RIAA File-Sharing Lawsuits Top 10,000 People Sued 490
An anonymous reader writes "While Firefox broke the 50,000,000 barrier today, the RIAA broke a more
dubious barrier this week: It has now sued over
10,000 file sharers for copyright infringement, making it a good time to ask
if the RIAA will ever throw in the towel. Taking an academic look at
what's best for the industry, this
economics article shows the financial upside to P2P file sharing. And
on the flip side, this
legal article argues that file swappers have a constitutional right to pay
much smaller penalties than the millions of dollars they can be liable for under
copyright law, making the RIAA's lawsuits much less profitable."
Average Joe doesnt care (Score:5, Interesting)
i fit home systems for a large PC company and the first thing customers ask me when i have installed their broadband and PC is
"where can i download MP3s ?"
"illegal or legal ?"
"i dont care"
Vote with your wallet (Score:5, Interesting)
When the RIAA started these lawsuits a few years back (what was it? 1999? 2001?), I was shocked and outraged. I couldn't believe what lengths these corporations would go to in prosecuting what amounts to a few cents' worth of theft per song. The defendants, while they did execute illegal act(s), are being punished far beyond the damages they caused.
What can one do, then? I decided to stop buying music CDs. I no longer listen to the radio, and hardly ever download music from p2p. I believe that since these lawsuits started several years ago, I have bought a total of about 3 CDs. Instead, I spend my time with more productive activities such as programming or spending time with my wife.
I know this isn't an option for many people, but it works for me. By refusing to purchase CDs, I vote against the RIAA with my wallet. By not listening to the radio, I don't support the stations that license the same music. You, as a reader of slashdot, might do well to try to find something like this to voice your disapproval. Heavy-handed tactics used as a business model = lost customers.
Legals of Old fart digitising his vinyl (Score:3, Interesting)
Can anyone actually comment on the legality of downloading what you already "own" in another format?
I am a fairly old fart and mostly I have downloaded music that I have already paid for, mostly old vinyl records and some that I have on video
Just what are the legals of this situation in the USA? What are the legals elsewhere, europe & Australia?
download now, pay later? (Score:5, Interesting)
Abstract:
When a minimum statutory damage award has a large punitive component, the danger arises that the award's punitive effect, when aggregated across many similar acts, will become so tremendous that it imposes a penalty grossly excessive in relation to any legitimate interest in punishment or deterrence.
i believe this means the RIAA is suing for ridiuclous large sums of money, hundreds of thousands of dollars for each mp3, even though in actuality the damages to the RIAA is much much smaller than what they're sueing for. a similar type of incident occured before in a court case:
BMW of North America, Inc. v. Gore, where the Court held unconstitutional a jury's punitive damage award of two million dollars to a plaintiff who suffered four thousand dollars in actual damages from the defendant's deceptive trade practices.
the author of the legal document is simply making an argument that the ruling of the BMW v Gore case should also apply to this case. the actual damages to the RIAA are a closer to a few dollars per song rather than the hundreds of thousands they're suing for. it will be very interesting if anyone being sued actually takes this kind of approach.
Re:Vote with your wallet (Score:2, Interesting)
ITS NOT STEALING!!!111ELEVEN!! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:throw in the towel? (Score:2, Interesting)
On the grounds that they cannot prove it was you who did it. Why is everyone treating an IP log as gospel?
You don't have to stop buying CDs (Score:3, Interesting)
You don't need to stop listening to music, it's a wonderful thing to do, and many people find it helps them focus and be more productive. You just need to find it from sources not affiliateed with the RIAA cartel. While that's not as easy as walking to Best Buy, it's not very hard.
Bankrupt the RIAA (Score:2, Interesting)
What do they have to benefit (Score:3, Interesting)
From what I've seen the RIAA will never throw in the towel unless legislation is brought up to impede on their "progress." As long as they can make a huge profit, they'll continue.
This is why I'm writing to both of my state's senators on why they should impose legislation to prevent the RIAA from taking all of this action. There's a better way to prevent piracy instead of suing dead 83 year-old people.
Re:They will stop.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:You (USED TO) fund this by buying CDs (Score:3, Interesting)
I have no clue what the situtation is like here in Canada, but it is not as bad as the states.
Actually, it's worse in Canada. In Canada you fund them every time you buy a hard drive, a blank CD-ROM or any one of a number of objects that don't directly infringe on their rights but could conceivably be used to. Don't feel bad though, the Netherlands followed Canada's stunning lead this week - so at least you're not alone.
