AfterDawn: Tech news

RIAA sues over 500 more individuals

Written by Jari Ketola @ 24 Mar 2004 9:16 User comments (33)

RIAA sues over 500 more individuals The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has filed lawsuits against 532 suspected pirates. Among those sued are, for example, 89 students from more than 20 different universities.
"There is an exciting array of legal music services where fans can get high-quality online music," said Cary Sherman, president of RIAA. "Lawsuits are an important part of the larger strategy to educate file sharers about the law, protect the rights of copyright owners and encourage music fans to turn to these legitimate services."

College students are generally considered to be the most active users of peer-to-peer networks. That's why it's not too surprising to see RIAA make a major move against them. Several universities have already signed deals with for instance Napster to allow their students access to legal music services at a reasonable price.

The rest of the sued individuals were users of commercial ISPs. Lawsuits were brought against them in California, Colorado, Missouri, Texas and Virginia.



Source: Reuters

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33 user comments

124.3.2004 09:30

REgarding the College student comment. Not suprising since college students usually don't have any money. Sen. Joe McCarthy would be proud. We must route out this dangerous criminals or who knows what corporations bottom line might lower a little bit.

224.3.2004 15:28

I for one think the RIAA is totally out of line with these ridiculous lawsuits(anyone from 8 to 80). I will not purchase any form of recorded music until the courts wake up and put a stop to the RIAA's nazi tactics.

324.3.2004 17:35

We need to wake up, not just here in the U.S. but every where. These corporate thugs are here to stay, as long as you & I keep voting for the same people that keep taking money from these corporations, it wont change. Thomas Jefferson once said that big business would be the baine(<-spelling lol) of society and business wasnt as global as it is today. And aslong as we keep buying and voting the same way we have a rocky road ahead of us I'm afraid. D

425.3.2004 03:00

Going after college student is stupid. These students will make money someday and start buying music in quantity if the music industry doesn't piss them off.

525.3.2004 07:29
Rodgers
Inactive

RIAA, continuing to prove what assholes there really are. It is like an elephant attacking an ant. I was kind of hoping the RIAA would come after me, so I could hit them with an invasion of privacy lawsuit. We need a couple of good judges to put the RIAA in their proper place, flushed down the toilet, where the rest of the shit goes. Best to all! Rodgers

625.3.2004 07:53
Pierino
Inactive

Ref: RIAA We don't need any more judges and lawyers, we have ONE too many of them. The way I feel would be good for both RIAA and the public: IF the price of a music CD would be darn reasonable, people wouldn't even bother to copy a disk and they will buy it instead. Same w/ DVDs. as long as the price is unreasonable hi, Crime pays Just my opinion -- Peace

725.3.2004 10:36
Rodgers
Inactive

The day music and/or video is sold at a reasonable price is just plain wishful thinking. The name of the game is greed. Corporate glutons will see to it that nothing they produce will ever be reasonably priced. Rodgers

825.3.2004 15:30

An 80 min blank CD holds 18-20 songs. YOU have to pay .88-.99 per song for a "legal download"-YOU have to supply EVERYTHING(including the blank disc)to produce a finished CD. THEY make a ton of money-YOU get totally ripped-off. If the RIAA would get rid of their need for greed and total control then maybe people would cooperate with them.

925.3.2004 15:32

they can sue all the people they want, they will never stop the piracy of music. the only thing they are accomplishing is the creation of a smarter more informed downloader. its just like spraying insects with bug spray, after enough times they eventually become virtually immune. riaa doesent scare me, what scares me is people choosing not to get informed about p2p and the many ways to ensure RIAA doesent have the ability to track you.

1025.3.2004 15:48

uhrndtq- "its just like spraying insects with bug spray, after enough times they eventually become virtually immune." Interesting analogy. Keep in mind; it is only the very few bugs that by a fluke mutation possess a natural immunity who survive this "process of elimination". The vast majority are killed... I'm not trying to mess with you. Just playing devil's advocate for a moment. It gets a little scarier when you start applying that idea to P2P users...

1125.3.2004 16:12

The simple fact is RIAA is continuing to piss into the wind.

1225.3.2004 18:32

Can you get sued if you live in Canada?

1325.3.2004 20:41

grayarea - your right.. it was just the first analogy that popped into my head.. maybe i should say.. its like fighting fire with gasoline? ............................... yes you can get sued in canada.. im not sure that it would stick though.

1425.3.2004 20:46

I agree with the fact the RIAA is way out of line. They whine and complain that sales are down, so they blame the fileshare companies and 8 year olds. This is so absurd. Maybe the reason your sales are down, is because your product, for the most part is overpriced and not very good. Or!!! maybe you're paying the "Artists" to much. When and if I see Britney Spears, or Lars on a street corner with a sign saying "Will sing for food" Then and only then will I feel bad about downloading music, and then maybe I'll buy a CD.

