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RIAA Grinds Down Individuals in the Courtroom
Iphtashu Fitz writes "The Associated Press recently reviewed many of the copyright infringement lawsuits that the RIAA filed against individuals charged with illegally sharing songs on P2P networks. According to the article over 800 of the targeted individuals have settled for approx. $3000 in fines. One man in California had to refinance his house to pay his $11,000 settlement. Many of the defendants are unwilling to face the possibility of even higher fines by fighting the suits in court despite the fact that it could resolve important questions about copyrights and the industry's methods for tracing illegal downloads. It seems that even some of the judges presiding over these cases question the RIAA's tactics. 'I've never had a situation like this before, where there are powerful plaintiffs and powerful lawyers on one side and then a whole slew of ordinary folks on the other side,' said U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner, who blocked the movement of a number of these cases in her courtroom for months. She wanted 'to make sure that no one, frankly, is being ground up.'"
Let me re-state what I've said before: If you do not agree with what RIAA is doing, stop supporting it. Sadly, this means stop supporting artists affiliated to it. Quit cold turkey. Do not buy their CDs. Do not attend their concerts. Do not request their songs on the radio. And do not download/share their songs on the Internet.
Go on and protest their actions. The louder, the better. But stop supporting them, or your cries will fall on deaf ears.
No sig
I wonder if it is legally possible to mount a class-action defense? The defendants could then pool their resources for lawyerage, expert witnesses, etc. If a class of parties can act as a plaintiff, why can't a similar structure be used in defense?
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
The sad thing, I think, is that those of us who would be brave enough to stand up in court aren't participating in the types of activities likely to get them targeted.
A lot of the people who are doing this probably don't own copies of the songs to begin with, which makes it tough for them to stand up for themselves.
What really needs to happen is that someone with an extensive music collection, and the desire to fight this, needs to leave various P2P applications open 24/7 with access to their vast, legal music collection, so that someone will notice.
'I've never had a situation like this before, where there are powerful plaintiffs and powerful lawyers on one side and then a whole slew of ordinary folks on the other side,' said U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner
the honourable Nancy Gertner has presided over, by her own admission, numerous drug related trials. US government vs crack addicts seems pretty similar to me.
Get some money hungry lawyers (I know, redundant), to start representing these guys and make a show out of it.
Blech, never mind. It's the diet pepsi talking.
This is all to common a theme these days. People are unwilling to stand up against tyranny, which is exactly what this legal campaign is. It's very similar, IMO, to the racketeering of DirecTV against people who had purchased smart card programming equipment.
If people would take a stand against the RIAA/MPAA when it comes a-knocking, a lot of light would be shed on their lair of demons. As said by the original poster, this would be a great chance to publically question the (RI|MP)AA about their calculations and figured, and tactics, and have the answers on record. Even if the individual being sued had a judgement made against him/her, I do not believe it would be anywhere near what the desired settlement would be, and it would finally set a precedence for limiting what could be sought in future cases.
If no one stands up against them, they will continue to rape and pillage the consumer. Think about "A Bug's Life,"; the RIAA/MPAA grasshoppers NEED us ants, and they KNOW we are strong and outnumber them, but somehow they are able to bully us into submission.
Shouldn't it be up to the people to decide the laws, not organizations? When did it come to organizations, companies, being more powerful than the government? The government is suppose to be by, for, and of the People.
if you're going to trumpet Brian Martin's work, do it with a link and a few excerpts.
Against Intellectual Property, Chapter 3 of Information Liberation by Brian Martin
If it is illegal, then I would like to see them doing this in criminal court. I would bet that the jury would asked for $20 fine per CD and done with this.
Posting to Slashdot while driving is also illegal in some states.
As part of a fair trial, wouldn't the RIAA have to supply a list of the songs it accuses you of downloading? If so, one could go to the store and buy the songs before the trial. Lose the receipts so there's no correlation between the trial date and the date you downloaded the song. Then in court, you prove to the RIAA you already owned copies of the songs.
Better yet, go to a used record store and save some money in the process!
Don't confuse what is legal and what is right. It would have been illegal for my ancestor's slaves to run away or disobey (I happen to be a distant descendant of a very wealthy slave trader), but that doesn't make it wrong.
Is that the sort of "class defense" you had in mind?
Here's what I do: Bitty Browser & Andromeda
I've never had a situation like this before, where there are powerful plaintiffs and powerful lawyers on one side and then a whole slew of ordinary folks on the other side.
