RIAA Says "Wanna Fight? It'll Cost You!"

jeiler writes "Ars has the details on an RIAA strategy to double the cost of settling copyright infringement suits for students who try to quash the group's subpoenas in court. In a nutshell: settle early, pay $3,000; try to quash the subpoena and the settlement cost rises to $8,000."

Comments

In the make-it-while-you-can dept.

[T3Tech]

The RIAA is a sinking ship and they're trying to make as much as they can as long as there are judges and courts that are still sympathetic to their rhetoric.

The four major record corporations fund the RIAA. These companies are rich and obviously well-represented. Recording artists and musicians don't really have the money to compete. The 273,000 working musicians in America make about $30,000 a year. Only 15 percent of American Federation of Musicians members work steadily in music. But the music industry is a $40 billion-a-year business. One-third of that revenue comes from the United States. The annual sales of cassettes, CDs and video are larger than the gross national product of 80 countries. Americans have more CD players, radios and VCRs than we have bathtubs. Story after story gets told about artists -- some of them in their 60s and 70s, some of them authors of huge successful songs that we all enjoy, use and sing -- living in total poverty, never having been paid anything. Not even having access to a union or to basic health care. Artists who have generated billions of dollars for an industry die broke and un-cared for. And they're not actors or participators. They're the rightful owners, originators and performers of original compositions. This is piracy." - Courtney Love

ARAG

[PhearoX]

Two words: Legal Insurance.

It costs about $17 a month, and I get hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal cost coverage for most situations. Basically, as long as the case does not involve a vehicle moving violation or is a conflict of interest with my employer (a major grocery chain), I am smilin' all the way to the court house.

I've had the insurance for almost a year now, and I've actually been kind of hoping for an opportunity to sue/counter sue someone... God bless America.

Re:And remember

[Anonymous Coward]

Or ask the EFF.

I'm not sure how it work, wether they just defend you for free (if they think your case is relevant to their fight), or if they just get paid low rate, but either way you'll probably get the most competent people for that precise matter, for far less than a top lawyer's fee.

Plus, you might get NYCL's autograph :)

Re:And remember

[Opportunist]

So? I'll be broke after the lawsuit anyway. And before my money goes to the RIAA, I'd prefer it to be in the hands of a lawyer with the chuzpah to fight them.

Don't forget what amounts of money we're talking here, and what people. We're not talking about the average 50ish person building a nestegg. The average defendant is someone who is in or just out of college, deeply enough in debt that they have to work their way out for 20 or so years anyway and for whom it doesn't really matter if you stack 8k or 80k on top of that. He is in bankrupcy after that.

So why not fight it? Any good reasons?

Smartest Idea Ever!

[Overzeetop]

Think about it from a lawyer's standpoint. You get a constant stream of income to support a group of very good IP defense lawyers. It's the typical reverse-ambulance-chaser play. You get money in the form of premiums, and then if you can prove bad faith on the part of the RIAA/MPAA you can attempt to recover your fees from a deep pocketed organization. Sounds like a good double-dip option. Somebody contact NYCL and a couple of startup investors. In fact, if you can get a few universities to add $19/student/year to their fees (it's a drop in the bucket when tuition is topping $30-40k), you might be able get startup funds from just a proposed team of lawyers, especially if you can kick in support for the Uni against subpoenas if they cover all their students with a policy. As long is you incorporate, if for some reason you lose miserably, you just shut down the company and let the losses die with the corporation.

I want in on this at the ground floor.