The Alliance of Artists and Recording Companies is suing Ford and General Motors for millions of dollars over alleged copyrights infringement violations. This organization argues that Ford and GM infotainment systems have the capability to rip (or in non-nerd speak copy one or more tracks) from a CD and that violates the law. Specifically the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992. Thus these companies need to cut this organization a cheque. Here’s some more details from the ComputerWorld article on this:
The lawsuit calls out a feature in Ford vehicles called Jukebox, which records songs from CDs to the infotainment system’s hard drive. The Jukebox function has been available on Ford vehicles since at least the 2011 model year.
For example, the owner’s manual explains, “Your mobile media navigation system has a Jukebox which allows you to save desired tracks or CDs to the hard drive for later access. The hard drive can store up to 10GB (164 hours; approximately 2,472 tracks) of music.”
The lawsuit also cites GM’s Hard Drive Device, made by Denso, which can rip music and has been available on numerous models since at least 2011.
The suit seeks millions of dollars to be paid by each of the companies for violating the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992. The Act protects against distributing digital audio recording devices whose primary purpose is to rip copyrighted material.
I have to admit that I’m a bit puzzled by this lawsuit. The reason being that this is known as space shifting which is defined this way in Wikipedia:
Space shifting (or spaceshifting), also known as place shifting (or placeshifting), allows media, such as music or films, which is stored on one device to be accessed from another place through another device.
Now this was upheld by the Ninth Circuit in the landmark case RIAA v Diamond Multimedia 15 years ago. That case affirmed that space shifting to the Diamond MP3 player for personal use was considered fair use. Thus one wonders how long this will last in front of a judge. But I am a computer geek not a lawyer. Perhaps a real lawyer could comment on this.
Zagg Customer Service Blows Me Away!
Posted in Commentary with tags Zagg on July 30, 2014 by itnerdOkay, I’ll admit that the title is kind of cheezy. But it is how I feel given my experience with the Zagg kiosk in in Toronto’s Fairview Mall. Now frequent readers will recall that I reviewed their InvisibleShield Glass screen protector for the iPhone 5S. Well, just this week I put my phone in my pocket in a server room so that I could have my hands free. When I took it out about 90 minutes later, the screen protector was cracked. What appears to have happened was that I put the phone in my pocket without closing the cover of the case it lives in (as that covers the screen) and my keys which were in the same pocket pressed against the screen protector cracking it. The good news was that the actual screen was fine.
Clearly, that was not the best thing that I have done lately.
Thus, I took a trip to Zagg to buy another one and get it professionally installed. When I explained what happened to the person who was working at the kiosk and I pulled out my credit card to buy a new one, he told me to put the credit card away and hand over my phone. He then did the following:
I tried to pay for it again (after all, I had damaged it so I felt that I should pay for it) and he refused politely. I have to admit that I am blown away by this. The reason being that this person who’s name I never got just did what needed to be done to resolve the issue with no fuss. That is outstanding customer service and something that should not only be praised, but publicized. Now I am sure that Zagg is looking at the damaged screen protectors so that they can improve their product. Thus this is likely a cost of doing business for them. Having said that, the fact that they replace these for free creates a great impression that you simply can’t buy.
Kudos to them!
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