Mothers Taking the Fight to the RIAA 635
An anonymous reader writes "p2pnet is reporting that two more single mothers are refusing to be victimized by the RIAA. Patricia Santagelo was one of the first to stand up and fight the lawsuits, which some say resemble protection racket schemes. Now Dawnell Leadbetter of Seattle and Tanya Andersen of Oregon have decided to follow suit and stand up against the recording industry behemoth. From the article: 'Don't let your fear of these massive companies allow you to deny your belief in your own innocence. Paying these settlements is an admission of guilt. If you're not guilty of violating the law, don't pay.'"
Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Good (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
Or else wait until the minor has a paying job, and garnish their wages just like they'd do with a person who couldn't pay back taxes, or child support.
Believe me, the court system has many ways to wring the money out of you. Just because the person is underage or dead won't stop them.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
On top of that, have you actually listened to the music being produced today? It is largely crap. Go look at what people are actually downloading over the P2P networks -- a lot of it is older music, music that under a reasonable copyright system would already be public domain.
(Or wait, do you think people should still be paying for Beatles and Elvis albums that have been burned into their neurons by radio, TV, freaking elevators for the last 40 years?)
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
or under a resonable business model it would have dropped in price and be readily available for purchase. But it's out of print and the few times you find it the seller is asking for a "collector" price of $100+ and you think; "I want it, I'm willing to pay for it but I can't buy it because it doesn't exist anymore other than maybe a low quality 128kbits iTunes download that really isn't owning it, so I'll download it" I wonder how much an on demand CD reprinting service would cost. It would be nice to have some of that "older music" on CD for $5-$10, the kind you can only find on old used cassette.
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
The post you're responding to never said they'd infringe on copyrights, did it? Just that they wouldn't give the RIAA any money. Nice try.
Get real. We all know what was implied and what most Slashdotters advocate.
On top of that, have you actually listened to the music being produced today? It is largely crap. Go look at what people are actually downloading over the P2P networks -- a lot of it is older music, music that under a reasonable copyright system would already be public domain.
Wrong, most music on P2P networks is popular music on the charts, like Creed, Foo Fighters, Madonna, Nine Inch Nails, The New Pornographers, and so on.
I couldn't even find several bands on P2P, like the Lascivious Biddies, or Larry Coryell's "Tricycles" jazz album, or a certain jazz-metal group I like. I had to go to iTunes. This posturing of P2P as some sort of bastion for elite music lovers trading esoteric materials that the RIAA won't let you hear is bogus. It's mostly high school kids and college students trading popular music so they don't have to pay for it. If today's music is so crap, why are people pirating it? If most people aren't trading popular music of today, why are those files the ones most widely available on the networks?
Do you know about CDBaby, the most widely used service by indie artists to sell their CDs and put them on iTunes? When was the last time you bought an album from a CDBaby artist? Probably never. You won't find any of those artists on eMule or Bittorrent, because P2P isn't used to trade hard-to-find music. It's used to get popular music without having to pay for it. It's simple human nature, folks. Stop denying it already. There is no culture revolution here. It's simple freeloading.
(Or wait, do you think people should still be paying for Beatles and Elvis albums that have been burned into their neurons by radio, TV, freaking elevators for the last 40 years?)
The fact you heard it in a commercial means you have the right to it for free? That doesn't even make sense.
Face it, no one on Slashdot has ever validly justified music piracy. They demonize the RIAA to justify thier behavior while ignoring the fact it means the artist doesn't get paid for their work. Artists willingly sign their record label contracts, so don't give me the sob story about the poor, victimized artists and their new antique car collections. And don't give me the poor, victimized mothers getting sued either--their IP was logged, get over it.
Like I said, I know this might get me modded down, but geez, I'm so sick of the hegemonous, pro-piracy mindset trumpeted in the comments on Slashdot in every single article with the word "RIAA" in its headline. For pete's sake, songs are
To you, copyright is this evil system when the RIAA is mentioned, but when some company violates the GPL, suddenly everyone is calling on the EFF to sue them for...infringement of the copyright of the GPL. Various references to the phrase "stolen code" are used. Funny how that works.
People just use the RIAA as a scapegoat, as a way to make themselves forgot about the human beings in the band whose music they're pirating. It's easier to demonize some faceless company than realize, "Hey, I'm making sure System of a Down doesn't get paid today."
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
No, the fact that it is 40 years old means that the creators got whatever profit they should be entitled to. Music which has entered the common culture over a generation ago no longer should be "owned."
Furthermore, even if we accept that copyright ought to be immortal and that copyright violaton is tantamount to theft, the punishment should fit the crime. Running a red light is a potentially deadly action. So why is the punishment for that less onerous than the punishment for uploading some old Kraftwerk?
And finally, the legal system should not be used as a weapon for the wealthy corporations to bludgeon poor individuals. Regardless of what the offense may be.
Meh. (Score:3, Insightful)
The Beatles, for example, are legends, and their works will continue to generate money well after the generatio
Re:Meh. (Score:5, Insightful)
No shit. They were an example--legends with music that transcends time, they WILL be heard for generations after anyone involved with them has gone! Perhaps you missed the forward pointing language, but I don't think that's my fault. Yeah, they're still alive and kicking, they deserve the fruits of their labor, but it's all too likely that the bigwigs who invested in their music have kicked the can--corporations excepted, they can live forever. Should their great-grandkids still be collecting royalties after they're gone? Should King's Quest I be tied up until 2078? Is it right that some Vanilla Ice wannabe in the year 2075 would have to liscense that famous loop from Under Pressure? I don't think so. Its insane.
