p2pnet - rss feed: RIAA ‘fines’ students $3,750
p2pnet / p2p News:- It’s a shame US District Colleen McMahon (right) isn’t in Boston. She might have had a thing or two to say about two students, there, who’ve been coerced by the members of the Big Four record label cartel into effectively discounting the maxim, ‘Innocent until proven guilty’.
Moreover, they have, to all intents and purposes, been ‘fined’ almost $4,000 by EMI (UK), UMG (France), Sony BMG (Japan, Germany) and WMG (US) without ever having been near a court or a judge.
Every time the Big Four use their RIAA to launch a Pay Us Or Else missile at someone as part of their blackly cynical sue ‘em all marketing campaign, victims are told to get further instructions from the Settlement Support Center LLC in Seattle.
Targets, always ordinary mothers, fathers, children, grandparents, as well as students, are then told by an ‘official’ at the centre that they’ll have to pay a ruinous amount of money to avoid being further persecuted by teams of RIAA lawyers during a civil court proceeding.
The minimum penalty for copyright infringement under the USA Copyright Act is $700 for each song, the maximum amount being $150,000 each. So even for, say, half-a-dozen songs, the minimum amount an RIAA victim might be facing if found ‘guilty’ would be $4,200 or almost $1 million at the top end.
A million dollars is a terrifying sum, but no one has ever had to pay it because not one of the victims has ever appeared in court, which doesn’t stop the cartel from using the mainstream media to suggest it’s successfully sued many thousands of people, around 14,000, at last count.
And this, in turn, further bolsters the idea that it’s impossible to resist the cartel.
‘Willing to stand up’
Patricia Santangelo, a New York mother, recently became the first to say No to the labels. But significantly, her case has received scant publicity and it’s therefore still not widely known that someone is at last standing up to the RIAA, as the misnomered Recording Industry Association of America is best known.
Judge McMahon first heard Santangelo, with Mike Maschio speaking for the cartel.
As Mike Godwin blogs, “I urge you to read the transcript of Ms. Santangelo’s court appearance here. It is fun to read, and it has made me an instant admirer of Judge McMahon, who refused to be a mere conduit steering Ms. Santangelo to the RIAA’s “conference center” (which should properly be called a “surrender center”):
MR. MASCHIO: No, all I was suggesting, your Honor, is that, if she doesn’t come with an attorney, that the more direct way of doing this — and this is just to facilitate things — is to deal directly with the conference center.
THE COURT (McMahon): Not once you’ve filed an action in my court.
MR. MASCHIO: Okay.
THE COURT: You file an action in my court, your conference center is out of it. They have nothing to do with anything.
MR. MASCHIO: Okay. I’ll give her my card.
THE COURT: If you are here, you are here as an officer of the court. You’re taking up my time and cluttering up my calendar, so you will do it in the context of the Court. Maybe it will be with a magistrate judge, but you will be representing your client, not some conference center. And if your people want things to be done through the conference center, tell them not to bring lawsuits.
McMahon told the cartel’s lawyers in reference to the Pay Us Or Else intimidation tactic that she’d, “love to see a mom fighting one of these”.
‘I have not seen anything’
In the meanwhile, some Boston University students have “settled” with the RIAA and will now be forced to pay up to $4,000 for sharing their music online.
One of them is College of Arts and Sciences sophomore Sam Choi who paid the cartel $3,750 rather than risk facing the multi-billion-dollar music industry, with its legions of lawyers and bottomless pockets.
“[The RIAA] never showed me any evidence about the file which I shared,” Choi is quoted as saying in the university’s The Daily Free Press.
“But they said they had screen shots. I didn’t demand to see [the evidence] because they might’ve made me go to court and I wouldn’t have been able to settle out of court.”
School of Hospitality Administration junior Kara Jansons is, “currently in negotiations with the RIAA because she does not feel she will be able to pay the $3,750 sum the RIAA demanded,” says the story.
And she, too, says she hasn’t seen any direct evidence suggesting that she “illegally downloaded material”.
