RIAA Files 477 New Filesharing Lawsuits

Fallen Kell writes "According to the CNN story, the RIAA has filed another round of lawsuits against filesharers. This round has many college students who are allegedly sharing music on their university networks. Again, the defendants are listed only by their university IP addresses. No lawsuit has gone to trial yet out of the 2,454 litigations started by the RIAA since it began its crackdown."

Comments

None to trial?

[lukewarmfusion]

Are we supposed to take it that all of those have been settled (supposedly by paying the RIAA)?

I wonder if there are any instances of the RIAA saying "oh, well you clearly know your rights and have not done anything illegal, so never mind."

There was that Mac user who was accused of sharing over a P2P that isn't available for Mac...

Re:None to trial?

[Dr Caleb]

A good rule of thumb is "if you are not sure if you have the right to redistribute something, don't."

I have thousands of MP3's, named the same as albums, artists and tracks. They are 3k-4k of random noise. eg: "Madonna - Sympathy for the Devil.mp3"

As was pointed out during the original hearing to release names of users here in Canada, the CIRA had no proof of what was actually in the files that people were sharing. No one downloaded the files, then listened to them. There was no trail of evidence, so it was dismissed.

Share junk - let them download it - maintian CD backups of the originals - maintian download and connection logs - and countersue for racketeering. Get rich quick.

Re:None to trial?

[phoneyman]

People sharing hundreds of songs via the Internet is clearly illegal and they should expect consequences if they lose the gamble that no one will catch them.

The biggest problem with the RIAA gambit is that the consequences are so far out of line with the actual damages that the risk of fighting is too high to take. This tends to both strongly encourage people to settle immediately (a $3K settlement, while steep, is a far cry from potentially hundreds of thousands of $), and inflame people against the RIAA.

The basic unfairness is that the law allows the RIAA to assume that each song shared replaces a certain number of songs sold. This is simply untrue. I think this basic fact is the real reason that people just don't see why it's wrong to share songs - they know that the majority of the ones they downloaded they weren't going to buy anyhow. File-sharing is a lot like the radio, but the way people want the radio to be.

IMO, the RIAA would be a lot better served by finding out what people really want from digital media. I'm pretty sure that they'll soon find out that free-as-in-beer is low enough on the priorities list that if they address the issues above it, people will pay for it. ITMS, I think, is proving this point.

And, finally, the RIAA members themselves have helped create this situation by creating a marketing system that exists solely on the basis of disposable content. They create acts from whole cloth, promote the crap out of them, rake in as much cash as they can, then dump them as soon as sales start to fall. They happily buy into a radio system that overplays "singles" in the hopes of promoting some CD sales, but ends up creating tunes that are popular for a few months and despised for years to come.

Pierre

Re:None to trial?

[shark72]

"You're not doing anything "illegal" by downloading, meaning you're not breaking a law. You're infringing on copyright."

The suits are aimed at sharers, those who provide the copyrighted material, not downloaders. While those sharers probably downloaded much of the stuff they're sharing, it's the sharing that's the clear no-no.

The legality of downloading aside, if you are "infringing on copyright" you are indeed breaking the law -- copyright law, in this case. Copyright infringement has both civil and criminal flavors.

Re:None to trial?

[huchida]

The legality of downloading aside, if you are "infringing on copyright" you are indeed breaking the law -- copyright law, in this case. Copyright infringement has both civil and criminal flavors.

Right, but you're nit-picking. My point was that these aren't criminal suits, and the, ahem, "sharers" aren't being prosecuted by an arm of law enforcement. Not that they potentially couldn't be, but paying the RIAA to go away isn't the same as a traffic fine.

Re:When will the backlash come?

[The Analog Kid]

Some lady in New Jersey is suing the RIAA on racketeering laws, saying that the RIAA is extorting money from filesharers by filing these mass suits and then settling because there is no way these people can legally fight the RIAA.

Defendants are listed only by their ip address

[Anonymous Coward]

Proxy Proxy Proxy Proxy

This is about to lose meaning.

[Geancanach]

The more people they sue, the less meaning the lawsuits have. Realistically, how are they going to go after thousands of people? So their lawsuits will just become small news items that fail to scare anyone. What is the point?