I guess she's never worked in criminal court.
And if they loose, the each member of the class could provide a coupon to the RIAA for $5 off a CD...
I am so happy to see that fine, upstanding corporate citizens such as the RIAA, are finally having their day in court. Our society will never be able to progress and move forward until the plebeian consumers finally understand their proper place in society. This example serves to prove why corporations should finally be given the right to vote in elections, according to how much money they attribute to the economy. Only when the corporations move forward, can the rest of our society follow.
OK, here's my little mini-rant on the topic of legal protection and public health care.
Nowhere in the Constitution of the United States or the amendments thereto is there a guarantee for health insurance. Or a guarantee that the government will take care of your doctor and drug bills when you get old. Nowhere. Go, read it, I'll wait.
Done? OK, but you'll notice in several places a reference to "equal protection under the law".
Don't socialize medicine. Socialize the legal profession. There's a constitutional basis for it, or at least more of a constitutional basis for it than socializing medicine. Give everyone equal protection in a court of law, something these people (and people accused of drug offenses) don't have.
Let's have lawyers like the Canadians have doctors. Let's have Johnnie Chochran representing some rich white kid who downloaded music from whatever kids are downloading with these days, and let's have it cost him absolutely nothing.
Bring it on mods.
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
CD sales are down...the RIAA is in panic mode. Many people already HAVE stopped supporting them which is why they're suing people left and right.
The cat is out of the bag...the horse has left the barn....the _________(insert favorite metaphor here). The MP3 Genie is out and they can't put it back in. Sorry, but it's a losing battle.
The industry will change...this is a fact. The RIAA doesn't like this because they're basically going to stop making the huge mark-up on the CD/Record Market they had cornered. But their monopoly is crumbling, and it's crumbling more and more as the day wears on. Their trying to plug the leaks but the whole dam is falling all around them.
Is this good or bad? I honestly don't know, but it's going to be an interesting thing to witness! We've seen it many times in the past here, when a business is failing, the last-ditch effort is to issue lawsuits.
Want to support a band/artist? Go see them in concert OR send money to them directly...and I mean directly TO them...not to the management/record company. Will people send off a check to Chili-Peppers? Don't know, stranger things have happened.
"Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it." - John Lennon.
Don't like the RIAA's tactics? Don't like how they rip off artists and sue their customers? Then don't buy from them. It's simply not that hard- buy used CDs if you must, get freely downloadable music from any of a dozen sources, go listen to a local unsigned band and buy their CDs. I've bought exactly one RIAA album in the last three years, and that was because I was curious about iTunes. I still get to listen to interesting new stuff all the time.
As far as file sharing, folks, as the law as written, file sharing of copyrighted works is illegal. No matter how you spin it (It's not theft, it's not wrong...), it's still illegal. If you think this is wrong, you have two options
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
For speeding, (which is arguably a more serious offense than file sharing because lives are put at risk) we have a system where people are caught and given a ~$100 fine on the spot. They can choose to drag it out in court later, but most don't.
Some items:
Cars have license plates. Likewise, IP addresses shouldn't necessarily be deep secrets. Put in place a system for instant subpoena of a suspected offending IP to obtain the user account.
Only cops hand out traffic tickets. Likewise, a copyright holder would have to work through law enforcement authorities to initiate any action against suspected violators. Remove all civil liability for small-time file sharing; make it purely a petty misdemeanor. An enforcement officer would verify that the copyrighted files in question were indeed available on the IP address in the complaint.
To prevent abuse of the above system, the suspected account owner would need to be notified in real time whenever such a subpoena is issued. This would detail who was requesting the IP address info and what for. This would be similar to the speeding system, where you usually can plainly see the police car with the radar on the side of the road once you get close enough.
If the suspected activity is confirmed, law enforcement authorities would mail out a ticket for ~$100. The fine would provide the funds to pay for this system. If the suspected infringer voluntarily pays the fine, it's the end of the story.
If the suspected infringer goes to court to defend himself and is found to have been falsely accused, they would be eligible for compensation of ~$5000 from the accuser. This would prevent excessive abuse from the **AA.
I think that this kind of system would essentially halt illegal file sharing (at least within the borders of a single country) without causing undue stress on anyone or violating too many civil rights. To me it makes a lot more sense than trying to make examples by handing out harsh punishments to a small handful of unlucky suspects.
