RIAA: too zealous?

[Skywatcher]

So as not to hijack the existing thread…

Boston Globe
The recording industry has withdrawn a lawsuit against a Newbury woman because it falsely accused her of illegally sharing music – possibly the first case of mistaken identity in the battle against Internet file-traders.

“When the RIAA announced they were going on this litigation crusade, we knew there was going to be someone like Sarah Ward,” said Cindy Cohn, legal director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an Internet privacy group in San Francisco that has advised Ward and others sued by the music industry. “And we think were will be more.”

The lawsuit claimed that Ward had illegally shared more than 2,000 songs through Kazaa and threatened to hold her liable for up to $150,000 for each song. The plaintiffs were Sony Music, BMG, Virgin, Interscope, Atlantic, Warner Brothers, and Arista.

Among the songs she was accused of sharing: “I’m a Thug,” by the rapper Trick Daddy.

But Ward, 66, is a “computer neophyte” who never installed file-sharing software, let alone downloaded hard-core rap about baggy jeans and gold teeth, according to letters sent to the recording industry’s agents by her lawyer, Jeffrey Beeler.

Other defendants have blamed their children for using file-sharing software, but Ward has no children living with her, Beeler said.

Moreover, Ward uses a Macintosh computer at home. Kazaa runs only on Windows-based personal computers.

Beeler complained to the RIAA, demanding an apology and “dismissal with prejudice” of the lawsuit, which would prohibit future lawsuits against her. Foley Hoag, the Boston firm representing the record labels, on Friday dropped the case, but without prejudice.

“Please note, however, that we will continue our review of the issues you raised and we reserve the right to refile the complaint against Mrs. Ward if and when circumstances warrant,” Colin J. Zick, the Foley Hoag lawyer, wrote to Beeler.

The trade group released Zick’s letter late yesterday and said it would have no other comment.

It is unclear where the apparent mistake originated.

According to the lawsuit, recording industry investigators tracked the file-sharing activities of a Kazaa user with the moniker Heath7 and found the unique numeric identifier, known as an Internet Protocol (IP) address, that was assigned to the user by the Internet service provider at the time.

The recording industry then issued a subpoena to Comcast, the user’s Internet service provider, demanding the name, address, and e-mail address of the person behind the IP address.

Evan Cox, a partner with Covington & Burling in San Francisco who is not involved with the case, said the error most likely happened in one of two ways: Either Comcast matched the wrong customer with the IP address, or the recording industry requested information about the wrong IP address, which is usually more than nine digits.

“If any of those [IP address] numbers are wrong or transposed, you’re going to get the wrong person,” Cohn said.

Whatever the source of the apparent error, it illustrates how difficult it can be to definitively match a person to an online screen name.

[SPOOFE]

Speaking as one who fully supports the RIAA’s right to try to defend their material, yes, I will say that they’re getting too zealous. They’re fighting the symptoms of the problem, not the cause. The best thing they can do is cut prices on albums and try to set up their own competing method of downloading songs.

[Ike_Witt]

My idea would be for her, and anybody else who gets falsely caught in the RIAA driftnet, to countersue for the highend potential of what the RIAA wanted. So, $150,000 (potential) per song times 2000 songs equals a countersuit for a cool $300 million.

[Terminus_Est]

In other news: Pope found to be Catholic. Bear defecates in the woods.

[Dreaming_of_Maria_Callas]

Kazaa doesn’t only run on Windows computers. You can access Kazaa’s FastTrack network from several *nix clients such as giFT. What if the neophyte Mac user is secretly a computer whiz who harnessed the power of Mac OS X’s Unix core?

UnuMondo

[Doomtrain]

Actually, I think the RIAA has done some good, what with suing dangerous 7 year olds and grandfathers. It’s made me realize just how much great independent music is out there and how much my music dollars–and I buy a LOT of music–matter to a company that pays artists and not teams of lawyers. And it’s made me realize that I’m going to put most of my money into cool indie bands rather than the RIAA’s pockets. So, fuck the RIAA.

[slortar]

Gee, with all this great press they’re getting, I’ll bet music sales are going to rocket. I’m heading to the store today to get that new Jewel CD! Yay!

[Jonathan_Chance]

You guys don’t get it. They’re not being over-zealous.

File-sharing (not really…the real culprit is the re-positioning of entertainment information (songs, movies, et al) from analog technology (records, VHS) to digital format.

That technological advance (and large-scale buy-in by both the public and the industries involved) was the first tone in the death knell of large-scale entertainment companies. And they’re smart enough to know that.

So of course they’re going to fight tooth and nail and not really care about collateral damages. They’re fighting for survival with no real plan to capitalize on the new technology because there isn’t one.

They’ll fight until they die. Then large scale music and movies will begin the slide into oblivion. Then bands and actors won’t be wildly rich, fewer people will go into music and movies, and there will be fewer choices available to consumers but what choices there are will be made by people with a passion.

Personally, I’m hoping one of the fall outs from this process is that more people start participating in the arts themselves instead of being content with simply consuming other people’s efforts.

[Captain_Amazing]

*Originally posted by GMRyujin *
** And it’s made me realize that I’m going to put most of my money into cool indie bands rather than the RIAA’s pockets. So, fuck the RIAA. **

Just to nitpick, the money doesn’t go into the RIAA’s pockets. It goes into the pockets of RIAA members. All the RIAA gets is annual dues.

[Triss]

What Jonathan Chance said.
We can always hope, anyhow.