Fight Goliath fund breaks $5,000
p2p news / p2pnet: The Patti Santangelo Fight Goliath campaign has broken the $5,000 barrier.
As I write this, the total from PayPal contributions has reached $5,163.02.
Santangelo, a New York mother with no financial resources, is refusing to let Warner Music (USA), Sony BMG, (Japan, Germany), EMI (Britain) and Vivendi Universal (France), the multi-billion-dollar Big Four record labels, blackmail her for something she didn’t do, that’s to say share music with other people via the p2p networks.
The mainstream media have now picked up the story and the Big Four are seeing it added to their dazzling and still growing list of PR blunders.
Santangelo will be against RIAA law-slingers Shook, Hardy Bacon, the infamous firm which defends the likes of Philip Morris in lawsuits brought by cancer victims against Big Tobacco; and, Cowan Liebowitz.
The Patti Santangelo Fight Goliath campaign was started to help provide funds for Santangelo who, although she still has lawyer Ray Beckerman in her corner, doesn’t have a legal team behind her.
The RIAA, the Big Four’s US faux ‘trade’ organization, would like to keep the Santangelo story ‘local,’ so to speak. But it has immense international ramifications, reflected by the fact that sites now carrying Fight Goliath donation buttons are based not only in the US and Canada, but also in Italy and Britain.
You can help by donating to the campaign through the PayPal button below >>>>>>>>>>>>
Or, if you prefer, snail-mail your contribution to Patti here:
Patricia Santangelo
c/o Ray Beckerman
Beldock Levine & Hoffman LLP
99 Park Ave (16th Fl)
New York, NY 10016
We’ll be getting totals of snail-mail donations for updates we’ll be posting every Friday.
Below is the list of sites which are displaying Patti Santangelo Fight Goliath campaign buttons:
- http://p2pnet.net $1386.79
- http://jasonrohrer.n3.net $1377.57
- http://boingboing.net $1149.48
- http://www.fightgoliath.org $401.59
- http://www.downhillbattle.org $310.12
- http://www.p2pforum.it $104.41
- http://www.p2pjihad.org/ $79.69
- http://virtualturntable.fourstones.net $72.22
- http://www.bl0g.co.uk/ $47.75
- http://www.azoz.com $42.79
- http://www.yourmercifulgod.co.uk/ $28.89
- http://boycott-riaa.com $23.37
- http://psg.com/ $19.12
- http://www.boycott-riaa.com $19.12
- http://www.pod2peer.blogspot.com/ $18.92
- http://blog.andrlik.org $14.26
- http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com $14.11
- http://http://www.myspace.com/brizmo $9.41
- http://www.livejournal.com/users/obscure411 $9.41
- http://www.quiglag.com $9.41
- http://www.soundnet.co.uk/ $4.50
- http://www.pdmedia.org $2.61 http://bandnet.org/ $2.55
- http://scattermall.com $0.67
Meanwhile, the RIAA is already targeting Britanny Chan, a 14-year-old Michigan school-girl and in one of the latest developments, the Big Four’s RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) seems set to try the same terror-tactic against one or more of Santangelo’s give children.
Santangelo is slated to challenge the Big Four in a civil court trial by jury, with no date set so far.
Will the case actually be heard, or will the Big Four use one device or another to drop it to avoid the inevitable terrible international publicity and revelations that’ll inevitably follow?
For now, thanks to everyone who’s either sent money in, or has posted a button.
It’s long gone time we made it clear to the Big Four labels that they depend on us, not the other way around, and Patti is helping us to do that.
Stay tuned.
Cheers! And all the best …
Jon Newton
Also See:
picked up – Patti Santangelo goes mainstream, December 26, 2005
cancer victims – New tactics at Philip Morris help stem tide of lawsuits, May 11, 2005
Michigan school-girl – RIAA schoolgirl victim hearing, January 9, 2006
terror-tactic – Teens next RIAA victims, December 23, 2005
January 16th, 2006 at 7:13 pm
Not one penny should go to Beckerman… not one penny.
