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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."
If half the RIAA's claims are as bogus as some say they are, the cost to settle shouldn't matter. Because you should win if you haven't done anything wrong. Right?
Right?
How is this different from any other type of corporate lawsuit? Raising settlement costs if the other party prolongs the case is hardly new.
How is this not racketeering and extortion? I mean, c'mon...
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
and prolong the fight, and if loses, declare bankruptcy.
...you ignore their notices and force *them* to bring *you* to court? You can claim you never got the notices. Not showing up at court at all is harder, because (I'm pretty sure) you can get arrested.
I understand that raising the cost of settling out of court is meant to deter people from fighting in the first place, but considering the ludicrous fines they expect people to pay, it's a little too low. Looks to me like they're just trying to highlight their low, low prices, to avoid people setting a precedent in court, against them.
Admit it. You post strawman arguments as AC so you get modded Insightful for refuting them, rather than Troll
Excluding the illegal downloads arena (which I know is what they're suing over), I think half the problem is the *AA not keeping up with technology.
At home I have a sizeable DVD collection (around 230 at last count), but with the release of Blu-Ray I'm starting to realize that my collection will eventually be obsolete (such as when DVD first came out, and people with a reasonable VCR collection realized that their collection would eventually be worth squat).
I think this is one of the reasons people download (the other reasons being ridiculous prices, etc). People realize that technology changes - CD collections have been superseeded by portable MP3 players (ipod and the likes), VCR's replaced with DVD's which will eventually lose out to blu-ray (once the prices down).
And people realize this - why should you pay for a CD/DVD, which will eventually become obsolete, when you can get what you want in a digital format (for a cheaper price)?
Preventive measure...
1.) Offshore proxy
2.) Encrypt your network traffic
3.) Change your MAC address from factory default if you can
Now let say you got your notice, now you should...
1.) Move your assets offshore, i.e. Carribean, Switzerland, cayman island etc.
2.) Practice your legal rights, especially the fifth amendment and the second amendment of the U.S. constitution.
3.) If all else fails, move to Canada or elsewhere to seek political asylum, claiming POW status, as **AA is basically a war machine against humanity.
"The New Age. The New Beginning."
Of course I didn't RTFA... why would I do that? You really are new here aren't you? Don't let my UID fool you.
This is a civil case. That means it isn't so easy to defend yourself. In a criminal case the standard is beyond a reasonable doubt. That is a fairly high standard because it means, just as it says there must be no reasonable doubt that you committed the crime for the jury to convict. That means that the prosecution actually has to prove their case, the defense needn't do anything at all if they don't. Also in a criminal trial, you get a lawyer, even if you can't afford one. Public defenders generally aren't as good as high paid lawyers, but they are lawyers none the less who can help you navigate the complexities of the legal system.
A civil case has a much lower standard, the preponderance of the evidence. More or less that means whoever has the more convincing argument. There can still be reasonable doubt, so long as one side seems to present better evidence, then they win. Also, you aren't given a lawyer, you have to pay for one yourself.
So even if you are innocent, paying the extortion money can be the easy out to take. It'd be real hard to mount a defense for $30,000, much less $3,000. Even if you do, they could still win.
That's the problem here. It isn't one of these "Oh you are innocent so you have nothing to worry about." No, you have a lot to worry about. Either you pay a ton of money to hire a lawyer to try to defend yourself, or you do it all by yourself and almost certainly lose just because you don't understand the legal system.
With the RIAA acting like a bull in a china shop, they will not only destroy the loyality of their own customer base ( which will cause the RIAA members to go out of business in the end ),
but they will also cause a lot of collateral damage:
They will, in the long run, cause a lot of political pressure for abolishing copyright law from a large portion of the population, so politicans will eventually abolish copyright in order to be able to win elections.
Now, a complete abolishment of copyright will cause damage because many people who currently use copyright in a reasonable way will not be able to create their products anymore.
Which means that the creation of information-products will be mostly in the hands of the government and to a lesser extent in the hands of hobbyists.
Creation of information-products like books, software etc mostly in the hands of the government is IMHO a dangerous thing because it gives a lot of influential (propagandistic) power to the government. (most politicians will like this, BTW)
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.
But they won't. It's an organisation with a legion of Chewbacca-Defense lawyers. The one thing they're good at is smoke-screens, and if they want to hide something, or make it exceptionally difficult to find out who actually wrote that policy, they can.
Admit it. You post strawman arguments as AC so you get modded Insightful for refuting them, rather than Troll
Eight grand is about what I make in a year. For a year's salary, I'd shoot a lawyer in the back of the head, cut them up, pour concrete over them, and toss them off a bridge. (Don't worry, I would never do that to an actual human being.)
RICO? Are you fucking kidding me? They aren't threatening anyone to keep them from defending themselves. Think about the kind of stuff that the RICO statutes were trying to criminalize and tell me if you can still say that with a straight face. If nothing else raising the settlement costs might encourage people to go the defense route instead of settling.
C'mon, people. Stop making arguments based on emotion instead of logic and facts. The RIAA and their army of lawyers are fucking scumbags, no doubt. And we have kind of a screwed up system here (yes, that was an understatement) which isn't making matters any easier. But spewing nonsense like this will get us nowhere.
If you settle right away, it costs them less. If you fight it, they spend more in legal fees. It's not only legal to do this, it's appropriate.
People like you make the RIAA look like the smart, honest ones.
