UPDATE: “Out of an abundance of sensitivity, we have elected to drop this particular case.”
RIAA’s ‘Sensitivity’ Backfires Bigtime
“An abundance of sensitivity”… but to what? As Cory Doctorow points out, the RIAA only dropped the suit after it started getting flack for continuing a lawsuit against the deceased man’s family. The RIAA’s “abundance of sensitivity” was clearly directed towards protecting its tattered image, rather than any sort of concern for the Scantlebury family.
Recording Industry vs The People — DO these people have no shame?
In Michigan, in Warner Bros. v. Scantlebury, after learning that the defendant had passed away, the RIAA made a motion to stay the case for 60 days in order to allow the family time to “grieve”, after which time they want to start taking depositions of the late Mr. Scantlebury’s children:
Gee, that’s generous. Here’s hoping the deadbeat’s survivors did not play stolen music at the funeral.
Think of the artist. Just think of those poor artists who aren’t not being compensated.
And who says the RIAA doesn’t have a heart?
If THIS isn’t reason enough to boycott all music to show the RIAA, then what is? Makes me want to go out an buy some albums, and put them on a Peer to Peer, just for spite.
It is utterly ridiculous to continue with frivilous lawsuits.. odds are the kids didn’t even own a computer. I hope the parents stick it to the RIAA through the media and in court. Thanks for keeping is up to date on the scum of the earth.
Sickening.
I will only go to live events and listen to Internet radio. I’ll never purchase another cd again.
Downloads are not responsible for killing the industry. The clueless bastards at the RIAA are.
The picture is perfect. The RIAA are truly bloodsuckers.
This was the first time I felt like mailing a story to the blog. The letter from the RIAA to the family is truly grotesque. I didn’t think it was possible for lawyers to sink any lower.
Sorry, I meant “…for the RIAA to sink any lower”. I spit on the RIAA.
To some, “ethics” is just a word.
As more and more people use the internet, the antics of the RIAA and the music industry will cause more kids/people to cease buying music and just trade music the old school (non peer to peer, or closed direct computer to computer) way. Someone is going to get fed up enough to have a closed network system whereby you create an account, verify who you are, have a tight EULA, (to stop RIAA spys) and trade music directly, computer to computer and put an end to the music and video industry as we know it.
The internet allows for ‘error correction’, ie , routing around problems. They’re tryign their best to put their industry out of business.
one problem with #10 – who reads the EULA? That aside, the RIAA are losers – the artists should be the ones boycotting.
The EULA would be for the RIAA or its spys.. saying alsomething like : By using this service, you agree to its legality in regard to your posessions or posessions and groups you represent.
So when the RIAA uses the system, they agree its legal.
I’m no fan of the RIAA and all of that DRM nonsense…but, is no one going to defend the concept at least that people deserve a right to defend the ownership of their property? I personally think the whole way the RIAA is going about this is simply counter productive. But, everyone here seems to lump everything together. Stealing music IS stealing music. I agree that downloaders and “reasonable” sharing is not the bane of the industry, but there really is a point at which making someone’s property freely available to the public is NOT the right thing to be doing. It isn’t the same thing to defend DRM free music on the grounds that it doesn’t work, or that the present DRM screws the consumer, as it is to defend people freely stealing music…just because it SHOULD be that way. I wish we could get away from this kind of generalization. I’d like to be able to defend music sharing without having to answer for music stealing. It would be nice to get the RIAA and the sort to stop with the ridiculous tactics, but it will never happen while we all lump stealing in with sharing. There IS a difference.
Yes, people should be able to defend their own property, but it’s the artists who should be doing the defending, not the RIAA that fails to actually represent said artists. Several artists have intentionally put their music up for download, and other have expressed discontent with what the RIAA is doing. If the RIAA actually was representing the artists, it would be acting according to the artist’s wishes, not their own checkbooks. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, since when is litigation a business model for anybody but lawyers?
Stealing music is stealing music except when the artist (who, in my opinion should be the person most qualified to say what can or can not be done with his/her music) is freely giving out the music.
You’re right, though, DRM does screw the consumer. The people really interested in breaking it always do, and so it serves as a punishment to everyone else. I equate it to trying to imprison Houdini. He keeps breaking out, and so everybody else ends up having to deal with increased security, with no change for the person the security measures are supposed to be for.
They’re still peices of S**T.