1526.3.2004 06:19

On a funny note, I just read that RIAA switched all it's servers to Linux. It will be very interesting to see what they say about SCO's lawsuit against everyone using Linux :) Will they pay up or or continue to be the hippocrites we all know they are?

1626.3.2004 07:06

uhrndtq- I'm not saying your "bug" analogy is inaccurate. Actually, if the RIAA/MPAA cabal continues to enjoy the success they have achieved so far in their "war on customers" your insect/pesticide/immunity analogy could end up being way more accurate than I want to think about...

1726.3.2004 09:26

i just like to sit back and laugh sometimes at the RIAA...what are they gonna do when they start losing these court cases...they've been so aggressively attacking us that they haven't really made a good legal alternative. off subject-why don't the RIAA bastards go after people selling their old cd's on ebay...isn't that pretty much the same thing?

1826.3.2004 09:26

what's going on with the sco and linux?

1926.3.2004 10:41

SCO claims Linux uses code they own the right to so they're suing anybody and everybody using Linux saying the user must pay them. They're taking on IBM and some other heavies at the moment. Their whole suit is ridiculous and asinine. I read an article last week saying that SCO ran out of money to continue their suit when BayStar Investment gave them $50 million at Microsoft's urging. Here's the story: http://news.com.com/2100-7344_3-5172426.html M$ seriously needs to die.

2026.3.2004 11:20

exerpt from above article-In May 2003, SCO said it didn't need any more funding, but in October, BayStar made the $50 million investment--$30 million of which came from the Royal Bank of Canada, which BayStar said has participated in several of its investments. In addition, Microsoft has paid SCO millions of dollars in a Unix licensing deal announced in May. doesn't the last sentence say it all...microsoft has a stake on unix, so they'll oust every linux user possible increasing their market share. this is the reason i hate the country i live in sometimes thanks for the heads up neph

2126.3.2004 11:38

Pretty sick isn't it? I acknowledge that MS did amazing things to boost PCs in the early years but their actions in the last decade have more than mitigated anything they've ever done to benefit computer users. They represent everything sick and wrong in corporate America just like riaa/mpaa.

2226.3.2004 11:45

i bet in the next few years MS will screw up and get a class action suit we can all get in on...they're way to greedy to get by unscathed

2326.3.2004 12:18

I'm sure all of you read that MS was fined for 600+ million $ in Europe for abusing their monopoly status and making their Media Player + Browser an integral part of Windows, therefore making it impossible for other parties to compete...They are appealing...

2426.3.2004 12:33

Quote:
They are appealing...
The case, right? ;)

2526.3.2004 12:38

yes, the case.

2626.3.2004 16:42

RIAA and it's affiliates have been raping music and it's customers since I was just a little genXer listening to Black Flag. The P2P wave is total karma. The truth is the record companies are the ones most effected by illegal downloading. Anyone ever see TLC's vh1 interview? They made like what .50 cents a unit. Or how about the Goo Goo Dolls and John Rzeznik? And everyone knows about Lou Pearlman and all his greedy little contracts with groups like NySNC and Spears. Don't let any of the propaganda foul you. Keep downloading the songs and support the artist by going to concerts and buying their merchandize. These are the outlets that enable them to make a living.

2726.3.2004 17:14

in regards to m$ being sued.. they have been having trouble with EU for a long time.. although honestly i dont think offering a version w/o a media player is such a bad idea.. its a free download anyway and most everybody is upgrading to 9 so whats the difference? EU is just trying to cash in on some of m$ millions.

2826.3.2004 18:13

I think the EU is right. You can't truly uninstall IE or WMP. Try it, the files will reappear right after you delete them. Sure you can "uninstall" them from add/remove but they're still on your system. IE and WMP both suck compared to the infinitely better third party apps out there. Competetion is a wonderful thing and I'd hate to be stuck with IE instead of Mozilla Firebird or WMP instead of EAC and Quintessential player which is what would happen if groups like EU weren't calling MS on their lame tactics. You can't even get windows updates without IE - total bullcrap.

2927.3.2004 14:24

i just read on the besonic website that RIAA's website has been down for about 3 days due to a dos attack on thier mail servers by a variant of the mydoom virus. looks like were not the only people pissed off at RIAA. pretty funny stuff really. thats what RIAA gets, did they think no one was going to retaliate? what do you guys think?

3028.3.2004 03:50

I'm glad the RIAA computers got a virus,it serves the greedy bastards right!

3128.3.2004 10:53

The RIAA should leave us alone and leave it up to the artist to get us. lol. just a thought

3228.3.2004 16:34

lol. being attacked by some of the female artists i have downloaded doesen't sound so bad to me. ;) no madonna no.. please dont attack me in my sleep!

3331.3.2004 05:44
runner121
Inactive

Why do I get the feeling If we had a chance to look at one thier PC's we would see a copy of WinMX?

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