The record labels' case against Jammie Thomas claims that merely "making available" music to the public is illegal, even if no copyright infringement takes place. Will an appeals court agree?
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I say, by the logic used to decide the case against her then one could also legally be known as an elephant simply because one owns a bag of peanuts.
This was the most ridiculous verdict based on the worst kind of evidence, this sort decision was never supposed to be allowed to happen in our great nation. Guess we are now subjects to the RIAA, FDA, MDA, and about any other 3 or 4 letter Association or Administration you can mention, and they come with an entire army of other 3 and 4 letter thugs to enforce their rule, FBI, CIA, DEA...
Any judge who tells a jury that they can only decide the facts of the case is a LIAR.
If you think you disagree with me, or you don't know what I'm talking about; Read about how a jury can NULLIFY the enforcement of ANY law.
http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/zenger/nullification.html
http://www.fija.org/
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/jury_nullification
Or maybe they'll just keep on trying to get that damned genie back in the bottle.
Bad enough the over inflated price of crap CD's (which is actually
main reason CD sales have steadily plummetted).
Or the record labels charging artists for things like "breakage"
on digital downloads.
Or forcing "slave like" contracts on young hopeful artists for
decades and telling them "This is the just 'standard' contract"
(wink).
Where music Greats like Little Richard or Willie Nelson are
bankrupt.
Or someone like Prince has to legally change his name.
Now we let them extort Grandmothers and Single Moms for
thousands of dollars with only the threat of legal action or
$220,000.00 for the simple "assumption" that someone shared
24 files with no actual proof that anything was downloaded from
her computer?
They can supeona the RAM chip from a server with all the
private information of people on that server whether they
downloaded anything or not?
What's the fine for a DUI?
What are your standard criminal fines for most crimes?
Some even violent?
But the IRAA gets $220,000?
I think they should be brought up on racketteering charges for
extortion and prosecuted to the full extent of the law under the
RICO act!
Just my $0.02 worth (^_^)
Quit falling prey to the media which forces it down our throats.
Find indy music and movie and spend your money on it.
Buy used and rent from your library.
Trade with a friend, or borrow.
Copy from the tv (digital music)
Learn to live without music..
make your own songs to listen to.
I dont know the answer but the only music I have purchased this year has been from emusic which is indie musicians. I am not saying I havent heard nor listened to mainstream but only when in the car and that is 50% of the time because I get tired of all the ads and talk shows.
If that is the case, Windows 95 and 98 both have sharing on the default drive (C:) turned on automatically, so, given that theory, if you bring one of these OS's online without a firewall, your guilt of illegally sharing everything on your drive. This would include the copyrights and patents on the OS itself even though this is how Microsoft configured the OS 'out of the box'. This is ridiculous.....
Further, many of these P2P applications re-enable sharing even after you manually turn it off. BearShare for example plays these games (where is ask everytime you shut it down if you want to share, and then reverses the 'YES' 'NO' buttons every time it ask - just to confuse and trick people that are not paying 100% attention.).
(copyrighted material) laying on a bench in the airport and
someone else takes it, do I pay $220,000 for "making available" a
copyrighted work? or if I throw it in the trash and someone else
takes it? etc. etc. gets very touchy.....
Even if you use the common legal practice of giving trebled damages then the fair compensation for those 24 songs would be under $75 not over $200,000.
1.) Jinx.com sells Anti RIAA T-Shirts. Everyone who owns an iPod
should also wear Anti RIAA clothing. Wouldn't it be great to see
kids on MTV sporting this swag? Post if you know of other
companies that sell Anti RIAA merchandise.
2.) If you code, participate in a DRM-cracking community.
3.) If you don't code, contact your local newspaper and write an
editorial.
4.) Everyone, tell your local music store managers that you are
not buying RIAA Member music and why.
IF YOU HAVE ADDITIONAL IDEAS PLEASE POST!
Writing an editorial is a waste of time, most editors agree with everyone else. Not like they would even publish the article.
Telling the $5.65 manager of the local music store about your problem with DRM, yeah, sure that will help......
Think a little...
Mugman
included music in the software to be shared.
Given that Kazaa is FOR sharing of electronic files...if the files
WEREN'T downloaded by someone else it wasn't for lack of
trying. This is different from accidentally opening up your
computer for sharing, or even deliberately opening it up for
access within your home network and someone from the outside
hacked in and got access, or the other scare scenarios being set
out.