There's plenty of music, video, photos, and stuff that has been produced since 1923, which is still copyrighted, and that stuff won't become public domain until 2019--if they don't decide to extend copyrights again, that is. Do you think it was a mistake that the copyright extension act was Sonny Bono's pet project? Talk about a guy with vested interests, too bad he couldn't stick around to gain from it. Many (most, nearly all) of the people who were adults when they created works in the 30's are gone now. Some of the stuff is still relevant, but it's sad that photos, newspaper articles, and even floor plans from the 30's and 40's could still belong to someone/something, I think.
I think milking copyrights in perpetuity is wrong. 40 years isn't unreasonable. 50 years isn't necessarily pushing it. I think the current 70 years for personal authorship is a little long (even if you create something at 18, you're covered till you're 88, that aught to be long enough to get your share out of your works). 95 years for corporate authorship is simply disgusting, though.
The thing is, they only need to find another Sonny Bono to push their agenda, and they've got it in the bag. That's not right or fair, and this is from someone who makes pretty good money on the side doing creative stuff, which is covered by copyright. In a world where nearly all arts are built upon the foundation of previous works, super long copyrights are a burden and a hindrance.
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
Why it's appropriate for us to decide what they're entitled to is this: copyright exists solely to promote the public interest, i.e. to encourage that works are created that otherwise would not have been, that the works are minimally encumbered by copyright if at all, and that they enter the public domain as rapidly as possible.
If you toy around with how much weight you ascribe to each of the various elements of the public interest, you can find a point where you maximally
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
By limiting the publics use, well, that's abusing the public who are responsible for the popularity of the piece in the first place. After all, there's also plenty of privately traded things -- plenty of artists will sell a piece entirely for one lump sum, in private (paintings do this, as well as individuals who sell the rights to their works). But by publishing works, they're saying "Hey, public! We put this out for you! If you like it, you should support the dude who made it!"
And the public responds as it feels it should. But the screwy thing is that these companies and many of the authors feel that these works should be heirlooms, or part of a family's history. And that's just wrong for published work. Once published, it's hardly the family's at all -- heck, it's barely the original authors. Nothing's stopping me from reading a book and telling my friends all about it -- it was published for public use, and the public should be able to use it as it sees fit. Limiting that so that lucky families can get rich off of works just abuses the system, and ruins it for individuals who get screwed in the system -- those who don't get rich, and have their work owned by a corporation, never to be re-released for the next hundred years.
Re:Good (Score:3, Interesting)
He doesn't need to make money off of albums he made 40 years ago. He's got concerts, and he released a new album last week. It's reasonable for him to make money off that (and other albums he's done in the past, let's say, 20 years).
Re:Good (Score:3, Funny)
Also, I have personally set up a server where one can temporarily host any music collection, less than the 100GB limit, on a ftp server.
Most importantly, we have encouraged thousands of students to think twice before participating in the extortion scheme t
Re:Good (Score:3, Interesting)
> have the right to it for free? That doesn't even
> make sense.
Wait a second -- are you saying that you don't own the right to remember your sensory experiences?
In less than a generation from now, we'll have the ability to record everything we see and hear. Actually, you can do it today, but it is simply expensive. That cost is going to fall like a rock.
So what you're saying is, even though a person HEARS something, they don't own the right to stor
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
There is no culture revolution here. It's simple freeloading.
I'm not going to deny much of what you're saying. Yes, the most popular files on P2P networks represent the popular media.
But what is freeloading? Your probable response would have something to do with not paying, "getting something for relatively nothing," and/or stealing.
My issue is this: when a company (or group of companies), in effect, bribes representatives to "get something for relatively nothing", is that not freeloading as well? Or is it different because they wear suits and have lawyers?
This system that all but excuses corporate transgressions, while throwing poor people in jail for stealing $100 TVs is repugnant. And I use the word system very purposefully: because that's what it is. There's a reason why most of those responsible for the Enron debacle are still in business today. There's a reason why the few that did get caught will only see relatively few years, probably in "jails" with golf courses. There's a reason why Halliburton and ilk can design their entire business models around guaranteed government contracts, while looters in New Orleans get bullets fired over their heads during a time of national crises.
In short, there's a reason why the RIAA can design their business model around outrageous laws that do not serve the public good and be called "victims", while college kids who ignore those laws are called freeloaders. That is the system. College kids downloading are no more freeloaders than any corporate fat-cat. The only difference is that the aforementioned aren't playing by the rules. That's why they're "freeloaders."
You want a revolution? The revolution involves exposing this system that allows people who have never provided a product or service to receive wealth for the rest of their lifetimes riding upon the backs of truly productive people. No, I'm not talking about welfare. It's an entire class of people who make their money through investment and lobbying. It's a modern form of slavery. The only differences are that it's not a racial thing (or if it is, only indirectly) and the poverty (by and large) only manifests itself in relative deprivation.
-Grym
Re:Single Mothers? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Single Mothers? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Single Mothers? (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, wait....
Sometimes to fend off a fight started with a sucker punch, you have to resort to playing a little dirty, too.
Why is that? (Score:4, Insightful)
You don't think massive corporations suing single moms is demonic behavior?
Hmmm maybe they do since the people opposing them are apparently excitable children.
Or maybe they're tired of seeing corporations making billions of dollars in profits and who have been porking the music buying public for years with price fixing dragging people who work for a living through the courts. Does that make me an excitable child?
That's probably one of the reasons Sony, BMG and some others collaberated to form RIAA, the same reason MSFT funded the BSA. So someone else could be the bad guy.