January 16th, 2006 at 7:23 pm
a lawyers address. i dont like it.
January 16th, 2006 at 7:34 pm
The money should be put into Escrow – not Santangelo, Jon or lawyers can get their hands on it. The administrator of the Escrow should ensure that the money is used for the correct purpose… And should check that Santangelo ain’t being ripped off by her lawyer
January 16th, 2006 at 7:42 pm
We had Patti’s home address up a while ago, but she was being pestered so we had to take it down. PO Boxes aren’t a good idea and this seems to be a reasonable compromise.
For what it’s worth, I have far better reasons than most people for not trusting members of the legal community but in my book, Beckerman – with whom I’ve now spoken quite a few times – is an exception to the rule.
Also, Myron Beldock defended Rubin ‘Hurricane’ Carter in a marathon case which was turned into a movie called ‘The Hurricane’ [http://www.altfg.com/Reviews/Hurricane1999.htm] starring Denzel Washington.
“After the New Jersey prosecutors dismissed all the charges against Carter and Artis in 1988, Beldock gave the celebratory party in his Greenwich Village apartment,” said the New York Times in a review of ‘The Miraculous Journey of Rubin Carter’ by James S. Hirsch.
”The real story,” Beldock said, ”is the fact that good triumphs over evil, and how hard it is to get there.”
Cheers!
January 16th, 2006 at 7:45 pm
Why does the line from this story that says “The mainstream media have now picked up the story …” contain a link to a post from this site from 3 weeks ago. I have seen the mainstream media do reports on Patti’s plight, but am yet to see any of them mention the Fight Goliath campaign. Can anyone offer a link to an article from the mainstream media that mentions the Fight Goliath campaign specifically?
For that matter I am yet to see Patti herself acknowledge the existance of the campaign in any manner whatsoever.
January 16th, 2006 at 7:52 pm
For the media, http://p2pnet.net/story/7432, not to mention the Associated Press, Los Angeles Times, and so on.
For Patti, “Thanks also to p2pnet and all readers for their support” (http://p2pnet.net/story/7351)
Cheers!
January 16th, 2006 at 8:34 pm
Not one penny should go to anybody. It is a waste of money!
You people know perfectly what you are all into: piracy and violation of copyright law, and that is a crime, and don’t ever pretend it is nothing like that. p2p is a great thing but….If one is busted, he or she shouldn’t go whining about it and ask for money. Who cares? It is not going to change anything, anyway. 10 people are gone, 20 more will appear instead. In a couple of months or so nobody will even remember her name except those whose money she had stolen with the help of gullible web-sites.
January 16th, 2006 at 8:49 pm
I know that the mainstream media have picked up Patti’s story, but have any of them mentioned the Fight Goliath appeal specifically? I cannot find one reference to it anywhere. I would love to be proven wrong (preferably with a link that points OUTSIDE the p2pnet.net domain this time).
For example, this one from AP mentions the david and goliath nature of the battle, but not the appeal itself:
http://www.suntimes.com/output/tech/cst-ftr-download29.html
The point of my question is to try and determine the legitimacy of the appeal.
By the way, the note from Patti that said “Thanks also to p2pnet and all readers for their support” was published on your site on the 17th of December last year. That was before the appeal was even launched, so I would suggest that it is in reference to articles articles and readers comments on this site and not anything to do with the appeal that you subsequently launched in her name.
So I ask AGAIN … has Patti ever publicly acknowledged the existance of the Fight Goliath appeal? I can’t wait to donate, but need to know that it has her endorsment before I do so.
January 16th, 2006 at 9:17 pm
Hi again Mr/Miss Anonymous:
“… has Patti ever publicly acknowledged the existance of the Fight Goliath appeal?
http://p2pnet.net/story/7511 – January 5: an email Patti sends to everyone who contributes: “The support that you have given me reminds me that I am not alone with how I feel about these lawsuits and I cannot thank you enough for that.”