Reasonable Doubt

[y86]

If you have a router.... with multiple terminals sharing 1 IP... doesnt that create reasonable doubt or which terminal - or which person was downloading / sharing? So isn't it impossible to prove guilt of any individual? So isn't that like 90% of us users who use a router? The only way to prove it is to get a warrent and search the property... bring it on. I doubt any of those dumbass's from the RIAA knows how to mount a ReiserFS partition...

Musings

[eclectro]

I can't help but wonder if there is a warehouse in Bangalore with rows of tables and computers, and workers trying to download music off the internet.

Doesn't make sense

[NEOtaku17]

Why is it that digital photos are not legal evidence in a court case but if they have your IP address doing the downloading(or uploading) automatically means you did it? Because computers don't lie? BS! I can think of a hundred ways that they could have false positives(such as IP spoofing and and using stolen remote connection and the like). I don't see how they could get it right everytime and that those people wouldn't fight it.

Re:Doesn't make sense

[the_mad_poster]

But there is nothing wrong going on here. And yes, piracy is wrong.

It's all I can do to keep from calling you nasty names.... so I'll just assume you haven't considered that maybe you WOULDN'T fight if you really knew what was happening, and I'll make my point.

If the RIAA sues you, and you were making the files available (UPLOADING people.. they're suing people who are making the files available, not necessarily the ones who download them), then settling would be the smart option, yes.

However, if the RIAA comes at ME with a lawsuit, I can't AFFORD to fight them. They can tie me up in court until my pockets are drained, and I didn't do a single goddamn thing wrong. I'm not sharing a fucking thing except code that I wrote myself. Funny thing about big, faceless organizations that can browbeat you with lawyers, huh? Oh, wait. I forgot... you can just walk right into a court and that's that, right? No, wrong. Some people have gotten off because their is no way in Hell they could've been sharing anything. I'm not one of those people. One of the systems on my network is a Windows box, and it's connected. It's also being fed an IP address by a local DHCP server which is picking up an IP address from the ISP's DHCP server. I'd have to show that I'm NOT that IP address, and that would cost me time and money. I can't afford it. If the RIAA decided to try and tie the thing up rather than lose, they could easily keep the case suspended with bullshit filings and amendments for the short period of time it would take me to go into the poorhouse. And then I'd STILL have to settle.

So, why don't you wake up and join the rest of us in the real world? If the RIAA starts filing it's cases on some actual evidence, fine. An IP address is WAY too variable to count as evidence. No, I'm NOT a lawyer. I have been on the nasty end of a civil suit though, and even that simple little proceeding was NOWHERE near as simple as you're painting this.

And yes, piracy IS wrong. Now, if you find any swashbuckling swordsman with parrots on their shoulders stealing crates of CDs, or pressers selling illegitimate copies of discs, let me know. Otherwise, I have no idea why you're bringing up piracy during a discussion of copyright infringement. If you're going to shoot your mouth off about it, you could at least get the situation and the terminology correct.

And this doesn't even bring in the moral objections to using the court system to send miscellaneous J. Does threatening letters talking about potentially enormous fines and lord knows what else in preperation of extending a "settlement".

Re:When will the backlash come?

[bechthros]

false logic again. Just because nobody *has* shown up to claim that yet doesn't mean they haven't been *able* to. There could well be people who've already pleaded out who seriously didn't do it, but were so terrified of fighting an entire industry and the costs of doing so that they figured it would be easier to make the payout. Just as there are lots of women who are raped who never report it, and victims of organized crime who pay protection money, etc etc. Next.

Re:When will the backlash come?

[RickHunter]

Even worse is that its literally impossible to prove your innocence. Any logs you have can be doctored just as easily as the RIAA can doctor their logs, and most courts are going to be a hell of a lot less likely to believe you. If, OTOH, the Judge places a reasonable burden of evidence on the RIAA, it becomes impossible for them to continue their case. (As was done in Canada, and which the Liberal Party has promised to change if they're re-elected.)

Kazaa users are the RIAA's candy jars

[l0ungeb0y]

This is a great business model for the RIAA.
File lawsuits a few hundred at a time and let the checks roll in.

Too bad no one stands to gain financially by fighting back.
Also too bad (correct me if I'm wrong) they choose to sue people who are either quite young or who are quite old.
Have yet to hear of the RIAA sue someone who is say... 30's to 40's, owns a house and can afford some decent attornies.