Now there's the ridiculous situation that, should everyone decide to protest the music industry and stop buying CDs, the music industry would, ironically, be even better off (they'd continue to collect royalties on every drive sold and have absolutely zero production cost). Sure, the staff would get laid off, no bands would get signed, but the share holders would continue to collect their royalties from drive sales in exchange for no expenditure whatsoever.
Worse, it gets better and better for them as time goes by. That the Netherlands where they charge X euros per gig of storage. A 60gb iPod will be taxed by about $250. That's painful right now. Now consider good old Moore's law (arguments about disc storage vs processors etc. aside). In another dozen years, we'll have ~2^8 times the capacity for the same price. Unless the ridiculous laws get reassessed, 256 * $250 implies a $64,000 tax on that 15 terrabyte drive that the nicer models come with. Now I know inflation's bad but I don't think it's quite bad enough to have $60,000+ iPods within a decade or so. Sounds like some politicians have no concept of how computing advances and they've signed in to being a law that'll be farcical within ten years.
Assume for a moment that CD prices have remained largely constant ($10-15 new) ever since they came out. If that remains the case, simply buying an iPod within a decade (or similar drive for your PC) will give the music industry the equivalent of your buying 4,000 albums. By that point, do you really think they'll care about a CD boycot?
Disclaimer: Yes, I know those numbers are unsustainable. That's kind of the point - illustrating how staggeringly short sighted most of the music industry protecting laws are. The one redeeming thing is that those taxes will get so stupid that the idiots who signed them in will be forced to reconsider them well within the decade.
Re:The RIAA Will Never Quit (Score:1, Interesting)
You have the same ignorant knee-jerk reaction that the RIAA has: that downloading music is supplanting the purchase of music.
For the small minority of people that are downloading instead of buying it is more accurate to say that they are stealing from the RIAA*, which is OK in my book
*Artists typically get > 10% of the sale, the majority of the sale goes to the members of the RIAA.
In a small European country... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:throw in the towel? (Score:3, Interesting)
I thought it was all about convincing the judge and/or jury, and if I honestly knew that the odds were 51% that the guy was guilty, I'm not so sure I'd say he was `guilty' (though this is a civil thing, so I'm not sure that `guilty' is the right term.)
Absolute proof is not even required in a criminal trial. In that case, it's `beyond a reasonable doubt'. (But this is a civil matter, so things are different.)A 51% change of being guilty is far more than a `reasonable doubt'. Apparantly the definition of the phrase preponderance of the evidence [law.com] is rather subjective as well.
Ok, you're a lawyer. (I'm certainly not.) What is your specialty?Re:throw in the towel? (Score:2, Interesting)
the RIAA accused 83-year old Gertrude Walton... alias "smittenedkitten."
83yo, "smittenedkitten"!!!
Walton had passed away in December
No computer!!
"Our evidence gathering and our subsequent legal actions all were initiated weeks and even months ago,
She DIED months ago! You were researching a dead woman!
"We will now, of course, obviously dismiss this case."
If I recall correctly, the woman's daughter faxed them her death certificate, and they still send threatening letters to the dead woman!! Now, once it hit the newspapers, they'll "of course" dismiss it.
Asshats.
Re:The RIAA Will Never Quit (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Average Joe doesnt care (Score:2, Interesting)
To the corporate shills lurking
When everyone started breaking the speed limit, they got rid of the stupid federal 55 mph speed limit. Well, now everyone's downloading, and it's time to get rid of the DMCA.
Re:throw in the towel? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes. And you're going to, or else, like I said, you end up in trouble for contempt.
Either way, a nuke-n-pave as soon as they actually sue will probably take care of it. Unless you really think they'll pay $10,000 for a lab to look at my HD with an electron mocroscope. (Besides- WHICH HD?? I have 3 in my computer right now. The boot drive doesn't have squat on it, and they are welcome to look at it all they want. The others can removed in less than 2 minutes.)
They'll request it all. And they'll likely ask you under oath if you erased anything. And what it was that you erased. And why you decided to erase it.
The fact that you took action that would destroy evidence, in direct response to the commencement of a suit, strongly implies that you're liable.
Trust me -- better men than you have tried to foil discovery.
Like I said, an open WiFi AP or a trojaned computer certainly refute it.
The former likely will not; most wifi traffic over wifi installed in homes is probably not that of third parties. The latter might, but only if it were trojaned at the time, and on the whole, it's still a fairly improbable circumstance. You're going to have to work hard to convince the court that it really wasn't you.
Only if they can prove (there's that word again!) you did it!
Failure to comply is easy to prove. Ignoring a request too long, or explicitly refusing to comply is sufficient, unless the judge decides that the request wasn't proper.