“… to try and determine the legitimacy of the appeal”.
Are you suggesting this is a scam of some kind?
Well, it ain’t : )
Cheers!
Jon
January 16th, 2006 at 9:33 pm
Thanks, missed that article.
Wasn’t suggesting a scam, those were your words. I just want to know my donation will end up in the right place.
January 16th, 2006 at 9:36 pm
Thanks Jon…..be well…………
Mike
January 16th, 2006 at 9:38 pm
> You people know perfectly what you are all into: piracy and
> violation of copyright law, and that is a crime, and don’t ever
> pretend it is nothing like that.
Sounds like you’re missing one of the big points of this case: neither Patricia Santangelo nor her children, by all the available evidence, have ever purposely shared a file, or wanted to.
So I’m very interested in this case — and I’ve never shared a music file in my life, either (to my knowledge!)
The RIAA is going after an innocent bystander here, who has done nothing more than to _allegedly_ accidentally allow “rogue” use of her computer — once — possibly by a teenage friend of one of her children. She wasn’t technically savvy enough to catch this when it happened… if it happened; the RIAA has basically no valid evidence against her, since the computer that purportedly did the sharing is now defunct due to a virus. But they’re pursuing the case anyway, telling her that if she’s really innocent she should find and name the real culprit!
Witch-hunt logic like this has absolutely no place in a country where the idea of “innocent until proven guilty” still holds — and Ms. Santangelo is not exactly technically qualified to do detective work on behalf of the RIAA in any case.
> It is not going to change anything, anyway.
Not true (in my not-a-lawyerly opinion). There’s a really good chance here to give a(nother) black eye to a group of corporate lawyers who are perverting the justice system to get their all-important message out there that “file sharing is illegal” — and who have demonstrated very clearly that they don’t care who gets hurt in the process… as long as none of their victims are rich enough to afford a good lawyer!
Here’s the choice: side with the RIAA and punish the guilty (and however many other people get caught in the crossfire) — or side with Ms. Santangelo and protect innocent people from having their lives arbitrarily ruined.
– And possibly let a few technically “guilty” people get away, yes; that’s what “innocent until proven guilty” _means_. But we’re talking, at most, about a fairly small offense here. All in favor of $3500 fines for littering, please stand up! $7500 speeding tickets, maybe? Speeders are at least increasing their risk of killing other people a _little_ bit; surely *they* deserve to be bankrupted by lawsuits more than a single mom who failed to notice six files getting copied onto her computer…!
January 16th, 2006 at 10:22 pm
So … back to the original topic of this thread. Has the “Fight Goliath” Appeal been mentioned in the mainstream media? If so can anyone provide a link?
Are you unable to provide such a link Jon, or were you avoiding that question?
January 16th, 2006 at 10:55 pm
The NYT talked to me last week for what I understand was/is to be a story. I don’t know if it’s appeared yet, or even if it _will_ appear.
Other than that, avoiding? I’m just very, very busy and I haven’t looked to see if Fight Goliath has been cited. If it hasn’t, it will. Count on it.
Cheers!
January 16th, 2006 at 11:41 pm
Keep up the good work
January 17th, 2006 at 1:23 am
“You people know perfectly what you are all into: piracy and violation of copyright law, and that is a crime, and don’t ever pretend it is nothing like that.”
Apparently, you don’t know what is going on here. The RIAA is going after and suing a lot of people who are innocent. They really don’t care what proof you have. If they could go after Mrs. Santangelo, they could go after you just as easily. If people stand up, they can change something. Would you rather the RIAA is allowed to continue what they are doing and just keep destroying innocent people’s lives? That’s what they are doing. How would you like to have everything you have ever worked for or achieved taken away for something you have never done? Until you have walked in her shoes, you might not want to judge.
January 17th, 2006 at 2:33 am
“We had Patti’s home address up a while ago, but she was being pestered so we had to take it down.”
Is it to possible to ellaborate on how she was being pestered and by who?