Considering the age groups I've seen publicised, it makes me wonder just how random the RIAA's Kazaa user sampling really is. Until someone actively stands up and fights back, no precedent shall be set on this.
Sure, the person might loose and have to pay more than they would have if they just settled... guess what we need is a good samaritan to step forth and martyr his/her self.
I don't mind the RIAA getting *something* for the bits that were downloaded for free, what about 0.99$ US per provably non-fair use download plus court costs for their time?

This sue for bags of cash and take a few grand to be "mercifull" crap needs to stop.

I wonder when they'll get ME..

[dustinbarbour]

Whoopety doo.. 437 lawsuits is it? And how many people did I see co nnected to KaZaA the other night? What? A million you say? Let's see. Up to now, I stand a scant 0.0437% chance of being sued. I think I'll take my chances.

RIAA

[perlfu_]

At this rate it seems they may never really put a dent in the file-sharing community!

Song of the piracy apologist

[Anonymous Coward]

The RIAA is doing absolutely nothing wrong here, but I fully expect a bizarre, knee-jerk negative reaction to the RIAA suing copyright infringers (the very thing Slashdotters said they should do back during the Napster lawsuit). Here at Slashdot, only the protection of GPL copyright violations is suddenly a big deal. Everyone else's copyrights can go to hell.

If you agree with any of this, feel free to repost it in the future.

Song of the piracy apologist:

(1) I don't personally believe in copying CDs illegally-- but I think we should avoid using unkind words like "piracy" to describe those that do -- instead, we should describe it as an "infringement", much like a parking infringement.

(2) I don't believe in the record companies emotively abusing the word "theft," but I do believe in emotively abusing words like "information," "sharing," and "Copyright Enforcement Militia."

(3) I believe that piracy is driven by "overpriced CDs" even though CDs have dropped in price over the years.

(4) I believe that piracy is driven by overly long copyright duration, even though most pirated works are recent releases.

(5) I believe that illegitimately downloading music is giving the author "free advertising". I don't buy any of the music I download, of course--but lots of other people probably do.

(6) I believe that ripping off the artists is wrong. The record companies always rip off the artists. Artists support P2P, except the ones that don't (like Metallica), and they don't agree with me, hence they're greedy or their opinion doesn't count or something.

(7) I believe that selling CDs is not a business model, but giving away things for free on the internet is.

(8) I believe that artists should be compensated for their work -- preferably by someone else. I mean, they can sell concert tickets (which someone else can buy) or sell t-shirts (to someone else) or something. As long as someone else subsidises my free ride, I'm coooooool with it.

(9) I believe in capitalism but only support music business models which involve giving away the fruits of ones labor for free.

(10) I believe that copying someone elses music, and redistributing it to my 1,000,000 "best friends" on the internet is sharing. Music is made for sharing. It's my right.

(11) I believe that record companies cracking down on piracy is "greed", but a mob demanding free entertainment is not.

(12) I believe that it's not really "piracy" unless you charge money for it, because, receiving money is wrong, but taking a free ride is fine.

(13) I believe that disallowing copying and redistributing music over Napster is the same as humming my favourite song in public. Because when I hum my favourite song in public, everyone likes it so much that they run home, get out their tape
recorders and once they've got a recording of it, they aren't interested in hearing the original any more.

(14) I believe that when illegal behaviour destroys a business, it's "free enterprise at work".

(15) I believe piracy is simply "free advertising." Even though that's what radio is, but with the legal permission of the copyright holder. Basically, what I really want is to be able to choose the songs I want, listen to them whenever I want, but I don't want to have to pay for it. Which essentially means I want the whole thing for free.

What I find amusing is that the pirates seem unable or unwilling to distinguish between creative activity and brainless copying.

Since a lot of the people here are GPL/OSS advocates: the "OSS way" applied to this domain is to learn how to play an instrument. Or how to sing or whatever. Then get together with a bunch of other people who can also play music, and make some noise.