“I have not seen anything except a few general excerpts that the RIAA sent in the original lawsuit,” the Free Press has her saying. “I’m not sure if I’m being charged for a few songs or hundreds of songs. [The RIAA] sent me a letter wanting me to pay $3,750. But I sent them a letter back and told them that I can’t pay them that amount of money, I would have to take a loan out to cover it. I’m still waiting for a response.”
Choi said he felt the university did not do enough to help the students during the legal process.
“It seemed as if [BU] tried to be supportive of the students,” he said. “But they didn’t do enough. From what I hear, schools like [the Massachusetts Institute of Technology] aren’t letting record companies even come close to getting the students’ names.
“We were advised to get lawyers and deal with it ourselves.”
A court date hasn’t been set for the remaining students’ trial, says the Free Press.
‘Hired guns’
Meanwhile, Patricia Santangelo’s case continues, and she’s represented by Ty Rogers, Ray Beckerman and Dan Singer from the New York law firm of New Beldock Levine & Hoffman LLP.
Since it became public knowledge that someone was at long last defying the labels, the RIAA lawyers have asked McMahon for permission to have a second oral argument of the motion, and to submit an unusual surreply to the defendant’s reply papers, say Santangelo’s attorneys on their Recording Industry vs The People blog.
“I would say that asking for a second oral argument [the surreply ] is unusual, because (a) in almost 31 years of working in litigation I’ve never heard of anyone doing it, and (b) the very asking for it is an admission that the first oral argument was lost,” says Beckerman.
“One can only guess as to why plaintiff’s lawyers are doing it. Apparently something happened after August 15th to convince the plaintiff’s lawyers that (a) they are losing, and/or (b) the case is more important than they initially thought it was. Or perhaps they are doing it because they are hired guns and their client just ordered them to do it.”
In an interview with p2pnet, Santangelo she’d never heard of file sharing before the cartel tried to get her to pay them $7,500.
“ That was the original amount that was asked of me,” she told us. “However, it was reduced to $3,750, if I remember correctly. At the time I was called, there was no music on my computer because it was only three or four months old. I’d recently moved and they had my old address and the computer we had at that location had been destroyed by a virus. So when I was told that I needed to sign some type of statement saying that myself, or someone in my home, was responsible for this ‘crime,’ I had nothing to actually look at except a court paper with an IP address.
“There was no file sharing company or account at that time. I couldn’t accept that.”
And to other RIAA victims, “Don’t let your fear of these massive companies allow you to deny your belief in your own innocence,” she stressed.
“Paying these settlements is an admission of guilt. If you’re not guilty of violating the law, don’t pay.”
Something you think we should know? tips[at]p2pnet.net
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win
- Mohandas Gandhi
See:-
Pay Us Or Else - File sharing, p2p criminals, March 12, 2005
impossible to resist - RIAA writes to Judge McMahon, September 7, 2005
The Daily Free Press - RIAA settles suits, September 9, 2005
interview - RIAA victim talks to p2pnet, September 4, 2005
September 9th, 2005 at 3:27 pm
They said they had screenshots?
What?
September 9th, 2005 at 4:11 pm
So, I just fined the RIAA $180000. It will take me years of downloading before the RIAA is finished paying this fine. It’s going to be another 20 years before I purchase a single dime of their crap from a record or vido store. I am however, willing to suspend the remainder of the fine provided the RIAA stop these frivilous lawsuits and repays all money collected by their extortion center.
September 9th, 2005 at 4:26 pm
This is the typical crappy way that BU (Boston University) treats it’s students. A legacy from John Silber who was President of the University for years and at some point became ‘Emperor of BU.’ He wouldn’t spend a dime fighting the RIAA or even the nickel for a piece of paper to send a notice to a student that their info has been ‘requested’, so they could take action themselves. His attitude would have been “Well, they must have been doing something they shouldn’t have, so they deserve what they get.” That whole attitude is still prevalent through out the University. If it will add to or preclude draining the coffers, they will do it. Like their hairbrained idea to sell the University’s radio station that was actually beating some of the commerical stations in the ratings. All of the sudden it was worth over $1M.
