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RIAA Wants to Depose Dead Defendant's Children
Exchange writes "In Michigan, in Warner Bros. v. Scantlebury, after learning that the defendant had passed away, the RIAA made a motion to stay the case for 60 days in order to allow the family time to "grieve", after which time they want to start taking depositions of the late Mr. Scantlebury's children. Recording Industry vs The People have more details"
The RIAA needs to lay off of the dead guy's kids. Seriously. He's DEAD, RIAA. What else could you want? A cookie?
Part of the inheritance, of course. The fact that they guy was rude enough to die before they could get to him doesn't change that he did grave damage to the coffers of the RIAA. Well, at least that's likely their thinking.
Army Attorney General Joseph Welch to Senator Joseph McCarthy, 6/9/54:
"Let us not assassinate this lad further, senator. You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"
Seriously. Why aren't the major news outlets making a big deal out of shit like this?
The truly sad part about this? It's not surprising at all.
My first reaction was, I guess if you've lost the trust of your customers you have nothing to lose.
But thinking about it, we aren't RIAA:s customers. Nothing any of us do or say will affect RIAA directly. Their customers as it were are the copyright holders, and their business is to maximize return to these people. The copyright holders (usually the recording companies) don't have us as customers either; their customers are radio and television stations and other broadcasters, and retail outlets from Amazon and Wal-Mart to record stores to gasoline stations.
They provide content produced by artists - and it's the artists we are customers for. We don't go to Amazon to buy the latest Sony Music album, we go to buy AC/DC (or Jessica Simpson, or Luis Armstrong, whatever your taste is).
It's this disconnect that keeps RIAA in business. We don't connect their actions with our favourite artists. The artists, in turn, have little incentive, and a huge downside, to raising their voice (most are, after all, not big enough to actually influence their company). The recording companies have no incentive to change RIAA's actions from their customers (Amazon et al) since those customers don't feel any backlash from us either.
The solution? I don't see one. In my case it has gradually soured me on music altogether. I haven't bought a CD in years - but neither have I downloaded anything either. Most people will never make any emotional connection between music and this legal harassment, however, and so RIAA will never have a reason to change.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
You realize of course, the context of the "kill the lawyers" quote is that the act of killing all the lawyers would aid in the establishment of a tyrannical reign. In other words, Shakespeare was saying that in some way, there are lawyers who protect freedom.
True, some lawyers work for the RIAA. By the same token, some programmers make spam software. Most lawyers don't work for the RIAA and many work for people's freedoms. Most programmers don't help spammers, and many actively work against spam. I think you should get the point -- it isn't the profession, it's the individual that goes bad. Fact is, by and large it is "people" who are cruel and vindictive.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
One must truly understand what the RIAA is trying to do here. Their goal isn't recoup lost revenues. Their goal is "shock and awe" through scare tactics. Basically, their lawyers are instructed to take no prisoners, go for the jugular, and show no mercy. It's to send a message meant to scare people into thinking that if you file share, the RIAA mafia will be after you like a rabid bulldog with lockjaw. Any respectful prosecutor would lay off and drop the case out of respect. After all, the accused party is dead, so there's really no point. But no, the RIAA is going to find some way to press onward and make it the whole family's problem now, and they know it'll bring negative publicity. They want it. They want to be feared, and for young little "sharing is caring" tykes to be looking under the bed for the RIAA boogyman at night if they so much as dare think about doing such an evil thing as sharing. This ruthless and heartless behavior is soooooo going to bite the RIAA on the ass someday, hopefully violently.
There is a lot of outrage expressed over RIAA tactics (as there should be), but I still think a lot of people are missing the essential point. There are many comments along the lines of 'How can the RIAA screw their customers like this?', and 'Don't they care about their PR?' etc.
The point is - no, they don't care about their PR, and they certainly don't care about their customers or their clients (the 'artists' who will in all likelihood never see a penny of the loot from the RIAA). The RIAA, like us, have seen the future, and like us, they know that it doesn't include them. They're not stupid - they know that electronic distributions systems will only get better, faster and easier. They know that an artist will soon be able to bypass the RIAA completely and reach the public directly. They know that the teenagers of today (who will become the consumers of tomorrow) find the notion of paying for music odd and outdated.
What we are seeing here, from DRM to pointless lawsuits to egregious congressional lobbying are just stopgap solutions, all of which will eventually fail, sooner or later. So what's an organization to do when they see their cash cow headed for the slaughterhouse, and know that there is nothing at all that they can do about it? Simple - they make as much money as they can before the inevitable happens. They know there will be no RIAA in the future - so in the meantime, they are abusing the system way past the breaking point in order to garner as much cash for the Executives to retire on when the time comes.
When seen from this prespective, the actions of the RIAA make sense. They don't care about their image - they care only about squeezing the last drop of blood from the stone before technology renders them obsolete. That doesn't mean we should give up the fight - we should continue to do all that we can to hasten the 'Day of Reckoning' - (shameless plug for Lizzie West's album 'Holy Road').
Goodbye RIAA - we hardly knew you. Not that we cared.
Leave me out.
The purpose of the RIAA lawsuits is not to make money from settlements. It's to scare people away from engaging in copyright infringment. As such, it's not in the interests of the RIAA to appear to have a heart. Moreover, every single one of you who's going to go home tonight and tell your friends about the big, bad, RIAA, is doing exactly what they hope you'll do.
No, it's not working they way they want. People see the entire RIAA represented music industry as a greedy dinosaur that's enacted a bunch of really bad laws which they are abusing beyond the intent of any legislative intent. It's backfired on them big time and they are going to lose the basis of their suits and might even face long overdue copyright reform that will eliminate their obsolete business model.
The IRS tried the intimidation approach once and what they got was Ronald Reagan and a twenty five year bitch slap. It's been a long long time since the IRS has confiscated property from anyone but blatant scoff laws and real criminals. The purpose of the IRS is revenue, not ruin. Anyone who thinks the RIAA is more powerful than the IRS is deluding themselves.
When you act like they are acting, retribution is swift. Me telling my friends all about the RIAA's behavior is going to do two things the RIAA really does not want. People are going to be that much less likely to buy music and people are going to rethink copyright law. These cases make the copyright lawyers look really stupid and none of this talk is fun. People don't want anything to do with party poopers like the RIAA. Music is supposed to be fun, unifying and shared.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.