Lawsuit Against RIAA Tries To Stop Them All

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Tanya Anderson has filed an amended complaint against the RIAA. One of the more interesting provisions in it is in the 18th claim, which seeks to stop the RIAA from 'continuing to engage in criminal investigation of private American citizens', no doubt referring to the unlicensed MediaSentry investigations. If granted, that could shut down the RIAA lawsuits entirely. Naturally, the RIAA doesn't like this at all. First, they got the judge to agree that the original complaint was too light on the details, so it was amended. Now the RIAA complains that it's too long, because it's 108 pages filled with the RIAA's dirty laundry. You may remember this as the countersuit to the lawsuit where RIAA lawyers tried to grill a 10-year-old girl, only later to drop their case for lack of evidence and have the mother sue them for malicious prosecution."

Comments

Tubes

[jlebrech]

Honestly the RIAA should just stop all this and invest in the Tubes and maybe charge in this way. Artist would then distribute through some RIAA developer method which would not take a cut. Then the RIAA could then just charge for the bandwidth.

Re:Tubes

[suso]

But but. That would require change. And we can't have that.

Doubt that's even possible.

[morgan_greywolf]

seeks to stop the RIAA from 'continuing to engage in criminal investigation of private American citizens. Like it or not, there's probably a few Constitutional considerations here. Although, what they should be doing is suing in individual states, where it's usually illegal to practice private criminal investigations without a license.

Re:Doubt that's even possible.

[geminidomino]

There is.

It's called Vexatious Litigation

Re:Doubt that's even possible.

[morgan_greywolf]

Yeah, let's check with a law dictionary on that one:

n. filing a lawsuit with the knowledge that it has no legal basis, with its purpose to bother, annoy, embarrass and cause legal expenses to the defendant. Vexatious litigation includes continuing a lawsuit after discovery of the facts shows it has absolutely no merit. Upon judgment for the defendant, he/she has the right to file a suit for "malicious prosecution" against the original vexatious plaintiff. Moreover, most states allow a judge to penalize with sanctions a plaintiff and his/her attorney for filing or continuing a "frivolous" legal action (money award to the defendant for the trouble and/or attorney fees). In other words, it has to be shown the the RIAA's lawsuit 1) has no legal basis and 2) that the RIAA and its laywers knew it had no legal basis and sued only to "bother, annoy, embarass and cause legal expenses to the defendant."

Thing is, some of the cases the RIAA has filed do have legal basis (these are the ones you don't hear about in the media and are settled out of court quickly), and while some of the most egregious examples might approach might approach vexatious litigation, I doubt you'll find a judge to agree that all of them do.

Re:I really hope she wins this

[Svet-Am]

However, as someone who's never illegally downloaded or uploaded music or movies or software over the Internet, this case really has no bearing on me personally.

Tell me again why this doesn't affect you. The *AA have shown again and again that the facts of the case really don't matter -- espescially when it comes to the method they use for identifying litigants, IP addresses. If your ISP has floating IP addresses, then this could easily become your problem.

be sure to read the update at the bottom.

[n3tcat]

Apparently she has to file a 3rd revision now.

Re:I really hope she wins this

[Jason Levine]

Being innocent of file sharing doesn't mean you won't get sued. I seem to recall a story about a Macintosh using Granny who was accused of using Kazaa (not available on Macs) to download rap music. It was only the publicity of the story that got the RIAA to back down. (And even then they reserved the right to go after her at any time.) It was obvious to everyone (except the RIAA) that she was misidentified. And if you are misidentified, your options are basically:

1. Spend a lot of time and money to fight to prove your innocence. If you are not successful, the fines will drive you into permanent bankruptcy. (If the legal fees don't do that first.)

2. Accept the RIAA's settlement offer to make it all go away. NOTE: Part of the settlement offer is admitting that you are a pirate even if you aren't one. But at least you won't face a long court battle and possible bankruptcy.

Most people chose Option #2 since it is the quicker and easier way to make it all go away. With recent RIAA court losses, though, it seems that more people are willing to try for Option #1. That's a good thing too. The last thing the RIAA wants is to actually fight these cases in court. They just want quick settlements so they can move on to the next victim... er, evil, bloodsucking pirate.

I hope the countersuits hold water

[thogard]

I run a web site that provides free hosting to bands that I think have a clue and my site has been banned by many universities because of the RIAA which has resulted in the bands not getting gigs in the US and other countries. From my point of view, the RIAA's actions are purely to prevent additional competition.