RIAA blackmail income
p2p news / p2pnet: As p2pnet has pointed out countless times, the RIAA has only been able to get IP addresses for slightly more than 18,000 of the estimated 60 million people in the US who’ve been happily engaged in online p2p file sharing.
“RIAA lawsuits against individual file-swappers result in the defendant settling with the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) to avoid going to court and possibly losing against the multi-billion dollar organization,” says ctrlc in The Pirate Times.
Actually, only a relatively small number have settled, but be that as it may, “Generally, these suits are settled at $3,000 USD to $6,000 USD,” says ctrlc story, going on:
“I have seen in the past few years a $2,000 or a $7,000 every now and then, but for argument’s sake, we will say the average settled lawsuit is $5,000, since this appears most frequently.
“Let’s say all [estimated] 18,337 USA citizens sued have settled for $5,000 USD each, to avoid going to court and possibly losing their homes. That would give the RIAA massive profits of $91,685,000! The RIAA has profited nearly $100 million by suing individual who are too helpless to fight back, since their ’sue em’ all’ campaign began, years ago.”
The story points out the RIAA continues to sue the magic number of [about] 750 people a month and, “Since the beginning of the RIAA’s sue-em-all campaign, file-sharing has only increased in the United States and globally. This proves that the RIAA is completely ineffective in deterring users from downloading music ‘illegally’.”
Therefore, ctrlc concludes, there can only be one true motive lying behind the lawsuits, “that being monetary gain, of course. With their campaign proving ineffective, their profits higher than ever, and domestic studies proving P2P does not damage sales, the RIAA continues to sue to make mass-profits for their own pockets.
“Nearly $100 million stolen by the hands of the RIAA, and our government standing by idly, allowing it to happen.”
Meanwhile, are these millions being channelled to the artists and music industry support workers who, according to the RIAA’s multi-billionaire-owners, are suffering extreme hardships because of file sharing?
Don’t bother to stay tuned.
(Thanks, Robin)
[A PledgeBank fund has been started here. http://www.pledgebank.com/FreeSpeechCanad. Please have a look, help if you can, and spread the word. Cheers! And thanks ....... Jon]
Also See:
60 million – Content and Control, January 8, 2005
The Pirate Times – RIAA Profits Nearly $100 Million by Suing P2P Users, March 31, 2006
April 6th, 2006 at 6:05 pm
From what I’ve seen, until about a year ago most of the settlements were $3000…. lately they’ve been $3750.
Most of the default judgments I’ve seen have been in the $4000 to $6000 range. Basically, they have been getting $750 per song from their ‘exhibit A’ list.
April 6th, 2006 at 6:37 pm
I would like to see some of these artists who have been firmly in the RIAA’s camp pull their heads out of the RIAA’s ass long enough to at least demand a share of that money.
April 6th, 2006 at 7:36 pm
What artists ?
All I’ve seen are cutout / paste-up sex dolls who could never sing in public or the degrading rap talk songs that promote violence.
April 6th, 2006 at 9:32 pm
Did I miss something, or did March go by without a new round of lawsuits? I don’t recall seeing the usual end of month press release.
April 7th, 2006 at 2:39 am
yeah I think you’re right – I have been watching all the cyberlaw sites for updates on law suits this year and reckon they have slowed down – might have something to with them changing law firms – but was also wondering about the Big Champagne p2p usage statistics – last I saw these was January 06, does anyone know if they have published monthly since then???
April 7th, 2006 at 9:33 am
One thing no one will ever see is a list of the money paid to performers and songwriters. Even if the list is published the money will have passed through intermediaries such as managers and publisher and the truth will be unknown.
The secrecy is justified as “privacy” but the “privacy” hurts the artists and is actually used to hide the facts from the artists and songwriters so they cannot benchmark (compare) their incomes to that of others. This “privacy” then helps the copyright cartels to grab all the money through creative accounting.
The solution is to open the books. This however is unlikely wherever lobbies of corporations are busy at work while the common workers (artists and songwriters) are too busy making money for the cartels while having no real (and not token) representation anywhere.
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
April 8th, 2006 at 2:24 am
Hey don’t you guy’s remember that when all these lawsuit’s started that ALL the money that was collected was to go to a fund so they (Riaa) could continue to sue more people!!!!! Yahoo!!!!! Let’s see at the rate their going it will only take them another 60 or so years to finish the job???? Wonder if they (major labels) will be in business that long!!!!! hahaha