Camara Goes On Offense Against the RIAA 316
whisper_jeff writes "Ars has an excellent write up outlining how Kiwi Camara (Jammie Thomas-Rasset's new lawyer) is following the 'Best Defense is a Good Offense' philosophy and going on the attack against the RIAA. Not content to just defend his client, he is laying siege against the RIAA's entire campaign and beginning the work of dismantling it from the bottom up, starting with the question of whether they actually do own the copyrights that were allegedly infringed. And, if you're thinking this is good for everyone who's been harassed by the RIAA, you'd be right — Camara, along with Harvard Law professor Charles Nesson, plans to file a class-action suit seeking to force the RIAA to return all the (ill-gotten) money they've earned from their litigation campaign."
We first discussed the efforts of Nesson and Camara to thwart the RIAA last month.
Re:Kiwi? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:A$$ kickin' time (Score:2, Informative)
Ray Beckerman (NYCL) is my third favorite lawyer, right after the lady who did my divorce and the gentleman who did my bankruptcy. When you need a lawyer, you NEED a lawyer. If you need a lawyer, (s)he won't cost you, (s)he'll save you far more than his or her fee.
I'm a fan of Lawrence Lessig, too. Too bad he lost that Supreme Court case he wrote about extensively in his book, available at your bookstore, library, or online. It's not full of lawyerese, it's a good read.
More on Camara/Thomas Vs. RIAA (Score:5, Informative)
Re:More exciting than the play offs (Score:5, Informative)
Except Redwings Hockey isn't a sport, it's a religon. And they'll bring home the Cup on Friday night.
But I like the idea of RIAA getting a dose of its own medicine. This day has been a long time coming, just like that other case [wikipedia.org] we've been watching from the peanut gallery. Almost makes you wish you could sell tickets & popcorn at it. It's gonna be a helluva show...
This stunt is dangerous. (Score:4, Informative)
This rookie kid might just as well land the RIAA a win. The odds may look good for Kiwi right now but if the rookie screws up he may end up handing the RIAA a free ticket to tyranny.
This "Rookie" is teamed up with a Harvard law professor who's called the "Billion Dollar Charlie" [encyclopedia.com] and has a 1998 movie, "A Civil Action [imdb.com]", about a case of his about a toxic polluter.
Falcon
Re:Wow!!! (Score:3, Informative)
Yes, but when you sue someone for ill-gotten gains, you don't sue for "Net Gains" but for "Gross Gains." Their expenses and payroll are irrelevant.
Re:Look that gift horse in the mouth, Jammie (Score:5, Informative)
Problem is, most "Indie Music" is really on a major label. Take Sub-Pop. Every band on Sub Pop has been called Indie at some point, and most think Sub Pop is an independent label. On the contrary. 49% of the label is owned by Warner Brothers. Sub Pop does not directly fund the RIAA, but every Sub Pop album you buy supports Warner Brothers, which does.
One can use RIAA Radar [riaaradar.com] to cleanse their music collection, but it's not perfect, since it does not detect this sort of indirect RIAA support. Realistically, if one want's to boycott the RIAA, they might as well boycott the idea of record labels themselves. In an age where bands can make their own album with consumer recording equipment, and make it sound just as good or better than professional releases, then distribute that music with the most powerful communication medium known to humanity, why do we still have these record label middlemen?
Re:Camara Goes On Offense Against the RIAA (Score:4, Informative)
Actually I would like to see Open Source/ Creative Commons type licences covering intellectual and creative works.
They are. Cory Doctorow's books, as well as many other writer's books, are. There are a lot of indie musicians using those licenses as well.
You can read any of Doctorow's books online, or download them in any number of e-reader formats from his site. Funny how being online and free (as in both speech and beer) didn't stop him from making the NYT best seller list. If your stuff's good enough to pay for, people will pay for it even if they CAN get it for free.
Re:Kiwi Camara is a race troll (Score:3, Informative)
He sounds like trouble in a box!
He does? Did you only read that one paragraph in the wikipedia article? Here's another part:
Camara was born in Manila, Philippines [in 1984]. A year later, his family moved to Cleveland, Ohio before settling in Honolulu, Hawaii, where Camara attended the Punahou School.[1] He wrote a medical paper on alternative treatments for rheumatoid arthritis at age eleven,[1] which was published in the Hawai'i Journal of Medicine.[2] At sixteen, having skipped high school, Camara earned a Bachelor of Science in computer science from Hawaii Pacific University.[2] He completed the program in two years and was singularly recognized by the university for outstanding academic performance.[2] The Philippines awarded him their Jose Rizal Certificate of Achievement while he was in college and later, in 2005, recognized him with a Presidential Commendation.[3]
Yeah man, watch out for that guy, you see him coming and you better go the other way.
Re:I have a stupid question (Score:3, Informative)
RIAA only needs preponderence of evidence because it is civil. Law enforcement needs beyond reasonable doubt because its criminal.
The RIAA's ill fated motion to bar objections (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Wow!!! (Score:5, Informative)
I'll ignore the snarky end of your reply
What do you mean you'll ignore it? Damn, that's the best part.
and chalk it up to this being a subject near and dear to your heart.
Instead of my just being a snarky bastard? Well thanks for the more charitable interpretation.
Instead, I'll ask for clarification
I can do that too, although I prefer snarky.
- are the lawsuits not the individual company versus the alleged infringer?
Yes they are. But the actual filing and preparation is done by the RIAA. They just stick the record companies' names in. And when needed they give the record companies papers to sign. And then, if they get a judgment, the record companies assign the judgment to the RIAA, and the RIAA brings its own judgment collection proceeding.
For example, the case at hand is "Capitol v. Thomas" not "RIAA v. Thomas". Or is it the cases are filed BY the RIAA on BEHALF OF the company?
Right.
As for the checks, I'll write that off as me being incorrect. It happens.
Yeah, the settlement checks are payable to "RIAA Litigation Fund" (or something like that).
Oh, and by the way, Matthew Oppenheim, who acts as the "client" and the "principal" of the record companies, for settlement purposes, was at the counsel table during the first trial (and was observed by Ars Technica's reporter as reading my blog on his laptop), and has gotten himself admitted pro hac vice in the case this time around, which means he will be doing some questioning, or argument, or both.
Re:Two sides (Score:3, Informative)
You know you would get a lot more attention if you didn't sling around some crap like "Even TPB claim its [sic] not them who are breaking any laws."
US law != Swedish law. TPB might have lost round one, but that doesn't mean it's illegal to do what they do in Sweden.
Re:A$$ kickin' time (Score:5, Informative)
Well, up until 1976, US Copyright law was still fairly sane... 28 years with the possibility to file for another 28 years... and you have to file for copyright on everything.
The Copyright Act of 1976 bumped that to the author's life plus 50 years, made copyrights automatic, and introduced a number of other things into US Copyright law (including Fair Use). It could be that some people thought that the latter changes were good things.
However, by the time the most recent copyright extension happened, in 1998, we had already been exposed to the modern insanity super-long copyrights introduced, and we started to fight against the insanity of increasing it even further. It also introduced nothing new in terms of how Copyrights worked (the DMCA came a year or two later). It was a pure greed move by certain corporate interests, including one mousy movie studio.
Re:How practical is such a boycott? (Score:2, Informative)