James Delahunty
12 Dec 2005 10:49
Cecilia Gonzalez, 29, has lost an appeal against a decision by an earlier District Court hearing that awarded $22,500 damages to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). She was accused of downloading and sharing copyrighted music on P2P networks, and is only one of many thousand U.S. P2P users that have been sued. She claimed that she was only downloading the music to sample it and that if she liked it, she would have bought it at a later date.
However, the appeals court wasn't convinced. "A copy downloaded, played and retained on one's hard drive for future use is a direct substitute for a purchased copy," the judges said. "Gonzalez' argument is no more relevant than a thief's contention that he shoplifted only 30 compact discs, planning to listen to them at home and pay later." Her lawyer had contested that she hadn't broken any copyright laws by sampling the music.
She had rejected a $3,500 settlement offered by the RIAA's settlement centre earlier on and the case was taken to court. She apparently downloaded and distributed at least 30 tracks. She was fined $750 per track.
Source:
The Register