It's sort of like the Republican controlled Congress and Senate passing the bankruptcy reform bill which makes it difficult to discharge credit card debt. You'd think with the increased collections the credit card banks would give people a break right? Instead they all raised their late fees and penalties, knowing that they can get away with it because people can't discharge their credit card debt in court. Bet ya didn't see that coming, did you?
I don't know anyone else, but I'm tired of corporate money running this country. I want my country back. I want to lead a torch carrying mob down K Street and sack every lobbyist office and burn every corporate jet at the airport. And this crap that RIAA is up to is just one more reason we really need to do that.
Re:Why is that? (Score:3, Funny)
Dude, gimme a call when you're ready to go. Just not on a Saturday, my weekends are kind of tight lately. . .
Re:Why is that? (Score:5, Insightful)
They allegedly have evidence. If someone has "broken the law", the correct prodedure is to contact the attorney general or relevant law enforcement agencies. If, once investigated, they believe said evidence is sufficient, the individuals in question will be processed through the criminal court system where they will be provided with an attorney if they cannot afford one, the right to trial by jury and the presumption of innocence until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. These are cornerstones of a society which, supposedly, values individual freedoms for all over special interests.
What the RIAA is attempting (and with some success) is to manipulate the civil legal system into a criminal surrogate, wherein they cause (or threaten to cause) such financial strife that defendants bow to their mighty will in an attempt to avoid life-long reprocussions that often make it difficult to provide for the future of the defendant's family (credit, education, etc).
Guilt or innocence has nothing to do with it.
They cannot, yet, imprison individuals but I'm sure they would simply love that sort of power.
The RIAA, and other similar organizations, are not elected representatives of the public trust and have no business acting in the capacity of such. Their blatant attempts to portray themselves in this light combined with predatory litigatious behavior would generally be considered crimes of coercion under common law.
Re:Why is that? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why is that? (Score:5, Insightful)
Legally, yes. There's no disputing that the law allows the record companies to do what they're doing. Never mind the fact that many of the laws that allow the record company to demand exorbitant settlment numbers were bought and paid for by those same record companies because they can give more in campaign contributions, they're still well within their legal rights to do what they're doing.
But morally, they're just assholes. Any law that causes hundreds of thousands of mothers to become targets of lawsuits demanding exorbitant settlements based solely on the youthful indiscretions of their children probably needs to be re-examined. Especially if those laws also make criminals out of millions of other people in this country.
The basis of the social contract is that we submit to the authority of the government and, in turn, the government uses that responsibility to do what's best for society as a whole. Their mandate is to build roads and bridges that no single person could afford to build on their own. Their mandate is to organize mass transit, fire and police stations, and stuff like it because we learned the hard way that those types of agencies don't work when implemented in a free-market fashion. And their mandate is to make laws that prevent certain behaviors that undermine the stability of the society we live in.
But when a law makes criminals out of a significant percentage of the population, it's their mandate to figure out whether that law is just. It's their job to ask who is being hurt by the offending behavior and to what extent. And it's their job to ensure that the consequences prescribed by the law are appropriate. I think the vast majority of Americans would say that the penalties for online music "piracy" are currently way too harsh.
It's easy to sit back and say that someone is in the wrong because they've broken a law. It's the very nature of the social contract that we submit ourselves to those laws and by breaking those laws, we also break our contract with society. But the agreement is two sided. To make laws that put the well-being of a select few individuals ahead of the well-being of the vast majority of the masses is just as much a violation of the social contract.
Unjust laws are meant to be challenged. Here's hoping that whatever jury hears these cases is fully cognisant of their right (and responsibility) of jury nullification when they feel that they law prescribes something the believe to be wrong.
Re:Single Mothers? (Score:4, Interesting)
Mothers are more important to society than the RIAA. If the RIAA, which is a leisure industry, is making life difficult for single mothers, who are doing the most productive work with the least amount of resources, we have our priorities misplaced.
Re:Single Mothers? (Score:5, Insightful)
You're right - we should only demonize them for bullying families, enslaving the artists, stealing from their own customers (with overinflated prices) and suing people to bankruptcy.
Re:Single Mothers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because mothers, especially single mothers, have the second-highest political value of all, right behind children. It's all about who you can march out in front of the television cameras.
Nobody cares about the rights of college students.
Re:Single Mothers? (Score:4, Insightful)
This is speculation but I suspect the reason there was a case to consider is probably because a child or a friend of a child installed some file sharing program on the computer. The account with the ISP was registered and paid by the mother. So when an action was filed it is the mother who was named though she probably had no idea of what might have been the cause.
It should be understood that the copyright laws that are being invoked were written in the draconian terms because they were intended for legal actions of one commercial venture against another. All the mother might know is that she was providing an internet connection that the child is required to have for school work (if you are a parent you are probably aware that this has become a new requirement).
The idea that a parent is responsible for policing a home computer or face possible legal action that could result in hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages is a new and startling development. If these cases go to trial and the mothers involved lose then the RIAA loses BIG TIME. The laws that they rely on to intimidate and win in the other cases will be seen as unreasonable laws and politicians will be falling over each other trying to address this perception. So if the RIAA wins then they definitely lose and if they lose they may still lose. Their best hope is that these individuals can be convinced to quietly settle.
That is why in the earlier case the most important development was that the judge told the lawyer from the RIAA that their resolution center was no longer involved in the case in any manner. They brought a suit in the judge's court and she [the judge] was determined that it would be adjudicated. Attempts to quietly settle were no longer an option. I suspect she was upset that the RIAA appeared to be using her court as a tool to force a settlement while avoiding a trial. Of course that is exactly what the RIAA wants to do.
As the IRAA starts going down hill (Score:5, Funny)
But... (Score:5, Insightful)
They are more powerful than you because they have more money than you, and that's all that matters in the United States in 2005.