Re:Legals of Old fart digitising his vinyl (Score:1, Interesting)
Theoretically, a rip of one CD is exactly the same as a rip off a different copy of that CD.
Thus, there is no difference in a file I rip from a CD I have in my hand, or a file I download from you that you ripped from your CD in your hand.
So, since there is NO difference, where is the crime? As long as I have the CD, I AM allowed to rip an MP3 (for backup, or format-shifting), and therefore, I SHOULD be allowed to DL the same MP3.
Re:Sure but there are plenty of others (Score:3, Interesting)
"1) How do you know those files are what they say they are? There's plenty fo files with fake names on filesharing networks. Sometimes it's people being assholes, sometimes it's small bands trying to pimp their shit, sometimes it's people who mislabeled because they are dumb. Since they don't download and check there's no real way to know."
On cross examination: "Mr Sycraft-fu, were they the files indicated in this lawsuit?" You better be able to tell a good lie, not only that but civil cases only need a preponderance of evidence, not beyond a shadow of doubt (and, chances are if you download "artist - name of song.mp3" then it is the song "name of song" by "artist" and not porn) so you better have enough evidence to counter thiers.
"2) For that matter, how do you know that list came form the right computer? Some networks, like Kazaa, aren't all that good at returning the correct list of files. You ask them for a list of files on host X, you get a list from host Y. How do you know this list is actually from the correct computer?"
This one, you may get, but then you better have been using Kazaa or a network that has those issue and better have more than your word that this is so. Also you better be able to lie well on cross-examination when asked (or I guess you can plead the fith?).
"3) For that matter, how do we know the company they pay isn't making it up? These people get money for finding this stuff, there's incentive to find bigger lists of files. How do you know they are adding to those list or in some other way pumping it up to get more cash?"
Do you really think this will work? If it did then it would be the defense for everything. They have evidence and you better have better than "Fakers!!!".
"4) How do you know the ISP gave you the right data for the IP? Espically with dynamic IPs, this can be hard to tell. Sure some geek says this is what it is but how do you know he's telling the truth? All you've got are some easily altered text logs. For that matter how do you know the logging software was working right?"
They bring the ISP administrator in an question him in court, he responds and is assumed thruthfull unless you can either show a lie or the judge/jury thinks that he us. This line will depend on his/her testimony.
"5) How do you know it was a certian computer behind that IP? Given the prevelance of wireless APs, it's easy to see that someone might ahve been using a connection without the owner's knowledge or consent. Where's the proof that it was actually a computer owned by that person that did it?"
Irrelevent - you take liability in this case anyway (again, preponderance of evidence, not beyond a shadow of doubt). After you loose based on this then you have the option to litigate against anyone you feel you can proove did it. There is a lawyer modded up somewhere in this thread that explains this better - but that is the way it goes. Again, this is a civil trial.
If it is a criminal case? You may get away with one or two of these points and not found guilty. None of them would hold up in civil court. In a civil suit you will be found guilty. If I (say, me being the RIAA) show that someone from an IP address directly linked to you (by expert testimony from your ISP) has downloaded multiple MP3's that either a) are all filenames that correlate to songs and nothing else, or even better (if I'm the RIAA) can show that they *were* those songs (easy enough - download the same binary, heck in most P2P systems that can get it directly from you) then you are violating copyright and you are guilty. The only hope you have is if you can convince the judge this law is wrong and he/she is a judge that goes for such things (well, unless you actually owned all the songs at the time of downloading and can show so).
Now, you may (or may not) fi
Re:throw in the towel? (Score:3, Interesting)
It seems to be the new legal `thing' -- when criminal charges fail, go with civil charges. OJ was found innocent of murder (I certainly agree that he seemed guilty, but `beyond a reasonable doubt' ? Probably not ...) but he lost the civil suit, and made the family of his dead wife lots of money.
Maybe it's time to start applying criminal trial standards (i.e. you can't be forced to inciminate yourself, `beyond a reasonable doubt', court appointed attorney for those that can't afford their own, etc.) to certain sorts of civil cases, because they're being used like criminal cases. Of course, merely mentioning this on /. isn't going to make it happen. But I wonder what the ACLU, EFF and others think about it ... [hmmmm] ...
It doesn't prove it. It makes me perhaps 70% sure you're a lawyer. (The other 30% could be a guy who googles a lot, or somebody who didn't make it through law school, orAs for `probably nothing will', I imagine there's some paperwork that goes along with passing the bar -- a certificate, a diploma or something similar. That would probably provide better `I'm a lawyer!' proof than merely not answering a question in a direct manner :)
(No, I'm not asking for proof.)