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RIAA Sues Woman Who Has Never Used a Computer
boarder8925 writes "Marie Lindor, a home health aide who has never bought, used, or even turned on a computer in her life, was sued by the RIAA in Brooklyn federal court for using an 'online distribution system' to 'download, distribute, and/or make available for distribution' plaintiff's music files. She has requested a pre-motion conference in anticipation of making a summary judgment motion dismissing the complaint and awarding her attorneys fees under the Copyright Act."
Doesn't this prove something about the RIAA's investigative methods? Let's assume that the woman is telling the truth, she has in fact never touched a computer in her life, therefore she has not downloaded the music in question. Meaning she has been FALSLY IDENTIFIED by the RIAA's investigative methods (whatever those may consist of).
My question is, now that this obvious inconsistency has been exposed, what does this mean to those that have already been convicted? Isn't it to say, if you incorrectly fingered this woman as a pirate, how can you prove that you accurately identified me as a pirate?
Maybe she is 80 years old. Personal computers started to become practical when she turned 60. She has always been a Home Health Aide, and has never had to fill out an online timesheet or purchase order.
I am sure there are lots of people like that out there, just that us geeks are not aways aware of them.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Can this work? The entire request to dismiss the case was one paragraph, with only one sentence stating that the defendant never used a computer. Wouldn't some investigation or proof be required in order for a case to be dismissed?
This just goes to show you the great lengths to which the RIAA will go to protect their interests and punish those who violate the law.
The RIAA will not be distracted by 'facts' or other nonsense in its relentless pursuit of justice!
"customer": 'but I've never even used a computer!'
RIAA: 'la la la - I can't hear you!'
Steve
Yeah but when they come to break down your door they need a geographic address, not an IP address -- presumably the address you signed up for your ISP with. So most likely the actual pirate here signed up for an ISP using her home address and name.
How many times have they said "Well if you don't want to get sued, don't download music!" Explain that statement, in light of THIS!
I hope the court really slaps them one over this. It's clearly shown that they're not doing the most basic of fact-checking. (I mean, come on now, for godsakes, a dead woman, and now someone who's never used a computer at all?) Where did they pull the IP address out of -this- time? (Never mind, I don't want to know.) This is a massive waste of her time and that of the court, and I hope they get slapped with a good bit worse then attorney's fees. All their suits should be dismissed with prejudice after this garbage.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
This lawsuit must just be a mistake since the lady never used a computer. If that's the case, why is this even newsworthy? They probably just messed up. It happens. That's what independant judicial system is there for.
No Sigs!
Okay, did I read the correct story? So she may have never used a computer, but I assume she is paying for the cable or dsl service that is likely attached to her television or phone bill? Or a child used her credit card to open an AOL account... And that there is someone in her household who uses the internet she is paying for to share music on p2p? That happens all the time in these cases. A kid shares the music and the parent is blissfully ignorant. The way the blurb is phrased sounds like it was written by Pravda. Is there another article with more details?
Here is an article that describes recent news in that case:
http://www.forbes.com/business/energy/feeds/ap/20
However her defense has changed slightly:Ah, yes... the old "it's the fault of a file-sharing program for allowing them to do it" defense. I wonder how well that one will fly.
Apparently Santangelo is receiving all kinds of donations from big hearted Internet file traders but frankly it looks like money down the drain to me. There is no way she is going to win when she's already basically admitting that she failed to supervise her kids and their friends when they were using her computer.
As far as this new case, who wants to bet that it won't turn out the same way? The lady maybe never touched the computer, but what about the kids? She's responsible for their actions! Saying "I didn't do it" won't help if it's your kids, like what appears to be the case with Santangelo.
Oh, that is simple. The RIAA imagines that everyone uses a computer and shares music, and is therefore a thief. And when they have convinced themselves of that, they just have to open the phonebook and pick any name to sue.
"How they managed to find this woman and sue her is beyond me..."
Probably one of her kids, or somebody in her hourse, was doing the actual file trading, and this woman's name happens to be on the cable or phone bill.
Sitting in my day care, the art is decopainted.
"i'm assuming she doesn't have broadband either. what ip address did they use to find her? just goes to show how stupid these lawsuits are."
A much more likely scenario is that somebody else in her household was doing the file trading, and her name happened to be on the cable or phone bill. It's a very common scenario for the cable or phone bill to be in the name of an adult (typically a parent or guardian), while a child or teenager uses the Internet connection to do something the parent/guardian doesn't know about. Might be downloading porn, might be sharing MP3 files. But it happens... a lot.
Sitting in my day care, the art is decopainted.
Sounds like some one in her home used her name/credit to buy Net Access leading them to sue her rather than whoever used the computer. Or perhaps this is a case of an identity thef!
It is also of course factually wrong that she has never used a computer. People use them all the them. There are embedded system in microwaves, ovens, washing machines, medical devices, etc. It would be impossible for anyone but the Unibomber to have never used anything that contained a computer... of course they mean personal computer/PC.. well, they should say that..
http://www.hawknest.com/
Agreed.
it's legal system
"its".
This is pure brilliance! It's a dictionary spam mail attack with lawyers to back you up. Fantastic business model.
It's like selling Cialis tabs/ Pen1s enlargement pills except the potential upside is much higher.
I mean normally you're going to sic your lawyers on the spammers, but now our lawyers ARE the spammer (no Soviet Russia gags please).
