Aug 29 2005 11:16:00 AM EDT
Runaround Suits
I’ve always said that the Recording Industry Association of America and its member companies are perfectly within their rights to sue those they think are infringing on music copyrights through peer-to-peer file-trading of songs. At the same time, it seems obvious that the RIAA should pick the lawsuits prudently, based on solid evidence, so that when the cases are publicized it will be clear that the defendants deserved what they got.
That doesn’t seem to be what’s happening, however. Instead, the RIAA notifies potential defendants that they are subject to a lawsuit that may result in hundreds of thousands of dollars of liability, and then gives them the option of settling the claim for only a few thousand dollars. It ought to be needless to say this, but sometimes an innocent defendant might still opt to take the settlement, because the risk of going to court and losing is so great.
Occasionally, however, you find a defendant who is troubled enough that he or she is willing to stand up to RIAA regardless of the risk. That seems to be the case with Patricia Santangelo. 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: 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.
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Aug 29 2005 07:23:48 PM EDT
Comment by: Supos
In a word: Wow! That is hands down the coolest thing I’ve read in a month. Anyone who only read the excerpt should read the whole thing.
That judge almost makes you believe there is still a hope for the American legal system. And the mom confirms that if the law was made for regular people, instead of high-paid lawyers (who don’t know their head from their ass anyway), we’d all be much better of.
Aug 29 2005 08:08:07 PM EDT
Comment by: Emil
Get what they deserve? No. What would be good is for a court to find that file sharing is not copyright infringement. It would be good news for everyone, and would probably save the record industry at the end of the day. Not that I care less. Anyway, I think you’re behind the times, no-one else considers file sharing morally wrong - well 99 percent of the population don’t anyway. Copyright should be returned to its initial purpose, an industry regultion. Not a means to terrorise ordinary folk.
Emil
Aug 29 2005 08:09:19 PM EDT
Comment by: Anonymous User
No, just you and a bunch of petty theives consider it morally fine. It’s stealing, stop pretending like there shouldn’t be compensation for these people’s work you assclown.
Aug 29 2005 08:33:59 PM EDT
Comment by: GriffJon
That’s a good, heart-warming transcript. Yay sanity in the legal system! Here’s hoping that she finds a good lawyer who sets some excellent precident in this case of the “computer owner is not necessarily responsible for all actions taken with said computer.”
Someone really devious should just compose a computer worm that creates a parasitic file trading network that connects to the various kazaa/gnutella/whichever networks at random nodes and IPs and moves files around at low bandwidths. Basically, nothing malicious per se, it eats a bit of your bandwidth and hopefully is otherwise hard to detect, but then forevermore makes prosecuting people on anything but very obvious, massive, commercial piracy impossible, or at least impractical.
Aug 30 2005 11:22:47 AM EDT
Comment by: Tammy
Am I reading too much between the lines to surmise that the judge’s unhappiness with the RIAA goes beyond the issue quoted in the excerpt? She seemed to be bending over backwards to give Ms. Santangelo a lot of help, and she seemed to me more than a little skeptical of the whole business that the RIAA was asserting. Of course, I also see the RIAA demanding all sorts of things they’re not entitled to — avoiding having to give Ms. Santangelo time to find a lawyer, forcing her to assert under oath whether she shared files, bullying her into dealing with the ‘conference center’ — and I can’t say I expect any judge would be thrilled at being a party to that sort of judicial bullying.
Perhaps it’s a measure of the RIAA’s arrogance that they think judges are going to just go along with whatever they say because they represent large, wealthy companies. Whatever the case, I’m glad that Ms. Santangelo drew a judge who’s not snowed by that.
My question is this: assuming the RIAA loses this case, what does that do to the thousands of other existing lawsuits they’ve got out there? And what does it do to the innocent people who have already been bullied into settling?
Aug 30 2005 02:15:03 PM EDT
Comment by: Anonymous User
So what’s the follow-up on this? She was to return to court July 8, according to the full transcript.
Aug 30 2005 04:52:22 PM EDT
Comment by: Observer
Apparently she has found herself a pretty good lawyer. Scroll down at: http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/ to read some pretty interesting Litigation Documents.
Aug 31 2005 09:49:43 PM EDT
Comment by: Ed
Ok. So we all hate what the RIAA and MPAA are doing to scare people into settling.
Right?
We should all get behind a case like this and find the nastiest toughest lawyer around and send them in there for one person. Say, like this lady.
So how about it? Anyone out there want to set up a PayPal account for donations to her legal fund?
If we band together they wont keep picking us off one at a time.
Sep 10 2005 01:26:08 PM EDT
Comment by: Chill Bill
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)
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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.
For more information on how to stick it to the man, visit Mark Steven’s http://www.adventuresinlegalland.com
Jan 22 2006 01:33:30 AM EST
Comment by: Vishal’s Diggs » Judge Puts the RIAA in Their Place
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