'Innocent Infringement' As A Way To Lower Copyright Infringement Damages?
from the seems-like-a-stretch dept
You often hear it repeated that "ignorance is no defense" to breaking the law, but it may actually be working in one copyright infringement lawsuit. Ray Beckerman has the details on a case where the RIAA is suing a teenager who claimed "innocent infringement" as a way to get the damages lowered from the $750 to $150,000 per file that the RIAA always pushes for. So, while the RIAA pointed out that there was a copyright notice on every CD, the court sided with the girl who pointed out that there was no such copyright notice on Kazaa or the songs she downloaded. In fact, she wasn't even aware that she was "downloading" -- assuming that Kazaa worked more like a radio. Of course, before others make the same argument, it does pay to recognize that the facts in this case are likely to be unique to this case, and probably don't apply in many other cases. The real problem still remains the ridiculous disconnect between the amount of "damages" allowed under the law and the actual "harm" (if any) caused by file sharing.
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Is there a difference?
Is there really a difference between Kazaa and 'net radio? In either case you're moving the bytes that compose a song file onto your computer.
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umm
I find a problem with "innocent" being "found guilty and charged"...this is still pretty freakin absurd by logic.
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"...lowered from the $750 to $150,000..."
hmmmmmm
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more than the actual cost of 99 cents per song is highway robbery!
Go F* yourself RIAA!
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Re: umm
have to agree with Matt on this.
maybe they should try involuntarily...
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Re:
as in the price the RIAA asks is between $750 and $150,000. they court is refuses to make a summary judgment unless the RIAA accepts the lesser fee of $200
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Re: umm
I find a problem with "innocent" being "found guilty and charged"...this is still pretty freakin absurd by logic.
If it makes you feel better, the technical term in civil acitons is "liable," not "guilty." "Guilty" is a term used in criminal court. Civil actions don't deal with guilt and innocence - only liability.
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So true
You'd be surprised by the amount of people I spoke to, regarding P2P copyrighted material downloads, that didn't even suspect they were doing something illegal. It's just like this girl's case, "but this isn't any different from taping songs from the radio" they say to me. (By the way, is that illegal?)
There is a serious case of unawareness among the general population regarding the nature of copyrighted material sharing, most think it has become something too "normal" to be even considered as "bad".
Interesting, isn't it?
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It's a step in right direction to some extent, but it's still pretty wrong. It's obvious that a person file sharing online does not do damage in the same way that a professional CD pirate does, and therefore the standard copyright penalties should not apply. It's right that a lower tier is being offered. Even so, this girl apparently didn't know that any harm was being done - a warning letter would have sufficed to get her to stop.
Now, we have a lawsuit, a family standing to be ruined by this case. The RIAA gain nothing - the roughly $7000 penalty won't pay for a day of lawyers on the other, more frivolous cases - yet they're gotten rid of a set of potentially good customers. Nothing is gained here elsewhere - the people who downloaded from this girl will not suddenly go out and buy a CD. If anything, her family and friends may feel she's been poorly treated and boycott the RIAA in protest. I'm glad I did that a long time ago.
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Profit needs to be the deciding factor
There really needs to be a fundamental change in copyright law, that separates copying into three categories:
1)Coping purchased content for personal use. Legal, period. Regardless of DRM, format change, modification. I bought it, it is mine, to do with as I please, "for personal use".
2)Coping to distribute for free (a la Kazaa). The Fine should be commensurate with the lose of profit (not revenue) say $0.50 a song times N, where N is some REASONABLE guesstimate. $200 a song seems fair. If you download from Kazaa, $0.50 per song downloaded.
3)Coping for profit (i.e for sale). Everything you made, and more besides. Seems fair to me.
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Root of all evil
Other than trying to get as much money as possible there is no reason why when someone is found to be infringing they are not simply charged the retail value of the album they have the unauthorized copy of. Even if they only have one song off of said album I would say go for the entire album price.
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Even if they only have one song off of said album I would say go for the entire album price.
If the songs are sold one at a time as they are with any of the online offerings, why should a penalty for infringement take into consideration songs they didn't copy?
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My son is a student at Duke University in North Carolina. He is a child of a single mother who went to school there on an athletic scholarship. We are in no way well off. I am am a hard working widowed mother. The RIAA is suing my son for copyright infringment for filesharing (He had it set to no sharing allowed until the University came and changed something with the computer set-up and then he got the dreaded letter)- the subpeona says Total Audio Files 811 and then it shows 9 song titles below that. Will he be charged for all 811 files?
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