NBA owner Cuban calls Hatch 'slimy' for soliciting donation
By Christopher Smith
The Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake Tribune
WASHINGTON - Already a frequent target of cyber-bashing for his campaign to curb the swapping of copyrighted material online, Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah now has drawn the Internet loathing of Mark Cuban, billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks NBA team and star of ABC-TV's "The Benefactor."
In a Sept. 4 post to his Web log, http://www.blogmaverick. com, Cuban relates an apparent encounter with Hatch that underscores his "strong dislike for politicians." Titled, "It's my blog so what the hell," Cuban's entry claims Hatch suggested Cuban sell Hatch's music CDs on Broadcast.com, an Internet multimedia company that Cuban eventually sold for $5.7 billion to Yahoo!
Cuban writes Hatch then invited him to visit Washington for what Cuban thought would be a discussion with the Senate Judiciary chairman about legislation regarding digital copyright issues.
Instead, Cuban says, Hatch proceeded to hit him up for "money for the Utah State Library.
"Just what a guy from Texas wants to fly to DC to discuss (I had hoped to discuss the Senator's massive confusion and ass kissing of the content industry)," Cuban writes. "He politely avoided the subject and guided me towards his request for money . . . slimy."
Cuban's reference to a "Utah State Library" project is unclear, although the Marriott Library at the University of Utah launched a fund-raising and lobbying effort earlier this year to help renovate the library.
Hatch's office declined to publicly respond to Cuban's online criticism. The barb is one of many in cyberspace directed at Hatch for legislation aimed at cracking down on illegal digital downloading of copyrighted materials, such as songs.
Hatch is currently pushing the so-called "Induce Act," which would hold technology companies liable for producing devices or software that induce people to violate copyright protections.
Hatch praised organizations that protect copyrights of creative works at a luncheon in his honor last month in New York City sponsored by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP).
"I'm so grateful for the people at ASCAP. They watch over us, they protect us, those of us who write music and without intellectual copyright protection, we wouldn't have the great music that we enjoy today. We wouldn't have the great artists that we have because there would be no incentive," Hatch said.
"This is modern-day piracy where young people who would never think of walking into a record store and stealing a CD are now downloading hundreds of thousands, millions of songs that they don't pay a dime for, that these creators are not getting compensated for."
While he's not a familiar name in Utah political circles, Cuban's boisterous courtside behavior as the fan-turned-owner of the Dallas Mavericks is a flashpoint for Utah Jazz fans.
During a 2001 Mavericks playoff game with the Jazz, Cuban screamed at Delta Center personnel operating the game clock, slammed his hands on a press table and blew a sarcastic kiss at Jazz coach Jerry Sloan. That season he was fined a total of $505,000 by the NBA for derogatory comments or gestures during games.

"Just what a guy from Texas wants to fly to DC to discuss (I had hoped to discuss the Senator's massive confusion and ass kissing of the content industry)," Cuban writes. "He politely avoided the subject and guided me towards his request for money . . . slimy."
Oh, that's good. Very interesting blog. He (Cuban) covers a lot of subjects.

Mark better watch out. Hatch is liable to pass a new law outlawing Cubans from owning an american sports team. (Heavy sarcasm).

I love Mark's blog musings on USB keychain storage devices. Think about that, and how quickly it will become the gift of choice, rather than sending soemone an iPod stuffed with music.

Mark makes a good point, he uses a USB device while watching DVD's on the airplane, rather than spin up his hard drive. That's a legitimate use to remember when the music business tries to sue USB device manufacturers out of business.

Certainly Mark can afford to buy any toys he wants. He is a good tried & trusted ally in our music efforts. Yay Mark! You go boy.

From Mark Cuban's blog on the USB keychain storage device that tomsong just reference: "I had a couple DVDs that I had PURCHASED, that I hadn’t had the chance to watch. I had a couple 512mb Flash Drives that I had bought specifically to test them out for video. I took the first movie, and using an encoder with compression (not going to tell you which one, don’t want to play favorites), I encoded the movies at DVD quality and saved the output onto each of the 512mb Flash Drives. "

Now, according to Jack Valenti and many of our legislators who want to protect IP, what he did was illegal, right?
So,Tom, is there any news about Rep. Boucher's HR.107 ?

Hey Lachatte, you're setting me up with a big fat one to hit over the fence. never thought you'd ask!

Boucher has repeatedly asked us to put out a Call Your Congressman Campaign to support DMCRA (HR 107) by becoming a co-signer in the House.

I like what Downhill Battle is doing but--reading the comments on the Save Betamax Campaign, it seems like a waste of time to call the wrong Congress critters. Boucher is indeed going to destroy the Induce Act when it crosses the street and comes to the House. But the DMCRA Act is the complete solution to de-fang the hated DMCA. Five uears of damage to the economy is long enough to assess that the DMCA is an ugly piece of writing. Let me count the ways---

We need to organize a call-in campaign to urge your own House of Representatives member to co-sign the HR 107 Bill.

Here's my link to more info and video highlights of the May 12 hearings.

http://files.dmusic.com/video/newindex.html

Here's a Boucher audio interview conducted by Phil Leigh of Inside Digital Media. Boucher is quite candid why the Induce Act will be D.O.A. in the House. His suggestions for contacting your Congressman about the DMCRA HR 107are here:

http://files.dmusic.com/video/boucher2.mov

"Cuban's entry claims Hatch suggested Cuban sell Hatch's music CDs on Broadcast.com, an Internet multimedia company that Cuban eventually sold for $5.7 billion to Yahoo!
Cuban writes Hatch then invited him to visit Washington for what Cuban thought would be a discussion with the Senate Judiciary chairman about legislation regarding digital copyright issues.
Instead, Cuban says, Hatch proceeded to hit him up for "money for the Utah State Library."

Hatch...how about just admitting yourself to a home for the hopeless senile and useless!

Hatch is just doing what I think he has done all his career at DC...looking after the best interests and financial welfare of "Open" Hatch. Constituents be damned is probably his motto.

So does this mean ol' Orin is having problems finding someone who will carry his CDs? After all, ain't he the one tryin' to shut down the nasty Internet? Now he wants to use it? Must be senile....Keeps forgetting which windmill he's chasing.

MARK CUBAN FOR SENATE!!!
MARK CUBAN FOR SENATE!!!

Hatch supposedly makes $18,000 a year in songwriter royalties. But he has been xposed as running the same scam that Newt Gingrich got caught selling his book in bulk to PAC groups and had to give the money back.

Hatch's supposed massive sales have been from one area only: a grateful sponsor buying in bulk (and using the CD's as Frisbees or landfill, I suppose.)

This is a violation of the Ethics Committee.

Tom, I've seen and heard the May 12 hearings. (Did Mary Bono really say that you can download a 6-minute song in 4 seconds? aaauuuugggghhhh. Valenti made ridiculous, unchallenged claims, too, didn't he?
I could only get audio on the second link.
When was that interview given?

Back to Mark Cuban...I agree with him about quality. Who wants to sit in front of a high definition television with surround sound and watch a grainy low resolution download? People want quality with reasonable cost and freedom to backup their investments without restrictions. Don't restrict creativity or technology!