EFF wades in on RIAA Howell case
p2pnet news | RIAA News:- The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation ) says it’ll add its voice to those speaking out against the RIAA’s efforts to tar and feather Pamela and Jeffery Howell, two more people accused of being massive online distributors of copyrighted digital music.
Howell’s case rocketted to international prominence when RIAA lawyer Ira Schwartz tried to argue MP3 files Howell made on his computer from legally bought CDs were ‘unauthorized copies’ of copyrighted recordings.
“I couldn’t believe it when I read that,” said Recording Industry vs The People’s Ray Beckerman.
“The basic principle in the law is that you have to distribute actual physical copies to be guilty of violating copyright. But recently, the industry has been going around saying that even a personal copy on your computer is a violation.”
Connecticut district judge Janet Bond Arterton recently threw out the RIAA’s infamous “making available” claim, “which comprises the bottom line for all the Big 4 P2P file sharing cases,” said a recent p2pnet story, going on that Matt Foster, a lawyer with Indiana Legal Services, unearthed the case, according to Beckerman.
p2pnet went on >>>
In Atlantic v Brennan, in a 9-page opinion, district judge Janet Bond Arterton ruled the RIAA has to to prove ‘actual distribution of copies’ and can’t rely on the mere fact there are song files on the defendant’s computer, and that they were ‘available’.
“This is the same issue that’s been the subject of extensive briefing in two contested cases in Elektra v. Barker and Warner v. Cassin,” says Beckerman.
Arterton also held the defendant —- who wasn’t even present at the decision —- had other possible defenses, such as whether or not the RIAA’s efforts to claim $750 for each allegedly infringed song is unconstitutional, and possible copyright misuse flowing from the record companies’ anticompetitive behavior.
Now, the RIAA is, “seeking thousands of dollars in damages from the defendants in the case, Pamela and Jeffery Howell, for alleged unauthorized distribution of copyrighted digital music,” says the EFF, going on:
“However, instead of proving that the Howells actually distributed music files, the RIAA claims only that they had songs in the ’shared’ folder of peer-to-peer file-sharing software Kazaa – without any proof that anyone other than their own investigators actually downloaded the songs from them.”
EFF senior staff attorney Fred von Lohmann will argue at Wednesday’s hearing that the RIAA can’t take this shortcut.
“This amounts to suing someone for attempted copyright infringement – something the Copyright Act simply does not allow,” he says. “If the RIAA wants to keep bringing these suits and collecting big settlements, then they have to follow the law and prove their case. It’s not enough to say the law could have been broken. The RIAA must prove it actually was broken.”
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Also See:
international prominence – Rip your legal CD? You’re a thief: RIAA, December 31, 2007
p2pnet – Judge nails RIAA ‘making available’ claim, February 25, 2008
EFF – EFF Takes on RIAA Lawsuit Strategy in Wednesday Court Hearing, March 3, 2008
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March 4th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
At least until the new laws that the RIAA/MPAA are currently trying to buy are passed. Then “attempted copyright infringment” will be made illegal. It’s the content industry’s wet dream.