The Insurance might decline certain cases for example for gross misconduct but usually you've got some support when needed, typically for less than 50 Euros per year.
In cases like this it is not uncommon for such insurances to bundle their efforts, sometimes including consumer organisations, to get a more fundamental ruling.
Of course littigation on the scale we now see in the USofA is not (yet) as common/rampant in Europe.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
...who just happens to be a real successful lawyer or have a lot of friends in the EFF or something, and it'll be interesting. They keep on throwing these lawsuits out helter skelter, and it's obvious they're not doing a lot of research about it (remember when they sued an 11 year old or something?). Eventually they'll hit somebody who'll fight back.
Here's a report that says "Nielsen Rating System At Odds With RIAA's Claim Of Lost Sales".
Here's a report that states "downloads have an effect on sales which is statistically indistinguishable from zero".
truth and justict for those who can pay for it...
but he DOES NOT call for the removal of credit and the lineage of knowledge. you are blinded by your hatred of corporate greed, which is understandable, but what you fail to take into account is that knowledge is cumulative, and that hard work should be acknowledged. Martin is not so much of a fool as to believe that authors should not be credited with their creation. his argument is against their creations, the knowledge that they provide, is held from those who need it most using corporate funded law to enhance PROFIT. he has nothing against recognition.
There are several thousand cases now to analyze. If the RIAA is actually selecting poorer than avarage plantiffs (as some here have alledged), this will show quickly in proper statistical analysis (plot the location of the plantiff on a map, look in the government's poverty index to see what the average inocome in that location is, assign points to an appropriate scale, i.e. 1 point/1,000 $ US).
If it's there, and can be statistically proven, the next step is to tell the media the RIAA is selectively targeting poor people. A good strong piece of evidence, like RIAA plantiffs averageing 20% below median income, deserves a nice simple "National Enquirer" type headline, like "RIAA out to crush the working class", don't you think? Offer the press a chance for one like that, and some of them will bite.
While you're at it you could analyze those plantiffs on ethnic lines if they are willing to share the data. If the RIAA has selectively targeted poor people, it would be very hard for them to avoid having selectively targeted minorities at the same time, although they could possibly have deliberately thrown out a percentage of minority cases to avoid the appearance. I'd suggest if this proves fruitful, rather than contacting the media directly with the allegation that the RIAA is selectively targeting black people, you let the NAACP bring the allegation, as in such case, there WILL be a class action countersuit filed, but it will have 22,000,000 members.
Of course, it's possible there is no consistant pattern. In this case, wait until a couple of months go by where the numbers of plantiffs that are poor or minority is statistically high, and then make the claim "In recent months, the RIAA has switched tactics, to selectively target poorer people."
Who is John Cabal?
Yep, really fair and balanced legal system im seeing here. This is a fucking disgrace, guilty murderers have had more legal support.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
So at a time when they're suing thousands of their own customers...not a good business strategy IMHO...they're also cranking out really boring, insanely depressing music that all sounds like it was stamped out with an audio cookie cutter.
If this keeps up they'll have to give up the cocaine, private jets and porn star girlfriends! I'm having a hard time working up any sympathy for them.
So, yeah, hit them back in the wallet. Go out and sample free downloads, there are thousands of legal songs you can check out. Here are a couple links to get you started:
You can also shop at used CD stores. The only way you're going to get them to change is to stop buying their crap.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
One recurring theme is powerful well-funded RIAA pursuing individuals who are forced to settle in order to avoid worse consequences.
Question:
is there any such thing as a "reverse class-action"?
IOW, is there any way that multiple defendants can gather and force RIAA to pursue them all as one joint defendant, so that they could pool their defensive resources?
If you can not pay for court expenses, at least make sure you install PeerGuardian or Protowall or make sure that at least you have a firewall to drop the ip ranges of anti-p2p organization.
The issue is that the RIAA is the one fucking up normal citizens' lives for no reason other than to buy time for a failing business model. If you disagree with this, it is not a good idea to continue to hand them money with which to do this: instead, you ought to boycott them.
I've been doing this for some time now, and there's quite a bit of non-RIAA music well worth listening to. Metropolis Records is a good place to start for industrial/EBM fans.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
The point is not that the people being sued probably were committing acts illegal where they lived. The point is that a massive organization is steamrolling over individuals to make an impression, whereas those individuals would never have bought for example, enough music to refinance their house, etc. The RIAA is also doing things which they didn't used to do 10 or 20 years ago, when people recorded a lot of their music off the radio as one poster mentioned.
