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RIAA Wants $1.5 Million Per CD Copied
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Not content with current statutory damages, the RIAA is pushing for higher damages for infringement, damages that would total $1.5 million for copying a CD with ten songs. It's all part of debate over the proposed PRO-IP Act. William Patry, a lawyer who wrote the seminal seven-volume reference on US copyright law, called it the most 'outrageously gluttonous IP bill ever introduced in the US.'"
Sweet! At that damage level, the RIAA could afford to ditch all pretense of supporting music, and make a killing by sending lawyers down the street in major metro areas to slap subpoenas on every passerby with an MP3 player.
All you trolls that insist copyright infringement is the same as stealing, please point out a single instance of somebody being fined $1.5 million dollars for stealing a CD.
Actually, that's about what each infringement is worth. If you use filesharing, and if for each song you download, you upload a song, your infringement for downloading/uploading and album on that fileshare would be about the cost of that same album; about $15. I still don't understand how any competent mind can come up with any more than that per infraction.
Since filesharing is on average 1:1, It's not that each person uploading ten songs is causing thousands of dollars worth of damages, its that thousands of different people are causing ten's of dollars of damage each. But if that were how it was stated in court, legal fees would outweigh damages, and lawsuits would no longer become lucrative sources of income.
One pirated CD copy is worth more than a human life!
An above-average wrongful death compensation award for a healthy working parent would be in the $1-3 million dollar range. You could go murder somebody. It'd be cheaper than pirating a few CDs. And if the CDs had DRM, the jail sentence would be shorter for the murder too! The US military pays out $600 for wrongful deaths in Iraq. A pirated CD copy is worth more than 2500 Iraqis!
In reality though, they're probably asking for so much in hopes that the compromise amount will be high. Hopefully congress tells them to fuck off instead of coming up with a "compromise" that is right in line with what they were really hoping for anyway.
Gold is 500,000 copies and platinum is 1,000,000. So if you go Gold, that's a net of $7,500,000.00. Now the company spent $100,000 to $250,000 recording, $3,000,000 in marketing (mostly payola) and another half million or so on incidentals (hookers, bail). Oh, and stamps. Add a half million.
The artist on the first album will 1 to 3% of the net, so with the remaining 3 and half million or so, that means the artist only owes the company an additional $150,000.00. Luckily there are 4 or 5 members in the band, so it's relativly painless. You should be able to make most of that back on your next album assuming you can come up with quality material in 9 months when the first album took 12 years of writing. (It's easier to just use the same songs with different lyrics.)
Have a cigar!
I think we should let them, only with the stipulation of a $1.5 Billion penalty when they file a lawsuit against the wrong person. Of course, this would be payable in cash to the person they sue. I would think that this would be an equally justifiable fine and would encourage some top tier lawyers to defend the public for a marginal percentage.