Petteri Pyyny
10 Sep 2003 14:22
The news story that we published yesterday, where RIAA sued a 12-year-old girl for illegal file sharing, has evolved since.
Girl's mother has now settled the case with RIAA, in order to avoid costly legal process and has agreed to pay $2,000 in damages to the RIAA. After the settlement was published, a file-sharing companies' lobby group,
P2P United, has stepped into the limelight and promised to pay the little girl's RIAA bill.
"We do not condone copyright infringement, but someone has to draw the line to call attention to a system that permits multinational corporations with phenomenal financial and political resources to strong-arm 12-year-olds and their families in public housing the way this sorry episode dramatizes," said Adam Eisgrau, the executive director of P2P United. According to him, the group has no intention of paying for other file-swapper's legal fees.
According to newspaper sources, Brianna Lahara is a 12-year-old schoolgirl who lives with her mother in public housing in New York City. She was one of the targets of RIAA's latest witch hunt in which the association sued over 250 individuals across the Unites States.
P2P United is a lobby group that represents many P2P networks and companies and tries to lobby in Washington DC to get through laws that would force music companies to license their content for P2P networks with fair pricing models. Association currently represents companies and P2P networks such as eDonkey, Grokster and BearShare.
Source: News.com