Contrast this with Harvard and MIT who have basically told the RIAA to go pound sand, adding “by the way, our endowments are much larger than the assets of your patrons and at Harvard, we have lots of lawyers and at MIT we have lots of very smart techno-wizes who could probably suck all of your e-mail out of your server and have it posted on 40 different websites within the hour.”
September 10th, 2005 at 1:01 am
Pretty soon they’ll probably sue a Hurricane Katrina victim.
September 10th, 2005 at 1:24 am
i my self woud like to know when will this blow over?
September 10th, 2005 at 1:41 am
Screenshots or a store shelf, no difference …
They are simply used for item presentation.
To be called theft, someone would have to remove the item from where it was placed, leaving a missing item.
To be called copyright infringement, someone else must be shown to have purchased a copy of the item.
If file sharing is a crime, then in no way does a screenshot imply that the file was shared. It must be shown that someone else acquired an actual copy of a said item.
September 10th, 2005 at 2:09 am
There is nothing wrong with what they are doing it is perfectly legal. People still have the right to go to court. They are not guilty until proven innocent unless they choose to settle. The problem isn’t the RIAA its the law making the fine for one song so high that people want to settle to avoid the risk of multi-million dollar fines.
September 10th, 2005 at 3:42 am
After what i’ve read about the RIAA, I’m gonna download kazaa,
e-donkey and Lime wire and start music sharing! Screw the Bastards!
September 10th, 2005 at 4:28 am
Screenshot? How pray tell does a screenshot show someone actually completed a file download? How does it prove that the one who put the file up for share even named the file correctly?
While one could reasonable assume that such a file might be owned, there is no ownership stamp to say that file is one that is an infringement possibility.
The only way to tell it is truely named is to use the file after it is recieved. Up to that point the file you downloaded could be anything from a recipe to a fake file with nothing in or on it.
Would you pay for a fake file with a name of a owned song? If it is was fake you wouldn’t truely have a owned song would you? Only a name.
This stinks to high heaven of intimidation, fear mongering, bullying, economic terrorism, and even the possibility of using illegally obtained information. I suspect it is one reason that the RIAA doesn’t want these cases to go to court, nor to reveal how they know what they claim to know.
September 10th, 2005 at 9:02 am
Could you tell me what is Settlement Support Center LLC in Seattle phone number?
So we can start hitting it with a sort of DoS attack on there phone lines.
September 10th, 2005 at 6:25 pm
LEARN THIS TO FIGHT THE RIAA
DON’T PLEA OUT
Now is not the time to cower to such repugnant and illegal extortion.
Read what the law says:
Fromt the United States Supreme Court:
Like the prudential component, the constitutional component of standing doctrine incorporates concepts concededly not susceptible of precise definition. The injury alleged must be, for example, “` distinct and palpable,’” Gladstone, Realtors v. Village of Bellwood, 441 U.S. 91, 100 (1979) (quoting Warth v. Seldin, supra, at 501), and not “abstract” or “conjectural” or “hypothetical,” Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U.S. 95, 101 -102 (1983); O’Shea v. Littleton, 414 U.S. 488, 494 (1974). The injury must be “fairly” traceable to the challenged action, and relief from the injury must be “likely” to follow from a favorable decision. See Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., 426 U.S., at 38 , 41. These terms cannot be defined so as to make application of the constitutional standing requirement a mechanical exercise.
Furthermore, [it] is equally true that before one is entitled to a remedy against an alleged wrongdoer, there must be some duty owing from the wrongdoer towards the injured person.” State Compensation Fund v. Superior Court, 15 Ariz App 597,598,490 P.2d 426 (1972)
—
That means to have a “cause of action” the RIAA will need to prove there is a real loss. Not “abstract” or “conjectural” or “hypothetical,”. Remember the burden of proof is on them.
September 11th, 2005 at 6:02 am
Why do it yourself and run the risk of them doing you for harassment?
When you find the number, pass it on to every “marketing” firm you can find. Use it as a contact number on every web based form and “survey” you can find. Post it on every website that gives you the option.
Let the marketing industry do the work for you ;o)
September 11th, 2005 at 8:57 pm
Don’t forget to leave messages in UUNET NG’s with the email addresses prominently displayed.