One of the unfortunate things that has happened to the OSS movement is that a lot of the loudmouth advocates for it don't understand what it's really about. They view it primarily as a means to get free stuff, and then they turn

allofmp3.com

[Anonymous Coward]

Every since I've been able to d/l albums for 60 cents from allofmp3 legally I stopped using p2p clients. :-)

Re:Oh Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

"Yeah, you keep singing, and don't forgot to pay your tax on every CD-R or MP3 storage device that you buy"

No, thats why i buy these things from the United States (no levy there :o) ). Also make some good cash buying in bulk down there and reselling it up here.

Thanks USA! :D

Flea Market Pirates are the Real Crooks.

[Peschula]

I am in the independent music/ film industry in Wilmington, NC and couldn't care less about who downloads my music. However if I did have some success and money invested in advertising and one of these people burned it and sold it at the flea market I would sue. I don't think the RIAA gives two sh*ts about downloaders either - just the bootleggers. It goes the same for the alcohol industry and moonshiners. In a capitalist economic system you can't have a business without a license and avoid the ability for your product to be taxed. Also these flea market distributers don't have enough command to know how to do business research on their own - only steal.

CDs aren't expensive

[amyhughes]

I personally laugh at the idea of buying a $10-$20 CD anymore

I keep reading how expensive CDs are and I don't get it. I've been on a music-buying binge the last six months or so. I've probably bought 300-400 in that time.

I have a CD club membership at amazon.com. It's so unobtrusive I don't remember who runs it, but it's one of those cooperative deals where amazon takes the order and some club sends the discs. The requirement is just to buy three discs in a year, which I did with my first order and have repeated many times since. Perhaps half of what I want is avaialable through the club at $7.50-$10. Most discs are $8.50 or $10.

When the club doesn't have it amazon usually sells it for $10-$13. Perhaps 1 in 5 discs I want cost more than that. Often they are also available through Amazon's "marketplace" of individual sellers. You have to pay $2.50 for shipping but I've almost always found a marketplace seller with a good rating than can sell what I'm looking for, with shipping, for under $12.

I keep my cart full of a couple dozen things I eventually want so that I can always easily find three or more discs to get my total to $25 for free shipping. There's also no sales tax. The same rules apply for club purchases (but for marketplace purchases shipping is always $2.50).

Barnesandnoble is usually more expensive but if I find a disc that seems pricey at amazon I check b&n. Sometimes they are cheaper.

If all that fails there's always secondspin.com or even ebay.

Bottom line, average over hundreds of recent purchases I pay about $10 per CD.

Amy

use an anonyminity proxy

[Anonymous Coward]

I started using anonx.com a week ago. It's specifically designed to shield you from these lawsuits. I'm happy with it so far. It's a pay service, but it costs less than buying one CD every two months, and about 1/3000 of the cost of a lawsuit settlement.

(and no, I don't work for them)

Re:Awful principle

[bonch]

I always hated the principle to sue a few people, 'as an example', with in mind the idea that if they are severely punished, nobody else will do it again.

It's called enforcing the law and showing people that it is being enforced in order to discourage them from doing it. It's a tactic as old as time.

It only shows one thing : the RIAA does not care about people. They could destroy one's life, they don't care if it can bring them $$$.

Huh? How does it "only show one thing", that they don't care about people? Any company suing somebody to protect their copyrights doesn't care about people?

Are you saying nobody should bother protecting their copyrights because, goshdarn it, they put people first?

Does that also mean the copyright of the GPL is invalid? After all, nobody should care if the GPL is violated, because dammit I care about people. Not following the law and protecting the fruits of one's labor.

Note one thing missing in all the discussion following this article--mention the artists. Nobody here gives a shit about the artists--it's all about RIAA, RIAA, RIAA. Nobody cares about what the artists think, nobody's asked them, nobody here knows any. Somehow, they've become the silent voice when it comes to everyone pirating the fuck out of their music, because the RIAA has been painted as as an evil scapegoat in order to distract the issue from the fact that what's going on is immoral and wrong. Artists willingly sign their contracts.

But hey, GPL and P2P good, RIAA bad. Next.

My Music Library.

[Biotech9]

Around a week ago i divided my music library into 2 smart playlists, one was 'Songs I own', and the other, 'Songs I don't own'.

Intially there was just around 10 gigs I did own, and 15 i didn't. Then i decided not to add more music unless It was stuff i DID own, and I had to take away correspondingly much from the playlist of music i DIDN'T own.

I now have around 15 gigs I do own, and 10 i don't, which has led me to two points.