January 17th, 2006 at 7:52 am
That person speaks for the RIAA because they’re probably a spokeshole for the org!!! Listen you RIAA, people were forced into buying CDs when Vinyl went away, now you bitch because people share music they bought legally, get lost!!! Besides that, you can’t prove Patti did anything, go to a jury trial and let’s see it, scumbags!!!
January 17th, 2006 at 1:05 pm
I enjoy visiting the web sites that post this button.
I try to reward them by at least by reading their web page and clicking on google ads if they have any.
January 17th, 2006 at 1:13 pm
I can’t imagine how much I’d have to donate before I had this opinion.
January 17th, 2006 at 1:18 pm
I wouldn’t want Patty worried about a single penny this RIAA suit has cost her. I hope she uses the money to pay for any legal costs.
Otherwise the pressure will force her to settle.
January 17th, 2006 at 3:22 pm
$5000 is pittance. The Big Four are gonna get that and more from her, everyone knows that. She’ll become the poster child for their scam. Everyone needs to stop supporting the media companies. Stop buying their music and movies.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:20 pm
I see it as this has just begun.
Everyday another Button shows up on a new web site.
January 17th, 2006 at 4:26 pm
I love the opportunity to have a stake in the outcome of the case.
Thanks for giving me a place to donate~
January 17th, 2006 at 8:32 pm
That id not what I mean….I mean, if you are busted, you are on your own, that’s the way it is supposed to be.
I do not support RIAA’s actions but I’d rtather be on a side of someone who has much more money that I do. It is too bad what is going on with Patricia. But let’s see some facts:
If she looses. which is more than likely, then other people will be forced to pay shitload of money instead of $3,500. Since any of you have downloaded/pirated (hmmmm….I mean, shared) on the amount of much more than this, it is a fair amount rather $150,000 per violation and/or jail time.
Also, she is defending herself. She DOES NOT NEED money right now. For her former lawyer? Doesn’t look like she has to pay money before the trial is over. If she wins, the RIAA picks up the tab. But if she looses…..And probably now she knows that she is in deep doo-doo, that’s why she asks for money now because no one will give anything later, when she is defeated.
I hope I am wrong but it all looks this way.
January 17th, 2006 at 8:41 pm
I want to fight the RIAA at every turn. If $20.00 makes it possible for Patti to fight, then I give her $20.00
I figure that you are getting at LEAST a $1.00 worth of entertainment arguing.
Send her a buck and maybe she’ll give you something else to write about.
January 18th, 2006 at 12:35 pm
yes, it is pretty apparent that RIAA propagandists have filled this site and that of Slyck.
January 19th, 2006 at 2:25 am
I personally think she should be able to use this for anything she needs, including utilities, house payment, food for her kids, etc.
The financial backing of the “Goliaths” allow them to drag this out
as long as possible, causing it to be a financial drain in ALL areas of
her life. ALL AREAS.
If she risks losing her home, she would have to back down.
If she has to choose between food for her kids, and fighting,
she may be forced to back down.
This is happenening to her, partially, because an inhuman corporation can only judge her by it’s own greedy example. A Corporation is incapable of trust. A Corporation onyl believes the absolute worst of anyone outside it’s scope. That’s why all downloaders are worse than thieves in their eyes.
We are better than this.
Yes, we have been burned before, but I AM willing to trust
Patti, completely. Open the floodgate of trust. THAT will drown
the greedy fucks.
January 19th, 2006 at 9:49 am
“For what it’s worth, I have far better reasons than most people for not trusting members of the legal community but in my book, Beckerman – with whom I’ve now spoken quite a few times – is an exception to the rule.”
On what basis? Ray Beckerman is not exactly what he portrays himself to be….
January 21st, 2006 at 4:29 pm
use your head. pro RIAA stooges who’d like nothing more than to harass someone for a fanatical cause.
January 21st, 2006 at 5:17 pm
Ive always found that Slyck tends to think for itself rather than get wrapped into this kind of politial mumbo jumbo.