Urge Obama not to work for the RIAA!
p2pnet news view RIAA | Freedom | P2P:- The RIAA’s damages theory, which seeks from $750 to $150,000 per MP3 song file, or from 2,200 to 450,000 times the actual damages, is flagrantly unconstitutional.
In SONY BMG Music Entertainment v Cloud, a Pennsylvania case in which the RIAA’s outlandish statutory damages theory is being contested by a sole practitioner battling several of the RIAA’s law firms, the US Department of Justice has filed papers indicating it’s considering intervening in the case — on the side of the RIAA!
United States Motion for Extension of Time in Which to Determine if Intervention is Appropriate
Don’t let this happen.
1. Write to president Obama urging him NOT to intervene; and
2. Rebroadcast this message by any means available to you, including emails, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, or any network or social network of any kind of which you’re a member.
This is an important test of whether Obama will allow his Department of Justice to be controlled by the dictates of the large record companies.
It’ll also provide an early test of whether or not he was sincere in promising he’d stand up for the working people, rather than for the big corporations who are making war against them.
Partners from Jenner and Block, one of whom was the architect of the RIAA’s mass litigation campaign, and another of whom traveled to Duluth, Minnesota, to try to defend the $220,000 verdict the RIAA had obtained against Jammie Thomas, now occupy the second and third highest positions in the new administration’s Department of Justice.
We’d also do well to remember Matthew Oppenheim, who’s identified himself to the Courts as “the client” and as “the principal” of the record companies and as the “sole person who has settlement authority” in these cases, and who’s the puppetmaster of these cases, was also a partner at Jenner & Block.
It’s time for this madness – this war against kids and other helpless people – to end.
Please pass this post along to your friends.
Ray Beckerman – Recording Industry vs The People
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If you don’t wan’t to see an escalation, instead of a halt, of the way in which Vivendi Universal (France), Sony BMG (Japan and Germany), EMI (Britain), and Warner Music (US) were able to call the shots in the Bush government, use People 2 People power to do as Ray suggests.
“President Obama is committed to creating the most open and accessible administration in American history,” says the message on the White House contact page.
“To send questions, comments, concerns, or well-wishes to the President or his staff, please use the form …”
Use it. It’ll only take a minute to write and fire off an email to the White House.
And don’t forget to tell him to order the RIAA to keep its hands off our kids.
Phone Numbers
Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
FAX: 202-456-2461
And if you know of anyone with any influence in the Obama administration, or in the mainstream media, contact them as well.
Jon Newton – p2pnet
February , 2009
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February 22nd, 2009 at 2:12 pm
Obama is harping on Net Neutrality, saying he won’t let it be regulated. While he may agree with fighting “piracy” he would not want to see Net Neutrality go to the wayside. Which means, ISP’s won’t be able to shape traffic and block sites.
Sounds a bit contradicting to support Net Neutrality but support the **AA groups and their support groups. So it will certainly be interesting to see what he does to please both (besides another bailout which will used to buy more legislation).
February 22nd, 2009 at 3:59 pm
Hi Jon -
I’m pretty sure you’ll be interested in this for a follow on your other posts:
http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2009/02/19/us-congressional-uspto-officials-see-geneva-policymaking-up-close/
February 22nd, 2009 at 5:09 pm
“This is an important test of whether Obama will allow his Department of Justice to be controlled by the dictates of the large record companies.
Itâll also provide an early test of whether or not he was sincere in promising heâd stand up for the working people, rather than for the big corporations who are making war against them.”
Indeed, Jon. You know, when he was elected, I gave it 6 months for the shine to come off his presidency, but now it looks like it could be just a month!
It’s a shame I don’t live in the great U-S-of-A (sarcastic) or I’d be writing to Obama about this.
February 22nd, 2009 at 11:39 pm
Obama said that he would be locking out lobbyists from his administration…that turned out to not be true. Anyone here have any idea how much was raised for his campaign by hollywood? If you think republicans are bad about cronyism, let me clue you in, all washington politicians are big about cronyism. In the eyes of the public Bush’s cronies were the oil companies, PMCs, et al.
It’s been my opinion for many years that the democrats cronies, come mostly from lunatic university professors and out of touch hollywood nutjobs. Give it a few more months before you pass judgement (I am), but I gotta tell ya, all politicians are the same. They all want power over us in some way shape or form. Most people when they vote for a politician, vote for someone they want to control something they themselves have no control over. Well giving power to politicians over some of the citizens, inevitably grants them power over all citizens. You lose a little bit of freedom every election, no matter who wins. Sad to say, I have yet to see this operate any differently. Democrats want control over a certain set of things, republicans another set. There is some overlap of course, but they still all want to take away our freedom to do something.
February 22nd, 2009 at 11:39 pm
I wrote the following…feel free to copy if you want:
Your Justice Dept seems to be chock full of ex-RIAA/MPAA attorneys. I would hope that they DO NOT PARTICIPATE IN ANY FASHION in any litigation attempts by their former employers to extort unreasonable and unconstitutional settlements from the likes of teenagers, the elderly, and the other VICTIMS of the RIAA, many of whom are completely innocent but strong armed into paying settlements they simply cant afford in these trying times. Its time that these companies are no longer given the power of government force to perpetuate failed business models and stifle innovation that they cannot control
February 22nd, 2009 at 11:42 pm
want to take away our freedom to do something.
Apparently the end of my last paragraph got cut off for some reason.