have bought ("Z" is one of my favorite albums all year, plus BRMC and Kings of Leon) and if I had I definitely would have put them on my computer so I could transfer them to my mp3 player. I sure am glad I found another means to obtain them.

I bought the new My Morning Jacket CD and loaded it on my computer. I don't know if I'll encounter problems later, but so far I don't have any. I would definitly be mad if it does end up crashing my computer.

I read an article in The Times about how a lot of people are blaming the artists for what happened. And some say they'll never buy an album from those artists again. What do you guys think about that?

quote:

Originally posted by Mel:
I bought the new My Morning Jacket CD and loaded it on my computer. I don't know if I'll encounter problems later, but so far I don't have any. I would definitly be mad if it does end up crashing my computer.

I read an article in The Times about how a lot of people are blaming the artists for what happened. And some say they'll never buy an album from those artists again. What do you guys think about that?

I read that Microsoft was working on an update to its anti-spyware program for the rootkit, and I'm sure other security utilities are doing the same (although Symantec was notably slow to react to the rootkit... some are crying conspiracy). If I were you I'd probably look into finding a utility that will take care of it. I'm no computer expert but it's my understanding that the rootkit's intended purpose is to spy on your system (undesirable at best) and its side effect is to open an easily exploited security weakness. So you might not realize you have a problem until it's too late.

As for blaming the artists... I find it hard to believe that they were complicit in all this. I can't imagine anyone but Lars Ullrich being ok with attaching malware to their CD with the ostensible purpose of stopping file sharing.

Instead of blaming the artists, I think they're Sony's biggest victims. Naturally, this will kill the sales of their current albums, as it's well known that Sony's response has been less than swift and thorough. Not purchasing these albums out of fear is a fair and reasonable response by the buying public. But to boycott these artists in the future? That, to me, is idiotic. There's someone out there who loves each and every one of the artists on that list. It is a damn shame that these musicians have to have their names associated with the rootkit. I would gladly support a boycott of Sony, however, and not just of their music labels. I also promise not to feel bad about downloading some of these albums.

At the moment I haven't read anything about how the bands are responding to this, which could be disastrous for their current album sales if not their careers. I don't know what, if anything, Sony owes them, but I hope Sony is not treating them like they're treating their customers (with contempt and disdain for our intelligence). If I were one of these artists, I would have hired a lawyer and worked on getting myself out of my Sony contract. Maybe they can't legally do this but I'm sure an arbitrator would at least hear their side. Normally, bailing on a contract with a major label would not be a solid career move, but this is certainly a special case. And with rumors and some evidence that most major labels use some sort of spyware, maybe these artists will turn up Matador or Sub Pop or Merge, and we'll have a happy ending.