The RIAA should change thier symbol to the swastika
Most of you know this, but… The RIAA is a political lobby group that represents the interests of the seven largest music publishing companies. They don’t represent artists, nor do they represent smaller and/or independant labels.
Stating that they represent artists (which they’ve said) is not so much disingenuous, as much is it is an outright lie. And while I would agree that these companies deserve to be represented and that the wholesale piracy of their product is not defensible, it is also indefensible to attack children for piracy who are doing exactly what I did as a teen – that is share music. In my day it was recording LPs to cassette. I bought LPs, my friends bought LPs, we all bought different LPs because LPs weren’t cheap from our perspective.
These guys need to go after bootleggers who mass produce counterfiets and sell out of the back of vans. Not kids who share mp3s online.
As has been reported in the past, by our esteemed editor SN, sharing music is not stealing. It is copyright infringement which is a tort. People who share music, without copyright payment, are not breaking the law. They may, however, be sued by those who have been injured for not paying the royalties. But there is never any sympathy for suing the little guy.
I will no longer buy a CD if the record label is a member of the RIAA. I get all of my music from Magnatune.com, or from Ani Difranco or other self published indy artists. If I really want a CD that was released on an RIAA label, which is very rarely, I will get the CD from a friend and rip it to my computer. I would rather buy the CD and support the artist, but I no longer see the point, none of the money goes to them.
The RIAA can’t afford to do this any more. There are now enough indy artists, and it is now accessible to anyone to create their own CDs, I think consumers and artists will stop supporting the RIAA eventually. The fact that I am 16 and have no issues avoiding the mainstream artists says a lot about the necessity of the RIAA.
Most of the BEST music comes from independent artists selling their CD’s at performances and on the street corner. Stuff that is quirky, imperfect, but full of soul… not some overproduced mas-oriented, buy-it-like-lemmings crap.
Except for some very noteworthy standouts, most ‘music’ becomes important only because the marketing machine wants to make it so. We buy because we are told it’s good, you must listen to it to be ‘hip’, and serves trhe lowest common denominator.
Support your local artists… buy a CD from the guy playing at the local Farmer’s market or street fair and enjoy it. Smile through the flaws and enjoy the effort behind it. You KNOW the money is going to the artist, you help the real arts and the local economy, and you avoid all this RIAA BS since the guy probably hasn’t been signed anyway.
Will RIAA be suing Justin Timberlake for his website posting his new MP3?
http://www.douglaskarr.com/index.php?s=timberlake
Just curious!
Doug
Most of the worst music comes from indies too, to be fair about it.
The incredible thing to me in all this is how, within a large group of people, who all graduated from law school (so they can’t be total morons), someone doesn’t say, “Hmmm, maybe suing a dead guy’s family is not such a hot idea. Isn’t there some degenerate looking college student we can go after instead?” In so many dealings like this, there seems to be such an absence of common sense. I know the RIAA is scum, but it’s still amazed that they, of all people, haven’t heard of PR.
You guys are just plain wrong. The RIAA is actually winning. Reasonable people know it is winning because of:
1) The enormous increase in users willingly paying to download digitial content; and
2) Peer to peer site after peer to peer to site succumbing to legal action against it. Most recently? Limewire.
Relying on peer to peer is increasingly becoming something only losers do.
15: The swastika doesn’t mean what you think it does. The meaning was perverted by the Nazis. I guess it’s a gigantic stroke of luck for the Western world that they didn’t choose to use a cross instead.
#21, As a former musician, I much prefer a raw edge to music. The homogenized, computer filtered, perfect crap turns me off. Most people that actually enjoy music would rather listen to a live set then some packaged pablum. And, most Indie music fits that raw mold. Sure there are some Indie artists that obviously would make better bus drivers, but at least you find out before plunking down your hard earned cash.
Hurrah for Creative Commons and Magna Tunes !!! If you are unfamiliar, check them out.
#24, The swastika is a version of the cross. There are literally hundreds of versions. Each one symbolizes whatever the holder wants it to symbolize.
25: Shape-wise, it may be something like a cross, but the word has a particular meaning, and that can be translated as “mark of goodness”. This mark is very prevalent in Hinduism, from ancient times, and is always intended to convey the same feeling, regardless of what one thinks its meaning is. No Hindu mentally associates a swastika with a traditional cross (straight arms). They are different symbols.
I guess I should have been more specific about what I meant by “cross”. I meant “Christian cross”.