Slashdot Mirror
CRIA Faces $60 Billion Lawsuit
jvillain writes "The Canadian Recording Industry Association faces a lawsuit for 60 billion dollars over willful infringement. These numbers may sound outrageous, yet they are based on the same rules that led the recording industry to claim a single file sharer is liable for millions in damages. Since these exact same companies are currently in the middle of trying to force the Canadian government to bring in a DMCA for Canada, it will be interesting to see how they try to spin this."
Irony, defined: The institution responsible for changing copyright law so individuals face millions in fines and years behind jail now has to argue against it to save its own ass.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
So that the artists might be more directly ripped off by the filesharing.
is they'll never pay a fine. guess how?
All this is going to do is to convince CRIA to up the amount of money and the number of hookers it sends to Ottawa to "persuade" Parliament to pass unbalanced draconian laws that
a. Further criminalize consumers
b. Abrogate all the sins of Big Media
Look at the history of the North American recording industry. They've been ripping off artists for years. Bo Diddley was scammed out of millions in royalties by faulty userous contracts.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
In American law, if you admit something on the record (AFAIK, IANAL, DSB [disclaimers suck balls]), you are prohibited from disclaiming it later. So, if they admit that a single song is worth, say, $75k, then they will just have to suck it up when they do the same thing. Now, if they can simply throw Bitch Mainwol in jail for a number of years, I would say that justice has been served.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
Every penny won by the artists in this lawsuit will be deserved. I hope the CRIA is found liable for every penny of the $60 billion and is put out of business once and for all.
I also hope similar infringements are found in the United States for both the RIAA and the MPAA. No company that treats their customers as poorly as these companies do deserves to be in business.
Time to cut out the middle man. The internet has opened huge new avenues for distribution; it's time the industry starts getting on board and the artists and content creators start getting more of what they are due.
appleguru.org
... and as someone who doesn't really trust companies that much, let me just say that, if the CRIA gets fined for willful infringement, I hope that this is the precedent that ends up being applied to the United States, not the reverse.
Now the recording industry's argument is going to be less and less well-received by the general population, and this can only be a good thing.
This will be settled ASAP by CRIA. They simply can't risk this case coming anywhere close to a decision. If they 'win' they set a precedent that borrwing files is OK. If they lose, well, they lose big!
When they settle, they will have strong 'proof' that they 'represent the artists' and will use that to help their cause. This will be over in weeks, the actualy lawsuit is just a bargaining tactic.
Moving on...
Wait, so the majors have been selling CDs for over thirty years with songs they don't own the copyright on?? They've been charging consumers for something they didn't own?
And they wonder why consumers are downloading music...
In retrospect, I don't think we've been pirating music at all over the past decade or so. We're all just small record labels that have been creating (very limited run) compilation CDs and putting the songs on our own 'pending lists'. We fully intend to pay the rights holders, once we can locate them and negotiate rights. Brilliant idea, guys! Thanks!
Seriously, I think the $60 Billion is still extremely low. At $20,000 per violation, that means only 3,000,000 violations, which I think is very light for the class of 300,000+ songs that are in the Payment Pending list. That is only estimating that 10 copies of each song were sold this way. The real numbers exist. They can find out EXACTLY how many copies of EACH unauthorized song were sold as all of that is accounted for each individual CD/Album/MP3 from the CRIA members. If we use the REAL number of songs and counts of infringement. I think we are talking easily more than 50 million violations here, not 3 million (which is only 10 sales per song, and we ALL know that a production run of CD's will be in the thousands each, and each COPY is a violation, not just each SALE, even broken CD's at the manufacturing site are unauthorized copies that took place (you know all that breakage cost part that they put into the contracts), they still count in terms of unauthorized/pirate copies). And remember, it is per song, so an album may have 15+ individual infringements in it, not a single infringement for the entire album.
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
I wonder if this will eventually turn out like GM and its dealings with the unions over the years. Bear with me...
GM corp. and shareholders spent decades working out deals with the unions, trying to minimize labor costs. They made deal after deal that would do things like promise better pensions, all to keep current costs down.
Then, when it all came crashing down, the net result was that the labor union ends up as a major (the major, after the government) shareholder in the company. All that effort goes to naught when it resulted in the "little people" gaining complete control of the company.
So I'm reminded of it here because the CRIA and RIAA and their kind have spent years creating the webs of copyright law that they now use to sue their customers. It would be fitting and just if those same laws lead to the "little people" - the artists - taking control of the industry.
Were I an artist in this case, I'd readily accept a major stake in the company in lieu of the settlement, especially if it was likely that the settlement would force them into bankruptcy and I'd never see my money anyway. Enough suits like this, and we could stroll in and fire the board and all the executives, and turn it into something that serves the artists and consumers.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
Nah, they wouldn't be concerned until it said something outrageous, like $60,000,000,000.
