Well, I don't know if this was intentional (to incite anti RIAA emotions) on
the author's part, and it may likely be corrected when you read this, but it
seems a major screw-up by CNN claiming it was about downloading in Jammie
Thomas-Rasset case:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/06/18/minnesota.music.download.fine/index.html

But of course the major failure in such a case is with her, her lawyers and
advisors. It seems they did everything wrong, from ignoring the initial
cease-and-desist order to letting it go to court and continually making up
easily countered lies. A better summary of the story is here:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/06/jammie-thomas-retrial-verdic
t.ars

Now, even though I think the fine is excessive, and I'm sure it will be
appealed, I don't think RIAA did anything wrong. What were they supposed to
do, once it got to that stage, not present a good case in hopes of losing
it?

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somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:
> Now, even though I think the fine is excessive, and I'm sure it will be
> appealed, I don't think RIAA did anything wrong.

  Maybe RIAA didn't technically do anything "wrong" per se, but it goes
to demonstrate how wrong the judiciary system of the US has gone: Steal
24 dollars worth of goods from a big company, and you get fined almost
2 million dollars. This kind of punishment system has a complete lack of
a sense of proportion.

  It also goes to demonstrate that the law is not the same for everybody.
For example, if this woman had gone to a store and stolen 24 dollars worth
of goods, she would have been fined some amount proportional to the
seriousness of the crime and the amount stolen. I don't have the slightest
idea how much this would be in the US, but I would bet it's most probably
in the thousands of dollars. Maybe even a few tens of thousands. Nowhere
even near millions.

  Why does the music industry get special privileges over other people, eg.
store owners? Why is stealing music a thousand times more serious of a crime
than stealing material goods?

  In Finland, at least in principle, the fine is always proportional to
the seriousness of the crime (and in some cases your annual income). You
usually pay compensation for the damage done, plus something extra as a
punishment (and this "something extra" is not a hundred thousand times the
amount of damage).

  But of course the music industry is spending lots of effort to change
the situation here as well.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:4a3ba8dc@news.povray.org...
> somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:

> > Now, even though I think the fine is excessive, and I'm sure it will be
> > appealed, I don't think RIAA did anything wrong.

>   Maybe RIAA didn't technically do anything "wrong" per se, but it goes
> to demonstrate how wrong the judiciary system of the US has gone: Steal
> 24 dollars worth of goods from a big company, and you get fined almost
> 2 million dollars. This kind of punishment system has a complete lack of
> a sense of proportion.

The CNN got the story all wrong, the trial was not for stealing/downloading
but for sharing. Read the second link posted, which does a much better job
explaining the case.

Post a reply to this message

somebody <x### [at] ycom> wrote:
> The CNN got the story all wrong, the trial was not for stealing/downloading
> but for sharing. Read the second link posted, which does a much better job
> explaining the case.

  She would have to have shared to 2 million people in order for the damages
to be proportional to the fine.

  (And no, "those people who downloaded it shared it further" is not a valid
argument. You can't sue one person for the crime made by another person.)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Warp wrote:
>   She would have to have shared to 2 million people in order for the damages
> to be proportional to the fine.

I think the point is that it was willful infringement. That is, they told 
her to stop, she said "bite me", so the fine includes punishment as well as 
restitution. Lying to the judge doesn't help, either.

Not that the fine is reasonable, mind. But it's reasonable in this case for 
the fine to be greater than the cost of paying for the files copied.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Insanity is a small city on the western
   border of the State of Mind.

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Darren New wrote:

> they told her to stop, she said "bite me".

Mmm. Bullet, bitten. ;-)

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> I think the point is that it was willful infringement. That is, they told 
> her to stop, she said "bite me", so the fine includes punishment as well as 
> restitution.

  You mean robbery is not "willful infringement" unless the shop owner
specifically tells the robber to not to do that?

  I don't think that argument makes any sense. I have never heard that
a fine is grown several orders of magnitude just because the property
owner told the criminal to stop. I can't even believe there's such a law
in the US or anywhere.

  And again, the punishment was in no way proportional to the crime, no
matter how "willfully" the criminal did it.

  What next? A child steals a candy from a store and he is given a fine
of a couple million dollars? What do we need a sense of proportion in
criminal law?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Warp wrote:
>   You mean robbery is not "willful infringement" unless the shop owner
> specifically tells the robber to not to do that?

"Infringement" isn't "robbery."  The same thing hold in patents, too.

>   I don't think that argument makes any sense. I have never heard that
> a fine is grown several orders of magnitude just because the property
> owner told the criminal to stop. I can't even believe there's such a law
> in the US or anywhere.

Usually not several orders of magnitude, but several-fold isn't uncommon. 
And it's usually for things wherein you're told you're doing something wrong 
that you might not have known was wrong. For example, distributing that 
music is only illegal if you know it's copyrighted. Infringing a patent is 
only wrong if you know it's patented.

Now, of course it's easy to guess that some modern music is copyrighted, but 
that isn't really the point. The legal system gives higher penalties for IP 
infringement if you know you're infringing than if you don't. If you don't, 
it's reasonable to charge lost income and no more.

>   And again, the punishment was in no way proportional to the crime, no
> matter how "willfully" the criminal did it.

I'm just sayin'. I agree with you.

The fines have a wide range, because copyright infringement can have a wide 
range of values. Distributing a copy of a song is a small thing compared to 
distributing a copy of (say) Windows 7 source code repository. It wouldn't 
seem unreasonable to attach a million-dollar fine to the latter, given its 
value.

So talk to the jury and ask them why they approved such a big fine?  And 
yes, it'll probably get reduced on appeal.

 > What do we need a sense of proportion in criminal law?

Well, it sounded like a civil case to me.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Insanity is a small city on the western
   border of the State of Mind.

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> The CNN got the story all wrong, the trial was not for 
> stealing/downloading
> but for sharing. Read the second link posted, which does a much better job
> explaining the case.

The second link is dead.

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Warp wrote:
>   And again, the punishment was in no way proportional to the crime, no
> matter how "willfully" the criminal did it.

BTW, the RIAA according to some reports is *still* willing to settle for 
some $3000 to $5000.  That seems entirely reasonable to me.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Insanity is a small city on the western
   border of the State of Mind.

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