RIAA Lawsuits from a John Doe's Perspective 629
An anonymous reader writes "Nick Mamatas was sued by and subsequently settled with the RIAA for file sharing. He wrote a piece for the Village Voice describing his experience, and he goes on to briefly discuss the implications of "John Doe" file-sharing lawsuits. He argues that the labels are using these suits as a source of profit; he also claims that when his lawyer contacted the RIAA to discuss the suit, he was put in touch with a regular staffer, not another lawyer. 'It feels like they're doing a volume business,' Mamatas' lawyer notes."
Re:The RIAA (Score:0, Informative)
does it matter? dont pay. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:It doesn't matter .... (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/03/09/bankrup
Re:does it matter? dont pay. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:How??? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Proof? (Score:5, Informative)
Which basically means, if the judge and/or jury thinks it's more likely you committed the tort than not, they can force you to pay damages.
Re:It doesn't matter .... (Score:3, Informative)
WHy do you think the RIAA targets grandmothers and little girls? Because they know that THEY won't fight it in court - they CAN'T. The RIAA will never sue someone who will likely make them look stupid in court.
Re:Shareholder Profit (Score:2, Informative)
Extraordinary profit?
The have settled with about 1,500 people for an average settlement of about $5,000. That is about $7.5 million total. Once you subtract attorneys fees and split the proceeds between the record labels, bottom lines are barely affected.
Re:does it matter? dont pay. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:It's like tort (Score:4, Informative)
it isn't the downloading that gets you in trouble (Score:3, Informative)
actually technically (Score:3, Informative)
Secondly copyright enfringment is not theft. Do not equate the two, to do so is in error.
Re:It doesn't matter .... (Score:4, Informative)
In 1886, Victor Hugo, who was tired of having his works protected only in one country at a time, called for and received an agreement by the nations of Europe to recognize copyright across borders: behold, the Berne Convention. AFAIK this implemented the idea of automatic copyright with the duration of at least the author's life plus fifty years.
Go read the Wikipedia articles on this stuff. At some point, WIPO was created, with huge financial backing. I think we all know what that means.
Anyway, my real point is that there are three groups to consider in this tug-of-war:
- the artists, who believe strongly in preserving the integrity of their works;
- the publishers/labels/companies, whose goal (ostensibly) it is to accelerate the spread of culture and support this venture by making a profit; and
- the free culturists, who wish to promote culture by making it as available as possible, in theory accelerating the creation of new culture.
Basically, most of us are in the third group, and no one with our views was ever party to the Berne Convention or any derivative agreements (perhaps until recently?). Since our point of view has never agreed to anything we negotiated concerning this, we do not implicly respect the agreements. I think I speak for us when I say that we believe that the original Berne Convention never considered the abuses capable of the multi-national corporation, and therefore that the life+50 minimum was a bad idea. I personally think that life+10 sounds like something that could be reasonable to all parties, but I would like to add that I think that royalties should only be collectable by the estate(s) of the original author(s).Re:It's a profit center!! (Score:3, Informative)
No surprise. Trolls don't feel pain. (Score:3, Informative)
I would guess it has something to do with personal information about him being illegally obtained by the RIAA which led directly to him losing thousands of dollars. Would you not complain? Guilt or innocence is moot when the police kick in your door without a warrant. Then again, I RTFA. I guess that's too much to expect of some folks though.
Calling downloading "civil disobedience" is an insult to those
Oh look, it's the thief who steals from the public domain. He's crying a river of crocodile tears... Copyright infringement can't be civil disobedience? What do you call this:
Nick replies! (Score:1, Informative)
It's like I always say, "Slashdot is full of morons."
I don't know who is stupider, the people who read the article and think that I'm "complaining" or those who think that they can just say "I didn't do it" and destroy the evidence and get away with it.
Re:It doesn't matter .... (Score:2, Informative)
Think about it man, the RIAA has not exactly done much to earn the trust (or respect for that matter) of the average consumer. Furthermore, the majority of songs downloaded would never be bought by the downloader if it was not available for "free". Music/DVD sales are NOT being hurt by file sharing, any non-industry funded economic study done in the past few year has shown that.
That being said, is file sharing wrong? Probably. Should the RIAA/MPAA be allowed to twist the legal system for FUD and profit? Probably not.
Error (Score:5, Informative)
There is an error in the article:
It should read "uploaders" because copyright prohibits unauthorized distribution. I doubt the RIAA can even find a way to sue downloaders. It is probably impossible because there is no way to prove where a file comes from.However, they try to make "downloading" appear to be criminal in their ad campaigns. It is interesting how great an effect this advertising has had. Even one of their victims cannot tell the difference.
Re:The little girl isn't the target (Score:1, Informative)
I have a family member who lives in poverty. They are a two parent (both working) family of 5. Their internet access consists of an 8 year old Gateway computer and dial up. The funds for the dial up are paid by other family members so they have a way to communicate cheaply with everyone across the country.
$400 to a poverty line family is a live or die price. That is the difference between mortgage|car|food payments for a month.
A lawyer in Austria defends against RIAA-clone (Score:3, Informative)
The case was based on Kazaa -- the young woman was forced to pay up to 200 Euros per song for future downloads. So this type of craziness is not limited only to USA and Australia -- Central Europe is also under attack.
I'm no expert on US law... (Score:3, Informative)
Kjella
Re:does it matter? dont pay. (Score:3, Informative)
If you had put a "lean" on him, you'd probably have some ugly Mafia mug showing up at his doorstep every day until he paid.