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How a Virginia Law Firm Outpaces the MPAA at Suing Over Movie Downloads

Posted by timothy on from the shame-if-anything-was-t'-happen dept.

Jamie points out this Ars Technica piece on a series of suits brought by the Virginia law firm of Dunlap, Grubb & Weaver against users they accuse of illegally downloading movies. The firm has an interesting business model in these suits; sue enough users in a DC Federal court to be worth splitting the sum of many small settlement offers (generally $1,500-2,500 apiece) with the filmmakers, rather than rely on winning after trial a small number of larger judgments. Most people settle, and Dunlap, Grubb & Weaver has so far named more than 14,000 "Does" — as in John Doe — including, as mentioned a few days ago, 5,000 who downloaded The Hurt Locker.

7 of 237 comments (clear)

  1. Yeah.... by Pojut · · Score: 5, Funny

    In the case of The Hurt Locker, when you stand to make almost as much money suing 5,000 people for "stealing" your movie as it did at the box office, maybe you should have made a better movie.

    --
    Living With a Nerd
  2. Seriously... by whisper_jeff · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Seriously, when is something going to be done about these guys? Their business model is built on "it costs more in legal fees for people to fight these accusations than to settle with us out of court so they'll just pay up" which, really, amounts to extortion. I cannot, for the life of me, understand how they are being allowed to get away with this shit. In a sane, logical world, somebody (the feds, the bar, whomever) would come down on them like a ton of bricks. Sadly, I don't think we live in a sane world any more...

    At this point, I think I'm just holding out hope that a competing law firm will think things through and decide they can make money by suing these vulture law firms for harassment and whatever else they can drum up. After all, if those firms can make money just suing at random, surely another law firm can also make money counter-suing, right? Well, where is our white knight law firm who's eager to make a name for themselves? If the feds won't put a stop to it, maybe a last-to-sue war between legal firms can put a stop to it.

    1. Re:Seriously... by Shakrai · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You need to climb off your horse and realize that not every ill in this country can be blamed on business.

      I got sued by someone who rear-ended me at a stop light. There is no conceivable way that accident can be attributed to my negligence. My insurance company settled with the asshole for $12,000 and then raised my rates. Their reason? It's cheaper to settle than to fight the lawsuit. The person who sued me was an individual who perverted the justice system. It had nothing to do with business.

      --
      I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
      We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  3. S2S by retardpicnic · · Score: 5, Funny

    It seems as though they have found that splitting the file, whoops, lawsuit up into many pieces that can be individually downloaded, whoops dealt with in no particular order is a more efficient protocol, whoops, business model. What will they think of next?!

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    sig loading.......
  4. Bittorrent Users Sue Movie Studios by spidercoz · · Score: 5, Funny

    In other news today, a group of 14,000 bittorrent users who have downloaded movies are suing the studios who produced those movies. The downloaders say the movies were deceptively marketed as being good, and that they were duped into wasting their time and bandwidth by downloading and watching them. The downloaders are asking for a collective total of 38 years wasted time and 448 terabits of wasted bandwidth, plus an unspecified amount for mental and emotional damages.

    --
    "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire
  5. Film Industry Saved by IP Chasers! by theNAM666 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Washington, D.C.-- Super Lawyers Duenlap, Grubb and Beaver declared today that they had been able to save the ailing film industry via a new, innovative IP-chasing strategy. "It's really simple," declared Duenlap. "You just put a really shitty film on the internet," said Grubb. "And then you wait for peoples' cousins dogs to come download five minutes from the honeypot, and SUE everyone in their zip code," said Ms. Beaver.
    Due to this innovation, Hollywood stars will continue to be able to walk the red carpet with millions in diamonds and rubies, instead of being reduced to begging at soup kitchens, said Duenlap, Grubb and Beaver.
    CNET news attempted to contact the IP addresses involved in this article but ping requests were not returned.

  6. Re:Attorney Emails by j00r0m4nc3r · · Score: 5, Insightful

    attacking an individual's personal life for what he does in public I find offensive

    I do not find it offensive in the least. You don't get to do whatever you want and hide behind the "It's just business, nothing personal" excuse. You are responsible personally for any business you conduct whether it be private, public, business, or personal. You are complicit in everything you do. I don't want to hear about how the lawyers are just doing it to put food on their family's table. You really think the guy who owns the law firm is just barely scraping by? These guys are just greedy fuckwads, plain and simple. And they are supporting an entire industry of greed and abuse. It doesn't matter if it's legal or not. There are plenty of things that are technically legal that are not ethical. Just because it's legal doesn't mean you should do it. I say fuck them and their personal lives.