(1) Why did I do this, was it because the RIAA are scary? Or am i obsessive compulsive?

(2) The playlist for music i don't own is actually now (now that i've stripped it down to the good stuff), a really good shopping list of music i should buy. And i probably will.

So, does the RIAA tactics work? Am i going to buy new music because of these scary law suits?

(really, i want to know!)

Re:When will the backlash come?

[geekee]

"Some lady in New Jersey is suing the RIAA on racketeering laws, saying that the RIAA is extorting money from filesharers by filing these mass suits and then settling because there is no way these people can legally fight the RIAA."

This is crap. It's not the RIAA's fault lawyers are so expensive. If you're innocent, no one's denying you your day in court. So if people aren't defending themselves because lawyers cost too much, that's not the RIAA's problem. If this woman can hire a lawyer to sue the RIAA, she can hire a lawyer to defend herself if she's innocent. In summary, another frivolous lawsuit. Saying there is no way to legally fight the RIAA is nonsense propogated by people who can't win their cases because they are guilty.

Re:When will the backlash come?

[Strider-BG]

Except one of the main problems in this country is that anyone can be sued for anything by anyone else with no consequence. The government only provides free legal assistance for criminal defendants, not civil ones so you have no choice but to hire a lawyer when you're sued. We need the system like they have (I believe) in the UK where if you're sued by someone and you win, they have to pay your legal bills. At least then it would incent companies to get their $hit straight straight. As it is there's no deterrent. My parents were bankrupted when they were sued by one of their employees for breach of contract - the guy's brother was an attorney and did it for free. My parents ended up winning but had spent over $100K in legal fees. Their small business couldn't recover from that ordeal and they had to shut it down, dragging themselves into bankruptcy.

So what now? Sue the former employee for a frivolous lawsuit? More legal fees to get what? The guy doesn't have that kind of cash. It's like getting mugged for $100K. They're fsck'd. Mom's working part-time at a doctor's office and Dad is looking for a job.

I hate our current President but the one campaign promise I hoped he'd deliver on is that of tort reform. Don't think that'll happen now though :(

Re:Random observations

[boomgopher]

Slashdotters have yet to legally or morally justify pirating an artist's music. Notice nobody mentions the artists--it's all RIAA. The artists are forgotten in this equation, their music ripped off and not paid for by anybody.

Look, I'm just being honest. I'm otherwise a pretty conservative guy (Christian, etc.), but I'm saying that I honestly don't have any internal or moral sense that file-sharing is wrong. I feel somewhat the same about software. The only time morality kicks in is when I'm using someone's software to make money - I feel a strong sense to pay for it then.

While I wouldn't sneak in to a concert since I feel that's wrong, I don't feel the same way about downloading illegal mp3s. Why? I don't know. It's very confusing to live in the modern world, and I don't have a good answer as to why I feel this way about digital 'property', IP, etc.

The expected "winnings" from Downloading

[CodeBuster]

I thought that it would be interesting if someone from the Slashdot community took it upon themselves to compute the net benefit which the downloaders accrue given that they have some probability 'P' of being selected by the RIAA for a lawsuit which they can settle for a loss of $3000. It should be possible, in principle, to compute for a given probability 'P' of being sued by the RIAA how many songs (at $0.99 per song as per the iTunes rate) one should be willing to risk downloading before the total 'winnings' (the money saved by NOT paying for the songs) exactly balances the expected losses from being sued by the RIAA. We will make a few assumptions in order to simplify our mathematical model...

1. Let us assume that all users on the file sharing networks are equally likely to be targeted by an RIAA lawsuit (in reality this would probably be a function of the number of songs shared, they artists and genres of the songs shared, and the amount of bandwidth devoted to sharing them out). Let this probability equal 'P'.

2. Suppose that the RIAA can sue no more than 1500 people per year (this is probably being generous).

3. Suppose that there are approximately 3.5 million users engaged in file sharing on the various networks at any given second (this is probably a lower bound and the actual number is probably much higher). Now the probability of being sued by the RIAA, assuming that all users are equally likely to be sued, is 1000/3.5 million or approximately 0.003% chance.

