File-sharing case prompts push for copyright reform

[sabredog]

Originally Posted by wyndslash

that's like a national debt already

...75 TRILLION DOLLARS!!!!

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by sabredog

When an industry frontpiece starts demanding 75 trillion dollars in damages, then you know there is urgent need to stop such claims even making it to court.

How to succeed in publishing in the digital age:

1. Con someone out of 90% of their income and get them to write a book for you.
2. "Leak" it to the pirate sites.
3. Collect IP addresses.
4. Start court action.
5. Kerching.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Which is why it should be changed to a criminal case. Only then will the punishment be made appropriate for the crime. Until recently I would have also said they would then be eligible for Legal Aid, but that won't be the case any more.

Making copyright infringement a criminal offence is exactly what the RIAA and MPAA want! That way they won't have to pay for the prosecutions, and can disclaim responsibility of the fines and other punishments.

One of the problems is that the statutory damages were set assuming that the infringer was doing the infringing commercially and on a large scale. They are completely disproportionate for small-scale non-commercial infringement.

[TGS]

Perhaps one innovation that ought to be driven by copyright enforcement is that the record companies who shrilly squeal about their losses ought to be forced to demonstrate their losses amount to anything at all, rather than just shouting that they do, before being awarded stupid damages.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by ardeegee

Sad, too, that the music compaines have to eat their $75,000,000,000,000 loss.

Yes, the Judge has ruled in that case that the record companies can only get one award of damages for each work infringed.

That's still between $7 million and $1.4 billion in damages....

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by Steven Lyle Jordan

These cases do need to be taken to court, so a fair and equitable decision and appropriate penalty can be set.

Unfortunately, the courts hands are tied by the statutory damages set in the legislation. They are not allowed to decide on an appropriate penalty.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by sabredog

Do you truly consider 75 trillion dollars to be fair and equitable?

Of course not! (Put the doobie down now!) Neither does the Electronic Frontier Foundation and its advocates. That's why they're pressing for reform and reasonable decisions and penalties!

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

We already know that the concept of fairness is a joke to you.

No, the concept of fair use as outlined in the copyright act is a joke. I am a student of life and see myself in the eternal classroom. Everything I see and do is educational, it is fair for me to share this knowledge with everyone. I try to be fair in everything that I do, mostly this involves giving away everything that I can, just posting on this forum causes exploitation so it's kind of tough to get away from the scale of karma but we do what we can.

We don't need a history of case law to recognize that copyright needs to be reformed, we just know that it does need to be.

Do you think you are fair? Do you think your fellow humans are fair? If not why do you think this? Is resource scarcity what creates unfairness? Are some people just unfair? And if so should we allow them to be so?

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Making copyright infringement a criminal offence is exactly what the RIAA and MPAA want! That way they won't have to pay for the prosecutions, and can disclaim responsibility of the fines and other punishments.

One of the problems is that the statutory damages were set assuming that the infringer was doing the infringing commercially and on a large scale. They are completely disproportionate for small-scale non-commercial infringement.

Making it a criminal case will fix that. Can you imagine the outcry the first time someone gets a bigger fine for downloading an mp3 than someone gets for mugging an old lady or something else that people actually care about? At worst the downloader would get a small fine they could pay off monthly, and most likely just a warning for a first offence.

In the UK there has been a few attempts to prosecute people for this sort of thing, but they tried to call it "fraud" instead of copyright infringement and obviously they failed to get a conviction for that reason.

[Anthem]

Originally Posted by Steven Lyle Jordan

Well, when I say "everyone," I'm obviously not including the nut-cases and radicals who would not be "satisfied" even if the law literally handed them everything on the planet on a silver platter. I'm mainly referring to rational people.

Law is about compromise. Welcome to society.

Just be more careful.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Unfortunately, the courts hands are tied by the statutory damages set in the legislation. They are not allowed to decide on an appropriate penalty.

I think the statutory range for willful infringement is $750-$75,000 per work (in some cases of willful infringement it may go higher). The jury could have imposed a fine of ~$22,000, based on T's infringment of 30 songs. Of course they didn't; they imposed a fine of $675,000, reduced by the court to $67,500. While there is obviously some room for disagreement as to whether $750 per song (for willful infringement) is too high, this is not a case where the jury imposed the minimum fines. They could have, of course, but decided that T. deserved to be fined much more.