Do I think the judgement was appropriate? I think the size was
excessive, and if the RIAA has any brains they'll reoffer the
original deal to settle the lawsuit. But if she had Kazaa on her
computer and was sharing the copyrighted music (and the Jury
believed she did), then she was indeed guilty and deserved a
judgement to be brought against her.
If this poor women had the chance to stand in front of a criminal court, all charges would of been thrown out. PERIOD!!!!
Just because she had Kazza installed doesn't mean a damn thing, there are legitimate uses for P2P applications.
There was NEVER any evidence of any wrong doing found on any hard drive in her possession.
ISP's tend to loose track of IP's; often there are a lot of morons working for these companies. Just because some moron with a MCP said it was her doesn't mean anything.
Interesting how the SN in question doesn't resemble the name of her or anyone else in her household.
Mugman
1. Kazaa is a legitimate file sharing program used for illegitimate purposes. If this is your reasoning, they better start suing millions. Kazaa also automatically scans for files without users realizing it.
2. The RIAA can't even actually prove she was the user, distributor or enactor of the file sharing. Hacking is common. All they have is an IP address. Burden of proof barely covers this.
The defendant can't appeal on the facts; she has to appeal on the law.
rather than just having it available.
Bootleggers and counterfitters offer us scads of products in the
hope that they we will buy stuff from them. I can see the law was
aimed at this practice. You build it will will arrest you!!
By leaving something out in "public" so that anyone can freely
use an existing product shoud not be covered by this reading of
"made available". It is different in intention and practice.
Understand that law is just a matter of opinion. Problem is,
judges and lawyers are involved!
Best of luck Jammie. I'm behind you.
In some cases you have to prove actual damages, but in copyright cases you can elect to get "automatic" or statutory damages. This saves the court time.
In the instant case, I would visit a location where the copyrighted work can be found and perform actions resulting in my having a new copy; at the end of the process the original is still where it was at the beginning.
In the library, I visit a location where the copyrighted work can be found and perform actions resulting in my having a new copy; at the end of the process the original is still where it was at the beginning.
Sure looks to me that the only difference is the "actions resulting ..." -- but those are entirely under my control in both cases.
You need to read up on the first sale doctrine. It's fundamental to understanding copyright law.
(I never play original CD's in my vehicle's CD player - a car's environment isn't exactly gentle to polycarbonates, ne?)
/P
Isn't music a natural phenomenon,a vibration?
The artist nor the record company made up notes, they used standard music notes that are in the public domain and arranged them to make a song.
The only reason the artist can make a song is because someone SHARED this knowledge.
So why was music ever copy-writable?
I think the law is making criminals in these cases.
Just because they package and sell it and people buy it does not give them ownership of something that floats freely through the air and was created at the beginning of time.
Why aren't they sueing cover bands making money in every little hole in the wall across the US?
I'm sure thats where they found their artists or a lot of them. I'm sure a lot of the artists were doing cover songs until they made it big.
I can see making money off the packaged product it is a service and product people are willing to pay for but the music has always been free on the air waves to record, are they looking for people recording songs off the radio? I used to lend my albums to friends all the time, now because there is a massive way to share they want to cry foul because of a change in medium. The medium changed when they went to CD's they were cheaper to produce but the price didn't go down and the consumer got less. the record companies are a bunch of cry babies, they still make lots of money they just want more.
Now they are persecuting INDIVIDUALS to make the point.
When they sell the package it should be on them to protect the contents maybe they should make you regiter your CD just like Microsoft does.
- Williams Vs. Warner/Chappell Music
- by Afrimerican October 9, 2007 8:10 PM PDT
- The RIAA, and major music record/publishing companies have an in with the courts because in the past few years, they, like many other industries have began to hirer law firms that have decades old political and Ivy league ties so it's hard for the average citizen to get a real shoot at justice unless they opt for a jury trial.
- Like this Reply to this comment
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (57 Comments)The first thing is not to admit to anything. second, and what the record companies use and get away with is the "Fair Use" defense.
It seems the young female in the predicate case is a student, thus, a fair use defense is very viable. I have only followed this case on the outskirt of all the details, but it doe'nt seem like she was charging for each use passed on, if she were, her defense is slim.
If no, fair use is the way to go. Then there is the matter of the program used, did she create the music sharing program, or was it acquired from someone else? If she created it, she diminishes her chances, if she got the music sharing program from someone else, she can sue them to cover her losses, and she can bring it up in court and inquire as to what claims, if any have been made against the music sharingsoftware provider.
Lastly, if she has an attorney, he/she needs to be fired, because a qualified attorney would have forseen the possible outcomes, and even if she lost, like she did, the payment would not have been as large.