Is RIAA's MediaSentry Illegal in Your State? 200
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "Is Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG 'investigator' MediaSentry operating illegally in your state?. The Massachusetts State police has already banned the company, and it's been accused of operating without a license in Oregon, Florida, Texas, and New York. Similar charges have now been leveled the organization in Michigan. Michigan's Department of Labor and Economic Growth, in response to a complaint, has confirmed that MediaSentry is not licensed in Michigan, and referred the complainant to the local prosecutor."
To clarify (Score:5, Informative)
MediaSentry is an American company that provides services to the music recording, motion picture, television, and software industries for locating and identifying IP addresses that are engaged in the use of online networks to share material in a manner said organizations claim is in violation of copyright.
hhmmmm. (Score:4, Informative)
how is jurisdiction defined in 'net terms? physical address of the "investigator"? physical address of the "guilty" party? location of all the 'net infrastructure? where the summons where served? seems like this is far from evident to me.
can they simply serve a warrant from a location where they are licensed?
Not banned in MA (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Freedom (Score:5, Informative)
RIAA Operating Illegally. Now there's a shock! (Score:4, Informative)
In Canada we have the CRIA (Same basic entity) that admitted to collecting more media tax than they were supposed to from customers, and what did they do with this extra money they shouldn't have had? Pocketed it themselves of course. As I understand it, to get money from the CRIA you have to apply to get a portion of it and again, if people don't apply for it, they pocket the money meant for the artists themselves.
Each blank CD, or tape we buy there's a media tax. The money from this goes to the CRIA to distribute to the artists in compensation for people using the blank media for piracy. How the law works here in Canada is when you "buy a CD" you are actually buying a license to that listen to that performance of the song privately. Canadian corporate law is based off of when you pay money, you have to get something in return. This is what makes downloading songs, or transferring them to another media for your own use legal in Canada.
It is legal to download songs in Canada, but it is not legal to download a song and listen to it that you don't have a license to.
Re:Freedom (Score:5, Informative)
California (Score:3, Informative)
>Is Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG 'investigator' MediaSentry operating illegally in your state?.
They do not appear to be licensed in California. A check with the Department of Consumer Affairs [ca.gov] license search does not show a license for MediaSentry. Searching on "Media" shows a delinquent license for Media Center Investigations in Kern County. It is, of course, possible that they are licensed under some other corporate identity.
Re:Freedom (Score:3, Informative)
NewYorkCountryLawyer also gave the reason why it shouldn't be allowed to happen in the first place: "If you were being forced to pay someone $4500 to get them not to sue you, for something you hadn't done,". That means they are threatening you before you ever enter a court. It's more of a gamble than many people want to make to stand up to a big company with many lawyers and apparent "evidence" just because they are mostly sure that the "evidence" won't be admitted. If you haven't done anything wrong, you should have to face that level of threat in the first place, that is why the licensing is at the investigation level.
Re:Freedom (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Easier question (Score:4, Informative)
They are not licensed in any state, according to what I remember from a past article. Your question then becomes: in how many states are licenses required? As well as, in how many states has MediaSentry conducted investigations?
Frankly, I'm going to be disappointed if there aren't any sanctions against them when this is all over. I know that they expunged a few things from their website, but I somehow doubt that they've actually stopped investigating.
Re:Pennsylvania? (Score:-1, Informative)
(Not only am I an Anonymous Coward, I'm clueless on html, too.)
Re:Freedom (Score:3, Informative)
It's called Impeaching a Witness.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witness_impeachment [wikipedia.org]
Re:Freedom (Score:2, Informative)
That is directly from the Ohio Revised Code [ohio.gov], first section. Notice that the rest of the law says that you have to have a license to perform investigation work for hire. No, you don't need a license to look into things for yourself, but you do need a license to perform this kind of work for someone else for pay.
The distinction is important, because, as others have said, you do affect the public when you perform investigative work. You affect the target of the investigation, you affect your client, and you (can) directly affect the courts. That's the reasoning behind having a license in the first place.
Disclaimer/Notice/whatever...: IANAL, but I am a licensed private investigator in Ohio. I'm familiar with the laws governing my particular profession, and I (and my investigators) always work within those laws, both spirit and letter. It's much easier than going to jail.