Let the expected losses (per year) from continuing to download be P multiplied by 3,000 which is the amount that it will cost to settle in the event that you are sued. Thus the expected losses to the RIAA for each year that you continue to download are only $8.57
which means that if you were planning on downloading more than 8.65 songs per year then your expected savings over paying the $0.99 fee per song on a service like iTunes makes it worth your while.

Now for a few caveats...I do not advocate the steeling of intellectual property music or otherwise and the above should be treated as a simple (and possibly flawed) look at the mathematics of downloading stripped of any moral pretense or consequence. However, even given the crudity of this analysis it is possible to draw a few conclusions...

1. The RIAA lawsuits will probably discourage the small time downloaders and the basically honest people from using the file sharing networks to get free music, but these users are probably in the minority anyway (most people share at about 100 songs).

2. hard core downloaders are not likely to be dissuaded unless the probability of being sued or the amount of the damages or both significantly increase.

3. The RIAA cannot sue everyone so there will always be an equilibrium whereby a user downloads and shares just enough songs not to get noticed so that his expected winnings precisely balance his expected losses.

Re:When will the backlash come?

[fustercluck2k3]

RIAA isn't an LE agency per se but they sure do act like one and government has only been too happy to allow it. Maybe you missed it but the entertainment industry is now dictating what gets taught in school.

http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articl es /2004/04/25/laying_down_the_copyright_law____to_ch ildren?pg=full

http://p2pnet.net/story/1309

Law Students

[TejWC]

Why is the RIAA suing Brown and Princeton students? What if they end up suing a law student?

Re:When will the backlash come?

[Shakrai]

Are you seriously that daft? They aren't going for the ones that download a song here or there...they're going after the ones with lots of songs available, downloading, uploading...

No, are you seriously that daft? I don't care who they are going after. My point is that even if they catch somebody who was sharing thousands of songs what kind of fucking evidence do they have that they themselves did not obtain?

My whole point (if you had bothered to read it) was that more likely then not any evidence they have they themselves collected. It's hardly impartial third-parties scanning the p2p networks looking for violators.

Picture this:
RIAA Expert Witness: I detected IP address xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx on Kazaa. When I scanned the computer it had X number of copyrighted RIAA songs up for download.
RIAA Lawyer: And you downloaded some of them?
RIAA Expert Witness: Yes, I downloaded the latest Dido song and as you all know that song was published by Arista records who holds the copyright.
RIAA Lawyer: So this person was sharing copyrighted music?
RIAA Expert Witness: That's right.
RIAA Lawyer: I have nothing further for this witness.
Defense Attorney: Who do you work for?
RIAA Expert Witness: I work for such-and-such a company.
Defense Attorney: What does your company do?
RIAA Expert Witness: We scan the P2P networks looking for copyrighted material that belongs to our clients
Defense Attorney: Who are your clients?
RIAA Expert Witness: RIAA, MPAA, etc etc
Defense Attorney: Do we have any evidence besides your good word that my client was actually sharing these songs?
RIAA Expert Witness: We have the IP address and we downloaded sever...
Defense Attorney (cutting him off): So all this evidence was gathered by your company, correct?
RIAA Expert Witness: Yes, you could say that.
Defense Attorney: And your company provides this service to RIAA as a courtsey?
RIAA Expert Witness: No, we are compensenated for it.
Defense Attorney: So it's fair to say that RIAA pays your salary?
RIAA Expert Witness: Well I wouldn't exactly say th...
Defense Attorney (cutting him off): Right, we'll get back to that. Tell me, what actual evidence do you have that my client was the one sharing those songs? Isn't it possible that you got the wrong address or that someone else was using his computer?
RIAA Expert Witness: It's possible but it's not very...
Defense Attorney (cutting him off): Thank you. Is it possible for somebody to hack a computer on the Internet and use it to relay copyrighted material to P2P networks?
RIAA Expert Witness: Yes it's possible but again...
Defense Attorney (cutting him off): Yes and if the computer was hacked and used in this manner would it appear to your software that it was my client sharing the copyrighted material or the person who hacked his computer?
RIAA Expert Witness: It would appear to be your client.
Defense Attorney: Thank you. Now, about that IP address -- has your company ever provided the wrong address to RIAA?
RIAA Expert Witness: Not to my knowledge.
Defense Attorney: Really? What about this case [hands him newspaper article about 90 year old woman who was subpenoed] -- would you read that to the jury please?

