RIAA Backs Down In Austin, Texas

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In November, 2004, several judges in the federal court in Austin, Texas, got together and ordered the RIAA to cease and desist from its practice of joining multiple 'John Does' in a single case. The RIAA blithely ignored the order, and continued the illegal practice for the next four years, but steering clear of Austin. In 2008, however, circumstances conspired to force the record companies back to that venue. In Arista v. Does 1-22, in Providence, Rhode Island, they were hoping to get the student identities from Rhode Island College. After the first round, however, they learned that the College was not the ISP; rather, the ISP was an Austin-based company, Apogee Telecom Inc., meaning the RIAA would have to serve its subpoena in Austin. The RIAA did just that, but Apogee — unlike so many other ISP's — did not turn over its subscribers' identities in response to the subpoena, instead filing objections. This meant the RIAA would have to go to court, to try to get the Court to overrule Apogee's objections. Instead, it opted to withdraw the subpoena and drop its case."

Comments

Re:A Question for Ray

[AviLazar]

1) Because it is a deterrent (there are people who won't d/l due to risk, people who won't u/l due to risk, and organizations such as Napster that had their original model shut down for a legit model
2) Because they may not collect $1,000,000 from the defendent but collecting $1,000 will still hurt some peoples wallets - and enough to get some parent to ground their kid for a year or five
3) Because you need to keep protecting your IP or risk setting precedent that you are OK with people stealing your IP

Re:It all blows

[AviLazar]

The fact that it's illegal doesn't make it wrong. Copyright law's function doesn't even vaguely resemble it's original intent and is now basically a government granted monopoly on culture. Ignoring unjust copyright law's is just civil disobedience and I say hiza!

Do you really want to attach Brittney Spears music to culture? The laws are not unjust - they are fair - you just don't like them. I am pretty sure murderers don't like jail either - I guess we should say that murderers are just doing a little bit of civil disobedience?

You are not being denied life libery and happiness by being told you have to pay for someone elses efforts. On the otherhand you are denying somebody money by taking their efforts and not paying them for it. If you want culture go to the museum or library. So I say "Ignoring unlawful behavior is just criminal and I say hiza!"

Re:It all blows

[mcgrew]

Well that's just silly. People want to take their music with them

And that's just ignorant. Whether you rip it from CD, rent it from iTunes, or sample it from the radio, getting it into your iPod is exactly the same in every case. WTF are you doing at slashdot? You obviously have less of a grasp of technology than the average thirteen year old, who can rip, downlaod, and sample for his iPod with ease.

at least if I'm buying it in some format I know that at least some amount is in fact going to them.

More ignorance. The major labels rip the artists off more than they rip the buying public off. Most indies own their own label; studios are cheap these days compared to musical instruments. The day when you needed hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of equipment to cut a record are gone. The labels are no longer needed.

That's great. Now we have two anecdotal stories

And an unanswered question.

I suppose this is about DRM or digital ownership

DRM has nothing to do with it. If you buy a CD, you own that CD. You can loan it to a friend, or sell it, or legally do anything you damned well please. With a download, you have no rights to resale, you cannot legally loan it to a friend, you have no ownership rights whatever.