Are the RIAA/UMG and/or their lawyers incontinent submorons? That's a polite way of putting it.
Civil discovery is a truly awful experience (bare all), and _they_ started this suit. They ought to have known they would have to produce anything connected to anything possibly introduced into evidence, and anything their opponents might want that could potentially lead to evidence. H3ll yes: logs, and then answer interrogatories about why they choose to prosecute some and not others. Don't blame them. How could they know that someone would actually fight back?
Of course lawyers will argue and object. They're paid to do this even for the stall when they know they won't succeed. I expect the judge to deny the objection and refuse to allow redaction. From your mouth to God's ear. (An old Yiddish expression.)
You know, I've read this piece before, but just now noticed that he claims that the TRACEROUTE that they ran from media sentry TO the ip address in question was stored on the computer that they are investigating....
which is silly on face. The computer (that they claim was Lindor's) didn't have a traceroute TO it from Media Sentry ON it...
So, clearly, the people producing these documents are -- just plain not competent.
In fact, DEFG and H all aren't on "lindor's computer"
uh.... And I'm sure that's been commented on before, but I just noticed it. Excellent post, rboatright. I'm glad you've been modded to +5, because you've earned it! Thank you for excellent input.
The ruling was very helpful. However, the RIAA came back in, buried the judge in paper, and there being no defendant's lawyer or defendant to fight back, the judge bought it, and gave them their judgment.
NewYorkCountryLawyer, can I engage you in some speculation?
Why would a judge let them get away with ignoring Daubert? I can't for the life of me answer your question. Rarely am I handed a ruling from a Judge which I simply cannot explain. This was one of them. I was, and am, stunned by it.
Isn't here a legal standard as to what procedures are acceptable in court when presenting evidence? A legal test that determines if a relatively new investigative technique is admissable as evidence if enough experts view it as reliable? How can Media Sentry present their evidentiary procedures as both propritary to prevent it's disclosure, yet admissable due to its being widely-accepted? It is, prima facie, a direct contr[a]diction. That's my question.
IANAL, but I have been an expert witness in many legal proceedings in Federal courts. As a part of discovery, you *have* to give the other side your raw data and details of your methodology. Otherwise, the judge is almost certain to throw out your testimony, as the other side has no way of discovering the weak spots in your case. I was involved with one case where the judge sanctioned one of the opposing experts and it took us three tries to get a decent set of data and models out of them. This had a very negative effect on the credibility of the other side's expert, which pretty well torpedoed their case. (They won as a matter of law, but damages were negligible.) Mind you, the data and models are generally covered by a protective order to maintain confidentiality, but it's so common that the wording is almost boilerplate. SafeNet and the RIAA don't have a leg to stand on here, and I can't imagine why they're bothering to oppose this unless they're pulling an SCO -- in which case, the judge should slap them down HARD. You're 100% correct, Paul. Now let's see what the judges in this case do. They have previously allowed the RIAA's "expert" to testify as an expert even though he admittedly satisfied NONE of the Daubert reliability standards, and even though he admitted that all of the materials upon which he was relying -- the printouts MediaSentry would like us to accept as gospel -- likewise failed to satisfy ANY of the Daubert reliability standards.
We don't have any prior examples of this specific niche technology at work. There's no baseline of acceptable "industry standard" out there - every bit of information about these products is held so closely to the chest of these businesses that we just do not know where the hell this data comes from and, more specifically, we don't know how this data is corroborated with ISPs to find these people who are supposedly committing the infringements. Plus, we have no idea of what the failure rate of this entire process has been. On top of all of that, there is no independent analysis of this method.
If the RIAA litigation team was an inventor, this whole ordeal would be nothing short of them running around screaming about how they've invented perpetual motion, and then not letting anyone independently verify that the machine works. Well said.
It is hard to imagine someone coming to federal court, asking the Court to accept its methods, and refusing to allow the Court to know what its methods are.
The only people I have ever met who have that much stupidity and that much arrogance are the RIAA's lawyers.
This motion may well come up for a conference or oral argument, or further briefing, so it would be interesting to see what you folks think about why these kinds of items are (or are not) necessary to test the validity of MediaSentry's methods and procedures.
I think your missing the point. For the sake of argument, lets presume that US copyright laws are fair (which I don't believe they are in their current state). Would the tactics the RIAA is using be acceptable? That's an easy one. NO.
The RIAA's tactics violate (a) copyright law (b) federal procedural law (c) constitutional due process and (d) morality.