Re:But... (Score:5, Insightful)
Which is why you can get a $20-million settlement for spilling your hot coffee in your lap while driving, or $250-million from a pharmaceutical company whose product had nothing to do with the death of your already cardio-dying husband.
The seemingly-crazy imbalance in the courts is scarcely all going one direction.
I'd be a lot happier, of course, if people who clearly did not deserve an incoming suit (say, because some single mom's wireless net connection was being hijacked by the 13-year-old next door who WAS too cheap to pay for his entertainment) could, with no real resources of their own, countersue to recover their legal expenses and the loss of their time and energy. On the other hand, nobody's got a decent reason, at this point, for pretending shock if they get a wake-up letter from anyone that holds a copyright when they're caught red handed abusing it.
Re:But... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's called backlash - what you get when you get a bunch of normal citizens being referees for a David-and-Goliath match, and they collectively make up their minds that Goliath's representatives are mind-boggling assholes. It's the kind of result you might expect in a society where there are huge class differences, but you still have the remnants of a jury-by-common-citizen system.
I think if you looked carefully at the statistics though, this kind of citizen backlash occurs infrequently compared to the times when the common citizen gets screwed over by entities with lots of money & legal representation.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:But... (Score:5, Insightful)
Right, right. But see, you happen to know what you're talking about, and you're talking about it on Slashdot. Now we cue proverbs about casting pearls before swine, etc., and pen some cynical post about idiots on the internet.
Then, predictably, a few ACs will respond with barely coherent one-liners, someone will get moderated +5 Informative or -1 Flamebait (hint: they're the same thing on Slashdot) and then some community college drop-out will share some dime store philosophy.
Eventually, the entire internet can be replaced by a very short script.
Me? I'm just the cynical oh-so-clever guy who thinks his cynicism makes him witty. So the fuck what?
By the way - thanks for explaining the McDonald's coffee thing. Someone should write a thesis on belligerent ignorance regarding that story. I've read the factual explanation no fewer than 5 times over the years, yet some people insist on the fantasy version. Eventually the urban legend must be replaced by the real version, since the truth is hardly a secret. Right?
Woah, holy crap. I think my cynicism failed me for a second. This ignorance will never die. Seriously, man, why try?
Re:But... (Score:4, Informative)
I remember McDonnalds coffee before this lawsuit. I bought it from time to time to clean engines. Some nice foamy engine bright to soften up the grease and their coffee to rince. Amazing stuff... it came out of the percolator boiling... as in it was still boiling when it hit the cup. However I eventually had to stop using it as after using it it would peal off the paint from the engine block. Not good.
Can't say I ever actually drank the stuff, it wasn't possible, not without burning your mouth.
a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong. Your only choice lies between paying a few k dollars to an extortionist company, or getting many millions to be able to afford lawyers and stand through the trial. It's not something an average person can do, so the choice boils down to either paying the extortion or suffering a personal bankcrupcy.
You're a citizen, not a company. You have no rights.
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:5, Interesting)
Ultimately, if you're going to fight this sort of thing, you'll want to not have too many assets, so if you do lose, you don't lose much. (Even a billion dollar judgement isn't worth much if the guy the judgement is against only has $6.)
You'll also want to have enough money to get some competent legal representation. The two normally do not go hand in hand -- usually when you have enough to defend yourself, you have so much to lose that it's safer to just pay. In fact, it's generally cheaper to just pay, even if you're poor, which seems to be what our entire civil court system is based on.
In any event, you may not need even thousands of dollars to defend yourself. You can spend as little or as much as you want on your defense -- the more you spend, the better the odds of winning, but even if you spend $0 and represent yourself, there is a chance that you'll win. It's also possible that some lawyers may work on your case pro-bono (since it would be good for a lot of advertising for them, especially if they won) and it's also possible that the EFF or ACLU may help defray your legal expenses if they decide that your case is strong enough to warrant their help.
Of course, there's also a very good chance that the RIAA won't push any cases far enough to actually go to trial. After all, so far they have a perfect record -- no losses -- and they won't want to risk that unless they're sure they can win -- and the people that are sure to lose are not the people who are likely to fight it.
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:3, Interesting)
Sometimes all it takes is a little technical knowledge and a sternly worded letter. I was a victim of one of the EMI extortion attempts. It turned out the software they were accusing me of running didn't run on any operating system anyone using my block of IP's used, plus my ISP firewall made it impossible for these first g
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:3, Insightful)
"and the IP address they presented as "evidence" wasn't yet allocated to a computer, nor was it available to DHCP hosts"
Interesting, sinc
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:4, Interesting)
I.e if you are in the RIAA's position and as a part of this judgement, the court finds that you acted in bad faith, you may not be able to challenge this in future cases. The next defendent might be able to point to that decision and say "Hey look, these guys are filing as next friends, but they have a record of doing so in bad faith. They don't own the copyrights and they have a history of abusing their access to the courts." Every additional loss would add to this ball of wax.
This is the problem that Microsoft currently has re: antitrust law and why they are so interested in settling things.
Re:Wishful thinking (Score:5, Interesting)
There's a very real chance the RIAA would lose each and every one of the lawsuits they filed, since they aren't actually investigating these alleged crimes. Worse, they are basing their accusations on only the flimsiest of evidence (and I use the term loosely.) Besides, this is not justice, this is not even racketeering
The only real chain of evidence that exists in these cases are ISP logs. That's it. That's the only link between an address acquired via monitoring file-sharing networks (an activity that is, itself, of questionable legality) and the supposed infringers. Someone's life and livelihood hanging in the balance over an entry in a log file somewhere. Maybe in your mind that constitutes a sufficient body of evidence to warrant accusing someone of the heinous crime of copyright infringement. Courts, on the other hand, generally take a dim view of frivolous lawsuits, as they consider them to be a complete waste of time. If it were otherwise, the RIAA would be taking all of these cases to trial, rather than simply intimidating people with their Armani suits and threats of bankruptcy. The very last thing they want is a defendant willing to stand up to them and take this to court.
