RIAA Confusion In Tenenbaum & Thomas Cases?

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "There seems to be a bit of confusion in RIAA-land these days, caused by the only 2 cases that ever went to trial, Capitol Records v. Thomas-Rasset in Minnesota, and SONY BMG Music Entertainment v. Tenenbaum, in Boston. In both cases, the RIAA has recently asked for extensions of time. In Thomas-Rasset, they've asked for more time to make up their mind as to whether to accept the reduced verdict of $54,000 the judge has offered them, and in Tenenbaum they've twice asked for more time to prepare their papers opposing Tenenbaum's motion for remittitur. What is more, it has been reported that after the reduction of the verdict, the RIAA offered to settle with Ms. Thomas-Rasset for $25,000, but she turned them down."

Comments

Re:Total non-story

[MichaelSmith]

And he has a think geek link to encourage /. to run the story.

Re:Settlement

[Vengie]

IAAL. I am assuming you meant to write "IANAL." A trial court ruling, while not binding on other courts (but certainly persuasive) may in some instances be binding on that same trial court, and as a practical matter, often is even when it need not be. Also, there may be an estoppel issue for the RIAA lurking here.

Re:Total non-story

[Anonymous Coward]

The attacks on Ray Beckerman are more than a little unfair, given his solid record over the years here on Slashdot. He's given a lot of free legal advice here over the years, and personally, I appreciate him. For the record, Blogspot.com is owned by Google, and I wouldn't be surprised to find that the ads are crammed in there by Google to help pay for the service. The insinuation here (and in other replies immediately following) that he simply posts here to drive people to an "ad-laden" site is more than unfair.

I, for one, appreciate his updates on these very important cases. If you disagree with Ray's take on requests for extension, that's certainly your right (and I disagree with you, by the way; I think it's very significant in this case, given the circumstances).

Re:OK, I'm dense

[Hatta]

the US Supreme Court has set a rough guideline that punitive awards should rarely exceed 4 times actual damages (i.e. $1.40 per infringed recording) and almost never exceed 9 times actual damages (i.e. $3.05 per infringed recording).

I've seen the idea floating around /. that the actual damages are not the purchase price of the song, but instead the price of a distribution license. Is the RIAA pushing that argument? I imagine the fact that "making available" was never proven would be a problem there.