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RIAA Wants To Bar Jammie From Making Objections
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In the Duluth, Minnesota case headed for a re-trial on June 15th, Capitol Records v. Thomas-Rasset, the RIAA has filed a motion seeking to bar the defendant, Jammie Thomas-Rasset (she got married recently), from making objections to the plaintiffs' copyright registration documents. To preempt those of you reacting with shock and anger at the American judicial system, let me assure you this motion has nothing to do with the American judicial system; the RIAA's motion has the chance of a snowball in Hell of being granted, as there is simply no legal basis for preventing a person from making valid legal objections in Trial #2, just because the lawyer she had in Trial #1 didn't make similar objections. I'm guessing that the RIAA lawyers realized they have some kind of problem with their paperwork, and thought this a clever way of short-circuiting it. Instead, of course, they have merely red-flagged it for Ms. Thomas-Rasset's new legal team. A few days earlier, the RIAA lawyers filed a similarly ludicrous motion trying to keep Ms. Thomas-Rasset's expert witness from testifying; that too is doomed."
You scoff, yet I'll wager my share options that those soulless weasels get a better hourly rate than you.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Win? Wow, I am going to have to add NYCL's contact information to my phone. Because when (and not if) I get sued for copyright violation I want to have a real chance at a defense.
Let's see, I download 10,000 songs and 1,000 movies. I probably have that many sitting on computers now. Jammie was only originally sued for 24 with some seemingly outrageous fine. I figure that if a fair use argument can be made for her, it ought to be able to be made for me as well. Especially since I am primarily a leech - I do not share outbound anything that I have downloaded. So for the most part, I am not distributing just "using". Sounds fair, right? Fair use, OK?
I would think that this case could then be used as a clear president for other cases and pretty much throw copyright to the wind. NYCL sounds liek the man to have on your side for this sort of fight. We all grew up with stuff being downloaded for free and it should continue to be just that way.