Blah blah blah. I think you see where I am going. It would be interesting to see. All the power to the people who are fighting these suits. Whether or not file sharing is legal, moral, or whatnot, I won't support an industry that sues broke college students and 13 year old children. I bought my last piece of RIAA music when they filed the first round of lawsuits.

Suing Downloaders or Uploaders?

[MrSin]

The way I understand it, they go after the uploaders NOT the downloaders right? If you share a bunch of stuff, you are a target. If you are a supernode, you are a target. But what if you bought pre-purchased music? Here in the Phx area we have several places that 'resell' music. You get yer old CDs and sell them to this place, which then resells them. Crap, that's 2 transactions RIGHT THERE that the RIAA didn't get their cut of. Why aren't they goin' after those stores? The stores are 'stealing' from the RIAA too aren't they? So, with this logic, I can go buy a CD at a re-sell shop, copy it, then re-sell it back to the same store. Sure, I'm gonna be out a difference of like $5, but that's sure cheaper than any online music store AND the RIAA gets zip of my cash.

this has got to stop and this is why....

[MoFoQ]

this really has to stop. 2,454 lawsuits, none go through, but it still, it means that the courts have to process not just the initial suits, but also the settlements. That takes time away from more deserving cases including tyco, enron, worldcom, reliant/dynergy (in california), etc. (the civil suits that is). It's a waste of taxpayers money to do this. And using public resources to further one's bottomline is suppose to be a no-no. Of course the old argument that this is a form of extortion; the fact that the whole and sole intent of filing the lawsuit is to intimidate and force those who don't have an army of lawyers at their disposal nor the law-savy to know that they have rights, pretty much get defrauded.

And another, just because they settle the civil suit doesn't mean smooth sailing from that point on. There's still the risk of a criminal suit if an "anonymous informant" gives the feds the info, in which case, the Recording Industry Ass. of America can and might get some more money. Double jeopardy in their favor (or lack there of).

In essence, you can actually categorize the Recording Industry Ass. of America as a terrorist organization. Webster's dictionary defines terrorism as "the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion." Using a threat of legal action against defenseless, unexpecting individuals with an army of lawyers definitely qualifies as inducing terror as a means to coerce or to extort. Hell, I prefer the mob over the Recording Industry Ass. of America. At least they don't target 12yr-old girls. That's low; lower than Hamas in some ways. (I won't use Michael Jackson to compare and contrast....as the saying goes "innocent until proven guilty* *-Unless you don't have millions for an army of lawyers") To target kids with lawsuits, the old addage, "taking candy from a baby" comes to mind and it's not right.

At least the RIAA has finally shown its true colors. Wait until they sue someone who died while serving their country (or a person in a coma); there will be hell to pay then. I hope that the politicians (especially those facing re-election) finally set up to the plate and condemn them and start passing more strict (or start enforcing existing) laws that prohibit using lawsuits or the threat of such with the sole intent to settle, which amount to a form of extortion.

MUTE is the way to go!

[Anonymous Coward]

http://mute-net.sourceforge.net

It protects your privacy and makes it hard for anyone to know where a file is coming from. You do sacrifice some speed for privacy, but you can't have everything.

There's versions for Linux, Mac OS and Windows.

And just a suggestion, if you really want your privacy, you better start running Linux.

(and the text based xfer is base 64 so it adds about 1/8 extra data to a file and allows packets to pass through other nodes easily since everything is passed within the network protocol)

Re:Protect yourself, use MUTE

[Anonymous Coward]

Anonymous servers aren't the answer. Boycott all of their contents is the answer. When in doubt, don't listen to the music. It's not like your life depends on it.

Re:When will the backlash come?

[Jim Starx]

There's a guy in Montanna named Jack Ass, he sued MTV for defaming his good character. He wants 10 million.

A woman in West Virginia got 2 million for injuring her back while opening a pickle jar.

How about the lawsuits against fast food companies for making people fat?

A volenteer little league baseball coach was sued by the catchers father because the team didn't qualify for a tournament in Florida.

A high school pitcher is suing Louisville Slugger because he was hit in the head when.......
.......
wait for it...
.......
The batter hit the ball!! God forbid we design something that makes the sport fucking possible!

Your right, I was completely wrong to assume that those lawsuits were frivolous....