The RIAA is using the law in a punitive manner, acting as judge, jury and executioner, effectively bypassing due process. They are doing this by selecting people that they feel will not take the risk of a full-blown trial. How can you possibly say they are operating in anything resembling "good faith"? My God.
Now, even if one accepts that ISP logs (and the RIAA's own monitoring efforts) are one hundred percent accurate, and trusts the RIAA to even provide accurate information, one cannot remotely discern the particular individual who is "guilty" (i.e., the person who actually clicked the "download" button.) Consequently, these sociopaths just sue the person whose name is on the Internet access account, regardless of whether or not that person did anything whatever to infringe someone's copyright. Seriously, I hope you have an unsecured WAP plugged into your cable modem: perhaps one of your music-loving neighbors will help to give you an object lesson in these matters. I would be happy to provide him or her with the requisite software and technique.
And this really avoids the question of whether the law is just (it isn't) and whether this behavior on the part of the RIAA should even be permitted under U.S. law. Another poster who claimed to be an attorney used the term "barratry" to describe this sue-happy behavior, and apparently it is illegal. So just be damned careful where you throw your support.
Re:Wishful thinking (Score:3, Informative)
Now, all nonsense aside, when you click that "download" button you ARE reproducing the work, copying it from the remote computer(s) to your own.
The c
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:3, Informative)
The RIAA doesn't want to go to court, its not profitable. this isn't exactly minting money but they are probably doing just enough cases to come close to breaking ev
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:3, Insightful)
IANAL.... And these are civil suits. However, the RIAA has behaved so badly in court so far, that I seriously doubt that it would be that hard to beat them. The facts are that often they don't have a strong case in these matters, so they have to spend the bulk of their money constructing a straw house. I commend these individuals for standing
It costs them money too. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It costs them money too. (Score:3, Interesting)
This isn't just about the financial incentive to extort people out of cash. It's mostly about racking up numbers for PR purposes. Unfortunately, all it appears to have done thus far is encourage filesharing.
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:3, Informative)
There's also the government scheme where they'll pay for it for you.. again if you have a reasonable case it needn't cost you a penny.
No reason for money problems to keep you from justice.
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:3, Insightful)
Say you thought you had a case against, say, Toyota. Would you sue them, and risk the possibility of having to pay their expenses? Even if you had what you thought was an iron clad case....it sometimes doesn't work out that way.
Fewer lawsuits is a good thing. But I'm not so sure 'loser pays' is.
Re:a citizen can't afford a lawsuit (Score:3, Insightful)
The protection racket angle... (Score:5, Interesting)
I hope some crusading federal DAs have their children targeted and decide to go after the RIAA.
Re:The protection racket angle... (Score:3, Interesting)
Currently, our laws provide for physical property laws, and intellectual property laws. You want to crusade to change the IP laws? Great. I dont think most people who want
Re:The protection racket angle... (Score:3, Interesting)
The longer the RIAA gets away with this, the federal DAs stand silent, the less any of us should feel that our government is for the people. When the government becomes corrupt, there is only one course to take for the citizenry
Civil Rico (was Re:The protection racket angle...) (Score:3, Insightful)
I hope she's reading this, more money for her and her attorney.
BTW, this is why you NEVER want to limit what attorneys or you can recover in lawsuits - because sometimes regular attys have to do the hard work that govt. either will not do, or when govt. is acting against you (as in criminali
What about a massive defense fund? (Score:5, Interesting)
I wonder how much it would affect the strategy is large numbers of objectors banded together to create a massive defense fund. Retain a few lawyers and offer to defend anyone who is accused.
Re:What about a massive defense fund? (Score:3, Informative)
This is the exact option that Ray Beckerman of Beldock Levine & Hoffman is taking. Mrs. Santangelo is said to be paying half rate, but given that she couldn't get a lawyer at all before Ray Beckerman came along, it's possible that the actual
Re:What about a massive defense fund? (Score:4, Insightful)
New Org (Score:5, Funny)
Re:New Org (Score:5, Funny)
But how do you solve a problem like MARIAA?
Re:New Org (Score:3, Funny)
Thank you so much; that seriously made me laugh my ass off. Reattaching ass now.
Re:New Org (Score:3, Informative)
WE ARE RIAA of BORG (Score:5, Funny)
That and we don't got dates for Saturday.
Sounds like she's probably on dialup (Score:5, Funny)
and... (Score:3, Insightful)
You know if you are guilty or not. If a court of law says you're guilty but you know you're not, still don't pay.
Re:and... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:and... (Score:3, Funny)
A quote which comes to mind here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Ordinary Americans desperately need, now, to begin to take back their country. If they leave it much longer, they themselves will not be the only ones to suffer consequences at the hands of their government and groups like the RIAA. The Australian government has already begun passing draconian laws of its own, following the cue of Bush, and I have no doubt that more will follow.
Technology is such these days that it is no longer good enough to merely talk about removing a dictatorial regime after it has come to power. In this case, it's not merely prevention being better than cure...Prevention may be our only option.
Re:A quote which comes to mind here... (Score:5, Interesting)
What laws would those be and how exactly do they relate to Bush? I'm all for people taking controll but it seems like ever fucktard out there thinks that everything was all milk and honey until Bush took office.
"Ahistorical - you think this shit just dropped right out of the sky
My analysis: it's time to harvest the crust from your eyes" - Fugazi
Civil Litigation (Score:5, Interesting)
What happens in civil court when you show up and tell the judge that you can't afford to hire a lawyer?
Re:Civil Litigation (Score:3, Informative)
You defend yourself, or lose by default. The right to have a lawyer appointed to defend you only applies to criminal court.
So, the sequence is thus:
(I'm beginning
Re:Civil Litigation (Score:3, Informative)
BTW US Federal courts make substantial allowances for pro se defendants.
Re:Civil Litigation (Score:5, Funny)
Come alone.
Sincerely,
The RIAA
This was just a matter of time ... (Score:5, Interesting)
I hope they keep up and tell the RIAA where they can shove their lawsuit. All it will take is one judge to rule in favor of any one of these single mothers to set a JUDICIAL PRECEDENCE nullifying every other case the RIAA tries to file.
Now back to reality, this will probably not happen this way. I'm not saying that the right to download a song is the exact same as the right to die or right to chose what to do with your own body, but everyone knows that these lawsuits are rediculous.
I hope they stick with it until the end, through all the appeals ... and win one for everyone. This is where we all knew that it would come down to. Whichever one of these cases actually makes it to court, will be the case that people refer to.
Lets just wait and see.
Sad to say... (Score:4, Interesting)
What a load this trivial seeming crap puts on the justice system.... just outlaw the RIAA, revoke their copyrights, returning them to the artists and be done with it. The artists are not profiting from these lawsuits. Turning everyone from 18 to 80 into white collar criminals is so unbalanced as to be laughable.
I hope these women make a dent in the RIAA money stash. I no longer care if the *AA have any valid arguments, their behavior is disgusting, and continues to be.
What a sham! Trying to force a single mom, too ill to work, into debtors prison, or its equivelent? Anything with dignity, legality, and general social validity rarely ever culminates in such outlandish situations... at least not that I can think of.
So how does America (and the world) get the attention of sensible members of the justice system? How does the public reverse this trend? Don't tell me how they were criminal and wrong and deserve to be prosecuted. There is no smoke without fire, and the stories of such ludicrous racketeering behavior is probably just the smoke.. not the fire.
Its just disgusting...
Re:Sad to say... (Score:3, Insightful)
In short: individuals are nice enough, it's populations as a whole that are bad and have a bad image.
Is a computer like a dog or a cat ? (Score:5, Interesting)
It looks possible that Kaaza was on her machine, but that she was unaware that it was there and what it was doing, for the purpose of this comment I shall assume that this was the case. (I am a Brit and so from an understanding of UK law).
Several independent points:
Can we make an analogy in law between liability of pet activity and liability of computer activity ?
In theory a computer is completely under its owner's control, but many people lack sufficient understanding of their machines to control it properly; what is the situation when a computer is hijacked by some malware that (unknown to the owner) causes damage (needless to say this happens frequently) ?
I think that the last 2 points are very important, I am not aware that they have discussed -- now is the time to debate this very important issue.
I would love to know what the law decides: is a computer like a dog or a cat ?
$$$ money (Score:5, Interesting)
A Proposed Legal Defense Tactic for Downloaders (Score:3, Interesting)
Here is the point: this person owes Metallica 5 dollars only if Metallica demands it; if Britney Spears decides not to ask for the 6 dollars she really does not need, then RIAA does not have a case as far as Mrs. Federline is concerned. We now know that many musicians are against RIAA's draconian way of suing the downloaders, but are afraid to voice their opinions for fear of offending their musician colleagues, I therefore suggest, as a legal tactic, that these single mothers publish their lists of "allegedly stolen" songs and publicly ask these artists if they want their 5, or 3, or 6 dollars paid to them. In other words, ignore RIAA, and go straight to the musicians, who, I'm almost positive, are more reasonable.
geolocation (Score:5, Informative)
I'm starting to wonder if the RITA* is using geolocation with the lists of IPs they bought from some possibly questionable collection/data mining agency. I don't remember the last time I heard of a middle or upper class kid getting sued, but they probably have a prepaid no limit iTunes account to go with their 60GB iPod photo. Are they sueing people who in most cases cannot affort their minimum $3500 settlement. They seem to be relying on lists of numners bought from IP harversters and taking what they get as 100% correct and never infallible. My advice to anyone who is unfortunately being sued an as far as they know they have done nothing wrong is how they got their information on you. If someone is using dialup and disconnects data will still be sent to that IP for some time, especially if they were requesting information from P2P apps, maybe kazaa supernodes.
It's possible that the requests were made several minutes before the IP was assigned to them but with the low response time you get with dialup, by the time the RITA snitches' packet sniffers got hold of it the "infringing" IP was assigned to someone else. I used Verizon DSL a few yrs ago before optimumonline was available in the area. The policy was one IP per house but you could connect as many PCs as you want. Without a router to keep a semi-static IP I'd go through lots of IPs a day since I turned my PC off when I left. For at least 20min after connecting ZoneAlarm would record pages of logs from traffic intended for the previous user of the IP, the IPs appeared to be immediately reassigned. I've on seen one takedown notice with logs, the inital detection and followup detection times were 20sec appart. With checking times only 20sec appart it's very possible that the packets they sniffed were going to another person but were time delayed.
Challenge the sources, if they're unwilling to reveal them then they're no more credible than kid A telling the teacher claiming that kid B did something bad or McCarthy's list of Communists that he never let anyone else see.
*I've stopped called the RIAA the RIAA, it's really the RITA Recording Industry Trust of America
RIAA, P2P, and Wireless Networks (Score:5, Interesting)
Coming soon to the Lifetime Channel (Score:3, Funny)
Music-downloading viruses: the ultimate defense (Score:3, Insightful)
Guide to Copyright Law (Score:3, Informative)
Here are some of my brief notes from my copyright law course. Some of this is kind of random, scattered and dissheleved.
BASIC LAWS
There are currently 3 types of property in the US:
1) Personal - should be obvious 2) Real - and/buildings 3) "Intellectual"
There are mostly 3 tyes of "Intellectual Properties"
1) Patents - systems, processess, formulas, etc 2) Copyrights - original writings or works of art from an author or artist 3) Trademarks - logo, name, design, slogan 4) Trade Secrets - anything a company uses secretly which is not patented
Trademark conflicts are between businesses and is based on geographic location and which industry it is used in. When courts try trademark cases they base their decision on the objective of "causing the least amount of confusion in rhe market place"
Novelty and inventiveness are required for a patent, but not for a copyright.
Anything that has a minimal degree of creativity meets the threshold for copyright can be copyrighted
A creative work is copyrighted the instant it is put in the form of a tangiable medium.
IDEAS ARE NOT PROTECTED BUT WORKS THAT CONTAIN IDEAS ARE COPYRIGHTABLE.
What can be copyrighted?
Literary works, musical works (including lyrics), dramatic works (music too), pantemines, cheorographic works, pictorial, graphic, scupltural work, motion picture, a/v works, animations, sound recordings, archetectual works.
RIGHTS:
As the owner of a copyright what rights do you have?
- Reproduction - Authorize derivivative works - Distribution - Public Performance - Public Display
- Digital Transmission (DMCA)
Copyright litigation:
The 3 questions asked by the court:
- Who owns the valid copyrigt - Was there unlawful copying by the defendent - Substansiality and/or similarity
REMEDIES:
The remedies for a civil copyright infringment are this
1- Injunctions (preliminary and permant) 2- Impoundment and/or destruction 3- Damages (fines/restrictions) damages can be actual (plantiff loss + defendent gains) or statuatory (as defined by law) 4- Court costs and attorney fees
Statuatory damages and court costs/attorney fees are not availble remedies to the plantiff unless the work was registered with the US Copyright Office PRIOR to the infringment by the defendent.
Statury damages can be as low as $200 per infringment for an innocent infringment but as high as $150,000 for a willful infringment.
To have infringment:
1- Plantiff must have ownership of valid copyright 2- Unlawful copying must have taken place 3- Access must be proven; direct (defendent saw/heard copy of work); indirect (access is inferred by wide dissemination) 4- Similarity; 4 types- identical; striking, substantial, insubstantial
Criminal infringment:
Willful infringment for commercial advantage or private financial gain by the sale of 10 or more copies or retail value of $2,500 or more within a 6 month period.
Penalties: $250,000 fines for a person or $500,000 for an entity and/or imprisonment 5 years for first offense, 10 years for second offense.
Constructive knowledge - once a work of art is registered with the USCO it is presumed that the defendent is aware of the copyright.
FAIR USE
What is fair use? It is a defense against alleged copyright infringment
The courts evaluate 4 elements in defining fair use:
- Nature of the work (factual vs fictional) - Nature of the use (commercial vs educational vs private vs public) - Amount and substantiality (using the hook/chorus or verse) - The effect on the commercial market place (more weight has been given to this one recently)
MISC CONCEPTS/IDEAS:
There is concept called the idea/expression dichotomy. The expression of the facts can be copyrighted but the facts themselves cannot.
There is a concept called the Merger Doctrine; there
Sidestep the whole issue (Score:4, Insightful)
So, I say, we sidestep the whole issue, and just start enjoying media that artists release under Creative Commons http://creativecommons.org/ [creativecommons.org] licensing. That is, tell the RIAA, in your face! There is LOTS of good music (and other work) out there that can be had freely. Sure, it's not the bubblegum stuff you're hearing on KRAP radio, but lots of it is really worth listening to.
The more we adopt alternate methods, the more the power will slip away from the current abusers. It's not a total solution, but it's a place to start.
Random lawsuits tend to end this way (Score:4, Interesting)
No what the recording industry is experimenting with is suing their customer base randomly as a new source of revenue in and of itself. It's like local police departments that periodically grind out thousands of traffic tickets. Fair? Of course not. Business as usual? Sure.
Re:Editors - edit (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What's there to fight? (Score:4, Informative)
If you run a busines selling music, and you fix prices, and you refuse returns, and you treat the artists like shit, and you refuse to adopt new technologies that come along in favor media that you can over-price, you have no right to act surprised when your customers find their own way to satisfy their demand. These RIAA suck.
Re:What's there to fight? (Score:5, Informative)
Repeat after me, COPYRIGHT INFRINGMENT IS NOT STEALING. It is in a legally separate category. Copy right infringment is sometimes against the law, but it is never stealing.
Re:What's there to fight? (Score:3, Informative)
Copyright infringem
For the last fucking time.... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:For the last fucking time.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:For the last fucking time.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Whoooah, slow down man. The 'stealing' argument is based on the idea that a music download means one less bit of music purchased. Whether stealing is the correct term or not isn't all that interesting. The claim is that money is lost from downloads. In those terms, the term 'theft' isn't all that unreasonable.
Unfortunately for the RIAA, the only real 'damage' that they've been able to reasonab
Re:What's there to fight? (Score:5, Insightful)
Copyright infringement is not theft. It's not stealing. "Stealing music" is a phrase invented by groups like the RIAA to try an justify their actions to the general public. Only the truly gullible and terminally stupid (i.e. you) really believe them. If you want proof that copyright infringement is not stealing, then simply look at the papers the RIAA filed. "Theft" is not the offence these mothers have been accused of. QED, copyright infringement is not theft.
Your post assumes that these mothers are guilty of the 'crime' they have been accused of. They way the RIAA spin in, it's beholden on the accused to prove their innocence. This act is directly counter to the principles that many legal systems were founded upon; notably - that one is innocent until proven guilty.
It is a logical impossibility to prove a negative. All the mothers can hope to do in this case is prove that they didn't use P2P applications or have music on their machines they didn't have a legal right to. This doesn't prove they weren't sharing music at the time the RIAA alledge.
The RIAA should be made to prove beyond all reasonable doubt that:
Re:Victims? Not really (Score:5, Insightful)
If I took you to court and said, "This man over here stole $4000 worth of music from my music collection. Pay me right now for damages." they might consider it, but what if I told them by stealing I mean that you took my CDs, copied them, MP3'd them, and then returned them without any kind of damage? Now is it stupid to ask for their full value?
Now what if I said that instead of my entire music collection, you owe me 50 times the price I paid for them. I'd be laughed out of the courtroom and cornholed by the baliff for making him miss McGuyver.
But its all good if you're a company, because God knows whatever a company says has been well researched, thought out, and their word should be taken over mine at all times.
Re:Victims? Not really (Score:5, Informative)
Full paragraph:
I have always been against music downloading. In fact, I have been a member of BMG's music club for quite some time and I purchase my music either from there or from Target. When I first got my computer set up almost three years ago, I had a friend set it up for me since I did not know how to do it. She had put Kaaza Lite on there and told me what it was. I never used it and had no interest in doing so. I deleted it since I had no use for it. Even though I deleted it correctly, as is recommended by Microsoft, Mr. Eilers has told me it can hide out in my system and play without me knowing about it. I have done a total check of my computer and it is no where on there.
I don't know if you're trying to make a point or not, but you completely ignored everything Tanya Andersen said in that paragraph.
Re:Victims? Not really (Score:5, Informative)
Nice job of selective quoting.,,
She tried to delete it and her computer says it's deleted. It can't be her fault if it's still used to share music.
"...She had put Kaaza Lite on there and told me what it was. I never used it and had no interest in doing so. I deleted it since I had no use for it. Even though I deleted it correctly, as is recommended by Microsoft, Mr. Eilers has told me it can hide out in my system and play without me knowing about it. I have done a total check of my computer and it is no where on there."
Re:Victims? Not really (Score:3, Funny)
Tort law is one of those things that isn't intended to punish the person causing the harm, but to compensate the person that was harmed. Consequently, we have lots of situations where a seemingly innocent mistake on one person's part can end up with them paying significant damages to someone else. "But I didn't know!" It doesn't matter.
To put it another way, if it can be proved that infringement of someone's copyright was done, the law is set up to make sure t
Re:Victims? Not really (Score:3, Insightful)
But anyone can set any IP address he likes, manually, as long as the other computer is off (which was mostly the case). Depends on the type of the network, probably. And if she had a WiFi router, unsecured...
AILF (Score:3, Funny)
Re:she had a hemorroid flare up (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:More gratuitous RIAA bashing - NOT! (Score:5, Interesting)
It's the RIAA's fault because they represent labels who have performed the following questionable or outright illegal actions (in no particular order)
- Paying radio stations in cocaine / sports cars / tens of thousands of dollars to make sure a single gets played 12 - 22 times a day every day for four months, ensuring a "reasonable" debut for an artist who nobody has ever heard of - and sometimes artists they have. This practice has been criticized and even litigated in the past (the 1950's and 1980's most notably) with little abatement in this practice.
- Ensuring that CD's remained in a $17 - $22 price range from [literally, no joke] 1983 to the present, despite the fact that literally anyone will tell you that the reasonable retail price for a CD should more likely be around $9, max. (Note that the price outside of North America is usually substantially higher.) LP's and Cassettes were priced around the $7-$9 range range when CD's were introduced (1982). Even with inflation there is literally ZERO reason for a CD to be "on sale" at $16 or so.
- Ensuring that their artists - even the ones who pull in the lion's share of profits for a label - only earn a maximum of $0.70 per cd sold (and not returned), yet making sure that that same artist is the one responsible for paying for the $100,000+ video they just made which will be played precisely one (1) time on your alleged music video station of choice.
- Continuing to take major percentages of money from the sales of any possible merchandise an artist can make while on the road, including the sales of T-shirts, cd's, posters, etc. at the show's merch booth. (Note: this is one of the only ways an artist actually stands to make more money in terms of a major record deal.)
- Failing to offer any consumer, anywhere, any sort of online alternative that actually makes financial sense. People know that digital files to not require things like packaging or shipping costs. Yet a song on iTunes = $1. That is flatly ridiculous. I don't get artwork, liner notes or anything else - I get the song. It's also not a high-quality version of the recording. My guess, that's worth $0.50 at the very most.
Why labels have been dragging their feet since the introduction of the MP3 is beyond me. Maybe lawsuits were part of their actual overall marketing plan for 2000 - 2015. I don't know. Either way: the RIAA knows all of the abovementioned points. They should be brought to bear on the actual fiscal facts of this situation. We as consumers have been putting up with this crap for decades, not just since the introduction of the internet.
In my opinion, especially the Santagelo case proves that the labels and the RIAA are well aware that they are on the cusp of breaching the law themselves. They back away when barked at loudly enough. My hope is that real justice is served and copyright law is examined in much greater detail in the courts. Artists are getting screwed anyway, no need for the labels to make out like it's our duty to correct that.
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