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Thomas' Testimony and the RIAA's Near-Fatal Error
eldavojohn writes "The long and torrid trial of Jammie Thomas is in its second stage and in full swing. Yesterday, two major events took place: Thomas gave her surprising testimony and the RIAA was threatened for not disclosing new information to the opposing counsel. Thomas claimed she didn't know what KaZaA was before the trial started. She also admitted that the hard drive handed over to investigators was different than the one that was in her computer during the time of infringement. Her testimony from the first trial was that 'the hard drive replacement had taken place in 2004 and that the drive had not been swapped again since.' This is problematic because the new hard drive had a manufacturing date of 2005. The RIAA had its own troubles, almost losing all evidence from a particular witness when they added an additional log file to evidence without the defense being notified of it. The judge mercifully only removed that new evidence from the trial. It was related to whether or not an external hard drive was ever connected to the computer."
Sorry, "innocent until proven guilty" only applies to criminal cases, not civil cases
If she is innocent until proven guilty - why does she have to give up her hard-drive and "prove" her innocence? Nobody is forced to prove innocence. The RIAA should be given the challenge, without her hard drive, of proving guilt. /shrug (IE: external records, etc.)
First, this isn't a criminal trial. It's civil, so there's no concept of "innocence." So they only have to show that a preponderance of the evidence shows that she committed the acts in question. The burden of proof still lies with the plaintiff, but to show a preponderance of evidence, they still need *access* to the evidence.
RIAA shenanigans aside, this is how the justice system basically works: if you have some evidence, the judge will let you request other evidence that may be related to help make your case. Here, given the fact that an IP address linked to her was observed engaging in possibly illegal behavior, it's reasonable to request access to the hard drive to determine whether her computer was involved. Most people (and probably any judge) would see that as reasonable. On the other hand, if they requested a search of her car (for instance), that would probably get tossed because it's unlikely to be relevant.
What you're basically suggesting is that search warrants and discovery be made illegal. If that happened, lots of extremely illegal behavior would be impossible to prove. Enron comes to mind initially.
As always, I'm not a lawyer, I just play one in my mind.
The RIAA's evidence is compelling.
The IP address was hers, with no WiFi, no NAT, and a password-protected Windows box
The username chosen was the one she's used online traditionally for 16 years.
The problem is, the nearly inevitible $100K verdict will not be justice, even if it is legally correct.
Test your net with Netalyzr
Where we don't care about anything important like the global economic meltdown or Iran's fraudulent elections or militants in Pakistan or North Korea going insane.
Read the masthead - we're nerds, not dorks, dork.
Nope, all we care about is being able to unabashedly steal music and then yell at the people selling it when they try to protect their interests
No, we are incensed at the mainstream music industry's blatant evil, including its bribery of Congress to get copyright lengths to insane levels. Personally, I will not respect any copyright on a work made more than a quarter century ago. Most of us DON'T infringe copyright, even copyrights on works that should be in the public domain.
You are free to consider anything I wrote moret than 20 years ago in the public domain, and anything newer as having a CC license.
Free Martian Whores!
The RIAA (not the "state")
I thought they were the same thing now.
"I don't have to think. I only have to do it. The results are always perfect, but that's old news." - Meat Puppets
Worked for Gandhi.
Worked for Prohibition.
Worked for national speed limit of 55 mph.
Seems to be working for pot.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
So, rather than work to fix the law by taming your congresscritters, you prefer to break the law because it is easier than actually fixing the law and then whine when you get caught that the law is unfair. I am sure that will work out great and get things fixed up in no time.
"Voting for justice is as ineffective as wishing for justice; what you need to do is to actually be just. This is not to say that you have an obligation to devote your life to fighting for justice, but you do have an obligation not to commit injustice and not to give injustice your practical support."
"In a constitutional republic like the United States, people often think that the proper response to an unjust law is to try to use the political process to change the law, but to obey and respect the law until it is changed. But if the law is itself clearly unjust, and the lawmaking process is not designed to quickly obliterate such unjust laws, then the law deserves no respect and it should be broken."
- Henry David Thoreau
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Disobedience_(Thoreau)
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