I don't buy RIAA music, haven't since I noticed the price of CDs in the stores was getting intolerable, this was 15 years ago. Somehow though I don't think removing one customer from their market is going to make a big dent.
Look, they're asking for it. This wave of litigation against individuals seems like a first for the judge because usually, customers don't tolerate that kind of shit. The RIAA believes it can get away with it and continue to feed you shit at high prices and you will continue to buy it. They are DARING you to fight back. Think about it.
So what else can you do? Well, if you are in business you could financially support non-RIAA or anti-RIAA bands, stations, software, or organziations. If you are in the prime RIAA demographic you can work hard to get all of your friends to stop buying RIAA music (especially the ones who are visible about it).
Ad agencies are beginning to realize the P2P type social networking (not just Internet-based, think word of mouth) gets much higher quality candidates (potential customers) than ordinary advertising. This can be turned around on the RIAA and suitable software / funding could magnify it. I think the iPod thing at Duke is fantastic. Now think of how to ensure that those iPods could massively reduce the amount of income the RIAA would get from that University, think and do something about it.
I don't buy RIAA music. I do like to watch live concerts on TV, and sometimes like what I hear on the radio (though I don't hear much of that either these days). These days cellphone subscriptions are starting to have a very large effect on record companies by removing disposable income from young people that would have gone to the RIAA. I am not for promoting illegal activities. I do see though a very unsettling trend of corporations taking over America (and elsewhere) and believe that litigation by the RIAA against potential customers , and the media slant on the affair (well there is a law against it so..) is a symptom of that.
The RIAA is within its legal rights at the moment to take these kinds of actions. It think it will be interesting to see their response if their customers exercise their legal rights to not purchase, to publicize, to organize, and to legally foment discord and financial destruction in the RIAA. Perhaps a good first plan of attack is to create a fund to hire artists away from the RIAA.
Remember, it is a lot like smoking. Every time you buy an RIAA product, you are saying "Thank you, please hit me again" to these nasty people. But the RIAA is always looking for new customers and new artists, every year. There is no reason why we couldn't start to put the pressure on them. Food for thought.
If someone that got sued by the RIAA came to slashdot and created a website to help with legal funds I wonder how much the /. crowd would raise for them?
Are we just talkers or can we each put a dollar where our mouths are?
I would think a donation thread and an advice thread WOULD help win a case against them.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
While I may be in the minority, I have done just that..
.. and better luck next time.
If I have downloaded some live show that I will listen to and feel is worth money, I send the ARTIST some cash..
If it wasn't worth any money to me, then I don't
And if decide its worth buying an actual studio CD from the artist, I refuse to fund groups that are with the RIAA, as they have alternative options now, and I support the groups that choose 'plan B'.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
With the RIAA suits, people are sued after someone allows pirated music to be downloaded from their computer.
With the DirecTV lawsuits, people are sued for merely possessing equipment that can be used for pirating DirecTV. Regardless of the spin DirecTV's lawyers like to put on it, the equipment people are being sued for truly has multiple purposes, some of which are legit. Rather than DirecTV being forced to prove you used it for piracy purposes, they drag you into court and you have to prove you didn't use it for piracy purposes.
The RIAA equivalent would be them sueing people who purchased DVD or CD burners stating the reason their lawsuit targets used them for piracy purposes. But with CD/DVD burners people, in general, understand them and know they have multiple purposes, many of which are legit. Judges/juries, in general, do not understand smartcard technology and DirecTV brings in dozens of "paid expert witnesses" who testify that the stuff is only good for pirating DirecTV. Sure, you can bring in your own expert witnesses who could show how full of crap DirecTV is, but it will cost you tens of thousands of dollars, at a minimum to get to that point. No wonder that people, even the few innocent ones (e.g., they bought it but never ended up using it for piracy purposes for whatever reason [e.g., changed their mind, too hard to figure out how to use, etc.]), settle for $5K instead of fighting it; it's a matter of simple economics.
Are most people who get sued by the RIAA guilty? I'd definitely say "Yes".
Are most people who get sued by DirecTV guilty? Again, I'd definitely say "Yes".
Have most people who have purchased DVD or CD burners used them to pirate a DVD-Video or a CD? I'd unquestionably say "Yes". So would it be fair for the MPAA or RIAA to just "carpet bomb" or "blanket sue" everyone who has purchased a CD or DVD burner because, in their opinion, 50, 60, or 90% of people who own them have used them at some point in the past to pirate music or a movie???
