FSF Reaches Out to RIAA Victims

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In what has been termed the ''RIAA's worst nightmare', the Free Software Foundation has announced that it is coming to the aid of the victims of RIAA lawsuits, by establishing an Expert Witness Defense Fund to assist defendants in RIAA cases. The purpose of the fund is 'to help provide computer expert witnesses to combat RIAA's ongoing lawsuits, and to defend against the RIAA's attempt to redefine copyright law.' The funds will be used to pay fees and/or expenses of technical expert witnesses, forensic examiners, and other technical consultants assisting individuals named as defendants in non-commercial, peer-to-peer file sharing cases brought by the RIAA, EMI, SONY BMG, Vivendi Universal, and Warner Bros. Records, and their affiliated companies, such as Interscope, Arista, UMG, Fonovisa, Motown, Atlantic, Priority, and others."

Comments

Re:Too late

[PhxBlue]

I'll bet they were waiting for enough money from contributors to make this happen.

I wonder

[markov_chain]

if Stallman has been reading xkcd lately ;)

I can see the connection

[kcornia]

While on the surface it may seem odd for FSF to come to the aid of P2P defendants, I think what they're really trying to guard against are future frivolous claims that could be made against open source software and the like.

If the RIAA is able to effectively take advantage of non-tech savvy courts, it's not too much of a stretch for other IP related companies to start filing claims, infringement suits, etc. against open source applications that compete with theirs.

Maybe I'm off base, but that's a possible reason for the FSF to be taking this course. It's more of a message to the business community at large that you're not going to have it that easy strong arming the technology world.

What do I know though, I was a history major..

Re:And what about?

[hedwards]

I agree with the sentiment, but what happens in Europe when the losing side was the side that was correct? Does it actually cut down on bad law suits, or does it encourage a larger spending in the hopes of winning the case anyway?

How would one of those being sued in this case come up with the money if they lost? Being innocent of the charges isn't always enough to ensure that one wins the case. All that would do in these cases would be to encourage the RIAA to pay more and represent a larger incentive to settle out of court.

When it comes to the cost of lawyers, often times people with a strong case can gain an attorney on a contingency basis, meaning that they lawyer takes a larger slice of the award in exchange for potentially working for free if they lose the case.

Other times an attorney will do the work pro bono publico, although the practice can at times be shady, as sometimes the attorney will seek an award in addition to what the complainant is asking for anyways.

What I would like to see is for the court expenses be limited to what the less wealthy side can afford, and if the wealthier side wants to spend more, require them to cover the difference whether they win or lose. With the Judge in the case ruling whether the sums of money involved are reasonable.

Re:Ray Beckerman is the fund adviser

[evanbd]

I would think the best way to help the average Joe is to give his average lawyer a set of clearly-defined, well-argued precedents and examples to base the defense on. Having the precedents and example arguments be stronger will help more people in the long run than trying to help everyone at once.

There's no way the fund can help everyone directly; I imagine it will help more people in the long run by carefully choosing its battles and winning them well than by diluting its resources and helping lots of people who, while individually deserving, won't have the same multiplicative effect on the resources spent.

Re:And what about?

[Shakrai]

Sounds like a great way to screw the lawyers

Ya know, my karma will probably get beat all to hell for this, but not all lawyers are bad.

Get charged with a crime you didn't commit and then tell me how you feel about defense attorneys. Get injured by someone whose insurance company refuses to pay for your treatment and tell me how you feel about them.

Do you have a negative opinion of the lawyers working for the FSF? How about the ACLU lawyers fighting for your civil liberties? How about this guy or this guy, both of whom were lawyers.

Lawyers represent their clients. You'd be doing better to direct your anger at the RIAA for the lawsuits and not their lawyers.

Re:And what about?

[TheRaven64]

Easy to fix. The loser pays the winner the loser's legal fees. If you only spend a small amount then your risk is small. If Grandma sues MegaCorp with a single lawyer and looses then it only costs her twice whatever her lawyer charges. If MegaCorp loses then Grandma gets all of her fees paid as well as whatever damages are awarded.

Re:And what about?

[evanbd]

That's done to an extent already. Legal fee awards in cases are normally capped to "reasonable" levels. When trying to determine what is reasonable, the opposing side's legal fees are considered directly relevant. If I'm asking for 50k in legal fees, you're going to have trouble complaining that my legal fees are unreasonable when you spent 100k on the same case. This was the direct cause of the interesting legal wrangling over whether or not the RIAA's legal billings would be revealed as part of the Foster case -- she was seeking legal fees, and the RIAA was contesting her fees as too high.

I'd much prefer to see it codified in a loser-pays system as you and the GP are suggesting, though.

Re:And what about?

[lar3ry]

I mean, the vast majority of people are flat out guilty and the settlement is giving them an out relatively cheaply.

Please cite the studies that show that this is indeed the case. I could look at the people that settled and make an assertion that is equally valid that the settlements were simply extortion fees paid by people that didn't have the money to pursue a legal case, and not necessarily an admission of guilt.

I have seen claims made by the RIAA in reports of cases that they have made that were simply untenable—that an IP address uniquely identifies an individual, that a person that sent a laptop to be repaired and had the hard drive replaced was intentionally destroying evidence, and that a computer screenshot that shows an IP address is conclusive proof that a person was sharing files (I can construct a screenshot that shows any IP address and make any claim I want by those rules of evidence).

What I have NOT seen is any evidence offered that sharing files in any way hurts the RIAA, its member companies, or even the artists, performers, or composers. How much do radio stations pay to play a single recording and make it available to millions of potential listeners? And how much per song is the RIAA demanding for people that they claim are sharing files? How long will the courts allow the RIAA and its companies to claim damages anywhere near the amounts they are currently claiming? If the damages they claim are intentionally misleading, then isn't this perjury?

The RIAA can make up any "facts" it wants to support their cases and then pull damage amounts from their asses and present them to the courts with a straight face. This is simply ridiculous, and it is my earnest hope that they finally get called on it and be made to pay the piper.

Re:Go FSF!

[Curunir_wolf]

Look, let me break it down. Many artists just want to be paid as much as they can for creating their work. Creating unlimited copies discourages people from paying the artist. Lack of payment discourages the artist from creating art. Lack of art is not good. If everyone copies artists' works instead of paying for them, then sooner or later, the pool of available artists will dry up, and there will be nothing new to copy.

I'm not sure what you are talking about, here, but it's not art. Maybe it's widgets. Widgets are not art - they are products designed to sell to some perceived or existing market.

Artists don't have to be paid to produce art, they produce it because the want to. Indeed, often because they have to. They have done it since the first cave man chiseled a bear on a cave wall, and they will continue to do it forever.

There have for a long time been people that valued art enough to ensure that the artist were paid for their work, and thus had more time for art instead of having to also perform other work to make a living. This is a good thing. Recently there have been whole corporations that hired artists to produce art works, then made money selling copies. Often huge amounts of money. Many artists got very rich.

Unfortunately, that kind of system also attracts the widget makers. Teams of widget makers often get together and produce something they call "art" (it's not) and make huge sums of money selling copies.

And what's the point in making them? Pretty much no point at all if you want money for them.

Good. If all you're doing it for is money, it's probably not very good anyway. Without all those widgety things crowding the ether, the truly insightful and inspiring art will flourish, enriching us and encouraging other would-be artists.

One supports our culture, the other drains it.

I'd say it's more like "one supports our culture, the other corrupts it."