Please explain, Rekrul.

If I buy a CD and want a copy of one song for another use in my home, the easiest way for me to get that copy made is to download it. Are you telling us this is making an unauthorized copy?
I believe it is my right by law to make a copy for my own personal use and I AM paying for it. - home copying act in the US - fair dealing in Canada - something like that.
Isn’t that what we pay a tariff for when we purchase blank CDs? Isn’t that the whole purpose of the Private Copying Collective? That’s what THEY say here:
http://cpcc.ca/english/index.htm

Yes, judges seem to be wising up, but the politicians are still happy to bend over for the entertainment industry. The PRO-IP act passed through the House with only ten votes against it. Not only does it create a “copyright cop” position for the White House, it provides for asset forfeiture in cases of copyright infringment. Please note that there is nothing in the bill that says such provisions can only be used in cases of commercial piracy. Also, in the US, it has never been necessary to convict someone of a crime, or even file charges against them in order to seize property that the police think MIGHT have been used in or gotten from a crime. People have lost cash, cars and even homes to the drug seizure laws, without ever even being charged with any crime. Now the government wants to grant that same power in cases of copyright infringement.

Yes I know, and that is an abominable miscarriage of justice when that occurs I believe. I’m just saying that the tide finally seems to be turning on the RIAA and their cronies, and judges and authorities are becoming better informed constantly on these issues, and can see through what these cartels are doing. At the same time many 1000s of people are being harmed and I feel that justice and decency will win out in the end. You may be right but if you are we are in for a very rough ride with no end in sight.

I wasn’t even aware there was a jury. I have read about it, but don’t recall all the details. What a farce! But like I said, although he was responsible for the judgment, he has now changed his mind over it, and I don’t believe he was required to order a retrial, so at least he wishes to do the decent thing now.

Oh,
I am aware of jury nullification. I spread that info around as much as possible.
Most people I tell about it think i’m crazy and you HAVE to obey the judge. If
you’re in the jury pool, don’t let ANYONE hear you mention it … you’ll go home
right away. Courts want sheep, not thinkers .. it seems to be the american way.

But,

When both sides lawyers work for the same side, picking a hanging jury is easy , join
that with an instruction from a judge that tells the jury ’she’s guilty’ and the deed is
done. I really feel this was a set-up, and the ONLY reason it’s falling apart is the ability
of word to spread, and spread fast.

This is where the cliche “No jury in the world would convict me/them” comes from.

Yes, but that is under the CURRENT laws. Laws change, often at the urging of the entertainment industry. If they can get a provision slipped into a bill that says making copyrighted material available on a P2P network is illegal, then it becomes illegal.

For example, it didn’t used to be illegal to circumvent copy protection. Companies openly sold pieces of software that would bypass or remove the protection from computer games. There were “nibble” copiers for copying protected disks and “parameter” copies for bypassing the protection. Now such things are illegal thanks to the DMCA.

“Downloading is not illegal. That is the RIAA dogma they’ve been pushing to the mainstream media. It is copyright infringement.”

As far as I know, downloading IS illegal, since you’re making an unauthorized copy without paying for it. The difference is that downloading is such a minor offense that no company is going to spend the time or money to sue you for it.

“If you take the time to read the trial transcripts, and the judges instructions, you will
see that Judge davis pretty much ordered the jury to find Ms. Thomas guilty.
In a age with no internet, that would have been it.
Done Deal.”

I don’t know if this applies in civil trials, but in criminal trials in the US, the jury is under no obligation to render any particular verdict regardless of what the evidence shows. In other words, the prosecution could have a video of the accused committing the crime, plus a dozen eye-witnesses and the jury could still find them innocent if they think that would be justice. It’s called “Jury Nullification” and it’s meant to protect people from bad laws.

It works like this; A really bad law is passed and everyone, except the politicians who created the law agree that it’s a bad law. Someone is arrested for breaking this law and put on trial. Even if the judge tells them that they “MUST” find the person guilty if the evidence shows that he broke the law, they can find him not guilty. If this happens enough times, the law effectively becomes unenforceable. It can also be used in isolated cases where the law is good, but the jury feels that it is being mis-applied, such as a wife who kills an abusive husband. This is where the cliche “No jury in the world would convict me/them.”

Unfortunately, in the US, juries are generally not allowed to know that they have the power to render any verdict that they feel is just. The judge has the ultimate say on whether or not a jury can know that they have this power, and most (all?) don’t want juries to know this. In fact, during jury selection, any potential jurer who indicates that they know about jury nullification, or that they might be inclined to use it or tell the other jurers will often be rejected as a jurer.

Jury nullification - Look it up, tell others, make sure that anyone called for jury duty knows about it!

Gabriel will start acting as a judge in Jully 1st. We have better to do something about this fast!

And let do something about jammie attorney since he has been paid by the RIAA to make her lose the case!

Also with have to investigate the jurors since at least some of them if not all on them has been corrupted!

Let’s get to the botom of this!

No Justice no peace!

If you take the time to read the trial transcripts, and the judges instructions, you will
see that Judge davis pretty much ordered the jury to find Ms. Thomas guilty.
In a age with no internet, that would have been it.
Done Deal.

Not anymore.
The speed that this traveled around the net was astonishing. It reached too
many of the right eyes and ears.
It creates to many questions about Judge Davis’ competence and integrity.

Judge Davis has been forced to cover his ass.

That’s the only reason he is doing this.

Plus she was accused of making available for uploading.”

Yes I was just generalizing, but it’s likely she had been downloading music as that’s what p2p does, and she had music files in her shared folder/s. I was not saying downloading is illegal, it’s just that we get accused of being scabby or something and my point was that one of the main reasons for it is that we can’t afford the jacked up prices, and they really are in Australia. They say we use this as an excuse to steal, but I wasn’t commenting on that. I don’t call it that. I call it sharing.

As a local lawyer frequently says on the radio, only lawyers can confuse te simplest of issues.

If someone lends (makes available) a CD to a many and some of theses makes a copy for personal use, is the lending distribution? A yes reply would be nonsense, as lending is a fundamental natural right. That is what libraries do. Making available is what record companies do when they sell records. Thus lending or making available cannot be illegal.

Did the copiers of the CD infringe the rights of the original CD producer? No, if there are no damages caused that can be proven as is the cases if no copies are sold to a third parties. If there are no proven economic damages (meaning damages do not exist) no damages can be awarded.

Applying the so called and absurd statutory damage under the circumstance that there is no damages is wrong (absurd may be a better word), because the statutory damage was meant to apply to cases where actual damages exist but cannot be calculated.

Its is time for a new legal terms for copyright laws:

- Infringement with damages
- Damageless copying

Damaging infringement would be the actual selling of multiple copies and the claimig of copyright on public domain works (a favorite and widespread infringement of music publishers and record companies, in the music world).

The use of “Save as” option on computers would be damageless copying.

I was under the impression that in order to infringe on a copyright, you must be caught distributing a copy. Downloading is not distributing, but uploading technically is. Not that I agree with the law in this matter though. It’s not the same thing as making a physical copy then selling it, because I don’t agree with that. Altruistic sharing is morally acceptable to me.

Downloading is not illegal. That is the RIAA dogma they’ve been pushing to the mainstream media. It is copyright infringement.

Plus she was accused of making available for uploading.