September 12th, 2005 at 11:06 am
The “Pay Us Or Else missile” is actually extorsion by a private Gestapo type.
I wonder, has the people realized that, regardless of the legality of p2p file sharing. police work and judicial decisoins and judgements are being made by the lawyers instead of the people through their ppolice organizations, the Justice Department and the courts?
The RIAA takeover of justice is nothing more than the destruction of democeacy. Too bad the elected officials of government have not noticed.
EXTORTION - The use, or the express or implicit threat of the use, of violence or other criminal means to cause harm to person, reputation, or property as a means to obtain property from someone else with his consent. USC 18
The Hobbs Act defines “extortion” as “the obtaining of property from another, with his consent, induced by wrongful use of actual or threatened force, violence, or fear, or under color of official right.” 18 U.S.C. S 1951(b)(2).
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
September 12th, 2005 at 5:46 pm
I must take exception to “There is nothing wrong with what they are doing…”. There are many things wrong. Some examples, and there are many others:
- What RIAA does is extorsion / criminal
- It is wrong for justice to be decided by private interests and a private police.
- It is game playing explitation of the legal system because the legal costs of litigating a defense fall upon the acused and the legal costs are ridiculously high because…. the laws has been turned into a business. If the acuser in a lawsuit had to to pay the legal expenses of the acused at time of filing the lawsuit, then fewer, if any, frivolous and abisive lawsuits would be filed.
- The legal theory that parents are responsible for what their children do is laughable, If a a parent were responsible for what a son/daughter does, the parent could never never leave the child out of sight, after all, children are alway “‘difaming” other children.
- The copyright laws cannot possibly be understood by 99 percent of the people. Even copyright lawyers do not frequently understand the laws because of the mixed up jurisprudence and the evasiveness of the laws.
- The legal system rewards lawyers, regardless if they win or loose cases.
- Most music is in the public domain. Perhaps one percent may have copyrights… but there is no practical way of knowing which is which when looking at a list of songs in a computer disk. When a kid is about to download a song file, there is no way to know if the file is public domain or not.
-The music does nor fairly share their income with the artist, the performers and the composers, in the case of music.
- RIAA members payola is a far more serious problem for the music industry from the people’s perspective and the Justice Deparment does nothing serious about it. So RIAA goes after kids while the Justice Department ignores RIAA member crimes.
etc, etc.
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
September 13th, 2005 at 12:05 pm
Re “there is no ownership stamp”, this is worse than it looks.
According to the self proclaimed “composer societies”, ASCAP and BMI, the U.S. national anthem, the STAR SPANGLED BANNER (and the anthem of many other countries) has hundreds of owners. I swear this is true even though I myself find it hard to beleive. If in doubt check http://www.ascap.com/ , ACE Title Search, Search the Database and enter Star Spangled Banner, click on title and you get “Your title search for “STAR SPANGLED BANNER” returned 277 results.”. This means that the STAR SPANGLED BANNER has 277 self proclaimed “owners” who pretend to profit and probably do profit from the use of the anthen. Certainly ASCAP and the music publishers that own and control ASCAP do profit.
Now let us say you download the STAR SPANGLED BANNER from a p2p network, is that theft?
Let RIAA answer the question.
Let ASCAP answer the question.
Let BMI anser the question.
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
September 15th, 2005 at 12:10 pm
Which means that RIAA can threaten someone who downloaded or shared the the American national anthem? The song belongs to all just because it is the national anthem and no one should need permission from anyone for copying or performing the song.
Who do these guys think they are? Where is their patriotism?
September 15th, 2005 at 1:40 pm
“Legal”, maybe. It’s never been tested in a court of law (until now). They are, of course, free to file lawsuits. On the other hand, if/when a court rules on one of these, the lawsuits may be found to be frivolous.
Even if not, that hardly means the RIAA is doing “nothing wrong”, either from an ethical or business standpoint.
Otherwise, I do agree that the punishment is out of whack with the crime, as defined by current law. It would be interesting to see what a court challenge on “cruel and unusual punishment” grounds would produce.
But then, IANAL. I just call ‘em like I see ‘em.