When you're afraid to download music illegally in your own home, then the terrorists have won!
This time they're the defendent so they're not allowed to mysteriously 'drop' the case. They can be forced to go to trial.
No sig today...
I predict that the CRIA will have a sudden change in heart about copyright violation enforcement - that will last as long as it takes to get this case dropped or settled. Then, it'll be back to business as usual.
The question is, where did the money for the royalties from these CDs end up?
Because here in Canada we have been following the same evolution of Capitalism that the US has adopted: companies (or groups of them) are superior to individuals and are held to a different standard. By all rights they should be forced to pay the billions in damages that they have earned by violating the laws they use as justification to get music downloaders to pay in court. They should get bit in the ass by the same principles they have been applying.
I am far too cynical to believe this will happen though, as I am sure many of you are. The right bribes will be paid to the right Canadian politicians and they will pay a few million in damages and that will be that. I don't trust Harper's government further than I can puke (and I almost do everytime I remember that we elected him. I am ashamed my country could possibly do so), and I expect them to suck up to the big music industry corporations and settle things quietly in their favour.
I sincerely hope I am wrong but I am far too cynical to think it will happen. We have government by corporation these days and they determine the laws and penalties.
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
CRIA is a mini-me of the RIAA and with any luck, they will be sued out of existence before they bring a backward, Draconian & American DMCA to Canada. But I doubt it.
(no offense Americans.. unless you're one of the cronies who created the DMCA)
notes in his affidavit that "the record labels have devoted insufficient resources for identifying and paying the owners of musical works on the pending lists." The CRIA members now face the prospect of far greater liability.
I'm assuming that the CRIA is basically the Canadian branch of the RIAA, or at least affiliated with it?
So, let me get this straight, those people can track down some college kid over the whole internet, what was probably using some dynamically assigned IP address, who may have moved a few times, etc.. and the CRIA can't find Bruce Springstein or even some lesser known artist because they haven't allocated enough resources?
Riiiiiiigggght.
It's NOT me! It's the meds! I'm on 1000mg of Fukitol.
The big labels have been pulling this stunt world wide during years. Recently in Mexico, Police raided the major offices of Sony after it decided to tell Alejandro Fernandez (a Mexican folk country singer) they were going to publish some of his tunes with or without his permission. After the smoke had settled, the Police seiged over 6K pirated CDs from the same offices of those who can't keep their mouth shut when it comes to bashing pirates.
My other OS is the MCP!
Isn't this the essential plot of Planet of the Apes (the real one, not that shoddy remake). A man, with no interest in humanity, suddenly has to defend the human race as being superior, to a religious zealot who believes that God created Ape in his own image.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
.... I think that sums up my thoughts quite nicely.
It's what copyright law was intended for. It's not Joe Schmoe making a mix CD for his best friends that's a problem. It's not even the guy who allows 10,000 people who weren't going to buy an album anyway to download it from his server. The problem is people and organizations who make a career out of profiting from other people's work.
The RIAA, CRIA and the MPAA are effectively no better than pimps. It's good that the law is finally being applied as it should.
The CB App. What's your 20?
... you think big corporations, especially investor owned ones, are fundamentally honest.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
If this has been going on since the late 80s, why did it take so long to file the class action lawsuit?
CRIA me a river!
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
I had previously suggested that RIAA was just a disguise, a mask used by the Big4 companies behind RIAA, and suggested that we actually refer to them by name: Warner, EMI, Sony, and Universal. Together they form the acronym WESU, as in "We sue! Yes, we do!"
Now this CRIA organization is suing. Hmm... let's see who the big members are. From TFA:
"The defendants in the case are Warner Music Canada, EMI Music Canada, Sony BMG Music Canada, and Universal Music Canada, the four primary members of the Canadian Recording Industry Association."
Sound familiar???? Good thing we unmasked the Big4 companies as WESU!
404555974007725459910684486621289147856453481154 in hex is "You sank my Battleship?"
[GPG key in journal]
In all the years of whining and complaining about needing stricter laws and harsher punishment and longer copyright terms, they always cited that the artists and their families are not getting paid because of piracy!
Well, I guess they weren't exactly lying were they. It's just that the people they claimed to be responsible for the atrocities against artists were not the file sharing public, but themselves.
..the CRIA were taking people to court for choosing piracy over handling stolen goods? I mean, if you take something and sell it on without paying for it that is called stealing, no?
Well, I'm with a previous poster here: 10 violations per song is ridiculously low given some of the artists on that list. The have the exact figures, so use them. If they cannot produce those numbers that implies guilt anyway, because those same numbers are required to PAY the rights - not having the numbers would demonstrate a lack of intention to ever pay out.
Time to break out the popcorn, I think. This could get entertaining. Any chance of a repeat in the US?
Insert
Sometimes life just balances out. Should this pan out, it would be a day to celebrate. Karma is a BITCH ;)