That is not a good thing.
So yes, copyright infringement can be criminal. However, the RIAA's evidence is extremely weak, not nearly enough for a criminal case. What's more, not all infringement is criminal, some is civil. Same sort of thing with traffic tickets. Some can be criminal, but many are not. If you get a simple speeding ticket, that's not a criminal ticket, it's a civil one.
Now also many crimes can have a civil component as well. Take a hypothetical situation: Suppose you are the owner of Evil Corp, and my wife works for you. Because you are evil, you don't give two shits about your employees and knowingly put my wife in a very dangerous situation. This causes her death. You end up getting charged with reckless endangerment and plead to manslaughter. Ok, great, however I'm still now a single parent trying to raise kids. Something that might help is some of the vast amount of money Evil Corp has made. So I file a civil suit against you for wrongfully causing her death. I win this, and thus get a large portion of your money.
OJ Simpson had something similar happen. He was acquitted of first degree murder charges. However he lost a civil suit charging him with causing wrongful death.
There's good reason for the system to work like it does, and to have civil and criminal components to a given case. However the RIAA is abusing it. They are trying to use civil suits to be able to go after people on extremely shaky, and often outright incorrect, evidence.
It is certainly a loophole that needs closing, but you have to be careful. While the civil system does allow for things like this, it also gives you the ability to go after people like the hypothetical Evil Corp, and does so even if the DA refuses to bring criminal charges.
This pushes the emphasis back onto social contract: because it is hard to detect a driver's skill, a single standard is set for all, which better drivers are expected to buy into since they believe in society.
Wikileaks, no DNS
The fact this kind of thing isn't blatantly illegal is just another example of how f**ked up this country's legal system is as it gives big business free rides and doesn't give two s**ts about the average person...
Well, I'd say it depends on how standard practice this is. Right now, they offer to settle for $3000, and if you go to court they will raise that to cover the expenses they've made. So far, so sort-of reasonable.
But if the story becomes "Settle for $3000 now, or we'll force you to pay $8000 later", that's approaching extortion. Especially when they've proven they'll cheat the justice system if they can to get the judgement they want.
When is the RIAA going to finally crack down on people that play music loudly enough to be heard by others? There are many times during the day that I can plainly hear music from other automobiles while on the road and from co-workers radios while at work. This is plainly a violation. Anyone that plays music at a volume that can be heard by others should be charged for a special license to redistribute and violators should be crushed by the full weight of the mighty music industry. I cannot believe these intellectual rights violators have been getting away with this obviously criminal activity for so long!
There's one simple way to stop the RIAA, MPAA, BSA silliness...make the member companies jointly liable for the excesses of the enforcement organization. Apply the same regulations for bill collectors. As long as they're playing by the rules and obeying the law, no problem. But if you're responsible for the actions of a collection agency you hire, you might be a little more selective about who you pick. Likewise if Sony, BMG and the others found themselves exposed to liability, they might lean on RIAA to play by the rules. In fact, I'd be willing to bet RIAA membership would drop significantly overnight.
I had a dispute with Dish Network a couple years ago, they tried to blame an advertising partner for the problem.
It would change the entire outsourcing landscape. If the local hospital is responsible for the actions of outsource contractors, they might think twice before hiring medical transcription services from Abduls Discount Transcription in downtown Pakistan. As long as companies can insulate themselves from liability when trying to cut corners the silliness is going to continue.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
They've convinced their Clients this legal service and the lawyers are rackin' up the billable hours.
Realize that an organization (any organization) becomes less self-aware (right hand knows what left hand is doing) as it becomes larger. Once it gets to a certain size, behaviour becomes fragmented--you'll often see one department working at cross purposes to another in the same company.
Ask anybody who's ever worked for the government (even a city government), or a Fortune 100 company.
The answer to the question "Why do they do something that is clearly self destructive?" is that there is no "they", and the folks that are doing the suing know *exactly* what they're doing.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
Maybe it's time for some viral civil disobedience. Dual-layer DVD's hold a fair amount of music. Maybe we need to start burning our music collections and leaving them in public places for people to scarf. Hell even a SL-DVD would be enough to get a fair amount out there.
Did a little research and did fine a company in Sweden that offered it:
http://www.boingboing.net/2006/06/28/p2p-insurer-will-pay.html
Don't know how valid that is, but it would also work if a large percentage of downloaders kicked just a few bucks into a slush fund to help people fight if sued.
The above article stated the odds of getting sued at: 1:1840
Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, religion destroys spirituality
How is that *not* extortion? Someone? Anyone? This is ridiculous. These boys have to go down!
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.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Utter and complete bullshit, and what's really sad is that I'm not surprised. Being sued, right or wrong, shouldn't be about how much money you have to defend yourself, damnit, especially when you're faced with a terrorist organization like the RIAA. Fucking bastards!
Read a traffic ticket someday. They have fields for criminal and civil complaints, and different language. With a civil ticket it will say something along the lines of "Without admitting responsibility... etc," for a criminal ticket it'll say "Without admitting guilt... etc." Criminal proceedings are to establish guilt, civil are to establish responsibility.
Or if you don't believe me, here's a Justice Court page about "Civil Traffic Violations": http://www.superiorcourt.maricopa.gov/justiceCourts/CourtsAndSections/trafficviolations/civiltrafficviolations.asp
Please don't shoot off your mouth and call someone wrong if you haven't researched the background. Law is a complex field.