However, in the first case (RIAA), their is direct evidence you did it; they can download a song from you and verify it is actually copyrighted -- they actually "observe" you committing the illegal act. In the second case (DirecTV), there is normally no direct evidence you did it. And that's what makes what DirecTV does, de facto, illegal, but in civil court, the person with the biggest pockets always wins. And until DirecTV sues someone with big pockets, they'll continue to illegally sue people and there's not much anyone can do about it.
So what would I do? If I was going to buy a smartcard reader or a CD/DVD burner in 2004, I'd go down to the local store and pay cash for it. I wouldn't use anything like a credit card or my real name when I bought it. If I couldn't buy it local, I'd go to a WiFi hot-spot, sign up with a Hotmail account, use a fake name and have the stuff sent to a rented PO Box (signed up for using a fake name) and pay for the stuff with cash or a money order.
And if you are wondering why I'd do the above with a CD/DVD burner. It's because people, in general, aren't going ballistic at the methods DirecTV is using. People, in general, just sit their with their thumbs up their ass when they hear about this, shake their head at the bad satellite TV pirate, while they listen/watch to their pirate music/movie that's playing that they burned with their CD/DVD burner.
...this is how things often work in the legal world, now-a-days. Legal professionals want to go to court as only a last resort, for the simple and compelling reason that you don't know what could happen. The RIAA doesn't want to go to court, as it's worried that they will set a bad precedent for their legal racket. The defendant doesn't want to go to court because they could lose big time, and be forced in to bankruptcy.
The problem goes much further than this specific case--the legal system is broken and needs fixing. We've created this zero-sum game, forcing people to either settle early and choose their own destiny, or go to court and leave it up to no more than a coin flip.
Thing is, under the current system, I'd advise my clients to do the same thing. Settle and get on with their lives. Yes, we need a test case to set some precedent here, but I would not put any of my clients in that position unless they were adamant about it.
There's just too much risk and money involved with going to court, and, so, settlements are creating a practically private legal system with often confidential terms. What to do, what to do...
default judgmenets are where there is no response from the defendant, the plaintiff is usually awarded what they asked for.
Stop listening to crap ...
That would be a perfectly viable way of ending the reign of RIAA-led corporate terrorism in music, if a majority of music listeners were to join in and stop listening to the crap. As things stand though, 99% of the audience consists of musical sheep, ie. people who despite their good intentions follow exactly the instructions of the music industry in deciding what music is "good" at any given time. The vast majority simply don't realize what's being done to them. Brainwashing is not too strong a term.
It's pretty inevitable. Unless you shut yourself off totally from the media, you get enveloped in the utterly pervasive music machine's output of not just music and video, but celebrity, hype and buzz. You literally cannot avoid it, it's as sticky as napalm. Face it, there is no future in asking the 99% of musically non-militant people to cut themselves off from the media, not even to enter the shopping malls where that sticky music is playing. The brainwashing is everywhere.
That public rating idea is great, and if it were to catch on then it might even improve the quality of "big business music" through perceived audience pressure. But meanwhile, music downloaders are being crucified, and leaving them to it in the hope that a long-term strategy might prevail is less than charitable. Some sort of direct legal action or preventative technical solution offers better prospects for the short term.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
RIAA Radar is one of the utilities on the web you can use to avoid spending your money in ways that support the RIAA in favor of supporting artists who are not affiliated with the RIAA:
http://www.magnetbox.com/riaa/I suggest everyone check out the RIAA RADAR, It has a list of most artists and their releases, and tells you if the artists company is RIAA or not. Check it out at: http://www.magnetbox.com/riaa/
Enjoy!
"Comedy's a dead art form. Now tragedy, that's funny."
Unless of course, they are innocent. But that is just sophistry, as the RIAA is above reproach, and never makes mistakes.
> From the beginning of your post you aknowledge the fact, that the accused are responsible as the accusors charge. So why argue about the standard of proof at all?
Accused, when found guilty, are responsible for what they did. Untill they are found guilty, they are accused of, suspected of, but NOT GUILTY.
This is fundamental to how law and justice work.
You still have to prove an accusation, AND IF IT IS TRUE, you can hold the person responsible for it.
Those are really 2 independant things.
> Or do you, in fact, sincerely believe, that some of the people RIAA, who has targeted so far, are innocent?