That's what this is. The best way to teach a subject is through the medium of something the student is interested in and cares about. What better way to instruct a generation of legal professionals on the previously arcane area of copyright law than to enlist them in the fight to bring down the RIAA/MPAA?
It seems to me that every law school clinic in the country should be doing the same thing--there'd be no shortage of students willing to participate. But if every law school doesn't do this, the ones that do should play it up in their marketing material to prospective students. Most kids go to law school because they want to help others; imagine how exciting it would be to lead the fight to help your peers against the most hated company and industry in the world. I would not be surprised to see many follow suit.
Wow you missed the sarcasm and the joke.
http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/ IS run by Ray Beckerman. I'm a big fan of his, and his contributions to Slashdot. That post my subtle way of directing people to another source of information. Wow you missed the sarcasm and the joke.
http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/ IS run by Ray Beckerman. I'm a big fan of his, and his contributions to Slashdot. That post my subtle way of directing people to another source of information. Thanks kaos. Much appreciated.
By the way, let me tell you, someone just pointed out to me the other day that I'd missed some Slashdot sarcasm, and he was right; it's really easy to do. But it's part of what makes Slashdot fun, the dry humor delivered straight.
I like the posts of NewYorkCountryLawyer, and if the editors or readers of slashdot would get sick of them they would not get past the firehose. And if slashdot were against people keeping journals and submitting them as stories, why do you think "Slashdot journal entries can be automatically submitted as stories"?
If you care about Your Rights Online, I think both his stories and his comments are to the point and well written and at least HIAL. If you don't care about your rights online, you can choose not to see that section in your preferences.
NewYorkCountryLawyer, keep up the good work! Thank you for your kind words, mrvan.
Dr. Jacobsen's background speaks for itself yes it does- the man has little to no experience in forensics or law(I work in forensics for legal cases) and is incredibly biased due to financial ties to the riaa and riaa associated companies. how the judge didn't strike the testimony in the first place is beyond me- . Me too, vuffi. It is unfathomable to me.
I noticed a lot of calls for EFF donations in this story, which is a good thing because it's my understanding that they helped fund this. It's great to contribute to EFF, because they do many good things, and have filed some wonderful amicus curiae briefs, but they did not help to fund this. The money came from private individuals contributing to the Expert Witness Defense Fund being administered by the Free Software Foundation.
But, if you really think that I'm just spouting off meaningless garbage that couldn't possibly have any value It's meaningless garbage, but it possibly has value to your overlords.
then we're obviously not going to have any kind of meaningful conversation There. I knew if you kept talking you'd eventually say something that was true.
The RIAA *DOES* have an odd habit of citing random posts online and airing them in court. Mostly they focus on Mr. Beckerman's blog and try to use that against him in court....... I've seen plenty of evidence in legal filings that the RIAA is essentially cyber-stalking Mr. Beckerman, for all the good it will do them. It's odd, isn't it? They did it recently in Arista v. Does 1-21. I thought it was funny when Ars Technica reported that the head of the RIAA litigation effort was seen reading my blog on his laptop at the Capitol v. Thomas trial.
Slashdot Mirror
The ruling was very helpful. However, the RIAA came back in, buried the judge in paper, and there being no defendant's lawyer or defendant to fight back, the judge bought it, and gave them their judgment.
Yes but that was an OUTRIGHT LIE on their part, TubeSteak. Didn't you read our reply?
It is hard to imagine someone coming to federal court, asking the Court to accept its methods, and refusing to allow the Court to know what its methods are.
The only people I have ever met who have that much stupidity and that much arrogance are the RIAA's lawyers.
This motion may well come up for a conference or oral argument, or further briefing, so it would be interesting to see what you folks think about why these kinds of items are (or are not) necessary to test the validity of MediaSentry's methods and procedures.
The RIAA's tactics violate (a) copyright law (b) federal procedural law (c) constitutional due process and (d) morality.
By the way, speaking of "class project", did you see Professor Nesson at Harvard Law School assigned a project of drafting a motion to quash an RIAA subpoena?
Gotta like that guy.
'Intellectual property' is a term used in American law to describe patent, copyright, trademark, and trade secret law. No more, no less.
A law clinic is where people with a legal 'ailment', who don't have the money to hire expensive private lawyers, go to find the 'cure'.
By the way, let me tell you, someone just pointed out to me the other day that I'd missed some Slashdot sarcasm, and he was right; it's really easy to do. But it's part of what makes Slashdot fun, the dry humor delivered straight.
That's like saying there's nothing interesting in a movie except the ending.
Your other post confirmed to me that you are a troll. And this one is just icing on the cake. Maybe you're my cyberstalker.