The thieving bastards over at the RIAA have been trying to find any way they can to punish everybody except the thieving bastards that are their teen customers for a while now. The thieving bastards (RIAA edition) have tried to make it illegal for you to copy a song you purchased, even for backup, if they put any lame technological roadblock on there, even if it is just a one-letter password. If you even try to get past it, you’ve broken the law. Not because you’re using the thieving bastards‘ intellectual property in an illegal way, but because you defeated their “anti-circumvention device” to do it.

So, if you buy a tune from Napster and try to copy it onto a device they don’t allow, you’ve broken the law, even though the law says you can make a copy in any way you prefer for personal use. (Hey, it’s not like the artist is seeing any recompense from this anyway, that’s why the RIAA are thieving bastards.

So Representative John Doolittle (R-CA) helped pass this stupid legislation and didn’t think much of it until he bought an iPod. Then he realized that the legislation would make it illegal to put music from an encrypted CD onto his beloved iPod, rendering it useless.

So he’s teamed up with Representative Rick Boucher (D-VA), who represents the town of my birth, among others, and offered up H.R. 107, the Digital Media Consumers’ Rights Act of 2003.

Write your congresscritter and demand that they support this bill. It would not eliminate penalties for piracy, but make it legal for you to make personal copies for your own use. So the RIAA can carry on suing its thieving bastards it calls customers, labels can keep screwing artists (because they’re thieving bastards), and you can enjoy your music on your iPod, your Rio, or on a home-made Edison cylinder machine if you so choose.

Thanks to Reason‘s Hit & Run for the pointer.