The real issue is that normal people - people who have never heard of Cory Doctorow or the EFF - are really not very sympathetic to file sharing. That's the real reason you keep getting such large damages in file sharing cases. Again, the idea that someone makes unlawful copies of songs and distributes it on the internet where it is downloaded by thousands or millions of other people, none of whom have paid for anything, is not an idea that has much resonance in the population at large. Most people think that this is wrong, and are not averse to punishing people who share files.

And, again, the case also has nothing to do with jury nullification - the jury didn't try to impose the minimum penalty instead of finding the defendant not liable because they believed that he had done something wrong and should have to pay for it.

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Making it a criminal case will fix that. Can you imagine the outcry the first time someone gets a bigger fine for downloading an mp3 than someone gets for mugging an old lady or something else that people actually care about? At worst the downloader would get a small fine they could pay off monthly, and most likely just a warning for a first offence.

In the UK there has been a few attempts to prosecute people for this sort of thing, but they tried to call it "fraud" instead of copyright infringement and obviously they failed to get a conviction for that reason.

Again, as I wrote above, there's not really a lot of sympathy for willful infringement among the people who sit on juries, so I'm not sure that there would be much public outcry if a willful infringer were given a 1 year prison sentence and $100,000 fine.

And even if you don't serve much or any time, having a criminal record will be much worse for your future than having had a fine imposed on you in a civil case.

And of course T. could have settled for $3,500.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

And even if you don't serve much or any time, having a criminal record will be much worse for your future than having had a fine imposed on you in a civil case.

True. If ever there was a reason for people to avoid file-sharing, that would probably be the best one.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

I'm not sure that there would be much public outcry if a willful infringer were given a 1 year prison sentence and $100,000 fine.

Well obviously the mainstream media would ignore it, just like they ignored the Oink case when he was found not guilty (despite TV news being there with cameras at the time of his arrest). But that is no longer a barrier to people finding out about such things. When people see crimes they don't care about getting much harsher sentences than crimes they do care about (like old lady-mugging) they will start to question it.

[sabredog]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

Most people think that this is wrong, and are not averse to punishing people who share files.

(snip)

Again, as I wrote above, there's not really a lot of sympathy for willful infringement among the people who sit on juries, so I'm not sure that there would be much public outcry if a willful infringer were given a 1 year prison sentence and $100,000 fine.

(snip)

And even if you don't serve much or any time, having a criminal record will be much worse for your future than having had a fine imposed on you in a civil case.

I do not think that is the case at all. Speak to younger people about file sharing and you will certainly find that it is far more common that you would think. As well as that, purchasing of songs using itunes is just a prevalent and just as popular.

Ripping and sharing of music amongst friends amongst teenagers is also very common as well and has been since the days of LP's and cassettes.

Most people simply do not care about the issue of file sharing.

A prison term for file sharing?

Good grief. In a day and age where a murderer or rapist only gets 5 years for violently ending or destroying someone's life, you are calling for a prison term for sharing digital data?

Do you build new prisons to hold the offenders and will the prison be funded and the prison staff going to be employed by the RIAA or MPAA?

Tell the front pieces of the entertainment industry that they will need to build and fund such "naughty corners" and they might back away from such suggestions and keep suing Mr and Mrs Joe Average. As it is far, far more lucrative and easier than actually making changes to their business and distribution models that belong in the past.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Well obviously the mainstream media would ignore it, just like they ignored the Oink case when he was found not guilty (despite TV news being there with cameras at the time of his arrest). But that is no longer a barrier to people finding out about such things. When people see crimes they don't care about getting much harsher sentences than crimes they do care about (like old lady-mugging) they will start to question it.

Your naivete is touching.

Seriously, though. No one really cares about criminals. Theft, fraud, and hitting an old lady are already about the same level of offense (unless you really bash the old lady), low level felonies...if Tenenbaum received an equivalent sentence, the public at large would not care.

(I'm not sure why you think that copyright infringement would be "much harsher" than battery on an old lady, though)