While recent rulings of US courts against MP3.com and Napster have cast doubt on the future of the online MP3 music business, a debate has just begun in Taiwan over the legality of downloading MP3 files following a search at a university in southern Taiwan last week.
"If it is determined that it is illegal for students to download MP3 files for their own use, I guess over 90 percent of university students could be held liable for that," said an electronic engineering postgraduate student at National Taiwan University, referring to the search by the Tainan District Prosecutors' Office last Wednesday.
"We're aware of the controversies surrounding the online swapping of MP3 music files and that misuse of the technology may infringe on copyrights. But it has only just occurred to me that simply downloading MP3 music could get one into big trouble," he said, adding that he disapproved of the actions taken against the students of National Chengkung University (
MP3, a technology for compressing audio sounds or music on a computer, has become extremely popular with PC users in Taiwan, and especially university students, who have easy access to computers and feel that music CDs are too expensive.
It is all too common for students to grab MP3 music files from the Internet and keep them handy in their hard drives. And with dozens of Web sites providing free downloads of MP3 files, music can be obtained for almost nothing.
Moreover, where a full five-minute song would normally take up to 60Mb at a 44kHz sampling rate, it only takes 4 or 5Mb using MP3 compression, with no noticeable loss in quality.
Using the MP3 format, over 100 songs with different copyright ownerships can be kept on a single CD, but legally this often involves infringement of copyright.
In Taiwan, there have been cases where students who made a profit from selling pirated CDs produced using MP3 technology were found guilty of violating the Copyright Law.
Robin Lee (李瑞斌), secretary-general of the non-official International Federation of the Phonographics Industry (國際唱片交流協會), said that in 2000 there were 1,460 cases of crackdowns on the sale of pirated CDs at night markets, CD stores, as well as on campuses.
Lee said quite a few students set up their own Web sites providing free downloads of MP3 music files, while many more frequently use the free services without thinking of the legal consequences.
In the wake of the search at Chengkung University, a debate has emerged over whether students will be permitted to access MP3 music files for their own entertainment if they do not attempt to profit from it.
Chen Jen-chieh (
The forms of online reproduction include uploading, downloading, posting, forwarding, pasting, digitalizing, browsing and printing.
In theory, one could be held liable under the law for simply downloading or printing material from the Web without authorization.
However, Chen said the law allows exemptions under the circumstances of "fair use," which include the use of copyrighted materials for educational purposes, in the judicial process, or for personal non-profit use.
Therefore, the Chengkung University students could be exempted from liability if they keep the MP3 files only for their own use and do not try to profit from them.
In contrast, Chang Shau-ping (
Chang said that no pop music CDs are currently produced in MP3 format in Taiwan.
It follows that the online MP3 files themselves are illegal reproductions and, needless to say, downloading the illegally-reproduced files constitutes an infringement of copyrights.
"The students do not have any legal privileges. They're adults over 18 years old and should take responsibility for their actions," the prosecutor said, in light of the growing uproar among the university students against Wednesday's search.
While law enforcement agencies seem eager to put an end to what they view as illegal acts, there are scholars warning that an all-out crackdown might pose a threat to the development of the Internet.
Liu Ching-yi (
"While they are seeking to apply the existing copyright regulations to developing technologies, they should also think a step ahead about what will come next and think carefully whether their decisions today will hinder possible development of the Internet," she concluded.
CHAMPIONS: President Lai congratulated the players’ outstanding performance, cheering them for marking a new milestone in the nation’s baseball history Taiwan on Sunday won their first Little League Baseball World Series (LLBWS) title in 29 years, as Taipei’s Dong Yuan Elementary School defeated a team from Las Vegas 7-0 in the championship game in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania. It was Taiwan’s first championship in the annual tournament since 1996, ending a nearly three-decade drought. “It has been a very long time ... and we finally made it,” Taiwan manager Lai Min-nan (賴敏男) said after the game. Lai said he last managed a Dong Yuan team in at the South Williamsport in 2015, when they were eliminated after four games. “There is
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers have declared they survived recall votes to remove them from office today, although official results are still pending as the vote counting continues. Although final tallies from the Central Election Commission (CEC) are still pending, preliminary results indicate that the recall campaigns against all seven KMT lawmakers have fallen short. As of 6:10 pm, Taichung Legislators Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) and Yang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔), Hsinchu County Legislator Lin Szu-ming (林思銘), Nantou County Legislator Ma Wen-chun (馬文君) and New Taipei City Legislator Lo Ming-tsai (羅明才) had all announced they
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) yesterday visited Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), as the chipmaker prepares for volume production of Nvidia’s next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) chips. It was Huang’s third trip to Taiwan this year, indicating that Nvidia’s supply chain is deeply connected to Taiwan. Its partners also include packager Siliconware Precision Industries Co (矽品精密) and server makers Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) and Quanta Computer Inc (廣達). “My main purpose is to visit TSMC,” Huang said yesterday. “As you know, we have next-generation architecture called Rubin. Rubin is very advanced. We have now taped out six brand new
POWER PLANT POLL: The TPP said the number of ‘yes’ votes showed that the energy policy should be corrected, and the KMT said the result was a win for the people’s voice The government does not rule out advanced nuclear energy generation if it meets the government’s three prerequisites, President William Lai (賴清德) said last night after the number of votes in favor of restarting a nuclear power plant outnumbered the “no” votes in a referendum yesterday. The referendum failed to pass, despite getting more “yes” votes, as the Referendum Act (公民投票法) states that the vote would only pass if the votes in favor account for more than one-fourth of the total number of eligible voters and outnumber the opposing votes. Yesterday’s referendum question was: “Do you agree that the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant