RIAA + Lawyers = Match made in Hell

[dang]

In their continued campaign to make themselves look bad, the RIAA has included in the 200+ people they decided to sue: a 12 year old NY girl.

Boy, talk about bad PR. According to the the girl and her Mom, they didnt even know they were downloading the songs to keep. They had signed up for Kazaa (29.99 or something like that) and used it to listen to songs as a one time thing (find song, listen to it, move on.)

This brings a new aspect to all this. I'm sure there are lots of people out there who are not technjunkies who actually understand how peer-to-peer works.

In Kazaa, you find a soung, you click download, it downloads and then you can "preview" or play the song back. What if people didnt realize they were actually keeping a physical copy and sharing it out to the rest of the world?

Also, it appears they thought they were accessing the music legally because they paid Kazaa for it's service.

I really hope all of this backfires on the RIAA and the Artists get a clue and start standing up for themselves.

Story:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,96797,00.html

[brianj]

<RANT>This is simply sick, sad, whatever. I don't even know what to say - this BS is just so out of control. Get a grip RIAA, I'm so sure all of those poor multimillionaire recording artists are just writhing in pain because they can't afford that new $30mil beach house now.<RANT/>

[dang]

The RIAA decided to quickly settle this case, most likely to the horror of the public relations mess. The thing that is still crap is that they settled for $2000. Now, that may not sound like much, but this family lives in a housing project in New York.


The family lives in a city housing project on New York's Upper West Side, and they said they mistakenly believed they were entitled to download music over the Internet because they had paid $29.99 for software that gives them access to online file-sharing services.


This still makes me sick....

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=501&u=/ap/20030909/ap_on_en_mu/downloading_music_11&printer=1

[Ioman]

Several Internet music services and a disc jockey have offered to reimburse a New York woman who paid $2,000 to settle charges that her 12-year-old daughter illegally copied music online.

A coalition of several "peer to peer" song-swapping networks said Thursday it was trying to locate Sylvia Torres so it could pay the legal settlement she reached with the Recording Industry Association of America on Tuesday.

Rochester, New York, radio disc jockey Brother Wease also offered to pay Torres' legal bill, and online music retailer MusicRebellion.com said it would allow Torres' daughter, Brianna Lahara, to download $2,000 worth of free music from its industry-sanctioned site.

However, the would-be benefactors all said they would not extend their offers to the 260 other individuals who face RIAA lawsuits for copying music through Kazaa, Grokster and other peer-to-peer networks.

An RIAA spokesman declined to comment on the offers.

Lahara, a Manhattan honor student who offered Madonna's "Material Girl" and some 1,000 other songs through Kazaa, has emerged as something of a poster girl for those who denounce the RIAA's legal campaign as heavy-handed.

"Out of all the millions of people who have downloaded, some girl in a housing project in New York City has got to come up with two grand?" said Wease, who offered to help through his charitable children's fund.

"I just feel that these people are bullies," said Grokster President Wayne Rosso, a member of the P2P United trade group, which offered to pay Torres' bill. "They're like the show-business version of the Taliban."

RIAA spokesman Jonathan Lamy said the recording industry was not targeting 12-year-olds. The only information it had when it filed the suits was the name and address of the Internet account holder, he added.

"The objective of this campaign is not to win a popularity contest, but to communicate a message of deterrence so people realize there can be consequences to this illegal behavior," Lamy said.

Rosso said the industry should try to work out a solution with Grokster and other peer-to-peer networks so record labels can be paid for the billions of songs downloaded monthly.

One solution could be a flat, per-song royalty rate similar to that paid by radio stations and Webcasters, he said.

Lamy said a flat-fee approach would be impossible because it would have to encompass movies, books and other copyrighted material traded online, as well as take foreign users into account.

Traffic has remained steady on peer-to-peer networks since the lawsuits were filed, officials at the networks said.

[mikeywalnutz]

The RIAA cannot sue everybody. Quick, everyone download Hot Chocolate's You Sexy Thing" immediately!

[dang]

hahahaha

[llbbl]

Record industry warns of new lawsuits


But as the identities of those individuals hit the press, criticism arose. The case of a 12-year-old girl living in New York public housing quickly became emblematic of what critics called the RIAA's excessive enforcement action. A 60-something Boston woman, accused of offering hardcore rap songs for download through the Kazaa service, was dropped from the lawsuit lists after it emerged she actually used a Macintosh computer, which did not support Kazaa.


http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5093078.html

This the last I had heard on this topic, LIke a month ago. Anyone find anything newer? Maybe those scum are biding their time and trying to make sure they get the it "right" next time.

[llbbl]

I combined threads since on same topic

[ECA]

I thought there was a law against mega corps.
Isnt RIAA in that group.
They sued MS for the same tactic.