I do not know, nor do you.
That is exactly why it has to be brought to the proper court with the proper kind of proof.
There is a very serious chance that there are people among those accused that did not do wrong, but simply cannot afford to fight the situation, even less so in the face of civil court with its low standards for proof.
> Or are you, perhaps, afraid, that RIAA (or MPAA) will, in the future use the same tactics to go after the much wider group of people, and there will be innocents there?
There is no reason to assume that it did not happen already, neither is there a reason to assume that it did. This is exactly why stricter levels of proof are required.
> That would be a legitimate concern, of course, but as long as it still costs RIAA more (in absolute terms) to wage each of these little battles, than it gets from the "victims" in settlements, there is no need to worry -- they are not making money off these settlements. They just want to scare people enough for the illegal downloads to stop.
As long as people have a big chance on losing regardless of being right or wrong, people are not going to fight it if they have a cheaper way out. This is directly frustrating the legal system and because of that an absolutely unacceptable practise.
There are working ways to deal with criminals that do not involve bullying people, scare tactics, frustrating the legal system etc. They should use those instead.
> Whether this is a wise plan or not should not concern us...
Yes it should, it undermines the legal system.
A very serious problem resulting from the RIAA way of doign things is the loss of proportionality in punnishment. Prop[ortionality is what makes that shoplifting is not punnished the same way as murder. It is extremely important that crimes that are coinsidered more serious are punnished in a more heavy way. What happens here is circumventing that alltogether.
The reason popular music is popular is because people happen to LIKE it.
The reason popular music is popular is because people have already heard it and are comfortable with repetition. Classical, Musicals, Big Band, Swing, Gospel, Rock, Punk, Metal, BoyBands: each generation did not morph into a new type of human being preferring a new type of music; each generation was indoctrinated by the music aimed at them during their formative years.
Today's popular music is simplistic compared to music before the rise of the guitar. Modern music is complex when it has 2 vocal melodies, 1 instrumental chord pattern, 1 instrumental melody, and a beat limited to what one person can create (hands doing one pattern and a single-note bass drum line.) Songs are limited to 3 minutes because there is not enough content to keep anybody interested longer. (I enjoy LinkinPark, but they usually turn off the music when they sing, and much of the "singing" does not have a melody.)
Today's music is not "better" than older material because it is more popular. It is popular because we hear it more often.
---
Please refrain from poorly written personal attacks. I do not know Morgaine, but the post was not "self-involved" and does not exclude Morgaine from the sheep category.
I spend my life entertaining my brain.
I think the RIAA is both Venue and Victim shopping to build enough precedent so they can survive a robust defense, which has to come along someday.
Bigger concern: Is the RIAA right? And I mean legally, not morally. Does internet file sharing constitute a valid example of "fair use" or not?
In the US legislation, the fair use defense is assessed on a case by case basis, weighing the four factors outlined in 17 USC section 107: (1) purpose and character of use, (2) nature of the work, (3) amount copied, and (4) market effects. Common examples of fair use are criticism, comment, education and research.
So if I own a guitar, can I call it a slam dunk and say: "I was learning those riff's, man... educational fair use!" ? Or how about "those words Eminem rapped really spoke to me... I LEARNED something about myself after that man... a truly educational experience."
If the rumors are true, and music sales are actually up (by some measures), then #4 goes out the window. Can the Record companies post a profit and still use the defense that the market is affected? If they can't when do the shareholders bail?
Lets face it: copying 100% of the work solely for personal listening pleasure so you don't have to purchase the work to begin with (in a market where Big Record Companies are losing their shirts) is a compelling case against an individual claiming "fair use." But that is spinning the case like the RIAA does every time they take on the little guy.
How exactly would Joe Sixpack defend himself? Maybe settling for $3000 is the smart play?
...But I digress. TREMBLE PUNY HUMANS!ONE DAY MY SPECIES WILL DESTROY YOU ALL!
You are looking at art as a method of deriving pleasure. By your definition only the fact that someone enjoys the art matters. Art to you is nothing more than a drug.
...
I am looking at art as something that can contain merit in and of itself. There is something that can constitute good art, and a person can spend their entire life just trying figure that out. Those persons get degrees in Literature, Music Theory,
It appears as though we have a difference of definitions. No conclusion can be reached in this argument. All I can argue in my favor is that the majority of people that really know art would strongly disagree with you.
A Usenet Troll Triumphs on Slashdot