Dave, RIAA wins almost 100pct vs p2p’ers ir sues. Its an interesting dichotomy.
Marty
"Wins" is too strong a word, since I don't think any have gone to
court -- see http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-Music-Download-Suit.html
as my source.
Besides, it's a very different situation. For my take on liability
issues -- note that I'm not a lawyer, and note that this is from 1994
-- see http://www.wilyhacker.com/1e/chap12.pdf
--Steven M. Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb
Mostly because it's almost always cheaper to settle than pursue a
defense. Read the articles about this "internet illiterate download
mom vs RIAA" story (you can't have missed it.)
She could've settled for ~$3500, she decided to fight it, she's now at
$24,000 in legal expenses and hasn't even gotten close to trial.
No juries to convince, no expert witnesses, no courtroom, no
fascinating point of law debated, just a simple economic choice, wanna
plead guilty for $3500 or run up $25K in legal bills and more? And
probably settle anyhow when you decide you've had enough.
Anyone who speaks about juries, the law, judges, etc in these kinds of
cases is just revealing themselves as having never had any experience
with the US legal system, or is speaking for a wealthy corporation who
can toss $50K at cases on a whim.
In my experience you can easily run up $25K in initial filings, just
letters going back and forth between both sides' lawyers, no judge or
court involved other than it's being filed by a clerk who checks some
mechanics (e.g., deadlines), but no one at the court is reading any of
it and they sincerely hope they never have to (i.e., that you'll
settle out of court, probably because one side ran out of money.)
bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein) writes:
In my experience you can easily run up $25K in initial filings, just
letters going back and forth between both sides' lawyers, no judge or
court involved other than it's being filed by a clerk who checks some
mechanics (e.g., deadlines), but no one at the court is reading any of
it and they sincerely hope they never have to (i.e., that you'll
settle out of court, probably because one side ran out of money.)
s/\$25K/$250K/, but otherwise, yes.
* Martin Hannigan:
Dave, RIAA wins almost 100pct vs p2p'ers ir sues. Its an interesting dichotomy.
Sure, but copyright law is a bit out of proportion. Maybe you could
hunt down the bad guys if they packeted you with Celine Dion
Florian Weimer wrote:
* Martin Hannigan:
Dave, RIAA wins almost 100pct vs p2p'ers ir sues. Its an interesting dichotomy.
Sure, but copyright law is a bit out of proportion. Maybe you could
hunt down the bad guys if they packeted you with Celine Dion
Nah, torture is a criminal offence. 
/ Mat