Put the RIAA on the NO SPAM list and you'll be fine.... or did I miss something?
29 mpg. YMMV.
Parents are liable for the behavior of their minor children. In your strawman case, the parents can, in fact, be sued for negligence.
Yes, but that's because the parent has not been performing their duty of care - an offence for which they would probably be found guilty in my hypothetical. My point is that they are not guilty of the offence the child committed.
If the police wanted to prosecute Ms Santangelo for negligance for allowing her child to use the internet unsupervised, that's one thing; but for the RIAA to be able to successfully sue her for Copyright Infringement, an offence she didn't commit, is another thing entirely, and wrong.
Remember kids, it's all fun and games until someone commits wholesale galactic genocide.
You can sue anybody for just about anything, however it doesn't mean you will win.
I'm starting to think the RIAA "investigators" pick people at random from the phone book or something and the only reason there aren't more cases like this is because almost everybody is using P2P.
No sig today...
it doesn't matter.
RIAA doesn't sue people for the money.
It doesn't even sue people to get them to stop doing whatever they are supposedly doing.
They sue them for the publicity.
This is worse than mere barratry: the more outrageous the abuse of the legal system, the more it suits there purpose. They'd send a spurious C&D to a deaf vegan paraplegic nun who runs a homeless shelter, if they could find one. In fact, brazenly baseless accusations are better than substantive ones; it gets the point across without the expense of a trial.
They're trying to establish a reputation like the La Cosa Nostra. And they want to use that reputation exactly the same way: to create de facto privileges that do not exist de jure, e.g. "You don't want to park there, that's Vinnie the Hatchet's spot."
And you can't call them to task for their misappropriation of state machinery to despoil private individuals of their fundamental human right to be left alone; not without talking about it, which is exactly what they want you to do.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Kind of like the old adage that goes something like "Discipline your child often. Even if you don't know what they did, they do." And no, I have no children. Yet. But it would seem clear that the RIAA really needs to look over their methods for collecting evidence. Didn't they end up suing a supposedly innocent Mac-user once, because they didn't realize that on a DSL or Cable subscription, you have dynamic IP? Maybe they need to be taught that *everybody* do not have computers, and *everybody* with computers are not using them to l33ch mp3s.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
In the old days people had a way of dealing with people like the RIAA execs. They grabbed them, stripped them, beat them, coated them in tar and feathers. In other words they made a public example of them to discourage other similar-thinking assholes from doing the same thing. Are we too civilized for that today?
Although the production quantities and profit have gone up for the farming conglomorates (from our moddern food production system), there is growing evidence that we are in essence poisoning ourselves. As an example, cows are fed steroids and antibiotics and these are then found in the milk. While this is good for the profits of large corporations, it doesn't do us any good. We can already produce more food than we can eat.
So, the RIAA is able to control music production to their own enrichment. The cost that we are paying is that the human spirit, the soul, the whole reason humans make music in the first place is lost. In other words: the music supply is poisoned.
The solution is to support free-range artists...
If you think imaginary property and real property are the same, when does your house become public domain?
With modern animal husbandry techniques, we now keep the animals penned and well fed, control their breeding, and we wind up with cows who have easily 50 times the milk production of medieval cows.
There is one problem with your analogy. The cows in this case aren't the musicians, they're the consumers. The RIAA wants to keep consumers penned in and forced to listen to radio stations they control, to watch music television they control, and to buy CDs at record stores they control. We are the cows that can't be trusted to make decisions on our own.
"That said, it's amazing how many slashdotters think that playing dumb and ignorant of the contextual or common meaning of a word or phrase makes them appear really smart."
:)
True but it allows the discussion to wander into how many embedded devices there are and what is meant by the meaning of use.
Then you have the other people saying this person or that person doesn't use devices that have embedded cpus in them which then leads to what do you mean by use.
Do you use the CPU in the stop light when you drive?... Oh never mind but good point
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
F*** the political correctness BS. That's probably the single biggest reason America is declining as much as it is today. If people would replace their PC attitude with some good old fashioned common sense (and the occasional tar-and-feathering of idiots who don't use common sense), this world would be a much better place.
I'm sorry, but I have a hard time saying two people pointing guns at each other makes them "men". It makes them idiots.
You want to be really manly, and slightly less idiotic? Throw a punch. Using a gun is for pussies -- even more so than hiding behind a lawyer.
RIAA needs to get an life and better investigators. This is like sueing Stevie Wonder for driving under influence.
Now that the US Supreme Court is completely tilted towards corporate interests for the next decade or two, maybe you shouldn't have been modded Funny, but Scary. I wouldn't bet against these idiots machinating the kind of farcical logic you've jokingly applied.
Remember how just last week, right in the midst of the Alito rubber-stamp hearings, some justices were caught red-handed feeding from the corporate tit. All-expenses-paid trips for Scalia, a twenty thousand dollar bible for Scalia sidekick Thomas, among many other things. By the way, the retort was that the justices were not breaking the law, as the rules do not apply to justices the way they apply for congressmen.
Therefore, all the RIAA has to do is pay for Alito's golf club membership and voilá!, this lady will have to pay damages for not downloading music, therefore causing distress to the corporations by screwing with their methods for collecting revenue via litigation.
Oh (insert your favorite deity here), I need a drink...
Lil' Thindime, lilting a lacrimose lament, krashes the kwaint konfines of Kokonino Kounty