RIAA Wants Its $222,000 Verdict Back 203
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "The RIAA, unhappy with the Court's decision setting aside its $222,000 jury verdict over $23.76 worth of song files, and throwing out the legal theory on which it was based, has made a motion for permission to file an appeal from the Judge's order, in Capitol v. Thomas. Normally, only final judgments are appealable, and appeals are not permissible in federal court from 'interlocutory' orders of that nature."
Re:Why is this news... (Score:5, Informative)
Not so much. You should see the sorts of motions that are filed on a daily basis. If their attorneys did not file for such appeal, its not only bad strategy but missing such opportunities is the foundation of malpractice. That being said, the appellate courts have a rule (FRAP 37) that grants the courts power to sanction attorneys for frivolous appeals. Up to the point of FRAP 37 sanctions, it is normal to file as many motions as one has time to in major cases.
Further - exhaustive motion practice is a legitimate strategy where Repeat Players (RIAA is regularly involved in litigation, and needs to be careful to "control" precedent) are up against One-Shot players (individuals who will only be involved in this sort of litigation once). The Repeat Player has extra incentive to invest in the litigation, and may overwhelm the incentive the One-Shot player has. It is for this reason that sanctions exist - courts may order attorney's fees awarded to a winning party where the losing party's conduct was vexatious or in bad faith.
by the way - why on /. can i not post in firefox? seriously
Re:It's not about the money (Score:2, Informative)
Re:It's not about the money (Score:1, Informative)
Oh, come on mods, the parent isn't flamebait he was trying to make a point.
Re:It's not about the money (Score:3, Informative)
FWIW, Jack Thompson actually went as far as violating restraining orders. I'm not sure this is up there yet.
But, IANAL.
Re:Why is this news... (Score:3, Informative)
$222K for the murder, $222K for the necrophilia, $222K for the dismemberment, $222K for the invoice, and $222K for postage and handling.
So $1,110,000.00
Re:The real reason they're doing this (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.texasbar.com/saywhat/weblog/2007/02/may-1996-all-purpose-brief-in.html [texasbar.com]
Re:Why WOULD the artists get this money? (Score:5, Informative)
But in reality, they're just trying to line their own coffers. When someone settles for some outrageous fee, not a damned cent of that goes to "making the artist whole" or making up for their lost sales. Nope, it goes directly into either the lawyer's wallets or the legal war-chest. The artist continues to get screwed to the tune of pennies per album sold, and tough shit about those lost sales killing your already paltry (unless you're Metallica or some other hyper-famous act) royalty payments.
Re:Hail Mary (Score:3, Informative)
Except that the current trial is scheduled for a jury, at which point it can all go to appeal together. Since the first jury trial (that the RIAA wants to stand) is already done, all that the appellate court would have to do after both are done is choose :-) It's called judicial efficiency, and in practice it means "don't make multiple passes through the system if you can avoid it."
Perhaps more to the point, the Appeals Court doesn't get a vote in the matter -- the permission for an interlocutory appeal has to come from the District Court.
Re:Why is this news... (Score:4, Informative)
Some plugins (like noscript) will prevent you from running scripts unless explicitly allowed. Allow slashdot.org and post away!
Re:Why WOULD the artists get this money? (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, the artist usually keeps the copyrights, or transfers them to a publishing company (generally wholly owned by the artist/artists, after what happened with Lennon/McCartney and the whole Northern Songs clusterfuck).
Re:Hail Mary (Score:3, Informative)
Interlocutory appeals are indeed rarely granted; IIRC it's usually when the rest of the case hinges on a point of law and there will be a boatload of work down the drain if the case goes down the wrong track. In this case, the Plaintiffs are going to try to convince the Court that it made an error of discretion in deciding that they (plaintiffs) had played fast and loose with their pleadings. Run that by again: they're going to persuade the Court that the Court was not only wrong, but waaaay wrong (abuse of discretion) when the Court decided it had made an error by trusting them. Boggle. And what's at stake? A retrial, with most of the motion practice and pretrial preparation already complete. Somehow I don't see the Court agreeing that this is so profound and urgent that it can't wait for the trial to be decided on its merits and a final judgment rendered.
. We have a word for it where I come from.
Chutzpah.
Re:Let the punishment fit the crime. (Score:3, Informative)
I will repeat this again, for the slow among you. The cost to purchase the files has no bearing on the case. The people are not being sued for downloading the files. They are being sued for distributing them (or trying to, or nothing at all if the attempt to distribute doesn't stand up). What this means is that the cost is not what it would cost to purchase the files for your private use, but what they would charge someone if they wanted to distribute the songs. If I called the RIAA and said "I want to give away a free CD on the street and include new hit song X on it, what will it cost me to license the song for distribution from you, it will likely be a large amount of money. These people are distributing the songs without paying the licensing fee, which is what the penalty is based on (and should be based on, since they are assuming the rights to distribute the songs that they don't have).
Whether you agree with the RIAA tactics, or think they should win the cases is another matter entirely. But saying "the songs only cost X dollars to buy" is a pointless argument, since that isn't what the lawsuit is about. The people are not taking the copy of the song they download, they are taking the right to distribute music that they don't have, and that is what the penalty should be based on (assuming the RIAA does win the case).
Re:I love this excerpt: (Score:3, Informative)
"Intent to infringe copyright" is not a crime nor is it civilly actionable, thus they cannot sue over it. Drug procession and procession with intent to distribute are both crimes.