RIAA's 'Misspeaking' May Have Affected Verdict

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "David Kravetz of Wired.com covered last year's Capitol v. Thomas trial gavel-to-gavel. It's worth noting, then, his article saying that the RIAA's recent statement — that Sony's top litigation lawyer 'misspoke' during the trial. She said that making a copy from one's own cd is 'stealing', which (in his words) may have caused a major miscarriage of justice. Wired further points out that later on in the trial, during the RIAA's examination of Ms. Thomas, 'On the hard drive she [turned] over were thousands of songs Thomas said she ripped from her CDs. The RIAA's Gabriel suggested to jurors that copying one's purchased music was a violation of the Copyright Act. Gabriel, for example, asked Thomas whether she had ever burned CDs, either for herself, or to give away to friends.' Gabriel, the RIAA's lead attorney, apparently misspoke too — prejudicing jurors along the way."

Comments

Let me clarify my position.

[palegray.net]

Please, your Honor, don't take what I actually said to heart. What I really meant to say was a complete reversal of the actual meaning of what some may interpret to be a broadly misunderstood fabrication of opinions based on statistical evidence to the contrary.

Re:Let me clarify my position.

[Courageous]

Please, your Honor, don't actually make me testify. Instead, let's just pretend that I testified, and you can then act as if I made the most compelling argument possible, and find for the plaintiff.

Respectfully,

Carcharodon Carcharias, Esq.

Re:Let me clarify my position.

[Brian Gordon]

Please, your Honor, it was merely 2nd-grade-level grammar that caused the confusion. I'm a slashdot editor!

Re:Let me clarify my position.

[Malevolent Tester]

If only lawyers shared the Great White's endangered status as well. Sigh...

Anyway, given their shared bottom feeding habits, wouldn't Ginglymostoma cirratum be more appropriate?*

* IANAMB, I looked the Latin name up on wikipedia, so it probably actually means "Fuck your mother, Brutus" or something similar.

Re:Let me clarify my position.

[X0563511]

<defense style="chewbacca">But that does not make sense! </defense>

Re:Let me clarify my position.

[jamstar7]

No, but I'm sure the sharks would be.

I'm still wondering why biologists continue to use lab rats to experiment on when there's so damned many lawyers about...

Re:Let me clarify my position.

[MorpheousMarty]

The risk is we might create a super lawyer which would be unstoppable. Not even fictional Nazi super-science is that evil.

Re:Let me clarify my position.

[Petrol]

You're forgetting, biologists need warm-blooded creatures for their experiments.

Wrong Musical

[pyrrhonist]

RIAA's 'Misspeaking' May Have Affected Verdict

It's Miss Saigon , not Miss Peking.

Also, the RIAA shouldn't take credit for the work of Claude-Michel Schönberg, Alain Boublil, and Richard Maltby, Jr.

Re:perjury ?

[pilgrim23]

And for this we gave up duals?

Re:perjury ?

[Torvaun]

Is that the one where you fight with a pistol in one hand, and a sword in the other?

Is this a law?

[BorgCopyeditor]

First, its duels [...]. Secondly, [...].

First, it's "it's." Second, if it's "first, ..." it's "second, ...."

Re:Is this a law?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's terribly interesting. There was in fact a time when first, secondly, ... was considered the correct usage. But that was a long time ago. Fowler's Modern English Usage, published in 1926, contains the following sensible advice:

First(ly), secondly, lastly. The preference for first over firstly in formal enumerations is one of the harmless pedantries in which those who like oddities because they are odd are free to indulge, provided that they abstain from censuring those who do not share the liking. It is true that firstly is not in Johnson; it is true that De Quincey labels it 'your ridiculous & most pedantic neologism of firstly'; the boot is on the other leg now; it is the pedant that begins his list with first; no-one does so by the light of nature; it is an artificialism. Idioms grow old like other things, & the idiom-book of a century hence will probably not even mention first, secondly. On the other hand, Eric Partridge writes in Usage and Abusage that "firstly is inferior to first, even when secondly, thirdly ... follow it." That was in 1947.

In short, if you want to distinguish yourself as a fusspot of the first order, this is a great way to do so. Personally, I favour first, second, third ....

Re:hopefully they'll get what's coming to them

[jamstar7]

i mean the RIAA executives. i hope they all go to jail and get aids from the rape.

Fixed that for ya. That'll be $5 plus $0.05 per view. Cash only, please.

Re:Unfortunately for Thomas, it doesn't matter.

[HappyEngineer]

She may have been guilty, but it was still a tremendous miscarriage of justice. I have no idea what "cruel and unusual" is supposed to mean if $222k for 24 songs isn't cruel.

Re:perjury ?

[pilgrim23]

duel, dual, do all, due awl. the difference only works in legal briefs... and mine are not in a knot.