WE SHALL OVERCOME, NAPSTER STYLE

Tomorrow, the Senate Judiciary Committee is slated to hold its second hearing on digital music. Napster, the hot-button issue of the day (more than, say, selling arms to Taiwan, Chinese diplomacy or campaign finance), has been on a campaign to galvanize its users to contact Congress, because "Washington insiders should never win out over the will of the people."

Obviously, the company hopes users take the title of the Orrin Hatch-chaired hearings, "Online Entertainment and Copyright Law: Coming Soon to a Digital Device Near You," to heart—especially the "You" part. The Netco is asking users to meet at My Brother's Place restaurant at 8 a.m. Tuesday, after which they will all march together to the hearings. The first 1,000 people get free Napster t-shirts! Protestors have been asked to download "Kumbaya" in advance, so they'll know the words.

Of course, Wired is reporting that Napster hasn't filed for any protest march permits, so when the police show up things could get interesting--to the extent that rioting file-swappers can be interesting.

The night before the hearing, Napster is holding on informational forum on file-sharing at the Ronald Reagan Building, just down Pennsylvania Ave from Dubya's place. Napster Founder Shawn Fanning, Public Enemy's Chuck D and former Grand Royal President Mark Kates will no doubt talk about how wonderful file-sharing is for everyone.

Dissenters will not be tolerated. That's what democracy is all about. Some digital-music hardliners believe the RIAA has attempted to suppress the event, a theory the organization vehemently denies.

Right, and the Internet isn't controlled by space aliens.

Speakers at the Senate hearing are AOLTW COO Richard Parsons, Liquid Audio CEO Gerry Kearby, Napster CEO Hank Barry, MP3.com CEO Michael Robertson, EMusic Chairman Bob Kohn and artist/musicians' rights advocate Don Henley. Check your egos at the door!

We'll watch it on C-SPAN and let you know what you missed. Kearby is so excited about his testimony that he's already released it to the media. Fasten your seat belts--he talks about how neato Liquid Audio is and the importance of keeping content secure. More bombshells will undoubtedly follow.

Interestingly, Hatch--who has given much lip service to Napster and been critical of labels in the past--recently told the Congressional publication Roll Call that he thought "what Napster was doing was wrong." Presumably he means allowing unfettered free swapping of unlicensed material, not getting its media-company sponsor to pump mondo bucks into G.O.P. coffers.

In a totally unrelated note, there's a list of big entertainment industry companies' contributions to political parties in the 2000 election cycle at opensecrets.org, which tracks those sort of things, so you don't have to.