Think the RIAA is out to sue all file-sharers? Maybe not. A report in Wired suggests that they’re being uncharacteristically lenient in one area: MP3 blogs. If you’re unaware of them, the concept is pretty simple. The authors post descriptions of albums and/or songs, and link to where you can download them, usually for free. These songs are not hosted by the blogs, but rather third-party hosting services like Rapid Share.

The question is, why don’t the record companies care? If they’re spinning their wheels and suing Limewire and Bittorrent users, why aren’t they going after these music bloggers? After all, they’re facilitating the illegal download of copyrighted material (the words of the RIAA, not of me).

First is traffic volume. For instance, one of the more popular blogs, It’s Coming Out Of Your Speaker, saw just 1,487 visitors yesterday. That is substantial by some means, but in the overall scheme of things, it’s a drop in the pan. I run a fairly popular baseball blog (specifically on the New York Yankees, furthering the niche), and we see double that traffic on a normal day — and even more now because of the climate within the niche. In any event, far more people visit Bittorrent and P2P sharing sites daily than these blogs.

Second is culpability. The overwhelming majority of these MP3 blogs are hosted by Blogger or WordPress, rather than being independently hosted. This leaves the RIAA wondering where they should set their targets, if they are to do so at all. It’s one thing to publish copyrighted material. It’s quite another to post a link to copyrighted material on a blog that you don’t technically own (since it’s hosted by Blogger or WordPress, they reserve the right to take down your blog). So it’s unclear whether they can even do anything to the bloggers.

Third is relevancy. I searched through a few of these blogs, and all I found was obscure and older music. Those aren’t exactly the alleys from which the RIAA makes its dough. It’s more concerned with the piracy of mainstream music, the kind that can rake in millions, even billions through record stores and digital outlets like iTunes and the Amazon store. I doubt the RIAA cares if three copies of an old New York Dolls album is downloaded. Chances are, no one was going to buy it anyway.

(Aside: This is no knock on the New York Dolls or any other obscure band. It’s a mere sales issue. I’m all for the more obscure music…and have actually taken a liking to the selections on these blogs.)

You’d think that the RIAA would be even more fired up because of the advertising issue. Not only are these bloggers giving people a portal to download these copyrighted albums for free, but they’re making a dime or two from advertising through Google AdSense. The RIAA I know wouldn’t stand for people profiting from piracy.

To me, this signals that something is up. We don’t have all the relevant data at hand, after all. Perhaps there has been a measurable growth in the sales of these more obscure and older albums since the MP3 blogs have come into existence. Going back to the New York Dolls example, maybe they sold 10 albums per month before the birth of MP3 blogs. But after they were mentioned on one of them, they sold 50 albums the next month. I don’t think the record companies are going to complain about that, do you?

That might not necessarily be the case, but it’s something to consider. For all we know, they could be leaving this issue alone because they have bigger issues at hand — like the threat of EMI to cut funding to the group. Yeah, that might matter a bit more to them than MP3 blogs.

But they’re out there, so you might as well check them out. My suggestion is to hit up It’s Coming Out Of Your Speaker and checking out the links list. Should be able to find plenty of material there.

The Republicans must be glad they failed to eliminate the filibuster way back in 2005 when it seemed the good times would roll on forever. The filibuster isn’t the grand spectacle of days yore anymore. Current Senate Rules allow you to stop all Senate business if the opposition doesn’t have 2/3 majority to vote to end debate. Rather than requiring that you then occupy the floor and speak continuously until the offending bill is dropped., you now simply need to threaten to do so

Regardless, it is a procedural maneuver that was never used before 1841. Upon its first use there was a debate as to whether a simple majority should be enough to end debate but the Senate has tended to lean towards extended and careful consideration of all bills and so the tactic survived. Today it is truly in its heyday.

The NY Times ran a story tonight which just might explain why there has been so little movement on big issues from this congress. in the first year of this Congress there have been more filibusters than ever before in a two year Senate session.

So far in this first year of the 110th Congress, there have been 72 motions to stop filibusters, most on the Iraq war but also on routine issues like reauthorizing Amtrak funding. There were 68 such motions in the full two years of the previous Congress, 53 in 1987-88 and 23 in 1977-78. In 1967-68, there were 5 such votes, one of them on a plan to amend cloture itself, which failed.

I’m all for the minorities right to assert itself. It’s important that there is a means to empower proponents of alternative viewpoints. It’s important that there is the ability to force the majority to listen to your point of view. That’s something that should never be changed. There is a problem when filibuster is used to prevent rather than ensure debate. That’s the problem we’re seeing today.

Therefore I propose that we return to the days of long winded speeches. Bring us back to the days when passion drove politics. Bring back that good old filibuster, the kind you could make a movie about.