Rich Fiscus
9 Aug 2007 5:38
German courts have started a trend that has the music industry up in arms. Calling copyright violation by file sharing a "petty offense", a judge in Offenberg instructed the prosecuter's office not to turn over the data saying the labels hadn't explained how ""criminally relevant damage" could have arisen from the alleged file sharing.
In other words how could the damage have been great enough to consider it a criminal offense?
One thing big entertainment companies don't seem to be willing to admit that there is more than one kind of piracy. While it's clear that all piracy is illegal, no clear connection between individuals sharing files on a P2P network and a significant drop in sales has been established.
In many countries there's a certain level of piracy that's considered a civil, not criminal offense. By definition, civil offenses aren't inherently harmful to society, and therefore often not grounds to release the kind of information in file sharing cases.
There's no question, for example, that Asian piracy rings distributing pirated music and movies in China, the U.S., and many other countries puts a dent in copyright holders' profits, is done for profit, and is a criminal offense. The link between someone downloading and a lost sale is more tenuous, and claims that such a connection exists should be met with a demand for proof - exactly what the German courts seem to be doing.
While US lawmakers have been considering criminalizing instances of copyright infringement that have traditionally been civil offenses, it seems that other courts agree with what file sharers have been claiming the whole time - that no evidence of serious financial damages have been shown.
Source: Ars Technica