Ridiculous Industry of @$$holes in America strikes again

[lightdarkness]

http://www.chronicle.duke.edu/vnews/.../425cf2fc4f353

For those of you who are too damn lazy...

Junior at Duke being sued for 3 million for swapping movies and music on Internet2 (High speed college network, new protocols). 400 More lawsuits to come.

Discuss.

[MalReynolds]

Yup, uh, sue the hell out of him, what he was doing is outside of the law. Very outside of the law. There's no way the court is going to get that amount of money out of him, but it scares away a lot of other people in the area.

Sue him, he deserves it.

Mal

[jewpinthethird]

Honestly, if you are sharing files with your friends at College, why not just burn a DVD or CD of music and movies and have people pass that around instead of risk getting caught using a filesharing program...because honestly, it doesnt seem like RIAA cares all that much about that....and the evidence can be destroyed easily too.

[MalReynolds]

Exactly. A pile of DVD's is set ablaze a lot easier than THE INTERNET. Jeeze.

Mal

[lightdarkness]

Originally Posted by jewpinthethird

Honestly, if you are sharing files with your friends at College, why not just burn a DVD or CD of music and movies and have people pass that around instead of risk getting caught using a filesharing program...because honestly, it doesnt seem like RIAA cares all that much about that....and the evidence can be destroyed easily too.

There are like 250 colleges on this network buddddddddy

[jujo07]

I think it's ridiculous. I don't understand how people can justify downloading music as stealing though. I also don't understand how the RIAA thinks they can control all the college's networks.

Also why do you guys think the lawsuit is so high?

[tnyhwk900]

Originally Posted by jujo07

Also why do you guys think the lawsuit is so high?

Because they can. Because we live in a nation where you can sue the fuck out of someone if you have the money.

Originally Posted by tnyhwk900

Because they can. Because we live in a nation where you can sue the fuck out of someone if you have the money.

Regrettably, this is also a country where you can sue someone for way more than the actual damages were worth.

If you steal something, yeah, you deserve to pay a fine, but it shouldn't be thousands of dollars more than the item actually costs.

[ImEric12]

Originally Posted by jujo07

I think it's ridiculous. I don't understand how people can justify downloading music as stealing though. I also don't understand how the RIAA thinks they can control all the college's networks.

Also why do you guys think the lawsuit is so high?

One way or another, downloading music is wrong. It is entirely illegal, and is stealing just as much as walking up to a store and putting a cd in your jacket and walking out with it. I've accepted the fact that no matter how much I try to argue it, stealing music IS wrong.

That doesn't mean that I don't still do it. I just consider myself a hypocrite, and I'm fine with that.

[JurseyRider734]

Originally Posted by chardish

Regrettably, this is also a country where you can sue someone for way more than the actual damages were worth.

If you steal something, yeah, you deserve to pay a fine, but it shouldn't be thousands of dollars more than the item actually costs.

Or millions, in this case.

I feel bad for the guy. We should fund him.

[talisman]

The temptation to dl on that network though....

jesus. Movies in two minutes. songs in twenty seconds.

Here's the key kids: don't host files. Just dl them.

[JurseyRider734]

Since they started having lawsuits against those companies i've had my cousin help me out with configuring Kazaa so that it would be extremely hard to track me. Just don't let people upload from you.

[ddrruler]

Originally Posted by talisman

Here's the key kids: don't host files. Just dl them.

Hah I don't ive known this forever

edit: Im not sure if he should be charged or not because on one hand he broke the law but on the other he is randomly being sued for something millions of kid/adults do...

[RevenG-]

I think that if you get sued it should be like this:

Movie...$25
You share it with 5 friends.
$25 x 5 = $125


So you sew them for the $125. So every friend you share it with costs you that amount of the movie. Or:


Movie...$25
Share it with 5 friends...
Multiply the cost by 2 each friend...
$50 x 5 = $250


See my point? This would be a bit more useful. But would probably not scare people into not doing wich is a problem. Thus, the one person gets too much of a punsihment to scare others to not share movies or music or, only sew a couple hundred dollars and possibly still keep kids doing it, but less.
But it is just hard to choose a right amount to sue in a right amount. So its almost always unfair.

[jewpinthethird]

Originally Posted by lightdarkness

There are like 250 colleges on this network buddddddddy

Start with one CD or DVD, give it to a friend. Then that friend copies it and gives it to a friend. And then that friend copies it and gives it to a friend. Et cetera.

There was even a movie made using this concept titled "The Ring."

[zildjian133]

I think it's wrong a money hungry organization is ganging up on college students.. If you ask me it's pretty trivial and not worth the destruction of a persons life...

[MalReynolds]

I think Manny Green had it right when he said "Steal a candybar, steal a movie."

The same pricinicple applies, although I do enjoy eating candy-bars much more than celluloid film.

Mal

[Tasselfoot]

A friend of a friend got hit for sharing music a few years back.... got hit for like $500 per song, and had like 5000 songs he was sharing... or 2.5 million. They worked out like a $10,000 settlement and a few years probation, etc.

Guys, for those who haven't taken a law class (I'm guessing less than .01% of you have), there are multiple types of damages awarded, and 99.999% of the time, the lawsuit awards given out by juries are appealed and greatly reduced by appellate courts. The HUGE amounts come from Punitive Damages, not Actual Damages.

Punitive Damages can be as high as the sky... whereas Actual damages can only replace the cost lost, etc. Punitive damages are given to prevent others from doing the same crime, which can be applied in cases like this.

[suicidalmuskrat]

i'm surprised they don't have to do jail time, actually. Because if downloading movies truly is stealing, and he stole 100 movies let's say, then he would most certainly be in jail. and the math would be more like this: 100 movies * 25 MSRP = 2500. then, 2500 * 8 (that's the standard multiplier applied to stolen goods...trust me, i know :-/ ). So that put's us at 20,000 dollars. But even that isn't right. Because at the third offense you're considered a habitual offender, and everything goes to hell. It still wouldn't add up to 3 million, but it certainly would add up to some serious jail time.

[Squeek]

Either way, this is just another attempt to scare people into stopping file transferring.

Guys, always remember that hosting BT links is legal. Nobody can shut your site down for solely that reason no matter who they are. I know the guy wasn't doing BT, but instead the college-LAN transfer system (All FTPs and the sort), but the point remains (gg SN.org). Read up on the law and you'll know what is REALLY right and what is not.

I mean, the Supreme Court is going to rule in favor of Grokster and make it legal to share files anyway.

~Squeek